by Sean Huxter
Jesus. Marcus. Who would have had the balls to take out Marcus and hope he could get away with it?
Oh shit.
“Wait, Turley, you say he was skinny?”
“Like anorexia.”
“And lots of other damage?”
“Tortured by the look of it.”
Shit.
Around that time some of the Coroner's people brought out a stretcher with a body bag on it. A couple of EMTs left the alley around the same time. No work here. No one to save. They prepared to pack up. I recognized one of the EMTs and walked his way.
“Halloran, right?” The EMT named Halloran recognized me too.
“Right.”
“I have a medical question for you.”
“So go see a doctor.”
“It's not about me. How long do you figure it would take a fat man to starve to death?”
“Depends. Three weeks. A month. Depends on a lot of things. Water, diet, stuff like that. Why?”
“Nothing. Intellectual curiosity.” Halloran rejoined his partner and they jumped back up into their rig and drove off, siren silent. Nothing to see here.
Shit.
I had to get to Norwood.
Chapter 10 The Franklin Line Commuter Train has three stops in Norwood: Norwood Depot, Norwood Central and Windsor Gardens. Norwood Depot was close to Brothers' offices on Washington Street. I hopped the train at Back Bay Station and got off at Norwood Depot. I walked up to Washington Street and entered the store front office of Brothers Construction and Paving. Nothing fancy, just a working contractor's office. It smelled of tar. Not surprising for a building and paving business.
A receptionist looked up and looked about ready to greet a potential customer until she got a load of me. Her nose turned pretty quickly, and what came out of her mouth was not as friendly as was probably originally planned.
“Can I... help you?”
“I'm here to see Jake Brothers.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“He'll see me. Give him this.” I handed her the cell phone he had
given me. She took it and went back to a brown door and opened it, disappearing within. Seconds later she came out and said “He'll see you.”
She pointed. I walked down the hall to the door and went in. “This is unexpected. I thought you'd call if you had any more information on Jeremy.”
“No. No new info on Jeremy, but I do have an important question to ask you.”
“Intriguing... go ahead. Ask away. You looking for a job? Hard working man like yourself would be easy to train on paving machinery. And the pay is not too bad.”
“No. Not looking for a job, leastways out here. Too far from Boston for my tastes.”
“Then how can I help you?”
I shut the door.
“Marcus,” I said.
“Marcus who?”
“Marcus the drug dealer who sold your kid bad drugs which he later OD'd on. That Marcus. The one you asked me specifically about.”
“Ah. That Marcus. What about him?”
“Dead.”
“Pity.”
“So how do you expect me to play this, Mister Brothers? You got me to give you Marcus, and you paid me for my trouble. I'm not dumb enough to believe you paid me for the information on your son. What you really wanted was a name, and I gave it to you.”
“Good story,” he said.
“So you hired one of that army of detectives I mentioned, and he found out where Marcus could be found, and contacted you, probably through Fennelly.”
“Intriguing,” he said, tapping a pen on his desk.
“I know some facts, Mister Brothers, and I have some suppositions. The facts are that Marcus was a fat man. Not a nice character. Would slice you in half as soon as look at you. And he was found practically starved to death, battered and tortured, and left in the exact same spot your son Jeremy was found.”
“Go on...”
“You know a lot of able-bodied men with muscle who owe you their livelihood. I'm sure it wouldn't have been hard to put a few in a van and catch Marcus off-guard and take him. It's not like he'd be expecting such a thing, not when you're as shit-hot as he is, and thinks he's the king of god-damned Boston.”
Brothers sat still, listening. Very still.
“When I'm short of facts, I have to make guesses,” I said. “And my guess is that your crew incapacitated him, drove him to one of your buildings, probably where you house paving machinery, and you had him hand-cuffed to a gurney or something where you made sure he had enough water to prevent dehydration – that would be too fast. You can die in a few days without water. But without food? Usually a few weeks.
“So here's where I get a bit sick to my stomach... you used tools. Pliers. Hammers. Saws. Blowtorches.
“For weeks.”
Brothers even smiled.
I continued. “You kept him alive for as long as you could, and when he was about to die of starvation, you finished the job in some way I don't even want to imagine, and then had your crew dump him in the exact same spot your son was found.
“How far off am I?”
“Oh,” Jake Brothers said, “you're dead on.” His smile couldn't be contained. It was gleeful.
“So now what,” he said.
“Now what? Now I go to the police and tell them who did it. Like a real detective.”
“Yes, you could. But then I might have to tell some of my men about you too... Wouldn't it be nicer if I just gave you some money and you could go away?”
“I don't bribe easy.”
“Who'd believe you even if you told? Even if you had photos no one would believe a bum like you! That son-of-a-bitch killed my son! As if he stuck the needle into his arm himself! He cut dangerous dope and dealt it to my kid! That can't go unanswered! No father can let that go!
“I was doing a good thing! I was doing as my Marsha asked me to do! I was going to collect my son and let bygones be bygones! He was going to move back in with me and he'd help me run the business! I was ready to forgive him – rather to ask him to forgive me for how I treated him – my own flesh and blood.
“Flesh and blood mean something to me! You live in a family like mine and flesh and blood mean something! No one can take my kid and get away with his own flesh and blood intact. You get me?”
His voice had begun rising, and he stood. Spittle shot from his mouth as he spoke. I could see his eyes... his mad eyes...
“So what's it to be? Police? And then they find another anonymous nobody in Alley 422 in a week or so? Who does that benefit? I did the world a favor. I got rid of one parasitical drug pusher who likely is responsible for dozens of deaths, and I am proud of it! I'm not ashamed of what I did. I only regret that the bastard didn't last longer before I put it out of its misery.
“So... put yourself in my place. Your kid. Your only kid. Murdered. What would you do? What would being a man
require you to do?”
Brothers reached for a drawer and pulled. I expected this was it. A gun.
Instead he pulled out another brown envelope. He turned around and opened a safe and pulled several stacks of bills from it and stuffed them into the envelope, sealing it with a lick of the flap.
“Fifty thousand dollars in this envelope. You can have it. Provided you never contact me again.”
I could breathe again now. There was no gun. Just money. And isn't that the difference between people like Brothers and people like me? They can afford for their problems to just … go away. Some of us don't have that.
My problems wouldn't go away with money.
But I thought about it, and I looked at the hefty thickness of that sealed envelope. People can always use money.
I looked Jake Brothers directly in the eye, and he looked directly into mine.
I reached down and took the envelope and walked out.
Chapter 11 A wise man once said: “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.” I couldn't think of much else as I too
k the Commuter Rail back into Back Bay Station. On the ride I had time to think, and when it came down to it, I remembered the question Brothers had asked me – what would I have done. What would being a man require me to do? What should I have done?
I got off at Back Bay and walked to the shelter I sometimes use. I borrowed a pen at the office and wrote on the envelope: “To the Pine Tree Inn: A Donation” and pushed it into a donation box just outside the door.
I walked out, down Tremont and up Alley 437 until I reached Dartmouth and Boylston where I took a seat under the shade of the trees in Copley Square near the Ticket Kiosk.
That's my corner.
2946 days sober
Chapter 1 The one problem with summer when you're living on the streets of Boston is that it ends. Fall is nice, but of course that ends too, and then comes winter. Winter on the streets of Boston can be deadly. I lost three friends last winter alone. The toll on the homeless was awful. It was a harsh winter, long and cold. And there are only so many beds in the shelters.
But for now it's fall and if you have to have fall you may as well have it in New England. Fall here is as beautiful as fall gets anywhere. The air gets crisp and tasty. The weather is still good, and the color is spectacular, but the nights start to get chill. I keep a blue plastic tarp under a dumpster in Public Alley 437. I'd need it tonight. Soon I'd need a thick blanket as well.
Sitting on the low walls on the walkways of Boston Common is a great place to sell copies of Loose Change, the biweekly newspaper published across the Charles in Cambridge. The paper is sold to vendors – homeless people – and we sell them to passersby for a buck and make a profit. It's called Loose Change because we accept almost any amount for it as long as it's near enough to a buck, the aim being that it allows people to pay for it with the loose change in their pockets. We pay a quarter a copy, so we still get a good margin. And it beats panhandling, I can tell myself. People get news, I get money; it's a winwin. I sell a service, I say confidently. Still, I've seen people take a copy, pay me a buck or more and then just drop it in the next trash can they pass. I still refuse to look at it as panhandling. Dignity is one of our last possessions, and we hold onto it dearly.
I passed St. Paul's Cathedral on Tremont, crossed the street and entered the Common past a lemonade cart. Tourists were lined up trying to get some respite from the sun. I looked up and to the west I saw tall clouds. Damn. Rain was coming. And if the height of those clouds meant anything, thunder and lightning too.
A few feet up the hill an Iraq vet was yelling loudly at Joanie Jones, a woman who claimed the Public Library steps were haunted with the ghosts of those slain during the Boston Massacre. He yelled “I did two tours in Iraq for people like you! Get the fuck out' my face!” He walked away but, undaunted, she followed him until he gave her a good shove and she got the message. “You crazy, woman! Stay the fuck away from me!” Mental illness is one of the main reasons these people are out here on the street.
Just down the wall from where I intended to set up shop, old Fernie sat with a Dunkin Donuts cup in front of him with some change in it, calling out the weather forecast and the local sports scores with that rich, baritone voice he has. It's a good gimmick. Old Fernie is one of the friends I didn't lose during the cold of last winter, thank god. When people walk past Fernie they usually have a smile on their faces, and usually Fernie ends up a few coins or a few bills richer. I'd call out the Red Sox scores too, but he kind of owns that. We have our rules. I sell the paper; old Fernie's our town crier.
I sat with Fernie for a few minutes, chatting about the weather he was calling out, gave him a free copy of the paper, which I know he likes to read, patted him on the back and walked up to Beacon to ply my wares there instead. Sunny fall Sunday usually means tourists walking through the Common, but I didn't see many yet. Perhaps after lunch.
Lots of tourists up there on Beacon though, checking out the Cheers pub then climbing the hill to bask in the glow of the golden dome of the State House and along the way admiring the brownstones, wondering how many millions each one was worth. Hint: The ones with the patina'd copper roofs are worth the most.
I began calling “Loose Change!” to all and sundry who walked up the hill. I sold three copies in under three minutes. I handed four singles in change back to a couple who, unprompted for such, cheerily declared they were from Florida and enjoying the weather.
That's when a Boston PD cruiser came flying around the corner up Park Street, sirens blaring, took the corner onto Spruce Street against the one-way and then onto Chestnut Street. I followed, sticking to the shadows cast by the tall buildings. Other cruisers showed up emitting officers who immediately started sealing off the street at both closest intersections. But by that time I was up there watching what was going on, one of the invisible homeless, blending in against the brown bricks.
There were a few people from the condos standing around, most looking shocked, disgusted, in pure horror.
Lying by the side of a recessed staircase leading up to an ornate wooden door lay a dead woman. African skin tone, dark hair, purple duffel coat and an orange skirt. Before more cops showed up and started shoving us back down the street, I noticed something odd... her hands. They were lying at odd angles to her arms. I couldn't get closer to see.
The Coroner's team was there now, setting up a tent around the body so they could work without interruption and without further disturbing the affluent dwellers of these streets behind Beacon Street.
Then the sky broke open with a loud crack and thick pea-sized drops of rain began to fall in earnest. I'm guessing they were glad they had the tent up in time. Rain can destroy a crime scene just as effectively as a tornado.
Chapter 2 When the ambulances had left and the cops began opening up the street, I saw Officer Turley, beat cop usually posted down on Tremont, and walked over. Turley's a friend, I guess. As much of a friend a guy like me can have, especially in a cop. He's done me some favors and I've done a few for him. He's a stand-up guy – the kind of cop who got into the work to do good and tries to do so on a daily basis. He even hands out bottles of water and cigarettes to those in need on occasion.
“Officer Turley. Horrible scene.”
“You said it,” Turley replied, removing his cap and wiping his brow. “Never seen anything quite like it.”
“Who was the woman?” I asked.
“Not a local. Not sure who she is, but I was talking to some of the Crime Unit bunch and they said she had no hands. Like they were cut off. But not recently. Gone for years, they said. She was wearing a matching pair of prosthetics. Made to look as much like real hands as possible, with some functionality.”
“I thought I saw that,” I said. “But I figured often killers dump bodies and cut their hands off to help prevent identification.”
“Yeah, not this time. She's been a double-amputee for years. I dunno, birth defect maybe. Thalidomide baby? She's a bit young for that. In her thirties'd be my guess.”
I remembered Thalidomide. Given to pregnant mothers in the sixties to calm morning sickness. Worked wonders, until they started giving birth to babies with flippers where their arms should be. I went to school in the seventies with one girl who was missing the lower part of one of her arms.
“What was she doing back here?”
“Not sure. Could have been dumped I s'pose.” Turley was stacking some traffic cones to clear the street and stowing them in the trunk of his cruiser.
“So you think it was murder?” I prodded.
“Definitely. Not just murder, the Coroner thinks.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” He looked disgusted.
Shit. Rapist-murderer in downtown touristy Boston. That wouldn't make the Mayor happy.
Chapter 3 A few days later I picked up a new stack of Loose Change and like I always do, I read through it. There were some interesting details about the murdered woman. Apparently she was from Africa – Rwanda – a political refugee. She lived with an older coupl
e in Brookline; apparently they had sponsored her travel to the US and her political asylum proceedings. A pair of truly charitable hearts, the paper wrote.
There were no details on her missing hands or why she was admitted into the US under asylum, but it happened in 1995, and she'd been living in Brookline ever since.
Compulsion, I guess, led me back up the hill and behind Beacon Street's facade to Chestnut Street. Not sure what was bothering me specifically, but there was something about the woman, something I couldn't quite put my finger on.
Perhaps something made me think I'd be the hero, I'd go check out the crime scene and find that vital clue the cops missed. I know how it sounds. Leave me alone. When I turned onto Chestnut I saw a man and a woman laying a wreath next to the recessed staircase where the body had been discovered. They held each other arm in arm and just stood there. I think the woman was crying and the man was stroking her back hoping to provide some comfort.
I felt like an intruder so I turned away. Before I got to the corner of Spruce Street I heard a man's voice say “Excuse me, sir?”
I turned around and the man, in his fifties, perhaps early sixties, was talking. To me apparently.
“Uh... yes?” I said. People don't normally talk to us, so I was a bit hesitant.
“You wouldn't happen to know who lives at this address, would you? I only ask because you look like you're familiar with this street.” Yeah, I'm familiar with the street, I thought cleverly.
“No, sorry.” I turned again. Dammit... I turned back around
“Did you know the lady?” I asked.
“The lady?” the man repeated.
“The …” I hate the word. “...victim?” I said.
The woman spoke. She looked like a very strong woman, not physically, but she had that air about her that indicated an inner strength, a will, a purpose. But on top of it was a layer of grief that was very visible in her stooped stance - and her tears.