One Police Plaza

by William Caunitz

  Anderman reached the top. He was out of breath. He bellied up to Malone. “You’re city cops, not federal! Their damn cards are in their homes. Each one of them are here legal.”

  “Too bad.” He pushed Anderman aside and prepared to leave. Ancorie was there, blocking his path; his anger evident. The two men stood toe-to-toe, glaring. “If I were you I’d move,” Malone whispered.

  The pulse in Ancorie’s neck pounded. His cheeks were flushed.

  “I mean right now, laddie,” Malone said, his tone now harder.

  “David?” Anderman called.

  Ancorie’s stare flashed to Anderman. He moved aside. As Malone was climbing down Anderman shouted to him. “You’re persecuting me, policeman.”

  “Some people might say that,” Malone said.

  G. Justin Hanley, Andrea St. James’s attorney, was waiting impatiently in front of the federal detention center. As the prisoners were being led from the car, the lawyer walked over. “Lieutenant Malone?”

  Malone looked at him. “Yes?”

  “My card.” It was not the plain kind of calling card that he had left at the Barton Hotel. The paper was expensive; the words on it in elegant raised lettering. Lieutenants must rate the expensive ones, Malone thought, handing it back. “Thanks, but I don’t need any right now.”

  Hanley stiffened, his patrician feathers ruffled by the glib reply.

  “Those men are not slaves; they’re my clients,” the lawyer said, pointing to the handcuffed men being led into the detention facility.

  Heinemann paused and looked back at Malone. The lieutenant waved him inside. “I told you they’re my clients!” Hanley insisted.

  “What are their names, Counselor?”

  “Their what?”

  “Names. Almost everyone has one these days. You should know theirs … if they are your clients.”

  Hanley’s face twisted into a grimace. “That makes no difference,” he stammered. “I represent those men.”

  “Oh, but it do make a difference, Counselor.” Malone walked away.

  Hanley went after him, grabbing him by the shoulder and turning him.

  “I demand their immediate release.” The lawyer’s voice cracked; his lower lip was quivering.

  Malone smiled. “Please get your hand off me, Counselor.” It was a thin voice, hardly a whisper. Hanley knew that a second request would not be forthcoming. He removed his hand. How he hated the flotsam of the street. In boardrooms among his peers G. Justin Hanley was a champion; but here, at society’s lowest rung, he felt outmatched.

  “You’re stretching the rubber band too far, Malone. It’s going to snap and take your head off.”

  Malone moved close to him. He noticed the beads of sweat bordering the hairline. He ran his fingernails over Hanley’s lapel.

  “Threats are very unprofessional, Counselor.” Malone walked away, leaving the lawyer clenching his fists. Malone craned his head to him. “When you see Anderman tell him that he should have given you all the facts … like the names.”

  A long corridor led to the holding pens where illegal aliens waited inside to be processed. Orientals huddled together, speaking softly in their native languages. Latins talked rapidly in Spanish, casting nervous glances at the immigration officials taking pedigrees through the bars. Some of the aliens were sitting cross-legged on the floor; old habits quickly return. Heinemann was waiting. “What took you so long?”

  “It became necessary to give an eminent member of the bar a lesson in street law.”

  “That eminent member of the bar will have them sprung within the hour,” Stern said.

  Malone agreed. “I just couldn’t let him get away with last night without breaking some balls. Besides, by the time Anderman gets them out the surveillance van is going to be parked on the south side of Borden Avenue. I want to know what’s going down inside that place.”

  It took Anderman and his lawyer the better part of two hours to obtain releases. Malone had laid a professional courtesy requested on the people at Immigration and they complied; stalling and shuffling Anderman and Hanley from office to office. It was almost 4 P.M. when a blue Ford sedan drove into the loading bay of the Eastern Shipping Company. Anderman and his workers left the car cursing the police in four different languages. Anderman hurried off by himself. During the drive back he had reached a decision. Andrea St. James’s presence had become a risk. Too many people were looking for her. When he got back to his office he called El Al. There was a flight out in ninety minutes.

  A frankfurter man set up his pushcart in front of Tauscher Steel. The peddler snapped the blue-and-yellow umbrella up over the cart, locking it into place. He flipped open the steam tub and stirred the orange-colored water. A log jam of frankfurters concealed the Bren gun wrapped in a waterproof covering. The man’s long hair covered the plastic wire that ran up the side of his neck into the miniature receiver plugged into his ear. A steel hat came over and ordered a frank with all the trimmings. The iron man strolled off, gnashing the strands of sauerkraut and onions hanging out of the roll. The peddler waited until the customer was gone. Then he leaned forward, adjusting the stacks of plastic cups. “The gray van that was outside the Interlude last night is across from the plant,” he whispered into the cups.

  The reply was immediate. “We wait.”

  The blue sedan bolted from the loading bay and crossed Borden Avenue. Andrea St. James was sitting in the rear next to Isaac Arazi. Hillel Henkoff was behind the wheel. A flatbed of I beams lumbered out of Thirty-first Street. The frankfurter man leaned forward. “A blue Ford sedan just left. Andrea was in the back.”

  Inside the surveillance van O’Shaughnessy radioed Malone that Andrea St. James had left. “Stay with her,” Malone said. “I’ll try and catch up with you.”

  Bo Davis wiggled the transmission into first gear and released the clutch. The van moved from the curb.

  Malone and Heinemann hurried from the precinct.

  “We’re in a hurry,” Malone said, sliding into the car. Heinemann reached to the floor and picked up the portable red light. He reached out of the car and slapped it onto the roof.

  “We’re on our way,” Heinemann said, flipping the siren switch.

  The blue sedan entered the Long Island Expressway at Greenpoint Avenue. Traffic was backed up over the hump. Andrea St. James stared at the row of A-frame houses that lined the service road. She had never noticed them before. There was a vest-pocket park that she had never seen; the handball court was covered with graffiti. It was funny the things people never take the time to notice, she thought. She was overcome with a sense of sadness at leaving. A delivery truck nosed past the blue sedan blocking her view; a graffito was fingered in the dirt: IRAN SUCKS.

  O’Shaughnessy maintained radio contact with Malone. The sedan was fifteen cars ahead of them. “Lou, do you want us to pull them over and grab her?” O’Shaughnessy radioed.

  “No,” Malone said. “I don’t want to blow the van. And besides, I want to see where they’re going.”

  Traffic exiting the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway merged into the Long Island Expressway at the bottom of the hump, creating a bottleneck of inching automobiles and frustrated motorists. O’Shaughnessy was standing by the two-way reflector, looking down into passing cars. A white Cadillac inched parallel with the van. A woman was driving. Her skirt was pulled up over her knees; her legs were apart. O’Shaughnessy gaped down at her but managed to tear his eyes away when he considered what absolute hell he’d catch if something went down while his attention was otherwise engaged.

  As the blue sedan made its way on the expressway an unmarked police car screeched into the entrance plaza of the Midtown Tunnel on the Manhattan side. Port Authority police were waiting to guide it through. The left lane of traffic inside the tunnel was stopped, locked bumper to bumper. Motorists felt twinges of excitement at the sight of the speeding police car, its revolving turret light throwing out waves of red. They wondered what was happening. Maybe they would have somethi
ng new to talk about over dinner, something that broke the monotony of the Long Island Expressway at rush hour.

  The blue sedan drove onto the Van Wyck Expressway heading south.

  O’Shaughnessy radioed the location. “It looks like they’re heading for Kennedy.”

  Traffic thinned past Liberty Avenue. Motorists pressed down on their accelerators, jerking their vehicles forward, releasing pent-up frustrations.

  Bo Davis shifted up to fourth gear.

  Heinemann was driving on the shoulder of the Long Island Expressway. When he reached the Van Wyck, the detective forced the police car in ahead of the line of traffic and sped south.

  The surveillance van maintained its distance behind the blue sedan. The detectives inside the van did not notice the Hertz truck bearing down on them. The truck cut to the left of the van and continued past, zigzagging the lanes of traffic. When it overtook the blue sedan it swerved in front of it.

  “Pat! That Hertz truck!” Davis rammed the accelerator to the floor.

  A hand pushed the canvas backing of the truck aside and two rifle barrels were extended. Long, egg-shaped projectiles protruded from both.

  Hillel Henkoff saw the puffs of smoke and the vapor trail. He wrenched the wheel sharply, trying to escape. Andrea St. James threw her hands up to her face and screamed.

  The car erupted into a ball of orange and yellow flames. The explosion lifted it twenty feet into the air, bending it in half and sending its twisted parts spiraling downward.

  One hour later the southbound lanes of the Van Wyck Expressway were still closed, traffic being detoured at Jamaica Avenue. Ambulances and other emergency service vehicles lined the shoulder of the parkway. A Fire Department pumper was watering the smoldering wreck. The steel-basketed bomb squad truck was parked across the highway, blocking it. Detectives sifted the debris. Parts of bodies were being collected and tagged and then put into body bags.

  Malone and his detectives were holding a roadside conference with Queens detectives and their commander, Assistant Chief Walter Untermyer, a particularly offensive scumbag who was known throughout the Job for his deep pockets and short arms. The head of Queens detectives wanted no part of this one. Since the place of occurrence was Queens, technically it was a Queens case. But Malone realized that it was part and parcel of the Eisinger thing—so he agreed that it was his. Besides, he wanted to get the hell out of there. There was work to be done. After the mess was cleaned up and the traffic lanes reopened, Malone made a beeline for the Eastern Shipping Company. It was sealed tight. Accordion doors were drawn over the entrance and locked. The loading bays were closed. Only the wall cameras were moving, their little red lights constantly blinking. He rushed back to the surveillance van. Jake Stern stepped out of it and gave him the message he’d just received from Harrigan: Anderman and the Braxtons had disappeared. The detectives had lost them.

  Malone kicked the van’s tire and turned, leaning against the side, his foot against the hubcap. He lit a cigarette, dragging deep. High above him the constant whine of spinning tires played off the massive underpinnings of the Long Island Expressway. To the west the Empire State Building rose majestically against a backdrop of deep purple. Malone knew that he was in a war zone. Person or persons unknown were turning his city into a battleground.

  When they returned to the Squad twenty minutes later they found Zambrano waiting.

  “Nice little war ya got goin’, Lieutenant,” Zambrano said.

  “It’s not my doing,” Malone said, rounding his desk and taking a virgin bottle of Jack Daniel’s from the bottom drawer.

  “Oh, I know that. But you see … it’s the mayor. He’s suddenly lost his sense of humor. He gets upset when people are blown away by rifle grenades on the parkways of his city. It’s bad for the tourist industry. And he wants answers to certain little questions. Like who did it? And why? And more importantly, will they do it again?”

  Malone poured.

  “Do you have anything? The commissioner has to tell handsome Harry something,” Zambrano said.

  “Why don’t you tell him to take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut?” Malone said, handing him his drink. “Untermyer decided that it was our baby. So far all we got are some fragments from the grenades”—he raised the cup at Zambrano and drank—“and a description of the truck.”

  “You were on the scene when it went down. Didn’t you give chase?”

  “O’Shaughnessy, Davis, and Stern were behind the van. They had to swerve off the road to avoid the flames. It was a goddamn mess. By the time I reached the scene the truck was long gone.”

  Zambrano stared down into the shimmering liquor. “What’s going on, Dan?”

  Malone gulped the drink. “I’m not sure.”

  “But you’ve got an idea, haven’t you?”

  Malone shrugged wearily. “When I know for sure, you’ll be the first to be told.”

  Zambrano stood up and measured him. “Be careful. Remember that it’s better to be judged by twelve than carried by six.”

  Malone poured another drink and hoisted the cup. “That, Inspector, is something I never forget.”

  As soon as Zambrano was gone, Malone called in the detectives. The blackboard was wheeled from the wall and turned to the unused side. Chalk in hand, Malone paced in front of the board, looking at his tired detectives. He started to free associate. “Anderman and the Braxtons have run for cover. We’re back to square one and all we have is a body. We don’t even have that; it’s been buried.” He turned and faced the board. “Eisinger worked for the Braxtons after she quit Anderman.”

  “Lou?” O’Shaughnessy interjected, slapping his leg. “I forgot to tell you. I checked with the Times. There was never an ad put in by Braxton Tours. I even checked with their billing department. And there’s another thing. My sources in the travel business tell me that the Braxtons don’t specialize just in tours to Israel. They handle a lot of travel to the Arab states. Mecca and things like that.”

  Malone shook a stern finger at the detectives. He turned to the board. “We have Eisinger going to Janet Fox’s apartment and giving her her Bible. That was early Friday evening. Epstein’s lab report states that she was murdered sometime Friday night going into Saturday morning. I had an Emergency Service crew remove the lock cylinders of her apartment. None of them were raked or picked. Which indicates to me that she let the killer or killers into her apartment, or they had a key”—the finger was again waved at the detectives—“or, the humps were waiting for her when she returned from Janet Fox.” He looked at Bo Davis. “You been dancin’ with Janet Fox?”

  Grinning faces turned to Bo Davis, waiting.

  “No, Lou,” Davis said. “I interviewed her. That’s it. She’s real nice, but I haven’t had the time to make a play. Exigencies of the service.”

  “Well make the time. Take the lady out to dinner and get close to her. I want the answer to one important question.”

  “And where do I get the bread to wine and dine her?” Davis said.

  Malone shook his head disbelievingly. He went to the telephone and called Arthur’s Cloud Room on Baxter Street. He spoke to Arthur himself. When he was through he replaced the receiver and said to Davis, “It’s arranged. Soup to nuts, all on the arm. We owe Arthur one.” Next he turned his attention to Gus Heinemann.

  “How have you been making out with the ownership of the Interlude?”

  “Zilch,” Heinemann said. “I traced the ownership from one corporation to another.”

  Malone folded his arms across his chest, rocking on his heels. “You’re using the wrong track. That neighborhood is zoned residential. In order for that place to operate they need a zoning variance from the City Planning Board. You don’t use dummy corporations with them. Check it.” He looked down, avoiding their faces. “Now comes the unpleasant part. Someone, somewhere in the Job is involved in this caper. I don’t know who; and I don’t know how. And I don’t think it’s a corruption matter. It’s a question of being involved in a
homicide and of fucking around with me personally. If any of you guys are squeamish about working on cops let me know and I’ll make adjustments in your charts so you don’t get involved.”

  “Hey, Lou,” Pat O’Shaughnessy shouted. “How come Bo gets to get laid in the line of duty and I don’t?”

  Malone closed his eyes and smiled. “You have Foam.”

  It was late and the detectives had gone home. Malone remained, drinking and staring at the blackboard. Outside in the squad room two detectives from the night watch were watching “Barney Miller.” The din of Chinatown mixed with the scratchy cadence of the police radio and the canned laughter coming from the television set. No matter how much he drank he couldn’t drown the stench of burned flesh. It was everywhere. He kept seeing the charred parts of bodies scattered over the grass. Unrecognizable lumps of charcoal fused together. What the hell was it about the Job that he loved, needed? He poured another drink. He didn’t want to be alone tonight. A cop never has to be alone. There are plenty of watering holes where he can spend the night with other cops drinking and bullshitting about women and the Job. But not tonight. Not for Malone. He wanted the comfort of a woman’s body. To be able to smell her softness, to taste her. To awake in the morning with his hand snug between her legs and to feel her soft ass pressing into him. To press back. To purge himself of the smell of death. He picked up the phone and dialed Erica Sommers.

  She sensed his weariness. “Come over, Daniel. I’ll fix you something to eat and fill a hot tub.”

  He was halfway out of the squad room when he remembered something and went back to his office. He picked up the pad, thought a moment, and wrote: “The Song of Asaph”?

  8

  THURSDAY, June 18 … Morning

  Bo Davis clasped his hands behind his head and sat up, watching as Janet Fox got out of bed. He cast an anxious glance at the telephone and then focused in on her retreating backside. He had decided last night that she had one helluva perfect ass. Smooth and firm, not one shell crater.