Deadlocked (Lou Mason Thrillers)

by Joel Goldman

  Ryan let out a small cry, yanking his arms as he felt the burning sensation of the first drug. His head dropped to the gurney, lolling side-to-side, the drug working quickly. Mary turned to Father Steve, clinging to him, her eyes still locked on her son as Ryan lifted his head a final time, the words tumbling over his thickening tongue.

  "I love you, Ma ...So sorry... innocent."

  And he was gone.

  Chapter 4

  Mason stood at the foot of his parents' grave two days after Ryan Kowalczyk's execution. His parents were buried in Sheffield Cemetery, a pious slab of land running down a long slope in an industrial district on the northeast side of Kansas City. Owned by an Orthodox congregation, it held the remains of hundreds of Kansas City Jews dating back to the early 1900s, taking its name from the steel company that once dominated the surrounding landscape. Mason's parents were buried high enough that he could see I-435 to the east and the railroad tracks that ran north and south not far from the bottom of the long slope. A train whistle split the morning, shaking the living even if it didn't stir the dead.

  His parents' names were carved in a single block of black granite, John and Linda Mason. Their Hebrew names were entered beneath the English. Mason struggled with the letters, familiar only in their form, their sound and meaning unknown to him. Claire had not pushed him to obtain a religious education, telling him that all the rules paled after the Golden Rule. Learn that one, she said, and you've learned enough.

  Growing up, his Aunt Claire brought him to the cemetery on Memorial Day, though neither of his parents had served in the military. It was a good holiday for remembering people, Claire had explained. John was her older brother, Linda as close to her as any sister. Good people sorely missed was how she ended each of their visits.

  Mason fell out of the routine of the annual visits when he left for college, returning to the cemetery only occasionally, the last time several years ago, the reason escaping him now. He didn't talk to his parents, as some people did when they visited the graves of loved ones. Mostly, he studied the headstone, hoping for an epiphany about what his life would have been like had they lived. He regretted nothing that had happened in his upbringing by Claire, though he missed every second of what his life might have been, the uncertainty never far from his mind.

  Kowalczyk's execution prompted this visit. Nick Byrnes's odd question implying that someone had protected Mason from the truth about his parents' deaths hung over his image of Nick, Harry, and Mary as they had watched Kowalczyk die. Mason had never doubted the story Claire told him. That his father lost control on a rainy summer night, his car slicing through a guard rail, down an embankment, both his parents dead when rescuers reached them. Now Nick's question rose like a tide through Mason's memory, leaving him unsettled.

  There was a rock on the center of the arched headstone, a smooth, flat oval that would have skipped forever across flat water. Leaving a small rock on a headstone was a Jewish tradition, a reminder to the deceased that they have not been forgotten, one of the few traditions Mason had picked up in his nontraditional upbringing.

  Mason picked up the rock, rubbing his fingers across a surface too polished for the rock to have been plucked from the ground. Whoever left the rock had brought it with them. Claire had never left a rock on the headstone to the Masons' memory, rejecting the practice as she did virtually every other religious ritual.

  Claire was as strong an advocate of Jewish traditions of social justice as anyone could be, though she had no interest in the theology. God, she said, knew where to find her if He was looking for her. Mason doubted that Claire had mellowed in her antagonism toward spiritual faith, though he never quite understood its origins. He sometimes imagined Claire having a fight with God, calling it quits because God was a sore loser.

  Who had left the rock, Mason wondered? He had no other family besides Claire and could think of no one who might have visited his parents' grave, leaving the rock behind as a calling card. He examined it again, turning it over in his hand as he turned over Nick's question in his mind, finding answers to neither, leaving the rock where he found it.

  Several sections over from where he stood near the top of the slope a blue awning had been erected at the site of a fresh grave. The excavation complete, two gravediggers were setting up chairs for the mourners. They'd stuck two shovels firmly into the mound of dirt next to the grave so that mourners could sprinkle soil onto the casket after it was lowered into the ground, a final good-bye. It was not yet eight o'clock and the gravediggers were glad to be finished, the sun already bearing down at the start of another blistering summer day.

  The city was roasting in a heat wave that had boosted temperatures into triple digits seven out of the last ten days. Humidity to match the temperature multiplied into a misery index that was off the charts. The sky was painfully blue. People were dying and the forecast was for more of the same. Mason had a feeling the gravediggers would be busy.

  Curious whether the men might have seen someone deposit the rock on his parents' headstone, Mason ambled their way. The gravediggers, one black and one white, were sitting in the shade of the awning on the chairs they had just arranged, taking long pulls on water jugs.

  "Bet you're glad this one's done," Mason said.

  "You got that right," the white man said. "Funeral's not till eleven. You're early."

  "It's not my funeral," Mason said. "I was just visiting my folks' grave. Back over there," he said, pointing. "John and Linda Mason," he added.

  "Double plot," the black man said. "Don't dig too many of them. Most people, they go one at a time."

  "How long you guys worked out here?" Mason asked.

  "Me and Marty," the black man answered, "we been here ten years. Ain't that right, Marty?"

  "You got that right, Albert," Marty said, wiping his wrist across his mouth.

  "Don't suppose you might have noticed anyone else visiting my parents' graves. Someone left a nice rock on the headstone."

  Albert shook his head. "Don't take this wrong, mister. I ain't got nothin' against your people, but I surely don't understand that rock business. What's a rock got to do with remembering someone anyway?"

  "I couldn't tell you," Mason said, embarrassed that he couldn't. "Either of you see anyone?"

  "We see lots of people visiting lots of graves. We too busy digging new ones to pay 'em much attention," Marty said, Albert nodding.

  "Tell you what," Mason said, handing them each a business card and a twenty dollar bill. "Next time you see someone over there, pay enough attention to call me."

  "All right, okay then," Albert said, pocketing Mason's money and card. "Be lots of people here today. Probably be

  a whole lot of rocks left on this grave."

  "Who died?" Mason asked.

  "Name of Sonni Efron," Marty answered. "Woman got shot in the face standing in her own front door. Don't that beat all hell."

  Mason recognized the name from the news reports. Sonni Efron had been murdered two days ago, front page news, the Kowalcyzk execution back-page filler. She was a prominent member of the Jewish community, active in philanthropic organizations and the arts. Claire knew her, though not well, and Mason not at all. Marty was right. There would be a lot of rocks left on Sonni Efron's headstone. The police had no suspects. Mason knew the cops would be in the funeral crowd, hoping her killer would be there too.

  Mason had a different appointment at eleven that morning. He'd given Nick Byrnes one of his business cards, telling him to call if he needed anything, or if he'd just like to talk. Nick called the day after the execution, saying he had a case Mason might be interested in handling, though he didn't offer any details. Mason gave his parents' grave a last glance as he went to work.

  Mary Kowalczyk was waiting for Mason when he pulled into the parking lot behind Blues on Broadway, a bar near Thirty-eighth and Broadway. The neighborhood was a stretch of Kansas City somewhere between run-down and uptown. Mason dodged potholes as he parked. His office was on t
he second floor.

  The bar was owned by Harry Ryman's ex-partner, Blues, who played jazz piano or tended bar as the mood struck him. It was a long, strange trip for a full-blooded member of the Shawnee Indian tribe, a trip that included dispensing rough justice for Mason's clients and attitude adjustments for those who stood in the way.

  Mary, dressed in black pants and a long-sleeved black blouse despite the heat, shaded her eyes against the morning sun that threatened to peel another coat of paint off the back wall of the building. Mason felt a knot in his chest, unable to separate her from her son, uneasy at seeing her again, uncertain how to console her. He hoped she hadn't come to see him, but couldn't think of any other reason for her to show up on his doorstep.

  Mason didn't know whether her son was guilty. Harry's version of the case against Ryan Kowalczyk was convincing and Mason trusted Harry's judgment as much as anyone he knew. Still, he'd defended enough people accused of crimes they didn't commit to harbor a steady suspicion of the prosecution. Ryan's last gasp of innocence haunted him. What's the point of lying in that final instant?

  Mason was less certain that Ryan deserved to die, his own feelings about the death penalty an ambivalent mush. He was opposed to it when he was defending someone on trial for his life in an imperfect system tainted by racial and class bias. A system dependent on the vagaries of recollection, often deceived by what the jury doesn't know. He was less certain when outrage at the perpetrator of an unspeakable crime swept over him.

  Mason looked at his watch. It was eight-thirty. If Mary had come to see him, at least she would be gone before Nick Byrnes arrived at eleven. He'd been in the same room with them once before and didn't want to do that again. Mason slowed as he approached her, saying nothing, letting her make the call.

  "Mr. Mason," she said. "I didn't meet you the other night. I'm sorry."

  "It didn't seem like the right time for introductions. I'm sorry for your loss," he added, hoping the sentiment was more comforting to her than it had been to Nick.

  Mary looked around, craning her head up to the second floor. "Is this really your office?"

  Mason grimaced, not usually embarrassed by his modest digs. "I'm up on the second floor. Are you here to see me?"

  "If you have time for me. I mean, I didn't call for an appointment, so I understand if you don't."

  "You're in luck," he said.

  Mason led her inside, up the back stairway, down the hall past the open door to Blues's office. Blues sat at his desk reading his mail, not looking up. Mason continued on, unlocked his office, picked his mail up off the floor, and turned on the lights before he noticed Mary still standing in front of Blues's office, her eyes riveted on him.

  "Mrs. Kowalczyk?" Mason asked.

  Mary gave Blues a last hard look. "That man," she said as Mason closed the door behind her. "Do you know him? Did he use to be a police officer? A detective?"

  "As a matter of fact, he did. That's Blues. His real name is Wilson Bluestone Junior. He owns the bar and this building," Mason answered, finally making the connection Mary had made.

  "He is a terrible man," Mary said, leaving no room for debate. "He treated my son like he was the worst scum imaginable, throwing him against the wall like he was a dangerous criminal when all he was, was a boy taken advantage of by his friend."

  Mary's words poured out, carrying venom that welled deep inside her. Mason knew that Blues probably did throw her son against the wall and treat him like a dangerous criminal because that's undoubtedly what Blues thought when he and Harry arrested the boy for double homicide. Blues was never gentle. A mother convinced that her son had been wrongfully executed would never forgive anyone who had a hand in his death. There was no point in defending Blues.

  "Have a seat, Mrs. Kowalczyk," Mason said, pointing to the sofa. "What can I do for you?"

  She sat, barely filling the corner of the sofa, her feet just touching the floor. "You mustn't discuss our business with that man," she said. "I won't allow it!"

  Mason walked around his office, opening the blinds on the windows that overlooked Broadway, fishing two bottles of water out of the small refrigerator behind his desk, giving Mary time to cool down, not wanting to tell her that, so far, there was only her business, not their business. He handed her a bottle of water and sat in a leather chair at one end of the sofa.

  "Everything we discuss is confidential, Mrs. Kowalczyk," he said, leaving out that Blues often worked with him when he needed special expertise in violence or protection. "How can I help you?"

  Mary put her unopened bottle of water on the butler's table in front of the sofa, wiping the moisture from the bottle on her pants. Straightening her narrow back, leveling her chin at Mason, she told him. "My son was innocent. I want you to prove it."

  Mason rolled his bottle of water between his hands, fumbling with the cap, taking a sip. He was never surprised by what people in trouble asked him to do. If their lives were on the line, they'd ask for the stars and settle for the moon. Mary Kowalczyk's trouble had come and gone. No celestial magic would change that, though he knew she wouldn't be convinced. He tried a different tack.

  "Mrs. Kowalczyk," he began.

  "Please," she interrupted. "Call me Mary," she said, forcing a smile over her grief.

  "Mary," Mason began again, gently. "The other night, there was a priest. I couldn't help but overhear what he told you. He said that your son confessed."

  Mary waved her hand. "Father Steve is a fine priest, a good man. He was taking care of Ryan the only way he could. It was important that Ryan make confession before he was taken from me."

  Mason was even less certain of Catholic tradition than Jewish tradition. "I'm sure that was the case. But the priest— Father Steve—said that Ryan confessed to everything. It sounded like he was talking about the murders."

  "Nonsense," Mary answered. "My son was innocent. Father Steve thought it would be easier for me if I thought Ryan was guilty. Ryan never lied to me. I was his mother. I would have known. That boy was innocent and he was murdered no different than that poor couple, the Byrnes. Only the law killed my son."

  "Are you asking me to sue someone for your son's death?"

  Mary turned red. "Dear me, no, Mr. Mason. I don't want blood money. I owe it to Ryan, to let him rest easy in heaven. I can't have his life back but I'll have his innocence."

  "Without some kind of trial to determine your son's innocence, the most I could do is investigate the case and tell you what I think."

  "That's not what I want. I want the governor to pardon Ryan. I've read up on it. He can do it even after they took my son from me."

  Mason sat back in his chair, looking at Mary Kowalczyk. She was a small woman made smaller by her thin, tired face, and the grief she wore like makeup. Her pants were worn at the knees, the cuffs and collar of her blouse frayed, the heels of her shoes scuffed flat. She wore a gold cross around her neck, though Mason was certain it wasn't real gold. Her dark eyes flashed, mirroring her determination. Saving her son's life had been her entire life. Saving his memory was all she

  had left.

  "Is that it?" Mason asked.

  "No. There is one other thing. I want you to prove that Whitney King killed those people. That boy should not be allowed to live another day pretending he had nothing to do with the killings!"

  "I don't suppose I could interest you in the moon and the stars instead."

  "Mr. Mason," she snapped, "I recognized your name when I heard the prosecuting attorney introduce you to the warden, but I couldn't remember why. It came to me yesterday. I've read about you in the papers. If you tell me you could get me the moon and the stars, I'd believe you. I only want justice for my son. I'll take it from you or I'll take it myself if I have to. Please don't make a joke out of that."

  Mason rose, circling his office once again, passing the books on his shelves that laid out the law, the files for clients who depended on him, the dry erase board where he worked out the puzzles of his cases, stopping behi
nd his desk. He rubbed his hand across his chest, feeling the scar left by the surgeon who'd saved his life after he'd been stabbed ten months earlier. He'd nearly died saving the life of Abby Lieberman, the woman he loved. Mary Kowalczyk only wanted him to save the memory of the son she loved. That didn't sound so tough. He looked at her again, wondering if there was more than grief behind her threat to take justice in her own hands.

  "I'll start with the court file. See where it goes," he said, not wanting to over promise.

  "I can pay you," Mary said. "My husband bought a life insurance policy for Ryan when he was born. It was for ten thousand dollars."

  Mason shook his head. "You keep that money."

  "I'd sooner burn it than spend it on myself, Mr. Mason. Either you take it and do the job right or I'll give it to the church."

  "You don't give up, do you Mary?" he said.

  "Not when I'm right, Mr. Mason."

  "Please," he told her. "Call me Lou."

  Chapter 5

  "Who was that woman?" Blues asked, walking into Mason's office unannounced, his tall, muscled frame shrinking the space between the door and Mason's desk.

  Mason stood in front of his dry erase board, studying the names of Ryan Kowalczyk and Whitney King written in blue connected by red lines to the names of Graham and Elizabeth Byrnes. Mason was a visual thinker, preferring to chart the progress of a case on his board, crisscrossing the connections between people, places, and things until he found the pattern that tied them all together. He wrote Mary Kowalczyk's name, circled it in green and tied it to Ryan, doing the same with Nick and his parents.

  "Mary Kowalczyk," Mason said. "She doesn't like you."

  "She was staring at me from the hall. I thought I recognized her. That's one mean woman."