Strega

by Andrew Vachss

  Another cop yelled back to me. "I want to talk to you, okay? I want to talk about what you want. Let me walk toward you. Slow…okay? My hands in the air. I can't talk to you about this and scream down this tunnel. Okay?"

  "Let me think about it," I told him, "but no fucking tricks!"

  "No tricks. Just take it easy, okay?"

  I didn't answer him, wondering where the Prof was by now.

  I stretched it out as long as I could. Then I called down to the cop, my voice shaking more than I wanted. "Just one cop, okay? I want the soldier. Tell him to come alone, you understand—and slow!"

  I heard the soldier's footsteps before I saw him. He rounded the bend in the tunnel from the east, shirt unbuttoned, hands over his head. He was short, built solid and close to the ground. I couldn't make out his features in the dim light.

  "Stop!" I barked at him.

  "Okay, friend. Just be easy, okay? No problems, nothing to worry about. All we're going to do is talk."

  "I want to show you something first," I told him. I held another grenade in my right hand, high up, where he could see it. Then I palmed one of the spare pull–pins I had with me in my left. I reached over to the grenade and pulled hard; my left hand came away with the extra pin. I flicked it backhand at the cop, listening to it skim down the tunnel, like a kid skipping stones on a lake. "Pick it up," I told him.

  I watched him bend down, grope around until he had it.

  "Fuck!" he said—not loud, but clear enough.

  "Now you got the picture," I told him. "I'm sitting on a couple dozen of these little bastards and I pulled the pin on the one I'm holding, okay? You get one of your fucking sharpshooters to drop me with a night–scope and the whole tunnel goes into orbit. Now, what about my plane?"

  "Those things take time, friend. We can't just make a phone call and set things up."

  "All it took was a phone call to set this thing up, right?"

  "Look, friend, I just do my job. Like I did overseas. Like you did too, right? I understand what you're feeling…"

  "No, you don't," I told him. "Where'd you see combat?" I asked him.

  "Brother, for all I know, I was in fucking Cambodia. They sent us into the jungle and some of us came back. You know how it is."

  "Yeah, I know how it is. But I did my stretch in prison, not 'Nam. Too many times. And I'm not going again. I'm going to Cuba or we're all going to hell."

  "Hold up!" he barked at me. "Give us a chance to work this out. I didn't say we couldn't do it…just that it takes a bit of time, all right? I have to walk back down and talk to the Captain, let him use the radio, call outside, you know?"

  "Take all the time you want,' I said to him, the most truthful words I ever spoke to a cop in my life. I watched him back down the tunnel.

  A few more minutes passed. I was looking around, checking to make sure there was nothing left in the tunnel to add to my sentence, when I heard his voice again.

  "Can I come back down?" he shouted.

  "Come ahead!" I yelled back.

  When he got back to where he'd been standing before, he was talking in a calm, quiet voice, like you'd use on a crazy person. Good. "It's all in the works, my friend. We've got the process started, but it's going to take some time, you understand?"

  "No problem," I told him.

  "Man, this might take hours," he said. "You don't want to sit and hold that thing without the pin for that long."

  "I got no choice," I replied.

  "Sure you do," he said reasonably. "Just put the pin back in. You can sit right by the grenades. You hear anyone coming or anything at all, you just pull it again. Okay?"

  I said nothing.

  "Come on, friend. Use your head. You're going to get what you want—we're doing it for you—we're cooperating. No point in blowing yourself up when you're winning, right?"

  "How…how do I do that?" I said, my voice trembling badly. "You have the pin."

  "I'll give it back to you, friend. Okay? I'll walk nice and slow toward you, okay? Nice and easy. We got a piece of wire—I'll wrap it around the pin and tie it to my holster belt, okay? I'll throw the whole thing down to you. Nice and easy."

  "You won't try anything?" I asked, distrust all over my voice.

  "What's the point, friend? We try something and you blow us all up, right? I'll be standing right here—I'll be the first to go, okay? I didn't walk through that fucking jungle to get killed on the subway."

  "Give me a minute," I told him.

  He gave me nearly five, playing out the string, doing what he was supposed to do. The cop and I were the same right then: I was holding the point for my brothers so they'd make their break—and he was a hundred yards ahead of the rest of his boys. It was only him and me that'd get blown to hell if this didn't work. The soldier had a lot of guts—too bad he worked with such a lame crew.

  "You're really getting the plane?" I asked him.

  "It's in the works," he said, "you have my word. One soldier to another."

  Maybe he did understand it. I was running in luck—an infantryman would know all about falling on grenades. If he'd been a Tunnel Rat in 'Nam he'd be thinking flamethrowers by now. But he was just doing his job. I let him persuade me.

  It took another ten minutes for us to work it out, but he finally came back down the tunnel with the belt and lofted it gently in my direction. I could see it gleaming in the tunnel's soft light. I reached out for it gingerly, feeling the sniper's telescope on my face. Fuck them—I'd have the last laugh in hell.

  But they didn't shoot.

  "I got it!" I yelled to him.

  "Just like I promised," he shouted back.

  "I'm putting it back in," I said, my hands shaking for just the right touch of authenticity. I swear I could feel all their breath let out at once when I went back into the blackness.

  "I'm going to sit right here," I yelled. "Just like I said. If any of you come even close…"

  "All you need now is patience, my friend," said the cop. "I'll sit right down here and wait with you." And he was right about both parts.

  15

  IT WENT on for hours. I knew the game—the soldier kept coming back down the tunnel to talk to me, reassure me everything was okay, ask me if I wanted some cigarettes, some coffee, anything—waiting for me to get sleepy. They had all the time in the world.

  It was well past midnight. Either my people had made it or they hadn't. I was seeing spots in front of my eyes, jumping every time the cops made a noise at their end. I don't drink coffee, but I knew what would be in the coffee they kept offering me, so I finally said yes.

  The soldier brought two Styrofoam coffee cups down on a tray, halfway to me, turned around, and went back. I told them it wasn't close enough, so he brought it even closer.

  Then he played out the string. "Pick one, friend. The other one's for me." It didn't matter which one I picked—they'd have pumped the cop so full of stimulants that I'd pass out before he would anyway. I popped open the lid of the one I picked and drank it all down like a greedy pig. The drugs hit me like a piledriver before I could even take the cup away from my mouth. I remember thinking just before I passed out how I wouldn't even feel the beating I was going to get.

  16

  SO I WENT back to prison, but only for possession of explosives. Possession of thirty–two kilos of sugar and quinine isn't against the law. And even Blumberg the lawyer was able to make something out of the fact that I was drugged and unconscious at the time of my arrest, so they didn't hit me with too stiff a jolt.

  I wasn't in population more than a week before one of Julio's gorillas asked me where I'd stashed the heroin. I told him I didn't know what he was talking about—as far as I knew, the cops had the stuff. And, anyway, I told him, it hadn't been me who roughed off the stuff in the first place. Some guy had contacted me—offered fifty grand for me to handle the exchange.

  Another man came to see me in the prison about the dope, but this guy came through the front gate. When the hack told me
my attorney was there to see me, I knew something was wrong—Blumberg wouldn't make the trip to Auburn even if I had paid him for representing me at the trial. This guy was all pinstripes and old school tie, with a pretty leather briefcase and a gold wedding band to match his Rolex. The new breed of mob lawyer, although I didn't know it then. He didn't even pretend he was representing me—he came there to be judge and jury, and I was on trial for my life.

  Okay—I was ready for him. We went over the thing a dozen times. He had me tell my story out of sequence, did his best to trip me up—it always played the same. But slowly he got a few more details out of me.

  "Tell me again about this guy who approached you.

  "I already told you," I said. "About thirty years old, long hair, almost like a hippie, dirty army jacket. He was carrying a piece in a shoulder holster—didn't care if I saw it or not. Said his name was Smith."

  "And he told you?"

  "He told me he had this stuff, right? And it belonged to your people, okay? And I should make arrangements to sell it back to him for two hundred grand. And all I had to give him was one fifty—the rest was for me."

  "You thought he stole it?"

  "I didn't know how he got it, right? What did I care? I figured the old man would be happy to get his stuff back—I'd make some heavy coin—it'd be a wash, right?"

  "You ever see this 'Smith' character again?"

  "He didn't show up at my trial, that's for fucking sure."

  "Mr. Burke, think back now. Is there anything about this guy that would help us find him?"

  "You got pictures I could look through? Maybe he's one of your own.

  "He's not," snapped the lawyer.

  "Yeah, I guess you're right," I acknowledged. "He was like one of those buffs, you know? A real whacko."

  "A 'buff'?"

  "Yeah, like those guys who carry around PBA cards and pretend they're fucking off–duty cops and shit. You know what I mean."

  His eyes flickered, just for a second, but I'd been watching for it. "Why do you think this individual was in that category?"

  "Well," I said slowly, "two things, really. Besides the shoulder holster, he had another gun strapped to his ankle. And when he reached in his wallet to come up with the front money I wanted…for the supplies…I saw a gold shield. I guess it was one of those complimentary badges the cops give you if you make some contribution."

  The lawyer screwed around for another hour or so, but his heart wasn't in it. I read in the Daily News three weeks later how an undercover narcotics officer was killed in East Harlem. Shot four times in the face, but they left his money alone. Only his gold shield was missing.

  17

  BUT THAT was years ago. Today I left seven grand with Mama. Max would know that five was for him and he should hold the rest for me. There was no time for Mama's endless nonsense about Max, but I did have time to eat before I went back to the office to change. I had a court appearance for the afternoon, and I wanted to look my best.

  Even though it was just a preliminary hearing, I normally wouldn't go into a criminal court. There wasn't any point pretending I had a private investigator's license, and even a flyweight defense attorney would have a ball asking me where I'd spent twelve years of my life. I testify a lot in civil court, though—matrimonials and crap like that. And I'm a lot more honest than the lawyers: I charge a flat rate for perjury, not so much an hour. But this was a special case.

  It really started in Family Court, where this woman came in to get an Order of Protection against her husband. Seems they were showing a film about child sexual abuse in school and one of her daughters started crying and the whole sleazy story came out. Anyway, she gets this Order, and he's supposed to leave the house, but he comes right back in and starts screaming at the kid how the whole thing is her fault and how she's going to go to an orphanage and stuff like that. And the poor little kid just plain snaps out—she was only ten years old—and they take her to this psychiatric hospital and she's still up there. The slimeball naturally takes off, and the woman hired me to find him. It only took a couple of days. I threw a quarter into a pay phone and the Warrant Squad picked him up.

  Most of the time the D.A.'s office wouldn't even think about prosecuting a guy like this. They got more excuses than Richard Nixon: the guy's the family breadwinner, the trial would be too tough on the kid, all that crap. The bottom line is that they don't want to mess with their sacred conviction rates—most of these family–style sex cases only get prosecuted when the perpetrator confesses, and even then the D.A.'s office doesn't get too worked up about it. After all, the family unit is the bedrock of America.

  But they finally formed this new unit—City–Wide Special Victims Bureau. It's supposed to cover all crimes against children, in all courts. I heard the D.A. in this case was really going to go for it, and I wanted to see for myself.

  I walked in all dressed up: dark–blue pinstripe, white shirt, dark–red tie, polished black shoes—even an attaché case. I wasn't carrying a piece—in the Supreme Court, they use metal detectors at the entrance because some politically wired judge complained about the dangerous radicals who might invade his courtroom and shoot it out with the guards. This happens in the Supreme Court about every other century, but you can't be too careful. On the other hand, right across the street in the Family Court, the average litigant carries some kind of weapon and violence is an everyday thing, but there's no metal detectors. That's New York—even the names of the courts are total bullshit—the lowest trial court is the "Supreme" Court, and the place where we turn abused kids into monsters is the "Family" Court. In this city, the name means more than the game.

  The Assistant District Attorney was one I hadn't seen before—a tall brunette with a white streak in her thick mane of swept–back hair, wearing a gray silk dress and a string of pearls. She had a sweet face, but her eyes were cold. She wasn't from the Manhattan office—I guess they sent her over because she was handling another case against the same guy over in Queens or something. The court officers all seemed to know her, though, so I guess she was a trial veteran—those are the only ones they remember.

  I sat in the front row—the one reserved for attorneys only. Nobody asked any questions—they never do.

  The defense attorney was a real piece of work. His haircut cost more than my suit, and diamonds flashed from everywhere. It looked like it was only going to be a hearing on bail, and the lawyer had a long list of reasons why his man should be let back out on the street—the defendant was employed, sole support of his family, active in Little League.. and that stuff. He looked like a weasel. His eyes darted around the courtroom—caught mine, and dropped. His wife wasn't even there.

  The only person I recognized was the court reporter—the guy who takes down everything they say on one of those machines that don't make any noise. He was a tall guy with big hands, slumped over his machine. He'd gone to Vietnam about the same time I last went to prison, and it burned him out. I'd watched him a lot of times and he never changed expression, no matter what went down. I asked him about that once and he told me the courtroom was the same as 'Nam—only here they did it with words instead of with bullets.

  The argument went on and on, and then the defense attorney made a mistake. He put his client on the stand, figuring the guy's long list of social contacts would get over on the judge. And it might have too, until the D.A. took her shot.

  She stood up at her table and began questioning the creep in a soft voice, just background questions about his job, and where he'd be staying while waiting for trial—crap like that. She shuffled through some papers at the table as if she couldn't think of the next question to ask; then she took a step closer to him.

  "Sir, on April twenty–fifth, did you enter your wife's home?"

  "It's my home," the creep smirked, "I paid for it…I'm still paying the mortgage on it."

  "Objection, Your Honor," said the defense attorney. "What does this have to do with a bail application?"

  "It ha
s to do with credibility," shot back the D.A. Then she gave a little bow of her head to the defense attorney, and told the court, "I promise to connect it up to the issue before this court, Your Honor, and I will not oppose a defense motion to strike the testimony if I fail to do so."

  The judge tried to look like he was thinking it over, glanced over at his assistant (they call them "law secretaries" in New York—they're all political appointees and they make more money than the judges in the "lower" courts), caught the sign, and said, "Proceed, counsel," just like they do on television.

  "Will you answer my question, sir?" the D.A. asked.

  Then he went into his rap. "Yes, I entered my home, with my key. Of course I did."

  "And did you have a conversation with your child Marcy at that time, sir?"

  "It wasn't a conversation. I just said she had caused a lot of trouble with all these lies. You see, if it hadn't been for that stupid movie they showed at her school…"

  "No further questions," snapped out the D.A., leaving everyone in the courtroom puzzled.

  "You may step down," said the judge to the creep. Then he turned to the D.A.

  "Young lady, I don't understand your line of questioning. If you can't connect this up"

  "My name is Ms. Wolfe, Judge, or you may refer to me as the Assistant District Attorney," she said in a gentle voice.

  The judge smiled, humoring her, and the defense attorney rubbed his hands together. They weren't good listeners—the lady was being quiet, not soft. You could see she was a pro. There was steel inside, but she wasn't going to waste her time showing it when there was no jury around.

  "Very well, Ms. Wolfe," said the judge, hitting the accent so the low–lifes hanging around the bench wouldn't miss his sharp wit, "the court is still waiting for you to connect it up.

  "Yes, Your Honor," she said, her voice hardening, "I have here a certified copy of an Order of Protection, signed by Judge Berkowitz of the Family Court. Among its terms and conditions are that this defendant remain away from the home and person of the victim."