Immoral Certainty

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  “Pleased to meet you,” said the Bogeyman, sweeping Marlene up off the sofa and into his thick arms, like a child.

  CHAPTER

  14

  Karp burst into the Bureau office, moving fast, slamming the door, the wind of his passage lifting papers from nearby desks. People moved to get out of his way. They expected no recognition nor did they receive any. While he did not actually run anybody down, he would have. Passing by Connie Trask’s desk, he said, “Anything?” She shook her head sadly and he cursed under his breath and plunged toward his private office. This had been going on for three days.

  Ray Guma and Tony Harris were waiting for him within, sitting at the scarred oak conference table. The table was littered with newspapers, tabloid and respectable, all turned to the same story, which was, as one of the tabloids had unfelicitously headlined it: LADY D.A. IN MOB SNATCH.

  Guma picked up the tabloid and tossed it contemptuously down again. “This is such bullshit, Butch. Mob snatch, my ass!”

  “Not now, Ray” said Karp.

  “Kidnapping a D.A. is not a wise-guy trick, Butch. You know that! The call we got is a scam, Butch. ‘Lay off the Bollanos or else!’ It’s from the movies, for cryin’ out loud! These aren’t crazy Colombians, Jamaicans, who knows what—we’re talking respectable middle-class gangsters here.”

  “They’re still gangsters. I’m not saying Bollano ordered it. It could be some punk out to make a rep. It could be some asshole off the boat from Palermo. They shoot judges in Sicily—maybe he figures a D.A. is fair game.”

  “Butch, I talked to Marlene before she left. I was probably one of the last people in the office to see her. She was talking about a break on this child abuse thing she’s been hot on, the one she says is hooked into the trash-bag killer. Isn’t it more reasonable—”

  “There’s nothing there, Ray. I’ve been over it with Marlene. And it’s not our case.”

  “Our case, horseshit! Did you check it out?”

  “Yeah, as a matter of fact, I did. I got a judge and a minister saying she was en route to the child-care center to look into what appeared to be a minor case of kiddie diddling. She never got there.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because it turns out that Jimmy Raney has had this mutt watching the center on and off for weeks under the obviously mistaken impression that the center is tied in with these trash-bag murders, and the mutt says she never showed up on the afternoon we’re talking about. What the fuck is this, Guma? You cross-examining me to see if I’m trying hard enough to find Marlene? Fuck you!”

  The color had risen to Karp’s face, an unusual and threatening sign. Guma flung out his hand in a gesture connoting extreme frustration and looked pointedly up at the ceiling, but said nothing more.

  After a moment, Tony Harris entered the uncomfortable silence. “Butch, on this Ferro killing thing for the grand jury: I’m missing something. You’re calling all the guys Noodles said were in Nyack the morning after, right?”

  “That’s right,” said Karp. “They were all at the castle too.”

  “But the castle was a bust. We got nothing,” Harris complained.

  “So it appears.”

  “Then why are we going ahead with these?” asked Harris, irritably smacking the sheaf of subpoenas down on the table. “In fact, why did we stage that raid anyway? You had Armand spotted for a crook weeks ago. So he tipped Bollano, we know that. The bugs were all disconnected, nobody said anything on the phone. They have a meeting anyway, the cops are there snapping away, and it turns out the cops can’t quite get anything that’s in focus enough to identify anybody, nor are any of them willing to swear they recognized any of the participants. Maybe they’re all on the wire, too.”

  “It’s possible,” said Karp abstractedly.

  “So what I want to know is, what are you gonna ask them that’s gonna do us any good?” Harris asked, observing his boss with dismay. He’s losing it, thought Harris, as he observed Karp’s slumped affect: exhaustion and boredom mixed. This thing with Marlene has taken the edge right off him. For his part, Harris felt abandoned and resentful, especially after what had happened with the great raid on the Mafia castle. Karp regarded the younger man wearily and said, “We’re just going to ask them if they were there, what they talked about, like that.”

  “But what good will that do. It’s no crime to have a meeting, especially if we have no evidence there was conspiracy taking place.”

  “It’s a crime if they lie about it,” answered Karp. “All grand jury witnesses have transactional immunity. If they lie we can get them on perjury.”

  Harris’s irritation grew and his voice got louder. “But Butch—they don’t have to lie! They know we got nothing.”

  “They’ll lie,” said Karp with assurance. He looked sharply at Guma. “They’ll lie because they’re mutts and they think they can get away with it.”

  “Relax, kid,” said Guma, “he’s got a ringer.”

  Harris stared. “What do you mean ‘ringer’? What’s he talking about, Butch?”

  Karp said neutrally, “I did a deal with the Feds. There were two FBI agents planted as electrical linemen on the road outside the castle. They had cameras and a parabolic mike set up. They can ID everybody there and testify about a lot of the conversation at the meeting.”

  “No kidding!” said Harris, hurt feelings and admiration warring in his tone. “That’s great, Butch, but it would have been nice to tell me about it, considering I’m putting together all this grand jury stuff.”

  “Sorry, Tony,” Karp said in a mollifying tone. “I’m devious. It comes with the job.”

  Harris stood and gathered his papers. “Yeah, well, I guess I should contact the Bureau and set up their testimony. Oh, by the way, any word on Marlene?”

  “No, not yet,” Karp said quickly. “Go direct to Pillman on that, Tony. We’re keeping the whole thing kind of close.”

  Harris left and Guma started chuckling as soon as the door had closed. Karp snapped, “What’s so funny, Guma?”

  “You. Him. ‘Devious.’ I love the way you come on like somebody who’s totally out front, and all the time the wheels and deals are turning around. I’m glad you finally admitted it. It’s good training for the kid there and an inspiration to your loyal staff. Personally, I intend to take it to heart.”

  Karp shot him a lowering glance. “Don’t be cute, Guma.”

  “Who, me?” said Guma, goggling his eyes like Little Orphan Annie. “Never happens. And by the way, not to change the subject, but how did it go in court today? The Mullen murders.”

  “Not bad. The general can still use a bayonet. Klopper is a pain in the ass, of course: His way of insinuating that his client and him are being crushed by the awesome power of the state. And the bastard wears you down with a shitload of objections he knows are going to be overruled. It’s exhausting, it confuses the witnesses and the jury…. I don’t know though, I got a feeling it’s going to backfire with Montana.”

  “Yeah, I always thought Judge Montana was a stand-up, no bullshit guy.”

  “I’m counting on it. Anyway, today I had the engineer in, Shannon, to establish the shape of the apartments and the whole crime scene. That’s critical, because we’re going to be talking about two incidents in the same hallway—the murder itself and the business with Tighe beating his girlfriend—also the thumbprint that ties our guy to the scene is out in the hall, on the doorway. And Tighe threatens the victim in the hearing of two cops out in the hall. So I want the jury to be as comfortable in that hallway as they are in their own hallway.

  “Then the first cop on the scene, Dienst. Big guy, good witness. Describes the horror scene, the little boy in the bloody apartment.”

  “You gonna call the kid?”

  “I could, but he’s out of town with the dad. I got some scruples about dragging him through it again, you’ll probably be surprised to know. I was surprised. No, I’ll deliver a statement, which the defense will stipulate t
o. If not, I will call the kid and after he testifies they’ll lynch the fucker right there in the courtroom. Which Klopper knows, of course.”

  “And the girlfriend … ?”

  “The girlfriend, yeah—great witness,” Karp said enthusiastically. Guma noticed with satisfaction that the worn look he had seen on Karp’s face earlier was fading in the enthusiasm of retelling the events and strategy concerning the trial of Felix Tighe.

  “Rivas, her name is. We established he beat her and she screamed and the deceased called the cops. He broke her place up too, the girlfriend’s, with karate blows, suggesting he was not averse to busting things up, like breaking down the door to the victim’s place. We established that the chain lock was ripped out of the wall by great force.

  “She also testified that the day of the murder, this scumbag meets her after work and tells her that he’s going to quote take care of the victim, that she’ll read about it in the papers—that’s a quote too—and that he’s got an alibi, so she quote shouldn’t worry about him.

  “Also, he forces her, by threat of violence, to accompany him down to the building where the murder took place. He tells her he has quote unfinished business in the building. In the cab, they’re jostled toward one another by a pothole, and she reaches out and touches something hard stuck in his belt.”

  “What, this is the day of the murder?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And he shows her the knife?”

  “Not that good, but almost. He tells her quote he’s got something, he’s carrying something. She didn’t see the blade but we can show he’s a knife artist.”

  “What, from priors?”

  “Yeah, a good one. A year ago in Queens he got stopped on a burglary and he ripped the cop up pretty bad with a big knife.”

  “Last year? You mean he walked on the attempted murder?”

  “Skipped. Convicted in absentia and they lost the damn wanted card.”

  Guma whistled and shook his head. “Sonofabitch! So how’re you gonna bring it out?”

  “Cross on the accused.”

  “Klopper’s gonna call this sweetheart?” asked Guma in amazement.

  “He’s got to, to try and impeach the girl’s testimony and explain the thumbprint. Also, this fucker is not a shaved head with five o’clock shadow and a mean scar—the guy looks like a prince, a movie star. He’ll be a good witness—articulate, clever. Confusing. I used all my challenges to get an all male jury.”

  “So you think you got it locked?”

  “I never think that until the guy stands up and says ‘guilty, Your Honor.’ But yeah, it looks good unless they fuck with my evidence. The girl and the print you could explain away: woman scorned, she’s a slut anyway, the accused hung around the place, his prints are here and there.

  “But we go to his room and find a knife that could be the murder weapon and a diary that says ‘fix big mouth,’ and a pair of pants soaked in blood, the same type as the victims’, and newspaper clippings of the crime … and now it looks a helluva lot better. And I got to say, little Freddie Kirsch did a good job on the Q and A and the Grand Jury testimony. Everything we need was brought out there.”

  “How could they fuck with it, Butch?”

  “A million ways,” said Karp grimly. “And Klopper knows them all. I don’t like this guy Lutz, Tighe’s roomie, for one thing. He testified on the evidence before the Grand Jury, but who knows? He’s sort of a skell himself.”

  Guma smiled as Karp continued his comment on the case: What he would do if they did that, what if they did this, how he would sum it up, together with commentary on law and precedents. Nothing juiced Karp up like a trial, and winning it would put him in as good a mood as he could achieve while his loved one was in the evil clutches of whomever. And Guma needed Karp in a good mood, since he was about to do something that, had Karp known of it, would have put Karp in a very bad mood indeed.

  An hour later Guma was in his car, a black ’57 Mercury junker, its paint iridescent with age, tooling along the Belt Parkway in Brooklyn. He drove to Cropsey Avenue and Bay 14th Street in Bath Beach and parked behind an immaculate white stretch Cadillac with dark glass windows.

  A young man with sunglasses and a good tan, dressed in clothes a little too tropical for the season in New York, stood at the rear door. He nodded at Guma and threw open the door of the white limo for him. Guma climbed in and sank back into cream leather soft as thighs.

  “Guma! Cosa dic’?” said the man in the back seat, a broad and gold-glittering smile splitting his deeply tanned face.

  “Lo squal’ incula il pe’c’,” replied Guma. “You’re looking well, Anthony.” The two men shook hands with warmth and enthusiasm.

  “Drive,” said the tan man softly. The engine purred into life, the young man in the tropical clothes leaped into the front seat and Guma and his friend Anthony Buonofacci cruised out into the littered streets of their shared boyhood.

  “You should get some more sun, Goom,” said Buonofacci. “You look like a mozzarella. When you gonna come down to Miami, anyway, huh? I told you, I’ll set you up good—plenty for a legal eagle to do down there. What d’you say?”

  This was a ritual. For almost twenty years Tony Bones had been trying to get Ray Guma to work for him, and Guma had always refused. Guma was comfortable with Tony as a friend; he would not have lasted five minutes as his lawyer.

  They chatted about old times for half an hour, as the big limo went past the landmarks of their misspent youth—the parochial school, the canals, the warehouses, the bars, the grungy shoreline of Bath Beach. Tony poured a couple of scotches from the built-in bar.

  “What a shithole, when you get right down to it,” he said gesturing toward the streets. “The old neighborhood! My mother won’t move, can you believe it? I got a condo for her, on the beach—she won’t move.” He struck himself on the head with the heel of his hand. “Testard’! Like a rock, huh?” He sipped his drink, put it down, slapped his knee and said, “So, tell me, you said you had to talk to me, so talk. What can I do for you?”

  Guma pulled from his pocket a newspaper article roughly torn from the Daily News and gave it to his companion. It showed a small picture of Marlene Ciampi and the story of her disappearance.

  “She’s a friend of mine, a D.A. Somebody grabbed her a couple of days ago and we got a call from somebody who said he was from the families. My padrone, Karp, this is his girlfriend. He’s got a squeeze going on Sallie Bollano, Harry, all of that outfit. He figures they snatched Marlene to get him to lay off.”

  “That’s horseshit,” said Tony Bones.

  “You think I didn’t tell him? He don’t listen, he gets an idea in his head, all he wants to do is run right up the middle. Like your Mama. But the main thing is to find the girl.”

  “Yeah. A cute little thing, by the way. Who grabbed her, you think?”

  “She was on to somebody she thinks was selling hairless pussy on a major scale out of a fancy day-care operation. She was on her way to talk to the boss of the place when she disappeared.”

  “And the cops … ?”

  “The cops think what Karp thinks—it was a family thing. Also, this bitch who runs this joint—she’s got some kind of heavy juice downtown. Nobody’s going to roust her unless we can get some edge on the whole business.”

  Tony Bones chewed his lip for a moment and studied the traffic. Then he said, “So, what do you want me to do? I got no organization up here, but if it was a pro job, I could ask around …”

  “No—I need you to set up a meet.”

  “Yeah? With who, Big Sallie and them?”

  “Right, with them, and another with the Ferros.”

  “The Ferros? Well, well. You know, I used to be pretty tight with Charlie Chan.”

  “I remember. That’s why I thought of you, and when I heard you were in town again….”

  “This squeeze that your guy got on Sally—it have something to do with Vinnie Red?”

  “Yeah, we got them, the
whole family, the don, the kid, Charlie Tuna, Joey. We have the wheelman and a corroborating witness. We got a conspiracy charge, too—tapes, pictures. The Bollanos are finished.”

  The other man whistled softly through his teeth. “Very interesting. So what’s the deal—if you got ’em, why meet?”

  “I want them to help us find Ciampi.”

  “Uh-huh. Also interesting. So tell me: one, what makes you think they can help; two, what you gonna give them if they do?”

  Guma took a deep breath. “They can help because nobody sells ass in New York, of any kind, without some kind of cover from the families. So we need names, a feel for who’s buying, who’s selling—the whole setup. If I get some help from the Bollanos, I can probably swing it the don doesn’t have to go up. He’s over seventy, it must be—he doesn’t want to spend his golden years in Attica.”

  “And where do the Ferros come in?”

  “They’re interested in fucking the Bollanos because of Vinnie, but they don’t have the muscle for a serious war, not to mention that with Vinnie gone they lost half their brains and ninety per cent of their balls.”

  “Yeah, yeah, but where do they come in … ?”

  “The corroborating witness is one of their guys.”

  Tony Bones thought about this for a few seconds, and then his face broke into a wide grin, and he began to laugh, an almost soundless aspiration that could, Guma thought, be terrifying under the right conditions. The spasm over, Tony wiped his eyes with a handkerchief and said, “What a pisser you are, paisan! Are you ever on the wrong side—what a waste!”

  “So you gonna set it up?”

  “Are you kidding? I wouldn’t miss it. You’re gonna get the Ferros to set up your case on the Bollanos, and then you’re gonna walk the don. How about Harry? He gonna walk, too?”

  “Come on, Tony, you gotta leave me some room here.”

  “OK, kid—I’ll set it up. But I tell you—like my Mama says, ‘Non fa’ il passo lungo della gamb.’”