Face of the Enemy

by Beverle Graves Myers

  Smoot shook his head, cigarette forgotten, gathering ash in his hand. “It was totally dark and quiet. I thought Arthur had forgotten and gone somewhere else.”

  “What time did you leave?”

  Smoot appeared to think. He dunked his cigarette in a cup that held an inch of cold tea. It extinguished with a hiss. “Just before eight. I had to step lively to make the curtain.”

  “What was the play?”

  When Smoot hesitated and creased his forehead, Bridges bustled in. “Junior Miss, wasn’t it? At the Lyceum. You told me about it.”

  That’s one place you didn’t accompany the boys, McKenna thought.

  “Yes, of course.” Smoot’s tone rallied a fraction. “I ended up sitting next to an empty seat in a packed house. Perhaps the usher would remember—Arthur and I are frequent patrons.”

  McKenna nodded. “When the doc sets a margin on the time of death, we’ll check that out. It’s possible Shelton was killed well before the play began.”

  “I se-e-ee.” Smoot stretched the word to three syllables. He rubbed his chin and took a moment or two to respond. “Well, I was grading exams here from mid-afternoon on.”

  “Anyone see you?”

  “I doubt it. The department empties out fast on a Friday afternoon.”

  “You take a cab down to the gallery?”

  A slight head shake. “Subway.”

  “Hmm.” McKenna clamped his hat on and asked, “Did Shelton often stand you up?”

  Professor Lawrence Smoot looked a little green around the gills. A wet, thick noise sounded from his throat, then, “No, Lieutenant. Never.”

  What’s this? McKenna questioned silently. The guy’s actually getting teary again. Maybe Smoot was feeling Shelton’s death more than he’d given him credit for.

  ***

  Outside, McKenna noted the young men strolling across the muted winter grass in groups of two or three. Their expressions were unnaturally serious, their tweeds and flannels dark. His eye was drawn to a Barnard coed whose red skirt flapped in the stiff breeze. Even this pretty young woman wore a frown.

  He took a deep, icy breath. The campus mood was grim for good reason. He’d tried to brush off Smoot’s poeticizing, but the words had struck him nonetheless: “What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?”

  McKenna had never been led to think a college education was for someone like him. Well, maybe City College, or, at a real stretch, Fordham. But he’d have been as likely to walk on the moon as attend the Ivy League Columbia. He didn’t even know if this university admitted Irish Catholics.

  War was much more democratic. Everyone was admitted—even these boys born to privilege.

  McKenna stopped at the ornate iron gates that divided the well-tended campus from busy Broadway. He glanced back toward the students.

  How many of these kids’ll end up on battleships in the Pacific? Flying bombers over Germany?

  How many will never come home?

  What passing-bells for those who die as cattle?

  Chapter Nineteen

  To Masako Fumi Oakley, Agent Bagwell looked like a man who had been put together by machine—the proper number of eyes and limbs, but no personality, no heart. Functional, but lacking a soul.

  Marched from her cell to a cramped, stale-smelling office by the sullen matron, Masako struggled to gather her wits. She had not slept since her arrest. All had been chaos, the ride to the Federal Building on Foley Square, where she had been marched into a holding cell with other frightened Japanese women. Then, later, the crowded van to the Battery and the cold ferry ride to this island prison. Everyone snatched from home, bewildered, lost, terrified.

  “Where are you taking me?” she had asked, as the FBI agents forced her from her apartment.

  “You don’t need to know,” was the response.

  “What have I done?”

  “That’s what we intend to find out.”

  Now, here was Agent Bagwell again, in this windowless room.

  “How is my husband?” She had to ask.

  He raised his gaze from a sheaf of papers. “What is your name?” he asked.

  “Masako Fumi Oakley. You already know that. How is Robert?”

  He stared at her with cold gray eyes. “Your husband is not my concern. Just answer the questions.” Smoke wafted straight up from a cigar in a flat metal ashtray. At a smaller desk, the stenographer’s pen went scritch, scritch.

  “Where were you born?”

  “Tokyo.”

  “Japan?”

  “Yes. Of course.”

  “Just answer the questions. Where were you educated?”

  “Moscow. Paris.”

  “In Japanese schools?”

  “Yes. Russian schools and French schools, also. Then I studied philosophy at the Sorbonne—before I went to art school.”

  The agent’s face was utterly blank. “When did you come to the United States?”

  “In 1934.”

  “Do you have any relatives in the Japanese government?”

  Masako sighed. “My father was ambassador to Russia, then to France. I don’t know what post he holds now.”

  “I do.” Bagwell sank back against the wooden chair. He reached out to tap the ash from his cigar but set it down without taking it to his mouth. “When was the last time you were in contact with him?”

  A lump in her throat thickened her response. “What does my father do?”

  “Miss Fumi, answer the question.”

  Oto-san. Oto-san. Even now you injure me. “We have not spoken for fifteen years. I was very young.”

  “Why not since then?”

  “He…he…my family disowned me.”

  “They disinherited you?”

  “That’s not strong enough for what disown means in Japanese culture. The word is engiri. I am no longer their daughter.”

  Scritch, scritch.

  “Why not?”

  I wanted to live my own life. I wanted to think my own thoughts. I wanted to study Western art. I wanted—

  “Answer the question.”

  “I wanted to be free.”

  Chapter Twenty

  “Last I heard, you were on your way to Foley Square, Lute.” Brenner peered through the windshield, navigating the black sedan through the maze of dim, narrow streets that led to the Bowery. “What did you get from the Feds?”

  “Nuts is what I got.” In the back seat, a sour taste rose in McKenna’s throat. “Some blowhard from Washington read me the rules and regulations. Those G-men won’t back down as long as Masako Fumi Oakley is in federal custody—where they’re concerned, national security trumps a local homicide any day. Now they intend to confiscate her paintings from the gallery, and I’ll be lucky if I get to interview the lady anytime before 1950. God, those guys piss me off.”

  He glanced forward just as the car’s headlights picked out a shuffling figure crossing against the light. “Brenner—look out!”

  The young detective smashed on the brakes. They were all thrown back, then slung forward.

  “Watch it, buddy—almost bought yourself a plot on Hart Island, there,” Brenner grumbled.

  “Skunked.” Patsy Dolan reset the toothpick dangling from one side of his mouth.

  Good guess, Pats, McKenna thought. You oughta go on Double or Nothing. With that brain you’d clean up. He didn’t say it, of course. Dolan did the best he could with what he had between his ears. Besides, the play of neon and shadow on the car’s windows didn’t encourage levity. With the Third Avenue El forming a rackety roof, and seedy hotels and dives crowding street level, the Bowery was the ultimate refuge for the destitute and derelict. Thank the Blessed Virgin he’d never had to pound a beat down here.

  McKenna turned his attentio
n back to the matter at hand: the ringleader of the art gallery picketers. Desmond Cox had picked him out of the mug book without hesitation. A low life named Herman Rupp who called the Bowery home.

  “This is it, Lute.” Brenner slid the car to the curb and turned off the ignition. Gold and black lettering backlit by a smoky interior announced Breslin’s Pool Hall—2 1/2 cents a cue. “From what I hear, Rupp’s so regular, he oughta be punching a time card.” Brenner twisted around and stretched a long arm along the seat back. “The pool hall from seven-thirty to eleven, Clancy’s Bar for a nightcap, then back to the Sunshine Hotel by midnight.”

  Dolan exposed his radium watch dial. “Eight o’clock on the nose, Lute.”

  “Okay.” McKenna unbuttoned his overcoat, touched two fingers to the pistol in its shoulder holster, a ritual gesture. “Take it easy, boys. Don’t wanna lose him out the back door.”

  The door’s recess stank of stale urine and cheap wine. They entered without announcing themselves. Breslin’s was just big enough for three tables, each flooded with light from a green-shaded ceiling fixture that harked back to the gaslight era. A battered bar held down one wall, along with a glass counter displaying boxes of cheap cigars. Slatted benches finished off the perimeter, sagging beneath flyspecked boxing posters.

  McKenna spotted Herman Rupp right away. The man lining up a shot on the middle table was no sap. More like a lug who preyed on the saps. He was fat but powerfully built, with a thick neck and short arms. Thin hair combed down with water made a manful effort to cover his shiny scalp, but the mottled dome was winning. His beard was tougher. There’d always be a blue shadow on that jaw, no matter how close the big guy shaved.

  Rupp, ignoring the three cops who’d fanned out like wolves surrounding a spring lamb, took his shot and sank it in a corner pocket. Then he reclaimed a long black cigar from the table railing and took a juicy suck. Meanwhile, his buddies blended into the shadows. From the corner of his eye, McKenna caught sight of the proprietor in a white apron slipping through a door to a back room.

  “Herman Rupp?” McKenna approached the table.

  “Who wants to know?” The pool cue clunked onto the felt-covered slate. Rupp crossed his arms over a corduroy jacket with the elbows poking through. Between the fingers of his right hand, the cigar stood up like a rigid dog turd.

  “McKenna. Homicide Squad.”

  Almost imperceptibly the yegg’s shoulders relaxed. Guilty of something, McKenna thought. But not murder.

  “Now, what could McKenna of Homicide want with a law-abidin’ citizen such as myself?”

  McKenna rattled off the dates and times of the picketing outside the art gallery.

  “So?” Rupp asked warily, applying the cigar to rubbery lips. “You here to run me in for not having a parade permit?”

  McKenna took his time, smiling all the while. “Swanky joint, that Shelton Gallery.”

  “Yeah. I guess.” His eyes narrowed, almost lost in cheek fat.

  “Somehow you don’t strike me as the kind of art lover who’d give a damn what Shelton hung on his walls.”

  “Maybe it’s Japs I don’t like—whether they’re droppin’ bombs or paintin’ posies.” Cigar ash rained on the floor.

  “Maybe someone who doesn’t like one particular Jap hired you to picket.”

  “Could be.” Rupp shrugged. “My memory ain’t what it used to be.”

  As if he had Rupp’s entire life history committed to three-by-five note cards, McKenna added the details of the payoff Cox had described. “Shelton’s dead,” he finished. “Murdered.” He took note of Rupp’s complexion—suddenly pale.

  “So, maybe you read about it in the papers,” McKenna pursued.

  Dolan and Brenner moved closer, crowding out what light there was.

  “That arty-pants fairy and me did business. That’s all. I ain’t got nothin’ to do with no murder.” Rupp reached for his cue again. Brenner got there first, stowed it in the wall rack.

  McKenna hitched one hip up on the table, the one that wasn’t aching like a bad tooth. “I see it like this.” He nodded, speaking slowly. “Shelton coughed up a wad and you called off your boys. You’d also had a nice look around his office, figured the guy was rolling in dough. Yeah…So, one night after he’d closed, you came back to shake him down for another coupla c-notes. Shelton said no. You fought. He ended up hitting his head on something.” McKenna swung his leg. “Probably something you brought along for the occasion.”

  Rupp’s dark eyes darted right and left, showing a lot of white. “I didn’t go to no gallery. I was right here bangin’ the balls around.”

  “I didn’t say which night Shelton was killed.”

  “It don’t matter. I ain’t missed a night here since I was laid up with flu last winter.”

  At a flick of McKenna’s left index finger, Dolan headed for the back room. Rupp’s gaze followed him.

  “You can remember all the way back to last winter?” McKenna drew his eyebrows toward his hat brim.

  “Yeah.” Rupp curled his lip.

  “Then you shouldn’t have any trouble recalling who paid you to picket in the first place. Somebody musta.”

  Rupp looked like a man who’d suddenly had ice water poured down his collar. “Like, maybe, somebody who had it in for Shelton, ya mean?”

  McKenna nodded. “Now you’re getting it.” He swept an arm toward the nearest bench. “Why don’t we step over here and talk about it? Nice and friendly like, from the very beginning.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Cabby paused in the butler’s pantry, carefully shifting the armful of cups she was trying to smuggle back into the kitchen without Helda’s notice.

  Damn. Soft sounds met her ears. The landlady must still be stirring around, wiping the counter or flipping through recipes. She’d blow a gasket if she saw all these cups—evidence of late night cocoas prepared on a forbidden hot plate.

  “Hey, who’s there?” A cracking voice called.

  Cabby relaxed with a shallow sigh—it was only the kid. Howie wouldn’t care if she and Louise were hiding an elephant in their room.

  “Just me,” she said, as she ferried the illicit cups to the sink and shook soap flakes out of the blue Lux box. “Where’s your mom?”

  Howie barely glanced up from the thick books spread out on the table. “Prayer service at church. Pastor called it special. You know—”

  “Oh, sure. I get it.” At Helda’s Lutheran church, the congregation would be mostly Germans. Cabby turned the taps, adjusting until the water was good and warm. Her thoughts ranged free while she scrubbed the cups under the rich white suds. The Reich hadn’t declared war yet, but everyone knew they would. Would the Lutheran flock be praying for a last-minute change of Hitler’s Nazi heart? Or simply asking God for the courage to withstand the inevitable?

  Howie was being unnaturally quiet. He must be worried, too. When war came, it wouldn’t be easy for a German kid in any American neighborhood.

  Cabby turned to see the boy’s nose buried in a book.

  “Doing your homework?”

  “Naw. I finished it.”

  “What’s so interesting, then?”

  Howie looked up, head tilted. His lips were tightened in a hard line, but his rounded jaw, still soft with baby fat, made him look young and vulnerable. Cabby could feel his distress from across the room.

  “Wanna talk about it?” She went over to him, dish towel in hand.

  “It’s Ma’s photo albums.” Howie flipped a page of snapshots with an impatient finger. “I’m trying to find somebody.”

  Cabby eased into a chair. Sepia-toned rectangles with pinked edges stared up from the dark page. A picnic by a lake, an elderly woman waving from a porch, a young woman holding a chubby baby. Cabby took a closer look. The woman’s light hair framed her bunch
ed cheeks as she gazed lovingly at the baby dressed in an old-fashioned christening gown.

  “That’s your mom,” Cabby cried, surprised at how young Helda had been. If that baby was Howie, the photo was taken only fourteen years ago, and Helda looked as if she might still be in her teens. “Is that you on her lap?”

  “Yeah.” Howie turned to another page. The pages were rough where photos and their adhesive brackets had been torn away. Tracing the outline of a missing snapshot, he said, “That one was Papa. After he took off, Ma practically shredded all his pictures.”

  Oh, so that explained the absence of husband and father. Poor Helda—leaving home and family for a new country, then her marriage gone bad. Cabby’s imagination flooded with images of a drunken Mr. Schroeder slapping Helda around, maybe even hitting Howie. But whatever had happened, the boy still missed his dad. His eyes were shiny with unshed tears.

  Howie gulped and said, “I thought I might spot Papa in a group photo, one Ma might’ve missed. But I’m running out of time. She’ll be home soon, and she’ll throw a fit if she sees I’ve drug these out.”

  “Let me help you.” Cabby reached for one of the leather-bound albums. “If you can describe him…what does your dad look like?”

  “Tall and skinny. Blond, curly hair that sticks up in the front.”

  Cabby grinned. “Kinda like yours. You must be a lot like him, huh?”

  “No,” Howie snapped, flipping sullenly through pages.

  Oh. “Okay.” Cabby opened her album. They worked in silence, studying the shots that contained several people. Memories of her own father’s outbursts and rants played in her head. If her mother’d had Helda’s backbone—the gumption to tell the big oaf to hit the road, the character to work hard and make a living for herself and her children—Cabby’s life would have been a lot different. She glanced at Howie’s bent head. The kid wanted to make a connection with his dad. Sure, she could understand that, but Howie might not know when he was well off.

  She continued paging through the album, but no tall, skinny man stood out. Howie hadn’t found anything, either. Eventually, footsteps sounded in the butler’s pantry, then paused. Not Helda. The landlady always let herself in through the back door.