Law and Order

by Uhnak, Dorothy

  The legend on the dirty glass door spelled out “The A-OK Trucking Corporation” and Morrison hadn’t the slightest idea who the hell the office belonged to but it was immediately clear to him that the location was selected because it afforded the utmost privacy and whatever was going to pass between them required this kind of setting.

  Morrison ducked his head forward over his lighter, blew out smoke from the back of his throat and looked up sharply as two men came from the inner office.

  Kevin O’Malley had a discreet but definite grip on Juan Jesus Rodriguez and he helped him to step rapidly into the room and to confront Johnnie Morrison.

  “This the man?” Kevin asked tersely. Apparently, he applied some greater physical pressure on the man, for there was a gasp and Kevin said louder, “I didn’t hear you. Talk.”

  “Yes, yes, si, yes, that’s the man,” Rodriguez said quickly.

  Deputy Chief Inspector Brian O’Malley turned from his perch on the corner of the cluttered, battered old desk. “This is the man who what?” he asked. “Spell it out.”

  Juan’s voice was dry and his tongue clacked but he spoke quickly and clearly with the weight of a pound of pure heroin held over him. “This here is the man who arrested me last month. And took my gun away from me.”

  Brian’s eyes moved to Morrison, fixed on Morrison, caught the uncontrolled paling, the tension, the doomed awareness of what was being done to him. He spoke to Rodriguez but looked steadily at Morrison. “Tell me the make and caliber of the gun this officer took away from you when he arrested you for possession of narcotics. Tell me the registration number.”

  Rodriguez reeled off the make, the caliber and the serial number.

  “You ready to testify to this in court?”

  Kevin moved suddenly and Rodriguez’ head bobbed up and down. “Yeah, okay, sure, yeah, Christ, you break my arm there.”

  Brian jerked his head and Kevin took Rodriguez from the room.

  Johnnie Morrison’s lips barely moved as he said, “That fucking little shit.”

  Brian said coldly, “That fucking little shit can connect you to a double murder, Morrison.”

  Slowly, Johnnie Morrison inhaled, exhaled, studied the smoke before his eyes, fingered the diamond ring on his pinky carefully, then looked up at Chief O’Malley and shrugged slightly. It was a gesture of acceptance, nonchalant, an almost elegant acknowledgment of his predicament. It was a mild salute, one operator to the other. He turned his situation over in his mind, examined it minutely, quickly, expertly for possibilities. In spite of the heavy, thick, lumpish roiling of his intestines, he felt reasonably calm. He knew that something could be salvaged, some bargain struck. Hell, that was why they were meeting in this shithouse of an office instead of at the district attorney’s.

  He turned his candid slate eyes on Brian, held his hands palms up, questioningly.

  “Okay, Chief. What is it you want?”

  “We’re going to do some house cleaning, Morrison,” Brian said.

  Aaron Levine took off his uniform jacket and hung it on the rack in his office. The collar left marks along his throat; it had always been just a bit too tight and he had felt slightly choked all through the funeral service, but he had stood at military attention along with the others and was, as always, impressed by the precision and impact of the ritual.

  There was so much work to do that he didn’t know where to begin. The mayor had acted swiftly in response to the television allegations of widespread corruption. He appointed an interim committee with which Aaron would have to work. He’d tried to speak to Ed Shea, to ask Ed what the story was, but Ed had avoided him at the funeral service. In fact, he’d looked sick. Aaron thought back to Brian O’Malley’s request that he look into allegations of a pad in Caputo’s division. He’d turned it over to Ed Shea directly because Aaron learned a long time ago that there were certain people you let handle things for themselves; they leave you alone, you leave them alone. Now, for the first time, he wondered, without much emotion, if Ed Shea had been on the take.

  It used to be a patrolman would shake a shopkeeper down for five, four of which was passed on to the sergeant and distributed from his hand up. Okay, hell, the shopkeeper got an extra bit of protection, an extra presence. Usually they didn’t complain about it; it was like death and taxes, inevitable. But this whole ritualized thing that was being alleged on TV and in the newspapers and on the radio, it could split the Department wide open. Aaron Levine, for one, did not particularly care one way or the other. His main goal had been to just stay in place long enough to get out at three-quarter pay. He’d never touched a dirty dollar, did his best to stop it when he could, either through direct action or a word to the wise. Like a word to Ed Shea. And if Ed Shea was someone wise, God, Aaron couldn’t understand a man like that. And this whole thing with the young patrolman they buried today, Peter Caputo. How his death could be caught up in this whole corruption allegation was beyond Aaron.

  The buzzer interrupted his thoughts and he depressed the button on the intercom. A nervous patrolman’s voice advised him, “Chief O’Malley is here to see you, sir.”

  “Oh, yes. Yes, send him in.”

  Aaron stood up to greet Brian O’Malley, who pointedly ignored his outstretched hand. Aaron immediately felt guilty of some terrible offense, some mistake in some unknown code. God, these hard Irish faces; no matter where he encountered them, under what circumstances, they made him feel an intruder.

  Wordlessly, O’Malley took a large manila envelope from beneath his arm, opened it, withdrew some lined legal papers which were covered with small neat words: entries, listings. He dropped the sheets to Aaron’s desk.

  “What is this, Chief O’Malley? This something for the meeting we have with Chief Pollack this afternoon?”

  O’Malley dropped into the chair in front of Aaron’s desk, leaned back, pressed the sole of one shoe on the edge of Aaron’s desk. His face had a frozen, waiting expression, tight and expectant.

  Aaron just glanced at the first page, skimmed the second, knew immediately what it was: a complete record of Aaron Levine’s career in the New York City Police Department. A line-for-line report of where he was assigned, what tour of duty, what scheduled hours of work, and aligned with that information was a complete rundown of the time, days, hours that Aaron Levine spent in various institutions of higher learning. During working hours, on city-paid time, in violation of not only departmental regulations but in the commission of fraud involving enough money to be classified a felony.

  Aaron sat down behind his cluttered desk. His hands moved restlessly over the papers; stupid questions filled his head relative to how this information had been put together so precisely. How could they always manage to compile things when he found it so difficult? What did any of this have to do with him, now, at this time, at this point, after all these years?

  Finally, O’Malley pressed with the sole of his foot and the heavy desk moved just slightly, just an inch or so, but enough to make Aaron look up.

  “Put your papers in, Levine,” O’Malley said quietly. “Get going on it today. Advise Chief Pollack you’re retiring at the meeting today.”

  Aaron spread his hands over the record of his life. Why at this particular point? His mouth opened, but there were too many questions and not enough protestations. O’Malley’s eyes were dark and cold. He rubbed his thumb under his lower lip for a moment, considered Levine, seemed to be giving great thought to something, then finally said, “I really don’t believe you know what the fuck has been going on. I really think you’ve been nothing but a goddamn patsy but the shit is going to hit the fan and my job is to keep it from flying too far. We’re all going to have to testify before the mayor’s commission, Levine. Now if all you want to be accused of is extreme incompetence”—he jutted his chin toward the documentation of Aaron Levine’s double life—“you get your papers in. I don’t care what the fuck you tell Chief Pollack. Tell him you feel you’ve let the Department down by not being on top of
this whole pad deal. Tell him you got an ulcer or a sudden urge for country living or whatever the hell else. But get your papers in today.”

  Aaron nodded. He watched Brian O’Malley shove himself back from the desk, stand up, shake his head with an expression of disgust and leave the office. Aaron sat at his desk, the work piled up, the demand for reports from the Chief Inspector and the Commissioner and the demands for explanations.

  Thirty-three years and he sat surrounded by his own ignorance, finally beaten by them. An odd thought struck Aaron: It was the father, Brian O’Malley, who had made it all possible for him. It was the son, Brian O’Malley, who brought it all to an end.

  Brian felt absolutely nothing toward Aaron Levine; for some strange reason, intuition maybe, he believed that Levine knew nothing at all about the corruption within the Department. He didn’t even feel anger at Levine’s total incompetence, just a vague, hollow sense of disgust.

  He caught sight of Ed Shea before Ed was aware of his arrival at the small, intimate Third Avenue spot they’d agreed upon. He watched Ed down the shot, hold his head still for a moment, then react with just a slight, barely discernible shudder. Brian turned toward the bar, held up two fingers, V sign, nodded toward the booth in the rear where Ed sat.

  Ed looked up, face neutral, but his eyes gave him away; there was a searching, questioning, puzzled intensity, as though if they remained wordless and if he studied Brian thoroughly, he would find the answers to all the terrible questions he would rather not frame.

  The waiter brought the drinks and Ed seemed somewhat surprised, reacted slightly, then tilted his toward Brian, went carefully on this one, needing to keep clearheaded.

  “Well, Bri,” Ed Shea said, “I’m here.”

  Brian searched for Ed Shea, for thirty years of friendship, but he was a stranger, curious, expectant, uncertain. Brian rubbed his hand roughly over his eyes, felt the weary exhaustion of too much betrayal, too much realization. He hoped Ed would make it easy for both of them; Christ, it was little enough to hope for at this point.

  Brian grasped the tall, cool glass within his palm, studied it for a moment, finally raised his eyes to meet Ed’s. Softly, he said, “Throw your papers in, Ed. Today.”

  That small shudder, as though he’d just downed a powerful shot of raw liquor, uncontrolled, barely noticeable, except that Brian noticed it, took Ed Shea for a second; then he sloughed it off, adjusted his handsome mask, pulled the tight smile, showed the good white teeth, head held to one side, flushed face almost relaxed because he was a pretty good actor.

  “Now why would I do that, Brian?” he asked lightly, as though this was all part of banter, a continuation of years of insult, playful banter between friends who knew and could penetrate each other with the confidence of knowledge.

  Brian wanted to do two things simultaneously. He wanted to rise from his seat opposite Ed, to strike out at him, to batter his face to pulp, to physically, powerfully, personally destroy him; and he also wanted to throw an arm over Ed Shea’s shoulder, clasp him, tell him, “Christ, what a stupid mistake I almost made.”

  He did neither; didn’t move; instead forced himself to become pure policeman, observing the slightest giveaway sign, capable of penetrating, noting, calculating, evaluating the slightest gesture, blink of eyes, movement of fingers, twitch of lips. Coldly, impersonally alert for the reaction, Brian O’Malley said, “We got Johnnie Morrison.” There was no reaction, none whatever. “We got him so cold that he is waiving immunity and is willing to testify before the grand jury. It’s going to be one hell of a circus, with all the publicity and committees, but it’s going to be done the only way we can still at least salvage something, Ed. He’s going to detail the whole pad operation. All the way to the top of the heap.”

  Nothing showed except some slightly relaxed breathing, which confirmed what Brian had somehow anticipated, that Ed Shea had been smart enough, clever enough, careful enough, corrupt enough to keep himself so far removed from the actual operation that when and if it ever hit the fan, he couldn’t be touched.

  Ed moved his head slightly to one side, shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll do the best job for the Department that can be done, Brian.”

  “I’m doing the best job I can, Ed.” He stood up slightly enough so that he had access to his rear trouser pocket, removed an envelope, sat down again. He held the envelope between his two hands for a moment, as though the act of holding it might somehow negate the contents. He felt an actual physical reluctance until he again confronted the man across the table from him. He tossed the envelope to Ed Shea.

  “These are photostats, Ed. The original and other photostats are in safekeeping.” Brian pulled himself from the booth and gave in to the deep savage urge to strike out. He grasped Ed Shea by the lapels of his suit jacket, leaned close enough to inhale the odor of fear, clenched his hands tightly enough to hold back the violence that pounded through his chest and head and arms. “You put in your fucking papers by this afternoon or so help me God, if I have to lie from here to next Christmas to do it, I’ll box you in on the murder of that poor sonuvabitch Caputo.”

  He didn’t use the key. After all this time, he pressed his finger on the small black brass-encircled buzzer and listened as the chimes echoed throughout the apartment, softly, melodiously, insistently. He stared straight at the small round mirror, caught the slight change in its consistency as she peered at him before opening the door.

  She was more beautiful than he had ever seen her: sleek, scrubbed, dark hair pulled back from her face casually with a clip. She’d been doing exercises and she wore a dancer’s leotard and tights. She was one long sinuous lean tight fine-boned vision of perfection.

  “Brian? Why did you ring the bell?”

  He leaned heavily against the door and felt his age and his weariness and his deep regret as he looked at her. She was so lovely. Finally, he reached into his jacket pocket, fingered the key he had detached from the others, then gently took her right hand and put the key in her palm and closed her hand within his with a gentle pressure.

  Karen whirled from him, tossed the key furiously to the floor.

  “Goddamn it to hell, Brian, come on! You can’t be this childish. You absolutely cannot be this stupid damn childish. It has nothing to do with you and me.”

  All the way to her apartment, in the taxicab, he thought of what he would say to her but all of it was pointless. None of it would penetrate; none of it would be comprehensible to her.

  Basically, he finally decided, it was the difference between them, between their time. Her world was right now, this minute, the quick and flashing sensation devoid of sentimentality or ties of any kind. She was riding the crest of her own career; singlehandedly, she had caused the explosive public scandal, she had accomplished the great coup. Her producers would take her more seriously now, would give her better time slots, more operating expenses.

  Her public outrage, night after night, had been really good: controlled, righteous, determined. But beneath the performance, Brian knew there was a total, cold lack of concern. The whole area of police corruption was something that would play itself out and she’d move to whatever was more timely, more exotic; on to the next great story.

  There was no more connection between them; it had always been tenuous and based on their differences rather than their similarities. They had amused and puzzled and delighted each other and through each other themselves. But it was the basic difference now which separated them: her insistence that nothing between them had changed, that they could remain aloof and remote and apart from something that really meant nothing to her and that was in the process of destroying a part of him.

  “Why don’t you at least say something, for Christ’s sake? Don’t stand there looking so...so...God Almighty, you knew I was after the story. That Caputo boy came to me because your people failed him. I handled it the way I had to handle it, Brian.”

  She stopped speaking abruptly, held her long hands behind her neck, stared down for
a moment, closed her eyes, raised her face to him.

  “There’s no way to keep it under wraps, Brian. I’ve been served with a subpoena from the grand jury. God, I’ve been interviewed by two assistant district attorneys and some people from the mayor’s committee have been calling. Bri, they’ve given me an hour, prime Sunday-afternoon talk-show time, this week. Work with me.” The idea suddenly encompassed her. “You could come off looking good, get the Commissioner to come on the show. Brian, it doesn’t have to all fall apart. You could be instrumental in salvaging something if you’d work with me.”

  He knew exactly which part of her was real, which part performance. He was oddly touched at the slight edge of panic which crept into her voice at his failure to respond. That was real. He watched and knew exactly when the realization came to her that she wasn’t going to have it her way. That in gaining whatever she felt she had gained professionally, she’d lost something too.

  She came to him, anger and panic exposed; she pulled his head down, forced her lips on his as though this was the answer to everything, this was what put them in a separate existence, apart, could maintain them and keep them untouched.

  He responded because her mouth was familiar, had been part of him for two years, and because he was tired and drained and emptied and in need of safety. She pressed her lean body against him, down the length of him; her hands slipped inside his jacket, encircled him, moved into him. He felt her sigh of relief as she rubbed her cheek against his, whispered something about his needing a shave.

  Finally, he pushed her back, held her by the shoulders, examined her with deep regret.

  “You want me,” she insisted in a husky whisper, “damn you, you know you do, Brian.”

  “What I want and what I get are two different things, Karen. It would be just like making it with a whore.” He reached his hand to her cheek, gently fitted his palm to the contour of her face and said quietly, sadly, “That would really be a lousy last memory for both of us, baby.”