Criminal Conversation

by Ed McBain

  “It’s Greek.”

  “Greek, okay, whatever. I tell him okay, I’ll take the ring for the next week’s vig, but he still owes me the grand. Which is where we left it. In other words, I got the gun for a hundred and change, and the ring for fifty. But it’s a beautiful ring, Andrew, you got to admit that, once you get past it lookin’ rusty.”

  “In other words, you gave me a ring this fuckin’ Richie Palermo crackhead stole someplace …”

  “Andrew, I didn’t know it was stolen, I swear on my mother’s eyes!”

  “. . . which my friend takes into a jewelry store to see which part of the Roman Empire it came from …”

  “He said it was Roman, yeah.”

  “. . . and it gets back to me that it’s a Greek ring stolen from the Boston Museum. This Jew who owns the shop tells her it’s a stolen ring, Sal. Which if the man wanted to cause trouble, he could’ve informed the police, Sal. The fuckin’ ring is on a list, Sal, capeesh? You almost brought the fuckin’ cops to my door with your fuckin’ rusty stolen ring!”

  “I didn’t know it was stolen.”

  “Did you ask him?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Where did you think a crackhead got a Greek ring from the second fuckin’ century B.C. …”

  “He said it was Roman.”

  “. . . if he didn’t steal the fuckin’ thing? Tell me that, Sal.”

  “I don’t know where he got it. I didn’t ask him where he got it. I didn’t ask him where he got the gun, either.”

  “Where’s the gun now?”

  “Gone with the wind.”

  “Are they gonna trace that back, too?”

  “Nobody’s tracin’ nothin’ back, Andrew.”

  “How do you know that gun wasn’t used in a fuckin’ murder someplace?”

  “The gun is in some fuckin’ African country by now, don’t worry about the gun.”

  “All I have to worry about is the ring, right?”

  “You don’t have to worry about the ring, either. There’s no trouble here, Andrew, believe me. The gun’s gone, and I’ll take the ring off your hands. There’s nothin’ to worry about, okay?”

  “Just don’t ever bring me anything else you know is hot!”

  “I didn’t know it was hot. But I’m sorry.”

  “You want to have stolen goods traced to you, fine. Just don’t get me involved in it.”

  “I’m sorry, Andrew, I didn’t know it was stolen.”

  “Here, take your fuckin’ ring back.”

  “Yeah, thanks. I’m sorry about this, I really am.”

  “You owe me five grand.”

  “What?”

  “Five grand, Sal. For the ring.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That’s what the ring’s worth, five thousand bucks. That’s what the Jew appraised it for, and that’s what I want for it. For all the trouble you caused me.”

  “Hey, come on, Andrew, give me a …”

  “Five grand, Sal. By tomorrow morning.”

  “Jeez, Andrew …”

  “So I can buy a ring doesn’t have a pedigree.”

  “I really didn’t know the fuckin’ thing was …”

  “Goodbye, Sal.”

  “Jesus.”

  The snow started on Saturday morning and did not end until Sunday sometime. Everyone was calling it “the storm of the century,” though she seemed to recall heavier snowfalls when she was a child. She and Michael took Mollie to the park, and they sledded all afternoon and then had dinner at Fazio’s on Seventy-Eighth, one of the few places open for business that weekend. The streets, the sidewalks, the entire city looked clean and white. Tomorrow the snow would turn gray, she knew, and in the days after that a sooty black. But for now, the city was a wonderland, and she wished she could be sharing it with Andrew. She felt certain tomorrow would be declared a snow day. Could she possibly get away to meet him? Would Michael’s office be open, or would he be home, too? When would the streets be cleared of snow? When would traffic start moving again? Would Andrew be able to send the car for her on Wednesday? If not, would the subways be running? She could not bear the thought of a blizzard preventing her from seeing him as usual this week.

  When the phone rang on the Monday night following the weekend storm, Andrew knew at once that something was wrong. Oddly, the first thing he thought was She told her husband.

  “Hello?” he said.

  The digital clock on the nightstand beside the bed read 11:50 p.m. He was more than ever convinced that Sarah had broken under fire.

  “Andrew?”

  He recognized the voice at once. His cousin Ida. Uncle Rudy’s daughter. Oh, Jesus, he thought.

  “What is it?” he said.

  “Honey,” she said, “my father is dead.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” he said out loud. “What do you mean? I thought …”

  “Not from the cancer, Andrew. He died of a heart attack.”

  “Where are you?”

  “At the hospital. The emergency room doctor told me two minutes ago. You’re the first person I called,” she said, and suddenly she was crying.

  “Ida?” he said.

  Sobbing uncontrollably now.

  “Sweetie?” he said.

  “Yes, Andrew. Yes.”

  Still sobbing. Her voice overwhelmed by tears.

  “Where’s Bobby?”

  “Here with me.”

  “Put him on.”

  “Are you coming here, Andrew?”

  “Yes. Put Bobby on.”

  Bobby Triani came on a moment later.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “What happened?”

  “He went to bed right after supper, woke up around nine thirty with first a pain in his arm and his shoulder, and then chest pains, and like he’s burping, you know? Something’s repeating on him. He called Ida, told her what was happening, but he figured it was something he ate. A little acida, you know? Anyway, Ida got worried, you know how she’s been about him ever since her mother died. She tells me get dressed, we’re going over his house. This is now around a quarter to ten. We went there, the pains are really serious now, he tells us it’s like an elephant is standing on his chest. So I called the ambulance, and they took him straight to the emergency room. They were working on him for almost an hour, Andrew, but they couldn’t do nothin’, this stuff they gave him couldn’t dissolve the clot, the strepto whatever they call it.”

  “How’s Ida taking this?”

  “Hard.”

  “Tell her I’ll be right there.”

  “I will, Andrew.”

  “Tell me what hospital you’re at.”

  He debated calling Billy at home, figured by the time he got to Great Neck with the Lincoln, he could already be oh his way in the Acura. He was out of the house in ten minutes flat.

  The Cross Island was empty at this hour of the night.

  Snow was banked high on either side of the narrow cleared lanes. His headlights threw long bright tunnels into the darkness.

  In many respects, he’d always been closer to Ida than he had to his own sisters. Angela was four when he was born, and Carol was two. A sort of twinship existed between them before he arrived on the scene, and although they lavished hugs and kisses and cuddly language on their cute little baby brother, he found it difficult to break into their cozy little gang when he was older, and seeking true companionship.

  Ida, on the other hand, was born two months after he was, and she was the one who became his constant playmate and confidante. Uncle Rudy and Aunt Concetta lived close by, and the two brothers and their families were constantly in each other’s houses. On Sundays, too, the entire family gathered in the big old house on Long Island’s North Shore, where Grandma and Grandpa had moved when they closed the bakery
in Coney Island. Andrew’s sisters secretly signed with their hands in the deaf language they’d learned from the encyclopedia, but Andrew didn’t care because he had Ida.

  Dark-haired, dark-eyed Ida, who resembled her father more than she did her mother, with the same nose Andrew later saw on paintings made during the Italian Renaissance. Andrew was still a blond little boy at the time—his hair didn’t begin turning first muddy and then chestnut brown till he was twelve or thirteen—but Uncle Rudy used to call them “Ike and Mike,” and then invariably would add, “They look alike,” though they didn’t resemble each other at all. He was referring to their closeness, Andrew later realized.

  He’d lost touch with Ida over the years.

  As he sped through the night to where she now waited for him at the hospital, he remembered the time she broke his head with a pocketbook when they were both six and he’d been teasing her about something. Wham, she’d swung her little red leather bag at him, and the clasp hit him on the back of the head and drew blood.

  She’d cried harder than he had.

  Ike and Mike.

  She used to tell him his ears were too big.

  He used to tell her she had a big nose.

  Eek, what a beak! Is that a nose or a hose?

  She called him Mickey Mouse.

  He called her Pinocchio.

  He’d loved her to death.

  He burst into sudden tears, and did not know for a moment whether he was crying for his dear Uncle Rudy or for all the dear dead Sundays he’d spent running around Grandma’s house with, his cousin Ida.

  The front page of Tuesday morning’s Daily News blurted out the story in a single hurried breath:

  BOSS

  HOOD

  DROPS

  DEAD

  The Post, riven by internal problems, carried a headline that was equally blunt:

  GODFATHER

  DEAD

  Sarah saw the headlines when she picked up the Times at the newsstand on the Seventy-Seventh Street subway platform. On the ride downtown, she merely glanced at the Metro Section story about the death of some big-shot gangster who’d survived countless shootings only to die, ironically, of a heart attack. Which served him right, she thought, and turned the page.

  When she got off the station at Sixtieth Street, she walked to the phone booth on the corner of Lex and dialed Andrew’s number. Standing on a mound of snow as she leaned into the receiver, she heard his familiar voice telling her the office would be closed on Tuesday and Wednesday. She waited for the tone, said, “Hi, it’s me. I hope nothing’s wrong.” Then she fished more change from her purse and dialed the number in Great Neck. There was no answer at all there.

  The weekend’s heavy snowfall was beginning to melt. The sun was shining brightly. Tomorrow was St. Patrick’s Day, and spring would be here on Saturday. But she could only think she would not see Andrew this week.

  Barney Levin called them at home that Wednesday evening, while she was making dinner.

  “Happy St. Patrick’s Day,” he said. “Did you go march?”

  “No,” she said. “Did you?”

  “I always march,” he said. “With the gays,” he added. “Have you got a minute?”

  “If you want Michael, he isn’t home yet.”

  “No, this is a question for you,” he said. “I’ve got a couple of checks here written to a woman named Maria Sanchez. Both of them for a hundred bucks even, one dated …”

  “Yes, she’s a cleaning woman. Comes in twice a week. I pay her fifty for the day.”

  “This something new, Sarah?”

  “She started a few weeks ago. Why?”

  “Did you withhold anything from those checks?”

  “No. Was I supposed to?”

  “Is she an illegal alien?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Then don’t ask her. Pay her in cash from now on, and forget we ever had this conversation.”

  “Wouldn’t that be breaking the law?” Sarah asked.

  “Wouldn’t what be breaking the law?”

  “Come on, Barney. Michael’s a DA. I can’t do anything criminal.”

  “Then start deducting federal, state, and city withholding taxes, plus PICA. And make sure she’s covered for workmen’s comp, New York State unemployment insurance, and disability insurance, too. Either that, or fire her. Those are your choices.”

  “Thanks. I’m so happy you called.”

  “Who asked you to marry a DA?”

  “Listen, Barney, while I have you …”

  “Yeah?”

  “What do you know about a company named Carter-Goldsmith Investments?”

  “What company?”

  “Carter-Goldsmith Investments.”

  “Are they on the Big Board?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “What do you want to know about them?”

  “Just how they’re rated, what they do, who the principals are, that sort of thing.”

  “Thinking of investing with them?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Let me ask around.”

  “Thanks. I’ll call you from school tomorrow.”

  “Gee, can’t you give me till midnight tonight?” Barney asked.

  “Friday, then,” she said. “Good night, Barney.

  “Good night, Sarah. Say hello to Michael.”

  “I will.”

  Smiling, she put the phone back on the cradle.

  While waiting for Andrew’s return from wherever he was, she’d decided to write a little poem for him. She had already looked up “Andrew” in the name book she’d bought before Mollie was born, and had discovered the name was from the Greek and that it meant “manly, valiant, and courageous”—no surprise at all. The nicknames for Andrew were Andy, Tandy, Dandy, and Drew, which sounded like a vaudeville team, but which had given her a lot to work with.

  The name Farrell was from the Celtic, and it meant “the valorous one”—how did these people know he’d once jumped into the sea to save her daughter? On the other hand; Farrell was a variant form of “Farrar,” going all the way back to the Latin ferrains, which meant “a worker with iron,” or, more simply, “a blacksmith.”

  She had already written the first stanza of her opus; now she wanted to do a second stanza that referred to his professional life. All by way of surprising him when he returned, whenever that might be.

  As she checked the thermometer on the roast in the oven, she went over the first stanza again in her head:

  Andy, and Dandy, and Tandy and Drew.

  Which is my love, and is my love true?

  Farrell the Valiant or Farrar the Iron,

  Which is my hero, and which one is mine?

  What to invest in this best of all men . . .

  . . . which was where she needed something about Carter-Goldsmith. She made a mental note to call Barney from the teachers’ lunchroom on Friday, and wondered for perhaps the fiftieth time today when Andrew would be back.

  On Thursday morning, the Post and the News both carried stories of the big gangland funeral, complete with photos of obvious hoodlums carrying the coffin of their fallen leader. There were more flowers in view than at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens. What was not in view was the face of the third pallbearer on the right, blocked from sight by the ornate black coffin itself.

  The Times covered the funeral in its Metro Section, giving it no photographs, and very little space. Mollie scanned the story as she rode the bus uptown to a Hundred and Tenth Street, where she would transfer to the crosstown bus that would take her to Hanover. Apparently, there was speculation and concern about who would take control of what was now called the Faviola family, but which had once been known as the Tortocello family. The former boss of the Faviola family, a man named Anthony Faviola, was now in jail and the most recen
t boss, his brother, Rudy, had died of a heart attack this past Monday night. So who was to succeed to the throne?

  Ahhh, such an earth-shattering question, Mollie thought.

  The article went on to say that law enforcement sources now believed that someone named Andrew Faviola, the nephew of the recently deceased dead gangster, would likely be heading for the maximum security prison in Leavenworth, Kansas, to consult with his incarcerated father, the aforementioned Anthony Faviola, about succession in the Faviola family, which name tickled Mollie because it reminded her of the Farkel family on the Nick-at-Nite Laugh-In reruns.

  On the facing page there was a story about a big drug bust in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. Undercover detectives from the Thirty-Fourth Precinct had raided a supposed body repair shop where they’d recovered five hundred kilos of cocaine—according to the Times, this translated as eleven hundred pounds—and two and a half million dollars in cash. On the bottom of that same page, the Times ran a small item they obviously felt was related by subject matter if nothing else. A twenty-four-year-old man named Richard Palermo, described as a small-time drug runner, had been found dead in a basement room on Eighth Avenue. The two bullets in the back of his head led the police to believe this was a gangland slaying, more than likely drug-re—

  The bus was pulling into the curb at her stop. Mollie grabbed for her book bag and rushed to the exit door.

  Standing in the bitter cold at the phone on the southeast corner of Sixtieth and Park, Sarah first dialed Andrew’s Great Neck number, got no answer there, hung up, managed to retrieve her only quarter even though someone had fiddled with the return chute, and immediately tried the Mott Street office. She got his voice on the machine again.