Forced Entry

by Stephen Solomita

  “Please, please.” It was Al Rosenkrantz, who also recognized the import of Born Miller’s death and was anxious to add his considerable weight to the evening’s momentum. “May I please address the group? I’m due in the Bronx in an hour and I have several announcements to make.”

  “I guess we’re all glad to hear that Mrs. Park is going to be okay,” he began, ignoring the hostility focused on him, while noting that it came from sources besides Mike Birnbaum. “Nobody could feel worse about what happened in the building than Precision Management,” he continued, his eyes moving from face to face. “And nobody could be happier about what happened to the animal who did that to Mrs. Park than I am. Of course, you already know that the scum got into the Park apartment through a window by the fire escape and you might want to consider security gates for your own windows if you don’t already have them. Please don’t think we’re putting the entire burden on you, however. That’s what my announcements are about.

  “First, you’ll be glad to hear that by tomorrow afternoon, the Jackson Arms will have a full-time, resident superintendent. Richard James Walsh.” Now he was getting some smiles and he returned them, careful to make eye contact. As expected, the Irish name was reassuring. He’d originally planned to drag Richard Walsh with him, to display Richard’s whiter-than-white face to the whole bunch, but Walsh had begged off, claiming a family problem. “And the first thing Dick Walsh will take care of—you have my word on this—is that disgrace in the lobby, including the mailboxes and the locks. Also, starting day after tomorrow, you can use the compactor shoots to get rid of your garbage.

  “Second, we’ve decided to put security in the building. A twenty-four-hour doorman to watch the lobby and make sure that anyone entering the premises has a good reason to be here. There’ll be two shifts during the week, with relief on the weekends. These men will be dressed in blue uniforms and will carry mace and a nightstick; they’re being provided by Aback Security and they’ll remain in place until you people are satisfied that your homes are safe. We expect their presence to eliminate much, if not all, of the vandalism that’s been going on in the lobby.

  “Third, you’ll be pleased to know that we’ve served Salvadore Ragozzo, the leaseholder on the apartment where the alleged prostitutes live, with an eviction notice and we’ll see him in Tenant-Landlord’s Court by the middle of March. We’d like to have some of you tenants down to testify about what you’ve seen. I’ve already taken up a lot of time, so I won’t ask for volunteers tonight, but anyone who would like to testify should call me at my office. I’m leaving some business cards on the table here, so you won’t have any trouble finding me if you need me.” He tossed the cards on the table, fanning them out and thanking the Lord that he hadn’t been interrupted. In spite of the chilly room, he was beginning to sweat. Maybe if they didn’t ask too many questions, he’d get out of here before he fucked up another shirt.

  When Stanley Moodrow heard Sylvia Kaufman pronounce the title “Community Affairs Officer,” he nearly grinned. It was his own appointment to the position of Community Affairs Officer of the 7th Precinct that led to his retirement. Sending the CAO was equivalent, in his mind, to sending a form letter extending “deepest regrets.” Porky Dunlap’s speech, thrilling as it may have been to the tenants, had only added to his contempt, especially the claim about chemical tests, which, in his opinion, was just so much cop bullshit. In most cases, you had to beg the forensic unit to process that kind of evidence; sometimes it took months. It never took less than a week. Not unless the media was looking over the commissioner’s shoulder.

  Al Rosenkrantz was a more difficult problem. Sure, he oozed insincerity, but he worked for a landlord. He was supposed to look like he loved throwing old ladies into the street. What he actually offered, on the other hand, was a fundamentally sound way to protect a building and would probably be enough to keep the Jackson Arms secure. Walking from the subway, Moodrow had taken a good look around. In the course of a long career with the NYPD, he’d been everywhere in New York at one time or another and his memories of Jackson Heights involved a stable, middle-class neighborhood, with clean streets and well-tended shrubbery around the houses and apartment buildings. His stroll had convinced him that little, if anything, had changed and that the landlord, whoever he was, had good reason to protect the property. In any event, the tenants were apparently buying Al’s solution. Their only questions revolved around “when” and “for how long.”

  Moodrow left early, resolving to come back to visit Sylvia Kaufman at some later date. There was nothing he could do to help her with the organizing, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t go to work. He walked back to the Jackson Arms and checked the names in the tenants’ directory near the buzzers, running his finger down the line until he found the one he was looking for: Sheehan, 4A.

  “Fuck,” Pat Sheehan said, opening the door. “Whatta you got, eyes in the back of your head?”

  “Only for you, dear,” Moodrow returned. Stepping into the apartment, he made a quick, professional sweep of the living room, noting both the clean, inexpensive furniture and the shrunken man who lay quietly on the couch.

  “Don’t get comfortable, Moodrow, ’cause you ain’t stayin’ around. I’m only lettin’ you in here, so I can get rid of you. For permanent. I’m clean and I been clean since the day I got out. I’m a UPS driver and I don’t get involved in nothin’ worse than a few beers. If I wasn’t on parole, I’d spit in your face.”

  “Does that mean you don’t like me anymore? The amount of time we spent together before you went upstate, I thought we was real buddies.” Standing in the center of the living room, his hands in the pockets of his overcoat, Moodrow seemed very permanent. “But, hey, Pat, a lotta things have changed since you roamed the Lower East Side. Like, I’m not even a cop no more. I retired. Now I’m a private eye.”

  Pat Sheehan had no idea whether or not Moodrow was telling the truth, but he was certain that Moodrow’s primary aim in coming out to Jackson Heights had nothing to do with him or with Louis Persio. Not that Moodrow wasn’t dangerous. When you’re on parole, everyone connected with law enforcement is dangerous, because you can be remanded to custody on the mere word of a cop (or a parole officer after a cop whispers into his ear)—incarcerated and held without bail pending a parole hearing which might or might not come up before some con shanked you while you were asleep.

  “So whatta you supposed to be? The Equalizer? I mean, you used ta be a fat Dirty Harry, but you ain’t a cop no more, so you must be somethin’ new.”

  “Fat? Get offa my face. And the fucking Equalizer’s at least ten years older than me. I’m more like the Thin Man. You know: elegant, suave, cosmopolitan. My whole life I wanted a Waspy girlfriend called Nora, but all my old ladies came from little countries between Germany and Russia.” Moodrow, uninvited, sat in an armchair near the kitchen and stretched his legs out. “Why don’t you introduce me to your friend?”

  Sheehan thought about it for a moment, trying to detect any trace of sarcasm in Moodrow’s request. He found none and went on to make the introduction. “This is my lover. Louis Persio. Louis, this is Stanley Moodrow from the 7th Precinct. Formerly from the 7th Precinct. Now retired.”

  Pat Sheehan didn’t bother to add the facts about Persio’s condition and Moodrow had seen far too many cases of AIDS to have to ask. Persio nodded slightly at Moodrow. The right side of his face was covered with a flaking eczema and, though his eyes were bright with fever, they also burned with intelligence and with the knowledge of impending death. It wouldn’t be long, Moodrow speculated, until Pat Sheehan was free of whatever had made him take up this burden.

  “You been living here awhile, Patrick?” Moodrow asked.

  “I been here more than two years, Stanley,” Sheehan replied. “And I’m willing to talk, if you came here to help out Sylvia Kaufman. But not if you came here to break my balls. Bustin’ me was one thing. Hasslin’ me is another. I’m fuckin’ clean and I plan to stay that way.” />
  As soon as Moodrow understood that Pat Sheehan and Louis Persio had been in residence for more than two years, he dismissed them as part of Sylvia Kaufman’s problem. Moodrow had known Pat Sheehan when Sheehan was just another junkie rampaging through the Lower East Side, had arrested him and testified at his trial. Sheehan was not a junkie anymore. He was much too healthy for that. But he would know who was operating in the building. He would see his fellow tenants with eyes as discerning as Moodrow’s.

  “I’m here because Sylvia Kaufman is my girlfriend’s aunt,” Moodrow explained. “Like I said, I’m retired, but I do private jobs. The other night, I’m laying in the bed with Betty and she starts telling me about her aunt who lives in Queens. Would I go and help her out. Hey, when you’re retired, you don’t have nothing but time, right? Anyway, to make a long story short, all I really know is there was a sexual assault here a few days ago and there’s whores and drugs in the building. Where I come from, that ain’t much to complain about, but like I said, it’s a favor.”

  Pat Sheehan, the only one still standing, strolled across to the refrigerator and opened two cans of Coors, handing one to Moodrow, before he took his seat. “So whatta ya want from me?” he asked. There was no resentment in his voice.

  “I wanna know what the fuck is going on,” Moodrow answered. “And I’m not gonna find out by asking the asshole cop who showed up tonight. That fat fuck only knows from bullshit. That’s his job. Bullshit.”

  “You think the other one is better? The one from the landlord?” Sheehan, who’d passed Porky Dunlap on his way out of the church, was openly skeptical.

  Moodrow shrugged. “At least what he said makes sense for the building.”

  Pat Sheehan leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “Maybe you lost your cop brains since you retired, Moodrow, but that scumbag is layin’ down a carpet of shit deeper than the one in Donald Trump’s living room.”

  “So he’s bullshittin’, so what could you expect from a landlord? I don’t wanna waste my time with him. I need to know what’s going on inside the building.”

  “Whatever you want, Moodrow.” Pat Sheehan pulled on his beer and looked across at Louis Persio who was following the conversation closely. He waited for Persio to give a slight nod before he proceeded. “At first there was just the mailboxes and the locks on the front door. They went out about a month ago. Then this pimp sets up two pigs in an apartment on the first floor. The pimp, by the way, is an oily fuck that’s so oily no one could rent to him without knowing what he was. Next thing, the whores are givin’ blow-jobs in the hallway and comin’ on to the tenants. Now you got two dopers set up in the apartment right across the hall from me. They must’ve made me for a junkie, because they did everything but jab the fuckin’ spike into my arm. Right now they’re dealing dope and crack to a few steady customers, but they told me they were gonna open up the whole neighborhood to the glories of cocaine.”

  “And there’s only two of them?” Moodrow asked.

  “Two that I know of, but there’s a lot of vacant apartments. That sweet landlord you like so fuckin’ much’s been dumpin’ out the Asians and the illegals as fast as he can check the leases. With that many empties, there’s gonna be squatters. Might be already, but I ain’t seen ’em.”

  “What about the rape? What’s that all about?”

  “A burglary,” Sheehan explained. “Dude’s takin’ off the apartment when the old lady comes home. Maybe she surprised him or maybe he was too stoned to run. Either way, he belted her out and then took advantage.”

  “With the kid watching,” Moodrow added.

  “Yeah,” Sheehan agreed, “with the kid lookin’. But it don’t figure to connect with the whores and the dope. Jackson Heights ain’t got much street crime, but it does have burglaries. People here got money and that makes them prey for the people who don’t. So what’s new?”

  Suddenly, Moodrow, his course of action firmly established in his own mind, stood up and prepared to leave. “Okay, Pat. I’m gonna go see if I can head this off before it turns into an epidemic.”

  “Is that a joke?” Louis Persio spoke for the first time.

  “What?” Moodrow asked, confused.

  “About the epidemic?”

  “You’re too sensitive,” Moodrow replied. “If you think I got a problem with you or your condition, you’re mistaken. The only problem I got is with my girlfriend and this building.” He hesitated momentarily, measuring his thoughts. “See, I have this deep conviction that if I don’t save these poor, helpless tenants, who just happen to be going through what half the people in this city live with every fucking day, my old lady is gonna walk away from me and I like her too much to take a chance.”

  “I want you to do us a favor,” Persio continued, ignoring Moodrow’s reply. “Do us a big favor and we’ll be your eyes and ears. We’ll be rats.” He began to cough, his emaciated body seeming to ripple beneath the green plaid blanket covering him. Sheehan rushed over to help, but Persio shook him off. “I waited a long time in my life to become a rat,” he said.

  “Why don’t you just tell me what you want,” Moodrow said neutrally. The idea of a trade-off appealed to his cop sensibility.

  “If Pat’s parole officer thinks we’re part of what’s going down here, he’ll break us up. At the least. Convicts on parole aren’t supposed to room with convicted felons. Even if the convicted felon is dying. Even if they’re in love.” He stopped abruptly, trying to read something in Moodrow’s blank face, then settled for the neutrality. “Talk to the parole officer. Tell him we’re childhood sweethearts. Tell him we’re Christian fundamentalists who got saved in the joint. Because we can’t move. There’s nobody who’d take me, even if we could afford another apartment, and I’m not too keen on doing the hospice bit while I can still make it at home.”

  EIGHT

  “I’M SORRY WE DIDN’T get a chance to talk before the meeting,” Sylvia said. Though she didn’t particularly like Betty Haluka’s new boyfriend (he was too deliberately inscrutable), Betty had—for one brief summer while her mother was ill—become a second child, and so, for Betty’s sake, Sylvia was polite.

  “No big deal,” Moodrow said, his eyes glued to the corner connecting the hallway to the lobby. “You had your hands full.”

  “You used to be a police officer?”

  “Yeah. Thirty-five years. Made it up to the detectives. Say, do me a favor, Sylvia. Move a little bit to the right so’s I could watch the lobby. I’m waiting for someone.”

  Sylvia looked at him closely. It was almost eleven o’clock and the rest of the tenants—the ones who’d attended the meeting, anyway—were safely inside their apartments. So who was he waiting for?

  When it became apparent that Moodrow wasn’t about to volunteer the information, Sylvia changed her tactics. “What did you think of Sergeant Dunlap?” she asked. “Do you think he can help us?”

  “Forget about him,” Moodrow said evenly. “He’s a shmuck. That’s why they made him Community Affairs Officer.”

  “I don’t understand?”

  “Community Affairs is a public relations post. It don’t have anything to do with the job. The only help Dunlap could give is persuading the captain to assign a few anticrime guys to work the building. And that’s not too likely, because the problem isn’t bad enough. Not when you look at what’s going on in South Jamaica or the Bronx. Maybe if you put together a strong tenants’ association, you could persuade one of the real cops to help you. The tenants’ patrol is a very good idea. Just be careful who you pick, because mostly they come around for a few shifts and then get bored. Stay at home and watch the football game.” Moodrow, though he noticed the crestfallen look on Sylvia Kaufman’s face when he told her about Dunlap, recited his speech matter-of-factly. Better she should know the truth. He was a great believer in truth. “And try to get that pastor at that church you were in tonight to call the precinct; he probably knows the captain by his first name. The precinct commander at the One One Five, by t
he way, is George Serrano. He’s Catholic and he’ll most likely be influenced by the priest.”

  “And Rosenkrantz?” Sylvia persisted. “Is he worthless, too?”

  “Nobody’s worthless,” Moodrow explained. “But you gotta know who’s gonna help if it gets bad and you could never count on the Community Affairs Officer. You can’t count on the landlord, either, but what Rosenkrantz says will most likely get the building back together. If only because Rosenkrantz has an interest in keeping the place up. I had a talk with Pat Sheehan before I came down here…”

  “You don’t think Pat is part of this?”

  “Actually, I don’t. But he knows what’s going on. He told me about the whores and he says there’s a couple of guys dealing dope in the apartment across the hall from him. Which is what I figure the problem is all about. Crack is so addicting, the dealers feel they can make any neighborhood into a supermarket if they can find a few locals to sample the goods. There’s always been drugs in the bars on Roosevelt Avenue. Coke and speed, mostly. A little dope. Now it’s moved over a couple of blocks.”

  “Does that mean you think it can be taken care of?”

  Moodrow shifted his glance just enough to look at Sylvia. The lady was very tired, that was obvious, and he was tempted to reassure her the way parents reassure their children after nightmares. “Look, Sylvia, I don’t have no psychic powers and I left my crystal ball at home, so you shouldn’t take what I say like it comes from the Pope. But I got every reason to think this situation could be taken care of. That’s what I’m doing here. I’m waiting to have a little talk with a Chinese kid named Joey Yang who lives in 4B. I think I might be able to persuade him to move out.”