Speak of the Devil

by Richard Hawke

  “I was under the impression that when you signed on, you became part of God’s family. So to speak.”

  “That’s true. But it doesn’t mean you forsake your secular family. We’re still very much in the world, Mr. Malone. As you can see, many of us don’t wear habits anymore. Not to deny tradition, by any means, but we’re not relics, after all. At least we hope we’re not. We’re attempting to bridge the more traditional aspects of who and what we are with the fact of our being in the modern world. God is in my heart. He is not in my clothes.”

  She had just started to lift the teapot and had to set it down swiftly as she burst into laughter. “Oh, my. Well, I surely didn’t mean it to sound that way!” She laughed again, then reached once more for the teapot. She shot me a look. “I think the tea has had time to sleep, don’t you?”

  THE NAME ANGEL RAMOS MEANT NOTHING TO SISTER MARY RYAN. I showed her the picture. She studied it thoughtfully. “He’s a criminal,” she said. “That’s what these numbers mean. He’s been arrested.”

  “That’s right.”

  “What did he do?”

  “As far as what they’ve nabbed him for? Robbery, assault, theft.”

  She looked up from the picture. “And what he hasn’t been ‘nabbed’ for?”

  “I believe he’s the person behind the Thanksgiving Day shootings and the bombing. I also think he’s kidnapped the deputy mayor. The package that Gary Harvey brought by. It contained… Someone cut off two of the deputy mayor’s fingers. I think the man in that picture did it.”

  The nun paled. “Oh, my.”

  “There’s an ultimatum: ten million dollars in exchange for Mr. Byron’s freedom. Everything’s pointing to Angel Ramos.”

  Sister Mary glanced back at the photo. “He looks menacing.”

  “That’s a good way of putting it.”

  “He must be in torment.”

  “Maybe so. But what’s more important right now is that we stop him before he can put anyone else in torment.”

  She set the picture faceup on the table, next to the tea tray, then changed her mind and turned it over. “We’ll do anything we can, Mr. Malone. But I don’t honestly know what that is. Besides to pray, of course.”

  “We’ll take that. But what we really need is to locate Ramos. The piece that isn’t fitting in is why it is that Ramos went through the whole song and dance Saturday with having us drop the money at the Cloisters, then calling you in. At the end of it all, we still had the money. If it was all just to deliver the package and let us know that he had Philip Byron… it doesn’t make any sense. The convent is nowhere near Ramos’s territory. But there has to be some sort of connection. There has to be a link.”

  “I can’t imagine what it could be,” Sister Mary said.

  “How many nuns are in residence here?” I asked.

  “Normally? Fifteen.”

  “Why ‘normally’? You don’t have fifteen at the moment?”

  “We had a loss recently.” She had picked up her teacup, but she didn’t take a sip. She looked past the cup, off into space. “You probably heard of it. Unfortunately, the papers played it up. More and more, that seems to be what they do.”

  “When was this?”

  “Oh, just last month. Near the end of October.”

  “You don’t mean the Sister Suicide?”

  Sister Mary lowered her teacup into her palm. “You might understand, we’re not exactly fond of that term. It’s terribly dehumanizing.”

  We were referring to a story that the papers had made hay with for nearly a week, just before Halloween. A nun in full habit had been found by a morning jogger in a wooded section of Prospect Park. She had apparently slit both her wrists. A suicide note had been left next to the body. As Sister Mary said, the papers had jumped all over it. Sister Suicide. I recalled the photo that had accompanied the story. It was taken when the woman was in her early twenties, before she joined the sisterhood. She was pretty, and that helped give the story legs for a few extra days. Attractive young nuns slitting their wrists in a public place aren’t your everyday news story. The coverage had been typically sensational and morbid. I had to admit, it had hooked me a little.

  Sister Mary Ryan said, “Margaret was a terribly troubled young woman. Of course, guilt is a useless emotion, but we’re only human. It’s there. All of us at the convent feel it. We can’t help but contemplate that we failed Margaret. Her difficulties were known to us. From the moment she arrived at Good Shepherd, it was a struggle for her. She had already suffered considerable tragedy.”

  “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” I said.

  “No, no. It’s fine. It helps, actually. It’s been especially hard on Natividad. Being so young. Until Natividad arrived, Sister Margaret had been our youngest. She was only thirty-three when she died. Natividad latched on to her immediately. I’d say she looked at Margaret as an older sister. We encouraged the friendship. For both their sakes, actually. Margaret… She had a drinking problem.”

  My reaction must have showed.

  “You’re surprised by the idea of a nun having a drinking problem?”

  “I guess I am.”

  “I always find it surprising that people are surprised. It’s what I was just saying. We’re human. We’re not saints.” She gave a coy smile. “At least not yet. We’re not without our problems, Mr. Malone. We’re mortal, and we suffer mortal failings. We do have a focus and a path and a calling and the assistance of our faith, and those are all wonderful securities. But we’re flesh, and not without sin. And I’m not going to pretend that Sister Margaret always made life at Good Shepherd particularly easy. She didn’t. She represented a formidable challenge. But in many ways, I think that might have been the gift she brought to us, at great cost to herself. Her difficulties challenged us to show the true depths of our compassion. Alcoholism is such a wretched disease. In the end, I suppose it took hold of Sister Margaret more forcefully than we did. Along with all her sadness and all her troubles.”

  She lowered her head. An image of my mother rose in my mind. Two images, really. In the one, she was flashing her seductively appealing smart-aleck smile and raising her glass in a ribald toast. Shirley Malone, life of the party. In the other… well, let’s just say the party had gone on a bit too long. A gem without luster. I shook the images from my head and picked up the photograph of Angel Ramos. I waited until Sister Mary looked back up before I spoke. “I’m sorry, Sister.”

  “I guess I shouldn’t let myself ramble so.”

  “Can I ask you to show this to the rest of the sisters? As soon as possible? If any of them have even an inkling that they’ve seen this man before, or have any information about him, I need to know immediately.”

  She leaned forward and took the photograph from me. She studied it a moment. “I know you’re going to find this man, Mr. Malone. I have faith.”

  That made one of us.

  I GOT MY FIRST RESPONSE TO MY AMIGO WILLY CARDS AS I HEADED down the West Side Highway. It was a male voice. No discernible accent.

  “You put these cards out?”

  “Yep,” I said.

  “You think you’re funny. Well, fuck you.”

  He hung up. I punched in *69, but the caller’s number was blocked. Probably a pay phone. Since I already had the phone out, I punched in the code for Margo. She answered on the first ring. “Hello, sailor.”

  Caller ID. It still creeps me out.

  “What’s new, pussycat?” I said.

  “I should be asking you. Where are you?”

  “Streaking past Riverside Church, on a bearing heading south.”

  “Any exit plans? Like maybe Seventy-second Street?”

  “Afraid I can’t. Not right now.”

  I gave her a brief rundown on my day. I left out the part about Tommy Carroll’s cancer. An irritating voice in my head said, Need-to-know basis. When I was finished, Margo asked, “Where does that leave you?”

  “I’m going back out to Fort
Pete.”

  “Now?”

  “Yes.”

  “You want company?”

  “No. You stay put.”

  “What do you think you can accomplish in Fort Petersen, besides getting yourself in trouble?”

  It was a good question, and I didn’t have a good answer. “If Angel Ramos is holding Philip Byron out there someplace, I want to at least be in the ballpark.”

  “I’m not hearing an action plan here.”

  “I’ll bob, I’ll weave.”

  “Oh, great.”

  In front of me, a red sports car bobbed and weaved. It also swerved into my lane, nearly clipping my bumper. I hit the brakes and leaned on my horn. The driver shot a hairy arm out the window to show me his finger, but I wasn’t impressed. I squeezed on the gas, running my bumper right up to his, close enough to kiss it. Apparently, I also muttered my innermost thoughts.

  “What’d you just call me?” Margo asked.

  “Nothing. Sorry.” The sports car swerved back to its original lane. I swerved right with it.

  “My last boyfriend never talked to me like that,” Margo said.

  “Neither does this one. A guy just cut me off.”

  “I’m going to cut you off.”

  As if on cue, our connection began to break up. The sports car did a little fake to the left, then roared on ahead. Margo was burbling on the phone and I almost lost her, but we got clear as I passed the railroad yards.

  “What were you saying?”

  “I was saying please come over tonight. I don’t care how late it is.”

  “Or early?”

  “Either way. This is where my fantasies of you holding down a nice job as a shoe salesman start to kick in.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

  “Listen,” I said, “how was your pop star today, anyway?”

  “Are you trying to change the subject?”

  “I am.”

  “My pop star had an ego the size of the Plaza hotel.”

  “Is that where you interviewed him?”

  “Yes.”

  “But if his ego was the size of the Plaza hotel, and you were interviewing him in-”

  “Hey. I don’t want the last thing I hear from you to be a stupid joke.”

  “It’s not the last thing,” I said.

  “But it was going to be a stupid joke, right?”

  “That’s in the ear of the beholder.”

  “Tell me you love me, then hang up.”

  “I love you,” I said.

  There was a pause. “Really?”

  I hung up.

  FORT PETERSEN AT NIGHT LOOKED PRETTY MUCH LIKE FORT PETERSEN during the day, except darker, and most of the shops had been replaced by iron gates. A couple of teenagers darted in front of my car in the middle of the block. One of them turned in my direction and made a pistol with his fingers. I held my fire.

  The Ninety-fifth precinct house was a block off Culver. I pulled into one of the slots reserved for the local crime fighters and went inside. The old guy at the front desk studied my PI license as if it were an unusually well-written piece of pornography. If he had moved it any closer to his nose, he might have accidentally licked it.

  “Who’s your duty officer?” I asked when he finally handed my wallet back to me.

  “Captain Kersauson.”

  “I’d like to see him.”

  The old guy picked up his phone. “What should I tell him it’s about?”

  “You shouldn’t tell him it’s about anything. I’ll do that.”

  He paused a moment, eyeing me, then dialed a number. “Captain? It’s Ross. There’s a gentleman out here wants to see you.” He cupped the mouthpiece and gave me a wink. “You see how I called you a gentleman? Even though you’re uppity?” He went back to the phone. “No, Captain, he didn’t. He’s a private investigator from Manhattan.” He listened, then cupped the phone again. “The captain wants to know if you’re Dick Tracy.”

  “I should have such a jaw.”

  Back to the phone. “No, Captain, he’s not. But he looks harmless enough to me… Uh-huh. Okay.” He hung up the phone. “Captain Kersauson will see you now. Through that door, take a left, then twenty feet, take a right.”

  “Sorry about the uppity.”

  He waved me on. I twisted the doorknob and walked right into the door. The old guy chuckled under his breath as he pushed the buzzer.

  Kersauson was waiting at his office door. He had a large head decorated with a marine cut. He could have stood to drop about thirty pounds, but I didn’t plan to veer our conversation into the realm of personal upkeep. He was in his shirtsleeves and wearing his shoulder holster and gun, as if he were ready for a siege. I handed him my card. He barely gave it a glance. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m looking for prostitutes.”

  “Is that so? What do you think this is, tourist information?”

  “I’m working a job,” I said.

  This time he gave my card a harder look. “Hell of a job. You getting paid for this?”

  “I’m trying to track down Angel Ramos.”

  The problem with a good poker face is that it sometimes gives away the very fact that you’re trying not to give anything away. The captain gave me an absurdly neutral stare for a good five or six seconds before he said, “Who?”

  “Angel Ramos. He runs an ice-cream shop over on Viceroy Street. Gives it away to the kids for free. Coaches Little League in the summers. Tutors math in his spare time. I believe he’s also president of the Rotary Club. No. Wait. I’m sorry. Angel Ramos? He pimps, pushes drugs, runs guns, beats up people and steals things. My mistake. Ever heard of him?”

  I was glad the old guy out front wasn’t here to see me getting uppity all over again. His boss didn’t look too happy to see it, either. “What’s this about?”

  “It’s about I need to find Angel Ramos. I understand he dabbles heavily in the flesh trade, among his other hobbies. I thought I might start by asking the girls on the street. Some girls like to talk, if you handle them right.”

  “What do you want with Ramos?”

  “That’s confidential information, Captain.”

  He replanted his feet. “We don’t have a prostitution problem in Fort Pete, Mr. Malone.”

  “There are hookers five blocks from the White House, Captain. I’m not smearing your precinct, it’s part of the landscape. I just want to know where the girls are.” I took my card from him and jotted a phone number on the back of it. “Here.”

  “What’s this?”

  “It’s Police Commissioner Carroll’s home phone number. I’m on special assignment. Call him. He’ll tell you whether to chat with me or throw me out on my can.”

  “Wait here.”

  I waited. Three minutes later, he came back.

  I asked, “Did you reach him?”

  “I got him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said to tell you where the whores are.”

  “Okay, Captain. I’m all ears.”

  CAPTAIN KERSAUSON CERTAINLY KNEW HIS PRECINCT. NOT EIGHT blocks south of the police station stood the large brick building that Victor Ramos had mentioned. Like he said, it took up the entire block. Its black silhouette made it look as if a piece of the sky had been carved away. A sign out front said: THE NIAGARA COMPANY. It was an industrial concern that took in and laundered towels and sheets and linen tablecloths, from hotels and restaurants in Brooklyn and Queens and from across the river in Manhattan. At the far end of the block was a half-acre parking area separated from the street by a metal fence that stood about twelve feet high. Several dozen vans with the Niagara logo were parked in the lot. According to Captain Kersauson, it was a little bit like a shell game, trying to guess which of the vans was serving as port of call at any one time for the local prostitutes and their customers. Technically speaking, the fenced-in parking area was locked up tight, as were the vans. There was even an una
rmed guard posted on the north end of the lot, in a little shack about the size of a drive-through photo place. According to Kersauson, the local flesh peddlers paid the guard not to look south.

  I drove slowly down Brockton Street, along the fenced-in parking area, and pulled over to the curb at the end of the block and turned off my headlights. Across the street were several abandoned buildings with boarded-up fronts, interspersed with darkened brownstones. Scanning the block for signs of life, I didn’t even see the woman approaching the car from the passenger side. At the tap-tap of her fingernails against the window, I started for my gun. I found the window switch instead and lowered the passenger window partway. She was a young black woman. Her hair was long and paper-flat, glistening in the minimal ambient light.

  “You looking for a date?”

  “I might be,” I said.

  “Might be shit. You out of gas or you looking for a date? What’s your name?”

  “My name’s Fritz.”

  “Right. My name’s Brittany. It’s cold out here, Fritz. Why don’t you let me in?”

  “Door’s open.”

  She tugged on the handle and let herself in. She brought with her a slight scent of cinnamon. She was wearing a tight denim blouse and a short red skirt. Not exactly winter wear. She ran her hands up and down her skinny arms. “It’s cold,” she said, giving a dramatic shudder.

  “You ought to be wearing a coat,” I said.

  She turned a sneer to me. I’m sure it was supposed to be a smile. “Coat don’t show me off,” she said. “You want to look?” Before I could say no, she tugged at her blouse the way Clark Kent tugs at his shirt when he’s about to go save the world. She flashed her breasts, then as swiftly covered them up again. “That’s your free sample. You want to go someplace warm and see some more?”

  “Have you got any friends?” I asked.

  She made a face. “You don’t want me?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  She gave me a queer look. “What? You want two girls?” Then she laughed, showing me a cracked tooth. “You got the stuff for two girls?”