Speak of the Devil

by Richard Hawke

  Charlie spoke up. “Your man’s dying over there, Carroll. Why don’t-”

  “Shut up.” Carroll inclined his head toward Noon.

  “What does he know?”

  “Jesus, Tommy, he doesn’t know anything, either. Is this your latest method of damage control?”

  Carroll considered me a moment. “What do you know?”

  “Angel Ramos is dead,” I said.

  “I got that on the TV.”

  “Cox isn’t.”

  He tried not to show his reaction, but he failed. “Bullshit. You’re lying.”

  “I’m not. He got hit, but he’s alive. So far, anyway.”

  “That’s crap.”

  “It’s not. It’s fact. What’s wrong? Do you have a problem with that? Cox is as corrupt a cop as they come, Tommy. What should you care if he lives?”

  Carroll said nothing. He was trying to sort out whether I was bluffing. Margo started doing something strange with her eyes. She clenched them tightly, then opened them widely and looked off to her right. She did this several times. I saw what she was trying to say. When Noon had tried to rise, he’d rolled off of his service pistol. Carroll followed my eyes.

  “One step in that direction and this one’s gone.” He pressed his pistol tighter against Margo’s head, then he indicated Charlie. “Him too. I’m sorry, Fritz. That’s how it has to go.”

  Charlie muttered, “Bastard.”

  Once more, I felt a shortness of breath. The edges of my vision were washing away as the scene in front of me seemed to be retreating. I was slipping into a tunnel-vision view of Margo and Tommy Carroll sitting a distant fifteen feet from me. Carroll was still speaking.

  “What’s up with Cox? Level with me. Is he really alive?”

  I shuffled forward a step. “He’s alive, Tommy. That’s on the level. And something tells me if he pulls through, he won’t be likely to keep his trap shut. Not if he thinks he can cut some sort of deal.”

  “He’s… a bum.” It seemed to take all of the big man’s breath to get the sentence out.

  “Maybe. But you know how prosecutors are. They’ll make deals with bums so long as the bum can give up a bigger bum.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Sorry. Was that a little too close to home?” I inched forward.

  “I’ll tell you who’s the bum in all this. Goddamn Marty Leavitt. He’s a sorry son of a bitch if ever there was one.”

  “You already gave me this speech last night.”

  “I didn’t tell you shit last night. That son of a bitch is a rapist. You were on to that, weren’t you, that nun thing? Damn smart-ass punk really fucking thought he’d gotten away with it. That stupid girl with her hundred stupid different stories… anyone with half a brain could tell she was protecting someone. There were at least four people questioned who told how she’d been mooning all over Leavitt. Big handsome ass hero, prosecuting her parents’ killer.” The police commissioner shook some of the sweat out of his eyes. He resembled an angry bear. “Who the hell prosecutes him when he goes off on this young girl and rapes her and beats her half to death? No one. He mauls this kid like a beast, then walks away. That’s just not right, Fritz. You know that’s not right.”

  I moved forward. “What did you know about any of that, Tommy? Your beat wasn’t Brooklyn.”

  Carroll scoffed. “I know people. I knew Tony DiMarco. He was the lead investigator. He met with me one night. He called me in. He was in a fix. He suspected it was Martin Leavitt who’d attacked that girl. He laid it out for me. He had the case.”

  “Why didn’t he just have Leavitt arrested?”

  “Get real, Fritz. Leavitt was already Mr. Big out there. You pull someone like that in, even if you’ve got the goods, you’re finished. You know what I’m saying. Leavitt had friends. A lot more friends than DiMarco. And Tony was six years from retirement. I gave him some pre-retirement advice. ‘Drop it. Let Leavitt walk. The bastard will come up short someday. A shadow like that can’t go away.’ Give Tony credit-he argued with me about it. But I finally convinced him.”

  “Why’d you do that, Tommy? That’s insane.”

  Margo had closed her eyes. Carroll brought up his free arm and wiped more sweat from his face. “Fucking right it was insane. You think I don’t know that? Sometimes you’ve got to make the call. That’s what I did. I gave that punk a pass. I let him walk.” Carroll’s eyes narrowed. He ran his tongue across his dry lips. “But the bastard finally came up short, Fritz. Prick thinks he can throw me to the wolves and I’m just going to sit on my ass and take it?”

  I got it.

  “Jesus, Tommy… you? You sent him those letters?”

  He nodded tersely. “Leavitt saw the suicide note. When he heard about the nun who’d offed herself in Prospect Park, he went through the pipeline to get a copy of her suicide note. Stupidest thing he could have done. No one goes through the pipeline without me hearing about it. Your old man taught me that one. Make everybody out there your ear.”

  “What did Leavitt want with Margaret’s suicide note?”

  “If you ask me, he just wanted to see if she screwed him over at the end.”

  “She didn’t. The note was just babble.”

  “Yeah. So was most of the crap in Nightmare’s notes. Just enough of the same kind of babble for Leavitt to know he was screwed if he didn’t do everything that was asked of him.”

  “The note I saw didn’t mention anything about Margaret King.”

  “Of course not. Wise up, Fritz. What you saw was a copy. Leavitt typed that one up. He left out the real good stuff.”

  “Jesus, Tommy.”

  Carroll gave a hard smile. “I screwed that bastard over in the end. You think I’m letting a punk like that smear me? Hustle me out of office? I don’t fucking think so. Marty Leavitt’s not taking me down. That’s just not going to happen. End of story. Sorry, Fritz.”

  “You’re Nightmare,” I said. “For Christ’s sake, let’s start talking evil, Tommy. What the hell kind of twisted crap are you trying to get away with?”

  “Forget it. I’m not nothing anymore.”

  He released his grip on Margo and shoved her forward with so much force that she pitched onto the floor. Charlie jerked his chair around and I got exactly one step closer before Police Commissioner Tommy Carroll swiveled his gun, bit down on the end of the barrel and pulled the trigger. The roar was deafening. Charlie recoiled.

  “Jesus Christ!”

  Carroll slumped sideways. Margo continued along the carpet on her hands and knees. She reached me and rose up weightlessly from the floor as if she’d momentarily licked the pull of gravity. Her arms looped around my neck, and she buried her head under my chin.

  “Fritz, Fritz, Fritz, Fritz…”

  41

  THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE BAGGAGE-CLAIM AREA LOOKED SO MUCH LIKE Shirley Temple that I did no fewer than three double takes. The mass of ringlets, the bright, intelligent eyes, the swollen-apple cheeks. She wore a short bell-shaped plaid dress and shiny black shoes, and I had no trouble imagining her hoofing it up the stairs to the arrivals hall with Bill “Bojangles” Robinson himself. Her mother was somewhat less glamorous. Around five foot four, she had her daughter’s cheeks, though to less cute effect. No ringlets, and her face was etched with anticipation. The two were each wearing an oversize button with the face of a young bristle-headed man posing in front of an American flag. As the passengers began descending the stairs into the baggage area, the mother reached into her purse and handed her daughter a small American flag on a stick. Little Shirley Temple began jumping up and down; she could barely contain herself.

  Me, I was able to contain myself. Airports generally put me to sleep. I positioned myself behind the phalanx of limo drivers who stood holding handwritten signs for the arriving passengers. BENNETT. FISK. WELCH. DALY. I spotted a discarded sign sticking out of a nearby trash bin and fetched it on a whim. I asked one of the drivers if I could borrow his Magic Marker, and I scribbled DORIS DAY on
the back of the sign. A few minutes later, a real Shirley appeared. I spotted her as she was coming down the stairs. She was walking alongside a young serviceman on a pair of crutches. I recognized his face. The two were laughing about something. The little girl darted forward, waving her flag and shrieking. The serviceman gave my mother a quick nod and hopped on one foot quickly down the rest of the stairs, letting his crutches drop to the side as he leaned down to scoop his daughter up into his arms.

  My mother turned and spotted me. Her face opened in a frozen laugh. “Ha! Doris Day! In your dreams.”

  I came forward and gave her a peck on the forehead. “Welcome home.”

  “You’re cute, in your way, but where’s Rock Hudson?”

  “Rock’s dead.”

  “Gay, too. How many times is one man going to break your mother’s heart?” She raised a warning finger. “Don’t answer that.”

  “You’re looking good,” I said, lifting her bag from her shoulder and slinging it over mine. “California must agree with you.”

  “It does. The people are as batty as they come, but they seem to be enjoying themselves. Half the girls are made of silicone, but they seem to be enjoying themselves, too. Tell you the truth, I couldn’t live there.” She flashed me a smile. “But I enjoyed myself.” She gave me the once-over. “Say, you’re looking nice and formal. This must be what it’d be like to have a lawyer for a son.”

  “They’re burying Tommy this afternoon,” I said.

  She caught her breath. “Ah, Jesus. Tommy Carroll. Between your father and Tommy, that job’s not holding such a good track record, is it? At least Tommy gets a full-fledged funeral. At least that.”

  “Let’s get your suitcase.”

  We waited a few rounds at the carousel before her bag finally showed. The soldier with the crutches was standing nearby, his wife and his daughter hanging all over him. Shirley indicated him as I stepped forward to fetch her bag. “We were seated together. He told me I was pretty.”

  “Did you ask him, or did he just volunteer it?”

  “What do you mean, did I ask him? Christ, you’re a rotten son. He said I have nice eyes.”

  “You do. He’s right. There’s no green greener than the emerald green.”

  She made a soft clucking sound. “I could use a drink.”

  “Let’s get into the city. I thought maybe you’d want to go to Tommy’s funeral.”

  I wasn’t just humoring her. About the eyes, I mean. They were still plenty sharp, plenty arresting. The old man used to wax like Yeats about Shirley Malone’s eyes. And his blood wasn’t even Irish.

  “I see you let the place fall to hell without me.”

  “It’s a tough old town,” I said. “It bounces back.”

  She glanced quickly over at the soldier, then back at me. “Yeah, I know the feeling.”

  A MASSIVE POLICE SWEEP OF ANYONE WHO HAD EVER EVEN PRONOUNCED the name Angel Ramos had been launched within an hour of his death. Immunities, bargains and outright bribes were all employed. Sometime around three o’clock in the morning, Philip Byron had been located-alive-chained to an overturned washing machine in the basement of an abandoned row house about a mile from the Flea Club. He was dehydrated and suffering from almost no sleep in over seventy-two hours. He was taken immediately to the hospital for treatment. The infection that had set in on his mutilated hand was not as bad as it might have been. He made a brief nonspeaking appearance on television from his hospital bed, giving a wan thumbs-up with his good hand. The doctors expected a full recovery.

  Patrick Noon pulled through as well. Tommy Carroll’s bullet had shattered a rib and damaged a lung, but Noon was out of the hospital in a few days. Leonard Cox also survived his wounds. He was absent four feet of his small intestine, and he’d be in the market for a new kneecap, but the prognosis was that he would live to see both his trial and the many, many years of prison time that likely stretched beyond that.

  I’d huddled for two days with Remy Sanchez and lawyers from the district attorney’s office and laid out for them all that I knew or presumed I knew concerning Margaret King, Leonard Cox, Roberto Diaz, Angel Ramos, Tommy Carroll and Mayor Martin Leavitt. I was, may I say, the center of attention.

  When it became clear that Cox was going to survive his wounds, I suggested a tactic that was debated for several hours and finally agreed upon. I proposed that Cox not be informed of Tommy Carroll’s suicide. He was kept away from radio and television and newspapers and from all personal visitors. His lawyers cried foul and declared that their client was also being kept away from his civil rights. Cox’s doctors announced-per instruction-that the health of their patient required this near-complete isolation and that yes, they would duly testify to that effect in court if requested to do so.

  Apparently, the health of their patient did allow him extensive visits from a particular Hispanic police captain. Remy Sanchez informed Cox that Tommy Carroll was not only alive but singing a most fascinating tune. Perhaps, Sanchez suggested, Cox would like to gargle some salt water and weigh in with a tune of his own.

  “He thought he was singing a duet,” Sanchez informed me over drinks at McHale’s after a long session at Cox’s hospital bedside. “But it was pure solo.”

  According to Sanchez, it was a strong performance. Cox set his sights on Police Commissioner Tommy Carroll. He was under the impression that by handing over Carroll, he was to receive substantial leniency in his own case. “Gosh, I don’t know where he got that impression,” Sanchez said. “He might claim it came from me, but I guess a guy in his position-all that medication and pain and everything-sometimes they just hear things.”

  Cox explained that it was Angel Ramos who had murdered Officer Thomas Cash out at the Brooklyn junkyard. Cash had arranged to meet with Ramos and had been wired to record their conversation in hopes of gathering information on his own partner, Jay Pearson, who was in thick with Angel. Or so said Cox. What Cash hadn’t known was that word had leaked to Pearson about Cash becoming a stoolie, so Pearson had directed Ramos to take the officer out. Ramos did. Somehow he managed to wrest Cash’s own service revolver from him and fired twice into the man’s heart. Pearson then appeared on the scene. Cox’s guess was that Pearson was planning to kill Ramos, thus mopping up two potential problems at once. But Ramos caught the drift and shot Jay Pearson point-blank in the forehead. Angel fled. Cox and McNally answered the 911 call about shots being fired in the junkyard, and while Cox was attempting CPR on Cash, he discovered the wire. He removed the wire and the recorder while McNally was off radioing for assistance.

  “Cox had the whole damn thing on tape,” Sanchez told me. “I.A. was taking gas. They knew Cash was wearing the wire, and they knew it was missing when Cash’s body got to the hospital. Because Ramos had used a service revolver on both men, Cox convinced McNally that they should rig the scene to look like a murder-suicide. No one really bought it. Cox swapped Pearson’s and Cash’s guns around, since Cash’s gun was the one that had been fired. He put the gun in Pearson’s hand and fired it into the ground, to get prints and residue. That was picked up on right away-the gun switch. The whole scene just didn’t quite fit right. It was a hack job. They let the story go out there anyway. They decided two ‘bad’ cops taking their own justice was better than a double cop killer on the loose.

  “Carroll knew Cox. Cox’s old man had been with homicide out in Brooklyn, and Carroll had tracked the son’s career, especially once it became clear that the son was going sour. Cox says that Carroll contacted him about a month ago. He said he wanted him to recruit a lowlife to take a shot at someone during the Thanksgiving parade. Just to shake things up, Cox says. Just to get the city on edge. He said he had fifty thousand dollars to play with.

  “Cox knew immediately who his man was. He had the tape recording of Angel Ramos taking out not one but two New York City cops. Between the squeeze and the money, Ramos was an easy recruit. Cox told Carroll about Angel Ramos and added that Ramos had picked up some rudimentary bomb-mak
ing skills at Incarceration U. That’s what got Carroll thinking on a larger scale. Ramos brought in Diaz to do the parade hit. The idea was that Cox and McNally would nab Diaz and whisk him away in the patrol car, presumably to let him escape later. That was crap, of course. It was just the way to let Diaz think he was safe. Diaz was an idiot. They were going to kill Diaz no matter what. According to Cox, though, it was Carroll who shot Diaz at the Municipal Building. Shooting McNally at the parade had not been part of the plan, and Carroll was furious. He personally took Diaz out for it. Then Ramos left the bomb at Barrymore’s that night. It was supposed to be a small bomb, just a little flame-up, it wasn’t necessarily supposed to kill anyone. Then Ramos did that nun act you told me about when he dropped off the next note. Sometime after he left the note at the convent in Riverdale, he went free agent. He nabbed Byron and decided to take over the game. From that point on, according to Cox, Carroll’s orders were to find Ramos and kill him on the spot.”

  Sanchez added an extra matter that I had already figured out by then. According to Cox, his instructions as of the morning I went up to Riverdale and spoke with Sister Natividad had been to take me out as well. Carroll could see that I was beginning to deduce that Margaret King was somehow pivotal. He feared that I’d uncover why Leavitt was being blackmailed and, eventually, who was behind it. I suppose it’s nice to know that the commissioner thought so highly of my skills.

  It was Charlie who explained to me that when Carroll showed up at the house, the visit had been presented as a general query as to where I was in my investigation. As Carroll had said, he knew I’d be sharing whatever I was learning with Charlie. If it appeared that I had already shared too much, Carroll would decide how to proceed with Charlie. When Margo stumbled onto the scene with Donna Bia’s cell phone, Carroll’s dilemma doubled. According to Margo, it was when Carroll saw me on television from Pier 17-alive-that he ordered her at gunpoint to call me. No fool, Tommy. He knew I’d come flying.