A Piece of the Action sm-5

by Stephen Solomita

  Greta stepped back and folded her arms across her chest. Her head barely came up to Moodrow’s lower ribs. “Maybe you could stop with the remarks and tell me what you want?”

  “I’m about to be arrested. What I need you to do is hold onto these papers and find me a lawyer in case I have to make bail.”

  The look in Greta Bloom’s face went too far back for Stanley Moodrow to read. It went all the way back to a small village in northeastern Poland.

  “The bastards,” she whispered.

  “Say that again.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Quick, come in. I’ll hide you.”

  “Just the papers, Greta. I’m too big to hide.”

  “You can’t let them take you.”

  “Hey, this is 1958. It’s not like the old days.” Moodrow could read Greta’s disbelief in the way she held her head off to one side, in the thin line of her tightly pressed lips. “Look, I could run away, find someplace to hide, but if I do that, I’m finished. I won’t be able to go out on the street. I won’t be able to investigate. But if I let myself get arrested, I’ll most likely be released without posting bail. Which means that as long as I don’t break any laws, they have to leave me alone.”

  “Don’t believe it, Stanley. Once they put you in a cage, they can do anything.” She reached out and touched the wound on the side of his head. “You’ve got stitches. Tell me what happened.”

  “That’s what I’m being arrested for.”

  “Somebody breaks your head and you get arrested?”

  “The other somebody, who got hurt much worse than me, is also a cop. And he’s singing a different song. Those papers you’re holding? They’re gonna get me out of this.”

  “Tell me, Stanley. Your father-in-law is involved here?”

  “Jesus, you’re a nosy old woman.”

  “Jesus don’t have nothing to do with it. Better you should call on Moses or Abraham. Anyway, please answer the question.”

  “My father-in-law, Pat Cohan, is what they call a full inspector. Do you understand? There are twenty-four thousand cops and forty-two full inspectors in the Department. That’s one for every …”

  “Five hundred seventy-one regular cops.” She sniffed loudly. “Don’t give a look, Stanley. I worked twenty years in retail. And we didn’t have no adding machines like today.”

  “Did I open my mouth?”

  “You were thinking. I could hear you.”

  “I gotta go, Greta. I wanna be upstairs when they come for me. If I’m not, they’re liable to wreck my apartment when they search it.”

  “First say what you were gonna say.”

  Moodrow sighed. “The point I was gonna make is that I don’t know who I’m fighting. It’s a problem for me. A big problem. For instance, the Patrolman’s Benevolent Association will supply me with a free lawyer. Only I don’t know if I can trust them. I don’t know if I can trust anyone. Except you, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “So what I want you to do is, first of all, keep these papers safe. Second, stay by the phone for a few hours. If I need a lawyer or they start talking bail, I’ll call you. Third, leave the hatpins in the hats.”

  Twenty-two

  On the way back to his own apartment, Moodrow fought the urge to peer down each hallway, to crane his neck at every turn of the stairwell. He knew, from long experience, that fear can be crippling, that a scared fighter usually leaves his fight in the dressing room. Besides, the fear, if he should allow himself to feel it, would be out of all proportion to the threat. How had Greta put it? “When they get you in a cage, they can do anything.” Moodrow wasn’t worried about physical abuse. It’d take a squad to put the cuffs on him. As for being killed, the rule of thumb in the NYPD was that cop killers weren’t taken alive. Not unless they surrendered on the steps of St. Patrick’s Cathedral with the Cardinal in attendance. And even if they did survive the actual arrest, the only thing gained was a free trip to Sing-Sing and a late-night appointment with the electric chair. If there’d been an unsolved cop killing in Stanley Moodrow’s lifetime, he didn’t know about it.

  Still, for all his bravado, Moodrow took a quick look down an empty hallway before opening his door, stepping inside and locking it behind him. He went directly to his bedroom, took the better of his two suits out of the closet and laid it on his bed. A clean white shirt and a brand-new tie followed. He began to dress, then noticed his mud-stained shoes. If you’re gonna do it, he told himself, then do it right.

  Ten minutes later, he was pulling on his newly polished brogans and straightening his tie. He took a moment to admire his reflection in the mirror, then strolled into the kitchen, poured himself a cup of coffee and picked up the Daily News. He could feel his mind racing, the way it often did before a bout. It was exciting, all right, but not the kind of excitement that helped fighters to survive. He tried to concentrate on the paper, but except for a couple of headlines, U.N. Girl Is Stabbed by Teener in Park and City Aide Advises PR’s to Learn English First, he didn’t understand a word he read.

  He was wondering who was going to come for him. It wouldn’t be Pat Cohan. He was out in Bayside and he’d said the arresting officers would be on their way up as soon as he made a phone call. Samuelson would be there, of course, looking to get his hands on the complaint he’d signed the night before. That would get him off the hook. Detective Lieutenant Rosten, too. If they recovered the complaint, they might even be able to make a case against him.

  Patero was the question mark. Precinct detective squads were invariably commanded by a single lieutenant. His functions were almost entirely administrative as he attempted to deal with Department politics as well as precinct crime. So what was Rosten doing in the 7th? And why was he riding with a detective, second grade? Samuelson had said that he and Rosten were coming from the scene of a homicide. That was a straight-out lie. The only legitimate reason for Rosten’s presence in the precinct would be as head of a special task force investigating a single crime or a single category of crime. He would never, for political as well as practical reasons, involve himself in day-to-day precinct business.

  A knock on the door interrupted Moodrow’s thoughts. He pushed himself away from the table, took a moment to straighten his tie, then strolled through the kitchen and the living room.

  “Who is it,” he called. “Is that Mayor Wagner? Cardinal Spellman? President Eisenhower?”

  He opened the door without waiting for an answer, expecting to find a dozen uniforms massed in the hallway to protect Samuelson and Rosten. What he found, much to his surprise, was Sal Patero, a briefcase tucked under his arm, standing by himself.

  “Morning, Stanley,” Patero said. “You mind if I come inside?”

  “That depends, Sal. Whatta ya want here?”

  “I wanna talk, Stanley. If you can spare the time. If you can’t, I’ll take off.”

  Moodrow, thoroughly confused, looked over Patero’s head at a still-empty hallway. Where were the arresting officers? Did Patero think he could make the bust by himself? He’d have to be insane.

  “You wanna come in, then come in. But I’m telling you, Sal, I’m not in the mood for bullshit.”

  “When you hear what I have to say, you’re not gonna think it’s bullshit.”

  Patero walked into the apartment, found an overstuffed chair in the living room and took a seat. Moodrow, after locking the door carefully, slipped on the safety chain and followed.

  “I didn’t expect to see you, Sal. Being as you’re not the precinct whip anymore.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “I made an arrest last night. Maybe you heard about it. Funny thing was two cops showed up just as I was about to interrogate my prisoner. One of them was a detective lieutenant named Rosten. I figure he was doing your job.”

  Patero sighed. “You wouldn’t consider giving me a cup of coffee, would you? Being as I’m a guest in your house.”

  “A guest or a prisoner,” Moodrow said evenly. “I can’t make u
p my mind which category you fall into.”

  “Very funny. Considering that you’re the one who’s gonna be arrested. That’s what I came here for. To warn you. The guy who attacked you last night was a cop. His name’s Michael Reina. They dragged him all the way from the One-Eleven in Bayside to do the job.”

  “Bayside, huh? Pat Cohan’s hometown. So how come they want to arrest me? Being as even you know that I was the victim? And if there’s already a warrant, how come nobody’s showed up to bring me in? Or maybe that’s your job?”

  “That’s a lotta questions, Stanley. A cup of coffee would go a long way toward keeping me alert enough to answer.”

  “All right, Sal. A cup of coffee it is. How do ya take it?”

  “Light, two sugars.”

  Moodrow walked back into the kitchen. He took his time with the coffee, stalling, really, while he tried to grasp the significance of Sal Patero’s warning. Had Patero really had a change of heart? Had his conscience finally got to him? Or was this just another chunk of Pat Cohan humor? Another twist of the knife.

  And even if Patero had come to his senses, what did that mean to Stanley Moodrow? The warrant was still out there. Pat Cohan was still out there. Melenguez’s killer was still out there.

  “You said two sugars, Sal?”

  “Yeah.”

  Moodrow took the mug and carried it back into the living room. He half-expected to find Patero crouching in the middle of the room, 38 in hand, but Patero hadn’t moved. If he was acting, Moodrow decided, he was doing a hell of a job of it.

  “Thanks, Stanley.”

  “You’re welcome, Sal.” Moodrow sat on the couch and crossed his legs. “You think maybe you could answer a few of those questions I asked? Now that you have your coffee?”

  Patero leaned forward in his chair. “You have a lot of support in the Seventh,” he began. “I mean a lot of support. That’s why nobody’s come down with the warrant. Rosten can’t put a squad together. Ordinary beat cops are telling him to go fuck himself.”

  “Why doesn’t he come down and do it himself?”

  “That question doesn’t need an answer. Michael Reina was beaten to a pulp. And he was the one with the baseball bat.”

  Moodrow managed a smile. “Well, I thought I’d ask you the easy questions first. From now on they get harder. I want you to tell me what you’re doing here. I wanna know what’s happening in the house.”

  “Look, Stanley, I never wanted to go along with Pat on the Melenguez thing. I got sucked into it. I’m not making myself into some kind of a hero, but most of what happened after the killing came from outside the precinct. That’s because Pat Cohan was pulling the strings. The decision to transfer the case out to Organized Crime, for instance. I had no control over that.”

  “But you did control Samuelson and Maguire. The way I hear it, you’re Samuelson’s rabbi. The two of them, they didn’t interview Melenguez’s landlady. Which, considering they didn’t have a suspect, they should’ve done the first day. You pulled them off before the case was transferred out. You, Sal. You.”

  “I knuckled under, Stanley. I’m not saying I didn’t. But it’s done now, and I can’t take it back. I have to go on from here and do what I think is right.”

  “That mean you’re willing to give a statement?”

  “A statement?”

  “Yeah. Put it all down on paper. Get it off your chest?”

  “What’ll you do with it? If I give you what you want?”

  “Well, I don’t figure the Times would be interested, Sal. That’s because it’s not ‘fit to print.’ But the Daily News might run with it. That’s my favorite paper, anyway.”

  “You can’t do that, Stanley. You can’t go outside the job. You know that.”

  “All right, all right, I was only kidding. I won’t take it to the papers. I’ll take it to Internal Affairs. How’d that be?”

  Patero took a long pull on his coffee. “Forget Internal Affairs. The Inspector running I.A.D. has been buddies with Pat Cohan for thirty years. They were in the same class at the Academy.”

  “Lemme see if I’ve got this right, Sal? What you’re saying is I can’t go outside the Department and I can’t go inside the Department. Tell me something, my supporters down at the precinct, what exactly do they want me to do?”

  “They want you to get Melenguez’s killer.”

  Moodrow slammed his fist into the arm of the couch. “Do I look like some kind of human sacrifice?”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about the fact that I’m tired of bleeding for other people. I had one too many fights and I don’t wanna get hurt anymore. I’m talking about you giving me a statement that I can use to protect myself.”

  “Look, Stanley, I brought you the entire Melenguez file. I had it copied before Rosten took over. They’re transferring me to the Crime Scene Unit. If I can, I’ll copy their files, too. But that’s as far as I’m willing to go.”

  “It’s not right, Sal. And you know it.” Moodrow waited for Patero to respond, but Patero just shook his head. “Well, what can I say? If that’s the way it’s gotta be, I’ll just have to live with it.” Moodrow let his shoulders drop to their normal set. He took a deep breath and shrugged his shoulders. “Being as the Department is the Department, I guess I oughta be thankful that I’m getting any help at all. Tell me something, Sal, you recognize this guy?”

  Moodrow took the sketch of Santo Silesi from an end table drawer and passed it to Sal Patero. Patero looked at it for a moment, tapping the edge of the paper with his forefinger. “I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think I’ve seen him with Joe Faci. I don’t know his name, though.”

  “Who’s Joe Faci?”

  “Faci works for Steppy Accacio.”

  “This Accacio, he’s Mafia, right?”

  “No.” Patero laughed softly. “He’s not even Sicilian. Look, Steppy Accacio is a small-time punk who’s trying to work his way into the big time. He’s ambitious, Stanley. Like you used to be. There’s a dozen Steppy Accacios on the Lower East Side. They come here like actors go to Hollywood. Looking for the big break.”

  “Then why deal with him? Why deal with a punk?”

  “We take money from street pimps, don’t we? I’m telling you that Steppy Accacio is only two steps removed from the street.”

  “Did he pull the trigger, Sal? Did Accacio kill Melenguez?”

  Patero looked directly into Stanley Moodrow’s eyes. “I don’t know who killed Luis Melenguez. Accacio told me he wasn’t there. He claimed it was an accident and that he and his boys would take care of the shooter. ‘It won’t happen again.’ That’s what he said. ‘Just help me out this one time.’ ”

  “You think he was telling the truth?”

  “Yeah, I believe him. I know that he was trying to expand and the rumor is that he hired outside talent.”

  “How far outside? Boston? Chicago? Los Angeles?”

  “More like Avenue B. I think they’re still working for him.” Patero looked at his watch and began to rise. “Stanley, I gotta go.”

  “Wait a minute, Sal, there’s something else. Look, sooner or later Rosten’s gonna come for me. How am I supposed to operate with a warrant hanging over my head? Maybe I should go down to the house and surrender.”

  “Don’t do it. Don’t give up your badge and your gun. Without a badge, you got no right to stop people on the street, no right to question suspects, no right to make an arrest.”

  “But if I make bail, I can move around freely until the trial and we both know it’s never gonna come to a trial. If I don’t surrender, I’m gonna spend all my time looking over my shoulder.”

  “So what? When they come, they come. It’s not gonna be any worse if you wait until they find you. Same warrant. Same charges. The main thing is to hang onto your badge and gun as long as possible. If I was in your position, that’s what I’d do.”

  Moodrow offered his hand. “Maybe you got a point. I gotta think abou
t it.” He took Patero’s hand in his. “It’s good you came here today. I mean it, Sal. It’s good. Unfortunately, it doesn’t get you off the hook.”

  He yanked Patero’s right hand forward and down, simultaneously driving a left hook into the right side of the lieutenant’s face. The force of the blow drove Patero over the back of the couch and onto the floor. Moodrow, worried about the Smith amp; Wesson nestled in Patero’s shoulder rig, circled quickly. He needn’t have bothered. Sal Patero was lying motionless on the rug.

  “Never drop your right hand, Sal. Not when you got a glass jaw. It just gets you in trouble.” He scooped Patero off the rug, tucked him under his arm, trotted off to the kitchen and sat the lieutenant in a chair. “Here you go, Sal. Your home away from home.”

  If Moodrow had had four sets of cuffs, he could have done the job right, but he had only two, his and Sal Patero’s. Still, he managed to secure Patero firmly, wrists to the right rear leg of the chair, ankles to the left front. When he was finished, he left the kitchen, and rummaged in the hall closet until he found his old nightstick and a copy of the Manhattan yellow pages.

  “Ya know, Sal,” he called as he walked back to the kitchen, “I wish I had a girlfriend living here. Because, the way it is, I haven’t got a nightgown for you to wear. But we can always pretend, right?”

  “What, Stanley, what …?” Patero was starting to come around. He was lost in confusion for a moment, staring blankly up at Stanley Moodrow. Then he realized that his hands and feet were cuffed and he began to panic. “For Christ’s sake. For God-almighty-sake. Jesus Christ.”

  “This isn’t gonna be difficult, Sal. Being as you’ve been through this drill once or twice, I won’t have to soften you up. What I want is a signed statement. In your handwriting. I want everything. Names, dates, places.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  Moodrow smiled. “Not crazy, Sal, just greedy. I want Melenguez’s killer and I don’t wanna be crucified in the process. I don’t wanna end up being some kind of noble sacrifice. Does that sound unreasonable? Your statement, along with everything else I’ve managed to accumulate, is gonna keep me off that cross. And I think I should warn you about something else. I found out more than you think I did. Much more. If you lie to me, I’m gonna know it. Lemme tell ya, Sal, lying is not your best option. Now, you wanna start talking? You could begin with your first contact with Accacio after Melenguez was killed.”