The Bait

by Dorothy Uhnak

  “Yes, I’m sure he does,” Christie said. “Everyone looks just like anybody else. Well, I better get to my office. Thanks for all your help, officer.” He looked so earnest; it didn’t seem possible that he was only five years younger than she. But then, she had five years more on the job than he had. “Good luck in your career,” she said, “I’m sure you’re going to be just fine.”

  He grinned, holding his prisoner with his left hand, so that his right hand was free to grasp hers. “Thanks a lot, Detective Opara, this has all been very interesting. Oh, and good luck with your boss.”

  Transit Patrolman George Alexander, age twenty-one, disappeared with his prisoner into the detention cage. Detective Christie Opara looked at the clock on the wall, and wished she could disappear too.

  4

  IT WAS 1:00 P.M. WHEN Detective Christie Opara turned the cold brass doorknob to the drab, green-walled office identified by the neatly stenciled legend in the smoked-glass upper half of the door: “District Attorney’s” Squad—Investigations.” She was prepared for the reaction of the members of her squad. She had worked too long with men not to anticipate exactly what her reception would be.

  Detective Marty Ginsburg was leaning over the battered old wooden desk in the far corner of the Squad room. It was a relic handed down from generations of municipal offices and, out of respect for the uniform gray metal and black-rubber-topped newer standard desks, it had been placed in the least conspicuous area of the room. Invariably, Marty, when in the office, claimed it for his own. Each of the four scarred drawers contained a nondescript collection of things, held in value by Marty Ginsburg. At the moment, half of the desk top was covered with coins: nickels, dimes, quarters. The other half was covered with large grains of salt and pretzel crumbs. A large cardboard-carton bulged with thick, doughy pretzels. Peering from beneath_ a heavy, lank strand of dark hair, Marty rasped, “Yeah, kid, what do you want? You the delivery boy for the ‘Quik-Lunch’? Where’s the coffee and how come it took you so long?”

  Christie held up her large leather shoulder bag. “Mailman, mister. Say, are you selling those pretzels?”

  Marty dug his arm into the box. “These are bagels—not pretzels. Italians sell pretzels. Jews sell bagels. Two-fer-a quarter, three-fer-fifty cents.” Marty winked. “That’s how we make all our money. You want the bargain deal or what?”

  “I don’t think I could swallow anything right now, but thanks anyway.”

  Pat O’Hanlon, a tall man with a light voice and a bland pale face, pointed a long index finger at Christie and asked no one in particular, “What-is-that?”

  Stoner Martin, first-grade and senior detective in the Squad, finished the sentence he had been pounding out on the five-year-old Royal, the best typewriter in the Squad and his by claim of seniority. He stood up and walked over beside O’Hanlon. “That, Patrick, is a second-grade detective. A female second-grade detective. Opara, I believe. Am I correct, officer?”

  Stoner’s black eyes glinted in his dark face. He was a handsome, dark-skinned Negro, a powerful man, his lean hard torso outlined by a narrow custom-made white shirt. He was the only man in the Squad who could successfully wear close-fitting, beltless slacks: he was absolutely hipless and stomachless.

  The three men regarded Christie as though she were an inanimate curiosity. She hoisted herself easily onto the long table against one wall, her sneakers dangling a good six inches from the floor. She leaned the palms of her hands on either side of her body, hunching her shoulders against their words, which were good-natured, but sharp.

  “We had a second-grade female detective in this Squad once, remember, Stoney?”

  Stoner scratched his chin thoughtfully, then snapped, his fingers. “Oh, yes, that’s right. She was a real ace, wasn’t she?” Stoner’s musical voice played over his “mockingly admiring words. “I remember now. A regular one-girl crime-buster. ‘Lock-’em-up-Susie’—that’s what we used to call her.”

  O’Hanlon nodded earnestly. “She sure made the Squad look good. Lifted the Squad’s activity record way up, carried the rest of us non-productive foot soldiers.”

  “Yeah, and us bagel vendors,” Marty chimed in.

  Stoner fixed his eye on Ginsburg, who was eating another pretzel. “Marty, if you think you are going to fill your already adequate stomach with enough of that poisoned dough to get you on sick leave, forget it. Mr. Reardon is not in a particularly sympathetic mood as of this moment and if you begin to feel a little queasy, you better not get a little queasy on these immediate premises.”

  Marty gasped, “I don’t feel so good. When I don’t feel so good, I eat. I can’t help it. I’m a compulsive eater.”

  “I’ve heard of compulsive eaters,” O’Hanlon said. “Stoney, have you ever heard of compulsive lock-’em-up second-grade female detectives?”

  Christie sighed. “Okay, fellas. Anyone want to hear what happened?”

  O’Hanlon looked at Ginsburg. “Marty, do you want to hear what happened?”

  Marty shook his head. “Not me. I don’t want to hear what happened. Do you want to hear what happened, Paddy?”

  “Hell, no, I don’t want to hear what happened. Stoney, do you want to hear what happened?”

  Motioning Christie toward his typewriter, Stoner Martin said, “No, I don’t want to hear what happened. But Mr. Reardon in there, he wants to hear what happened. But first he wants to read what happened, Detective Opara, so will you just put your typing fingers on this keyboard and type up a ‘complete-the-Man-said’ report of what happened, so that the man will know completely what happened?”

  Christie set up the papers: one original and two onionskin copies, and found some small consolation in the fact that Stoney had relinquished the Royal and now muttered over the inadequacies of the ancient Underwood. She typed: “From: Detective Christie Opara, Shield 4754; To: Mr. Casey Reardon, Supervising Assistant District Attorney, Investigations.” Turning the paper down four spaces for the body of the report, Christie looked up and flexed her fingers. “Fellas—Stoney, Pat, Marty—I’m sorry that you got hung up because of my arrest. Really.”

  Stoney stared up for a moment, then unlocked two keys which had stuck together. O’Hanlon, without stopping his search for some address in the Manhattan directory, began singing in his soft tenor, “Who’s sorry now? Who’s sorry now?”

  Marty, a piece of pretzel in one hand, a clutch of coins in the other, came over to her desk. “For myself, Christie, I don’t really mind.” He opened his large hand, revealing a palm filled with money. “See, I figure I’m about a buck twenty ahead. And I got breakfast and lunch out of my box.” He leaned toward her and whispered loudly. “But Bill Ferranti is the guy you’re going to have trouble with.”

  “Ferranti? Why?” She pictured the mild, clean-cut partner of Marty Ginsburg.

  “Well, Bill looks like a very nice guy. I mean, gee, no matter where you go with Bill everybody figures—salesman, librarian, IBM technician. He’s got that nice manner that makes everybody else look like a bum. But boy, is that a cover-up.” Marty looked around, whispering even louder. “You see, I’ve worked with him for five years now, so I know better. What happened was, see, Ferranti with that white hair of his, well, he couldn’t be taken for one of the college kids, and it seems somebody got a little nervous, with this dapper white-haired guy hanging around the school cafeteria. Like, if he was a professor or something, he’d be in the teachers’ lounge, not in the students’ cafeteria.”

  Christie frowned. “What happened?”

  “Well, I guess I better tell you. Someone got nervous, like I said, and called the security guard and they gave Ferranti a fast toss and Ferranti blew a fuse. I mean, how would a guy feel, them acting like he was some kind of a nut—hanging around the young college girls, you know?”

  “You’re kidding?” Christie asked hopefully. Then, seeing Marty’s mournful face, “You’re not kidding?”

  “I’m telling you what happened is all. So listen, kid, you just sta
y away from Bill, see, that’s the best way. Don’t say nothing to him, not even a word. He cools off in complete silence. Mr. Reardon sent him uptown for some information on something, but he’ll be back soon, so you just ignore him, okay?” Marty patted her reassuringly on her shoulder and returned to tally up his profits.

  Christie called to O’Hanlon. “Pat? Is that true? What Marty said about Bill?”

  O’Hanlon’s eyes scanned the ceiling, his mouth stretched. “Just give him a wide berth, Christie. He always simmers down.” Then, softly to himself, “After a while, that is.”

  The sharp voice cut through the room over the clattering of typewriters. “Hey, Stoney, is what’s-her-name here yet?”

  Christie’s fingers leaped from the keys. Stoner quickly crossed the room and depressed the key of the call box on his desk. “Yes, sir, she’s, just typing up the report you wanted.”

  “Well, tell her to make it snappy!”

  “Yes, sir.” Releasing the key, he turned to Christie. “The Man said to make it snappy.”

  “Yes, I heard him. They probably heard him in Canarsie. What’s-her-name is typing as fast as she can.”

  Christie typed steadily, then rolled up the paper to read her report. Her fingers found an eraser in the top drawer, her eyes fixed on an error. Carefully, she placed scraps of paper against the carbon and scrubbed away a letter, then, lining the paper up, hit the proper key sharply. “Damn.” She had placed the letter in the wrong spot, causing a strike-over. Slowing herself down, she neatly erased the strike-over, then repaired the damage a best she could. She pulled the report from the machine, signed her name. “Okay, Stoney, here it is.”

  Stoner took the report and held the first copy up toward the light. His voice was sad. “Nearly made a hole in the paper. Mr. Reardon doesn’t like near-holes in his reports. Oh, well, I better get it in to him anyway.”

  She watched Stoner walk down the connecting corridor, rap once on the smoked-glass door and enter Casey Reardon’s private office.

  Christie walked to Marty’s desk, absently pressing a few salt crumbs on her finger tips and licking them with her tongue. “Marty, what do you think?” she asked, trying to sound casual.

  “Well, I think I must have eaten about twenty-two bagels so far and I think I don’t feel so good.”

  “Come on, Marty, no more jokes.” She hadn’t intended to sound quite so urgent.

  Marty pressed his hands against his large stomach, then, peering at her through his thick hair, his voice changed, becoming serious. “Okay, kid. Let’s say that you’re not officially a member of the Squad until you’ve been through the fire initiation. We have—one and all, at one time or another—been through it. Now, it’s your turn.” He stood up, his heavy hand on her shoulder. “He’s rough, but he’s a good boss. Fair. Just don’t try to fool him. Tell him what happened straight out, no excuses.”

  “Thanks, Marty. I will.”

  Stoner rolled into the office with the easy, rhythmic step of an athlete. “Okay, little one,” he said softly to Christie, “the Man says now.”

  Christie swallowed, looking around the room. The men were all very busy; too busy to glance at her.

  Christie knocked twice on the door. She didn’t realize how loud the second tap was until the voice bellowed out, “For God’s sake, don’t break the door down—just come in!”

  She entered the large square room, which was a strong contrast to the dinginess of the Squad office. It was flooded by light from windows on two sides. The walls, a light beige, were filled with framed photographs, shiny metal plaques presented to Casey Reardon from an assortment of fraternal, civic and ethnic organizations; certificates, documents, law degrees, diplomas, citations. His desk, a large, modern oiled walnut, was cluttered with an assortment of papers, folders, case files, a haphazard stack of books, two pen sets, and a small, double-framed picture, probably of his family. There was a dark green leather couch against one wall and two straight-backed, wooden-armed chairs, upholstered in the same green leather, directly before the desk.

  Reardon was leaning back in his tilt chair, his feet crossed on the top of a desk drawer that had been opened just for that purpose. He was scanning Christie’s report through horn-rimmed glasses. He looked up, motioned her toward a chair, then, pushing his glasses up into his dark red hair, he said, “Wait a minute. Hold it right there.” He stood up, hands on his hips. “My God. Walk across the room.”

  Christie uneasily followed his hand, which waved her from one side of the room to the other.

  “Turn around. Go ahead, just turn around. Now, back here.”

  Christie’s fingers nervously settled on the heavy side seam of her levis. Self-consciously, she hooked her thumbs into her side pockets. Reardon ran his hand roughly over his face, then dug at his eyes for a moment. “Turn off the radio, will you?”

  Christie walked to the cabinet and turned the knob the wrong way. The music blasted into the room. She snapped it off immediately, and muttered, “Sorry.”

  “Sit down. Go ahead, relax.” Reardon leaned back again, silently rereading her report.

  Christie lifted her eyes from the edge of his desk and studied his face. It was the kind of face which had probably improved with age. The paleness of the typical redhead had deepened. There were still clusters of reddish freckles across the bridge of his short, pugnacious nose, but they too were dark. His eyes, an almost transparent amber, could range from honey to fire-red and they dominated his face. Light darted from them in sharp flickers through the thick, short red lashes. His hair was as dark as bottled iodine and thick and unruly. His face was strong, revealing much of the character of the man: there were some small lines along the edges of his eyes and the start of some heavy expression lines across the forehead. The chin was square and firm with just an indication of light red stubble. It was still a boyish face, yet at forty years of age, there was also a touch of maturity beginning to dominate.

  If time had mellowed the visage of the man, it did nothing to blunt the imprint of the West Side longshoreman’s son. He still spoke in the flat, tough slangy voice of the street, flavored by four years in the Marine Corps. During Reardon’s courtroom years, many a magistrate and judge had demanded in anger or requested in despair that he modify—if not his manner—at least his vocabulary.

  Reardon pushed the glasses back into his hair again, and tapped her report on the edge of his desk. “Very explicit, concise. You write a good report, Opara.”

  Christie breathed evenly. “Thank you, Mr. Reardon.”

  He regarded her for a moment, then glanced back at the report. “He was a big guy, this Rogoff. Let’s see: six foot one; 185 pounds. Big solid guy, huh?”

  His voice betrayed none of the anger she anticipated from their telephone conversation. Possibly he had reconsidered the situation, a condition for which Christie felt grateful.

  “Yes sir, he was a big man.”

  “Mm-h’mm. Well, I’d like you to give me a different kind of rundown now. In your report—and very efficient too—you describe what happened and what action you took. Now, I’d like you to tell me a couple of things not included in your report. Rightfully not included,” he amended quickly. “Just a few things to satisfy my curiosity, right?”

  That seemed reasonable; he just wanted some more details.

  “Now, you started from your home with enough time to get to your assigned location, right?” He accepted her nod. “Judging from your attire, you were fully prepared to report to your scheduled assignment. I assume you’re dressed the way you are in anticipation of a ‘trip party’? Your contacts advised that everyone wear casual clothing?”

  “Yes, sir,” Christie said agreeably. “I wouldn’t be dressed like this otherwise.”

  “And of course, you hadn’t anticipated going into court today under circumstances other than those connected with the pinch we expected at City College?”

  “No, sir. The last thing in the world I expected to be doing today was arraigning an 11
40.”

  His voice was edged with sympathy for her predicament. “I imagine you must have felt pretty embarrassed, dressed like that. Christ, you look like a little boy.”

  There was nothing in his voice to indicate his words had been meant unkindly. “Yes, sir. They sure gave me the business—in the precinct and at the Photo Gallery and all.”

  “I guess they did. And I guess they were especially surprised when you told them you were from the D.A.’s Squad. Dressed like that. Collaring an 1140. On the subway.”

  The pacing of his words had changed. Each phrase was a little more precise. The pause between each statement was just a little longer. Christie felt her fingers tightening around the arms of the chair. Reardon stood up, loosened his tie, opened the top button of his shirt. He walked to the window, gazed out for a moment, then, rubbing the frame of his glasses along his chin, he turned his attention back to her. “At what point—exactly—did you decide that collaring this 1140 was more important than continuing on to your assignment?”

  The unfair question had to be weighed carefully. “Mr. Reardon, if those two little girls hadn’t been on the train, I wouldn’t have touched him.”

  “Yeah, but the two little girls were on the train, weren’t they?” His eyes were motionless on her face. His voice switched to an interested, inquiring tone. “Tell me about those two little girls. Describe them.”

  Christie felt her voice going hollow, the way it did when she was testifying on the witness stand. She was being baited; she wasn’t sure, yet, where his questions were leading. Carefully, she said, “They were about eight or nine years old. Two little girls.” She lifted her hand, palm down: “About this tall. One blond girl; one little brunette. And—well—carrying their schoolbooks—and—” she faltered under his continuing stare.