Shallow Graves - Jeremiah Healy

by Jeremiah Healy

  I went over to the chair with the Johnny Walker Black, picking up the bottle and setting it on the counter of the bar. Behind me, Danucci said, "Our ways, they don't work so good for this kind of thing, Cuddy. Somebody gets hit, you can usually trace it back up the line, iigure out who ordered the contract. Something like this, this . . . random kind of thing, we got feelers out on the street. But they should have turned something by now, and they haven't given us shit."

  I said, "I'm not going to give you a name so you can kill the guy."

  Danucci looked up at me now, the dead-eyed stare, his tugged-down tie the only part of him moving. "What, you think, you give the name to the cops and they lock him up, he's some kind of safe from us?"

  "I might not get that far. My job is to be sure the people at the agency didn't have her killed to collect on the policy. I decide they didn't, I can stop."

  Danucci thought about that. "We pay you to keep going."

  "No."

  "You see The Godfather?"

  "Yes."

  "That Coppola, he got a lot of it right. Not everything, but a lot. We pay you with your life."

  An offer I couldn't refuse. "I already have my life."

  "Not if I decide otherwise."

  "You decide otherwise, send two of your best. They don't come back when you expect them, don't call anybody, don't even pack. Just run for your life."

  Danucci grinned, the big jaw jutting. Not a pretty sight. "You don't scare, huh?"

  "I scare. I just don't change my mind."

  Danucci sat there, maybe thinking what he was going to say next, maybe deciding which two of his best he was going to send. Maybe just remembering his daughter.

  Finally, he said, "You find out who killed Tina, you tell the cops?"

  "Probably."

  "Then we can compromise here. You don't got to tell me the guy's name, but you stay on the thing till you find the cocksucker who done this. Then you give him up to the cops. We'll take it from there."

  "And if I don't stay on the case?"

  The grin again. "Life is sweet, Cuddy. Do yourself a favor, taste it a little longer."

  When I didn't say anything more, Danucci said, "Okay, we got a deal, and you got our cooperation. One hundred percent. Anything you need, Primo'll be right there."

  "I work alone."

  "Fine. You need something, you give him a call."

  Danucci seemed calm, almost rational. I tried to figure how much of what I'd seen with the bottle was an act. I thought, not much. He just went in and out like that. At least over his daughter's murder.

  "I don't expect to be calling him."

  Danucci went to the desk and used a pen to scribble some lines on a business card. Standing tall, his hair was about level with my chin. "This is Primo's apartment number, best way to reach him. This one's my home number here, you need it."

  I took the card.

  "You want to see the place in the South End?"

  "It would help."

  "I'll call Ooch right now."

  "It won't be tonight."

  "Fine. Whenever. What else you need?"

  "I'd like to talk with your wife and your brother."

  "Claudette and Vinnie? Why?"

  "They knew your daughter. I didn't."

  "You think it'll help, okay. When?"

  "Now would be good."

  Joseph Danucci nodded once, the developer who could be decisive. "You got it."

  -9-

  SHE WAS DEFINITELY THE TALLEST VIETNAMESE WOMAN I HAD EVER SEEN.

  At least five and a half feet in just slippers like a ballerina, Joseph Danucci's wife must have seemed a giant in her home country. She came into the den haltingly, taking a step before returning to the door and closing it, as though she were the guest in my home and wanted to make a good impression. She stopped a body length away from me. "I am Claudette Danucci. My husband say I speak with you."

  The good eye wandered a little over me, the glass eye steady, its lid coming down only halfway as she blinked.

  "Again, Mrs. Danucci, I'm sorry about your daughter."

  A brief nod. "You will drink?"

  I'd pitched the beer. "No. Thank you."

  "You will sit?"

  I took the unstained chair. Danucci lowered herself into the couch as though a glass of water were balanced on her head. If Mau Tim had half her mother's grace, I could understand her success as anything, model included.

  "Mrs. Danucci, I'm investigating the death of your daughter for an insurance company."

  Another brief nod.

  "It would help me if you could tell me something about her."

  She waited a moment. "I could tell you many things about her. I could tell you her first word to me when she is one year. I could tell you how many time I brush her hair when she is five year. I could tell you how there is a knife in my heart because I must think of these things to tell you them."

  I dropped my head.

  Her voice changed. "I am ashame, Mr. Cuddy."

  I looked back up at Claudette Danucci. A large tear glided down along her nose from the good eye, nothing from the glass one.

  "I am ashame because I embarrass the man my husband tell me will find the killer of my child."

  "Mrs. Danucci, you have every right to be upset."

  She turned her face, both eyes fixing on me. "You were in Vietnam?"

  "Yes."

  "In Vietnam, the life of a woman is her children. I can have one child only, and now she is take from me."

  I decided to go with her. "You met your husband in Vietnam?"

  "Yes. I was . . . You know what ‘tea girl' mean?"

  "I do." It was slang for a bar girl who got Gls to buy her drinks, usually iced tea masquerading as liquor.

  "When my husband meet me, I am tea girl. Do you know why I am tea girl?"

  "Mrs. Danucci, you don't — "

  "I am tea girl because I am rape by your black soldiers. I am good Catholic girl, Mr. Cuddy. I hear stories from the French time, about the Morocco black French. They rape and kill peasant girls in the village. Stories say, that not happen in the city, but it happen to me. I am too tall for Vietnam man. I think, I find America man to love me. America black soldiers find me."

  "I'm sorry."

  "No. I want to tell you these things. You will see. I am tea girl because my family not want me after the America black soldiers have me. I am lucky. I am pretty and I am different because I am tall. I not have to eat rats or snakes, to steal to live. I get many gift from PX. I have many America white soldiers. I get ma tuu, the marijuana, to help forget.

  "Then I meet my husband. He is different. He want to buy dinner, not drink. He bring me flowers to my apartment. He is honorable man, my husband. He walk with me in the streets. The old women say things in Vietnam words, names they have for the America invaders and women like me with them. My husband know these things, and still he walk with me.

  "One day, I find out, I am pregnant. With my daughter. The other tea girls, they say, 'Claudette, you take this herb, it make the baby go away quick. Quick, before the America soldier see the baby inside you.' I do not want abortion, Mr. Cuddy. I want the baby of the man I want to be my husband. You know what happen to the children of America soldier and Vietnam woman in Vietnam?"

  I'd seen the kids wandering Saigon, though there weren't so many of them when I was there. Stringy, sallow girls with blue eyes that didn't slant quite right. Husky, mocha boys with broad noses and ripply hair. Ostracized, even beaten or stoned by the relatively homogeneous Vietnamese.

  "The children of the mothers who stay in Vietnam, they have nothing. The America soldiers are fathers but not husbands. They come to Vietnam and leave, but the mothers stay and the children stay and they have nothing.

  "But my husband find out I am pregnant, he is happy. He say, 'I will marry you, Claudette. I will take you back to The World in the plane.' The other girls, they say, 'Claudette, all the soldiers say that, so you will still bum-bum with them until
near time baby come.' But my husband is different. He find out I am pregnant, he take me out to big dinner. Celebration. We coming home to my apartment, we see two QC."

  "QC" was short for "Quan Canh, the South Vietnamese military police.

  "My husband, he want to tell them how he is happy. They curse at him in Vietnam words. He know some words, he hear other girls use. He get mad, he punch one QC. The other hit him with stick and break stick. I scream and use my" — her hands fluttered up — "nails to scratch his face. QC use his stick that is broke to hit me in face. My . . ." This time her hand fluttered toward her glass eye, but stopped and came back to her lap. "They run away from us. I get other America soldier to stop, get ambulance, to get . .

  She stopped, took a breath. "I am in hospital. I do not lose my baby, but my eye is . . . gone. Not in my head. My husband come see me. He have bandage around his head, and he cry. My husband cry for my eye, Mr. Cuddy. He is honorable man, and he 'sponsor' me. I must see government officials, Vietnam men and America men, every day for many day. I must give some money, then same ones more money. But I get out, my daughter still inside me. I come to The World. And you know what I find?"

  "No."

  "I find The World is strange place. In Vietnam, new wife go to house of the mother of her husband and work for mother. Work hard. What the mother want new wife to do, new wife must do, no questions. Here, the father of my husband is not please with new Vietnam wife. The friends of my husband not please with new Vietnam wife. But the mother of my husband is a beautiful woman. I have so little English, I say to her, 'What need you done?' She say, 'You talk like I do, I first come to America. You pregnant, Claudette. You . . . eye. You sit. I work for you.' I love my husband, and I love the mother of my husband, who make me call her 'Amatina.' Her name from Italy. So when my daughter is born, and she has the beautiful eyes, the violet eyes, we give her name 'Amatina,' too."

  Claudette Danucci swallowed with difficulty. "We call my daughter 'Tina,' because the mother of my husband say she cannot tell who we want when we call 'Amatina'. The mother of my husband teach me the things of Italy my husband like. In Vietnam, I learn to cook with mint and basil, cilantro and nuoc mam from the fish. From Amatina, I learn to cook with mozzarella and oregano, but also the fish, the anchovy, they use too. From Amatina, I learn to behave for the father of my husband, and even he start to like Vietnam wife of his son. And daughter of his son, with the eyes of his wife from Italy. Six, seven year ago, when Amatina . . . get sick, my daughter and me, we take care of her here, in this house. When Amatina . . . die, we take care of the father of my husband, who has the heart attack in his house and cannot care for himself. We are family, Mr. Cuddy. Like in Vietnam, I teach my daughter respect for the family of her father."

  "Even though her father's family was a crime family."

  Claudette Danucci fired up. "What is crime, Mr. Cuddy? What is crime when you are rape by America 'protectors' and beat by your own police and rob by your own government? What is crime when your whole country is victim?"

  I didn't have an answer for her.

  "When did your daughter move to Boston?"

  She lost the fire. "Year ago."

  "She . . .” Danucci stopped, thought, and started again. "She want to be model in pictures. Many people in Boston tell her she is beautiful for model."

  "How did you feel about that?"

  "I did not like it. A daughter stay with her family until she find a husband. That is still the best way."

  "How did your husband feel?"

  "He did not like it, too. The city is . . . not safe, he say."

  "Your daughter stayed for a while with her uncle?"

  "Yes, but then my husband say, 'Tina, you must stay in the house of my father on Falmouth Street. Cousin Ooch, he protect you there.' "

  "Tina agreed to that?"

  "Yes. She even say that is better. Vincent apartment is not so large, and in Falmouth Street she can live for no money." George Yulin had said Mau Tim had lived for a while with Oscar Puriefoy, too, but after Claudette Danucci's experience with black soldiers, I wasn't about to bring it up. "When did your daughter change her name?"

  The good eye wandered, the glass one staying fixed on my left shoulder. "She all the time ask me about Vietnam. About what we do there, names we have for things. She asked me Vietnam word for 'violet,' for her eyes. I tell her ‘mau tim'."

  Everyone else so far had pronounced it "mahow tim." Danucci said it more like "maw teem".

  "When my daughter was little girl, I would call her mau tim when only she and me there because my husband want her to be all-America. Then she ask me last year, Vietnam word for model, but she already know it is 'mau' because she say, she look it up in dictionary. It is same word, but say different."

  Claudette Danucci looked up at me. "She decide to use that name, not Amatina or Tina. My husband not like this, too."

  "Why did she change her last name to Dani?"

  The good eye closed, the glass one's lid again only halfway down. "I think she want to . . . break away. In Vietnam, when girl decide to leave village to go to city, her mother say, 'That is my Saigon daughter.' My daughter want to break away from family, live alone in city."

  "The way her uncle did?"

  Both eyes opened. "The brother of my husband is a lawyer. He decide his name to be different for business."

  "Mrs. Danucci, I'm sorry to have to ask you these — "

  "Ask."

  "Did your daughter ever mention someone named Shawn to you?"

  "Shawn?"

  "Yes. Maybe a boyfriend from school?"

  "No. My husband very strict with our daughter when she live here."

  "How about after that?"

  "After?"

  "Did you speak with your daughter much after she moved to Boston?"

  "Yes. I talk with her on telephone all the time. I see her sometime for lunch when I drive to Boston."

  "Did she mention any boyfriends then?"

  The head lifted. "No."

  "Did she seem happy to you?"

  Reluctantly, I thought, Claudette Danucci said, "Yes. Pretty happy."

  "She enjoyed modeling?"

  "She say, 'It is boring. You must hold things and stand stupid.' But yes, she most of time like the things she do, the people she know, her friends."

  "Did she seem happy at the agency?"

  Claudette Danucci cocked her head.

  "I mean, was she satisfied with Lindqvist and Yulin representing her?"

  "Oh." Danucci seemed to think about it. "She say, people tell her she must go to New York for modeling."

  "Visit there, or live there?"

  It was obviously a question Danucci had already thought about. "Live, I think."

  "Did your daughter talk with you about that?"

  "No. But I think . . ."

  "Yes?"

  "I think maybe she decide to go there."

  "To New York?"

  "Yes."

  "Why?"

  "Because on phone . . .” For the first time, the good eye completely filled, and she reached into the cuff of her dress for a hankie. She sobbed very quietly into the cloth for a moment, then wiped that eye. The glass one stayed at half-mast, the more hardened mourner at a funeral.

  "I am sorry, Mr. Cuddy."

  "I understand."

  "The day . . . the day she die, we talk on phone. She seem excited."

  "What did you talk about?"

  "The trip of her father to Philadelphia, the dinner my husband and I take her to the next night in Boston. She was very busy on a . . . shoot somewhere that week, so I must catch her up on all family things. She tell me she have something exciting to say at dinner. Something she decide to do."

  "Move to New York?"

  The hand fluttered. "I am afraid yes."

  "Afraid?"

  "The dinner is suppose to be happy time. A birthday for our daughter and her father and me. I do not want her to . . .destroy the happy time with her . . . news."<
br />
  Suddenly fierce, Claudette Danucci passed the hankerchief across her face. "Mr. Cuddy, in Vietnam, I am call 'Viet Kieu' because I am Vietnam woman who come here to America. In Vietnam, the children eat sand to fill their belly with something. In Vietnam I cannot hope to work in a house one-half beautiful like the one I live in here with my husband. I have beautiful car my husband give me. I have five hundred dollar to spend on beautiful handbag that maybe go with three dress I wear. Five hundred dollar, a whole family live for year in Vietnam. Whole family, wait in Vietnam office, sleep on floor, on dirt outside, for month, two month, to come here to America."

  Her voice surged. "I tell you these things so you will understand, Mr. Cuddy. I see hard things in my life. But nothing so hard like when I sit in my living room and the telephone ring and the brother of my husband from Boston tell me my daughter is dead. I give up all I have, I give my other eye, for my daughter to live again. Do you understand this?"

  She was riveting, the good eye on me and the glass eye on me, too. "Yes."

  "When I sleep, I dream. Before my daughter die, if I dream of things in Vietnam, bad things, hard things, I dream of these things in Vietnam words. When I dream of things here, in America, good things, beautiful things, I dream in America words. Now my daughter is dead, and I dream in Vietnam words, all things in Vietnam words."

  "Mrs. — — "

  "You promise me, Mr. Cuddy. You find the one kill my daughter?

  "Mrs. Danucci — "

  "You find him, you tell me."

  "Mrs. — — "

  "You promise!"

  I promised.

  -10-

  THERE WAS AN AWKWARD MOMENT AS CLAUDETTE DANUCCI STOOD and moved toward the door to the den. Awkward, because Vincent Dani had knocked and then come in without waiting for an answer, saying "Claudette?" His brother's wife just shook her head, stumbling a little as she passed. Dani gripped her at the shoulders, steadying her. His hands lingered a beat longer than necessary, his eyes a beat longer than that as she patted his left hand and went out the door, shutting it gently behind her.