Suspects

by William Caunitz

  Scanlon said a silent farewell to Joe Gallagher, the man who had helped him stay a cop.

  “They gave him some sendoff.”

  Walter Ticornelli’s black ringlets looked as though they had been soaked overnight in a vat of grease. The shylock’s reeking aftershave caused Scanlon’s nose to wrinkle.

  “Do you take a bath in that stuff?” Scanlon said, moving downwind.

  “Whaddaya mean? That’s Musk for Men by Le Claude.”

  “It smells like panther piss for schmucks.”

  “Whadda cops know about fancy things?”

  “I guess nothing. But I am glad to see you here, because I want to ask you a few questions.”

  “About what?”

  “Eddie Hamill. I hear stories.”

  Ticornelli’s face darkened with anger. “I hear them too. They’re old wives’ tales. Don’t believe them.”

  “Someone pegged those shots at you.”

  Ticornelli made a gesture of frustration. He spoke in Italian.

  “Hamill never shot at me. Believe me, there was nothing between Hamill and me, nothing.” He shook his finger at Scanlon and his pinky ring sparkled. “Besides, what would that have to do with Gallagher and Yetta?”

  Scanlon answered in English. “Mistaken identity. You might have been looking to take Hamill out and the guy you hired to do the job mistook Gallagher for Hamill.”

  Ticornelli slapped his forehead, said in Italian, “And I suppose that I also had the old lady’s son and wife killed?”

  “I have to follow up on every lead, every rumor.” Scanlon was aware of the unconvincing sound of his response. He was also aware that he did not have the manpower to squander on leads that made no sense, rules or no rules. Still, he probably could put the Hamill thing on the back burner for a while. He knew where Hamill had burrowed. If he wanted him, he could always reach out for him.

  Ticornelli glanced around to make sure that no one was within earshot, moved up closer to Scanlon, and confided in Italian, “This Gallagher thing is hurting a lot of good people. Your Irish cop friends got their strawberry noses stuck up everyone’s ass. We’d like for things to get back to normal. This is a quiet neighborhood, and we like to help it stay that way.” He held up one finger and switched to English. “Whatever you heard about Eddie Hamill and me is nothing but pure, unadulterated bullshit. Forget it. Don’t waste your time.”

  Scanlon grabbed Ticornelli’s finger. “And you wouldn’t bullshit a cop, would you, old friend?”

  The shylock worked his jaw muscles. “Of course I would. But I ain’t. And you fucking well know it.”

  He’s telling the truth, Scanlon thought. “Will you work with one of our artists and prepare a composite sketch of the driver of the getaway van?”

  Ticornelli was surprised. “Are you going soft in the head? I work the other side of the street, remember? You and me, we talk. Now and then I whisper something to you in Italian. But that’s between us. I help you make a sketch, and the world knows.”

  Scanlon spoke softly in Italian. “A few seconds ago you told me you wanted to help, get things back to the way they were. You help me, no one is ever going to know. I promise.”

  “A cop’s promise is about as good as a barroom promise.”

  Scanlon’s unflinching glare held the shylock’s eyes. He said in Italian, “I keep my word, Ticornelli.”

  A sullen silence came between them and lingered.

  Minutes passed. Scanlon said, “I’d owe you one, one that you could call in anytime.”

  “No one would ever know? They’d be no grand jury, no court, no testimony?”

  Scanlon nodded.

  “Okay. I’ll meet with your artist.”

  Scanlon left him and moved through the thinning crowd. Rented buses lined up to take out-of-command policemen back to their borough’s marshaling points. Several pipers from the Emerald Society band headed for the Dunnygall Bar and Grill. Another group of policemen followed behind the pipers. Scanlon thought, They’ll get their loads on, some cop will pull up a piper’s kilt, the piper will cold-cock the cop, and the donnybrook will have begun.

  Maggie Higgins came out of the church and walked over to Scanlon. “I stayed behind to light a candle for Lieutenant Gallagher.”

  Scanlon nodded approvingly. “How’s everything going at home?”

  “It sucks. We never should have moved in together. My car is parked a few blocks from here. I’ll meet you back at the Squad.”

  Watching her shove her way through the crowd, he thought, We all got our problems.

  Biafra Baby, Colon, and Lew Brodie were standing beside the department auto, talking. Christopher was leaning against the car reading a book on nutrition. Scanlon walked over to them and told Biafra Baby and Christopher that he wanted them to check out Harold Hunt, the accountant husband of Donna Hunt. As they talked, Scanlon noticed the shopping bag filled with boxes that Hector Colon held in his hand. “What’s with them?”

  Colon reached into the bag, took out one of the black boxes, and held it up. “Roach motels,” he announced proudly. “The cucarachas crawl inside and get stuck in the glue. They die a slow, miserable death. I’m going to put them around the squad room.”

  The long entrance hall of the Gallagher apartment had rooms on both sides. Green linoleum covered the floor. People were arriving bearing platters and trays covered with aluminum foil.

  Scanlon made his way around a group of beer-drinking policemen who were standing just outside the entrance and moved into the apartment. He turned to his left and entered the first room. Cigarette smoke tainted the air, and intermittent bursts of laughter punctuated the hum of conversation. A long table had been set up against one of the walls. It was covered with food: bowls of potato salad, macaroni salad, tuna casseroles, platters of American and Swiss cheeses, and baloney, liverwurst, and ham. There were bowls of baked beans and beets. A dozen or so bags of potato chips and pretzels were piled along the back of the table, and there were long loaves of white bread, and large jars of mayonnaise and pickles. A second, smaller table contained a large electric coffee urn, stacks of white cups, and homemade pies and cakes. A third table was covered with bottles of booze and mixes. Two cops acted as bartenders for the thirsty crowd.

  Scanlon looked around and pushed his way out of the room. The parlor was down the hall on his right. It had a Colonial-style sofa with a wooden frame. On the wall above the sofa was a painting of Galway Bay. A cross made of palm fronds was stuck into the right-hand corner of the frame. A large color television and stereo were on a portable stand. A St. Patrick’s Day hat was perched on top of the television set.

  Scanlon moved through the parlor. When he did not see George Harris or the widow, he left the room. The kitchen was at the end of the passage; it too was mobbed with people. Scanlon glanced in and noticed the old-fashioned gas stove with the heavy doors and black legs, and was reminded of his Italian grandmother and of all the wonderful meals she had cooked for him on a similar stove.

  He moved through the apartment. A drunken woman pushed her way past him, babbling, “Where’s Mary? Mary Gallagher, you poor soul, where are you?”

  Scanlon came to a closed door in the middle of the hallway and paused to listen. He heard voices inside, so he knocked and went in. Mary Ann Gallagher was sitting up on a queen-size bed that had a blue chenille bedspread. Her head was back, resting against a headboard covered with tufted burgundy fabric. A dressing table in the room had mirrors on its sides and top. It was covered with jars and tubes. There was a large television, and a dark blue rug, and two overstuffed chairs.

  Mary Ann Gallagher was holding a cup and saucer on her lap. Three other women were in the room along with a tired George Harris, who had a mourning band stretched over his shield and a spitshine on his black cowboy boots.

  Harris moved to greet Scanlon. “Glad you could make it, Lou.” He placed his hand flat on Scanlon’s back and guided him over to the bed. “Mary, this is Lieutenant Scanlon. You met him at
Joe’s wake.”

  She offered a limp hand, and Scanlon took hold of it. “I’m so very sorry, Mrs. Gallagher.”

  “You were at the wake,” she said.

  “Yes, I was.”

  “Wasn’t it grand? Did you see all the flowers? They certainly did Gallagher proud.”

  “Yes, they did,” Scanlon said, looking at Harris and whispering, “I want to be alone with her.”

  “Can’t it wait? She just got back from the cemetery,” Harris whispered back.

  “No, it can’t,” Scanlon said.

  Shaking his head in disbelief, Harris motioned the other women to leave the room. One of them, a skinny thing with a flat backside and a head of blond hair that was black at the roots, came over and kissed Mary Gallagher on the head. “We’ll be right outside the door if you should need us, Mary dear,” she said, in a squeaky voice as she cast a hostile look at the Italian interloper.

  You frigid, shanty-Irish bitch, Scanlon thought, watching Harris usher the women from the bedroom. When they had all gone, Scanlon dragged over one of the chairs and sat down beside the bed. “We have to talk, Mrs. Gallagher.”

  “About Gallagher?”

  “Yes.”

  Her striking blue eyes moved slowly over his face, taking his measure. The dark circles that he had seen at the wake were no longer there. And her skin was no longer pallid and sickly. Color had returned to her cheeks, and she wore a light shade of lipstick.

  Scanlon saw something in those eyes, deep down. It wasn’t sadness. It was a wariness and a hint of her determination to have her way. He wished he had brought Maggie with him. Women are better at questioning other women. They speak the same language, understand the unspoken questions.

  “Mrs. Gallagher,” he began, “there are certain questions concerning your married life with Joe that I—”

  “Why?” she snapped. “Why is it necessary for you to pry into my married life?” She turned and stared at the wall. “Our life together is nobody’s business.”

  He watched her sip tea. Maggie should be here, he thought. She’d probably have started by complimenting her on her nails or something.

  Mary Ann Gallagher had long, graceful hands with nails that were beautifully cared for and painted a deep red. They were pampered nails, out of place in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and out of character for a new widow. He found himself looking at her and thinking that she didn’t seem quite right in the part she was playing. Her black chemise dress draped her body, outlining an attractive figure. Her ears were pierced, but she wore no earrings.

  “Gallagher died a hero. I really don’t have to answer any of your questions, Lieutenant.”

  His left ankle itched. He tilted down to scratch it, and when he felt the fiberglass he cursed himself for forgetting. He did not want to waste time with the widow. “Mrs. Gallagher, your husband isn’t a hero until I say he’s a hero.”

  She looked at him, her thoughts blazoned across her face: You guinea bastard. “What do you mean by that?”

  “My Squad caught your husband’s case. And I make the final determination on how he died.”

  “But it was in the line of duty,” she protested.

  “Not until I say it was.” He toyed with the tightly knit balls of the chenille bedspread. “What was your married life like?”

  She raised the cup to her lips. Sipping tea, she contemplated the gray hexagon design of the wallpaper. She lowered the cup into the saucer. “My married life with my husband was unsatisfactory.”

  “In what way?”

  She looked into the cup, straining to read tea leaves. “When we were first married, Gallagher wanted me to do certain unnatural acts, things that I could never bring myself to do. I really never enjoyed that part of married life. In time Joe came to understand that and we got along fine. We grew to respect each other.”

  “How often did he …” Damn, he thought. “How often did he make love with you?”

  “Once every six months or so,” she said casually.

  Scanlon felt as though he were one of those creepy, nose-picking detectives with stained ties who get off on asking female complainants for unnecessary details of sex-related crimes. How did you react when the perp came, my dear?

  He watched her finish her tea and lean over the side of the bed to put the cup and saucer on the floor. As she moved, her dress clung to her body, outlining bikini underpants.

  Scanlon decided that Mary Ann Gallagher was indeed an incongruous woman: pampered nails, sexy underpants, a magnificent ass, and an avowed distaste for sex. “How did Joe spend most of his off-duty time?”

  “Gallagher expended most of his time and energy on being a police department celebrity. He belonged to over a half-dozen police-related organizations. And he was active in every one of them.”

  “Then it’s safe to say that he was out most nights of the week.”

  “He was always at one meeting or another.”

  “Do you think that there might have been other women in his life?”

  Her lips narrowed and tightened. “There was never another woman in Gallagher’s life. My husband was a Catholic! A Fourth-Degree Knight.”

  His thoughtful expression gave way to a question. “Is George Harris a good friend?”

  Her slanting eyebrows arched in the center, an involuntary expression of distress. “Yes he is, a dear friend. I don’t know what I would have done these past days without him.”

  “Did you and your husband socialize with Harris and his wife?”

  “Occasionally we would attend department functions together. Once we went to the Lieutenants’ Benevolent Association’s Winter Carnival at the Nevele Country Club.”

  “Did you or your husband have any contact with Stanley Zimmerman or his wife, Rachel?”

  “No we didn’t. Really, you certainly don’t think that their deaths were in any way connected to Gallagher’s? It was nothing more than a horrible coincidence.”

  “Maybe. Do you work, Mrs. Gallagher.”

  “No.”

  “How did you and Joe manage financially?”

  “Just fine. Everything is so expensive today, but we managed. We don’t owe a soul.”

  “Did Joe ever gamble?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Did he moonlight or have any other business dealings outside the Job?”

  “The department was Gallagher’s life; he gave it his all.”

  Scanlon’s mind raced, trying to find new questions. He noticed that she had mentioned going out with Harris and his wife, but not that Harris was divorced. He wondered if she knew, and decided not to ask. Never put your cards on the table, any cop worth his salt will tell you that. An image of a scared little girl in Mary Janes with the wide, lolling tongue of a Down’s syndrome victim and the uncomfortable face of a twelve-year-old boy came to mind. “How are the children taking all of this?”

  “The poor darlings really don’t understand. They only know that their daddy is gone, and that they will never see him again.” She choked up, began to sniffle. Reaching into the Kleenex box on the night table, she pulled out one and dabbed her eyes. “I have to give the darlings back now.”

  “Give them back? I don’t understand.”

  “They are foster children. We’ve had them for four years. And now that I’ll have to go to work, I’ll be unable to care for them.”

  “I thought they were adopted.”

  “No, they’re not adopted. We couldn’t have any of our own so Joe decided to take in some foster children.”

  When Scanlon left the bedroom he noticed clusters of people standing around in the hallway. He found George Harris standing outside the kitchen, drinking a can of beer. “How’d it go?” Harris asked.

  “Okay,” Scanlon said, watching a woman inside the kitchen drain a can of beer. He saw her bend the can in half, arch it into a plastic garbage bag, reach down into a metal garbage can that was filled with ice, and pull out another can. She was talking to a man in a bus driver’s uniform.

/>   “What did you think of Mary Ann?” Harris asked.

  “There was something about her that made me uncomfortable.” The muscles on the right side of Harris’s face made a lopsided smile. “She’s a good woman, Lou,” he said, shaking out one of his clipped butts.

  “I’m sure that’s true, George.”

  Gales of laughter came from the beer-drinking woman in the kitchen. “Let’s get out of here,” Scanlon said, and led the way through the crowd.

  The fresh air felt good. Scanlon leaned back against the wrought-iron gate and glanced up. He began to admire the Greek Revival houses on the block. He liked the three-sided projecting bay windows. There were two Italianate brownstones in the middle of the block with delicate ironwork and detailing over the doors and windows. A stream of people bearing food threaded their way up the steps of the Gallagher house.

  “Have you come up with anything on the case?” Harris asked.

  “A lot of stone walls. What happened in the Nineteenth really threw us for a loop,” Scanlon said. “I don’t know which end is up anymore. Who the hell would want to murder the Zimmermans?”

  “Beats the hell out of me, Lou. But you know, both sets of homicides don’t necessarily have to be related.”

  “That’s what I keep telling myself. Have you found out anything?”

  “I spoke to every cop in our unit and to most of the cops in the One-fourteen. Not one of them knew a thing about Joe’s love life or about his gambling.”

  “That’s bullshit. Cops were with him when he stopped women for phony traffic violations. I’m going to have to speak to them myself.”

  “Lou, they’d speak to me a lot faster than they would to you.”

  Scanlon looked at Harris. “Do you think Joe could have been getting it off with one of the policewomen in your unit?”

  “Anything is possible, but I don’t think so. Joe liked the conquest. If he ever made it with a subordinate, he’d never know if he’d scored because he was her boss or because he turned her on.”

  Higgins was drafting the supplementary Unusual on the double homicide in the Nineteenth when Scanlon walked back into the squad room. “If you had a couple of foster kids, would you be able to just up and give them back?” he asked Higgins.