The Complete Cooper Collection (All 97 Stories)

by Bernico, Bill

  “Now where are we going?” Clay said?

  “The roof,” I said.

  Further down at the end of the hall I spotted a door with a small plaque identifying it as the door to the roof. I tried the handle and it opened. Clay and I stepped into the hall on the other side and climbed the stairs to the roof. We stepped outside and I pointed to the west.

  “Over this way,” said. “The bathroom window should be right about…here.”

  And it was, sitting three feet above my head. Directly below the window was a narrow passage, too small for a person to walk through, which connected one part of the roof to the other. I leaned over and looked down into the crevice. All I could see was a dark, shapeless object. It had fallen down four or five feet into the crevice. I stuck my arm down but couldn’t reach it. I stood back up and scanned the roof. Several yards to the north I could see something lying on the tarpaper covering. It looked like a long, metal pencil but on closer examination it turned out to be one arm of a television antenna. It had apparently broken off the main antenna mast a few feet away. I scooped it up and hurried back to the crevice.

  I lay on my stomach and swiped at the object with the rod. I could nudge it, but couldn’t get a grip on it. I stood back up and grabbed one end of the rod and laid it across the doorframe, bending just the tip into a makeshift hook. I lay back down and tried again. This time I managed to hook onto the object and gently pulled upward until I could grab the object with my hand. I stood again and handed it to Clay.

  Clay unrolled it and held it up. It was a gray coverall. I could see a lump in the middle and reached inside, pulling out a matching gray hat with a shiny black visor. I let it dangle on the end of my finger and smiled at Clay.

  “We got him,” Clay said.

  “Yes we do,” I agreed. “Let’s go.”

  I brought the evidence with me and returned to Hollister’s office to see Hannah. She had cleared Dan’s desk of the paper mess we made and was sitting at her reception desk.

  “Find something?” she said.

  “We sure did,” Clay said.

  I held a hand up to silence him and the three of us went back into Dan’s office. I closed the door behind me and turned to Hannah.

  “Can you tell me where Officer Granger is right about now?” I said.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But I can find out. Give me a minute.” She left Dan’s office and returned in two minutes. “He’s on patrol with Sergeant Hilliard.”

  “Can you make up an excuse to get them back to the station house,” I said.

  “Why?” Hannah said.

  “Because it’s safer than confronting him on the street,” I said. “Here we can control the situation and take him down with no risk to the public.”

  “I’ll ask the desk sergeant,” Hanna said and turned to leave.

  “No,” I said. “We don’t want to let anyone else in on this until he’s here in front of us. No telling who might turn out to be his ally. Could you just call him in yourself? Make up something about Dan being back here and wanting to talk to him.”

  “I’m on it,” she said and took a seat behind Dan’s desk. She grabbed a microphone on a short stand and pulled it in front of her, pressing the talk button. “Car nineteen come in.” She waited a few seconds and repeated, “Car nineteen come in, please.”

  “Car nineteen, go ahead.” It was Sergeant Hilliard.

  “Car nineteen, return to the station house,” Hannah said. “Captain Hollister would like to see you both.”

  “Car nineteen, copy that. E.T.A. ten minutes,” Hilliard said.

  Hannah turned to me and said, “Now all we can do is wait until they get here.”

  I showed Hannah what we’d found on the roof. I emptied Dan’s coat rack and hung the coverall on a hanger so it could be seen by anyone entering the office. I placed the cap on top, facing us. A few minutes later there was a knock on Hollister’s office door. Hannah opened it and stepped back as Sergeant Hilliard and Officer Granger entered. They both took off their hats and looked around the room.

  “You said Captain Hollister wanted to see us?” Hilliard said. “Where is he?”

  Hannah said, “He’ll be along in a minute,” knowing that wasn’t true.

  Officer Granger nervously stood next to his sergeant, shifting his feet every few seconds. He scanned the room, as people will do when they’re waiting. His eyes came to rest on the coveralls hanging on Dan’s coat rack. I watched his face as he recognized what he was seeing. His lips pursed and his feet shifted again before he spoke up.

  “Sergeant,” he said to Hilliard. “I left something in the patrol car. I’ll be right back.” He turned to leave.

  I stepped between Granger and the door. “It’ll keep,” I said.

  “Excuse me,” Granger said. “I said I have to leave, now get out of my way.”

  The sergeant turned to Granger, his face frowning. “You stay where you are officer.”

  Granger went for his gun and had it out before anyone could stop him. He aimed it in our general direction and then directly at me.

  “Back away from the door,” Granger said, waving the gun barrel toward the inner part of the office.

  “Are you crazy?” Sergeant Hilliard said. “Put that gun away.”

  Granger kept the gun trained on us with his right hand, his left hand reached behind him and grabbed the doorknob, twisting it and pulling the door open. Over his shoulder came the familiar sound of a rotating cylinder and a hammer being cocked in his ear.

  “Don’t move,” Captain Dan Hollister said.

  Hilliard grabbed the gun out of Granger’s hand and gave it to me while he pulled the cuffs off his belt and slapped one end on Granger’s left wrist. He spun the officer around and connected the other cuff on his right wrist.

  Dan let out his breath and dropped his arm. He stepped into the office and laid the gun on his desk. “Boy, that was getting heavy,” he said. “Maybe I’m not ready to come back to work just yet.

  Hannah got up out of Dan’s seat and stood aside while Dan sat down.

  Dan looked up at me. “Okay, let’s have it.”

  I filled Dan in on what Clay and I had found and how we’d searched Granger’s background. When I finished, Dan turned to Granger.

  “You have the right to remain silent,” Dan said.

  “You don’t have to give me that,” Granger said. “I can say it in my sleep.”

  “All right,” Dan said. “You wanna answer just one question for me? Why?

  “Why?” Granger said. “You have to ask why? How long have you and the D.A.’s office had Benedetto under surveillance? And still you couldn’t bring him in. Just because he has money and power and he’s a thug, does that give him special privileges and the right to kill Tim?”

  “Tim?” Dan said.

  “Timothy Cleary,” Granger said. “My cousin Tim. Benedetto had no right to shoot him.”

  “Just like you had no right to shoot Benedetto,” Clay said. “I’m sure Benedetto deserved it as much as anyone, but it wasn’t your duty to administer justice. In fact…”

  “Justice?” Granger said. “You call what he did justice? What I did was justice. Benedetto got just what he deserved.”

  I pulled my notepad out of my pocket and flipped it open to the last page and read aloud. “For your information, Officer Granger, Benedetto was out of town the day Timothy Cleary got shot. We know that for a fact. Another thing, he didn’t have it done, either. None of his associates were involved in your cousin’s death. Clay and I uncovered the truth during our investigation, in case you’re interested.”

  Granger scowled at me. “What proof have you got?”

  I continued to read from my notes. “Benedetto didn’t shoot Cleary, but we know who did,” I said. “You threw away your career and you life for a hoodlum that wasn’t worth it. And now all you have to look forward to is life in prison, unless they decide to execute you.”

  “You think the D.A.’s gonna execut
e me?” Granger said.

  “Maybe not the present D.A.,” I said. “But his successor just may.”

  “His successor?” Dan said.

  I nodded. “If you’ll send a couple of officers to the fifth floor to arrest him, we can put this case to bed.”

  “Cooper,” Dan said. “Have you lost your mind? Why should we arrest the D.A.?”

  “Because Benedetto didn’t kill Timothy Cleary,” I said, “but Harrison did.”

  You could have heard a pin drop in Dan’s office.

  Clay broke the silence. “That’s right,” he said. “He wasn’t receptive to me at all when I went to see him, and that made me curious enough to look a little deeper into the man’s background. Cleary was a loan shark and he was cutting into Benedetto’s territory all right, but as dad said, Benedetto isn’t the one who took care of him. Harrison had had Cleary hauled in once before, and being the ambitious, greedy type that he is, he saw a way to make some serious money on Cleary’s operation. Cleary dodged the racketeering charges and Harrison took his cut of Cleary’s loan shark operation for looking the other way.”

  Granger’s face fell apart. “All for nothing?” he mumbled.

  “That’s right,” Dan said. “All for nothing.” He turned to Hilliard. “Take him downstairs and book him—murder one.”

  Hilliard led Granger out of the room while Dan grabbed his phone, pressing the intercom button.

  “Hannah, get me detective Martin,” Dan said. “Tell him to grab a couple of men and come to my office immediately.”

  “Yes sir,” Hannah said.

  A minute later three men from the detective division walked into Dan’s office and looked to Dan for further instructions.

  “Go on up to the fifth floor and bring District Attorney Harrison down here—in cuffs.” Dan said.

  “Harrison?” One detective said. “You want us to arrest the D.A.?”

  “That’s right,” Dan said.

  “What charge?” the detective said.

  “Murder one.” Dan explained.

  The detective looked at Dan questioningly.

  “That’s right,” Dan repeated. “Murder one. Now go bring him in.”

  The detectives left and headed for the elevator.

  Dan turned to me and said, “I want to be at the elevator when he steps off. I want to see the look on his face.”

  “So do I,” Clay said.

  We all left Dan’s office and waited in the lobby for the elevator to return with the three detectives and the D.A. Minutes passed that felt like hours. I checked my watch. It had been fifteen minutes since the detectives had left Dan’s office.

  “Something’s wrong,” I said. “It shouldn’t take this long.”

  I pressed the button for the elevator and we all stepped in when the doors opened. We got out on the fifth floor to a chaotic scene. The three detectives all stood in Harrison’s office while four other officers kept people back in the hallways.

  “What’s going on here?” Dan said to one of the officers.

  The officer pointed to Harrison’s office and said, “It’s the D.A., Captain. I guess the detectives came up her to bring him in for something but he wouldn’t come with them. That’s all I know.”

  Dan walked into Harrison’s office with Clay and me following close behind. The three detectives stood facing the window but weren’t moving. Dan walked up behind them.

  “Where’s Harrison?” Dan said.

  The detective pointed to the window. “Out there, on the ledge,” he said.

  Dan eased up closer to the window and looked out. Harrison was standing on the ledge with his back to the building. Clay and I eased over to the other window and glanced out. A crowd was forming on the street below and some were shouting, ‘jump’ while others just gasped.

  Dan stepped closer to the window. Harrison saw him and sidestepped further away from the window.

  “Don’t come any closer,” Harrison shouted.

  “Come in here right now,” Dan demanded. “What are you going to accomplish out there?”

  “Go away,” Harrison said.

  “We know all about you and Cleary,” Dan said. “We know he was putting the squeeze on you and that he was ready to come forward. But it’s over now. Come back inside and we can talk about it.”

  “You know what they’d do to a cop or a district attorney in prison?” Harrison said. “I’m not going to prison.”

  “What choice do you have?” Dan said.

  Harrison looked Dan in the eye and a calm came over him. “This,” he said, stepping off the ledge and plunging to the street below. There was a collective gasp from the crowd and a few screams as he connected with the pavement.

  Dan stepped back away from the window and over to where we stood. “Not the way I’d have wanted to go,” Dan said, shuddering.

  “Two lives wasted,” I said.

  “Just two?” Dan said.

  “Granger and Harrison,” I said. “Benedetto and Cleary don’t count. We’re better off without them.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Dan said. “Let’s go. I need a drink.”

  Dan ordered the detectives to seal off Harrison’s office until the crime lab could come up and confiscate all of Harrison’s papers. He instructed the officers in the hall to help with crowd control in the street. Then the three of us rode the elevator back down to the lobby and returned to Dan’s office.

  We all sat, not sure what to say and then Clay broke the silence. “Well, I have to say, for my first case it couldn’t get much more exciting than this,” he said.

  “So you think you’ll want to stay with it?” Dan said.

  Clay smiled broadly. “You bet. From now on it’s Cooper and Dad all the way,” he said.

  I held up one finger and said, “You mean Cooper And Son, don’t you?”

  “Cooper And Son,” Clay agreed.

  37 - Even In The Best Of Homes

  1976 had been a good year for me and my son, Clay. It had marked both Clay’s five-year anniversary with Cooper and Son Investigations, and it also marked the year I retired and turned the business over to him. I’d made myself available on an as-needed basis, filling in when he needed time off or help with the mundane chores so he could concentrate on the investigation part of the business. I missed the legwork for the first few months after I’d retired, but I soon got used to having lots of free time to do some of the things I’d never had time for before Clay joined the business.

  During the month of July that year, I spent a week in a cabin in the woods by myself, just fishing and reading and enjoying the peace and tranquility. I chose the week of the Fourth to get away from the city. I’m as patriotic as the next guy, but I couldn’t stand the thought of all that noise and commotion they were sure to make over the country’s bicentennial celebration. I hated to see the week come to an end because I’d promised Clay that I’d take over the business the following week while he took his vacation.

  Years ago we’d gone on vacations together, but these days it was difficult to find time when both of us could go together, leaving the business closed for seven days. Clay was still trying to establish himself in the investigation business and make a name for himself and couldn’t afford to leave the business unattended for any extended length of time.

  It had been more than ten years since muggers had killed my second wife, Amy, changing my life forever. I’d been stabbed and shot during the mugging and in time my physical wounds healed, but my heart never did. Amy is with me every day in everything I see, hear, smell and think. But she gave me the greatest gift a man could ask for—my son, Clay, and in the years since her passing we’ve grown closer than any father and son could hope to.

  Ten years ago, shortly after Clay and I had scattered Amy’s ashes in the Hollywood Hills, I’d sold the house that Amy and I had shared for fifteen years and where Clay had grown up. Clay and I took an apartment on Yucca Avenue where we stayed for the next three years. Then in the fall of 1969 Clay left for
college and I kept the apartment for another three years. It was close to my office and inexpensive to maintain.

  Clay had dropped a bombshell on me late in 1971 by telling me that he’d dropped out of college and wanted to join me in the investigation business. Originally I didn’t think it was such a good idea, but Clay was persistent and convinced me that I needed help running Cooper Investigations. We’d changed the name to Cooper and Son and Clay asked me to move in with him in his house in Glendale. It seemed like a good idea. He’d have me there to look after the place and make him an occasional dinner and I’d have a house to come home to that wasn’t empty or full of memories that weren’t always pleasant.

  With the year coming to an end, Clay and I had been making plans to celebrate the new year with Dan Hollister and his wife, Laverne. Their son, Dean would also be joining us along with his new girlfriend, Veronica. We had reservations at an out-of-the-way restaurant in Pasadena, away from the Hollywood glamour crowd that was sure to be filling the nightclubs in town. But that celebration was still six weeks away and we had a business to run.

  Shortly after Thanksgiving, I got a call from Paul Martin, the man who’d bought my house more than ten years ago. He called to ask about one of the walls in the house and wanted to confirm that it wasn’t a load-bearing wall before he tore it out to expand two of the rooms into one large space. I told him I wasn’t sure and that he’d better bring in a specialist.

  “Can I ask a favor of you, Paul? I said before getting off the phone.

  “Sure, Matt,” Paul said. “What is it?”

  “I know this sounds a little strange,” I said, “but when you finish the remodeling job, could I have a look at the results?”

  “Sure,” Paul said. “That would be fine. Besides, I’d kinda like to show off the new room and who better to show it to?”

  “Thanks, Paul,” I said. “I haven’t been in that house since I moved out all those years ago. When do you think you’ll have it done?”

  “If everything goes as planned and there are no snags, I plan to be finished before the end of the year,” Paul said. “But you know what they say about the best laid plans and all that.”