“Bizarre! Medal of Honor winner is murdered by a hit man with a conscience. Said hit man knows you and wants you to set things right. You start asking questions and a police chief working in cahoots with a man running for Staten Island borough president tries to kill you, and then murders two other people. The chief dies conveniently, leaving no evidence we can use. And you cover up the murders because, well, I’m not too clear on that. I guess it’s just your nature.”
“Cahoots?”
“I love that fuckin’ word. I hardly ever get to use it. Oh yeah, you’ve also arranged to have a hit woman pretend to hunt you down. She a looker, by the way?”
“A knockout,” I said. “It would be an honor to be shot by her.” I leaned forward. “So, what’s your next move? Can you give me a few days?”
Cormac shook his head. But it was in resignation.
“I’ll write up what I have. That will take me a few days. Not that I’d ever submit it. They’d ship me off to a department psychiatrist. What will you be doing?”
“I think I’ll make myself a nuisance around the Yorke campaign, see what happens. I’m not convinced Yorke knows what’s going on. Rizzuto was shaking him down, but he said he doubted his old pal had the cojones to order a murder. And Bubbles Belvin said Yorke wasn’t really a bad guy, as far as politicians go.”
“Two wonderful recommendations.”
“I know. But my money is on Bowles. He actually spoke to Rizzuto. But it doesn’t really matter. I’ll make enough noise; something will shake loose. I just need a little leverage to justify an investigation that doesn’t lead back to Maples and what happened upstate. I’m sure a forensic audit of Rizzuto will uncover payoffs, and from there the string will start unraveling. I just feel I’m missing something. Like how Rizzuto got the word I was going to Pulaski so quickly.”
“Well, the old nuisance ploy has worked for you in the past. How long do you think it will take?”
“I’m hoping just a couple of days. I have Veronica to think about.”
“Veronica?”
“The hit lady. She has a reputation to protect. It won’t do her any good if I’m out in the open and any Girl Scout could take me out and she doesn’t. I certainly don’t want her mad at me.”
“Why should she be any different?”
CHAPTER 24 - BOWLES
Bowles wasn’t hard to locate, and then follow. Yorke’s campaign stops were public knowledge. I went to a Knights of Columbus hall on Kreisher Street in Tottenville where the candidate was speaking at a luncheon. It broke up just after 1 P.M. and Yorke and Bowles came out and got into a black Range Rover, Bowles driving. Five other people, two men and three women, obviously campaign workers, climbed into another car carrying placards and other electioneering materials. The little caravan made four more stops, all on the south shore of Staten Island. No one noticed me tagging along. Two of the stops were at assisted-living facilities and two were at busy strip malls, where Yorke went door to door, shaking hands as he went along, with the workers following in his wake handing out pamphlets. After the last stop, our three cars hopped on the Richmond Parkway and headed north. Traffic, as usual was abysmal, and almost 40 minutes later the Yorke team pulled into the St. George Ferry Terminal. Politicians are always promising to do something about the traffic, and I hoped a frustrated Yorke received an object lesson. Of course, given what I knew, I doubted he’d ever get elected.
The campaign must have arranged something in advance because the Yorke cars were allowed to park at the top of the ramp where commuters are normally dropped off. The group all got out and walked into the terminal. A cop stood by their cars. I assumed Yorke would spend the next couple of hours glad-handing commuters as they came off the evening rush-hour ferries on their way home.
I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, so I drove up to Richmond Terrace and went into a bodega across from the ball park. I used the restroom while the counterman fixed me a Cuban sandwich. The restroom made me wonder about eating the sandwich, but I was hungry. I took the sandwich and two black coffees back to the terminal and pulled up behind the campaign cars. The cop came right over.
“These spots are restricted, bub,” he said. “You’ll have to move.”
I flashed my P.I. license and handed him one of the coffees.
“Yorke security,” I said.
He took the coffee with a nod and walked away. I ate my sandwich. It was pretty good.
If there is anything duller than watching commuters hurrying up a ramp and jumping into waiting autos, I’d like to hear about it. For distraction, I started ranking the legs of women on a one-to-ten scale as they passed my car and headed up the ramp. I was happy it was warm and there were a lot of short skirts, but it was a slow evening, gam-wise. For one thing, most of the commuters entered cars behind me, so I was only getting a long-distance view through a rear-view mirror, hardly an ideal way to judge something so important. I thought about getting out and leering over the top of the car, but I was pretty sure Yorke or one of his minions might notice me when they came back.
I was stuck on eight as the highest rank for the longest time when a young brunette in high heels clicked by. She didn’t get in any car and headed up the ramp toward Bay Street. She was a ten, leg-wise, and the rest of her might have gone even higher. The cop spotted her too, and he watched her until she disappeared from sight. When he turned around he smiled at me and shook his hand and mouthed a “wow.” I nodded.
About 10 minutes later the Yorke entourage came out. I scrunched down but they didn’t even bother looking into my vehicle. When they pulled away. I followed. The cop even held up ramp traffic for me.
The next stop was at Liedy’s, a popular blue-collar tavern on Richmond Terrace. Yorke emerged 15 minutes later and drove to the nearby Little League complex in Snug Harbor, where he caught the tail end of a couple of games and shook hands with parents and had his picture taken with a lot of kids. Then he was on to the Staaten, the popular North Shore restaurant and catering hall near my home in West Brighton. Yorke was the guest speaker at a Rotary meeting. I went in and asked one of the Rotarians when Yorke was due to speak and knew I had at least an hour. I shot home, showered and changed my clothes. I suspected it was going to be a long night.
I was right. Yorke was an indefatigable campaigner. He finally called it a night after stopping by another Rotary meeting, a Lions Club, a barbecue at Nansen Lodge, two funeral homes, three more taverns, an American Legion post and something called the Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club. His travels took him the length and breadth of Staten Island. I went into a couple of the venues and Yorke never looked tired. He shook hands, back-slapped and said a few words at each stop, and seemed to be enjoying himself. I couldn’t help but reflect that had he showed as much energy and initiative in Vietnam, I wouldn’t have been following him around. For my part, I was beat.
After his last stop, the car with the campaign workers peeled off and I followed the Range Rover to Todt Hill. It pulled into a large circular driveway in front of a large Tudor on Hunt Lane. There weren’t many cars around and I knew I was on the verge of being conspicuous so I drove past and pulled to the side two houses up. I pulled out a pair of binoculars from the center console and looked back. Just as I did so, another car, a silver Mercedes, pulled up behind the Range Rover. Yorke and Bowles got out of the Range Rover, and Teresa Yorke, the Mercedes. It was going on 11 P.M. and I wondered where she had been. I couldn’t hear anything but it seemed to me that husband and wife were arguing. Maybe Yorke was also wondering where she had been. Bowles got in his Range Rover and the other two walked stiffly into their house. I followed Bowles.
He drove to Grymes Hill and pulled into another circular driveway, this one in front of a large ranch house on Cunard Street behind Wagner College. I had done some research on Bowles. Divorced years earlier, he moved to Staten Island with his boss and now lived alone. He went into his house and shut the door. I watched lights go on and off and waited until I was pretty sure he was in fo
r the night. That seemed like a good idea, so I went home to my more modest house on St. Austin’s Place. When I pulled in, I wondered if I had enough room to put in a circular driveway.
***
I spent most of the next week doing the same thing. I didn’t realize there were so many social clubs, civic organizations, ball fields, veterans’ organizations and old-age homes on Staten Island. We hit the ferry ever morning and afternoon. Churches, bars, restaurants, bodegas — anywhere there was more than two people was fair game for the Yorke campaign. After a couple of days all I had to show for my shadowing was a back seat full of literature handed to me by Yorke campaign workers at various stops.
Late Friday afternoon, I followed Bowles to Newark Airport, where he dropped Yorke off at one of the domestic terminals. I stayed with Bowles, and on the way back to Staten Island called someone I knew on the city desk at the Staten Island Advance to ask where Yorke might be going.
“Some sort of candidate seminar and strategy meeting in Albany. Guy’s a lock in the election, so they are already grooming him or something.”
“When is he due back?”
“He’s flying back with Wrobelski first thing Monday morning.”
Wrobelski was the paper’s political correspondent.
“Why do you want to know?”
“You’re breaking up. Must be between cell towers. Talk to you later.”
Bowles went straight home. I parked a few doors up from his house. I didn’t really know what the hell I was doing, or what I hoped to find out. I needed to get lucky and have Bowles do something really stupid. I sat there three hours, feeling really stupid myself, and was about to call it a night when a silver Mercedes pulled in behind Bowles’s car and Teresa Yorke got out. It was dark and I couldn’t be sure, but she was holding what appeared to be an overnight bag.
I actually said, “Ah, hah.”
But it was dark. I couldn’t be positive it was an overnight bag. I didn’t want to sit there all night to see how long she’d be in there. I had already spent half the night waiting for something to happen. Since something happened I felt obliged to do something myself. Looking in a window seemed the natural thing to do. I knew I was taking a chance. This part of Grymes Hill was very security conscious. There had been a rash of burglaries in some of the borough’s better enclaves in recent weeks. I wouldn’t have been surprised if there was a neighborhood watch and perhaps even a roving private security patrol. I was sure the cops would cruise by randomly, as well. Being nabbed as a Peeping Tom wouldn’t do my reputation any good. And I was pretty sure having Bowles knowing I was looking in one of his windows at night wouldn’t do my investigation any good, either.
My motto in such situations is “when in doubt, do it quickly before you talk yourself out of it.” I got out of my Hyundai and walked up the driveway, then went around the side of the house where I thought I saw some light coming from a window. I sidled up to the window and looked in. I should have saved my “ah, hah” for what I saw. But, actually, I think words would have failed me.
***
“I suppose she could have been bobbing for apples,” I said
It was Saturday and I was in Alice’s apartment in Greenwich Village. I had decided to take the rest of the weekend off. It’s a luxury you have when no one is hunting you. Besides, I wanted to think. I also wanted Alice, but I could still think. Most of the time. We were lying in bed after about an hour of me not thinking. The early afternoon sun was streaming in over the bed. She was making little doodles on my chest. I was getting hungry. I didn’t eat the night before. I had managed to get a cup of coffee and a fried egg sandwich in me before heading to the city but I needed more fuel, especially after a vigorous hour with a woman who was very glad to see me.
“You looked in a window? Like a Peeping Tom?”
“Sticks and stones. I even took a video with my cell phone.”
“You said it was dark.”
“It was dark outside. Inside, in the den or whatever it was, they had the lights on and a fire going in the fireplace.”
“Weren’t you afraid they’d see you?”
“She was on her knees with her back to the window and Bowles was sitting in a chair looking at the ceiling, slack-jawed.”
“And she was giving him a blow job? You’re sure?”
I looked at her and then reached over to the table next to the bed and grabbed my cell phone.
“Film at 11. I think the flickering shadows on the wall from the fireplace are a nice touch, don’t you. Very artistic.”
“She’s not bobbing for apples,” Alice said as she watched. “She’s polishing his bone. My God. The candidate’s wife with his campaign manager! I didn’t think they even liked each other.”
“You don’t have to like someone to polish his bone.” Alice punched me. “Although it certainly helps.”
“What happened next?”
“My, aren’t you the prurient one. A minute ago you called me a Peeping Tom and now you want a blow-by-blow description, pardon the pun.”
“Do you ever want to have sex with me again?”
“Of course.”
“Then answer the question.”
“It went Marx Brothers on me. My cell phone rang. I’d forgotten to turn it off. It was Cormac. Fortunately, Bowles had started to yodel at that moment, so I skedaddled before anyone heard the phone. Went home and got a few hours’ sleep and drove back around 6 A.M. Her car was still there. I stayed for a couple of hours. She never came out. I said the hell with it and came here. Why should everybody else have sex but me?”
“What does Cormac think?”
“Same thing I do. Now we have leverage to crack this thing wide open.”
“What’s your next move?”
“To a restaurant.”
CHAPTER 25 - ALBANY
I wanted some quality time with Nathaniel Yorke far from the prying eyes of his wife and Claude Bowles, who in any event were otherwise occupied. So, Sunday morning, while I made our breakfast of bourbon-laced French toast, I asked Alice to work her magic with her computer and find out where the Albany political conference was being held.
“Don’t forget to slice the bread on an angle,” she said.
The secret to good bourbon French toast is a day-old French baguette, sliced so that each piece is about an inch thick. A dash of any bourbon in the eggs will do — in a pinch, so will sour mash or dark rum — but the bread must be sliced at an angle. Or so the Foreign Legionnaire who taught me the recipe said. I don’t know why it makes a difference. But now Alice, who once probably would have put the slices in a toaster, never failed to remind me to cut at an angle.
“And not too much cream,” she added, her head buried in the computer.
I swallowed a remark about it being my damn recipe and dunked some slices in the egg mixture, then transferred them to the frying pan. I had just set out our plates when Alice shut her computer.
“It’s at the Albany Marriott,” she reported as she dug in, “and runs until 5 P.M. Yorke is one of the speakers on an afternoon panel.”
“Would you like to go to Albany with me?”
It didn’t have quite the ring to it of “would you like to go to Paris or London?” but I was hopeful. I poured each of us more coffee. The windows were open and I could hear the Village coming to life in the streets below Alice’s Christopher Street apartment.
“I’m scheduled to give a lecture tomorrow morning at the New School on the limits of sense and reason as explained in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason.”
“So, the answer is yes?”
“The answer is no. There will be people in the audience I want to impress.”
“Let me guess. From the Ivies.”
“See. I knew you are more than a Peeping Tom. Can I have that last slice of French toast? This is yummy. You did a good job. Sliced just right.”
“The world has a surplus of fat philosophers. Perhaps you should let me have it.”
Alice, who works ou
t like a fiend and but for her swimmer’s shoulders would be something like a size 2, speared the slice and poured maple syrup on it.
“Kant would say you are being unreasonable,” I said.
She cut the slice in half and leaned forward to feed me with her fork. As she did, her robe opened and one breast peaked out, revealing a nipple.
Just why the hell was I going to Albany?
***
Jack's Oyster House at 42 State Street is an Albany institution, famous as a hangout for politicians and lobbyists, as well as tourists. I’d eaten there before and was pleasantly surprised to find out the food was better than touristy. In fact, it was damn good. But I wasn’t there to eat. It’s a three-and-a half-hour drive from Manhattan to the New York State Capital and I spent the time planning what I was going to say to Yorke. When I got to the Marriott, I still didn’t have a clue.
Yorke’s panel, in one of the hotel’s larger conference rooms, was at 4 P.M. and well-attended. Most of the discussion centered on how newly-elected officials at the state and city level could push political reform in the State Senate and Assembly. It was probably the same subject debated when there were Iroquois in the audience. And would have the same result: nothing would be done. The New York legislature resembles the Ukrainian parliament on a bad day. I wanted to raise my hand and ask them who they were kidding, but I didn’t want Yorke to spot me, just yet, so I sat in the back behind some ladies with big blue hair.
Yorke, presumably because of his many years in upstate politics, was apparently one of the stars on the panel and answered questions with a calm assurance. A born leader. Unless the North Vietnamese were shooting at him. I had hoped to catch him on the way out after the panel discussion ended but he and a few other speakers disappeared through a back door. I collared a conference staffer and asked him where they were all going. Which is how I wound up at Jack’s Oyster House.
Yorke and his group had a corner table and were having a great time. Lots of people stopped by to say hello. I sat at the bar and ordered a beer and crab cake sandwich. I had a clear view of Yorke’s table and kept staring over at him. Once or twice I thought I caught him looking my way but the joint was crowded and I wasn’t sure he spotted me. I grabbed a waiter as he walked past.
GUNNER (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 5) Page 16