Which could not exactly be said for the Town Hall Station, up the steps of which I went, through the main door on Addison, up into the big waiting-room area. It was Friday afternoon, and business here was slow—a few juvies were slouched on the hard wooden chairs lining one wall, waiting for their parents to show, flirting with a bored lone hooker sitting polishing her nails, waiting for her pimp or lawyer or somebody to pick her up. I checked in with the fiftyish flabby Irish sergeant who sat behind the booking counter reading a racing form, and was sent on upstairs. I was expected. Sergeant Donahoe, he of the basset-hound countenance, showed me to the small interrogation room where Drury stood grilling the seated Sonny Goldstone, Nicky Dean’s partner from his Colony Club days. A police steno, a plain young woman in matronly blue, sat just behind and to one side of Goldstone, taking it all down.
The cubbyhole was well lit but stuffy. Goldstone’s fleshy face seemed expressionless, even bored. He had the sort of soft, bland, unthreatening features—hooded eyes, straight nose, petulant mouth—that so often belong to the truly cold. He was wearing black-rim glasses tinted a slight brown. He was dressed neatly, successful businessman that he was, in a tailored, vested brown suit with a tasteful two-tone brown striped tie.
Drury’s usual dapper look was absent; he was stripped down to his vest, sleeves rolled up, tie loosened, working up a sweat. He was as good a man as any at the verbal third degree. On the other hand, you still can’t beat a rubber hose.
Drury nodded to me, as I closed the door behind me, and Goldstone’s eyes flicked my way once, then stared back into nothing, ignoring both me and Drury, which was a good trick in this closet. I don’t know whether Goldstone recognized me or not; we’d only seen each other that once, that night in ’39 when Estelle took me up to a third-floor Colony Club suite.
“You were seen going into the apartment building Tuesday afternoon, Sonny,” Drury said, matter-of-fact, confident as God. “Positively identified by the manager of Estelle’s building.”
Looking at nothing, Goldstone said, “She’s nuts. She’s talking nonsense.”
“The woman picked you out of our rogues’ gallery files yesterday. And today she picked you out of a five-man lineup.”
“I remember. I was there.”
“I was there, too, Sonny. I saw her pick you out; no question in her mind.”
Shrug. “A lot of people look like me.”
“You were in that apartment, Sonny.”
Shrug. “I was there before. Not Tuesday. I got twenty or thirty people who saw me elsewhere at the time of the crime.”
“Name one.”
“I’ll wait for the trial. Which there’s never going to be.”
“Did she talk, Sonny? Did she finally tell you where that million was?”
Smirk. “Why, Drury? You want to borrow some of it to buy some more fancy-ass suits?”
This is where a rubber hose comes in handy.
Drury, unfortunately, was not that kind of cop. Donahoe came in and tapped Drury on the shoulder and said, “Visitor’s here.”
He nodded toward Goldstone, saying to Donahoe, “Lock that fat bastard up.”
“You got nothing,” Goldstone said.
Drury pointed at him. “We got bloody fingerprints in that apartment. Think about that in your cell, wise guy.”
We stepped out in the hall.
“You really got fingerprints in blood?” I asked Drury.
“Yeah, from off a kitchen cabinet,” he said, walking toward his office. I followed along.
“You think Sonny’s your man?” I asked.
“Maybe. But he was right about one thing—he really does have a common sort of face. Another Nicky Dean associate, Thomas Stapleton, who we’re looking for now, could be Goldstone’s brother. Ditto for John Borgia, who was tight with Dago Mangano, one of Dean’s partners. As for the bloody fingerprints, they belong to a woman or a small man—not Sonny Goldstone. We’re in the process of pulling in no less than a dozen Colony Club male employees for questioning, and half again that many working girls associated with Estelle, plus her former roommate. And then there’s that Adonis-crowd hood Eddie McGrath being sought for us in New York. And a suspect in the North Side fur thefts we got a line on. That doesn’t touch the thirty-plus respectable gentlemen whose names and numbers were in Estelle’s little black book.”
“Jesus. Why don’t you just gather all the suspects in Chicago Stadium and turn off the lights. It works for Charlie Chan.”
He stopped just outside his office, the door of which was closed. “It gets worse. But I didn’t ask you down here just to hear Sonny Goldstone not talk. There’s somebody waiting inside here who might prove a little more interesting.”
I followed him inside his private office, which was just big enough to comfortably house his desk, a few files and a couple of chairs, one of which was occupied by a small, dark, attractive but rather frail-looking woman in her late thirties, facing his empty desk, waiting for him to fill it. He did, nodding to her, smiling.
“Mrs. Circella,” he said. “Thank you for coming in to see us voluntarily.”
“Why shouldn’t I?” Nicky Dean’s wife said sweetly, with just the faintest hint of an Italian accent. “I’m not a criminal.”
She was smartly attired, wearing a black Persian lamb coat over a navy blue suit and a wide-brimmed navy felt hat. The effect of the dark apparel was almost one of mourning. Her oval face was pale, which made her sensual red-lipsticked mouth seem startling, and next to the full red lips nestled a beauty mark, which was enough to make you wonder if Nicky Dean had been crazy or something. Even with a dish as luscious as Estelle Carey, why cheat on this stunning creature?
Greed, of course. Something Nicky and Estelle had in common.
I just stood and listened, leaning against one wall. The police steno filed in and took her inconspicuous place in the corner, as Drury said, “You don’t mind going on the record with your statement, Mrs. Circella?”
“Of course not. I’m a good citizen. I always cooperate one hundred percent with the authorities.”
If there was any sarcasm in her words, I couldn’t find it.
“I came, at your request,” she said, “although I must admit I don’t understand why you would want to question me in regard to a murder. Particularly one committed while I was out of the city.”
“Where were you on February second?” Drury asked.
She batted long lashes, innocently; her eyes were wide and brown and lovely. “I was in New York City, of course. I was staying at the Alamac Hotel. To be close to my husband in his hour of need. Nicky and I learned of her death together, you know.”
“No, I didn’t.”
She was twisting a lace hanky in her hands, nervously. “We were sitting outside of the grand jury room of the U.S. Courthouse in New York, and someone brought in a copy of a Chicago paper. The Herald-American, I think it was. There was a picture of Estelle on the front page, but at first I didn’t recognize it. I recognized the name, though. So I turned to Nicky and said, ‘Didn’t this girl work for you?’ And he looked at her picture and said, ‘Yes.’ Then he said, ‘Let me read that paper.’”
“What did he have to say?”
She lowered her eyes. “‘That poor girl,’ he said.”
“I see. Let’s start at the beginning. Did you know about Estelle Carey?”
She shook her head, no. “I didn’t know her. I knew who she was, but we never talked. I wouldn’t recognize the sound of her voice if I heard it today. Oh, I saw her from time to time—at the dice tables at the 101 Club and the Colony Club, which Nicky owned.”
Drury smiled, but his eyes and forehead frowned; this woman was either very naive or very crafty, and, either way, it was getting to him. “Mrs. Circella, I didn’t ask if you knew Estelle. I asked if you knew about her. By which I mean…”
She licked the lush lips. “I heard the rumors that she and Nicky were friendly. I could never verify them, though.”
“How
hard did you try?”
She smiled slightly, regally. “I didn’t. I never tried. I’m a Catholic, Captain Drury. When I married I made a contract with God. None of us is infallible. I am not my husband’s judge. Nick has been a good husband to me for nineteen years.”
“Have you been aware of how he’s earned his living during that time?”
“Yes. Nightclubs. But they were no part of my life. I spent my time at home, with our two children. I won’t pretend I liked his business. It’s the one thing we’ve argued about. But when I’ve asked him to give up his nightclubs, his answer is always the same—that he had to do something for a living.”
Drury was drumming his fingers on the desk. “Were you aware that Nick was connected with the Stagehands Union?”
“Yes,” she nodded. “I know Mr. Browne and Willie. But Nicky resigned from the union before all the trouble started.”
“You know nothing of a million-dollar slush fund then?”
She smiled again. “The FBI and the Internal Revenue Service have that same interest. I’m sure if we had a million dollars, I’d know about it.”
“And you don’t?”
“Of course not.”
Drury sighed. “You were in show business once yourself, weren’t you, Mrs. Circella?”
She sat up; she didn’t seem so frail, all of a sudden. “I met Nicky when I was appearing in a show at the Cort Theater. Each night he’d come and listen to my singing. Then he’d send roses. Finally we met through a mutual friend. That was in 1923; we were married the following year.” The past glory faded, and she settled back into the chair, frail again. “Now I can’t even sing the baby to sleep, since I had diphtheria. My vocal cords were affected, but that doesn’t matter. When I married Nicky, I washed my hands of show business. A wife stays home and minds the children, like Nicky says.”
“Getting back to Estelle Carey…”
“I was at fault.”
Drury leaned forward. “Pardon?”
She gestured with the lacy hanky. “I have been a sick wife for a long, long time. Nick couldn’t be blamed for seeking the company of a gorgeous creature like Estelle—and she was gorgeous.”
Was as in past tense.
She went nobly on: “None of us knows what life has in store for us. We are all in God’s hands.”
Anyway, Estelle was.
She smiled bravely. “I have only pity for Estelle Carey. She missed everything that is fine in life—home, family, the respect and esteem that are every woman’s birthright.”
“No bitterness at all, then.”
She shook her head no. “I’m sorry for her from the bottom of my heart. Since this has happened, I’ve gone to church and lit candles in her memory. Her murder was a terrible, terrible thing.”
Drury smiled politely, rising, gesturing to her. “Thank you, Mrs. Circella. You’re free to go now. Thank you for stopping by.”
She rose, smiled politely back at him. Fluttered her eyelashes. Great eyes on this dame. “Certainly, Captain Drury,” she said.
“Sergeant Donahoe, in the hall there, will show you out.”
She walked by me, snugging on navy gloves, trailing a wake of expensive tasteful perfume. I closed the door behind her.
Drury sat back down. “What do you think?”
I was still standing. “Some classy broad.”
“I mean, is she on the level?”
“Yeah. In her way.”
“What do you mean, in her way?”
I shrugged. “She’s lying to herself, not to you. She’s human; she hated Estelle like any good wife would. But she prefers to affect her good-Catholic-wife, stiff-upper-lip, superiority-through-suffering stance. It gets her through the day.”
“In other words, her marriage is an arrangement she can live with.”
“I’d say so.”
“I say if she’d been in town Tuesday, we might have a real suspect.”
“No. I don’t think so. I can’t picture that sweet little thing with an icepick in her hand.”
“Sometimes women can surprise you, Nate.”
“Hell, they always surprise me. Personally, I wouldn’t mind finding a wife like that—beautiful, devoted, expects you to fool around on the side. I didn’t know they made ’em like that anymore.”
“You want a girl just like the girl that married dear old Nick.”
“Maybe. Anyway, I don’t think she’s a killer. I don’t think she even hired a killer.”
“The papers are going to love her,” Drury said, glumly cynical. “They’ll fall all over themselves for that ‘every woman’s birthright’ speech.”
“You got that right. Anything else you’d care to share with me? Or should I let you get back to your couple of hundred suspects?”
His face narrowed into anger, or at least a semblance thereof. He shook his finger at me. “Yes there is. Why didn’t you give me D’Angelo’s name?”
“Oh. So Uncle Sam finally ran him down for you, huh?”
“Yes, and we were out to see him this morning. And we discovered you’d been there Wednesday night. What gives?”
I held my hands out, palms open. “He was on Guadalcanal with me, Bill. He was in that same shell hole as Barney and me. We almost got killed together. I owed him a warning of what was ahead for him—cops, reporters. He had that much coming.”
“Being in the service together doesn’t justify withholding information…”
“Yes it does.”
He shook his head. “Go on, make me feel like a heel. You been to fight the big war and I haven’t. Make me feel like a piker.” He thrust his finger at me. “But if you’re going to be sniffing around the edges of this case, don’t you goddamn dare withhold information or evidence from me again; our friendship isn’t going to cover that, Nate.”
“Understood.”
“Now do me a favor and get the hell out of here.”
I did.
On my way out, I stopped by Sergeant Donahoe’s desk. “You got it?” I asked him.
He nodded and looked around furtively and opened a desk drawer and got out a sack.
“Two gee’s?” he whispered, holding on to the thing with both hands.
“Two gee’s,” I whispered back. “In cash. You’ll have the dough tomorrow.”
“I better,” he said, with his usual hound-dog expression, and handed me the sack.
I took it and walked down the stairs, out of Town Hall Station, in front of which the pretty, petite Mrs. Nick Circella was talking to Hal Davis and some other reporters, halfheartedly shielding her face with a gloved hand whenever a flashbulb went off.
I tucked Estelle Carey’s diary under my arm and walked by them.
That night I met Sally backstage at the Brown Derby at half past one; she stepped out of her dressing room wearing a white sweater and black slacks and a black fur coat and a white turban and looked like a million. Not Nicky Dean’s hidden million, maybe, but a treasure just the same.
“How can you look so chipper?” I asked her. “You just did four shows.”
She touched my cheek with a gentle hand, the nails of which were long and red and shiny. “I get a little sleep at night,” she said. “You ought to try it.”
“I hear it’s the latest rage,” I said.
She looped her arm in mine and we walked to the stage door. “It’ll get better for you. Wait and see.”
We’d spent Tuesday night together, in my Murphy bed, so she knew all about my sleeping trouble. She knew I would toss and turn, and then finally drop off only to quickly wake up in a cold sweat.
“I go back there when I sleep,” I told her. We were walking out on Monroe. It was cold, but not bitterly cold.
“Back there..?”
“To the Island.”
Our feet made flat, crunching sounds on the snowy sidewalk.
“Did you talk to your doctors about this?”
“Not really. I ducked the issue. I wanted to get home. I figured it would let up, once I did.”<
br />
She squeezed my arm. “Give it time. This is only your fourth day back. Say. Why don’t you see if a change of scenery helps your sleep habits? I’ve got a room at the Drake, you know.”
I grinned at her. “Surely not that plush white penthouse that fairy friend of yours sublet you, way back when.”
She laughed, sadly. “No. I don’t know what became of him, or his penthouse. It’s just a room. With a bed.”
“You talked me into it.”
We crossed Clark Street, heading for the Barney Ross Cocktail Lounge. Traffic was light for a Friday night. Of course, the bars had already been closed for forty minutes.
“Do you know what this is about?” she asked.
I shook my head no. “All I know is Ben asked me to stop by, after hours tonight. I asked him if I could bring my best girl and he said sure, and drinks would be on the house, and we’d have the place practically to ourselves.”
“Are you positive that’s what he said?” she asked.
We were approaching the entrance, from which came the muffled but distinct sounds of music, laughter, and loud conversation. The door was locked, but through the glass a swarm of beer-swilling people could be seen. We stood there basking in the glow of the blue neon that spelled out Barney’s name and the outline of boxing gloves, wondering what was going on, and finally Ben’s face appeared in the glass of the door, and he grinned like a kid looking in a Christmas window, unlocked it, and we stepped inside.
“What’s up?” I asked him, working to be heard above the din.
“Come on back!” Ben said, still grinning, waving a hand in a “follow me” manner, leading us through the jam-packed, smoky saloon. The jukebox was blaring “Blues in the Night”…mah mama done tole me…and the place was filled with guys from the West Side, older ones my age or better, except for some kids in uniform, and a lot of ’em patted me on the back and grinned and toasted me as we wound through ’em, way to go Nate, you showed them yellow bastards, Heller, that sort of thing. The rest seemed to be people from the sports world, the fight game especially, including Winch and Pian, Barney’s old managers, who I glimpsed standing across the room talking to a young kid who looked like a fighter. I hoped for his and their sake he had a punctured eardrum or flat feet or something, or he wouldn’t have much of a ring career ahead of him, not in the near future anyway. A few reporters were present, mostly sports guys, but Hal Davis was there, and he had a bruise on his jaw that looked kind of nasty. The look he gave me was nastier than the bruise.
The Million-Dollar Wound (Nathan Heller) Page 28