This Saturday afternoon, the first day of November, Taylor sat on a couch in the Dodds’ small living room, which was filled with large cops. All of Dodd’s brothers were cops, except for one fireman, who happened to be the biggest of the group. There were others squeezed in too. Taylor, after being ordered onto the couch between two brothers, was offered a beer by the fireman.
The two-story attached home built of brick and aluminum siding was a mirror image of all the others on the block. No driveway, but a front yard and a backyard. Off in three directions: headstones. This view was what owning your own place in Queens often meant.
Twenty minutes passed with the men talking to each other and ignoring Taylor. Nothing was said about police work. Not one word. The discussion revolved around the miserable season the Jets were having. They’d lost 45-28 to the Baltimore Colts at Shea last weekend. Most of the men were Jets fans, which was no surprise here in Queens. Two were for the Giants, and since their team also had only two wins, they didn’t have much to say. The discussion got most heated when one of the Jets fans complained about having to share Shea with “the fucking Giants.”
“You’re lucky to have a real team in there.”
“Go fuck yourself.”
“C’mon? You kidding? The Yankees and the Giants are the best that shithole is ever, ever going to see.”
“You guys screwed up the entire schedule. Four teams sharing. Why? So yours can get a better stadium.”
The conversation went on like that. Profane, genial sports talk. No shoptalk. That was okay. Taylor could wait. His job was about waiting. The wall opposite was crowded with family pictures, some old black and whites and a bunch of Kodachromes with colors that didn’t occur in the natural world. Many taken at the beach. Could be Montauk or Fire Island, or even Rockaway here in Queens.
Sitting with those sand-covered kids, smiling. He didn’t expect to die. She didn’t expect to lose him.
The hulking fireman stepped aside, and a brunette stood in the doorway that led to the dining room. The woman was petite anyway but looked positively miniature with all the big bodies around her.
A gray-haired man, tall, angular, and muscled, went over to the woman. He leaned in a moment, whispered, and turned to Taylor. “What do you want to know?”
Taylor addressed the woman directly. “I’m very sorry for the loss you and your family have suffered. I know this is a difficult time. I’m looking into your husband’s death. It may not be as straightforward as has been reported.”
The gray-haired guy shook his head. “If it’s not, the detectives will figure it out. You’ll get a press release.”
“Sometimes the detectives don’t figure it out.”
The man crossed the room in two big steps and pulled Taylor off the couch. He had a badge out, a gold badge, and pressed it into Taylor’s cheek. “I’m a detective. What exactly are you implying?”
The badge hurt. Taylor was going to lose the interview before he could make his case.
Go for broke, bonehead. If they’re going to toss you out anyway. Once the long blue line closes ranks, I get nothing.
“I think Officer Dodd may have been set up.”
“You fucking think what?”
“I’ll see him.” Kathy Dodd’s voice was a little above a whisper, but the detective let go immediately.
“Are you sure?” He turned back to her. “You never know what these vultures are up to. Remember that Eyewitness News asshole?”
“Let him through, Davey.” She left the doorway.
Davey stuck his face very close to Taylor’s. Budweiser mingled with Old Spice. “If you mislead her, if you hurt her in any way, if you do even the smallest thing I don’t like, I will break you into pieces and these guys will spread you all over Queens.”
“That isn’t going to happen. Might even be able to help.”
A dark disbelieving laugh as Davey stepped out of the way, shaking his head.
Taylor walked through the dining room. Candles on the table burned, though it was midday. They gave off a waxy lemony scent that mingled with coffee and cake. Seven pairs of eyes followed him into the kitchen. If it was possible, the ladies at the dining room table looked more suspicious than the men in the living room.
In the kitchen, the screen door to the backyard banged closed. He opened it and stepped onto a small wood deck with just enough room for a rubber welcome mat and a cast-iron hibachi on a round white aluminum table. The hibachi held gray ash still in the shape of charcoal briquettes. Their last cookout?
Kathy was already sitting on a folding beach chair—aluminum piping and green plaid plastic strips woven to form the seat and back. The dark shadows under her eyes jumped out from her washed-out, beyond-pale skin. In the pictures, she smiled at the world as a good-looking woman. Now it was hard to see past the exhaustion.
Taylor took the other chair. The back half of the small yard formed an intricate garden. A waterfall trickled out of a miniature mountain on the right and became a lazy little stream that ran around the outside of the garden all the way back to a pond at the foot of the mountain. A wooden bridge arched over the stream from the yard just in front of them. In the middle of the garden was a maze created with foot-high shrubs. On the left, a forest of tiny trees, or bushes cut to look like trees. The whole thing was a tiny world in itself.
A breeze on this surprisingly warm autumn day caught Kathy’s dark hair and flipped it. She didn’t seem to notice.
Taylor took out his notebook and made a list of what was in the garden. “That’s amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Robert loved doing it. He was a city boy who should have been a country boy. Wanted to be a country boy. Talked about moving us way up to Mahopac.” A brief chuckle and shake of the head. “I’m sorry you had to wait. The boys insisted on making calls.”
“To who?”
“Apparently you don’t hate cops. Do pretty well by them. You’re lucky. They wouldn’t even let the Times guy in the house.”
“Sounds like the Channel 7 reporter didn’t treat you so well.”
“He just wanted to get me to cry for everyone watching. Asked me about meeting Robert. What the kids are going to do. So I cried. He got here before the boys started looking after me. He got what he wanted.”
“I’ve no interest in making you cry, but what I’ve learned may not be easy for you to hear.”
She blew out air. Lipstick was her only makeup. “I don’t know how I can hurt any worse.”
“I’m hoping you might know something that will help.”
“Like what?”
“Was there anyone who had it in for your husband? Anyone on the job?”
She turned toward him with a look that was serious, but not surprised. Her dark brown eyes were clear. The breeze continued to whip her hair around. “Why do you ask that?”
“Can you keep all this between us for now? Too many holes.” I also don’t want a cover-up. Check that. More of a cover-up than already is underway.
Kathy nodded gravely.
“Johnny Mort wasn’t a criminal, wasn’t violent at all. That is, until someone threatened him. I think to get him to do the mugging. The shooting itself … well, there are some holes there too. Samantha Callahan was diverted from the chase by a fake radio call. Could be so she wasn’t on hand to see the shooting. Now she’s being threatened to drop her story. Cops are making the threats.”
“Oh God, Samantha. The boys wouldn’t let me talk to her, either. She called yesterday. I’m sorry for that. Robert had no problem with her as a partner. You’re sure? She didn’t abandon him like they’re all saying?”
“As sure as I can be. Like I said, a lot of missing pieces. They didn’t find Mort’s gun after the shooting. I’m still waiting for news on that. There are a few other elements that don’t make sense. What was happening on the job?”
“I was so afraid something like this would come up. So afraid I didn’t want to think about it. The past couple of months have
been awful. A year ago when he moved to the precinct, Robert pretty quickly figured out there was a group of patrolmen taking bribes. Robert wasn’t a Serpico or anything. He just wanted to be left alone to do the job. Always said, if he wanted to be a crook, he’d have been a crook. Or a banker.”
She took a sip of water.
Similar to what Samantha said.
“That’s one reason he was okay with Samantha as a partner. He figured he’d get left alone if he rode with her. They’d never trust her to know. It all worked until late in August. He’d been in the precinct too long, they said. They didn’t like that he wasn’t a part of it. Funny, they never say exactly what they’re doing. It’s like they’re embarrassed. Still, they take the money. A new Internal Affairs guy had arrived at the start of the summer. That had them all jumpy. They needed to tie up loose ends.”
“What’s the name of the IA officer?”
“Christian Slive.”
“Did your husband talk to Slive?
“Told me they talked, but couldn’t say what about.”
“What did your husband do about the approach from the corrupt guys?”
“Said no.”
“They don’t like it when you do that.”
“I know.” She intertwined her fingers. Her knuckles whitened. “I asked him if they came at him again.” A pause. “You know, threatening. He insisted it was only the once. Everything was quiet.” She shook her head. “He said that because he knew how scared I got after the first approach. Robert became so unhappy—anxious, and Robert was never an anxious guy. He didn’t have any patience with the kids. Even stopped working in the garden. That was his retreat from the job. He’d putter around in there every day he could.”
“Did he mention any names? A cop named Schmidt?”
“Wouldn’t. Didn’t want it to touch me. I know that doesn’t leave you with much, but you seem to have more pieces than anyone else. If what you say is true.” In her voice was sadness, like she knew it was. “I was wrong that I couldn’t hurt any worse. I’m afraid of your story. I’m crushed already. I don’t know that I can take any more bad news.”
Taylor handed Kathy Dodd his card. “I’ll let you know what I find out before I write it.”
“I’m not sure I want you to.”
Chapter 11
Taylor sat on a stool at the Oddity, the name the regulars gave to the Odysseus Coffee Shop, his grandfather’s place at Madison and 75th. Grandpop adjusted the rabbit ears on a small black and white. The TV was a big deal. Grandpop rarely allowed it in the dining area.
“I’m not running a saloon here in this place,” he’d say. Today was different. Governor Carey was going to answer President Ford’s charges against the city. Grandpop permitted the TV only when history was being made.
Taylor forked off a piece of cheese and bacon omelet. “It’s all just politics.”
“It’s not just politics. What would happen to this city if it went under?” His grandfather, barrel-chested with a full head of white hair, topped off Taylor’s coffee.
“Business as usual. Isn’t it already a financial swamp?”
“This small business of mine will be dragged down with it. The state. Everything between. Carey has said this. So will other cities and states. It’ll be a financial calamity.”
He’s worried. Maybe the threat’s real. Not just paper and talk.
But hadn’t the city been spending more than it collected in taxes since Mayor Wagner? Maybe. He couldn’t remember. Things definitely got worse with the oil shock and the recession. At some point, Taylor had figured, things would get better again. He thought about the briefcase full of city bonds, his first direct connection with the crisis. What had the cops done with it? He’d follow up on that after the speech.
One thing Taylor liked about working Saturdays—and he did it a lot—was that he owed Worthless nothing. His workweek was Monday to Friday, unless he was covering for someone on the weekend. Today, he could pursue the story as he pleased.
Carey’s long Irish face with its bushy dark eyebrows appeared on the screen. The governor started by slamming Ford’s plan to create a way for the city to go bankrupt. Bondholders would lose billions. Billions more by the U.S. Treasury—that is, U.S. taxpayers—as investors wrote off their losses and the government had to make unemployment and welfare payments. Carey refuted Ford’s speech point-by-point, winding up to an emotional conclusion, a call to battle that left behind the numbers and the technical details of finance.
“For New Yorkers, a final note: our city is often abrasive and arrogant, sometimes cold and unfeeling, always challenging. For a lot of reasons, it has incurred the scorn of some of our countrymen—because of our pace and tone of voice, because of the colors of our skins and the accents in which we speak, and our tradition as a magnet for the disaffected, the dispossessed, the dissenters.
“Whether we shall escape fiscal default, I do not know. Our fate is in the hands of people who, for now, appear determined not to let facts get in the way of what they want people to believe—and who are seeking political advantage by kicking the city when it’s down. But whatever happens, New York will survive. We will remain a home for the exiled and oppressed. And perhaps we will have learned the lesson of fighting among ourselves, instead of standing together to wage a common fight for each other. Come what may, we will win that fight.”
Led by Grandpop, the five guys sitting at the counter applauded, prompting those in the booths to turn their heads to see what was up. Carey had described the city Taylor loved—what he loved about it. Maybe the city the rest of the country hated. The speech was an exhilarating reply to the president. At the same time, it put a nervous twist in Taylor’s stomach as he thought about those damn bonds. He put down the next forkful of omelet. He wasn’t hungry anymore.
He couldn’t shake the idea he’d made a big mistake holding off writing. Problem was, the bonds were a lead with no story to go underneath. He needed the police to say what they were doing there and how they were tied to Johnny Mort. He went back into the kitchen and used the wall phone to call Novak at home.
“Cracking speech, huh?” Novak asked.
“Yeah, a good one. How long does the city have?”
“You ask the best questions. Two weeks, three. Maybe a bit longer. Here’s the problem. No one knows for sure when the blade will drop. The city and the state juggle money to make a payment at the last minute. The banks make another short-term loan. Public employee pensions swoop in and buy some bonds. The shell game goes round and round. It’s got to stop soon. The city’s probably been technically bankrupt more than once this year. If Ford doesn’t get out of the way, it’ll be the real deal.”
“Explain to me again how the bonds Mort had will make things worse.”
“Let me be clear. On the numbers, they won’t. The city’s got fourteen billion in outstanding debt. A quarter million is a molecule in a drop in a bucket. Ford, the Republicans in Congress, all the upstaters in the state legislature, they think the city’s finances are run like my daughter’s lemonade stand. Worse, actually. They’d have evidence they were right if it turned out even one briefcase of missing bonds was floating around. That could wreck any chance of a bailout. But only if the bonds were the city’s. Unsold securities or something like that. You see, someone else could own them. Then this might just be simple theft.”
“Pretty big for simple.”
“Sure. The briefcase would get some attention because of the crisis, but it wouldn’t play into the hands of those opposed to helping New York. You need to discover who owned those bonds.”
“I gotta find Mort’s family. You know, Novak, I’d say you should consider covering cops, but the beat’s too quiet for you.”
Novak laughed, calling Taylor an asshole, and said he had to get off to mix cocktails.
Grandpop sent Taylor on his way with the instruction to do something to help the city. The old man was proud of everything Taylor did at the Messenger-Telegram. Customers m
ight bring other papers into the Oddity, but the only one Grandpop displayed on the counter was the MT. He was, in fact, the opposite of Taylor’s father, and so it was his mother’s father Taylor came to for family.
He was sad, nodding his assent to Grandpop as he left the coffee shop. The story he was working on was hardly the kind his grandfather had in mind.
Detective Trunk ate fried chicken out of a Colonel Sanders bucket. He was in the middle of pulling apart a wing with the gusto of Henry VIII when Taylor sat down at the desk opposite.
Trunk frowned and finished tearing the wing in two. Odor of greasy chicken. “Who the fuck let you in?”
“I told the desk sergeant you wanted to see me. Badly.”
“You’ve got a real sense of humor.” He chewed as he talked. “You’ll be leaving even faster. I’ve no use for you.”
“You seem a smart guy to me. Might want to listen.”
“Oh fucking marvelous. Compliments from the press.” Trunk cleaned off the middle wing bone and picked up a biscuit as big as Taylor’s fist.
“I figure you’re not going to ignore reports of corruption. Cover-ups aren’t the rage anymore.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Dodd was invited to go on the pad and refused.”
Trunk put the biscuit down, wiped his hands deliberately with a yellow paper napkin, and sipped from the straw sticking out of a large soda. “You ought to be careful what you allege. If you want to leave by the door you came in.”
“Something else that ought to be in your picture. Officer Callahan says she received a call that diverted her from the chase, diverted her long enough for Dodd to be murdered. Maybe killed in a way that’s different from how things look.”
“Where’s Callahan now?”
“I’ve no idea.”
“You better hope not. She didn’t turn up today. She’s not at home. She’s not anywhere. Looks like she’s running. We’re putting out a warrant.”
Drop Dead Punk Page 8