Investigation

by Uhnak, Dorothy

  I felt sorry for the uniformed cops assigned to handle the political protesters; for the most part, the guys assigned to these various functions didn’t know what the hell the whole thing was all about, but they ended up being the only visible form of “oppression.” While the poor slobs on the street were yelling and shoving and provoking their own arrests, I was with the targets of their anger, be they Russian or Chinese or Cuban or Israeli or whatever, who were usually socializing politely with one another, drinking and eating at any number of gourmet luncheons, dinners or receptions. The closest thing to antagonism at these affairs would be one diplomat bragging to another about the marvelous custom tailor he had located in New York and then smugly and undiplomatically refusing to give the name of said tailor.

  Occasionally, some nut in Hollywood would come up with some kind of gimmick to publicize an about-to-open film, and, the Mayor being ever anxious to attract film-makers back to New York and being himself one of the beautiful people who loved to mix it up with movie stars, we would be handed over as taxpayer-paid personal bodyguards to an assortment of producers, directors, male and female stars and celebrities. Some of the guys got sore about these assignments. I found them interesting: like a visit to a foreign world.

  Even the hardest old-timers in the squad, the impossible to impress, would always remember the special assignments to the Secret Service contingent traveling to New York with John F. Kennedy. Usually, when you’re assigned to a top government official, you never get beyond a polite “Good morning,” but at the end of the day J.F.K. would wave a mob of us into the hotel suite, kick off his shoes, yank down his tie, break out the booze and egg us on to tell him our “war stories” about life on the streets of New York. I always had the feeling he was a buff; that under other circumstances he’d have been one helluva Irish cop, with that quick sharp wit and incisive way of getting right to the center of things with a few fast remarks.

  The department went higher-education crazy in the late sixties and started to replace members of the various squads and bureaus, regardless of experience and performance, with college-educated men. Half the guys I worked with began hustling back and forth between assignments and classes at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, frantically compiling credits. I figured that either my years of various police experience qualified me or they didn’t qualify me for the job I had been doing for the last five years; which had earned me promotion to second-grade detective.

  I got bounced—without prejudice—from the B.O.S.S. at the beginning of 1967, and Tim, who had just made captain and was assigned to a precinct in Brooklyn, arranged for me to be assigned to the Queens Homicide Squad.

  I hated Homicide. I hated everything about it, including some of the guys I worked with who liked to pretend that they were instrumental in “solving” a case. Any cop worth his shield knows that unless a homicide is committed by someone close to the victim, the odds are that the perpetrator will remain at large. Unless you get lucky and an informant comes through for you. Informants—what the Hollywood cops call “snitches”—are the backbone of any successful police department. The informant is generally the scum of the earth, and when his usefulness is over, any cop would throw him to the wolves without a blink. Which is not exactly the cute relationship of the television-series Homicide Squad hero who sleuths out solutions week after week, using ten bucks’ worth of information and a head full of clever ideas. And who feels an off-the-cuff affection for his “snitch” and vows to revenge his death, should he get caught by his fellow hoods.

  I worked Homicide for four years and was promoted from second to first grade, which meant my salary was at captain’s level, same as Tim’s. Of course, I could always be dumped all the way back to patrolman. Tim, with his civil-service rating, could never be lower than captain and had a wide-open future into the upper-echelon appointive ranks. Once his political friends were in position to help.

  On the wall space between the two windows behind Tim’s desk were mementos of his graduation from the sixteen-week-long F.B.I. training session which Tim had attended in Washington, D.C., in 1969. There was a two-foot-square replica of the F.B.I. official insignia, all blue and gold with white lettering: DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE at the top of a circle; FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION at the bottom of the circle. Inside the circle, a badgelike emblem, the top half gold with a blue scale, showing, I guess, the quality of justice, the bottom half striped red and white like a peppermint stick. Beneath the badge was a sort of unfurling ribbon divided into three sections, proclaiming FIDELITY—BRAVERY—INTEGRITY.

  Centered beneath this was an expensively framed photograph of Tim Neary having his hand shaken by J. Edgar Hoover. Tim’s face was wooden, his eyes riveted on the somewhat pop-eyes that seemed to look right through him.

  Tim had confided to me, years ago, after a couple of drinks too many, that there seemed to be something a little “strange” about the Director. (That’s what you called him if and when you talked about him at all: the Director.)

  Tim told me how he and other graduates of the F.B.I. training session had been rehearsed for the graduation ceremony to the point where every man in the room, regardless of his age, rank, experience and professional position, was reduced to a dry-mouthed nervous little kid afraid to so much as blink or swallow when in the Presence. Not to mention the emotional condition of the F.B.I. instructors responsible for their training and their successful completion of the prescribed course. They had been rehearsed as to the precise number and length—in inches—of the steps to take when approaching the Director for presentation of the diploma; the exact distance to maintain between them; how far to extend the left hand for the diploma and the right hand for the handshake. Which had been, Tim confided, warm, moist, loose and heavy. They had been told to say nothing more or less than “Thank you, Mr. Director”; to release the handshake immediately, drop the eyes respectfully, turn and noiselessly return to their assigned seats. There was to be no coughing, throat-clearing, whispering, slouching; there were to be no crossed legs; feet were to remain motionless, neatly aligned, whether standing or sitting. No excess movement of any kind in the room, including blinking or facial twitching.

  The Director did not care for any of the above behavior.

  Today, everyone and his publisher is telling “strange” J. Edgar Hoover stories, making accusations and telling jokes right on television, but this was in 1969. Tim came over to my house at six the next morning after our little drinking session, woke me up, held my arm in a killing grasp and made me swear to God, on the foundation of old friendship, that I would forget that he had ever mentioned anything at all about the Director. Of course I swore, and we never mentioned the matter again.

  There wasn’t much that Tim’s wife could do with the color of the walls in Tim’s office. As squad commander, he rated a sort of municipal bluish gray as compared to the municipal greenish gray of the squad room. I don’t know where the hell the city buys its paint, but somehow they manage to get a dirty color to swab on the walls so that the room looks exactly the same before and after painting. Tim’s Venetian blinds were gray metal city issue and were some improvement on the squad room’s yellowing heavy cloth window shades. His wife had supplied the custom-made heavy green-and-blue drapes and the heavy flat green-and-blue tweed wall-to-wall carpeting, whereas the squad room has no drapes and we make do on the municipal brownish-gray rubber-based floor tiles. Tim’s medium-size wooden desk came with his job, but his wife had dressed it up with a collection of executive-type furnishings from Bloomingdale’s: a good leather-edged blotter holder; matching green leather pencil cup; silver-framed photo of herself; a couple of gag-type paperweights. The gold-plated pen-and-pencil set had been a presentation gift to Tim from the Sergeants’ Benevolent Association. The rest of the stuff on the desk, metal file trays, battered intercom, four-button black telephone, was standard city issue.

  Tim turned from the window, checked his watch for maybe the tenth time, touched the knot of his tie, then ca
refully put on his suit jacket. He shook his head at me and resettled the lapels on my jacket. “Joey, Joey, you still dress like a Bronx boy. Where the hell do you buy your clothes, Alexander’s?” He tried to sound casual, but he was as tight as wire.

  Even the District Attorney’s secretary’s office had paneled walls and real leather couches and wall-to-wall carpeting. The secretary’s desk was bigger than Tim’s and she clicked away on her living, breathing new red electric typewriter. She told the D.A. we were waiting, and his loud voice boomed from the intercom over the soft hum of the typewriter. She raised her eyebrows brightly and jerked her head, adding her permission for us to enter the realm.

  The D.A.’s office was not only paneled, draped and carpeted, it was also chandeliered with a huge brass affair hanging from the center of the ceiling, giving off a warm amber glow. There were built-in bookcases along one wall, filled with what looked like real-leather-bound sets of lawbooks. Which looked like no one had touched them since the day they had been installed. The furniture was all dark and heavy. There were a couple of oil paintings on the walls, each with its own little brass light and heavy frame. In one corner of the room, there was an antique mirror framed in dark heavy brass, with a small matching console table on which rested the D.A.’s silver hairbrush and silver clothing brush. They were engraved with his initials, as were his silver letter opener and his outsized silver fountain pen. I knew this because Jerry Kelleher liked to make a public point of the fact that he was used to all this: to real leather furniture, wall-to-wall everything and his initials on old silver. His father had been a judge, so he was a second-generation “successful” and accustomed to the finer things in life.

  The D.A. was winding up his telephone conversation with the kind of reassuring, nonmeaning sounds you make when all the business has been discussed and you’re into the socially required niceties. He leaned back in his tall expensive executive chair, laughed into the receiver of his ultramodern telephone, winked at us as though we were party to the fraudulently good-natured remarks he was making.

  Tim’s face was stiff and cold, accepting as an insult the fact that we had been summoned prematurely and had to wait while the D.A. finished his conversation. Finally, after a hearty laugh, Kelleher hung up. The telephone disappeared on the surface of his huge, cluttered ornate desk: the judge’s desk, as everyone knew. The kind of old desk you can’t buy for love or money anywhere because they don’t make them like that anymore; the kind of desk you have to be second-generation successful to appreciate. People like Tim and me thought it was a pretty ugly old hunk of junk.

  The District Attorney of Queens has always been openly pleased with his nickname: Gorgeous Jerry. An attractive man with high pink color, bright-blue eyes and an unruly mop of lemon-colored fluffy hair which he finger-combed from his forehead in a calculated way, he greeted us, literally, with a wide opening of his arms as though we were long-missing friends he was happy to see. It took him about thirty seconds to greet us, offer us any of the comfortable leather chairs in front of his desk and our choice of Scotch, Jack Daniels or coffee. It took us another thirty seconds to sit down, get settled and politely refuse his hospitality.

  Even if he did switch labels on his clothes, I thought he looked pretty good for a fifty-four-year-old former college athlete who for years had overindulged and underexercised. Jerry Kelleher was very popular in Queens and could have spent the rest of his life being reelected to the D.A.’s office. But Jerry figured eight years was long enough; it was time for the big move. To City Hall.

  Unfortunately for Jerry, he came across as too much of the chameleon pol to inspire the disillusioned, weary and battered voters of New York City. Despite his pink cheeks and golden hair, he carried the atmosphere of the smoke-filled back room. He might have been as clean and pure as he claimed, but the voters wanted, if not the substance, at least the appearance of purity.

  At least that was how one powerful section of the Democratic Party read things, and since Jerry couldn’t be persuaded that he had a nice setup where he was, a Democratic mayoralty primary was set for early June.

  Gorgeous Jerry was pitted against the noncontroversial if somewhat unknown figure of Marvin L. Schneiderman: forty-six years old; former member of the City Council; former Assistant Commissioner of Public Works; former Commissioner of Investigation, with an accumulation of credits for having cleared up a certain amount of corruption in various city agencies. He was presently in private practice. He was a relatively attractive man; a widower with two very photogenic, well-behaved little girls. He was inoffensive; bright without being too intelligent; ambitious as hell without letting it show too much.

  The key to the outcome of the primary rested with Ken Sweeney, the young Democratic Party leader of Kings County. Kenny had weight not only in Brooklyn but in the city, in the state and, in fact, nationwide. He considered himself to be, and was in fact, a kingmaker, and he had come out a few weeks ago for Marvin L. Schneiderman, pledging the considerable support of his organization and, of course, of himself. Ken had had the decency to take his old pal Jerry for a decent meal at Gage and Tollner’s, the well-known Brooklyn political watering place, and to tell him, face to face, man to man, that there was nothing personal involved; it was just “politics.”

  I knew about the meeting because Ken Sweeney had told his law partner, Tim’s wife, Catherine; Catherine told Tim and Tim told me.

  And Jerry Kelleher knew that Tim knew about the luncheon; and Tim knew that Jerry knew he knew. But Jerry didn’t know that I knew, because I wasn’t involved, directly, in any of their games.

  To an uninformed spectator, the two men would appear to be cordial, even fond of each other. They exchanged some small talk, then the D.A. told his secretary, via the intercom, that he wasn’t to be interrupted until further notice. He sat in his high-backed black leather chair, settled himself in, clasped his hands over his stomach and carefully rearranged his normally happy face into an appropriately sad expression. He jutted his chin toward the afternoon New York Post, which had been placed on his desk, the headline facing us: QUEENS BOYS FOUND MURDERED.

  “Bad business, bad business, Tim.” He shook his head and studied the upside-down headline for a moment, then unclenched his fingers and carefully touched the corner of his mouth. His diamond pinky ring caught a spark of light from his desk lamp and cut right into Tim’s eyes, but Tim never blinked.

  “Well, wadda ya say, Tim? We got some kind of nut running around Queens, sneaking into the bedrooms of sleeping children in the dead of night and stealing them away and murdering them? What the hell are we dealing with here, Tim?”

  That, of course, would be the worst possible situation to deal with: terror would spread into the heart and mind and home of every vulnerable citizen of the Good Borough, the Safe Borough, the Borough of Homes.

  Neary gave a quick, concise rundown of what he knew at this time, turning now and then for my comments. Jerry Kelleher nodded from time to time, as though not listening too closely but just waiting for us to finish. He picked up his silver-handled long-bladed letter opener and toyed with it, then dropped it on his desk. His eyes stayed on the opener for a moment, then he looked directly at Tim with his clear, wide watercolor-blue eyes.

  “There’s something I’m afraid I don’t quite understand in all of this, Tim. Maybe you can help to clarify it for me.” His tone wasn’t one of confusion; it was of accusation. “Tim, why the hell, why the living, breathing, fire-burning hell, are we stuck with this goddamn case in the first place? Why the hell can’t it be bucked to Homicide where it belongs?”

  “You’ve heard of budget cuts, I take it,” Tim said tightly. “And of layoffs; and of the department being seriously understaffed. And of the whole Detective Division being screwed up and dissipated by non-detective assignments? That’s where the fault lies, Jerry. There were no detectives at the 107th when the call originally came in, so it was bucked to my squad. And since members of my squad caught the case, it’s ours until c
ompletion.”

  All the time Tim was speaking, Jerry Kelleher stared at him with a slight, unpleasant smile turning up the corners of his big pink mouth. There was about thirty seconds of silence when Tim finished, which can be a very long period of silence in certain circumstances.

  “I’m speaking, Captain Neary, of practicalities, not technicalities,” Kelleher said softly. “I am aware of the fact that technically a case of this importance rests with the responding detectives and hence their squad. What I’m wondering is, why can’t some arrangement be made so that maybe Joe here,” he jutted his chin in my direction, but his eyes stayed on Tim, “could be assigned to the Homicide Squad for the duration of the investigation. Surely the two of you are tight enough with Chris Wise to work something out.”

  The funny thing is that such an arrangement could have been worked out and it would have taken the pressure off Neary as well as off Kelleher. But Tim, when his back is to the wall, goes for the jugular even though his own best suit is going to get all bloodied and ruined.

  “No way, Jerry,” he said tersely. “It’s against departmental rules.”

  “And we all of us, of course, operate solely and totally within the framework of ‘departmental rules,’ ” Kelleher said carefully.

  “I can only speak for myself, Jerry. I know that I do,” Tim shot at him.

  Kelleher was better at this kind of thing than Tim would ever be. He just smiled, nodded and said, “Well, then, so be it. Now, Tim, you haven’t really questioned the mother about all this, have you?”

  “We have a preliminary statement. It hasn’t even been signed yet. It was taken in my office this morning. Both parents gave us statements, but they haven’t told us anything significant yet.”

  One thick yellowish eyebrow shot up Kelleher’s forehead until it disappeared underneath the silky yellow lock of hair. He spread his large, soft pink-palmed hands over his desk.