The Company of Demons

by Michael Jordan

  “No surprise. Did he tell you how terrible I am?”

  I chuckled, despite myself. “Matter of fact, he did. He thinks you’ll try to cheat him.”

  “Me cheat him?” She leaned forward.

  “He brought up the watch, by the way. Claims that your dad gave it to him, that they were close.”

  Jennifer gasped, then laughed. “I’m surprised he didn’t try selling you Super Bowl tickets for the Browns.”

  I grinned as I sat back in my chair and rested my hands in my lap. “He said something else, too, something strange, about knowing what you are capable of.”

  Jennifer scrunched her face, as though she found the assertion distasteful. “It really does sound like he’s delusional. Can something be done so he doesn’t waste his inheritance on drugs?”

  “Let me see the will.” She handed the document to me, and I quickly reviewed it. “With your mother and Martha gone, everything’s split between you and Frank. Your dad didn’t set up a trust. You could ask a court to appoint a guardian, but the judge would have to find Frank incompetent. And, sorry to say, being a drug addict isn’t the same thing.”

  “My dad worked his whole life, and now my brother will blow half of everything.” Jennifer looked away, and her eyes caught my framed law degree, awarded by Cleveland-Marshall, on the paneled wall. “If only Martha were here. We were so close … she’d help me get through this, for sure.”

  “Pancreatic cancer, right? I remember how upset your dad was.” I tried not to think about sloppy Chivas kisses, the slip of a bra clasp. The way that Jennifer had behaved at the funeral, her very presence now in my office, confirmed the fact that the secret of my indiscretion was safely entombed with her sister.

  She nodded. “Her, we all loved. Now I’m stuck dealing with a brother I haven’t spoken to in years.”

  Oyster had seldom talked about his children—all our bullshitting over all those beers, and we’d barely scratched the surface. I scanned the rest of the will. “Your mom was designated as executor, so I’ll petition the probate court to name you. Your brother could ask to be named, but there’s no chance he’d be approved.”

  “As long as he gets his money, I don’t think he’ll care.” Jennifer’s eyes flashed, just like her sister’s. “And I think it’s a lot.”

  She handed me a folder, and I looked at the top statement, a mutual fund investment summary that showed an account balance of over $427,000. I studied the statement in disbelief. Never in my wildest imaginings would I have thought that Oyster had squirreled away that kind of dough.

  “And look at the next. Does it say what I think it says?”

  Yeah, holy shit, it did. A whole life insurance policy with a face amount of two million dollars. This would be the largest estate to ever cross my desk. I couldn’t help but mentally ballpark my fee. “You and your brother are the remaining beneficiaries.”

  “Dad should have removed him. Wanna bet on how long it’ll be before he runs through every last dime?” She toyed with a silver arrow pendant that dangled between her breasts.

  “I have to ask … your dad was such a down-to-earth guy. A policy like this isn’t cheap …”

  “He inherited his parents’ farm and sold it for a bundle—that shopping plaza in Westlake? Enough to put me through college, and Dad always said we’d be okay if anything happened to him. But I had no idea—two million in insurance?”

  Jesus, all the drinks I’d shared with Oyster, and he could have bought the bar ten times over. I figured he always thought that I was the big shot, the attorney-at-law. I thumbed through a deed to the house, automobile title, a checking account statement. My father had left my late mother a pittance, and the nursing home leeches had sucked away everything, except for some cheap personal trinkets and costume jewelry: the sum total of my lofty inheritance.

  “He drove used cars. Mom made some of her own clothes.”

  “This is … significant, Jennifer. Do you have a financial advisor?”

  She crossed her hands over a knee. “I’m careful with money.”

  “Then I’ll go through all of this, prepare an accounting, and let you know when we need to meet. I’ll need to run some paperwork by your brother, too. He told me he’d give me a call, but just in case … he also said you have his number …?”

  She pulled it up on her cell, and I jotted it on a notepad. “If I reach him, I’ll try to get him to call Salvatore, too.”

  “Good luck. Just make sure to tell me whatever wild stories he comes up with. I could use a good laugh now and again.”

  She stood up and shook my hand, then I walked her to my office door. When she smiled, I remembered her sister smiling the same way, her ruby lips just slightly parted. A little bit of my conscience crawled from its dark lair to remind me about Cathy, but despite my best efforts, I lingered a good long while on Jennifer’s perfect ass as she strolled through the lobby. When Marilyn caught me looking and raised her dark eyebrows, it was my turn to shoot her a look.

  Once the door closed behind Jennifer, Marilyn said, “So, what’s her story?”

  “Sad, actually. Widowed, and now this.”

  “She seems kind of … I don’t know, detached.” Marilyn turned her head to make sure I noticed her earrings, which consisted of multiple strands of gold. Fake, I assumed, since her paycheck bore my signature.

  “Well, look what she’s going through. Nice earrings, by the way.”

  “Thanks. And, by the way, I didn’t know you were so into fashion.”

  I waited.

  “I saw you checking her out when she left. Must have been admiring the dress.”

  “Smart ass. Why don’t you order some sandwiches and take out an ad in the bar journal for a new secretary.”

  “Sure. Let’s see … hostile work environment, substandard pay, fetch lunch … anything I’m leaving out?”

  “Handsome Irish boss?”

  “You getting a partner?”

  I smirked, grateful that Marilyn was around to keep things light, and went back to my desk. Jennifer had started me thinking about the killings again, the oddity of so many similarly brutal murders sprawling three distinct periods. There was nothing pressing on my agenda, so I resumed my perusal of the Internet and the electronic fount of information on serial killers. I was all too familiar with the Butcher’s reign, so I directed my focus to the earlier murders, the Torso Murderer.

  His first victim, a female, had never been identified. She had been dubbed the Lady of the Lake when some pieces of her dismembered body had been found scattered along the Lake Erie shore. The identity of the second victim, christened the Tattooed Man because of the six distinctive tattoos etched into his skin, also remained a mystery.

  I clicked on three or four sites before stumbling across one that was a compilation of all of the articles printed about the murders by the now-defunct Cleveland Press. A particular photo caused me to sit up straight: Jack Corrigan, one of the guys on the force who’d taken me under his wing after all the bullshit with my father. He was much younger in the picture, but there was no mistaking that chiseled face. I devoured every word of the accompanying story.

  My instinct was to call him, but Jack wasn’t the type to chitchat over the telephone and patiently entertain my litany of questions. I leaned back in my chair, basked in the bright sunlight streaming through the window, and wanted a cold belt of whiskey to untangle my mind.

  I read the article again, wishing that the actual newspaper was spread in front of me so I could smell the crinkled paper and examine the faded ink. One thing I knew for sure. I needed to sit Jack Corrigan down, face-to-face, and find out about the dark night in a Cleveland lumberyard when he had slugged it out with the Torso Murderer.

  A fistfight with one of the deadliest killers in history, and Jack had lived to tell the tale—but never mentioned a word. What the hell?

  7

  “You want rocks?” Jack handed me a Pabst and shoved a chipped plate, covered with bread crumbs, to a corne
r of his laminated kitchen table, its dull green surface riddled with cracks. The aroma of burnt toast lingered.

  I looked up at him and studied the shock of white hair that clung to his skull, the deep lines in his face. “Nah, I’m good.”

  “That’s my boyo.” He settled a bottle of Kessler’s and two shot glasses on the table. “You been hangin’ out downtown with the East Siders; maybe you’re used to a frosted mug?”

  The side of town somebody lives on—that says it all. The East Coast ends, and the Midwest begins where the muddy Cuyahoga River splits Cleveland in half. Jack chuckled at his little joke and slid onto the wooden side chair across from me. On the wall behind him, pictures of his extended family were tacked haphazardly, and a shiny gold cross crowded a washed-out photo of his late wife.

  “Hell, I hear you’re an honorary one of ’em now. Box seats at the orchestra, joined the art museum?” I grinned, and his face lit up for a moment.

  “They can stick all that bullshit up my ass.” He filled our shot glasses and tilted his toward a map of County Mayo, hanging above the table in a plain white frame. Like most Clevelanders of Irish descent, Jack’s ancestors had fled Mayo during the potato famine of the 1840s.

  “Slainte.”

  We drained the Kessler’s in a gulp. The whiskey, harsh for my taste, was Jack’s liquor of choice. No question, he was West Side Irish to the core. The grimy Ford Fiesta in the drive, the frayed tennis shoes, and no pretense about wanting to get sauced up.

  “So, you doin’ okay, Jack?”

  “Still on the right side of the grass, like you give a shit. Haven’t heard from you in a fuckin’ year.”

  “This is the thanks I get for making a social call? You too old and decrepit to pick up a phone?”

  “Fuck you.” He refilled our shot glasses. “Your little girl. Molly, right? Still playin’ sports?”

  “Best point guard in the league last year.”

  “That little shit? Good for her. We’ll see how she does in high school, goin’ up against those spades on the East Side. Bastards can jump over a car.”

  Jack’s views on race were set in stone, and I didn’t expect him to start waving a pennant at the parade on Martin Luther King Day. I steered the conversation. “You know that guy who was killed at the Tam? Friend of mine.”

  “I read all about it in the paper. I ain’t blind yet.”

  “He was a good guy. Had these eyes … we called him Oyster.”

  “Oyster? That’s a goofy fuckin’ name.”

  “See, his eyes—”

  “What’s it matter now? Poor bastard’s dead. You sure you wanna talk about this?”

  “Can’t pretend it didn’t happen.”

  “I’m not saying that.” Jack’s gaze drifted across his narrow kitchen, over the scuffed, checkered green-and-white linoleum, the cluttered countertop, and the percolator that he’d probably picked up at a yard sale when I was in middle school. “Last I knew, you were doin’ great. I just don’t want to see you get all worked up.”

  “Been doing great for a long while, Jack. Years. In fact, I’m going to handle the estate.” I knew he meant well. Before my old man’s long, downhill slide, they’d been buddies.

  “The estate? You’ll be ass-deep in this stuff every day. The murder investigation, the press … let someone else take this one.”

  “It’s a nice fee.” His concern was touching. After the funeral, Jack had spent plenty of Sundays with me, shivering in the frigid blasts whirling from Lake Erie, while we cheered on the Browns at the old Municipal Stadium. The rank odor wafting from the urinals in the men’s rooms was an indelible memory. “I’ve been doin’ some research, Jack, trying to make sense of it. Reading up on the old Torso murders.”

  “You can’t figure this crap out.” Jack nodded and sipped his beer. “Let it go.”

  “I found a story in the Press, 1950.”

  His eyes widened. “That …? Fuck, you do know they decided it wasn’t him?”

  “Yeah, but the story—”

  “Oh, for … look, a call came in late one night that somebody was inside a factory yard, industrial area downtown. Me and my partner cruise down there and split up so he can check the front gate and me, the back. I get to the gate and it’s open. I walk in, my piece and light in hand, and bam, somethin’ bangs into my skull.” Jack shook his head. “As close to knocked out as I ever been. I hit the gravel; the light and the gun went flyin’. I pop up quick and see this guy making for the gate.”

  “You went after him?” I already knew the answer.

  “Keep in mind, he’s twenty feet away, which means whatever he whacked me with, he lobbed it at me, which takes some doin’. I yell for my partner and take off. I see right away this guy’s big, real fuckin’ big.”

  “How, compared to you?”

  “Must have been six-six, and more bulk, not fat. I catch up, and we go at it. He got in some good ones, but what with the army, the Academy, I knew what I was doin’.”

  I pictured them shuffling in the dirt and sawdust, trading punches, grunting.

  “But wouldn’t you fuckin’ know it, I step in a pothole and twist my knee. Go down faster than a hooker. My partner’s yellin’ now, but he’s not halfway across the yard, and I watch the big son of a bitch sprint into the street and disappear around the bend.”

  “Christ, did you …?”

  Jack hoisted his beer between us, as though it were some kind of stop signal. “I told you I’d tell the story. You gonna let me?”

  I nodded.

  “We search the yard and find a body, no head. Plus, the guy’s balls were hacked off.”

  “Well, it had to be Torso. How could anyone think otherwise?”

  “You’ll have to ask the coroner back then. Prick said the job wasn’t as neat as Mr. Torso would’ve done and some other bullshit. He argued it had been years since we’d had any other murder that might have been his. There was that one article in the paper about my fight, and that was all.”

  I clutched my mug. “Jesus, Jack. What the hell did he look like?”

  “Too dark to be sure. All I locked on was his eyes, when we were goin’ at it. Kindly, like a favorite uncle, even though he was tryin’ to take me out. I did work with a sketch guy, and they ran with it, but nobody ever turned up.”

  “You and the Torso Murderer. My God. You shoulda told me.”

  He drained his beer and shrugged. “Bullshit. The higher-ups said it wasn’t him, so all I fought was some guy who got away. No sense talkin’ about it now.”

  I wanted to buoy him up, to dispel the aura of resignation that seemed to surround him. My God, if only his knee hadn’t buckled. I looked at him, at those eyes that had seen things mine never would, never wanted to see, and he glanced away. Was he keeping something from me?

  “Christ, you’re not thinkin’ there’s some connection?” I drained half a shot.

  “Can’t say, but I’m curious if the new vics were dismembered like the vics of Torso and the Butcher. The boys downtown once described it as surgical skill. No one was just hacked apart, ever.”

  “I remember. My dad said you looked at vets and docs, anybody with training.”

  “Somethin’ else, too.” Jack hunched forward. “We’ll see what the coroner says about all this, whether the neck muscles are retracted.”

  “Which means …?”

  “Which means, Johnny, that they were still alive, maybe conscious, when the decapitation began. That’s how it was, every time, for both those killers.”

  I pictured Oyster’s face, those blubbery eyes gaping in disbelief as he realized what was happening to him.

  He paused, eyeing the Kessler’s. “When the Butcher came around, we considered it—whether Torso was back again. So many similarities … they both had to be strong as fuck, the way they carted bodies around. Torso even carried ’em up the hills in Kingsbury Run.”

  “But it can’t be Torso now, he’d be—”

  “Hey, I’m old, not stupid. I
can do the math. Prick would be older than me and wearin’ Depends. But the Butcher, if he was in his twenties for the first go ’round, he’d only be in his sixties now. And when I was in my sixties, I could still kick some ass.”

  “Yeah, I heard stories.” His gnarled hands and misshapen knuckles spoke volumes.

  “And leavin’ your friend’s wallet on him, the Butcher did that sometimes. The so-called expert back then, some knobhead who never worked a beat, said the killer was sendin’ a message. Guys like Oyster, regular Joes, will worry it might happen to them.”

  “But a copycat would know all this stuff, Jack. The Butcher vanished decades ago.”

  “Yeah? These whack jobs disappearing, then coming back, isn’t uncommon at all. The Grim Sleeper out in California, or remember the BTK killer?”

  “Bind, torture, kill, right? Oklahoma?”

  “Kansas, and off the radar for fifteen years before starting up again after some rag ran an article—”

  “Oh, Christ …” Just like Cleveland Magazine.

  “Hey, I wasn’t suggesting anything. You didn’t write it.” Jack took a deep sip of whiskey and dug a fingernail into a crack on the tabletop.

  “Fucking reporters. I shoulda known better. I was a freshman when that article came out in the old Cleveland Press, about how Torso screwed up Eliot Ness, and the Butcher ruined my dad.”

  “You know your dad was a solid cop. Some of that shit they said …”

  “They fuck Ness over, too?”

  “Probably not as bad.” Jack shrugged. “His days with the Untouchables were behind him, for sure. He did some good here, but the Torso thing ate at him. Divorced, drinking, hit and run. He was a mess.”

  “You worked with him?”

  “Before my time. I joined up after comin’ back from overseas. Peter Merylo was the lead dick then.”

  “Remember the title, front page? “Twins of Futility.” My mother was crying, and I never saw my dad look … just beaten. Jesus.”

  “Don’t start relivin’ all of that, Johnny.” Jack finished his shot and poured another. He filled my glass to the brim and rested his arms on the table. “You haven’t dug out that letter from the Butcher, have you?”