“Do you mean pajamas, Captain?”
“No, I mean a fancy dress.”
“An evening gown? Yeah, I do.”
“Good. Get yourself and it to the Waldorf forthwith.”
And that was how Marie had met President Kennedy, at his forty-sixth birthday party, when he graciously insisted on meeting his security detail. No, Marie couldn’t complain about her first few weeks at work, even if little was accomplished. Pilfered Hollywood plots didn’t break the case in the end, but dull, old-fashioned diligence did. They stuck to the mutts who’d done hotel jobs before, and they grabbed them when they did them again. It wasn’t exactly a fairy-tale ending, but it was a happy one nonetheless.
WHEN SHE REPORTED to Lieutenant Macken in his office the Monday morning after the arrests were made, he was in a benign and philosophical cast of mind, leaning back in his chair and savoring a toothpick as if it were a handmade cigar. He was a smallish, softish man, and Marie was unused to seeing him at ease or in command. Captains and inspectors had run the investigation, and he tended to recede behind the largest piece of furniture he could find when they haggled over strategy. The only thing distinctive about him was the toothpick. It never left his mouth, and it gave his round red mug the look of an unappealing sort of canape, like a little ball of pungent cheese. He had finished his bacon-egg-on-a-roll and coffee—light, three sugars, he’d made plain, should he ask for another—and three newspapers were spread across his desk. All the headlines told of the arrest of the Baby-Faced Bandit. He had reason to be proud, too, she supposed.
“So anyways, like I always say,” Lt. Macken intoned, “It’s wonderful how much can be accomplished when nobody worries about who gets the credit.”
“Yes, sir.”
Marie had read the papers, too. Her name hadn’t been mentioned, which didn’t surprise her. She’d played a secondary role, working the tails and joining in the interrogations. What the lieutenant had done to earn multiple quotes and a photo in the Herald Tribune escaped her, but he was her boss now. There was no sense in comparing him to Inspector Melchionne, but she wished she could look at him without wondering whether his mother had never corrected his posture, or if there was an actual hunch to his back.
And she found his remark peculiar, as it was the issue of credit that had broken the case. There hadn’t been one arrest, but two, of onetime partners. The first, who defiantly claimed to be “the best Negro burglar on the East Coast,” had felt slighted, as he was obliged to undertake elaborate masquerades—a turbaned foreign dignitary, or a tuxedoed member of the band—just to gain entry to the hotel lobbies. He could jimmy a window, leaving the barest of marks, and he could pick all the old warded locks and most of the new pin ones. He’d taught the rudiments of the trade to a cherubic blond twenty-one-year-old, who needed only a shoeshine, an off-the-rack suit, and his “dopey white baby-face smile” to win the unchallenged liberty of the upper floors. Baby Face could manage only the most basic technique—popping the spring lock on an unbolted door, with the celluloid “Do Not Disturb” signs conveniently provided by the hotels—but that was all he needed to collect a million dollars in jewelry in the past year, including the Selznick job. The old-timer hadn’t done too bad, either, but he was peeved by the underworld scuttlebutt about how the new kid put him to shame. When he was arrested on another burglary, he gave up Baby Face.
“So, Marie, here we are, back to real life.”
“Here we are.”
“How’s it going so far?”
“Great, just great. I’m really looking forward to working here.”
During the detail, she’d been so caught up in the case that she hadn’t thought about what would happen after it ended. She hadn’t worried about finding a partner. In the Policewomen’s Bureau, she’d worked alone more often than not. Only the Broadway Squad was a steady two-hander, patrolling the movie houses for pickpockets and perverts, but all the girls there were game and able. They switched up whenever and wherever, do-si-doing like square dancers instead of pairing off, cheek-to-cheek.
“So, who do I work with?”
“Well, usually, I’ll stick the new man with a team until he gets his head above water. By then, he gets to know the other guys in the office, and things just sort themselves out.”
“Oh, all right,” she said. “What lucky devils are you going to put me with?”
“Whoa!” he sputtered. “I couldn’t do that! They’d raise holy hell, if I put you with guys who didn’t want you there.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to go where I wasn’t wanted . . .” That wasn’t entirely true. She had no interest in spending eight hours a day with men who resented her, but she wasn’t going to allow them to veto her chance at advancement. Though she cared for the lieutenant less with each passing moment, she realized that she could use his indecision to her advantage. “I don’t want any special treatment. Tell you what, give me till the end of the day. See if I can’t come up with somebody.”
The lieutenant agreed, and Marie left the office. Eight hours were seven more than she should need. She’d have been pleased to work with any number of the men, and she assumed, maybe cavalierly, that the reverse was equally true. But her fallback plan had always been Ralph Marino. It wasn’t even asking for a favor from him; it was collecting one. He’d sworn to her, years before, “Trust me, I won’t forget. What you did for me, I will never forget. I owe you, Marie.”
The favor for Marino had been Marie’s first, as a cop, and it had the sentimental meaning of a first kiss. Ralph was in Manhattan South Burglary now, though hadn’t worked the hotel detail—even by the end, less than half of the citywide burglary folks had been conscripted—but the warmth of his endorsement had helped pave the way for her ready acceptance. Marie liked his steady partner, Arthur, a tall, affable pipe-smoking Irishman. But when Marie took Ralph aside for a quiet word, the conversation was brief. “I’m sorry, Marie, I can’t.”
“What? Why?”
Marino had changed little since they first met. He was somewhat stouter, but his round brown eyes were still lively, his expression a constant, shifting battle between exasperation and amusement. He still favored a porkpie hat, though it was now in his hand, as if he were begging for change. He shook his head and lowered his eyes. “I asked my wife. I mean, I said you were working with us, since she was so grateful for what you did. She sent something after. Candy, flowers? Did you get it?”
Marie had gotten back thousands of swindled dollars for the Marinos, which didn’t seem right to mention at the moment. “I don’t know—probably. Ralph, it was years ago. Yes, I’m sure I got the candy. Thank you, thank her. What’s wrong?”
“This started weeks ago, when you first showed up. She starts yapping about how terrific you are, how she can’t imagine how you conned your way in with the old Gypsy broad, when she was such a con herself. Talked about you, asked about you, every week. Last night, I say you’re coming back to regular work at the squad, and you’re gonna need a partner. She drops the question real sly, casual-like. ‘Oh that Marie, I worry for her out there on the street, fighting with those animals. Is she a big girl?’ And I say, ‘No, she’s a little slip of a thing, but she can handle herself. When I first met her, she lumped up a guy twice her size.’ And then she says, ‘Well, if she gets into scrapes like that, she must look busted-up like a prizefighter by now.’ I shoulda known she was setting me up. I say, ‘No, some lady cops get a hard look to them, but Marie, she’s a pretty Italian girl, with a helluva figure, and—’”
“Oh, Ralph, you poor sap.”
“I know. Am I an idiot, or what?”
“You’re an idiot.”
For this, Marie had risked Gypsy curses? Marino had kept his word, in the strictest sense: He hadn’t forgotten the favor she had done him. He remembered as if it were yesterday. He just wouldn’t return it. “Yeah, I feel like such a stroonz,” he continued, his remorse painfully plain. “All night, she was at me. ‘If you think for one goddam minute you
’re gonna partner up with some Svengali with a helluva figure—’”
“Poor Ralph!”
“I couldn’t live like that, Marie, God help me. Fighting all the time, suspicion. If your home, your family, isn’t right, nothing is.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”
Marie couldn’t stay angry with him. She couldn’t fault him for the importance he placed on domestic peace, though she was hardly acquainted with it herself.
By way of contrition, he confiscated a desk for her—their squad occupied two rooms upstairs at the 54th Street precinct—and, more important, he discreetly reviewed the roll call with her, scratching off the names of more than half of the men: Goofball . . . Ass-grabber . . . Drinks three or four scotches at lunch . . . Never stops whistling the same song, a week at a time . . . It was good to know. By the time she’d organized her desk and gathered office supplies, two hours had passed. Who would she pounce on next?
Bowen and Baxter were younger men, in their late twenties, businesslike in the better sense of being plainspoken, and the worse sense, too—they could be a little dull. When she spotted them, she had a passing reservation about how they might wear on her. There was a stuffiness to them, something rigid and dour. How quickly they set her mind at ease! When Marie made her offer, they looked at each other, then the ceiling, then the floor, and then each other again. She wondered how their necks could be so stiff, after such exercises. And then they giggled like schoolboys. “A woman on the team?”
“Hey, why not?”
“Every team should have one!”
“What’s the French word? Ménage à . . .?”
“Whatever it is. Damn it, Marie, you should have said something when we were on the detail. What a waste.”
“How many hours did we have to pass in hotel rooms, doing crosswords, playing cards?”
“Better late than never. Let’s go to Gallagher’s for lunch, we’ll have champagne.”
“I don’t like champagne, Hal. Maybe Marie doesn’t like champagne, either.”
Marie raised her hands and backed away. “Oh, look,” she said, laughing forcibly, hoping to inspire them to do the same. “Our first fight! And we haven’t even started yet. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be. I couldn’t come between you boys. Besides, my husband’s the old-fashioned type, he doesn’t want me to be with two strange men at a time. Have fun at lunch.”
Marie turned away quickly. There wasn’t an expression they could have on their faces—hurt, hungry, haughty—that wouldn’t make her want to smack them.
What to do? Delay wouldn’t work in her favor. The last bit of wisdom Mrs. M. had offered was that Marie shouldn’t type too quickly, in public, until she settled in. Someone would ask her to type something, and she’d oblige, just to be helpful, and then someone else would ask, because she’d done such a good job. Before long, the lieutenant would declare that she was essential to the office in that capacity. But she worked through the list of sober, nongrabby, nonwhistlers without even getting an “I’ll think about it.” Two offered the same apologetic refusal as Marino, alluding to jealous wives. If she approached one more man to offer the pleasure of her company, she was afraid she’d be arrested for solicitation.
It was after four when she noticed Macken staring at her. Better to make the first move, she thought. She went inside his office and shut the door behind her. “Hey, boss.”
“Uh, well, I’ve been thinking. It can be hard enough breaking in a new man. With a girl, I can’t even guess what . . . The thing is, I think you might have gotten the wrong idea about what we do here. We mix it up with some rough customers. The last month, it was all playing dress-up in fancy hotels. But the party’s over. And now it’s my responsibility to make sure you make it home safe every night.”
Marie barely nodded as he went on, determined to let it be known that she understood him, not that she agreed with anything he’d said.
“Anyway, Frankie is out of the office today, but I could run it by him, looking out for you, and maybe he’d be willing to show you the ropes.”
Marie wanted to race downtown to the Policewomen’s Bureau and beg to be taken back. Frankie was known as “the Farmer,” because he looked like he’d been bred to pull a plow, and he often dressed the part as well. He’d been kicked off the hotel detail four days after Marie’s arrival by a particularly dapper captain, who noted that the Farmer’s shirt was never unstained with ketchup, mustard, or gravy, at the beginning of the day as well as the end. What cut it for the captain was when the Farmer came in with a three-inch tear in the seat of his trousers, through which his under-shorts were plainly visible. “What the hell is wrong with you? Do you have a wife at home? Does she walk around with dark glasses and a cane? Did she break all the mirrors? Nobody wants to see your ass!”
“Sorry, I thought my jacket would cover it.”
“Then why aren’t you wearing it?”
“I was hot.”
The captain turned on Macken in cold spite. “Did this guy save your life during the war? Get him the hell out of here! I don’t want to see him again.”
When the Farmer had winked at Marie the first time—it had been a daily occurrence for the days he was tolerated—his face contorted so painfully she mistook it for a twitch. And as if the package wasn’t already irresistible, he was also known as the office stool pigeon. He and the lieutenant lived near each other, in Rockland County, and the Farmer picked up the boss most mornings to drive him in. On duty and off, no chore was too demeaning for him, whether fetching the lieutenant’s dry cleaning, or helping to build the back deck to his house on weekends. Now, Macken wanted to give Marie, like a pet, to his own pet.
Marie faked a cough and turned around. When she did so, she saw another man walk into the office. Who was he? It didn’t matter. She had a fire in her belly—and a baby, too—and she didn’t have time to waste. She jumped up from her seat. “Thanks, boss, but I got it all squared away. Appreciate you looking out for me!”
Marie fled and took the stranger by the arm. He was a stick of a man, tall, with a thick brush of black hair, and the pronounced features and tan-in-January skin that got actors with names like Rizzo and Rodriguez movie credits as varied as the Maharajah, Running Deer, or Comanche Brave. “Do me a favor, walk outside with me.”
Startled, he complied. The suit he had on looked like he’d last worn it for his First Communion. Still, it was clean, and the man who wore it wasn’t the Farmer. Did he even work here? Marie extended a hand and prayed that he wasn’t an insurance salesman. “Detective, I’m Marie Carrara, I’m new here, and—”
“Al O’Callahan, nice to meet you.”
Marie would not have cast him as an O’Callahan. Still, Aloysius O’Callahan’s name was one that hadn’t been crossed off Marino’s list. “You need a partner, Marie?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you mind driving?”
“No.”
“Always?”
“Not at all.”
“See you tomorrow.”
THE MANHATTAN SOUTH Burglary Squad was misleadingly named. Burglary was stealing from a place—trespass plus theft—and it was rampant all over the city. But Al and Marie didn’t spend their days taking fingerprints, or writing down serial numbers of stolen TVs. Their job wasn’t to investigate old crimes but to prevent new ones, and any thief was fair game. Marie didn’t care what they called the squad. She liked the open-endedness, and she liked how it was going with Al. One day, he spotted the broken window of a hot car as it screeched around a corner; another, the airborne shadow she saw in an alley proved to be a junkie with a crowbar, dangling from a fire escape. Arrests piled up.
What troubled her was that she couldn’t call him her partner, at least not yet. Al’s regular partner, Ed Lennon, was home convalescing from an ulcer, but he was due back in a week or so. Real partners were nearly matrimonial in their attachment, and a cop who didn’t have a partner in his wedding party or as a pallbearer at his funeral either had a very large
family or small talent for friendship. Working with Al was a tryout, less of an engagement than one long first date. Marie hated to think of the time she spent with Al as courtship, but the idea couldn’t be avoided, even as they paid the office wisecracks little heed—Would you look at the lovebirds! He’d arrived in the squad only a few months before Marie, and he was as determined to make his name as she was. To find someone with her drive, undistracted by her gender, was romance enough.
As it was, their conversations were brief: “How about him?” “You see that?” “Let’s take a look.” When Marie made a joke about the ten-cent cigars he smoked, he smiled, but the closest either came to venturing a personal opinion was about lunch, and they always went to the Automat. Beyond the barest biographical facts—a Mrs. O’Callahan and several little O’Callahans awaited Al nightly in Queens—there was no chitchat about their lives, their families. They didn’t bicker or banter. Nor did she raise the issue of what would happen when his old partner returned. It was Marino who told her about Ed Lennon’s celebrated career: he helped catch the “Mad Bomber,” whose mostly dud explosives terrified the city for years, and the man who blinded Victor Riesel, the labor columnist who fought with such fervor against Communists and gangsters that Albert Anastasia ordered a bucket of acid thrown in his face.
Marie was more than pleased, and less than surprised, on the Monday morning when Al said they had to drive out to Long Island, to Levittown. There was no need to explain their errand.
Lennon was pale as a potato, of middling height, gaunt except for a paunch, with half a head of buzz-cut silver hair. It seemed to recede before her eyes, like breath on a windowpane. Even allowing for his recent ill health, Lennon didn’t just look awful, he looked odd. He had a shuffling gait and wore a baggy and hard-worn moss-colored corduroy suit. Amid the cheery uniformity of the mass-produced ranch houses, he could have passed for a lawn ornament. He regarded Marie with blue eyes that had a distinct gleam as he took the seat beside her. Apparently, her driving duties would continue uninterrupted.
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