New York Nocturne (23 page)

He had done this knowing that I was asleep not fifty feet away, knowing that I would be accused of the crime.

This whole thing—the table, the witnesses, the dialogue—everything here might have been a fine display of stagecraft. But at that moment, at the very center of my heart, I knew with absolute conviction that if it would help me get to the truth, I would pull the trigger of that Colt, without any hesitation at all, and I would shoot Albert.

I think that Albert, looking into my eyes, saw this.

He stared down for a moment at his folded hands then looked back up at me.

“Okay,” he said. He nodded a few times. “Okay. I get it. You love the guy. This I totally get, miss. This I totally understand. He is a guy that people just naturally love. Everybody. Men and women. Kids. With this guy, you could not help yourself.”

No one at the table moved. No one spoke. Everyone was leaning slightly forward now, listening to Albert.

Albert didn't look around the table. He continued to look at me and cleared his throat. “He is very smart. But you know that, right?” He smiled quickly. “And you know he is smooth, like silk from China. And he is brave, miss. You never see that part of it, but he is totally, one hundred percent brave in every situation. Brave like an archangel. And in a really sour situation, when things are going bad on you right and left, this is a guy who can save your bacon. Always. In France once—and this is a totally true story, miss—he saves my actual life.”

He moved his body slightly toward me and lowered his head a notch as though he were about to confide a secret. He said, “He is the Golden Boy, see. The Golden Boy. That's what he is from the very beginning. The Golden Boy, miss.”

He cleared his throat again. “That's why I am there. Like she says.” He nodded toward Miss Lizzie. “To keep an eye on him. To make sure he is okay. And I did. I saw to it. I did my job. I took care of him.”

He paused and looked down at his folded hands then back up at me. “But see, the thing is, miss, he is a guy who is missing something. Missing a part, you know? A piece of the equipment. It's the part that tells you, ‘No.' It's the part that says, ‘No, you cannot do that.' It says, ‘No, right here is where you got to draw a line. Right here is where you got to quit.'” Albert shook his head sadly. “He doesn't have that part, miss. He never had that part.”

He took a deep breath, puffed up his cheeks, and blew out the air slowly from his pursed mouth as he let himself slowly fall back against his chair, his hands sliding along the table and stopping atop the wooden chair's arms.

He looked defeated. Deflated. As though he had been tossed there by the tide.

Glancing over at me, almost wearily, he said, “A few months ago, I hear there is a problem. A chunk of money is missing.” He sighed. “A very big chunk of money is missing. It is suggested to me, see, that I find out where it is disappearing into.”

He glanced at Mr. Liebowitz then looked back at me. “They come to me, see. I don't go to them.”

“I understand,” I said.

For a moment or two, he looked straight ahead, not at me, but beside me, past me, into some hidden piece of private history.

He sighed again, and then he swung his eyes back toward me. “I find out, okay? No big surprise. He is smart, and he has been around the block a few times, but I been around that block, too, miss. I know how people hide money. And so I find it. I know where it is. But I inform no one, see. No one. Instead I go to a guy I know, and I say to him, ‘Look, there's a guy at the Dakota. I want you to go to him and tell him this. I want you to tell him that Mr. Rothstein knows about the money. You tell him he's got to make things right, or Mr. Rothstein will make them right himself, the way Mr. Rothstein makes things right.'”

As I said, the Colt that I was holding was heavy. Now its barrel swayed a bit to the right and then to the left. I took a deep breath, tightened my grip, raised the barrel, and brought the weapon back to bear on Albert.

Albert ignored the gun. He said, “You know what he does then, miss?”

“No,” I said. “What did he do?”

“He laughs. Can you imagine this? He laughs when the guy tells him. You get it? This is what I mean about missing a part. Who could laugh in that situation?”

Albert lowered his head. I waited. When he raised it again, he said, “Okay. There's a phone call I get. Last week this is. I am informed that two people are proceeding to the apartment, to deal with the money problem. I say, ‘No. No two people. I will deal with this problem myself,' I say. They ask me am I sure? ‘Yes,' I say, ‘I am sure.' See, miss, I owe him that. It should not be other people. It should be me.”

He looked at me carefully, as though studying me. “It is okay, miss. He never knows what is happening. I hit him from behind, just a tap, and he is out like a light. No pain, no trouble. He does not suffer, miss. I promise you this. Using the hatchet, that is only to make the cops confused for a while. I know I will fix things for you later, see. For sure I will. And, listen, before I forget, there was something that he wanted you to have.”

He reached slowly into the front of his coat, the left-hand side.

An interesting thing happened at this point. Despite my earlier warning to myself, I had been lulled by Albert's voice and by the story he was telling. When he reached into his coat, I was genuinely curious about whatever it was that he might be bringing out. And I think that by this point, most of the people sitting around the table felt the same way.

But another part of my mind, one over which I had little or no real control, noticed instantly, as Albert's hand began to emerge from the jacket, that what Albert held in his hand was the brown wooden grip of a revolver. Without thinking about it at all, without debating it, that part of my mind immediately made me pull the trigger of the big Colt pistol.

At the same time, it seemed, Mr. Liebowitz was leaping up out of his chair, next to Albert, firing a small automatic down at the man, firing again and again and again.

Albert's hand flopped down, empty, from his suit coat as his body jerked and twitched and bounced, and then he lay slumped in the chair, his mouth awry, his head lolled to the side. His eyes stared up at the ceiling.

“Jesus H. Christ,” said Lieutenant Becker and pushed himself away from the table.

The room stank of gunpowder.

I was still staring at Albert. I looked around the table. Mrs. Parker, her face pale, was staring at him, too. Without looking away, she opened her purse and fumbled inside it. Mr. Lipkind was staring at me then frowned and looked down. Miss Lizzie leaned toward me and put her hand on my arm.

Mr. Cutter was somehow standing behind me. Gently, he took the gun from my hand, shoved it behind his back, walked around me, bent over Albert's body, and examined it. He turned to me. “You missed,” he whispered. He turned to Mr. Liebowitz. “You didn't.” Curtly, he gestured with his hand: gimme. “The pistol,” he said.

Mr. Liebowitz put his pistol on the polished mahogany table and slid it across. Beside him, Mrs. Parker had the lip of the upraised silver flask in her mouth.

Mr. Cutter snapped up the weapon. He asked Mr. Liebowitz, “Traceable?”

“No.”

Mr. Cutter walked around my back, past Miss Lizzie and Mrs. Parker, and held out the automatic to Lieutenant Becker. “Yours.”

“Fuck you,” said Becker.

“You just solved the Burton case,” said Mr. Cutter. “A clean kill.”

Mr. Liebowitz said, “I'll back you, Becker. I was here. I saw it.”

Becker looked back and forth between the two of them. He said to Mr. Cutter, “Gun's not mine.”

“You found it,” said Mr. Liebowitz.

“Where?”

“In the safe at Burton's apartment.”

“What safe?”

“In the library,” said Mr. Liebowitz. We went there this morning, you and I. We found it. I opened it for you. You asked Albert to come down here, to Morrie's office, to answer some questions. He confessed then tried to pull out a gun. You pulled out that one, and you killed him.”

“Thin,” said Becker.

“Thick enough,” said Liebowitz. “You'll get a commendation.”

Mr. Cutter said, “And your friend Rothstein will owe you.”

Becker leaned forward and took the pistol from Mr. Cutter's hand then sat back and hefted the weapon in his right hand. He looked at Liebowitz. “How come I used this instead of my own pistol?” He jerked his thumb toward the left armpit of his rumpled suit coat.

“You had it in your coat pocket,” said Liebowitz. “You didn't trust Cooper. As soon as he started talking, you slipped your hand, casual-like, into your pocket.”

For a moment, Becker looked down at the gun again. Then he nodded. “That I can sell.”

Mr. Cutter tugged a handkerchief from his rear pocket and handed it to Becker. “Wipe it. Don't forget the clip.”

Mr. Liebowitz searched around near his chair and found the five spent cartridges he had fired. Using his own handkerchief, he wiped them clean and then tossed them back on the floor.

Mr. Lipkind stood up, his round face grim. “Okay,” he said and looked around the table. “Okay. This never happened. Miss Borden, Mrs. Parker, Amanda—none of you were here. You got that? Miss Borden?”

“Yes.”

“Mrs. Parker?”

“Jesus, yes. I've got it.”

“Amanda?”

I was staring again at Albert. There was not much blood. His black vest seemed simply stained as though he had spilled coffee on it. He looked like someone merely feigning death, playing some morbid trick. In a moment, he would blink his eyes and sit up and smile at everyone.

“Amanda?” said Mr. Lipkind.

I turned to him. “Yes,” I said. “I understand.”

“Promise me,” he said.

“I promise.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

Mr. Cutter drove Mrs. Parker, Miss Lizzie, and me to Grand Central in the Packard. Along the way, we stopped at the Algonquin to pick up Woodrow, Mrs. Parker's dog. Mrs. Parker sat up front, the Boston terrier panting happily on her lap. Miss Lizzie and I sat in the rear.

None of us spoke much. But as we drove down Forty-Second Street from Fifth, Mrs. Parker turned to Mr. Cutter and said, “Do you have a first name, Mr. Cutter?”

“James,” he said.

“James, that was very brave. Going to Mr. Rothstein's office that way.”

“Robert came along.”

“Yes, well, Robert was very brave, too, of course. But going up against a professional criminal, even with Robert there—it was still very brave, I think.”

He turned to her and I could see his handsome face in profile. His shiny black forelock trembled. “It's my job, Mrs. Parker.”

“Dorothy,” she said.

He smiled. “Dorothy.” And then he turned back to watch the traffic. I thought I heard Mrs. Parker sigh before she turned to look out her window. Over her shoulder, I could see the dog. He was staring straight ahead.

We had said our goodbyes in Mr. Lipkind's office. The farewell was a bit hurried; Lieutenant Becker was still in the conference room, waiting for the signal from Mr. Liebowitz to telephone headquarters.

“Look, Amanda,” said Mr. Lipkind. “You just go back to Boston, and you forget all about this.”

“I don't think I can,” I told him. “Forget about it, I mean.”

“You will,” he said. “Sooner or later.” He was wrong, of course.

“And don't you worry about your uncle's lawyer,” he told me. “I'll be seeing that shyster tomorrow. I'll give you a jingle, let you know what happens.”

“I don't want anything from John.”

“Let's see what happens first. In the meantime, you have a safe trip back.” He held out his hand.

I took it, and we shook.

I turned to Mr. Liebowitz and his round shiny head, and I held out my hand. “You were great,” I said. “Thank you.”

He took my hand between both of his and squeezed it. “My pleasure. I hope I see you again.” He smiled. “But in different circumstances next time.”

“I hope so,” I said. He released my hand, and I turned to Robert. “You were great, too, Robert. Thank you.” Again, I held out my hand.

Smiling, he took it. His big black hand was gentle, and his dark eyes were warm. “It's been good to know you, miss. You take care of yourself.”

“You, too.”

Miss Lizzie said her goodbyes, and then Mr. Lipkind said, “Now get out of here, both of you. Mrs. Parker's waiting.”

Just before we left the office, Mr. Liebowitz said, “Amanda?”

I turned back. “Yes?”

“It's over,” he said. “Cheer up.”

I shook my head. “I keep thinking about Albert. About . . . you know. Firing that gun.”

He shook his head. “You missed. I killed him.”

“Yeah, but why did he reach for a gun? I was pointing that big pistol right at him. Maybe he wasn't too worried about me. But he had to know that Lieutenant Becker had a pistol, too. And he probably knew that you had one.”

He stroked his shiny, bald scalp. “Well, I can think of two reasons.”

“What two reasons?”

“First off, maybe he thought he could get away with it and escape.”

“And second off?”

He smiled. “Second off, he knew he couldn't get away with it, but he knew he could end it right there.”

“But why? Why end it?”

“Maybe he wasn't happy with what he'd done. And maybe he thought you were the only person who had a right to fix things.”

“But why?”

“Well, maybe because he believed that you were the only person who loved John as much as he did.”

For some reason, this hit me very hard. I felt a bit as though I had been kicked in the chest. I took a deep breath. “Oh,” I said.

“You okay?”

“Yes. Yes, I think so.” I took another deep breath. “Really? You really think that's what happened?”

“I don't know, Amanda. None of us will probably ever know.” He smiled. “Go,” he said. “Get to the station.”

The Grand Central Terminal was the same bright, bustling cavern it had been when I first arrived. People still scurried back and forth, striding with determination across that huge marble floor. But now I wondered whether all of them knew where they were going, knew what might meet them when they arrived.

The train would be leaving in fifteen minutes. Miss Lizzie bought tickets, and Mr. Cutter found a porter for our bags.

Mrs. Parker embraced Miss Lizzie and then turned to me. “When you come back here,” she told me, “you get in touch.”

“I will.”

She put out her hand and we shook. “I can't say it's been fun,” she said, “but it's certainly been interesting.”

I smiled and then turned to Mr. Cutter. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

He nodded.

Miss Lizzie and Mrs. Parker watched as we stepped away from the counter, toward the information booth. I stopped about halfway there, amid the rush of people, and he stopped beside me.

“Mr. Cutter,” I said.

His blue eyes looked into mine. “Yes?”

“Did I really miss Albert when I fired that gun?” I asked.

He smiled. “By a mile,” he whispered.