SIREN'S TEARS (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 3) (4 page)

CHAPTER 3 – FATHER ZAPO

The next day I was sitting in my office reading
Doonesbury
when a large black fly landed on my newspaper. I didn’t know flies lasted into November. It had been unseasonably warm, but still. I suspected it might be last fly of the fall. A survivor. I didn’t care. I hate flies, almost as much as I hate mosquitoes. I didn’t care if it was the last fly on Earth. We weren’t talking spotted owls or Florida panthers here.

I hadn’t moved a muscle but the fly must have sensed my intent, because it flew to the window and started buzzing around its rims and slamming against the glass. Great. A loud fly.

I didn’t have a fly swatter. I think they are disgusting. I rolled up the paper and walked slowly to the window. I didn’t like my chances. Fly swatters work because their business end has holes that let air pass through. Flies, incredibly sensitive to changes in air pressure, lose that extra step they need when a fly swatter heads their way.

I heard someone come into my outer office and say something to Habika Jones, who was now working full time as my assistant, having quit the security firm responsible for my building. Even though I had banked some good money on some recent cases and was able to match Abby’s previous salary, it was still a leap of faith on her part. But as a former Army M.P. she was being wasted patrolling the security desk in the lobby and we both knew it. Her insight and experience had helped solve the Olsen case a few months earlier, and she was only a part-timer then, moonlighting from her regular job.

I hoped she’d keep my visitor busy until I finished with the fly. I waited until my target quieted down. Then I struck. November flies apparently don’t even have that step to lose, because I mashed this one against the window. It made an impressive smear.

“Got you, you son of a bitch.”

“Nice work, Ramar of the Jungle.”

It was Abby, standing at my office door. An elderly priest stood smiling in the doorway just behind her. He had a thick manila envelope in his hand.

“You must have incredible eyesight, Mr. Rhode,” the priest said.

“Excuse me?”

“To be able to tell that the fly was a male.”

“You’re losing me, Father.”

“You said, ‘son of a bitch’.”

Abby laughed.

“Alton, this is Father Zapotoski.”

I don’t get many priests coming to the office. In fact, he was the first that I could recall. Probably looking for a donation. I couldn’t very well say I gave at the office. I was in my office. Then I looked closer at him. It was the full head of white hair, neatly combed, that jarred my memory.

“My vision is good enough to know we’ve met, Father. Or, should I say, almost met?”

“You remember, then, Mr. Rhode,” he said. “That’s good, very good.”

Abby looked a little confused, then shrugged.

“Would you like some coffee, Father,” she asked.

“No thank you.”

“I’ll leave you to it,” she said. “Don’t forget to clean that window, boss.”

Abby walked back out to her desk, shutting the door behind her, and the priest came over to me and put out his hand. He had nicotine stains on his fingers. He was smaller and thinner than I remembered, his roman collar too big for his neck.

“I almost didn’t recognize you, Father.” He was the same priest I’d seen at the mall, looking at guides at the travel agency kiosk. “So, it was you who was following me.”

“Yes.”

“And I presume you are a real priest.”

“Almost 40 years. I’m assigned to Our Lady of Solace in Tottenville.”

“I’m glad. If you had been a hit man in priestly garb, I might be as dead as that fly.”

He smiled.

“Yes, Mr. Rhode. It would be a good disguise. Old priests aren’t very threatening, except maybe to your sex life.” His accent was slight, and sounded Slavic. “I wasn’t following you very long. You were very good.  I saw you checking out the crowd, and let you go when you went into the men’s room. I might have gotten away with following you in there, but to what end?  Priests have a bad enough reputation as it is. I left when I saw the security guard enter. I hope you weren’t harassed. I know you were in there so long just to see who might follow you in. I had learned enough about you.”

“And what was that?”

“You have excellent instincts. You are obviously a cautious man, well skilled in your craft.  You had no reason to feel threatened, and yet you felt so. Had I not had so perfect a disguise, which, after all is no disguise, I believe you would have made me.”

“Forgive me, I mean, excuse me, Father Zapotoski, but you don’t talk like a priest.”

He smiled at my Catechismal slip of the tongue.

“Please call me Father Zapo. All the kids in the parish do. I’m Polish and my first name is so long you would have to buy a vowel to feel comfortable. You know the joke about the Pole who goes to the optometrist who asks him to read a line on the eye chart? ‘Read it,’ the fellow exclaims, ‘hell, I know that guy!’”

“When I heard it, it involved a Czechoslovakian patient,” I said.

“Yes. That would work, too,” the priest said. “Anyway, I have a weakness for detective and spy mysteries. I know all the lingo, as you call it.” He paused. “And I was in the Polish army before becoming a priest. Military Intelligence. Please no ethnic jokes. We were very good at our jobs. We had to keep the Russians and both the East and West Germans properly confused, and for the most part we did.”

“Your English is excellent. Barely a trace of an accent.”

“I began my ministry working with American missionaries in Africa and have been in your country, mine now, for many years. My English was very good to start with. It was the second language of the intelligence service.”

“All this is fascinating,” I said. “But why were you following me?”

“A momentary lapse on my part. Weakness, really. I’ve tried to leave my old life behind but I just wanted to see if I still had the tradecraft. I have been meaning to speak to you but I didn’t follow you to the mall. I just happened to see you there.”

“How did you know who I was?”

“I Googled you when I did my research. Your photo had been in the newspapers. I must say, some of your cases have been notorious. You lead an interesting life.”

“You have no idea, Father.”

“My first inclination was to approach you at the mall, but the way you were flitting around from store to store I thought you might be looking for someone and I would be compromising a surveillance.”

I laughed.

“I was flitting around, as you said, because I couldn’t make up my mind. It’s been a long time since I’ve shopped in a mall. Now, what did you want to see me about?”

He began untying the string of the manila envelope.

“I believe there is someone who is killing men in my parish.”

CHAPTER 4 – OLD, COLD WARRIORS

“Killing, as in murdering?”

I knew it was a lame thing to say. He smiled patiently. I had the impression that I was not the first person he had approached with that declaration.

“Yes, Mr. Rhode. Three murders, to be exact. Or. I should say, to be inexact, since I fear there may have been more.” He tapped the envelope he was holding and started to open it.  “I have the information in here. It’s a bit sketchy, I’m afraid, but it should be enough to start.”

Start what?

“Hold it, Father. Before we get ahead of ourselves, why did you come to me? What about the police? This sounds like a job for them.”

“Yes, it should be,” Father Zapo said. “But they don’t believe me. Neither does Marat Rahm. I hope you will not take offense, but you are not my first choice. I was duty bound to go to my pastor, first, of course, then, when he dismissed my concerns, to the bishop. As you might imagine, that did not endear me with Monsignor Barilla, going over his head to the bishop. I’m afraid my days at Our Lady of Solace are numbered. I was due to be put out to pasture, anyway. I’m 80 years old and only working part-time at Our Lady. There’s a shortage of priests, as you may have heard, so the archdiocese allowed me to keep working.  But I believe I have now greased the skids, as you say.”

“What’s this about Marat Rahm?”

Marat was Arman Rahm’s father, a former KGB agent who saw the writing on the Kremlin wall before the dissolution of the Soviet Union and used his money and contacts to bring his family to the United States, where he consolidated existing Russian expat gangs in Brooklyn into a businesslike crime family. With the weakening of the Italian Mafia on Staten Island, he sought greener pastures. Arman took over the operational duties of the family after the assassination of his older brother but Marat’s fiat was still respected on both sides of the law. Arman and I were almost friends growing up until our career paths diverged, when he became a crook and I became a cop. My recent dealings with the Rahms have been complicated. They involved me in one of their schemes, which almost got me chopped into pieces before they saved me at the very last moment. And when I was in a bind on my last case, their help was indispensible. The fact that Arman and Kalugin are also fond of Alice, and vice versa, has not hurt our détente.

“After the police showed little interest,” Father Zapo continued, “I went to Marat. We are old adversaries, from the Communist days. I have forgiven him for having me imprisoned, and I also believe that he intervened to prevent me from being shot. He won’t admit that, of course. But our relationship has reached the point that we can drink the occasional vodka together. Alas, while he heard me out politely, he was not much more inclined to believe me than anyone else. But when his son said he had seen you working during the recent storm, Marat suggested that I contact you. He said you owed him a favor. He also said you were a miracle worker of sorts.”

It would have been useless to discuss my relationship to the Rahms with the old fellow. I was his fifth choice, after all. He’d tried the Roman Catholic Church twice, the N.Y.P.D. and the Russian mob, and now I got him. After me, I suppose there was always Inspector Clouseau. I resigned myself. I didn’t know what the story was, or what was in the envelope, but if Marat Rahm, who I knew to be an atheist, thought the priest needed a miracle, I would at least listen. It was certain to be entertaining. I wasn’t going to blow the old fellow off, but this promised to be a quick and easy way to even things up between the Rahms and myself. Although to be honest, I had trouble understanding why I owed them anything.

“What have you got, Father?”

He lay documents in three small piles on my desk, all neatly held together by paper clips. The first page of each pile was a photocopied obituary from the local paper. I quickly scanned the names. John Clifton, Ralph Lydecker and Mario Spinelli. I looked at the photos of the men and read their obits.

“Mr. Rhode, would you mind if I smoked while you read my files?”

Smoking was prohibited in my building. In fact, it was prohibited in all New York City buildings, even those, like many on Staten Island, downwind of the chemical factories in New Jersey that spewed out carcinogens and other poisons in volumes that could knock a Pterodactyl out of the sky. I couldn’t see sending an 80-year-old priest down eight floors to smoke in the parking lot. I opened up a drawer on my desk, pulled out an old green ashtray that said “Henny’s Steak House” and placed it on the radiator ledge next to the window with the fly smear. I opened the window.

“Try to blow the smoke out, Father. If Abby gets a whiff, you’ll be giving me the Last Rites.”

“I am not a coffee drinker, Mr. Rhode, but I understand that most private investigators keep a bottle of something stronger in their desk.”

I laughed.

“You’ve read too many thriller novels.”

Truth was, I’d just relocated my bottle. I walked over to the small fridge in the corner.

“Bourbon all right?”

I held up a bottle of Rebel Yell.

“It’s not vodka, but beggars cannot be choosers, my son.”

I poured him a drink in one of the coffee cups sitting on the fridge. It was just past 10 AM, a little early for me, but an old master sergeant told me once that letting a man drink alone was a court martial offense in his book. Most of what I knew about life came from old sergeants. I poured myself a stiff shot.

“I am not a whiskey priest, if that’s what you are thinking, Mr. Rhode. I would not have made it to this age if I were.” We clinked cups and took swallows. “But a man without vices is not a man. As I said, I prefer vodka, but this is excellent. Thank you.” 

He took his cup to the window and lit up an unfiltered Camel. While he smoked and drank at the window, I sipped my bourbon and read the other material attached to each obituary. It was a mixed bag. Each pile contained printouts of what was obviously Internet searches that basically augmented the information in the obituaries. There were also some other newspaper clippings about the men’s businesses and other activities, mostly social or related to sports.

John Clifton, 62, owned a Ford dealership in Oldbridge, New Jersey. His face was a frequent advertising presence on local cable television, but I’d never met him.

Ralph Lydecker, 60, ran the family lumber business in Mariners Harbor. Lydecker Lumber was well known on Staten Island, having been established in 1898. Ralph was the latest Lydecker to run the place. I met him once or twice when I needed some supplies during my periodic bursts of home improvements. Nice fellow, as I recalled, who didn’t necessarily try to sell you the most expensive material in his yard. I wondered who was running the business now. With all the rebuilding that would follow the recent storm, Lydecker Lumber would do very well.

I also knew, or at least had seen, Mario Spinelli, who owned the Spinelli Home for Funerals in Pleasant Plains. I had been to one or two wakes in his parlor. His was the most recent media clipping, since there was a story about his generosity in providing free funeral services, including caskets, for two reclusive drowning victims of the Superstorm whose bodies had not been claimed.    

All three men were active in various associations related to their parish, Our Lady of Solace. Their participation as coaches of various parish basketball and baseball teams, as well as those in the borough-wide Catholic Youth Organization, was also highlighted in clips from the parish newsletter that Father Zapo had compiled. All had died suddenly, of apparent heart attacks. Clifton and Spinelli at home, a few hours after dinner; Lydecker while playing golf. I compared the dates of their demise. They were roughly spaced a year apart, with Clifton’s death the most recent, just over two months ago. All left widows, and a total of seven grown children among them.

“I have a lot more information,” Father Zapo said as he sat back down after two cigarettes, “but frankly, it’s not much different from what you have in front of you. I didn’t think I had to copy everything. Besides, Monsignor Barilla keeps a close eye on our Xerox machine. It’s got some sort of counter on it. We each have a code. Isabella is kind enough to do some of my copying for me, using her code, but I don’t like to abuse the situation and perhaps get her in trouble.”

“Isabella?”

“Yes. Isabella Donner, one of the young women in the parish. She occasionally fills in for the Monsignor’s regular secretary. She only works a few hours a week. I only do my copying when she’s there.”

He looked at me expectantly.

“Well, Mr. Rhode, what do you think?”

“We’re not talking a Marine combat platoon here, Father. Men in their 60’s drop dead of heart attacks, often without symptoms or warning, all the time. Three deaths in about two years doesn’t seem that unusual to me. I bet that you could find a cluster like that in every parish on Staten Island. Maybe the country. You knew these men and were close to them. Unless you are saying that their deaths are related to their knowing you so well, this just sounds like a tragic coincidence.” As soon as I said ‘coincidence,’ I felt uneasy. How many times had I told people that I didn’t really believe in coincidences. It was a standard detective line. “Is that what you are saying? They died because they knew you. Some sort of holdover from the Cold War?”

Father Zapo waved his hand.

“No. No. No. I only knew these men from my time at Our Lady of Solace. This isn’t a spy story. There is something else at work here. I don’t know what it is. Maybe everyone is right. It’s just the ruminations of an old man.” He touched his nose with his index finger. “But this has never failed me. I smell a rat. Considering how the men died, I suspect they were poisoned.”

I looked over at the smashed fly on the window. You got off lucky today, pal, I thought.

Father Zapo leaned forward.

“If I’m wrong, I’m willing to pay the consequences. But if I’m right, and I walk away, someone else may die.”

“It wouldn’t be a picnic for me either, Father. I may also pay some consequences if you’re wrong.”

“I was told that you are a man who doesn’t mind stepping on toes.”

I wanted to say that I preferred not doing that while chasing wild geese. But I tried another tack.

“I will upset some people with my inquiries. To do this right, I’ll have to speak to your pastor, maybe even the bishop. Do you really want that?”

“As I’ve said, I’ve burned those bridges. Don’t worry about it. I was almost sent to Siberia once. A retirement home is probably no worse.”

I wasn’t making much of an impression on someone who had once been at the tender mercies of the KGB. But I gave it one more shot.

“What am I supposed to do? Go to some man’s widow and suggest that her husband may have been poisoned? Without any proof that I can see? Do you realize that the only way to prove your theory may be to exhume the bodies?”

“Perhaps it won’t come to that. You may identify the killer by other means. I hope so.”

“Did you approach the widows?”

For the first time, he looked uncomfortable.

“No.”

“Why?”

“I have my reasons, which I cannot explain.”

All private investigators deal with people who don’t level with them, spouting everything from half-truths to outright lies. We’d go broke if we only took clients who were completely forthright. Zapo smiled, and played his best card.

“There is one other thing. You understand, of course, that I do not have the means to pay you. But Marat Rahm told me you would be happy to help.”

Terrific. I was going to investigate the heart attacks of three men when I was pretty sure the killer was a Big Mac.

“All right, Father. I will look into this. One final question. I presume these men knew each other, either from the parish or through business. In fact, I gather they all belonged to some of the same associations, like the Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary. But do you know of any other more meaningful connection they had? Were they related by marriage? Played in a regular poker game? Shared a mistress? Took vacations together? Anything?”

I had rattled off the list quickly and noticed that he blinked at the word ‘mistress.’ I didn’t know if that meant anything. He might have been due for a blink. But what he said next made me wonder.

“They were men like any other. They weren’t saints.”

“In what way, Father?”

“The usual way, my son. And that’s all I have to say on the subject.”

He got up to leave.

“Oh, before I forget. You can usually reach me at the rectory but please take down my cell phone number.” He reached into his pocket and took out an iPhone. On the back was a small piece of tape from which he read off a number. “I’m afraid I haven’t memorized it yet. I just got this. Still trying to figure out how to use it. I lost my other phone and Monsignor Barilla gave me his when he upgraded. He was also kind enough to get me a new two-year calling plan.” Father Zapo smiled. “Although I’m sure he regrets that now, since I’m not likely to be in the parish much longer. I understand this is an older model without all the bells and whistles. But it does have some useful functions. It has a voice recorder and a note pad, both of which are helpful when I am preparing a sermon.”

“There is a way to recall your number using the phone, Father. I can show you if you like.”