Suspension (28 page)

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Authors: Richard E. Crabbe

BOOK: Suspension
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“You
mean
that, don't you?” she said with almost a touch of wonder in her voice. “Don't say it if you don't mean it, Tom. You don't have to—” She stopped herself, shaking her head. “But you know that,” she said almost to herself. Mary looked hard at his face—the little crinkles around the eyes, the mustache, the scar at the temple, the small shock of white hair there. It was a strong face, a good face, a face she loved and trusted.
“I have my dreams, Tommy,” she said, looking into his eyes. “I've locked them away. Doing what I do, I can't afford dreams of a normal life. Family and children; they've been just dreams to me. I can't let myself be dreaming like that but once.” There was a powerful, desperate seriousness in her words. Tom knew the risk she was willing to take with him.
“If I take those dreams out again, it'll kill me if—” She paused for a long moment, looking off as if seeing something far off. “It would just kill me,” she finished.
Tom believed it was so. “I just want to make you happy, is all. We'll take it slow but I'm thinking we're dreaming the same dream, you and I.” He smiled a tentative, hopeful smile that said as much as his words. Mary hugged him with a ferocity that almost startled him. He knew he had taken the right turn.
Funny how the choice unmade is so uncertain but, once done, looks like no choice at all. Mary's hand was in his as they walked back up Broadway. The sun was warmer now. The wind had died to a whisper. They walked in silence down the road they had chosen.
But when it comes to planning, one mind can in a
few hours think out enough work to keep a thousand
men employed for years.
—WASHINGTON ROEBLING
C
aptain Peter Coogan, commander of the Fourth Precinct, sat with the rest of the “corps” in Coffin's office watching as he stalked back and forth like a caged animal. Coogan and Coffin had been near-equal partners in the corps for three years. Coffin most always took the lead in things, though. August carried a cigar in his right hand that he was using to stab the air as he made a point. In between, he'd suck on it, so it glowed like a little furnace.
“I'm going to ruin that son of a bitch, then I'll see if he don't whistle a different tune.”
“What're you going to do, August?” Coogan asked, almost amused by the show Coffin was putting on.
“Well, we've got a pretty good idea where Tom is getting his money, right? We know the bars, the whorehouses, the gambling dens as well as he does. It don't take an Edison to figure who's paying him off, does it?” Coffin almost shouted.
Coogan put his feet up, enjoying Coffin's tirade. He locked his fingers over his middle, twirling his thumbs in silent satisfaction. He'd warned Coffin against taking action against Braddock, and he was enjoying his little gloat.
“One by one we shut them down. It's got to look right: standard procedure, all that bullshit. Make it look official. Cracking down on the criminal element following the Venkman and Finney thing,” Coffin said, waving his cigar. “That's the story. The fact that it's actually true is merely convenient. Hell, we arrest enough of them, we can hurt Braddock bad. Maybe then he'll
knuckle under. What do you say, team?” he asked, challenging the others of the “corps” grouped around the room.
Coogan spoke first. “Never thought Braddock was a solid member of the corps, but he's a solid man. A good cop too. Can't say I want to make an enemy of him.” A couple of the others seemed to nod in agreement.
“Not scared of him, are you, Pat?” Coffin asked sarcastically.
“Not scared,” he said evenly, choosing to ignore the slur, “just not
stupid
. Ain't saying I'm not in, mind. Just saying let's be careful.”
“And the rest of you?” Coffin peered around the office, his wide-open stare a challenge to each. “Good. We do this right, and he'll get the message in double-time. He's no fool. He'll see which side his bread is buttered on.” There followed a general discussion of who they'd hit first. Once that was decided, Coffin dismissed the men. There were an even dozen. Coogan stayed behind.
“Why want him back in so bad, August? We can do fine without him.”
“Well, I tell you, Pat, sometimes it's a puzzle to me too,” Coffin said. “He's a burr under my saddle, but he's solid. He can be counted on to do what he says. That's more than I can say about some of the rest.” Coffin knew that for an understatement. “And it's a whole lot better having him on the inside. We've got more control that way. Out of the corps, we can't be sure who the hell he's talking to.” Tom knew a great deal about Coffin's extracurricular activities, enough to put him away forever. “Third thing, it's dangerous to kill the man, though I've been tempted. Don't know what went wrong with Venkman and Finney, but you saw what those two looked like. For God's sake, Finney's head looked like it got run over by a freight wagon, and his arm … how Braddock did that, I don't know.” Coffin didn't bother to mention how Tom had disarmed him earlier, but it echoed in the back of his head, like a schoolyard taunt.
“Well, August, it might surprise you to know that I agree with you. Surprised you took the chance of riling him in the first place.”
“Hmph. Plan went a bit overboard.” He shrugged. “Figured Tom could be taught a little humility. Was getting on his high horse lately, complaining about who we're taking protection from and the like. Figured I'd put the screws to Finney for the beating. I'd have Tom in my debt and a bigger percentage from Finney in the bargain. It would have been pretty.”
Coogan chuckled. “August, only
you
would call that deal pretty.”
“Would have been,” Coffin said defensively, “except those boys got carried away. I didn't want him dead, just ‘rearranged' a little. That Dutchman didn't have the intelligence of a stump. Should have made allowances for that, but what the hell; what's done is done.” Coffin never was one to dwell on his failures.
He was always ready to get on to the next plan. It was one of his real strengths.
“Humph. But now we gotta be puttin' the squeeze on Tommy's payoff. Don't want to be doing that for long. Some of that money trickles into our pockets too, ya know,” Coogan said, ever the more practical of the pair.
“Don't have to tell me. This won't take a lot of doing.” Coffin sat back in his swivel chair. The spring in it gave out a long screech that Coogan could feel in the fillings of his teeth. “Gotta have somebody oil this goddamn chair,” he said absently. “Hell, maybe I'll just put in a requisition for a new one.” He put his feet up on the desk and smiled. He was more than willing to sacrifice a few dollars in the short run for a greater profit in the long. August twirled a pencil in his fingers like a bandleader's baton as he struck a reflective pose. He flipped it by one end, and it spun in the air at least three times before he caught it without seeming to try. Coogan sipped his coffee and watched the little show: the feet up, the pencil spinning, the pensive look. He knew something was coming.
“Nope, Tom won't take long getting the message. Of course, I have a contingency plan in case he proves hard of hearing. Tommy does have his weak spots, after all.” Coffin smiled wickedly.
C
aptain Thaddeus Sangree sat at his desk, writing a note to his contacts in Richmond. The meeting the night before had been productive. Sullivan had suggested an idea that showed great promise. He said it had occurred to him while he was up in the cables, tying off the suspenders and stays. Basically it was just a refinement of their original plan, but it could turn out to be a critical piece in the puzzle of demolition. The simplicity and economy of the idea coupled with its enormous potential had great appeal. In truth, they wouldn't need to actually sever all the cable and roadway beam connections. All that was necessary was to sever some, and weaken the others enough so that the weight of the bridge would do the rest. Based on the tests they had already conducted, Thaddeus was sure this was the plan that would bring down the bridge.
Early on, when the towers were still under construction, Emmons had come up with the idea of planting dynamite in the hollow base of each tower. An explosion within the enclosed tower would be devastating and, with enough explosive, could have literally brought down the bridge like a house of cards. As attractive as the notion was, eventually they had rejected it. To do so before the bridge was finished wasted the symbolism of the act. It would also have meant that any dynamite planted in the hollow towers would have to sit
there for years, until the bridge was finished. There was no way they could be certain that dampness and age wouldn't result in a big fizzle.
The plan they had agreed upon had its pluses and minuses too. No plan was perfect. But it had a certain economy and simplicity to it that seemed to bode well for its success. The captain chuckled when he thought of Roebling's reaction.
“I wouldn't be you for all the gold in California,” he said to the window. Though Thaddeus couldn't actually see Roebling's big brownstone from his office, he knew the direction in which it lay. He often found himself talking to Roebling. He would face out his window, imagining him there in Brooklyn, a broken cripple, barely able to feed himself or move about the house. It amused the captain to think of him so. “I wish I could be there to see your face: the horror, the disbelief. It will be too much for the mind to grasp, too enormous, too awful. Will you cry out? I wonder. Will the shock alone kill? You
are
frail. Any shock might be fatal. Been known to happen and to healthier men than you.” He chuckled at the thought of Roebling's death—the despair and defeat. “Will you bring yourself to watch? Will you watch the bodies as they splash, or will your eyes see only the bridge? Guess I'll never know,” Thaddeus mused. He could imagine, though, and he gloated in his conjured images.
The captain tried to go back to his writing, but his pen stayed poised an inch above the paper. He tried to think of what he had to say, but it wouldn't come. There was just one thing that he could think of. It kept repeating in his head, and before he thought of what he was doing his hand had written it out. “I live for the day” was scrawled across the page.
“Damn!” the captain cursed, crumpling the paper and starting over.
T
om had gotten out of bed late. It was ten-thirty by the time he'd had a snuggle with Mary, got himself dressed and ready to head out. Mary's cook, known simply as “Cookie,” had fixed him some eggs and bacon, which he wolfed down. He was feeling guilty. Despite the fact that he had plenty of good reasons for lying in bed, like a concussion, stitches, and a still-swollen hand, he felt the need to get moving on the Bucklin case. It gnawed at the back of his mind constantly, particularly now that his head was spinning a bit less. He remembered old man Bucklin's words, and as he left Mary's place, he jangled the little key in his pocket. He'd find out what the hell was going on with the bridge and who had killed Terrence for that matter too, but there was one place he needed to stop first.
He hadn't been home in four days, and he worried about Grant and Lee. Even though Sam had said he'd look after them, he knew how they could get
when he left them alone for too long. It would be guerilla warfare with the two of them waging a relentless campaign of furniture scratching, carpet soiling, and general mischief. He was outnumbered and outflanked. He'd stop by just for a minute, just to see that they were okay, he told himself, then it would be back to business.
He hailed a cab and headed downtown. It was going to be a longish ride; the midmorning traffic was heavy. In some places they moved at not much better than a walking pace. Tom sat back and tried to enjoy the ride. Considering what his last cab ride had been like, that wasn't too difficult. He remembered suddenly that it was already April 3 and he hadn't made his collections. Cursing to himself, he figured that he had at least a dozen stops to make. It wouldn't do to have the criminal element thinking he was getting lax. Those types would start pushing back real quick if they saw a weakness. He made a mental list of the three or four most difficult of his clientele, figuring to visit those first. He didn't want to waste too much time even on this, not with the Bucklin business still hanging above his head. If he kept the hard cases in line, the word would get out that he wasn't getting slack. Being slack with that crowd was like blood in the water to sharks; he'd get eaten alive.
Tom tried to figure the most efficient route to make his collections. He wanted to end up on the Lower East Side, because he planned on paying a visit to the Bucklins, to ask them a few more questions. Tom jingled the key again, rolling it about along with his change. Would the key yield any secrets? There had to be something, some other bit of information they had but perhaps weren't even aware of. What was going on with the bridge he couldn't figure, but as Martin had said, there had been plenty of strange things happening during the construction, from payoffs, to fire, to fraud and death. It could be anything.
The cab pulled to a creaking, rattling stop on the cobbles in front of Colonnade Row. Tom got out, paid the driver, and went in. In the hall he passed Mrs. Aurelio's door. He could hear his downstairs neighbor singing Italian opera to the accompaniment of her gramophone. He was no judge of opera, but he figured the old lady was about as bad as he'd heard and louder than most. She was nearly deaf, and when she took a notion to start singing, the whole building knew it. Of course, in Italian, he couldn't really tell how badly she was butchering what she sang. Her late husband had been a butcher, and it seemed that she, in her own way, carried on the tradition.
Tom went up the wide staircase to the second floor, propelled by Mrs. Aurelio's operatics. He was so distracted by the music and her singing that he almost didn't notice that his front door was unlatched. The open door was like an alarm bell clanging in his head. He drew back the key like a burned finger
from a hot stove. The key went back in his pocket. The Colt came out of his holster. Tom noticed his palm was already wet. He stood aside, afraid he might be shot through the door. With his left hand he reached slowly for the knob. But, as he touched it, he pulled back a second time.
“Son of a bitch, now what am I gonna do?” he grumbled under his breath. He remembered the squeaky hinge. What once seemed like a minor annoyance, or a sort of homey welcome, now took on the aspect of a death knell.
Tom stood outside the door for what seemed like a long time, though it was barely a minute. He could already hear that damn hinge like a siren for anyone waiting inside. He considered just waiting in the hall, but that wasn't something he had the temperament to do. It could be that Sam had just forgotten to close the door all the way, or maybe Mrs. Aurelio, when she let the iceman in. Tom knew he'd be healthier not to assume those sorts of causes. “Well, Tommy boy, you're a cop, you've got a gun, you can't stand out here forever,” he whispered to himself. Tom crouched low, Colt in his right hand, left on the doorknob. His heart was pounding in his chest, galloping at full tilt. As gently as he knew how, he pushed the door in. It swung open, silent as a snake. Nothing. On careful cat's-paws Tom crept into his front hall, Colt held in both hands close in front of him. He had once seen a cop have his gun knocked from a one-handed grip. It had almost cost that man his life. Tom had learned from the mistake. He heard a voice in the front room.

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