The Bannerman Effect (The Bannerman Series) (23 page)

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Authors: John R. Maxim

BOOK: The Bannerman Effect (The Bannerman Series)
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“I'm a big girl,” she said stubbornly. ”I can take care of my—” She bit her lip. An abrupt wave of her hand told her father that he had no need to contradict her. The marks on her face, the bandage that still covered her left eyebrow, were proof enough.

He answered anyway. ”I know,” he told her, “that next time you'd be more careful. It's not that simple. It's not like, living in New York, you're careful where you walk at night and who you let into your apartment. We're talking killers here. On both sides. With them, in the time it takes you to even to get nervous, someone would be dead.
And
if Bannerman has you to worry about, and it slows him down because maybe he doesn't want you to see something that would make you afraid of him, that someone could be him. It's a different world, Susan. And you can't live in it. I know what I'm talking about.

”I know you do.” She squeezed his hand. And she knew that when he spoke of different worlds, and of different people, and of impossible loves, he was also talking about himself and a tiny elegant woman named Elena Brugg.
He'd said little after that. Nor did she argue. She wanted to say, but didn't, that sometimes people know things that aren't true. Or that shouldn't be true.
The three days passed. On Tuesday morning, Susan Lesko kept an appointment with her doctor. The stitches were removed. A ski accident, she told him. He said she was lucky, that there would be a scar but it would not be terribly noticeable. The Swiss surgeon knew his business. The hairline fracture of her cheekbone had knitted properly; it would leave a small lump under the skin that might shrink in time. The bruise over it, small but dark and clotted, would also fade eventually. In the meantime, makeup would cover it. He replaced the bandage on her brow. Keep it on for another day or two, he said. She stripped it off before she reached the street.

Her doctor's office was on Park Avenue near Thirty Eighth Street, a few blocks south of Grand Central Station. She walked toward the terminal, intending to pass through, to continue up Fifth or Madison for a while and enjoy the rare springlike temperature that had worked up from the Gulf overnight. But as she reached the station lobby, her eye fell upon Gate 25, just left of the escalators. She had used that gate many times in recent months, many weekends in Westport. Another train was boarding, going there again. She looked away, biting her lip. But slowly, almost unwillingly, she turned her head to stare up at the main Departures board. The Westport train, it said, would leave at 11:07. She checked her watch: 11:02. She bit harder.

It was foolish. She knew that. But there she was, at a quarter after twelve, standing near the Westport station, trying not to be noticed, watching local businesspeople walk into Mario's just across the street.
Billy McHugh would be at the bar. Molly Farrell would be seating luncheon customers. One might be Paul. He took lunch there often.
The thing to do, of course, would be to walk back into the station, keep her head down, and wait for the next train back to New York. She knew that. The last thing she needed was to be caught standing there like a dummy if Paul Bannerman's car suddenly popped around the corner.
On the other hand, she was hungry. It had been days since she felt much like eating. Eight pounds lost since Davos, when two would have been plenty. Portions at Mario's were huge and they were good. And Molly, who had stayed with her in the hospital, talked to her, listened to her . . . was a friend. So was Billy. He'd been there as well, she heard. He'd always been kind to her.
Her father tried to tell her things about both of them. He meant well, she supposed, trying to make her feel well rid of them. And there was probably some truth to the stories. But not much. No one who spent ten minutes with Billy, let alone Molly, could believe that he would . . .
Never mind. It's too ridiculous.
Susan went in.
Billy saw her first, then Molly. Billy waved, a big grin, then held up a bottle of the Chablis that she liked. Molly ran over, took her by the shoulders, inspected her face, smiled her approval, then kissed her cheek and led her to the small window table that she had often shared with Paul.
See? They were glad to see her. They were friends.
Molly, after five minutes, went back toward the office. While there, Susan felt sure, she made a phone call. Susan saw that in the glance she threw at Billy as she returned and in the briefest flicker of sympathy that crossed her eyes as she stopped once more at the table before returning to her station at the door.
Susan ordered. She watched the street. Paul did not come.
So on Wednesday she took the train again. And on Thursday. And again on Friday.

On that Friday, Detective Lieutenant Harry Greenwald pulled his car into a metered space on Broadway
near
the corner of 181st Street and waited, his engine running, windows up. He was ten minutes early.

 

Greenwald was well off his beat, but he knew this neighborhood. He had grown up not far north of here, in the Inwood section. Right against Fort Tryon Park and in the shadow of The Cloisters.

Used to be nice, he thought ruefully. Trees on most of the streets. Window boxes with flowers. People mostly Irish and Jewish. Working stiffs. Kids grew up to be cops, firemen, postal workers. The Jews had all the stores. In the streets, always a touch football game or a stickball game going on. Not that much traffic. Cars waited until a play was over. Even so, the cops were supposed to break up the games. Confiscate the stickball bats. No big deal if they did. The kids would just go down the nearest basement and steal the super's broom. That's what crime in the streets was like in those days. That and throwing snowballs off roofs at people walking by and sneaking into the subway to go up to Baker Field on Saturdays. And sneak in there, too.
The Jews weren't that much on football, Greenwald remembered, even counting Sid Luckman and Sammy Baugh. But they were better at stickball and school-yard basketball. Hell, back before the war and a little after, the Jews were better at all the sports. Look at boxing. The only thing the Irish kids had on them was that they got new suits every year for Easter but even that was dumb because that time of the year you pay retail.
Greenwald smiled. It was nice.
Look at this shit now, he thought. No Irish, no Jews. Go find a tree that hasn't been poisoned to death by the air. Garbage in the streets. Graffiti sprayed on every building. And he could sit there an hour without ever seeing a single white face except on weekends when the cars from Jersey and Connecticut drive in to make a buy. Cocaine was the only white thing left here if you didn't count the new Reeboks on the feet of every kid with a beeper on his belt and a pocket full of crack vials.
Greenwald shook his head. Say any of this at home and his daughters call him a racist. He wouldn't have to say
nigger.
Or
spic.
All he has to say is
nonwhite
and it's like he's the Grand Dragon. Never mind that they live out in Port Jefferson where there isn't a black family within a half a mile. It's why he doesn't bother talking to them about it. What do they know?
Anyway it's not the black blacks. It's not the ones whose parents grew up in the city and who busted their asses to get someplace like the Jews did in the thirties and like the Irish did before that. You look at the blacks who are in pro sports or the blacks on the cops. They're mostly from the old-time families. What it is, mostly, is the Jamaicans and the Dominicans. For ten years now they've been coming by the planeload. They head right for the welfare office for something to tide them over until at least one member of the family can hook up with a drug gang. First thing they buy is those Reeboks. Then the beeper. Even kids who don't deal wear beepers so they get respect.
Next they buy a gun.
This isn't true? This is racist? Five Dominican gangs have divided up the entire West Side, Broadway to the river, from 133rd Street to 181st. The Jamaicans, the “posses,” have St. Nicholas Avenue and are moving east and south with guns and crack. More than 500 shootings, counting misses, in the past year. Over a hundred didn't miss. Are there decent people here? Hardworking? Religious? Sure. You can spot them on their way to work, on their way back, and buying food or going to church. They're the ones with their heads down, moving fast, keeping their kids close until they can get home and lock the door. They try to keep their kids clean but sooner or later the kid has to go to some shit public school or go find some shit job. That's when he learns economics. What's better, kid? Two hundred bucks a week for pushing a broom or $1,500, part-time, pick your own hours, no heavy lifting.

He saw Wiggins coming. Skinny. All arms and legs. Crossing 181st, doing a roll, looked like he was floating, head bobbing to the sound from a Sony Walkman. Green-wald rolled down the sidewalk window and whistled. Wiggins made a show of innocent confusion. You talking to me? I ain't done nothin'. What do the man want with me? Greenwald flashed a badge. Yelled at him. Ordered him into the car.

To anyone watching, the thin black man was arguing, denying, occasionally flinching whenever Greenwald raised a hand. In fact, Detective Sergeant K. T. Wiggins, now back on undercover after helping to guard Susan Lesko, was handing an audiocassette tape to Harry Greenwald. Greenwald snapped it into the machine he held on his lap.
“The first voice,” said Wiggins, holding a hand over the “play” button, “is a Jamaican called “Buster Bang.” Real name: Nathaniel Weeks. He's a hitter . . . enjoys his work ... for a Jamaican gang called the Jungle Posse. The second voice is Hector Manley, street name is “Dandy.” Hector's garbage but he's quality garbage. Couple years of college, one year in a Catholic seminary, quit, became a goon for the Labor party, busted one head too many and had to split. Hector is with an elite offshoot called the Jungle Lites. The meeting is in his apartment. It was wired just two days ago when Hector got rousted by the DEA. Hector is worse than a hitter. Story is, the Jungle Lites were—”
”I know,” said Greenwald. “Trained in Cuba. Urban guerrilla techniques. And this is about Westport?”
“If I was sure, I would have called Lesko myself. You listen. You tell me.”
Greenwald pressed the button. Voices came on, melodic, singsong. One good thing about Jamaicans, thought Greenwald, is you can eavesdrop without needing a black guy to translate. They all sound like Harry Belafonte.
“Right here,” said Wiggins. He turned the sound up.
”. . .
got to bang that dry cleaner man. Got to bang him
soon. ”
“
Not yet. I will speak with him first. ”
“
He is hurting us, Dandy Man. The others see we do noth
ing, it makes them brave. ”
“
On Saturday, I will go to see him. Do nothing until then. ”
“
What about the Arab? Have you decided?”
[A pause.]
“We are to meet next week. Wednesday. ”
“
It's a lot of money, Dandy Man.”
“
It is also a lot that he asks. ”

“
Forty cars? We can have them in a day. The drivers are no problem. We have brothers in Norwalk and in Bridgeport. We
have it fucking surrounded, Dandy Man. Give me two days,
three at most, and it will be done. We will be famous, you and
me. No one will ever forget us.”

Certainly not the police”
[Then, thoughtfully.]
“You
would do this thing, Buster?
”
“
Think of it, Dandy.”
[Voice excited, gleeful]
“Forty cars,
all at once. One big bang and there is no more town. Fourth
of July, man, and we can watch it. There is a highway bridge
where we can see it all. They will think it is the end of the
world.”
[There was a sound. A door buzzer.]
“
Have you spoken of this? To anyone?
”
“
Only you, Dandy Man. And the Arab.
”
“
You will say nothing to these men. Nothing at all.
”
“
But we do it?
”
“
It might be done. Yes. On Wednesday, I will decide.
”
Wiggins pressed the “stop” button. “That's it,” he said. “There's another meeting but the tape runs out before it gets going.”
Greenwald stopped writing. He'd been making notes on a pad. He brought his pen back up to the first item. “Who's the ‘Dry Cleaner’?” he asked.
“That's not a street name. They're talking about Wesley Covington. Owns a Minute Man franchise on St. Nicholas Avenue up in the Heights, lives on 153rd Street. He's formed a block association to try to keep out the dealers. Has neighbors, volunteers, patrolling with bullhorns and walkie-talkies.”

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