They Don't Play Stickball in Milwaukee (4 page)

“Detective Caliparri?” She went pale. “Your names?”

“Dylan Klein. John MacClough.”

“One moment.” She picked up the phone, punched in a few numbers, and turned her back to us. We could hear her whisper, but not her words. With some color having returned to her cheeks, she faced us and said: “Staircase to your right. One flight up, third door to your left.”

“Thank you, Sergeant. . .Hurley,” I read off her name tag. “Sorry for your loss.”

She just bowed her head and waved us up the steps.

“Come,” the answer came to my knock.

By the time MacClough closed the door behind us, my clothes needed washing. The place reeked of cigarettes and a layer of smoke hung in midair like a sleeping ghost. A man, trying hard to look disinterested, sat on the corner of a desk smoking a Kent. He had a kind, meaty face with a nose that twisted more ways than a ski trail. He was dark-skinned, gray-haired, and brown-eyed. His smoke-yellowed fingers were thick and square at the nail. When he finally stopped the disinterested act, he looked right past me: “John MacClough.” His voice was raspy. His tone was equal parts anger and disdain.

“Klein,” Johnny said, “meet Detective Nick Fazio, late of the NYPD.”

I shook his hand. He shook back. Whatever Fazio had against MacClough apparently wasn't going to be held against me.

“Look,” I said, “it's nice that you guys go back. I'm all for reunions, but I'm here to talk to Detective Caliparri.”

“Then I guess you're gonna have to hold a seance. Caliparri's dead. Someone broke into his house last night and decided to give him a haircut with a shotgun.”

“Robbery?” MacClough wanted to know.

“The place was ransacked,” Fazio answered, “but the perp left a few grand in cash and jewelery untouched. So whatever he was there for, it wasn't money. What did you want to talk to him about Mr. Klein?”

“My nephew, Zak Klein. My older brother reported him—”

“Here it is!” Fazio pulled a folder off his desk, waved it at me, stopped and read through it. He looked up and flicked his cigarette butt at MacClough's feet. “So you're Jeffrey Klein's brother.”

“I have that dubious distinction,” I confessed.

“So now I understand why you're here, sort of. What's his excuse?”

“He's a close family friend.”

“Really!” Fazio stood, walked by me, and got right in MacClough's face. “Geez, and I thought it might have something to do with Hernandez, this being a missing kid and all.”

There was that name again, Hernandez. Ten years we'd known each other and the name Hernandez had only come up in relation to Mets' baseball. Now, two days in a row, it surfaces in connection with one of MacClough's cases. Weird. Over the past decade, I thought I'd heard every lurid detail of every big case—good and bad—involving John MacClough. Apparently, one case had slipped his mind. It hadn't, however, slipped the minds of Jeff Klein or Nick Fazio. On the contrary, the Hernandez case seemed like a very hot topic.

“Show the man some respect, Fazio,” MacClough said coolly. “His nephew is missing and he buried his old man yesterday. You think he gives a shit about us?”

“Sorry about your father,” the detective said, finally facing me. “Look, Mr. Klein, I know the file. I'll tell you what Caliparri probably told that big
macher
brother of yours; the kid split. Maybe the pressure of school got too much for him. Maybe he knocked up some girl. Maybe it's drugs, maybe booze. Maybe it's all of the above. In this town, the major cash crop is dysfunctional teenagers. Money fucks ‘em up. Now don't get me wrong. We'll keep the file open, but he'll show of his own accord. In this town, they always do.”

I wanted to argue. I didn't. He made sense. I hoped like hell he was right. I peeked over my shoulder at MacClough, but his expression said nothing to me.

“Thank you, Detective. I hope you don't mind if I check in with you every few days.”

“Not at all, Mr. Klein. Sorry again about your dad.”

“Sorry about Detective Caliparri,” I said.

He was too busy lighting up to respond. I was by the door, but MacClough had yet to move. He seemed distant, preoccupied.

“Do you think they're related?” MacClough spoke to Fazio.

“Is what related,” the detective asked rhetorically, “a dead cop and a missing college boy? You been off the job too long. They happened weeks apart. And you're forgetting, technically the kid went missing all the way the hell upstate in Riversborough. What's the connection?”

“Just a thought,” MacClough said, “just a thought.”

As I began pulling Fazio's office door open, someone on the other side pushed it hard. That displeased my right knee greatly.

“Sorry!” It was Sergeant Hurley.

“For chrissakes, Hurley, what is it?” Fazio was impatient.

“Private security firm reports a 1030.”

“Call out the fucking National Guard!” Impatience turned to sarcasm. “I got a dead cop here. On a good day I don't give a rat's ass about a 1030. What makes today any different?”

“I think it's kinda relevant,” Hurley sneered.

“Why? Where'd the break-in happen, at the mayor's residence?”

“No Detective Fazio, it happened at 5 Lovesong Lane. That's Mr.—”

I cut her off. “That's my brother's house!”

Either Zak's room had been ripped apart by someone who had a grudge against electronic equipment and wall-board or it had been visited by the world's most discerning tornado. It even looked worse than most teenagers' rooms. The rest of Jeffrey's Victorian nirvana up there overlooking the Hudson had remained untouched.

Before we went in, MacClough said just this: “You know nothing.”

That was a pretty accurate assessment, I thought. But I knew what he meant. Insurance investigators play this game with police all the time. I was to keep private anything I might notice. Fazio and his uniformed minions were to be frozen out, at least for the time being. It was especially easy to play the game that day, for, as I kept reminding the local constabulary: I didn't live there. I didn't know where things went. I didn't know what was missing. It got so tedious, I wanted to run to the nearest print shop and have cards made that read: “My brother will be here shortly. Ask him!”

MacClough had kept his mouth shut until Fazio, frustrated with my inconvenient lack of knowledge and my ban on his smoking in Jeffrey's house, dismissed us: “You can go.”

“Still think there's no connection?” MacClough wondered aloud.

“What I think is police business and you ain't police, not anymore.”

“Same M.O. as Caliparri minus the body?” MacClough guessed.

“Same answer as before. Only now, I'm ordering you to leave.”

When John sensed that I was going to argue, he pulled me out of the house by the arm. He may have been on bad terms with Fazio, but apparently it was important to maintain some measure of goodwill with the detective.

“Where we going?” I asked as we walked to his old Thunderbird.

“I'm not going anywhere.”

“And me?”

“You're going to college.”

Long Sleeves

The cab fare back to Sound Hill was roughly equivalent to one quarter of the advance to my first book. God knows, I wrote the damned thing in less time than it took to get home. I stopped by the Scupper to pass on a few instructions from MacClough to his brother Billy and to wash the day down with a pint. One pint turned into two and two into three. Billy gave me a lift after I helped him close the place.

Procrastination time was over once I'd showered and shaved. I went to my writing desk and dug out Larry Feld's business card. I flipped the card over to where he'd written down his home number. I punched in the numbers and half prayed to get his answering machine.

Larry Feld was sort of a lawyer from the dark side of the force. Stated politely, Larry was an attorney who represented outcasts, societal pariahs, and miscreants. In fact, he was a Mafia lawyer who defended the occasional serial rapist or pedophile. But Larry Feld was also a guy who'd grown up on my block, a guy who used to invite me over for Passover seder. He had gotten me my first jobs as an investigator and always made sure to feed me enough work to pay the bills. Problem with Larry Feld was, he never did anything out of the goodness of his heart. It was a toss-up as to whether he just didn't understand goodness or had no heart. The jury was still out. What Larry did understand was the system and what he did have was connections. He was not unlike my brother Jeffrey in those respects. If you needed information, he could get it. The bill, however, was almost always too steep.

“What is it?” He was home.

“It's Dylan, Larry.”

“Sorry about your dad.”

“How the fuck did you—”

“One hears things. I sent a basket,” he said. “Your dad always hated my guts. At least he wasn't a phony about it and he treated my folks with respect.”

Feld's parents had survived Auschwitz, but not at all intact. His father was a morose little man who wore long sleeves on dog days to hide as many scars as he could. His mother painted their windows black. For cruel children and their cruder parents, the Felds were easy targets for every joke and whisper.

“Thanks,” I said. “He did hate you.”

“Enough sweet talk, Dylan. You only call me when you want something.”

“Hernandez and Fazio. Hernandez is an NYPD case that could go back maybe twenty, thirty years. John MacClough had some involvement in it. Fazio is a dectective up in Castle-on-Hudson. Used to be NYPD.”

“Hernandez I've got to look into. If Fazio's first name is Nick, I can give you something now.”

“Nick's the name,” I confirmed.

“Most decorated detective to ever work Internal Affairs. Retired, detective first grad. He's got a great rep. Even the guys he brought down respect him. Works in Castle-on-Hudson to prove to the world he's real cop, not just another cheese eater.”

“See if Fazio and MacClough intersect at Hernandez.”

“Shit!” he hissed. “You don't need me. You need a road map.”

“I need you, Larry. Trust me.”

“You're the only the person I know who could say that and get away with it. Give me two days.”

When Larry clicked off the line, I began dialing my father's number. Old habits are harder to bury than the dead.

They Don't Play Stickball in Milwaukee

The airport at Riversborough was the stuff of sketch comedy. Though situated just south of the Canadian border, it wasn't exactly a major hub. It had one runway, a wind sock, and a terminal building the size of a Photomat. None of this, however, prevented the port authority from shamelessly proclaiming: “Welcome to Riversborough International Airport—The best little gateway this side of the border.” I would have hated to see the worst little gateway.

Snow and liberal arts were Riversborough's major commodities. As I drove my rental into town, I read several bill-boards for the area ski resorts. They all, apparently, liked the copywriter for the local port authority. Their ads were equally shameless and catagorically featured the words best and little. I wasn't great at Scrabble, but I bet I could have kicked that copywriter's ass.

When I checked in with the local police, they gave me the same song and dance Fazio had laid on me, only in a more polite, northern New York kind of way. Zak would turn up. They were sure of it. None of them had attended the college, but they knew it was extremely competitive. And when one cop told me that Riversborough was the best little liberal arts college town in the east, I asked him if he had any relatives in advertising.

The campus was postcard pretty. The buildings were all red brick and white clapboards bordering a central quadrangle. The only bit of ostentation was the gold dome atop the library clock tower. There was no visible activity on campus and a visitor might suspect school was still in recess. But like many schools situated in snow belts, underground tunnels connected all the buildings.

I parked in the visitors' lot and made my way around to the dorms. Though not quite as quaint as the main body of the campus, their design features were consistent with the rest of the school's architecture. When I walked up to Zak's door there was already someone waiting. Her nature was a mystery to me as she rested her head on her knees and hugged her blue-jeaned legs.

“How ya doing?”

She was startled. “God, you sound like Zak.”

“People say that.”

After inspecting my face, she said: “You look like him too.”

“People say he looks like me. I'm his Uncle—”

“—Dylan.” She popped up and shook my hand. “Way cool. Zak talks about you all the time. You're the cop turned writer.”

“Something like that.” I was happy to hear her refer to Zak in the present tense. “And you are?”