Red Hook Page 15

  “Isn’t there a whole eviction process? Doesn’t that take a lot of time?”

  “I don’t know. I think I better just stay out of his way for a few days, and hope the old man gets better.”

  Jack could have prevailed on a colleague from the task force for a bed for a few nights, or he could have gone to a motel, but he figured this might be an opportunity to finally get to know his son.

  Ben chewed on his lower lip. “So you want to stay here?”

  “If that’s okay with you.”

  His son scratched his armpit. He didn’t answer for a moment. “Well…I guess I could clear away some space in here. I think I’ve got an extra key somewhere.” He turned away abruptly. “I better take a shower.” He disappeared down the hallway.

  Jack got up and stepped over several piles of books on his way to the phone. He called the squad room, praying Sergeant Tanney wouldn’t pick up. He was relieved to hear his fellow detective Carl Santiago on the other line.

  “Leightner, that you?” It’s me.

  “Man, where the hell you been? The sarge’s been going apeshit. You okay?”

  “I’m fine. I had…a personal problem. Everything okay at the squad?”

  “Yeah. It was slow yesterday. You coming in?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  He hung up. Pressing his fingers against his temples, he made his way across the cluttered room and looked out the window. Down below, the backyards of the block formed a green courtyard. The sky was a hazy white. On top of a chain-link fence separating two of the yards, a gray cat moved stealthily forward. It stretched out a paw and placed it carefully, as if testing thin ice, sending Jack back to a snow-covered lake and a December day in 1961.

  Christmas was just over. He and his father and Petey crunched through the snowy woods, carrying borrowed skis. The lake was frozen and they were going to glide across it.

  The boys walked in their father’s footsteps, where he had packed down the snow with his huge oiled leather boots. Petey, husky even at nine, went second, and Jack brought up the rear, stumbling in the deep snow. His stomach was full of delicious slices of glazed ham, fried to a crisp in an iron skillet, and mashed potatoes, and lima beans he ate without protest, not wanting to spoil the unusual peace of the day. They were only staying in the little Catskills cabin for a weekend, but his father was proud that he had been able to bring his family upstate for their first real vacation—in fact, it was the first time they had ever left the city. He was proud that he had learned how to ski cross-country as a boy in Russia, and now he would have the chance to pass this knowledge on to his sons.

  The day was chill, but there was no wind and not a cloud in sight. A branch cracked and the sound traveled across the flat white surface of the lake, ricocheted back like a rifle shot.

  Petey was singing Buddy Holly’s song ‘That’ll Be The Day.’ He’d been singing those two lines over and over for the past three days, driving everyone in the cabin nuts.

  At the edge of the lake, they stopped to put on their skis. Across the way, above the rough beard stubble of the winter trees, a plume of smoke uncoiled from the chimney of a neighbor’s cabin into the perfect blue of the sky. The snow on the lake was shiny with a frozen crust. Jack and his brother started to argue about who got to wear which skis, but they were stilled by a look from their father. They didn’t want to disturb this cheerful mood he was in, heading out with his sons into the wilderness. They clamped on their skis in silence, fingers pink from the cold. Their father took off his red-and-black-checkered jacket and tied the sleeves around his waist. His bushy eyebrows stuck out from under the brim of a thick wool hat.

  “This will get the blood movink,” he said as he sidestepped heavily down onto the lake. He slid out across the field of white, not looking back to see if his sons were ready. They scurried out after him, short legs pumping double time. The tips of the ski poles poked holes through the crust. They squinted against the glare of sun on ice and snow.

  Peter skied out effortlessly, with his usual mysterious ability. Jack scowled as he struggled to keep up the rear. Why, he asked himself for the thousandth time, had God been so unfair? Two brothers, born only two years apart—why would he make one cheerier, handsomer, a born athlete?

  Halfway across the lake, their father stopped and reached into his pack to pull out a big chocolate bar.

  “You boys aren’t gettink tired, are you?” His breath puffed white in the frigid air.

  They shook their heads earnestly. Their father gave them each a piece of chocolate, then pulled a metal flask out of his coat pocket and tipped his head back to drink heavily. He’d been taking hits off the flask all morning.

  As they resumed their trek, Jack wondered what would happen if he broke through a weak spot in the ice and plunged into the freezing black water, like Tony Curtis in Houdini. Sometimes he had nightmares about the scene where the magician escapes from a trunk at the bottom of just such a frozen lake, only to swim up and panic, discovering that he’s lost sight of the opening in the ice. What would his father do? Would he dive into the water and rescue his son?

  All went well until they reached the far shore. Jack was short of breath, but his father insisted they push on around the bend. His breath turned ragged, and he was afraid that his asthma was coming on, a slowly tightening band of pressure around his chest. He knew better than to complain—his father had heard someone on the radio suggesting that asthma was born in the mind, and since then he had looked on his son’s condition as an embarrassing sign of weakness. But Petey heard Jack wheezing and turned back to help—for once their brotherly rivalry was set aside. Jack stopped and bent over to ease the pressure in his lungs.

  His father turned around, and it was as though a dark cloud had suddenly drifted out over the picture-postcard lake.

  “Come on, Jack, keep going,” his brother urged, but it was too late.

  His father skied back and grabbed him by his collar, looked down as if he didn’t recognize his own son. “Moof,” he ordered.

  Jack struggled for breath. His father yanked him up. “You little shit. We stop when I tell you.”

  He knew his father hated to see him cry, but he couldn’t help sniffling.

  “Moof!”

  “My boots hurt.”

  “This problem, we can solf. Take them off.”

  He looked up, uncomprehending.

  “Piotr, help take his boots off.”

  His brother gave Jack an anguished look, but their father cuffed him on the ear. He bent over and unlaced the boots. Jack slowly pulled them off.

  “Now the socks,” his father said.

  When his feet were bare, his father yanked him to his feet. “Now we can go beck.” The old man skied on ahead, not looking back as they moved across the lake. Jack didn’t dare to complain as his feet crunched through the snow. The cabin seemed very far away.

  “You all right, Jack?” Petey skied along next to him, his face tight with worry. “Here—let me carry your shoes and the skis.”

  “He’ll get mad,” Jack answered. I don’t care.

  Petey gathered up the things and skied clumsily on with his arms full of skis and shoes and poles. Jack had never loved his brother so much.

  Soon his feet were purple with the cold. He couldn’t help crying.

  His father stopped. Just as unpredictably as his dark mood had emerged, it faded. “Put your shoes on, boy,” he said, then turned away.

  Back at the cabin, his mother stared at Jack, who sat trembling before the fireplace.

  “He fell in the side of the lake,” his father said. “Silly boy.” Jack was silent. His brother looked miserably down at the broad plank floor.

  Their father shouldered the door open and stomped outside.

  twenty-two

  “YOU SHOULD HAVE CALLED in,” Sergeant Tanney said, leaning forward in his desk chair. “If you needed the shift off, I would’ve been happy to give it to you.”

  “You’re right,” Jack said. �
��I’m sorry.” He knew he was due for a dressing-down but he was in no mood for a lecture, especially from such a young supervisor.

  “You okay?” Tanney said, “You don’t look so great.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Are we back on track?”

  “Back on track.”

  “Glad to hear it. I’m sorry to hear about your landlord. Remember, if you ever have a problem, come to me first.”

  “You got it. Thanks.”

  Tanney rose and offered his hand.

  Jack left the sergeant’s office, surprised at how painless the session had been. His coworkers looked up from their desks.

  “He bust your balls?” asked Carl Santiago.

  “Not too bad.”

  “We were worried about you yesterday.”

  Jack rubbed his jaw. “I screwed up. But I’m fine.”

  “Back to the salt mines, then.”

  “Yup.”

  Sitting at his desk, he called the hospital and was told that his landlord’s condition as stable, but that it was still too early to determine the state of the neurological damage from the stroke. Mr. Gardner was not being allowed visitors today, but he could come by tomorrow.

  Once you got past the metal detectors, the Brooklyn DA’s headquarters was a warren of drab offices and hallways jammed with cardboard boxes of case write-ups dating back before the computer era. Cheap bronze plaques decorated the walls, along with photos of offspring fortunate enough to be able to go to expensive colleges and escape the city bureaucracy.

  Jack found Gary Daskivitch sitting on the edge of a desk, chatting with a secretary. “You ready to roll?” he said, cutting into their conversation. He was anxious to get going on the case again.

  Daskivitch stood up. “Yeah.”

  “Have a good meeting?” His partner had come to discuss one of his other cases with an assistant DA.

  “It was fine.” They walked out into a gray hallway. “Hey, I tried to call you yesterday morning, but you weren’t home. Then I got a call from your boss, all pissed off, looking for you. What was that about?”

  He frowned. “It was my landlord. He had a stroke.”

  “No shit? The old guy? Is he okay?”

  He shook his head. “Not so good.”

  “Sorry to hear that. He seemed like a real gutsy old geezer. How you doing?”

  “I’m beat. I got about four hours’ sleep the last couple of nights.”

  “Maybe you should take a day off.”

  Jack shook his head grimly. “We’ve got work to do.”

  They continued down the narrow hallway.

  “Wait a sec,” Daskivitch said. He backed up to stick his head in a doorway labeled Narcotics Task Force. “Hey, Richie—how they hanging?…Oh, yeah? Give my regards to your wife—tell her I’ll be over during the day sometime next week.”

  A box of envelopes came winging through the door, narrowly missing Daskivitch’s head.

  Jack pushed a button to unlock a security door. “Who was that?”

  “A DEA guy. We did a sweep together when I was with Narcotics.”

  They followed a group of weary secretaries and attorneys into an elevator. The DA’s people were off work, but the detectives were just starting their day.

  “You got along with a DEA guy?”

  “He was all right—for a Fed.”

  They walked through the marble lobby of the Brooklyn Municipal Building out into the soupy early evening. The sidewalks teemed with civil servants impatient to get home.

  Jack spat on the side-walk. “I hate Feds. Arrogant sons of bitches. A few years back, we got this call about a shooting in Bensonhurst. Turns out it was a triple murder, a Mob thing. I go out there with another guy from the task force. We pull up, there’s two vans parked outside. Unmarked. These guys in suits are not only tromping all over the evidence, they’re actually scooping up the bodies and piling ’em into the vans. This guy smiles at me and says, ‘Hey, how ya doin’?’ I say, ‘I’m doing fine, and who the hell are you?’ He flashes an FBI shield at me, he climbs into one of the vans, and off they go. Not another word. The dildo actually had the nerve to wave at me as they went by. Fuck you, NYPD.”

  Around the corner, they settled into his car. He turned the air-conditioning up full blast.

  “So where we going?” Daskivitch said.

  “Manhattan. Upper East Side.”

  “What the hell for?”

  He filled his partner in on the Romanian maid’s story. “I want to talk to her boss.” Anybody with an apartment in the Bentley was probably a big wheel; this time Jack was glad of Daskivitch’s intimidating bulk.

  His partner turned to him. “Your sergeant okay with you spending so much time on this case?”

  Jack leaned forward against his shoulder harness. “I don’t care how much time it takes.”

  The dispatcher chattered away on the radio. After a few minutes they joined the line of cars heading up onto the Brooklyn Bridge. At rush hour, it would have been faster to take the subway, but such an undignified option never occurred to them.

  “Hey,” Daskivitch said. “My wife’s been bugging me. She wants to know when you’re gonna call her friend Michelle again. Do you like her?”

  Jack loosened his collar. “Yeah, sure. She’s nice.”

  “Did, uh, did you have a good time after Jeannie and I left?”

  Jack nodded ruefully. “Yeah, we did.”

  Michelle had been a lot more than a good time. He could see getting close to her. But after the closeness, fights would inevitably come; that was part and parcel of a relationship. He didn’t know if he had it in him to ride the roller coaster of love anymore. Maybe he was just too old. Anyway, he didn’t deserve to enjoy himself, not with Mr. Gardner in the hospital and Raymond Ortslee in the morgue.

  “So?” Daskivitch said. “You gonna call or what?”

  “I’ve had a lot to deal with. I told you about my landlord.”

  “Is he in intensive care?”

  “Yeah. And now his son is trying to kick me out of my apartment.”

  “That little fuck. I bet he can’t wait to sell the house.” Daskivitch glanced out the window, down at the East River flowing under the bridge. “You should call her, though. She’s not the one-night-stand type.”

  Traffic stalled in the middle of the bridge. Jack shifted in his seat. He tugged on his shoulder harness—something was wrong with the retractor and the safety belt kept cinching up on him. “Maybe. We’ll see.”

  Down on the East River, a barge bullheaded against the current. Across the way, loading cranes rose over the one remaining shipping yard in Red Hook.

  Traffic picked up.

  Jack thought about Michelle bucking over him, her long hair whipping around and her back tensing as she came. He thought about his son and hoped the kid didn’t think he was some kind of drunk. He pictured Mrs. Gardner inviting him in for a piece of cake; Mr. Gardner sprawled out in pain next to his bed all night; Raymond Ortslee reaching for a doorknob.

  He despised himself.

  He watched his partner’s face as they were ushered through the lobby of Heiser’s building and saw his own initial awe and discomfort mirrored there. This time—reluctantly—the doorman showed them to the fancy tenant’s elevator in the lobby. The operator, a young man in a braided uniform, kept his gaze fixed on the floor as they rose.

  “I hope this is gonna be worthwhile,” Daskivitch muttered. “You bug somebody who lives in a place like this, they’re liable to gripe about it to One PP.” That was One Police Plaza, also known to cops on the street as the Puzzle Palace.

  Jack hadn’t actually spoken to Heiser yet. The man was some kind of big real estate developer, head of a corporation called Sumner International. When he called the work number, a snooty receptionist put him on hold, then came back to inform him that her boss was extremely busy and would only be able to speak to the detective at home.

  Fuck him. Jack wasn’t going to be intimidated. This wasn’t
Donald Trump, for chrissakes. He’d never even heard of the guy.

  As much for his own benefit as for his partner’s, he turned and said, “You’re a detective now, Gary. You can talk to whoever you need to.”

  Daskivitch shrugged. “It’s your funeral, bunk.”

  Jack looked up at the numbers as the elevator slowed. Fourteenth floor.

  “Which way do we go?” he asked the operator.

  The kid smiled wryly. “You’ll see.”

  The doors opened and the two men walked out into a small foyer. There was no question of finding Heiser’s apartment—only one door stood ahead. Evidently the man lived on an entire floor.

  The foyer was walled in gold-smoked mirrors. Above hung a huge quartz chandelier. To the side, a small gilded table supported an enormous bouquet of white orchids. Jack reached out and fingered the edge of a petal. They were silk, the most realistic fake flowers he’d ever seen. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Daskivitch adjusting his tie in the mirrors. He did the same, then pressed the doorbell.

  After a moment, he heard a patter of feet on the other side and the door swung open to reveal Marie Burhala’s flustered face.

  “No, please,” she said. “You told me there would be no troubles.”

  Jack patted her shoulder. “It’s okay. We’re here to talk to Mr. Heiser.”

  “You won’t say nothing about me to the Immigration?”

  “Don’t worry. This has nothing to do with you. He’s expecting us.”

  She looked doubtful. “Please wait,” she said, motioning them into a large entrance hall. “I tell him you are here.” She hurried around a corner.

  The foyer boasted the 1970s glitz of a casino or a Trump hotel: lots of chrome, more giant chandeliers, smoked mirrors, gold leaf. It was the home of the kind of man who would need to drive a flashy car. Recessed spotlights in the ceiling lit brightly colored paintings, mostly abstract—Jack was no art expert, but it seemed to him that they clashed. What the hell: money didn’t necessarily buy class.

  “Look at this crap,” he muttered, stepping up to a garish painting that seemed to show a huge block of ice melting on a table.