Red Hook Page 16

  “I’m not too big on art,” Daskivitch said. His hands were folded tensely over his crotch—he looked as if he were waiting to be called into the principal’s office.

  “You know what a jobbee like this would go for?”

  Daskivitch didn’t move from the entrance-way. He shook his head.

  “I dunno either,” Jack said. “But I bet these paintings cost more than both of us will see in a lifetime.”

  Marie returned. “He will see you now.”

  They followed her around the corner and down a long hallway. Other hallways branched off it—the place was a maze. Marie knocked timidly on a grand double door. After a moment, she pushed it open. Jack almost whistled as he walked into a room big enough to serve as a basketball court. It was filled with groupings of couches and armchairs. An Oriental rug covered the floor. The walls were plastered with more artwork that looked as if it belonged in a bad museum. At the far end of the room, a big middle-aged man sat in a leather armchair with his legs stretched out; his tasseled black loafers rested on an ottoman. He held a glass of Scotch in one hand and a telephone in the other. A bit of a paunch showed under his obviously expensive gray suit, but he looked strong and healthy, except for his face, that of a man who liked his booze. His big, nearly bald head was lightly freckled; thin lips, deep-set eyes. He tucked the phone under his chin.

  “Be right with you,” he said to the detectives. He continued a hearty phone conversation, as relaxed as if he were alone in the room. At one point he set his drink down and reached out toward a coffee table. From a large glass bowl he picked up two gray onyx eggs. As he continued the conversation, he closed one hand over the stones and rotated them around with a scraping noise that set Jack’s teeth on edge.

  Jack edged closer to the window and stared out at the spectacular view. Through a thicket of gleaming glass towers, the East River glinted in the sun. Beyond that, a tiny helicopter whirred out toward the flat sprawl of Queens.

  “All right, Tom,” Heiser finally wound up. “Have him bring the plans by my office on Monday morning and we’ll give it a look-see. I’ll fax you my answer by Winsdee.” His voice had a Southern drawl to it, but not Deep South. Virginia, Jack guessed.

  Heiser put the stones back in the bowl and stood up. He was six two, probably.

  “Now,” he said. “What kin I do for you gentlemuhn?”

  He didn’t invite them to sit.

  Jack stepped forward across the vast carpet and thrust his hand forward. Grudgingly, Heiser reached out his own. Jack squeezed the man’s hand and tried to turn it. Not only did Heiser resist, he actually tried to turn Jack’s hand the other way.

  “This is just routine,” Jack said. “We’re interviewing the tenants to see if anyone might have any information relating to the death of one of the employees of the building.”

  Daskivitch shifted from foot to foot at this lie—he knew Jack hadn’t talked to any other tenants.

  “Oh, yes,” Heiser replied. “I heard about that. Turrlble thing. Shocking. We’re going to take up a collection, see what we can do for the man’s family.” Despite his words, his hard eyes showed no trace of sympathy. Something flickered underneath, though. Jack sensed that he-was capable of cruelty. It was an instinctive reaction, certainly not something he could-write down in a report, but he didn’t like the man.

  “Randall,” a woman’s voice called from a doorway at the back of the room. “Are you dressed yet?” A tall, gangly woman with a sharp chin hurried in. She wore black evening dress and held both hands up to insert an earring. She paused at the sight of the detectives. Heiser’s wife might have been pretty long ago, in a stern sort of-way—now she just looked stern.

  “I’ll be right there,” he told her. “I’m just finishing up a little business.”

  She frowned and raised her eyebrows in disdain. “Hurry up. “You know we can’t be late.”

  “This won’t take a minute,” Heiser said.

  The woman grudgingly retreated.

  Jack cleared his throat. “Did you know Tomas Berrios?”

  Heiser shrugged. “I couldn’t really say I know the custodial staff. I know the names of the doormen, but that’s about it.”

  That didn’t answer the question. “Have you had any particular contact with him?”

  Heiser touched the back of his shiny head. “Of course we give everyone a nice bonus at Chrissmuss. And we see them around the building all the time.”

  “He hasn’t done any work in the apartment recently?”

  “Listen, I was very sad to hear about all this, but as you boys know, this happened in Brooklyn. I don’t see what this has to do with the tenants here.”

  Jack noted the demotion from “gentlemuhn” to “boys.”

  The phone rang, but Heiser ignored it. A moment later Marie appeared at the door.

  “Mr. Heiser, it’s—”

  Heiser wheeled around. This time he was not so forgiving of the interruption. “Goddammit, Marie, can’t you see I’m in the middle of something!”

  Like an angry lion taking a sudden swipe, claws extended; the anger was not far from the surface.

  The maid flushed. “I take a message, sir.” She backed out. Jack felt sorry for her, a young kid having to put up with a powerful, tense boss. Without a green card, she didn’t have much choice.

  Jack considered pressing Heiser about his recent conversation with Berrios. He wasn’t surprised that the tenant would not volunteer that he had been haughty to the victim. If Jack asked him about it, the man would know that his maid had spoken to the police. He would certainly call the poor kid on the rug for that—might even fire her. Besides, sometimes it was wise to withhold a little information. If it ever came down to a real interrogation, he might use it to trip the man up. Jack decided to let it go for the moment—he’d reconsider the matter if Heiser gave any further cause for suspicion.

  “Well, now,” Heiser said, his brittle attempt at cordiality returning. “If you boys don’t have any further questions, I need to change into my evening clothes.”

  Daskivitch turned, but Jack stayed planted.

  “Just one. Do you spend much time in Brooklyn?”

  Heiser bent down to a coffee table and opened a silver box. He removed a cigarette, but didn’t offer one to the detectives. Jack was tempted to light up one of his own.

  “Perhaps you’re unaware of the nature of my business,” Heiser said. “My company has holdings in Manhattan, Los Angeles, Dallas, Miami. Some of our projects run into hundred of millions of dollars. Brooklyn isn’t of much interest, frankly.”

  “Have you been to Red Hook in the past few months?”

  “In Brooklyn? I don’t believe so.”

  Jack folded his steno book and looked at his partner. Daskivitch tilted his head toward the door.

  Heiser cleared his throat. “Good luck with your case. Marie will show you out.”

  “Thanks for your time.”

  Jack extended his hand. Heiser made him wait a moment before he shook it.

  Marie led them out. Just before they reached the front door, Jack stopped. “Do you think I could trouble you for a glass of water?”

  “Of course.”

  Without waiting for an invitation, Jack followed her around the corner. “Come on,” he muttered to his partner, who followed reluctantly.

  The back hallway was long enough for a bowling lane. It was hard to imagine so much space in an apartment. Photos covered the walls: Heiser sailing, Heiser skiing, Heiser in a tuxedo, smiling with an arm around his wife.

  Marie pushed through a swinging door into a kitchen nearly the size of Jack’s entire apartment. A tiled island in the center of the room provided yards of counter space. The stove had six burners, like the kind in a restaurant kitchen. Marie reached up into a cabinet for a couple of glasses and then peered inside a giant double-doored metal refrigerator. “Wait here—I get you some Evian,” she said, and walked around the corner.

  “This guy doesn’t feel right to me
,” Jack said to his partner.

  “What? He’s rich and he’s an asshole—that makes him a murderer?”

  “I didn’t say that. But something feels hinky to me. Did you notice how he skated away from mentioning that he told Berrios to stay out of the apartment?” Jack saw a door in the back and walked over. It opened into a service stairwell. This was where Tomas Berrios had entered when he paid his visits to Marie.

  “You’re really hyped up about this case all of a sudden,” Daskivitch said.

  Jack turned to his partner in exasperation. “Christ, Gary! It’s a murder. I’m a homicide detective.”

  “There’s nothing else bothering you?” His partner’s eyes held the same concern and doubt he’d shown on the fire escape outside Ortslee’s apartment.

  Embarrassment and shame made a twisted braid in Jack’s stomach.

  “Drop it. I’m fine, already.”

  “Okay.” Daskivitch backed up and raised his hands.

  Marie returned with a bottle of water and poured two glasses.

  Jack downed his water and set the glass in the sink. He turned to the maid. “We’ll just slip out the back.”

  After a tense, silent ride back to Brooklyn, he dropped Daskivitch back at the Seven-six house and headed on to Midwood to pick up some clothes. He took the Gowanus Expressway. To his right, New York harbor glinted in the sun like polished chrome. I should have gotten myself a boat, he told himself. Should have taken it out fishing like a lot of other cops. Made the days off more bearable.

  At the border between Red Hook and Carroll Gardens, the elevated expressway crossed over the fetid green worm of the Gowanus Canal as it slid between the factories and junkyards of South Brooklyn. Since the canal curved around a bend, he couldn’t actually see the spot where the body of Tomas Berrios had been found, but he could picture it all too well. He had a lot of images now, but they stubbornly refused to flow together into a story.

  Why had someone killed the man?

  Motive was overrated. On TV cop shows, juries always had to be told why the perp did the crime. Nice to know, but unnecessary. If you had good fingerprints or witnesses, chances were you weren’t going to have to go before a jury, and the perp’s psychology didn’t matter. Unfortunately, whoever killed Tomas Berrios had not been considerate enough to leave evidence or living witnesses behind. Which left Jack working backward, trying to puzzle out the reason.

  Ortslee’s follow-up murder seemed to rule out a lot of possibilities. Berrios had probably not been killed by a jealous lover, or a low-level drug dealer, or someone he’d gotten into a fight with on the street. The perp here had both organization and muscle. The only person in the case so far who might have such power was Randall Heiser, but there was no evidence of his involvement. You couldn’t arrest a guy for being a prick.

  As Jack drove on toward the church spires and green oasis of Park Slope he patted his jacket pocket, only to discover that he was out of cigarettes. The trip to Midwood was a long one and he wished he could light up.

  The house was eerily quiet. It might never again hear Mr. Gardner tromping down to his workshop basement, or Mets games playing on the radio in the upstairs kitchen.

  Jack made arrangements with a neighbor to feed the old man’s cat.

  When he got back to Boerum Hill, his son wasn’t home. He ate a couple slices of the pizza he’d brought over. At nine, Ben called to say that he’d be working late. It sounded like he was calling from a bar or restaurant, though.

  Jack watched TV for an hour, switching back and forth between dopey sitcoms, then stretched out on the futon for a nap.

  He dreamt he was a boy again.

  He was on the frozen lake with Peter—they were racing to the far shore. Jack was winning, but then a hole cracked open in the ice and he was falling through. And Petey as…Petey was stepping on his shoulder, pushing him down into the dark, icy water.

  Somehow now it was Petey in the water, instead. Jack searched frantically for a stick or something to reach out with. To save his brother.

  Sirens. Cops came, and a crowd gathered. A reviewing stand. The police commissioner wanted to give Jack a medal, or was it a trophy? He looked all over, but couldn’t find Peter in the crowd.

  Out in the street, a car alarm blared on and off.

  He woke, ashamed to find that he’d been crying in his sleep.

  twenty-three

  THE NEXT AFTERNOON, JACK had just draped his jacket across the back of his chair and was about to sit down to some paperwork when Sergeant Tanney stuck his head out of his office.

  “Leightner, can I see you for a minute?”

  He walked over to his boss’s office and stood in the doorway. “What’s up?”

  “Come in for a minute. Siddown, take a load off.”

  “All right,” he said grudgingly.

  “Close the door.”

  Tanney leaned forward in his chair. “Everything going okay?”

  Jack nodded.

  “You feeling all right?”

  “Why?” Cut to the chase.

  Tanney leaned forward. “If something’s going on in my squad, we keep it in the squad. Upstairs stays out of it unless I say so. But I need to know what’s going on with the detectives here.”

  Jack shifted in his chair. “What’s your point?”

  “I happened to stop by the Seven-six this morning. Your partner there is concerned about you. And if he’s concerned, then so am I.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I know you’ve had some tough news, Your landlord, your apartment. If you need a few days to straighten things out, we can—”

  “Hold on. I’m fine. I don’t need any—”

  “Listen, Jack, I’m gonna say something and I hope you don’t take it the wrong way: if you’re feeling some stress you might want to consider talking to one of the department counselors.”

  “You mean a shrink?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with talking to somebody.”

  “I didn’t shoot anybody.” Departmental regs required counseling for any cop involved in a shooting.

  “I know that, but—”

  “And even if I did shoot someone, I wouldn’t go to a shrink. In my day, if you had to pop somebody, you went to a bar after and some of the guys helped you straighten yourself out.”

  “Nobody’s ordering you to see a counselor.”

  “Well, that’s good. Because I’m fine.”

  The sergeant rolled a pen around his desk. He considered Jack carefully.

  Jack stood up. “Well, if that’s all, I’ve got a lot of paperwork to catch up on.”

  Tanney tugged at his earlobe. “There’s one more thing. I’ve been reviewing your work on this Berrios case.”

  Jack sat down.

  “You’re a good detective, Leightner. Thorough. Strong on the details. You work a case hard.”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “No. Not most of the time. But my job’s a little different from yours. I’m not just looking at things case by case. I have to watch the big picture. How we’re allocating our resources. Our time. Our energy.”

  “What? You’re saying this isn’t an important case? No press, right? Just some poor Hispanic schlub, is that it?”

  The sergeant rubbed his hand over his mouth. “Slow down, Leightner. Every victim is important. Though he wasn’t exactly the Mexican ambassador, was he?”

  “He was Dominican.” Jack sighed. “Listen, Sergeant: at least half the victims we get are dirtbags. Some of these mutts might as well be running around wearing signs saying ‘Kill Me’! But as far as I can tell, this kid was clean. A family man. A good worker. He didn’t deserve to be trussed up like a hog, to have his face bashed. To get stabbed in the, in the fucking heart.”

  “Of course not. But the question is, how much time do you need to spend on this? And do you need to go knocking on doors all along the Upper East Side?”

  Jack smiled fiercely. “Oh, okay. Now I see where we’re
going with this. Heiser. That son of a bitch went and complained to One PP. They’re busting your balls.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “How is it? Some rich prick doesn’t feel like answering a few questions, you’re gonna yank my chain?”

  “If you have so much energy, how about helping with some of our priority cases? Santiago could use a little help with this Cobble Hill thing I have to read about in the papers every goddamn day.”

  “You’re saying that Tomas Berrios wasn’t as important as some Cobble Hill yuppie? And it’s not just him—what about the Ortslee murder?”

  “We don’t know for sure that there was any connection. Look—all I’m saying is that we don’t need to stir up problems unless there’s some concrete reason.”

  Jack stood up. “You want me off this case, I want an order in writing.”

  The sergeant sat back in his chair and swung from side to side for a moment, considering Jack. “I’m just asking you to use your best judgment, Detective.”

  Jack glared at his boss. “That’s what I get paid to do.”

  In the Seven-six squad room, Daskivitch was at his desk, his head down as he shuffled through some paperwork.

  “Hey, bud,” Jack said as he walked in. “Everything good with you? ’Cause everything’s great with me.”

  Daskivitch looked up, his guilt in his eyes. “I didn’t go to the sergeant—he came to me and asked me how you were doing. I was worried about you. You haven’t been sleeping, you seem all riled up—”

  “Listen, you’re a good kid. But what you did—not good. This is not how a cop fucking behaves, You have a problem with me, you bring it to me.”

  “Come on, Jack. I don’t have a problem with you. He thought you might want a few days off. That’s all.”

  “Number one: the last thing I need is the sergeant on my back. Number two: mind your own goddamn business. Capisce?”

  “I was just trying to be—”

  “Fuck you. Okay? Just fuck you.”

  A female clerk turned from a filing cabinet in the corner of the room and stared.

  “Fuck you too,” Jack told her. Daskivitch started to get up but Jack pushed him back into his seat.