PART 35 (2 page)

Sandro nodded.

“Murder cases are a great responsibility,” the judge cautioned.

“They're work—real, serious work.”

“I realize that, Judge.”

The judge grew distant for a moment. Sandro waited respectfully. “You know, seeing you sitting there, Sandro, I can't help thinking of your Uncle Jim at your age. Handsome, and the way he carried himself, imposing. That was just about the time when he was getting so well known—or should I say, infamous?—that it wasn't healthy for a young politician to be seen in his company. He knew it, too. He knew it and stayed clear of me for more than thirty years. I didn't see him from the time I first ran for alderman from the old neighborhood until my children gave us a Mediterranean cruise for our fortieth anniversary, 1961. That must have been about a year before Uncle Jim died.”

“The spring of '62,” Sandro supplied.

“The ship stopped at Naples, and I looked him up. He got to be an old man in those thirty years.” The judge laughed self-mockingly. “I guess I didn't look like a spring chicken, either. But I remembered him when he was a power, a force not to be defied.”

Sandro said nothing, nodding or smiling occasionally, well aware that Judge Porta's ramblings eventually revealed a destination.

“We talked about when we were kids together and how we used to drop five-pound paper bags filled with water from the roof of the very building you were born in on Mulberry Street.” There was mischief in the smile that warmed the judge's face.

Sandro found it difficult to visualize Uncle Jim, the notorious Don Vincenzo Tagliagambe, better known in the tabloids as Jimmie Pearl, throwing water bombs off a roof. Sandro's own earliest recollections of Uncle Jim barely predated his father's death, when Don Vincenzo, childless himself, became a second father to his sister's son.

“I think Uncle Jim felt he had to keep away from the people he loved,” said Sandro. “Perhaps he felt they'd be smeared with the tarred brush the newspapers used on him.”

The judge fell silent momentarily.

It had not been long after his father's death, Sandro thought, before Don Vincenzo exiled him to that pristine fortress of propriety, the Spring Hills Military Prep School—and at first it was an exile for Sandro, away from his friends, his family, the old neighborhood, and the old ways: Sandro had been abandoned in a world that he never knew existed and Don Vincenzo had only heard about. Those first months were lonely. But the boy's street instinct served him well; he was wary, close-mouthed, and never spoke to anyone about his background or about how his education was being paid for. As Don Vincenzo had instructed him very carefully, it was nobody's business that he was Jimmie Pearl's nephew.

The future that lay ahead of Sandro, according to Don Vincenzo, was to be great. He was going to be a gentleman, and a lawyer, the best, the toughest that ever lived.

“Your Uncle Jim did very well by you, Sandro, very well indeed, but he wasn't really a pillar of that community you want to devote your time and mind to,” the judge now said. He was apparently getting closer to his point.

“I've always thought he was a basically good man,” Sandro replied, “underneath all that copy in the newspapers.”

“Sure, he was a good man. To you, to your mama, to his family, to me, to his friends. But what about the other people he didn't love, that he terrorized?”

“I'm not able to tell you about that, Judge. You know, Uncle Jim kept me totally in the dark about what he did. There aren't even many people who know that I'm his nephew.”

The judge shrugged over the long-distant past. “He was always trying to help people in his strange way. He thought—
Buon Anitna
, may his soul rest—that I didn't know when I first ran for alderman that his people were going around to all the polling places casting ballots for dead voters whose names were still on the rolls.” The judge was smiling. “Fortunately, I won by more than the number of dead voters, so I don't feel so bad about it.”

“The only thing I feel bad about, Judge, is that he had to die so far away from everyone, deported. I know he was involved in a lot of things, but I've never believed he was mixed up with narcotics. He thought that drugs were vile.”

“Sandro,” the judge cut him short. “That's a subject I won't discuss. He was a man whose principles I vowed to fight with my last drop of blood. He was your uncle, my boyhood chum, but he was convicted by a jury of being a racketeer, a hoodlum. He had his appeal, he lost, and the case is closed. The community is better off without him. I'm sorry to say that.”

“Could he help the conditions in which he was born?” Sandro defended. “The poverty, the violence…”

“Hey, Sandro, don't tell me a hard-luck story. He and I grew up together. I went through it too. I'm here. Where did he end up? An old man, alone, back where he started, with no one near him to help him spend his money. That's all he could talk about that day in Naples.” The judge studied Sandro. “He also talked a lot about you. He knew he was finished. But you were just starting. He told me you were going to be—the phrase struck me—a beautiful lawyer. That's what I was getting at before I got sidetracked by my own stories.”

“Sidetracked, Judge, but never derailed.”

“No,” the judge laughed. “Your coming here today is fate working itself out, Sandro. Through you, your Uncle Jim will make his reparation. You will pay back for him. You know what I mean?”

Sandro did.

He buzzed Elizabeth on the intercom. “Give me the name of the defendant again.”

“It's Luis Alvarado.”

“Okay. Now get Sam Bemer for me, please.”

She buzzed shortly, and Sandro picked up the phone.

“Hi, Sam, how're you?”

“Never better, m'lad. How's yourself?” Sam Bemer's hearty voice was an essential part of his benchside manner. It seemed fitting for a thick stocky man with thick curly hair and a thick black cigar—for such Sam Bemer was.

“Very well,” Sandro answered. “I understand that I have been assigned the distinct privilege of being cocounsel in a murder case with the legendary Sam Bemer.”

“You're much too kind. I received the same word myself this morning. I'm delighted we'll be working together.”

“I hope it'll be a delight. I'm sort of in the dark about murder cases,” said Sandro. “Where do we start on this?”

“Well, the first thing we want to do is to talk to our client and hear his story. Then we'll talk to the D.A. to see what we're faced with. Of course, with a cop-killer, it's tough to do very much except try the case. The D.A. doesn't usually entertain any plea to a lesser charge for a cop-killer. You go over to the court and get out the file. See whatever there is to be seen. Then we can meet and go to the Tombs to see this Alvarez.”

“I think it's Alvarado.”

“Whatever. His being a spic is just another strike against him.”

“Another?”

“I read about this one in the newspapers when it happened. Some guys read stocks, sports. I read crimes. I think our guy is a junky besides. And he's a colored Puerto Rican. And he's got a record. And he's charged with killing a cop. And besides all that, I think he confessed to the cops. This case is like walking into a furnace.”

There was a pause as Sandro digested these words.

“When shall we get together?” he finally asked.

“Let's see. How about tomorrow, say eleven, at the Tombs?” Bemer suggested.

“My calendar is open.”

“Fine. Oh, it might not be a bad idea if you could pick up copies of all the newspapers that carried the story. The reporters get a lot of off-the-cuff stuff from the cops. You never know how helpful it might be.”

“Right.”

“Don't be glum,” said Bemer. “In a case like this, where there's nothing to lose, we can take the long shots, pull out all the stops. The experience'll be good for you.”

“I hope it's good for our client.”

“He's lucky already; don't worry about him.”

“How is he lucky?” asked Sandro.

“The cops didn't kill him in the station house.”

CHAPTER III

As Sandro turned the corner from Centre Street into White Street, he could see Sam Bemer standing atop the four-step entrance to the Tombs. Officially it is the Manhattan House of Detention for Men. But everyone calls it the Tombs. It is probably the busiest prison in the world, housing every person detained for trial in Manhattan and Staten Island, as well as all those who have been arrested in other boroughs and are arraigned in night court. There is a turnover of at least six hundred men a day in the Tombs, three to four hundred new inmates received, three to four hundred released or bailed, each with papers, physical examinations, photographs, files, cards, and a host of other records.

Sam saw Sandro and started to nod his head, a smile spreading from either side of the cigar in the center of his mouth.

“Hi, Sam.”

“Sandro,” Sam responded, removing the cigar, still smiling, nodding his head in tight, muscular movements. Sandro shook Sam's large hand.

“Waiting long?” Sandro asked, as they turned to enter the vestibule.

“Not more than two or three minutes. You certainly look prosperous.”

“Well, I'm keeping busy, not doing too badly.”

“That's fine—fine.”

Ahead was a huge door made of a grid of steel bars over thick glass with a frame of brass-faced steel. In the top part of the door a hinged glass panel, called a Judas eye, opened, and a wizened face appeared.

“Morning, Counselor,” said the front-door guard.

“Morning, Joe,” said Sam. Joe turned a large key in one of the door's locks, and the huge door swung open. Sam and Sandro entered the reception area. There were offices to the right and left. Those on the right were enclosed within five-foot-high half-glass panels. In them, men in the blue uniform of the Department of Correction were sifting through files, answering phones, writing. On the left were the executive offices. Straight ahead was an entire wall of bars with a gate in the center. On the other side of that was a lawyers' waiting area, and twenty feet beyond that was still another wall, with its own steel and glass door. The lawyers' waiting area gave the appearance of a cage. Inside it, a uniformed Negro sat at a desk. There were also a few chairs and oil paintings on the walls.

“Want to sign the book, Counselors?” said Joe, directing them to a desk to the left of the entrance. Sam wrote the name of the prisoner Alvarado, his own name, and Sandro's name. Sam also filled out a slip of paper with the prisoner's name on it.

“You know what floor he's on, Counselor?” asked Joe, taking the slip.

“No. This is the first time with this fellow, Joe,” said Sam.

“I'll get it for you,” said Joe, handing the slip over to one of the uniformed men, who fingered through a file of orange cards, wrote something on the slip of paper, and handed it back to Joe.

“He's on the seventh floor, Counselor.” Joe handed the slip of paper through the bars to the guard at the desk inside the waiting area. He stood, selected a key from a ring of large keys, and opened the barred gate.

Sandro and Sam stepped into the cage and sat while the guard crossed the room to the door in the far wall. He handed Sam's slip of paper through the Judas eye to an unseen guard within.

Sandro got up to inspect the paintings. They were the work of men awaiting trial. One depicted the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse against a gray background. The horses were elongated; the artist was probably a better burglar than painter. There was another of President Kennedy, one of Pope John XXIII, a clipper ship at sea, flowers. A few were quite well done. Perhaps some painters got arrested, too.

“Did you have a chance to get any of those newspapers I suggested?” Sam asked.

“Yes, they're in my bag. I read them.”

“Well, what's the story?”

“From the newspaper accounts, these two were burglarizing an apartment in the Delancey area, on Stanton Street. Someone called the cops. Two cops arrived. One of them ran to the roof, became involved in a struggle, and was shot in the back with his own gun. By the time the other cop got up to the roof, the killer was gone. They picked up one of these guys at the scene. He lived a few doors away. He confessed and named the fellow we represent, who was picked up at his home several hours later, about one
A.M.
, and subsequently confessed.”

“Both Puerto Rican? Both junkies?”

“Yes. You were right. Alvarado is Negro, too. Very dark. Now there's a question for you. Is he Negro or Puerto Rican or both?”

“Negro, Puerto Rican, junky, a police record, a cop killed, and he's supposed to have confessed. Well, let's see what this fellow has to say for himself. You can't always trust these newspaper accounts. Sometimes you have to wonder how the hell anyone could have invented some of the stuff they write.”

Sandro didn't speak. He sat watching Sam and then the Negro guard, who continually thrust his keys into the gate or the door, maintaining a flow of traffic. Presently, a slip of paper was passed through the Judas eye in the door in the far wall. The guard took it and read. “Alvarado?”

“Yes,” said Sam. They walked to the door on the right, which the guard unlocked for them. It led into a large room with frosted windows covered by steel bars. Doorless cubicles, each furnished with a small table and two chairs, lined both side walls. There was a bench against the wall at the end of the room. On it, a short, trim Negro with a pencil-thin moustache sat studying the two lawyers as they entered. A guard sat in one of the rear cubicles, reading a newspaper.

“Alvarado?” asked Sam.

“I'm him,” said the man on the bench, rising, walking toward them. He was about five feet six. He had short hair and was quite dark. His features were Caucasian. He wore chino pants and a white T-shirt, no belt, and laceless scuff slippers; most prisoners held for serious crimes are never allowed laces and belts, in order to discourage suicide attempts.