The Ashes of an Oak (14 page)

‘A rat would make sense,’ said Emmet. ‘They’re as big as cats down there.’

‘Well then,’ sighed Kelly. ‘I pity the cat that meets the cat sized rat in the fat darkness of night.’ She smiled tightly.

Steve and Emmet exchanged glances.

‘There’s a lot of heavy traffic goes by,’ offered Steve. ‘One of those great lorries could cause vibrations.’

‘Whatever the reason,’ said Kelly. ‘We didn’t miss it. It wasn’t there.’

‘That you could see.’

Kelly sighed and closed her eyes. She could see why Milt liked it up here. It was like bathing in testosterone. She would walk out of the precinct trailing that attractive smell of sweat and semen that pervaded the men of America’s locker rooms.

She pressed on regardless.

‘Also, if you are trying to connect this with the recent spate of murders that Milt told me about, then it’s inconsistent.’

‘In what way?’ asked Steve. He was beginning to get pissed now and it was starting to show.

‘He hasn’t stolen before.’

Steve laughed dismissively. ‘Apart from a wedding ring, a heart, a shoe and a couple of eyes, you mean.’

‘No,’ said Kelly patiently. ‘I’m not talking about trophies. Those are trophies. What I mean is, according to the information Milt gave me, nothing of value was stolen, until today.’

‘Of course it was,’ said Steve. ‘It doesn’t matter what you call it, be it trophy taking or theft…’

‘No,’ said Emmet firmly. ‘She’s right. As I recall, Robinson Taylor still had his wallet on him when he we found. It still had a hundred and twenty bucks in it. The white girl in the deserted offices, she still had a bracelet, a watch and a necklace on her. You make a good point, Kelly. His motive, whatever it may have been, was never theft. So why would he suddenly take her purse?’

‘Well, technically, he didn’t,’ said Steve. ‘He hid it.’

Emmet locked his fingers and rested his chin on them. ‘Why?’

‘To come back for it later?’

‘That’s still theft.’

‘To hide her ID.’

‘He didn’t care about ID. He left Robinson Taylor’s wallet behind with his driver’s licence and his video club card in it.’

‘Maybe he panicked,’ snapped Steve.

‘He panicked?’ Emmet snorted derisively. ‘You’re talking about a man who opened up another man with a knife and then dumped him in the middle of Brooklyn in broad daylight. You’re talking about a man who towed a dead girl wrapped in Saran wrap from God knows where to a deserted office space, dumped her body and then calmly walked out, got into his car and drove away like he was leaving church. You’re talking about a man who, in the middle of an apartment block, threw an old lady’s body down four floors just to see if it bounced. He dissected a fat man and took the time to squeeze him into a furnace for Christ’s sake!’

He lit a cigarette and rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. He was tired. He pointed his fingers with the cigarette in at Steve. ‘He doesn’t just not panic, he’s brazen. He doesn’t give a damn. In a city where life is cheap and the worst things happen to the nicest of people, he knows he can get away with almost anything and no one will see him. Jesus Christ, he’s a rotten tree hidden in a rotten wood.’

He fell back in his chair. His hands shook. He was mad as hell with Steve. In the past twelve hours the man had done nothing but screw up.

He sighed deeply. ‘Go home, Steve. Go and see Val and have some time together.’

‘She’s still at her mother’s place.’

‘Then go home anyway. Get your head straight.’

‘You can’t just…’

‘I can. I am,’ said Emmet evenly. ‘Christ knows, I won’t be long after you.’

Steve picked up his jacket and, with a cursory nod, left.

‘I’m sorry, Kelly,’ said Emmet. ‘We’re all feeling the stress.’

‘That’s okay.’ She crossed her legs and relaxed. ‘Milt says you have some first class hooch in here. Fancy sharing?’

Emmet smiled. ‘I knew there was a reason I liked you.’

He opened the draw, pulled out the bottle and poured some into a couple of mugs.

‘Here’s to strong women,’ he said as he raised his glass.

Kelly narrowed her eyes. ‘I’m inclined to think you may mean that, Emmet.’

‘I do. I have a daughter just like you. And she takes after her Mom. I’m the soft touch in our house.’

‘Well then, here’s to the soft touch,’ said Kelly.

‘Do you think it’s the same guy?’ asked Emmet.

‘No. She was killed at the scene. It’s my understanding the others weren’t.’

‘Damn. I was hoping…’

‘You were hoping it was the same guy so your Detective Matto would be in the clear?’

‘Yeah,’ said Emmet tiredly. ‘I mean, I’m certain he is in the clear, but…’

‘I know. Milt told me.’

‘Milt tells you a lot.’

Kelly leaned forward. ‘You know what else? Everybody thinks Milt’s gay. I’m here to tell you he’s not.’

Emmet completely failed to hide his surprise. ‘You and Milt?’

Kelly nodded and winked seductively. ‘Keep it under your hat.’

‘Wow!’ Emmet poured them another drink. ‘If you don’t mind me saying Kelly, and with all due respect, Milt is one lucky bastard.’

Kelly sipped at her whisky. ‘Ain’t he though?’

Tuesday

Chapter 16

Frank had slept on and off for the better part of two days. Today was the first day his head felt clear; more crystal, less sand.

He had woken to the distant sound of a floor polisher as it danced across the landing outside his room. He had heard the cleaner’s feet keep step with it, pull it back into the routine when it skipped against the skirting.

Then came the sound of hospital business - ward phones, high heels, trolleys carrying patients, drinks and candy, that rolled by on wobbly wheels, that bumped unevenly along or squeaked shrilly against the newly polished floor. Conversations, muffled by the door, rumbled past his room like thunder clouds, to be replaced by a breezy lightness or the earnest whisper of approaching storms.

He looked around the room. It hadn’t changed. Milt had been right. There was no better way to pass time in hospital than in a coma. He looked at his watch. Eight thirty. He sighed at the thought of the long day to come. How was he going to fill those hours?

Gingerly, he put a hand up to his head. He had expected to find himself mummified, swathed in the livery of the sick, but there was little more than what amounted to a big plaster stuck to his head. He could feel stubble. He pined for his lost hair. Gently, he ran his fingers over the wound and felt the clips that ran along it. He pushed down and was impressed to find that it didn’t hurt as much as he thought it would.

He gave his head the gentlest of shakes. It didn’t fall off. That, he thought, was a positive thing. More importantly, the dizziness that he had felt leading up to the operation had gone, though his neck and shoulders felt stiff and a headache ran up the back of his neck, through the vertebrae, from where it beat mercilessly at the front of his head.

Impulsively, he threw back the bedclothes and lifted his right leg. It worked. He chuckled to himself and thanked God. So did the left. He tested both his arms. They moved freely. The right one still had a drip in the back of his hand. He looked up and saw a bag of saline hanging loosely from a hook on a stand. It dripped with the regularity of a heartbeat. There were still some pins and needles in his right hand, but nothing like there had been before surgery.

With trepidation and eager excitement, he rolled into his side and dropped his legs over the edge of the bed, then straightened himself up. His feet touched the floor. His toes curled away from the cold. He pressed them down, then his soles and his heels, until they were flat upon the cold surface. It felt good.

With tight lips and taut muscles, he slid himself forward until he was standing, albeit with one white-knuckled hand on the drip stand. He let his blood pressure catch up and tested his balance.

‘Right,’ he said to himself. ‘To the bathroom.’

The door opened.

‘What the hell are you doing?’

Mary Matto’s face was thunderous.

‘I’m going to the john.’

‘Get back into bed you crazy bastard! You’re not supposed to be walking yet.’

Frank beheld his legs in mocking wonder. ‘And yet, I am.’

‘Well, stop it.’

‘No.’ Frank took tentative steps towards the bathroom. ‘You try to stop me, I’ll fight you, woman.’

Mary took his arm to support him. ‘They must have taken your brain out and stuck it up your ass, you stubborn son of a bitch.’

‘Would you just help me?’

‘I’m helping. I’m helping.’

Suddenly she stopped and held him back. She turned his face towards her and kissed him. ‘Hi,’ she said. ‘I missed you.’ Her hands shook and her eyes were tenderly moist.

‘Hi.’ He ran the back of his hand across her soft cheek. ‘I missed you too.’

She walked on with him some more. ‘You stink like a badger you know.’

‘One thing at a time,’ he said. He got into the bathroom and closed the door. ‘One thing at a time.’

Steve Wayt and Jim Baker were invited into the house of Thomas and Tamara Astle without hesitation. They invited them into the living room and offered them cold lemonade.

They sat on the sofa. Between them was a little girl, no more than eight or nine.

She looked like her dead mother.

‘What’s your name?’ asked Steve.

The girl moved in close to her grandad and wrapped his arm around her.

‘It’s okay,’ said Thomas. ‘You can answer the man.’

The girl pulled herself in closer to him and turned her face away.

‘She’s shy,’ said Thomas. ‘Her name is Angelica.’

‘She knows?’ asked Steve.

‘She knows.’

‘Is she okay being here?’

‘Yes. Some things you have to learn young. Some things they already know. Either way, the world invades.’

Jim moved behind Steve and tried to make his large frame unobtrusive. Thomas got up and got him a spare chair from the kitchen. Jim thanked him and sat down.

Steve looked at the little girl. She wore her hair long, straightened, in a ponytail. She had the smooth skin of youth and the wide eyes that hadn’t quite yet learned to narrow in anticipation or cynicism. They were nut brown eyes. They shone in the way that only the eyes of children could shine, with a healthy clarity, as yet unblemished by illness or age.

Steve cleared his throat. ‘Are you aware of what your daughter did for a living?’

‘We are now,’ said Thomas. He sat with staunch pride, the kind of pride that only a father could have, especially a father full of regrets.

‘You had no idea?’

‘She told us she worked in a factory on nights. We had no reason to doubt her.’

‘Do you happen to know anybody that she may have hung around with? Anybody that she didn’t get on with? Somebody that may have had reason to hurt her?’

Tamara Astle tutted and shifted agitatedly in her seat. She put a hand on Angelica’s head and ran it across her hair.

‘The girl fell in with a bad crowd a long time ago. My granddaughter here was the result of a union between herself and a man named Johnson Degat.’ She closed her mouth and her lips curled as if she was stifling nausea. ‘He got her onto drugs, got her with child, then got himself killed.’ She kissed Angelica on the head. ‘He managed to ruin three lives. Five if you count me and her father.’

‘So who was running her now?’ asked Steve.

‘Running her?’

‘Who did she work for?’

‘We’re not aware of her dealings,’ said Thomas. ‘We kept in touch with her for the sake of the child. We still loved her, you understand, she was our daughter, but we lost her long ago. Angelica was our link with her. There was always that hope…you know?’

‘So you didn’t know of any associates…?’

Tamara pulled the girl closer until her ears were covered. ‘Is that what they call themselves nowadays?’ she whispered harshly. ‘Associates? Not whoremongers and whores? Not criminals? Not merchants of misery and pain?’ She took a deep breath. Her nose wrinkled. ‘Colleagues? Associates? They weren’t lawyers, sir. They were lawbreakers, criminals, scum. You understand that?’

‘Very much,’ said Steve.

The old lady was beginning to annoy him. She was the one who let the girl slip away from her, she and her holier-than-thou husband. Did they think he came there as some sort of police virgin? That he had never had his nose rubbed in this shit before? It was their fuck up, not his.

‘How long since you saw her?’

‘Last night, around seven.’

‘How was she dressed?’

‘Blue jeans and an old green shirt,’ said her mother. ‘Same way she always did before she went to work. To the factory, that is,’ she added quickly.

‘There was nothing different in her behaviour?’

‘Nothing.’

‘She didn’t seem upset?’

‘No.’

‘In a hurry? Reluctant to leave?’

‘No.’

‘So everything was normal, so to say?’

‘Normal?’ asked Charlene’s father. ‘Well, that would depend on what you call normal, would it not?’

‘Within the bounds of your lives.’

‘Yes,’ said Thomas. ‘Within the bounds of our lives, it was about as normal as it could be.’

Steve got into the car. His face was severe, brooding.

‘Well that was a waste of time.’

Jim Baker took of his hat and wound down the window. He took out a handkerchief and wiped it across his bald head.

‘Oh,’ he said. ‘I don’t think that was so bad.’

‘Really? What did we learn?’

Jim wiped the handkerchief down his neck and the top of his chest. ‘No more than any other white cop in a black neighbourhood, walking into the house of a black man whose daughter has just been killed. I’d say you did pretty well to get through the door. They’re good people.’

‘So good they let their daughter go on the game. How long before the kid’s out there too? Another four, five years?’

Jim put his hat back on and put his handkerchief back into his pocket.

‘Twenty-five years ago, the Astles were my neighbours and they were beautiful, kind people. I can remember them bringing Charlene home from the hospital, him a janitor at the hospital, his wife doing clothes repairs and laundry on the side. They sent Charlene to school, gave her good Christmases and birthdays, invested themselves in her. Then some dope-headed son of a bitch comes along and whispers pretty nothings in her ear and steals her out from under their nose.

Does lightning strike twice? It does around here. Look at this place. Needles on the floor, pregnant kids, a crime rate so high that there ain’t numbers big enough to describe it. If you aren’t in a gang by the time you’re nine, it’s probably because you’re dead. Is that how it was for you, Steve? Did you have gangs in your college? No, you probably had
a capella
groups and chess clubs.

At the end of the day, you wipe this shit off your shoes and go back to your nice house with a nice lawn and your neighbourhood watch. All it takes for you to get rid of this is a long shower. These poor bastards never get rid of it, not until they’re dead or in jail. And you stick your white nose in here and think you have the right to judge? The fuck you do.’

‘That’s not what I meant,’ said Steve.

‘Well, that’s how I heard it.’

Steve bit his tongue, but he was hot and impatient and fed up with trying to win in a system that was already doomed to failure. Look at Frank; the guy was a day from death and all they cared about was why he woke up next to a dead woman after going it alone in the dark against a dangerous man.

‘Well then,’ he said, ‘maybe you need to take a step back and see it how it really is, Jim. It’s a cesspool and it leaks. It carries its germs and its stench all the way though the city. There are decent people being mugged and murdered and robbed every day by someone who crawls out of here with nothing but the intention to terrorise.’

Jim prodded himself firmly in the chest. ‘
I
didn’t.’

‘And for every one of you, there’s a hundred of them. You know that.’

‘I know it and I know why. Because if you’re black, you’re more likely to get a poor education. If you get a poor education, you don’t get a decent job. If you can’t get a good job, you do what you can to get by. No money leads to poverty, which leads to ghettos, which leads to trapped and angry people banging their heads against a wall or finding any way they can to get out.’ He turned in his seat to face Steve. ‘Do you know that the proportion of blacks to whites in prison is over six to one? Jurors are three times more likely to recommend a death sentence for a black man than for a white man. Did you know that? So maybe we should be defending these people instead of feeding the myths and exploiting their weaknesses.’

Steve thumped the steering wheel. ‘For Christ’s sake, Jim. Get off your soapbox. I’m not a social worker and neither are you.’ He lit a cigarette. ‘All I know is that in five years some poor fool like me is going to have to come down here and scrape that little girl off the sidewalk. I see it coming. I’m a goddam futurologist when it comes to Brownsville. All I do is clean up the shit that others leave behind.’

Jim pointed through the window at the corpse of his hometown. ‘And who left that behind?’

Steve turned on the engine and slammed the car into gear. ‘Well, it sure as hell wasn’t me.’

He accelerated away. He’d had enough of this bullshit. Every day they had to clean up the filthy detritus that the night-time tide had puked up, while people like Frank Matto got sucked under as the current caught their legs and pulled them out to sea.

Mary left Frank asleep. He had exhausted himself trying to persuade all those around him of his miraculous recovery.

At five, he had thrown up from one side of the room to the other and crawled back into bed like a scolded cat. The nurse had given him an anti-emetic. He had nodded off for a quarter of an hour and then woke up ready for the fight. Mary had forbidden him to move. 

He didn’t care. He was on the mend; his legs worked, his arms worked and his brain worked. There was hope.

Mary stayed with him through a light meal (the hospital had provided her with a meal too. It was a relief not to have to root through the cupboards when she got home). Frank tolerated it well and followed it down with some water. He was pale and shattered but, as he had fallen asleep at seven-thirty, he held Mary’s hand and said what a great day it had been and slipped into sleep mumbling about the lake and the house and the school upstate.