City Of Lies (46 page)

‘It’s been done before,’ Duchaunak says. ‘It happened in Chicago a few times. You get these guys from opposing families, and then someone comes up with something that’s too big for one organization alone, and so they work it out together. It’s the strangest goddamned thing. They shoot the hell out of each other, they walk on each others’ territories, all this shit for years, and then suddenly they find something they can’t do with the resources they each individually have and so they pull a robbery together, they cut up the proceeds, and once the dust has settled they’re shooting the hell out of one another all over again.’

‘That doesn’t make sense—’ Harper starts.

Duchaunak smiles knowingly. ‘Don’t try and apply any logic to this, Mr Harper. One thing you cannot do . . . one thing you
will never be able to do is apply logic to what these people do. This is another race of human beings who happen to occupy the same planet as us.’ Duchaunak shakes his head. ‘You try and rationalize this within your own frame of reference and you’ll overload. I wouldn’t even try.’

‘And how do you
know
that they’re going to do this thing together?’

‘I don’t
know
anything, Mr Harper. It’s not a question of what I know, it’s a question of—’

‘Whatever,’ Harper interjects. ‘The bottom line is you want me to talk to these people. You want me to see Walt Freiberg and Cathy Hollander, whoever else might be around—’

‘And find out what they’re going to do.’ Duchaunak finishes it for him, leans back in his chair and crosses his legs.

Harper looks away towards the window. ‘You’ve lost it, you really have lost it, Detective—’

‘Hey, I didn’t get personal,’ Duchaunak retorts. ‘What is this? I’m asking you to do something to help me and you get personal.’

‘You
didn’t get personal?’ Harper asks, his voice starting to rise. ‘What in fuck’s name are you talking about, you didn’t get personal? You’ve spent the last week convincing me that these people are one crazy, fucked-up bunch of psychopaths and bank robbers and how I should get out of New York as fast as I can, and then all of a sudden, right at the point where someone’s put you on a leash, you’re asking me to go amongst them, all nice and polite, and just ask them where they might be having their next armed robbery. Jesus, if that isn’t personal then I don’t know what is.’

Duchaunak is silent.

‘Well?’ Harper asks.

‘Well what?’

‘You have anything to say?’

Duchaunak shakes his head. ‘Point taken, Mr Harper. It
is
personal. In fact, looking at it the way you’ve just put it, it couldn’t be more personal. I’m sorry to have troubled you.’ Duchaunak starts to rise from his chair, reaches for his overcoat.

‘Hey, what the fuck is this?’ Harper asks.

Duchaunak frowns, shakes his head. ‘I’m leaving,’ he says matter-of-factly.

Harper smiles, starts to laugh. There is a tone of sarcasm when he speaks. ‘I see,’ he says. ‘Backwards psychology. You are so predictable.’

‘So predictable?’ Duchaunak asks. ‘It’s not a matter of being predictable or anything else Mr Harper. What you say is true. I can’t argue with you. This is a complicated situation, and in all honesty it’s unfair of me to expect you to get any deeper into it.’

Duchaunak pulls on his overcoat, starts for the door.

Harper seems uncertain. The conflict of thoughts, of emotions, is displayed on his face. ‘Wait,’ he says.

Duchaunak pauses.

‘Back up a minute will you?’

Duchaunak turns and looks at Harper.

‘This thing, this robbery you’re talking about . . . this thing goes forward and people are going to die. Is that what you’re saying?’

Duchaunak shakes his head. ‘An armed robbery is an armed robbery, Mr Harper. By definition it involves the use of firearms, the commission of a felony, a very serious felony, and the people carrying out this robbery have every intention of escaping with not only the money but also their lives. If a situation arises where deadly force is exercised in an effort to stop them, well all I can tell you is—’

‘Enough with the police shit okay? Just tell me the fucking truth,’ Harper interjects. ‘They do this thing, some people are going to die . . . that’s all I’m asking you right now. Yes or no, tell me if some people are going to die.’

Duchaunak nods. ‘Yes, Mr Harper, some people will almost definitely die.’

Harper is silent for quite some time. He looks through the window, ten floors above street level, ten floors above New York, and all he can hear in the room is the frightened beating of his own heart.

He turns and smiles at Duchaunak. ‘Why are you such a crazy bastard?’

Duchaunak looks down at the floor. ‘Stress of the job?’ he asks. ‘I don’t know, Mr Harper, I really don’t know . . . maybe just because someone around here has to be crazy to make life a little more interesting.’

‘And you need my help because you’ve been pulled off this thing?’

Duchaunak nods.

‘And if I don’t help you, then you’re out in the back end of nowhere all on your own?’

‘A little melodramatic, Mr Harper.’

‘Melodramatic but true, right?’

‘Right.’

‘So what do you want me to do . . . what do you want
exactly
?’

Duchaunak steps away from the hotel room door. He advances two or three steps further into the room and buries his hands in his overcoat pockets. ‘What I want, Mr Harper, is for you to do everything they want you to do. You are here for a reason. You are not here because Evelyn insisted you come. You’re here because Walt Freiberg made her insist. He needs you here for some reason. Somehow, and this I cannot figure, you play some part in this thing, and it has something to do with the fact that your father was shot. If Walt Freiberg believes that Ben Marcus had your father killed, then there may very well be some arrangement that they’ve reached. This is what gives me the idea that they’re working together. That’s as much as I know, and even that is guesswork. You’re here because you are Edward Bernstein’s son, and this fact counts for something in whatever Walt Freiberg has planned. I just need you to speak to them, to make them think that you’re willing to be as much a part of this thing as they need you to be . . . and whatever they tell you I need you to report back to me.’

‘And that’s all?’ Harper asks.

‘I’m asking for as little as I can, Mr Harper, and believe me, if there was any way to have you completely uninvolved in this then that’s the way I would prefer it. I am in the proverbial shit . . . in fact I am rafting down a rapid of shit, there are holes in my canoe and I don’t have a paddle. That’s how
in the shit
I am.’

‘So you better leave.’

‘You what?’

‘You better leave, Detective, and you better make sure as many people see you leave as you can manage. If your theory is correct, if I
am
needed in some way, then this hotel will be being watched by whoever, and as soon as you leave Walt Freiberg will come over, or maybe Cathy Hollander or whatever her name is,
and they will want to find out what you have told me, what crazy ideas you have been filling my head with, and then they will tell me how everything you’ve said is utter insanity and that it’s time for me to get the real facts.’

Duchaunak takes a card from his pocket and hands it to Harper. ‘On the back is my cellphone number. Don’t call me from another cellphone, call me from a kiosk in the street, a public phone in a train station or a shopping mall, somewhere like that. Don’t phone me at the precinct or at my home. Call me and tell me where you are and I will come meet you or call you back from another public phone.’

‘Because if they figure out I’ve spoken to you—’

Duchaunak shakes his head. ‘Don’t even go there, Mr Harper . . . believe me, don’t even go there.’

‘So leave,’ Harper says.

‘I’ve left already,’ Duchaunak replies, and opens the door. He steps out into the hallway and closes the door silently behind him.

John Harper, late of Miami, Fla., stands near the window and closes his eyes. Had he been a religious man he might have said a few words, but he is not, and thus says nothing. Tries to think nothing too, but that is harder. He backs up a few feet, sits down, leans back his head and sighs.

‘Unbelievable,’ he says quietly. ‘Un-fucking-believable.’

Three minutes and eleven seconds later the phone rings.

‘Go through them again,’ Marcus said.

Sol Neumann cleared his throat. ‘For us we have Ray Dietz, Albert Reiff, Maurice Rydell, Henry Kossoff, Karl Merrett and the kid that’s come in to replace Lester McKee. His name is Lewis Parselle.’

‘And for the prosecution?’ Marcus asked, smiling sarcastically.

‘Freiberg himself, Ricky Wheland and Ron Dearing as drivers, Joe Koenig, Charlie Beck, Larry Benedict and Leo Petri.’

‘And the girl?’

Sol Neumann shook his head. ‘Freiberg has her on point down at Bethune and Greenwich.’

Marcus shook his head. ‘She’s a smart girl, Sol. Don’t underestimate her.’

Neumann nodded in agreement. ‘Smart she may be, but the whole thing is out of her league.’

Marcus smiled, started laughing. ‘Let me tell you something, Sol. You can hear me on this thing or you can choose to know best. Regardless of Lenny Bernstein being out of the picture he is not really out of the picture, you get what I mean? These people, Freiberg especially, have worked with Bernstein for so many years that they think like him. This thing will go down just as if Bernstein was right behind it, just like he was running everything.’

‘And the kid? What the hell do we do about him?’

‘Give it until tomorrow. We get word he is someone, or we don’t. If we get no word, or the kid is something out of someone’s imagination, then Freiberg is going to get himself killed. That’s the way it is. I can’t be dealing with this runaround shit. He’s some Miami bigshot . . . hell, if he’s that fucking big then we would have heard something reliable. Who the fuck does Freiberg think we are? He thinks we’re three days
off the farm? There’s no doubt this thing will run. Too big, too much planning to just let it all fall apart, and there’s too much at stake. And it’ll go forward regardless of whether Walt Freiberg is dead or alive.’

Neumann didn’t speak.

‘You get any word on the man himself?’

Neumann shook his head. ‘Same as yesterday, the day before. They got him hooked up to everything and then some. Still don’t know if he’s going to make it.’

Marcus shook his head. ‘So the kid will stand for him like Freiberg said. We get word the kid is good then it stays as planned. No word then Freiberg is dead. It is what it is. The thing goes down, we wind up with the major pieces. Freiberg will be gone, the kid will disappear wherever the hell he came from. What the fuck, eh?’

Neumann nodded. ‘What the fuck.’

Marcus nodded. ‘So call ’em in, all of them. We meet at seven at the Indiana Club and go through everything again.’

‘You want me to call Freiberg?’

Marcus shook his head. ‘I’ll call Freiberg.’

Sol Neumann rose from where he was sitting.

‘And Sol?’

Neumann looked down at Marcus.

‘I want to lose the cop as well.’

‘The crazy one?’

Marcus nodded. ‘Yeah, the crazy one. Someone should’ve put that poor son-of-a-bitch out of his misery a long fucking time ago.’

‘Couldn’t agree with you more, Ben, couldn’t agree with you more.’ Neumann turned towards the door, on his face an expression of relief. Ben Marcus had not asked about Thomas McCaffrey.

At one-nineteen p.m., afternoon of Monday, December twenty-second, kneeling in a slick of blood that was making its way west towards Mulberry, feeling that same blood seeping through the knee of his regulation green coveralls, listening to the heart, feeling the pulse as it slipped away beneath his finger, wishing that the guy over his shoulder would stop screaming at the top
of his voice for
Somebody to fucking do something . . . Jesus Christ, what the fuck is going on here? Can’t somebody DO SOMETHING!

One-nineteen p.m., afternoon of Monday, December twenty-second, Blue Cross medic Keith Kurtz pronounced Detective Yale Sonnenburg dead.

Simple as that.

Bullets – two of them – one through the side of the guy’s neck, one in the lower part of his stomach. Second one punctured his leather belt. Clean hole right through. Bullet was lodged somewhere in the mess of guts behind. Maybe the belt was the only reason his stomach stayed inside his shirt. Big bullet. Close range. A nine milli, maybe a .357. There were guns all over the place, lot of blood, because the guy that shot the cop was dead too. Mexican, Puerto Rican perhaps; olive skin, dark hair, face pretty wrecked from what Kurtz could see as he kneeled beside the dead body of Yale Sonnenburg. Looked like the Mexican took two or three shots as well. One seemed to have gone through the bridge of his nose.

Kurtz didn’t know that Sonnenburg was due to be married in less than a week. Had he known it wouldn’t have made a difference. Shit like that doesn’t count for much in the face of a nine milli.

The other cop just carried on hollering like he was a fire siren. Kurtz’s partner, a weatherworn, seen-it-all-before twenty-five-year veteran called Alfredo Langa, steered the hollering cop into an alleyway off of Mott Street. Kurtz figured the place was some sort of chop shop, like an auto-parts warehouse or something. Cans of paint everywhere, like big steel drums of the stuff, and all bright yellow. Yellow like sunflowers.

Kurtz radioed his central despatch to have them send out some more cops and the deputy coroner. He also told them to send a doctor, someone who had the authority to sedate the other cop.

Kurtz checked the dead cop’s jacket for ID, found it tucked inside his left breast pocket along with a sheet of paper covered in blood and lines of type. Looked like some foreign language, Hebrew or somesuch. The guy’s shopping list maybe – lox, bagels, cream cheese, chicken livers, who the fuck knew? Whatever it was, it sure as hell wasn’t a great deal of use to him now.

Kurtz smiled to himself. You had to maintain your sense of humor, he thought. However insane this stuff got, you had to keep your sense of humor together.