City of the Absent (28 page)

The next day, things got worse for Alastair when
more loaded fate came literally knocking at his door. Captain Benjamin Shorendorf dressed in his cleanest uniform stood on Alastair's doorstep alongside a dumbfounded Mike O'Malley and several other strong-armed cops. Mike kept apologizing while Shorendorf read the arrest warrant.

Ransom only heard the last portion. “‘…for the murder of Father Franklin Jurgen, who overnight died in Cook County Hospital of complications of his wounds.'”

“They're saying they have new evidence pointing to you, Rance,” said Mike, “but I don't for a moment believe it.”

“That's good of you, Mike, but apparently everyone else is all too willing to believe the worst of me.”

“Will you come along quietly, Inspector?” asked Shorendorf.

“And what about you, Captain?” asked Ransom.

“What about me?”

“Shouldn't you be getting some sort of commendation for that perfect shot through the heart of that big fellow yesterday who was on the verge of harming a child?”

“I only did my duty as I saw it.”

“Hmmm
…lot of that going around.”

Shorendorf held up the wrist cuffs and a second officer held up the ankle chains.

“Don't be ridiculous, you men!” shouted O'Malley. “You don't take a fellow Chicago police officer into custody in chains on a whim.”

“It's no whim! I have orders!” countered Shorendorf.

“Tell me something, Ben,” Ransom said, extending his wrists, “how safe are you and for how long, once Kohler decides
you
are a liability?”

Shorendorf's eyes gave him away, going temporarily wide before he shouted, “Get 'im into the paddy wagon, now!”

“Yeah…treat me as just another Paddy, Ben. Go right ahead, but one day it'll come back on you.”

The ankle chains snapped around him, and Ransom was led off amid the inquiring eyes of his neighbors. Only two people might hurt him and badly, he reasoned, and they'd never testify against him. He'd already anticipated getting each out of town.

Moments before the wagon door was closed and locked, Alastair saw Frederick Hake lurking about the shadows, watching the arrest with great interest. Had Hake come to warn him too late? Or had Hake come to gloat? Was Hake set up to lie on the stand? Would William Pinkerton lie on the stand? After all, there was nothing innocent about his actions the night someone had disfigured Father Jurgen, a disfigurement that ultimately led to the man's death.

“Damn it, I didn't do it,” he muttered in the pitch-dark wagon.

“Sure you didn't, Inspector…and this is the result!” It was Bosch, beaten and thrown into a black corner of the wagon.

“Henry, what've they done to you?”

“Beat a confession from me, they did.”

“What confession?”

“That I led you to Father Jurgen, and that you had a nasty large pair of pincers the whole time.”

“Not that you saw me use these so-called pincers on Jurgen?”

“They stopped pushin' when I fainted out the third time.”

“Sorry this had to happen to you, old-timer, very sorry.”

“You and me both.” Bosch could hardly speak. “How much've they got on you, Inspector?”

“I'm told the Pinkerton's've amassed a regular dossier.”

“Un-g'damn-believable
that it should end like this. You and me, good, stouthearted fellows, our good turns and kind natures turned against us.” He paused to spit blood. “T-Turned on us like the twisting head of a snake. Just not fittin' nor right nor proper.”

“It isn't over yet, Henry; we still have our day in court. And we hold onto our dignity.”

“Dignity, ha! You perhaps. Me…I couldn't take it when they started on me in earnest.”

Ransom lit a match from a box yet in his pocket. The light illuminated Bosch's ashen and bloodied face and head.

“Shorendorf worked you over badly, but I saw no bruised knuckles.”

“Used his brass knuckles, he did. Did a thorough job of it. I'm spittin' teeth.”

“You only made the one lie, Bosch?”

“That I guided you to that boat, yeah. Hell, I didn't even know the name of the tub till they supplied it.”

“What about Samuel?” asked Ransom. “You think he's OK?”

Bosch's eyes lit up. “Is he the reason you're in this fix? I knew no good could come of it, paying that boy same wage as me!”

“Is he in harm's way?”

“He might've been, but no. Seems your lady friend got him over to Hull House, where he stole a bundle from the kitty and hopped a freight outta town. 'Least that's the story.”

“And a great story it is, too.”

“Plain, simple truth no matter how hard to swallow.” Bosch was having trouble gulping and breathing. He was too aged a man to take such a beating without its taking a great toll.

“It's good he's out of the city.”

“You knew Kohler would—” Bosch's words were punctuated and interrupted by coughing. “—that Kohler'd put the Pinkertons on to you, so why in hell'd you not skedaddled yourself?”

“Too late for regrets now.”

“They mean to hang you for murder.”

“Then damn them, they've a fight on their hands.”

“Why do you suppose they put us both in here together, Inspector? Answer that, you're so smart?”

“They likely expect me to kill you just so they can bolster their flimsy warrant.”

“My sentiments exactly.” Bosch's laughter turned into a gut-wrenching cough. “So are you?”

“Am I what?”

“Going to kill me?”

“Convert you, perhaps; kill you, no.”

“Thank you, Inspector, for sparing me. Now tell me…for my own edification…did you really cut off a priest's privates?”

“Do they really believe for a moment that I'm going to give up a jailhouse confession to the likes of you, Bosch? Or anyone else for that matter?”

“I heard you say, ‘I didn't do it,' when you believed yourself alone.”

“Give me something I can use, Bosch.”

“I have nothing.”

“Tell me you have the information I asked you to find.”

Outside, they heard the muffled toll of a bell and men shouting. Both men inside the closed, windowless wagon wondered why the commotion and to what precinct were they being carted.

“Sounds like a funeral dirge out there,” remarked Bosch.

“Forget about that. Listen, Bosch, now you, of all people, know the truth of my innocence in this affair with the priest.”

“Yes, I know…for what it's worth.” Bosch's bashed-in face shone purple in the darkness here. Outside, the bell
tolled again. “They say the truth sets a man free, but in your case, who'd believe it? 'Fraid you're a victim of your own making. That reputation of yours, how you handled the Phantom of the Fair…all of it is come back to—”

“Roost, I know.”

“Haunt ya is what I was 'bout to say.” The wagon jostled over a pothole. “There go my dentures,” joked Bosch. “Wh-What's left of 'em.”

“Sorry you had to take such a beating, Henry. How do you afford dentures?”

“P-Paid for by the ponies.”

“Damn it, Henry. Tell me you learned who 'twas bailed out Philander Rolsky? Tell me you're holding out on me for a better deal.”

“Rance, I'm sorry. They got me by the short hairs before I could learn anything.”

“Then we might never know who put up bail for that murd'rin' Rolsky.”

“I shoulda acted faster. Thought I had time, you see.”

“No blame falling on you, Bosch, but when you're set free, do me a kindness, will you?”

“Whatever I can, yes. We've been partners a long time, Inspector.”

Hardly partners
, Ransom thought, but said, “Get word to Jane Francis Tewes as to what's happened, and without telling another soul. And don't be followed by that creep Frederick—”

“Hake, yes, I mean no! I know his hand is in this business somehow. Evil bastard'd sell his own mother to the butchers.”

“Also get to Mr. Philo Keane at his studio, and if he's not already gone from the city, tell him to get out of Chicago until all this blows over.” Ransom knew that Philo would never survive a Chicago police interrogation room.

“If it blows over.” Bosch sat silent a moment, and again came the tolling bell and the muffled shouts of men outside the wagon. “What the deuce is all that noise for?” Bosch finally asked.

“Can't quite make it out, but I suspect they're wasting no time in drumming up public opinion against me.”

“Is that legal?”

“It probably is in Chicago.”

“Damn them but I think they have you checkmated, Inspector.”

“It's never occurred to me,” he half joked.

“The charges are not frivolous or slight, but the sort that'll incite press and public against you.”

“I'm sure I'm already hung in the first edition.”

“I'll talk to Carmichael, tell him your side—your suspicions.”

“I fear Carmichael useless.”

“Why do you say so?”

“He's washed up, on the sauce, and I fear he's too far gone.”

“Somehow, then, we've lost.”

“The only leverage I have is public record, and not even that if it's been falsified.”

“Aye, someone may've altered the books.”

“Someone paid cash to see Rolsky walk. The who of it could lead to some answers as to why Nell Hartigan was killed, and why Pinkerton threw up so many hurdles.”

“A cover-up?”

“Of the case she was investigating, yes.”

“And you say it is Pinkerton, do you? Once again working for the establishment?”

“Possibly. Damn but I need a lawyer. Listen, again, once they release you—”

“They'll only do so if I tell them what they want to hear, Inspector, and that will seal your fate.”

“Then tell them.”

“Tell them what?”

“What they want to hear. I need you on the outside.”

“But when they call me to court, what then?”

“Then tell the truth.”

“Or skip bail?”

“Or skip bail. But not before you contact Malachi Quintin McCumbler for me, Henry.”

“The lawyer, yes, the one I can ill afford.”

“He's worth his salt, and McCumbler'll know, or by God find out who posted bail for Rolsky.”

“You'll need him for trial at any rate.”

“Exactly.”

“I'll get to him if at all possible.”

“Shrewd fellow is McCumbler.”

“Still, it's all wishful thinking. Suppose they don't let me go, Ransom?”

“You strike your deal with 'em; they'll let you walk until the day you're called to testify.”

“Yes, but e'en so, Mr. McCumbler's not likely to listen to a clothespin like me!” He smacked his peg leg as he said this.

Ransom's eyes had adjusted to the dim light. “Tell Malachi what we've discussed. He'll know what steps to take.”

“Hope you've a plan. Hope you can beat this thing,” said the old snitch, ending with a coughing jag.

The wagon came to a sudden halt, men shouting at animals. Then came the reverberation of lock and chain being snatched away, and the doors were flung open on a gunmetal gray sky, framed in the iron bars, all mirroring Alastair's mood. Ransom stepped out to find himself staring at the Des Plaines Street station house. They'd taken a leisurely, long route to get here, tolling a bell as they did so and spreading word of his arrest along their route. This had been all the noise that'd kept him and Bosch curious and nervous at once. All a display to embarrass him on his home territory.

“Damn it, Ben,” he swore at Shorendorf, indicating the Des Plaines station. “We gotta do this at
my
house?”

“Orders…just fol—”

“Following orders, sure, Ben, sure. And when I make bail, I may follow some dictates of my own.”

“I am assured you'll never make bail, but hold on here! Are you threatening me? You wanna add threatening an of
ficer to the list of complaints against you, Inspector? Trust me, the list is long enough.”

“You used to be a good cop, Ben, till they got their hooks into ya.”

“Shut your blatherin' mouth, Ransom.”

“Go ahead, rough me up! Do me like you did poor Bosch in there cowering in the corner! Bastards, all of ya!”

Bringing his billy club over Ransom's head, Shorendorf struck in the flash of an eye, and Alastair fell, bleeding, to the ground, his body sliding up under the paddy wagon.

Mike O'Malley, who'd stood nearby, rushed Shorendorf and yanked the club from him before he could strike a second blow. “The man's in chains! What the hell was that for?” Mike looked as if he might slam Shorendorf with the club, but he was grabbed by Shorendorf's men.

“Resisting arrest!” replied Shorendorf, regaining his club. “You all saw it.”

Mike, shoving away the men holding him, shouted, “The ill treatment of the prisoner'll go in my report, Captain. You can bet on that.”

“Look, we're all cops here, all professionals, but a man like this”—he pointed to Alastair, who unsuccessfully struggled to regain his feet—“he brings us all down in the eyes of the public. I've no mercy for him, and neither will the courts!”

Alastair sat beside the paddy wagon, still dazed. He half heard Mike's words defending him. “Ransom's the best detective on the force. Sure, maybe he's somewhat unorthodox, but this time, perhaps he just got too close to the truth to suit some people. Hey, Captain?”

Bleeding and blinking blood from his eyes, Ransom saw from where he sat a regular fop of a man parting the cops—a man so obsessed with modern fashion and so vain about his own appearance that he'd become a ridiculous caricature, except that it was not a man. It was Jane as Dr. Tewes, and Gabby Tewes directly beside her. The ladies fought past Mike and the others. “Leave him alone! Get back!”