Silent Night (5 page)

“You and St. Christopher are staying right here with me, buddy,” he said as he shoved him roughly to the floor.

Brian gasped as his forehead slammed onto the cracked linoleum. He sat up slowly, rubbing his head. He felt like the room was spinning, but he could hear the woman he had followed pleading with the man. “Jimmy, don't hurt him. Please. Leave us alone. Take the money and go. But get out of here.”

Brian wrapped his arms around his legs, trying not to cry. He shouldn't have followed the lady. He knew that now. He should have yelled instead of following her so that maybe somebody would stop her. This man was bad. This man wasn't going to let him go home. And nobody knew where he was. Nobody knew where to look for him.

He felt the medal dangling against his chest and closed his fist around it. Please get me back to Mom, he prayed silently, so I can bring you to Dad.

He did not look up to see Jimmy Siddons studying him. He did not know that Jimmy's mind was racing, assessing the situation. This kid followed Cally when she took the wallet, Siddons thought. Did anyone follow him? No. If they had, they'd be here by now. “Where did you get the wallet?” he asked his sister.

“On Fifth Avenue. Across from Rockefeller Center.” Cally was terrified now. Jimmy would stop at nothing to get away. Not at killing her. Not at killing this child. “His mother must have dropped it. I picked it up off the sidewalk. I guess he saw me.”

“I guess he did.” Jimmy looked at the phone on the table next to the couch. Then, grinning, he reached for the cellular phone he had taken from the glove compartment of the stolen car. He also took out a gun and pointed it at Cally. “The cops may have your phone tapped.” He pointed at the table next to the couch. “Go
over there. I'm going to dial your number and tell you I'm turning myself in and I want you to call that public defender who is representing me. All you have to do is act nice and nervous, just like you are now. Make a mistake and you and this kid are dead.”

He looked down at Brian. “One peep out of you and . . .” He left the threat unspoken.

Brian nodded to show he understood. He was too scared to even promise that he'd be quiet.

“Cally, you got all that straight?”

Cally nodded. How stupid I've been, she thought. I was fool enough to believe I'd gotten away from him. No chance. He even knows this phone number.

He finished dialing and the phone beside her rang. “Hello.” Her voice was low and muffled.

“Cally, it's Jimmy. Listen, I'm in trouble. You probably know by now. I'm sorry I tried to get away. I hope that guard will be all right. I'm broke and I'm scared.” Jimmy's voice was a whine. “Call Gil Weinstein. He's the public defender assigned to me. Tell him I'll meet him at St. Patrick's Cathedral when midnight Mass is over. Tell him I want to turn myself in and I want him to be with me. His home number is 555-0267. Cally, I'm sorry I messed up everything so badly.”

Jimmy pressed the disconnect on the cellular phone and watched as Cally hung up as well. “They can't trace a cellular phone call, you know that, don't you? Okay,
now phone Weinstein and give him the same story. If the cops are listening, they must be jumping up and down right now.”

“Jimmy, they'll think I . . .”

In two steps Jimmy was beside her, the gun to her head. “Make the call.”

“Your lawyer may not be home. He may refuse to meet you.”

“Naw. I know him. He's a jerk. He'll want the publicity. Get him.”

Cally did not need to be told to make it quick. The moment Gil Weinstein was on the line, she rushed to say, “You don't know me. I'm Cally Hunter. My brother, Jimmy Siddons, just called. He wants me to tell you . . .” In a quavering voice she delivered the message.

“I'll meet him,” the lawyer said. “I'm glad he's doing this, but if that prison guard dies, Jimmy is facing a death-penalty trial. He could get life without parole for the first killing, but now . . .” His voice trailed off.

“I think he knows that.” Cally saw Jimmy's gesture. “I have to go now. Good-bye, Mr. Weinstein.”

“You make a great accomplice, big sister,” Jimmy told her. He looked down at Brian. “What's your name, kid?”

“Brian,” he whispered.

“Come on, Brian. We're getting out of here.”

“Jimmy, leave him alone. Please. Leave him here with me.”

“No way. There's always the chance you'd go running to the cops even though the minute they talk to that kid, you're in big trouble yourself. After all, you
did
steal his mama's wallet. No, the kid comes with me. No one is looking for a guy with his little boy, are they? I'll let him go tomorrow morning when I get to where I'm headed. After that you can tell them anything you like about me. The kid'll even back you up, won't you, sonny?”

Brian shrank against Cally. He was so afraid of the man that he was trembling. Was the man going to make him go away with him?

“Jimmy, leave him here. Please.” Cally thrust Brian behind her.

Jimmy Siddons's mouth twisted in anger. He grabbed Cally's arm and yanked her toward him, roughly twisting her arm behind her.

She screamed as she lost her grip on Brian and slipped to the floor.

With eyes that denied any history of affection between them, Jimmy stood over his sister, again holding the gun to her head. “If you don't do what I tell you, you'll get more of that . . . and worse. They won't take me alive. Not you, not nobody else is gonna send me to the death chamber. Besides, I got a girlfriend waiting for me. So just keep your mouth shut. I'll even make a deal.
You don't say nothing, and I'll let the kid live. But if the cops try to close in on me, he gets a bullet in the head. It's as simple as that. Got it straight?”

He stuck the gun back inside his jacket, then reached down and roughly pulled Brian to his feet. “You and I are gonna get to be real pals, sonny,” he said. “Real pals.” He grinned. “Merry Christmas, Cally.”

T
he unmarked van parked across the street from Cally's apartment building was the lookout post for the detectives watching Cally's building for any sign of Jimmy Siddons. They had observed Cally come home at just a little after her usual time.

Jack Shore, the detective who had visited Cally in the morning, pulled off his earphones, swore silently, and turned to his partner. “What do you think, Mort? No, wait a minute. I'll tell you what I think. It's a trick. He's trying to buy time to get as far away from New York as possible while we take up the collection at St. Pat's looking for him.”

Mort Levy, twenty years younger than Shore and less
cynical, rubbed his chin, always a sign that he was deep in thought. “If it is a trick, I don't think the sister is a willing accomplice. You don't need a meter to hear the stress level in her voice.”

“Listen, Mort, you were at Bill Grasso's funeral. Thirty years old, with four little kids, and shot between the eyes by that bum Siddons. If Cally Hunter had come clean with us and told us that she'd given that rat brother of hers money and the keys to her car, Grasso would have known what he was up against when he stopped him for running a light.”

“I still believe that Cally had bought Jimmy's story about trying to get away because he'd been in a gang fight and the other gang was after him. I don't think she knew that he'd wounded a clerk in a liquor store. Up till then he hadn't been in really serious trouble.”

“You mean he'd gotten away with it till then,” Shore snapped. “Too bad that judge couldn't put Cally away as an accessory to murder instead of just for aiding a fugitive. She got off after serving fifteen months. Bill Grasso's widow is trimming the tree without him tonight.”

His face reddened with anger. “I'll call in. Just in case that louse meant what he said, we've got to cover the cathedral. You know how many people go to midnight Mass there tonight? Take a guess.”

*   *   *

Cally sat on the worn velour sofa, her hands clasped around her knees, her head bent, her eyes closed. Her entire body was trembling. She was beyond tears, beyond fatigue. Dear God, dear God,
why
did all this happen?

What should she do?

If anything happened to Brian, she would be responsible. She had picked up his mother's wallet, and that's why he'd followed her. If the child was right, his dad was very ill. She thought of the attractive young woman in the rose-colored coat and how she had been sure everything in her life was perfect.

Would Jimmy let the boy go when he got to wherever was his destination? How could he? she reasoned. Wherever that was, they'd start searching for Jimmy in that area.
And if he does let him go,
Brian will tell how he followed me because I took
the wallet
, she reminded herself.

But Jimmy had said he would shoot the child if the cops closed in on him. And he meant it, she was certain of that. So if I tell the cops, Brian doesn't have a chance, she thought.

If I don't say anything now and Jimmy does let him go, then I can honestly say that I didn't tell because he threatened to kill the kid if the cops got near him, and I knew he meant it. And I know he does mean it, Cally thought. That's the worst part.

Brian's face loomed in Cally's mind. The reddish brown
hair that fell forward on his forehead, the large, intelligent blue eyes, the spatter of freckles on his cheeks and nose. When Jimmy dragged him in, her first impression was that he wasn't more than five; from the way he spoke, though, she was sure he was older. He was so scared when Jimmy made him go with him out the window and onto the fire escape. He had looked back at her, his eyes pleading.

The phone rang. It was Aika, the wonderful black woman who minded Gigi along with her own grandchildren each afternoon after the day-care center closed.

“Just checking to see if you're home, Cally,” Aika said, her voice rich and comforting. “Did you find the doll man?”

“I'm afraid not.”

“Too bad. You need more time to shop?”

“No, I'll come right over now and get Gigi.”

“No, that's okay. She already ate dinner with my gang. I need milk for breakfast, so I've got to go out anyway. I'll drop her off in half an hour or so.”

“Thanks, Aika,” Cally put down the receiver, aware that she still had her coat on and that the apartment was dark except for the entryway light. She took off the coat, went into the bedroom, and opened the closet door. She
gasped when she saw that when he took Frank's suede jacket and brown slacks, Jimmy had left other clothes crumpled on the floor, a jacket and pants, and a filthy overcoat.

She bent down and picked up the jacket. Detective Shore had told her that Jimmy had shot a guard and stripped him of his uniform. Obviously, this was the uniform—and there were bullet holes in the jacket.

Frantically, Cally wrapped the jacket and pants inside the overcoat. Suppose the cops came in with a search warrant! They'd never believe her, that Jimmy broke into her place. They'd be sure she gave him clothes. She'd go back to prison. And she'd lose Gigi for good! What should she do?

She looked around the closet, wildly searching for a solution. The storage box on the overhead shelf. In it she kept whatever summer clothes she and Gigi had. She yanked the box down, opened it, pulled out the contents, and threw them on the shelf. She folded the uniform and coat into the box, closed it, ran to the bed, and fished under it for the Christmas wrappings she had stored there.

With frantic fingers she wrapped candy-cane paper around the box and tied it with a ribbon. Then she carried it into the living room and put it under the tree. She had
just completed the task when she heard the downstairs buzzer. Smoothing back her hair, and forcing a welcoming smile for Gigi, she went to answer it.

It was Detective Shore and the other detective who had been with him this morning who came up the stairs. “Playing games again, Cally?” Shore asked. “I hope not.”