The Vaults (28 page)

It was frustrating and Frings’s buzz was waning. He popped another painkiller as the hint of a burning sensation licked at his lip.

Part of the new regime, Puskis was learning, was to eat meals out, which was fine. He sat with his two minders at Kostas’ Diner, eating pasta with tomato sauce and garlic bread. The two men ate sausage sandwiches and drank coffee.

Puskis asked, “How can I afford to eat like this every day?”

The smaller of the two men, sporting a trim mustache, seemed to be in charge. “You get a per diem.”

“Do you have it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you have it? Do you have my per diem?”

“Of course. Lead man on each shift will have it.”

“Can I have it?”

“Your per diem?”

“Yes. Can I have the money? I would prefer to be responsible for my own finances, if that is acceptable.”

The mustache shrugged. “I don’t see any harm.” He pulled a clip of bills from the breast pocket of his jacket and handed two fives over to Puskis.

“Thank you.”

The junior of the two men was uncomfortable in silence. “You must have seen it all, Mr. Puskis.”

This seemed an odd thing to say. “I haven’t actually seen anything,” he replied. This, he reflected, was true and not true. He had not witnessed anything beyond the incoming and outgoing paperwork that made up his life. But the sheer volume of knowledge that he possessed did probably add up to “seeing it all,” or experiencing the big picture of crime and justice in the City.

“Come on,” said the younger man. “You’ve been at the Vaults forever.” He then asked a succession of questions about mobsters and psychopaths who had enjoyed brief flings with notoriety in the recent past. Puskis indulged
these questions as a way of passing the time and on the theory that there could be no harm in ingratiating himself with his minders.

The checks arrived, creating an uncomfortable moment. The Mustache gathered them up, but Puskis insisted on paying for his himself.

“I’ll take care of it, Mr. Puskis.”

“I’m sorry to be a bother, but I have my money. You gave it to me. I would much prefer to handle my own affairs as much as possible. Surely that can’t be a problem for you?”

The Mustache puckered his face in annoyance and gave a dismissive wave of the hand. It wasn’t worth an argument.

Puskis handed his bill to the man at the register, a Hungarian named Ferenc.

“Could I keep the slip?” Puskis whispered.

Ferenc leaned in. “What’s that again?” Mimicking Puskis’s hushed tone.

Puskis looked over at the two ASU men at his table. They were looking at him but not really watching.

“I need the slip.”

Ferenc followed Puskis’s glance to the two officers, then looked back at Puskis. “Of course.” He slid the slip across the counter. They exchanged payment and change, and Puskis scooped up the slip along with the bills.

“Thank you,” Puskis said. “Will you be here tomorrow morning?”

Ferenc nodded.

“Then I will have something for you.”

Red Henry and Ian Block sat next to each other in an otherwise empty sauna at the Capitol Club. Henry sat with his hands on his knees and his elbows pointed outward. The heat had caused red blotches to emerge on his massive back. Block, not even half of Henry’s size and darker complected, leaned back into the raised bench.

“So the Poles are going to come around,” Block said.

Henry nodded.

“Peja said it was you scaring that little ratfuck union commie goatfucker. What’s his name?”

“Enrique Dotel.”

“Yeah, Dotel. Peja told me he pissed his goddamn pants. Said you hung him out the window by his ankles and he pissed his pants. Said the Poles loved it.”

Henry nodded.

“What’s wrong, Your Honor?” Block said, gently mocking.

Henry turned to Block. “Where are the others?”

“What? You mean Altabelli and Bernal?”

Henry nodded.

“Altabelli, it’s his anniversary. He’s been married to that Jane for twenty-five years, if you can believe it.”

“I know it’s his goddamn anniversary,” Henry snapped. Block was a misogynist, and while it could be amusing at times, it generally pissed Henry off.

“Bernal said he had a meeting.”

“Who with?”

Block shrugged, but Henry wasn’t looking at him now and missed it.

“Who with?” he repeated louder.

“I don’t know,” Block replied quickly. “He didn’t say, I didn’t ask. What’s eating you?”

Henry turned again to face Block. “Who would be the first to betray us?”

“Betray us?”

“Yes. The four of us: you, me, Altabelli, and Bernal. Who would be the first to betray us?”

Block looked surprised, but then warmed to the question. “Well, I figure it wouldn’t be you, and I know it wouldn’t be me.”

Henry nodded, eyes on his steepled fingers.

“So Altabelli and Bernal. I don’t know. You think someone turned?”

“Just answer the question,” Henry said with a seriousness that had Block concentrating on the question again.

“I don’t know. It’s a hard one. I had to say one, I guess I would finger Bernal. He’s so goddamn nervous sometimes. Why?”

Henry rubbed his face with his giant hands. “I don’t know. I’ve got a feeling. Things are getting dicey. I told you that this clerk from the department went looking for Reif DeGraffenreid?”

Block nodded and leaned forward.

Henry continued, “So I put Smith on him, follow him around a little. Guy never leaves his office. But the other day, who pays him a visit? Frank Frings. And then goddamn Frings writes a column that says he’s met with these guys that’ve been planting the bombs.”

“So you think this clerk is the bomber?” Block asked, puzzled.

Jesus Christ. “Of course not. We’ve got a couple of guys chaperoning him, but not for that reason. He’s harmless except that he went looking for goddamn DeGraffenreid. So I’ve got two problems. One, these bombers Frings says he’s met with. Two, this clerk found out about DeGraffenreid and then talked to Frings. So on the one hand I need Frings to tell me who the bombers are, and on the other hand I need him to not look into the DeGraffenreid case, or any of the other Navajo cases.”

Block shrugged as if it were no big deal. “So? Make him talk. Put the fear of a vengeful fucking God into him. You know how to do that shit. Look what you did to that poor commie bastard this morning.”

“Don’t be a goddamn moron. Frings is untouchable. He’d write about it in a second, and no matter how goddamn charming and innocent I act, half the people will believe it. So I did a couple of other things. You know Frings’s girl? Nora Aspen?”

“She’s a nice piece.”

“Feral’s got her.”

“No shit.” Block seemed to enjoy this news.

Henry nodded. “He pinched her from her apartment. Left a note for Frings to drop the case.”

“Has he?”

“Not yet. He may need her to suffer a little first. Let him know the gloves are off. I also sent Smith to have a chat.”

“I’m guessing that didn’t go over.”

“No. But he cut Frings a little. Gave him something to think about.”

“Well, don’t hurt that Aspen piece too much. Wouldn’t do too much good for the American male’s morale.”

Henry shook his head. “Another thing. Lena Prosnicki got out.”

“Christ almighty. How’d she do that?”

Henry frowned. “We’re looking into it. We’ve got no idea what she did once she escaped. One of the nurses noticed she was gone during bed check. Feral was busy, so I sent Smith after her and he took care of it.”

“Jesus, Red, there’s a lot of shit happening.”

Henry nodded, staring at the far wall.

“So what does Bernal have to do with any of this?”

“I don’t like that this is all happening right now. Doesn’t make sense to me that, like you said, it all happens at once like this. There’s always something, but in drips. This is a goddamn flood.”

“So what’re you going to do?”

Henry didn’t answer. He had a funny look about him. Block was about to ask again, then thought better of it.

It was late, but she said she wanted a bath. Of course, without windows, she had no way to know the time. The drug-induced sleep would have contributed to her disorientation, as well. Feral had not foreseen this request—stupidly, he told himself—but it seemed reasonable enough. Still, it posed some logistical problems. He went through his bathroom and carefully removed anything that she could use to harm him or herself: razors, of course, and the rope that he used to hang laundry, scissors, all medicines, and matches. Even without these items, she could still drown herself. It was awkward. He drew her a warm bath.

She was in a robe when he let her out of her room. It was the first time that she had stepped foot in the rest of the apartment, though it was only to walk a few feet down a hallway. Her hair was up and she looked unkempt in a becoming sort of way. He paused at the open bathroom door and let her enter. She began to close the door, but he stopped it with his hand.

“You must leave the door open.”

“Are you going to watch me bathe?” she said with a pout. Was it a flirt? A taunt? A challenge? Whichever, it made him uneasy.

“No. I’ll sit in the hall, but I can’t let you shut the door. You could hurt yourself.”

She smiled. “Think I’d drown?”

Feral didn’t smile. “I don’t know.”

She gave him an indifferent shrug, turned, and without warning shed her robe. Feral looked away quickly and moved a step down the hall so that he could not see in, his heart pounding.

“The water is perfect,” she called out.

He wasn’t sure how to respond, so he said, “Do you see the soap?”

“Thank you.”

Feral stood silently in the hall, listening to the gentle sloshing of the water as she moved about in the tub. After a brief silence, he called out to her, “Is everything okay?”

“It’s lovely,” she said, sounding as if she meant it.

“There’s a towel on the sink when you’re done.” He kept his voice level but wanted to hear her again.

“Yes, I see it. Thank you.”

After a few more minutes he heard the sound of water displacement and then dripping as she got out of the tub. He heard the soft noise of towel against flesh as she dried herself. Feral stayed rooted to his spot in the hall.

She appeared in her robe, her hair wet and pulled back, her face shining. As she passed him in the hall, small beads of water dropped from her hair onto his hand. She walked directly to the door to her room, then turned to wait for him to open it with a key. They were close now, close enough that he could feel her breath on his face.

“Thank you,” she whispered, and slipped through the threshold.

He closed the door behind her and found himself alone in the hallway.

Bernal arrived first.

Fog had come in off the river and penetrated Frings’s trench coat, leaving him shivering in his damp clothes. Frings would not have found Bernal but for the orange glow of his cigarette intensifying with each inhalation. It was incredibly stupid for Bernal to arrive first, but Frings resisted the urge to confront him. He was probably already sufficiently on edge.

“You’re early,” Frings whispered.

“You’re not the only one who is nervous about being watched.”

Frings couldn’t see Bernal’s face. “Are you sure you weren’t followed?”

“Are you sure?”

It was a fair enough point, so Frings got on with it. “Your guy Samuelson. He’s a convicted killer but was never incarcerated. How am I doing so far?”

“Go on.”

“There are others, too. Other murderers who were convicted but never sent to prison. They were shipped out to the country.”

Fog had a way of dulling and diffusing sound. When a sudden noise, like a scraping and then a thud, came, Frings could not pinpoint its exact nature or direction.

“I don’t like it down here,” Bernal whispered. “Let’s go up on the bridge.”

A little-used trestle bridge ran directly above them, spanning the river. At one time it had been a railway bridge, but it had converted to an auto and pedestrian bridge when the railroad was rerouted. Frings followed Bernal by sound as he scrambled up the rise to the pitted gravel-and-dirt road and then to the bridge. For some reason, Bernal walked fifty yards or so onto the bridge before stopping and leaning with his arms on the railing. The river rushed beneath them, shrouded in fog.

“So you found out about Samuelson.”

“I don’t understand it. Why didn’t they send those sons of bitches to prison? Why ship them out to the sticks?”

Bernal had a new cigarette in his lips and he struck a match, illuminating his face. The brief peek at Bernal’s psyche showed a man close to his limits.