Ice Blues - Stevenson Richard - Страница 39

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He shook his head glumly. "It's a hereditary skin condition, Slotz-Planckton's disease. The cold weather aggravates it. It started to clear up in LA, but when I got back here it took a turn for the worse. It is aggravated by severe weather and by stress, my doctor tells me. Stress, Strachey. I am experiencing stress. Do you know why?"

"Financial problems? Worrisome moisture on your basement walls?"

"You know goddamn well it's you and this goddamn Lenihan thing. It's as plain as can be that everybody and his Uncle Eddie is holding out on me in this thing, and the time is close at hand when I'm going to have to start playing hardball with the likes of you. Do you catch my meaning or do I have to draw you a picture?"

"You can skip the lurid visual effects, but you can tell me who else has been holding out. I'm not admitting that I have, but who else?"

He gave me his fish eye. "You know as well as I do who else. The woman you visited in LA Friday night, before I could get there first, Mrs. Danny Lenihan. The broad went all weepy on me, which is understandable, I guess, considering, but in a full two hours of blubber and boo-hoo she didn't tell me diddly-shit about what her son was doing out there last weekend and how come this Piatek had left her boy two and a half million, and where was the two and a half million now? So, what'd she tell you? Plenty, I'll wager. You people all stick together, don't you?"

"We people?"

"I've always figured Joanie for a lez. Or maybe I heard it somewhere. You can't tell me she and that Tesney woman aren't playing doctor with the shades pulled down. So, what'd she confide in you? Come on, Strachey, make this easy for the both of us, huh?"

"'Playing doctor with the blinds pulled down.' Ned, you're the consummate romantic. No, she did not confide in me either. She just let loose with a lot of confused ill will toward Albany and its citizenry. She detests this place so much, she wouldn't even set foot in it to attend her son's funeral. It sounds as if you'd met Joan Lenihan before or know quite a lot about her."

He looked thoughtful and said, "I was the investigating officer when Dan died. It was me who took Joanie's statement back in-fifteen, sixteen years ago, it must be. Joanie wasn't a bad-looking cookie back then. Great knockers, a real pretty woman even with her buck teeth. Out in LA, Jesus, she looked like she'd been through the wringer. Or maybe she's just getting old. Hell, Joanie's older than I am, must be closing in on sixty.

"That was a sad time for the old man, let me tell you. Danny was Pug's only son, and while I can't say that Dan ever did his pop proud, even so he was all Pug had left in the world-Pug's missus passed away back in the fifties- and it was just like the bottom fell out when Dan bought the farm. I think the North End must have been draped in black for a month after that one."

Again, I was confused. "Why were the police involved in Dan Lenihan's death? I had the impression he'd died as a result of his alcoholism."

Bowman shrugged mildly, as if to recite a commonplace. "Indirectly, yeah, it was the booze. What happened was, Danny froze to death on the street.

At two or three in the morning in January he passed out on the way home from Mike Shea's tavern down on Broadway. A paper boy found him at six in the morning on Second Street across from Sacred Heart, stiff as a board.

"Of course, I think Dan was stiff as a board from the time he was about eleven. How Joan put up with him all those years, I'll never know. They say she married him because Joanie was a drinker herself when she was a kid, and the two of them tied one on one night and ended up in Dan's bed, and old Pug caught em and made em make it legal. The story was, Pug had pretty much given up on Danny by then, and he wanted grandchildren.

"Well, he got em. Conine's barren and Jack was a faggot, if you'll pardon the expression, which I know you won't, you being one yourself. I don't know what went wrong in that family. Pug Lenihan was one of the finest men this town ever produced, and then it all just went to hell for him. How does that happen? You tell me."

I did not offer an opinion, which would have been uselessly inflammatory. I said, "It's a sad history, but I'm more interested in the present state of the Lenihans. Jack in particular, who's been bludgeoned to death. Where does the investigation stand?"

He gave me his incredulous imbecile look, which was unusually imbecilic owing to the albino squid clinging to his face. "I can't tell you that. That is official police information. It is you, Strachey, who are in possession of information that could wrap this thing up in two days. I can smell it all over you. You reek of withheld evidence. The question is, do you give it to me voluntarily, or do I turn this simple process into something ugly and complicated for both of us? Which is it, huh?" He glared at me across his little friend.

I said, "You're up against it, Ned, am I right? You spent seven hundred dollars of the department's two-grand travel budget and you came up empty-handed. You've got nothing to show for your junket and little to go on otherwise. You're frustrated and you think your frustration will be relieved if you beat up on me. Well, forget it. I'm not interested. I can spend my time more profitably elsewhere, and so can you."

He remained calm, maybe at the urging of his physician. "Do you want to be dragged down to the lockup? Right now?"

"You could arrange that, I guess, but you won't. You're only guessing that I've got information pertinent to your investigation, and your guess is no legal basis for an arrest. Lock me up and I'll be on the streets in forty-five minutes, and you'll end up with egg on your face. I mean, if there's room for it on there."

He flinched, but remained seated, not moving, tight-lipped.

I said, "There is, however, a way we might be able to get together on this thing. Pool our resources in the interests of justice, civic improvement, and a nice commendation for you from the chief. As you have figured out, my aims in this case are broader than yours. I want Jack Lenihan's killer locked up and punished, yes, but I also want Sim Kempelman's outfit to have the two and a half million so they can run the thieves and knuckleheads out of city hall and replace them with save-the-whales, anti-nuke, ACLU goo-goos."

Bowman gripped his desk tightly, but still he said nothing. He seemed to be losing strength.

"As it happens," I said, "there is a way for both of us to accomplish everything we want to accomplish. With your assistance, I think I can hand you Jack Lenihan's killer. Notice I said 'assistance.' What I'm saying is, I'll take the risks and do most of the real work, and you'll get the credit."

After a moment, he stood calmly, walked to the door, and closed it. Seated again, he said, "I can listen. I want Lenihan's killer tried and convicted. What do you want from me? What does this so-called assistance entail?"

"First, Ned, one thing. If we work together on this, are you willing to follow the trail wherever it leads? No matter who's involved?"

He leaned back in his swivel chair and clutched the arms. "What the fuck are you talking about, Strachey? What's a remark like that supposed to mean?"

"I'm not sure yet myself. Just answer the question. I know you're a blowhard and a narrow-minded jackass, but I've always thought that despite your obvious limitations you were also an honest cop. Correct me if I'm wrong."

"My entire career has been devoted to enforcing the law. You break the laws of the state of New York or the city of Albany and you reckon with Ned Bowman, whoever you are, period."

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