Butcher's dozen en-2 Read online

"You sure?"

  "No."

  "No? You mean you aren't sure?"

  "I mean no I ain't ever seen him. You spent your dollar, mister."

  "I'll spend more, if you got the right answers." He spoke up, working his voice above the sound of the exhaust fan in the ceiling. "That's a standing offer, if any of you gents would care to take a look at the photo."

  "Fuck you," the stubbly-faced guy next to the reporter said.

  But the guy on the other side of him reached for the photo and it was passed down the bar. The half dozen men present all had a look, but passed it back, without a word.

  "His name," the reporter said, slipping the mug shot back in the jacket pocket, "is Eddie Andrassy. If that names familiar to you, it might be because you saw it in the papers."

  McFarlin, who was pretending to be paying no attention, damn near laughed out loud at that. Most of these guys couldn't read, and those that could wouldn't be wasting a nickel on a newspaper.

  "He was one of the Butchers victims," the reporter said, his smirk gone. "He was one of the first ones found. He had his dick cut off, gents. Balls, too. Cheers." He lifted his beer to them and slurped at it.

  Nobody said a word. Steve seemed to be getting irritated, his face settling into a nasty mask.

  "It would behoove you gents," said the smart-ass reporter, "to help me out if you can. Not only is there a standing reward of some five grand in it for you, it's folks on these very streets of yours that are getting hunted by this monster."

  Nobody said a word. The ceiling fan churned.

  "Florence Polillo used to hang around this joint," the reporter continued, "and I think Eddie Andrassy did, too, whether this apron here remembers him or not." He smiled without sincerity at the bartender and said, "Maybe you weren't working here back then. It's been over a year."

  Steve said nothing; he had stopped polishing the glass, which was shining and filthy.

  "Flo used to hang out with a guy named 'One-Armed Willie,'" the reporter said, mostly to Steve. "Does Willie ever come in here anymore?"

  "No," Steve said.

  "Is he around?"

  "I hear he hopped a freight," somebody down the bar offered.

  The reporter looked at Steve for confirmation, and Steve, with some reluctance, nodded.

  "I'm interested," the reporter said loudly, above the fan, stepping away from the bar, "in hearing about anybody who used to do business with Flo, or was friendly with Flo-man or woman."

  A guy down the bar a ways laughed. "You think the Butcher is a woman?"

  "Could be. Over in London, they figured Jack the Ripper was a midwife, you know. Why, take old Flo herself. She looked sort of like a fullback I know, only the fullback is cuter. Any of you gents want to earn a few bucks, I'm paying for info-and unlike that standing reward, I pay up whether the info leads to an arrest or conviction or not."

  The reporter smiled pleasantly at the bartender and his patrons, downed the remainder of his beer, and swaggered out, swinging his coat over his shoulder.

  "Cocky son of a bitch," the stubbly-faced guy said, still nursing that same goddamn beer.

  "The fucker," Steve said, looking at the door where Wild had disappeared.

  "He should mind his own goddamn business," the stubbly-faced guy said.

  McFarlin gave the man a more careful look. Something was stirring in the recesses of his brain.

  "Did she really used to come in here," the stubbly-faced guy was saying, "that butchered broad?"

  "Yeah," Steve said. "She sure did. She was a sweet ol' hag."

  "Pity she got hacked up."

  "Yeah," Steve agreed. "But she caused me trouble, getting it like that."

  "How so?"

  McFarlin, without being obvious, just out of the corner of his eye, studied the stubbly-faced guy. I know him, he thought. Where do I know him from?

  "Well," Steve was saying, "her buying it like that brought the cops in here like goddamn flies. We had to shut the game down in the backroom, for weeks."

  "Fuck that shit," the stubbly-faced guy said sympathetically.

  "And they messed with our patronage," Steve said with an oddly dignified formality. "Rousting 'em, hauling 'em downtown for questioning. Some of the people who come in here, they got reason to wanna steer clear of the cops."

  "Whores like Flo, you mean?"

  "Yeah," Steve said.

  Somebody down the bar laughed and said, "This place is fairy heaven, after seven."

  Steve scowled at the voice's owner, said, "Go to hell, Pete." He looked at the stubbly-faced guy and said, "We ain't a fag hangout, bud. We just don't figure what hole you wanna stick it in is any of our business, catch my drift?"

  The stubbly-faced guy grinned. "Their money is as good as mine, huh?"

  Steve tried to smile back; it was hard for him. "That's it. It ain't any of our business, in general, is the idea."

  Ness!

  McFarlin damn near spit out his beer. He hoped his face hadn't shown his surprise.

  But he'd be damned if this scummy-looking near-derelict next to him wasn't goddamn fucking Ness himself.

  "Well, that guy Andrassy," Ness was saying, "I hear he was a fag."

  "He was a two-way ghee," Steve said matter-of-factly, nodding, drawing a beer for a customer and taking it to him down the bar. Then he came back and said to the director of public safety, "But Eddie was a good kid."

  And Ness, cool as a cuke (McFarlin had to hand it to the son of a bitch), said, "So he did hang out here, huh?"

  "Yeah. He knew Flo. They weren't thick or anything, but they knew each other. Had, you know… mutual friends."

  "That guy 'One-Armed Willie' the reporter was mentioning, you mean."

  "Yeah," Steve said. "Him and others. Like, you know-Abe Seleyman, the strong-arm guy. And Frankie Dolezal-he's a plasterer who's plastered most of the time."

  Ness laughed, sipped his beer.

  McFarlin was impressed. He hated Ness's guts on general principles, but this was a fine, sneaky piece of police work. Ness was wearing well-worn work clothes, his hair was a brown, dry mop, his face stubbly, his teeth looked scummy. To almost anybody down here, he would be unrecognizable.

  It took a cop like McFarlin to make him, and it had taken him a while. McFarlin had never met Ness, but he had seen him any number of times, and not just in the papers; Ness, on the other hand, would not know McFarlin from Adam. There were scores of cops driven from the force, and only those prosecuted, or the higher-up ones, would have come to Ness's attention individually.

  But it wasn't the role Ness was playing that impressed McFarlin, though he was playing it well; it was the scam of coming in, sitting at the bar, waiting for the reporter to come in and prime the pump, and then sitting back with a bucket and letting the bartender fill it up. Part of McFarlin wanted to shake Ness's hand, but at the same time another part would've like to put a bullet in him.

  "I don't think I know either of those guys," Ness was saying.

  "Well," Steve said, "Abe's a real bastard to a lot of people, but he's always been jake around here. He's been shaking down small merchants in East Cleveland. The cops shut the real protection racket down, so a small-timer like him can make a little chicken-feed racket play, for a while."

  "Nice work if you can get it," Ness said enviously. "This Frankie guy, is he in the same racket?"

  McFarlin continued to be impressed: obviously Ness had heard Steve describe Frankie Dolezal as a plasterer, but was playing dumb to keep the bucket filling up.

  "Naw," Steve was saying, "Frankie's a nice guy. He's kind of a roughneck-I seen him go after somebody with a knife before."

  "Maybe he's the Butcher," Ness said, conversationally.

  "You don't know Frankie," Steve said, actually smiling. "He's a sweetheart. He's got a brother-in-law on the cops, for Christ's sake. Goes to church regular. Works regular, too."

  Ness shrugged, as if he'd lost interest. Finished his beer. Then he had one more, which he drank more quick
ly

  Once Ness had gone, McFarlin sat staring at the door.

  "What's with you, Bob?"

  McFarlin looked at the bartender blankly. He wondered, for a moment, what do. Should he tell Steve who he'd just been blabbing to?

  "Nothing at all, Steve," he said, downed his beer, and headed out to his car.

  Within an hour he was standing before the desk in the office of Sheriff William O'Connell on the fourth floor of the Cuyahoga County Criminal Courts Building, which also housed the jail. The jail, as the sheriff and his people referred to the Criminal Courts Building, was separated from the Central Police Station by a parking lot and a world of bitterness.

  "That goddamn gloryhound!" the sheriff, on his feet, was sputtering, waving a fist. He was a big, fat man with a square head and small dark eyes and, at the moment, a bright red face; he was sweating through his khakis despite the buildings air-conditioning. His office was a moderately-sized affair decorated with awards of civic merit from the various suburban police departments where he had served the public and various gangsters, not necessarily in that order.

  McFarlin knew all too well that the sheriff feared and resented Ness, who the papers were always saying would make a good county sheriff, if he ever got tired of the safety directors post.

  "It was slick, Sheriff," McFarlin said, gesturing, shrugging. "Guys a detective. You got to hand it to him."

  "I hand him shit! That son of a bitch has cost us more money than

  …" Suddenly the sheriff began to smile. He sat back down. His desk was tidy in the way that the desk of a man who does little actual work is tidy.

  "Sit down, Bob," the sheriff said. "Sit down."

  Bob pulled up a straight-back chair and sat.

  "This little Boy Scout bastard," the sheriff said agreeably, "has put his dick on the chopping block. You seen the papers?"

  "Sure," Bob said, not getting it.

  "He's taken over the 'Mad Butcher' investigation personally. Staking his whole goddamn rep on it."

  "Well," Bob said, shrugging again, "you can't deny he's getting in there himself and doing the job.

  The sheriff's face reddened again. "He's a showboat! An arrogant little prick! Doing it himself, out in the field…"

  "From what I overheard," Bob said, "he was doing good-gathering new information, lining up new suspects. He was getting somewhere."

  The sheriff smiled like an evil cherub. "Exactly. And so can we."

  "What?"

  "Get somewhere."

  "I don't follow you."

  "You're not: going to follow me at all." He pointed at his deputy. "You're going to follow Ness."

  "Oh," Bob said, smiling, getting it.

  The sheriff rose and went to a wire-meshed window and looked out, looked across at the Central Police Station and smiled. His small dark eyes glittered.

  "And, Bob-you're going to steal that arrogant little prick's case right out from under him."

  CHAPTER 8

  A knock woke Ness.

  In the darkness, for a moment, he didn't remember where he was; then the stale smell, and the heat, and the rough, scratchy blanket, brought it back to him. He slipped out of the cot-like bed and padded toward the door in his stocking feet-he was sleeping in his socks, despite the heat, because the wooden floor in this rooming-house room was nothing you'd want to lay bare soles upon.

  He didn't know what time it was-he'd left his wristwatch behind, back in the real world-but he'd gone to bed around one A.M., and it was still dark outside.

  So whatever time it was, it was a hell of a time for somebody to come calling.

  Another knock.

  He was standing to one side of the door, questioning the wisdom of going on this mission unarmed, reaching for the chipped pitcher on the washstand nearby, when he heard a harsh whisper from the other side of the door: "For Christ's sake, it's me."

  Wild.

  Ness let some air out, unhooked the eye latch that locked the door, and let the reporter in, He shut and relatched the door, and his hand fumbled across frayed wallpaper and found the light button. A bare bulb above threw weak yellowish light on the small shabby room and its sparse, metallic, institutional-gray furniture.

  "This is a fucking cell," Wild said, pushing his straw fedora back, his eyes wide.

  "Not really." Ness, in his underwear, sat on the cot. "I'd offer you a chair, but there doesn't seem to be one."

  Wild sat next to Ness. "Well, we probably aren't the only guys sharing a bed in this joint tonight. Mind if I smoke?"

  "What, and have you stink up the place?" Ness asked, then smiled and waved his permission.

  Wild lit up and sucked on a Lucky, threw smoke out restlessly, shook his head. "Four nights in this dump. How can you stand it?"

  "I don't mind. Beats hell out of a flophouse crib with a chicken-wire ceiling. Ness paused, then said, "You shouldn't be here, Sam."

  "Well, I'm delivering a message. Merlo wants to talk to you."

  Ness sat up. "Developments?"

  "Think so." Wild shrugged. "He didn't tell me. He doesn't like having a 'newshound' on the team. Anyway, he's sitting in an unmarked car a couple blocks from here, off the main stem."

  He gave Ness directions.

  Ness got up and got his pants and shirt out of a dented metal wardrobe. "You better go on," he told Wild, motioning toward the door with his head. "We shouldn't be seen on the street together."

  Wild stood, smoked nervously, said, "Eliot, you're going to get yourself killed. Why didn't we stick to the original plan, anyway? It was working out fine."

  Stepping into frayed brown pants, Ness said, "I didn't know we were going to hit pay dirt so soon."

  He was referring to the nameless tavern near Central and Twentieth. They had known it was a prime possibility, since Florence Polillo was known to have frequented the place; however, it was to have been only one of many such hellholes that Ness and Wild would hit, using the system Ness had cooked up whereby Wild asked provocative questions, then departed, leaving the already-present, undercover Ness to listen to what was said in the aftermath of the reporters departure, asking questions himself when he could get away with it.

  But discovering that victims Andrassy and Polillo had known each other-a fact that had eluded investigators for over a year-prompted Ness to stick with the nameless bar; and he had taken this room in a nearby two-story brick rooming house to better become an inconspicuous part of the local landscape.

  He and Wild had continued pursuing their routine at other taverns in the areas bordering the Run, particularly the Roaring Third, but only from late morning till around six. Evenings, Ness-alone-would spend leaning against the rail in the seedy joint near Central and Twentieth. The canvassing has slowed down accordingly.

  "Look, Sam," Ness said, bending to tie the laces of his heavy work boots, "I have three good suspects in that bar- and I've struck up conversations with all of 'em. In fact one of them lives right here in this rooming house."

  "Jesus!" Wild said.

  Ness, standing back up, raised a finger to his lips.

  Wild went to the window and sent his cigarette trailing sparks out into the night. Then he turned to Ness, now fully dressed in his threadbare apparel, and said, "You're going to get yourself fucking killed."

  Ness smiled dismissively.

  Wild went to him and stared him down. "You don't even have a goddamn gun."

  "I don't need a gun."

  "Oh, yeah, you know all about that jujitsu stuff. That'll work swell against some crazy asshole with a butcher knife."

  "Nobody knows me around here."

  "Sure, sure. You're in disguise-just like Sherlock Holmes."

  Ness had to wince at that; he'd been an avid Holmes reader since he was a kid. He didn't like to think he was acting out some childhood fantasy here. He preferred to consider this good, solid undercover police work.

  "You got stubble on your face," Wild said evenly, "and you washed the Vitalis out of your hair. You put
some gunk on your teeth, and you slouch, and you swear. But somebody who knows you will make you, my friend."

  "Who would know me down here?"

  "The Butcher."

  Ness moved toward the door. "Merlo's waiting, Sam…"

  Wild was patting the air with one hand, gently. "Eliot, let's not forget that you and the Butcher have something in common."

  Ness laughed shortly. "Such as?"

  "You're both publicity hounds. Now don't give me that look! I'm all for you getting headlines-I've helped out enough, in that line. And I know, I know, it's part of your job to make the papers. It's something you do well. But so does the Butcher."

  The truth of that jabbed sharply at Ness, but he said nothing.

  "He leaves these bodies out in the open, where they are bound to be found eventually," Wild went on, "when he could be disposing of them in such a way that they wouldn't be found-like the heads and hands aren't found, when he doesn't want them to be."

  "Make your point," Ness said.

  "My point is, this guy probably has a goddamn scrapbook of what he's been up to-he may even bump another victim off, or at least pull a body out of his fridge and dump it, when he's stopped getting as much play in the papers as he'd like. See, he likes being the Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run-not just for the butchering, either. For the celebrity."

  "Well, you may have something there."

  "Of course I do. And if he's collecting his press clippings, and believe me he is, he knows all about you declaring private war on him. He hasn't just seen your mug in the papers-he's likely memorized it. He ain't no fool, but you, my friend, are bordering on that condition."

  "If he recognizes me," Ness said, "maybe he'll come to me."

  "Oh, yeah, and cut your head off and go steady with you, till the next idiot comes along."

  "Sam…"

  Wild sighed in frustration, then gave Ness a look so earnest and concerned it surprised them both. "You may also spook your boy. Have you considered that? You might make him take a powder."

  Ness shrugged matter-of-factly. "If he's one of the suspects I've narrowed in on, then he'll give himself away if he runs."

  Wild shook his head, rolled his eyes. "It's like trying to reason with a fucking brick wall."