“You’re not being arrested. Just detained. For investigation.”
The steward balled his fists. “I want to call my lawyer.”
“Who is he? This Fross?”
“He would take my part. Yes.”
“All right. I was going to call the gent, anyway. Don’t work yourself into a lather. We’ll give you a nice, quiet place where you won’t be disturbed. Until you hear from him.”
He marched the Filipino to the booking desk, gave him into custody, signed the complaint blank. On the line: NATURE OF CHARGE, he told the desk-sergeant to write: possession of narcotics.
“Print him, Charley. Ask Identification to check the whorls with the negatives from that house of ill-fame in Brooklyn. With anything they might have been able to dust out of the Purdo’s kid’s room on Treanor Place. And anything else they’ve got lying around on this suitcase job.”
“You wouldn’t like ’em to use the comparison microscope down at the Federal Bureau, would you, Lieutenant?” The desk-officer made notations on a pad.
“They’ll do that in due course, Charley, I’ll be over at the Tavern, if the Inspector wants me.”
He used the phone book, found Henry Sutlee Fross listed at 40 Wall Street. But he didn’t find him in. The man on the switchboard said Mister Fross was in court, wouldn’t be back until mid-afternoon.
It was beginning to pour when Koski crossed the thirty feet from the white stone building to the Headquarters Tavern on Centre Market Place, — a cold, steady downfall that brought shiny black coats and dripping hats to the racks beside the café door.
Koski found a table near the window across the street from the Hole, where the patrol wagons drove up to empty their hauls. He ordered bean soup, pot roast, home-fried, red cabbage, raisin pie and coffee, — continued to gaze at the purple handwriting on the menu long after the waiter had taken his departure.
He stripped a loose end of cotton from the folded napkin beside his water tumbler. A loose end, he reflected grimly; too many of them, entirely. The Seavett was full of them. Why hadn’t anyone seen Merrill Ovett on the trip across the river from Rodd’s to the Wall Street dock? Why hadn’t Barbara Ovett been more concerned about her husband’s unexpected return, his sudden vanishing? What had been bothering Cardiff when he watched Koski go into Mrs. Ovett’s stateroom? Was there any significance in Frankie’s quick-leave?
There were other bits of unfinished business that rankled in the Lieutenant’s mind. At the Bar-Nothing Ranch, for instance. How had the man with the bandaged face known his victim and the Purdo girl would be there? What knowledge was Big Dommy holding out? What had Claire Purdo known that made it necessary for her to be rubbed out?
There weren’t so many doubtful angles to the Whitehall Street phase of the case, but they might be the most important of all. The son who rebelled at his father’s pattern of life, his shipping out under an assumed name, the high number of sinkings of Ovett vessels, the short-wave apparatus—
He got to his feet, wandered down between the tables. Uniformed men nodded to — him, plainclothesmen swung genial punches as he passed so he had to curve his body out of range in order to protect his ribs. A couple of cameramen inquired if he had any more meat in the refrigerator.
A graying inspector with a napkin tucked up under his chin called out: “I’ve had a councilman Cahill on my neck all morning. Says he’s going to go all the way up to the top if you don’t lay off Dominick.”
“Some day that Greek’ll short-circuit himself good.”
“I told Cahill we had no control over you; you were unpredictable, erratic and we’d be glad when you put in for a pension. But we had to stand for your vagaries because you knew the secret vice of one of the mayor’s cousins.” He gnawed on a lamb-bone. “Cahill will probably start sucking around you, now; get you to use your inside to boost him into a soft spot at City Hall. These two-bit wirepullers!” He mopped his mouth, grinning. “Was Dominick in that thing?”
“All the returns aren’t in yet, Eddie. I’d say Dommy wouldn’t be elected. Thanks.”
He stopped at the cigar counter long enough to read the list of Departmental Transfers pasted on a cardboard; edged into one of the phone booths. It took five cents and five minutes to learn that the Sixth Detective Division was blank on the subject of visitors to Ellen Wyatt’s sail-loft and that the SINBAD message had been telephoned in to the Fulton Street Western Union from a coin-phone.
He got back to the table as Mulcahey came in, shaking himself. “A wild guess chase, entirely, skipper. Joslin was in the midst of admiring friends all day the Sabbath. Unless half the waterfront is committing mass perjury. Still, I will feel better when we have him in tow, again. What are you munching on?”
“Pot roast. Stop spraying the tablecloth. You’re worse than a Saint Bernard after a bath.”
The Sergeant examined the list of dishes. “Eels today. Juicy fried eels, praise be. And a beaker of bock, garsong.” He felt of his lip, wincing. “Say, coach...”
“Say away...”
“Did you happen to gander at the Joslin scar? Would it be farfetched to figure a guy who wanted to commit a felony would wish to hide a marker like that? With a bandage, mayhap?”
“Some such idea did occur to me.”
“It would carry weight with a jury, in my opinion.”
“Why for? You could cover up a hell of a lot of things with a bandage like that. A mustache, for instance. A beard. Or the shape of a face.”
The waiter brought a tray. “Phone for you, Lieutenant.”
“Thanks, Mac.” He laid down his fork, went into the booth. “Koski, here.”
“Nixon. Hate to spoil your repast, but I knew you’d want to know.”
“Bomb away.”
“Eustape Mirando, junkie, license 2714, recovered a portion of a human body from the east bank of the Gowanus Canal about three-quarters of an hour ago.”
“Every little bit, added to what we’ve got.”
“What we’ve got is an arm.”
“Which arm?”
“Left.”
“Just the very thing I wanted, Inspector. How did you know! Tattoo mark on the bicep?”
“Not even a vaccination mark. The upper part of the member was what the Medexam office calls severely lacerated. In other words, all chewed up to hell and gone. Done with a knife, I’d say.”
“Runs to form.” Koski considered. “How about the hand. Any prints?”
“We can get prints from a billiard ball. The skin’s shriveled, of course. But we’ll pump a little embalming fluid in the arteries and bring the lines out a little. If there’s enough left of the arteries.”
“Um! About the prints. When you get them, check around with the others, hah?”
Nixon made a derisive noise. “We’ve got a checking job that would panic a blonde at a night-club cloakroom. I’ve got three of my best boys glued to the eyepieces, classifying Agaroppoulous, Purdo, Johnson,—”
“Who’s he?”
“She. Dora Johnson. Colored maid at Agarappoulous’ den of iniquity, — Johnson, Hurlihan, the shots from Room Five at the Bar-Nothing, from the Purdo place, the Wyatt studio, Merrill Ovett’s apartment and God knows what.”
“Add one minor item. A Filipino by the name of Frankie Salderon. Frankie’s in a pew at the Tombs. Much oblige.”
He went back to the table. “How’re the eels, Sarge?”
“A dish for the duke, no less.” He lifted his glass.
“Attaboy.” Koski drained his coffee, standing. “They found an arm. In the Gowanus. Seems to go with the rest of the jig-saw. Whoever tossed it into the canal made sure we wouldn’t see any tattooing on it, though. It was a busy day with the knife.”