The detective who went to Gumpy’s in a sports shirt and slacks on the night of July thirteenth was a man who had no connection with the Kramer case at all. In debating who should make the collar, Carella and Hawes weighed in the fact that Hawes had been tailed not two nights before. It was possible, just possible, that the tail would turn out to be the person who had the assignation with Lucy Mencken. And if Hawes had been tailed, was it not likely that other members of the squad had likewise been tailed and could likewise be recognized? They did not want to lose a collar by being spotted for bulls. They chose a man who’d done no legwork on the Kramer case, a man in fact who’d just polished off a burglary and who was waiting for action.
The man’s name was Bob O’Brien. He was a Detective 2nd/Grade. He was Irish clear down to his belly button. Some of the bulls held that the only reason he’d joined the force was so that he’d be able to march in the St. Paddy’s Day parade down Hall Avenue. Actually, O’Brien had joined the force quite by accident. He’d applied for positions as postal clerk, fireman, and cop; he’d passed all three examinations. By pure chance, the police department had called him first, and he’d taken the job.
O’Brien was six feet one inch tall and he weighed two hundred and ten pounds. When you got hit by O’Brien, you sometimes suffered a fractured jaw. The hamhock-hands cliché had been invented to apply to the Irish mitts of Bob O’Brien. He’d been raised in Hades Hole, and had learned the art of street fighting (as opposed to the art of boxing) before he’d cut his second teeth. In those days, O’Brien had been on the opposite side of the law. When you saw a cop coming, you ran like hell. Now, and fortunately for the city, he was on the right side of the fence, using his fists for law enforcement, using his 20/20 vision and his .38 Police Special to excellent advantage.
Bob O’Brien had killed seven men in the line of duty.
He was not a trigger-happy cop. He never used his gun unless he had to. But there are cops who get the dirty end of the stick, cops who are forced to use their gun, and Bob O’Brien was one of those cops. He had killed his first man when he was still a rookie, and the first man he’d killed was a man he’d known. He had still been living in Hades Hole at the time. It was a Saturday morning in mid-August, and O’Brien was off-duty and wearing a pair of swimming trunks under his slacks and sports shirt. He was supposed to meet a few of the fellows on his front stoop. From there the boys would go to the beach. He was, of course, carrying a gun in his right hip pocket. The street was quiet with the hush of a hot summer. O’Brien loafed on the front stoop, waiting for the boys. It was then that Eddie the Butcher came out of his shop with the meat cleaver.
Eddie was chasing a woman. On his face was the crazed look of a man who has lost all touch with his surroundings. O’Brien came off the stoop as the woman rushed by. He stepped directly into Eddie’s path. He had no intention of shooting Eddie.
“What’s the matter, Eddie?” he said gently.
Eddie raised the meat cleaver over his head. “Get out of my way!” he shouted.
“This is Bobby,” O’Brien said. “Now put away that—”
Eddie lunged forward, knocking O’Brien flat to the pavement. With one hand holding O’Brien’s throat, he raised his other hand over his head, and the cutting edge of the meat cleaver gleamed in the morning sunlight. O’Brien twisted onto one hip. The crazed expression was still on Eddie’s face. The meat cleaver was poised above O’Brien’s head. And then it began its shimmering descent. O’Brien, acting reflexively, drew his revolver, and fired. The cleaver dropped from Eddie’s hand, six inches from O’Brien’s face. Eddie rolled over onto the scorching pavement—dead.
That night Bob O’Brien cried like a baby.
And since that time death had hung around his neck like an albatross. Since that time he had been forced to kill six more men in the line of duty. He did not know any of these men, but that was the only difference between them and Eddie the Butcher. Whenever he was forced to kill, Bob O’Brien still wept. Not openly. He wept inside, and that is where it hurts most.
Gumpy’s was jumping that Saturday night. In the space of twenty minutes, O’Brien was approached and propositioned five times. He turned down each proposition. He felt only pity for Gumpy’s clientele, and so he turned down each proposition with a simple shake of his head. The people he despised were those who came to watch the display.
At eight ten, Lucy Mencken arrived.
She seemed quite flustered, quite beyond her depth. She sat at a table in the corner and instantly surveyed the room. The man in the brown sharkskin suit had not yet arrived. She ordered a drink and waited. O’Brien ordered a drink, which he did not touch, and he, too, waited.
At eight twenty-five the man in the brown sharkskin suit entered the bar. A copy of the Times was rolled under his right arm. He looked around, his eyes passing over Lucy Mencken and then the rest of the room. Then he went to sit at her table. A few words passed between Lucy and the man.
O’Brien got off the bar stool. Casually he walked to the table. Casually he caught the man’s brown sharkskin sleeve with his right forefinger, twisting the sleeve, capturing the man’s wrist in a makeshift handcuff.
“Police,” he said flatly. “You’re coming with—”
The man started to get out of his chair. O’Brien very casually hit him. The clientele of Gumpy’s started an ungodly shriek.
“Go home, Mrs. Mencken,” O’Brien said. “We’ll take care of him.”
Lucy Mencken surveyed O’Brien with a hard, flat stare. “Thanks,” she said, “you’ve just ruined my life.”
THE MAN IN THE sharkskin suit was Mario Torr.
In the Interrogation Room of the 87th Precinct, he said, “This is false arrest. I don’t even know why I’m here.”
“We know why you’re here,” Carella said.
“Yeah? Then suppose you tell me why. I’m an honest citizen. I’m gainfully employed. I stop into a place for a brew, I see a pretty dame, I try to pick her up, and next thing I know I’m getting the rubber hose.”
“Has anybody laid a finger on you, Torr?” Hawes asked.
“Well, no, but—”
“Then shut your mouth and answer the questions!” Meyer snapped contradictorily.
“I am answering the questions. And somebody did lay a finger on me. That lousy big Irish bastard who put the collar—”
“You resisted arrest,” Carella said.
“I resisted, my ass. I just got out of the chair. He didn’t have to hit me.”
“What were you doing in Gumpy’s?” Meyer asked.
“I told you. I stopped in for a brew.”
“Do you always go to fag joints?” Carella asked.
“I didn’t know what kind of a joint it was. I passed it, so I stopped in for a brew.”