“This is bullshit. You-”
The woman snapped, “Shut up and listen.” She explained: They set up a sting in Hanny’s bar. The private eye pretended to be a scam artist from Florida selling stolen boats and their older son played a young guy from Jersey who’d been duped out of his money. This got Ricky’s attention, and he talked his way into the phony boat scam. Staring at Schaeffer, she said, “We knew you liked boats, so it made sense that Ricky’d try to set you up.”
The husband added, “Only we needed some serious cash on the table, a bunch of it-to give you losers some real incentive to betray each other.”
So he went to T.G.’s hangout and asked about a hooker, figuring that the three of them would set up an extortion scam.
He chuckled. “I kept hoping you’d keep raising the bidding when you were blackmailing me. I wanted at least six figures in the pot.”
T.G. was their first target. That afternoon the private eye pretended to be a hit man hired by T.G. to kill Schaeffer so he’d get all the money.
“You!” the detective whispered, staring at the wife. “You’re the woman who screamed.”
Shelby said, “We needed to give you the chance to escape-so you’d go straight to T.G.’s place and take care of him.”
Oh lord. The hit, the fake Internal Affairs cop… It was all a setup!
“Then Ricky took you to Hanrahan’s, where he was going to introduce you to the boat dealer from Florida.”
The private eye wiped his mouth and leaned froward. “Hello,” he said in a deeper voice. “This’s Malone from Homicide. ”
“Oh fuck,” Schaeffer spat out. “You let me know that Ricky’d set me up. So…” His voice faded.
The PI whispered, “You’d take care of him too.
The cold smile on his face again, Shelby said, “Two perps down. Now we just have the last one. You.”
“What’re you going to do?” the cop whispered.
The wife said, “Our son’s got to have years of therapy. He’ll never recover completely.”
Schaeffer shook his head. “You’ve got evidence, right?”
“Oh, you bet. Our older son was outside of Mack’s waiting for you when you went there to get T.G. We’ve got real nice footage of you shooting him. Two in the head. Real nasty.”
“And the sequel,” the private eye said. “In the alley behind Hanrahan’s. Where you strangled Ricky.” He added, “Oh, and we’ve got the license number of the truck that came to get Ricky’s body in the dumpster. We followed it to Jersey. We can implicate a bunch of very unpleasant people, who aren’t going to be happy they’ve been fingered because of you.”
“And, in case you haven’t guessed,” Shelby said, “we made three copies of the tape and they’re sitting in three different lawyers’ office safes. Anything happens to any one of us, and off they go to Police Plaza.”
“You’re as good as murderers yourself,” Schaeffer muttered. “You used me to kill two people.”
Shelby laughed. “Semper Fi… I’m a former Marine and I’ve been in two wars. Killing vermin like you doesn’t bother me one bit.”
“All right,” the cop said in a disgusted grumble, “what do you want?”
“You’ve got the vacation house on Fire Island, you’ve got two boats moored in Oyster Bay, you’ve got-”
“I don’t need a fucking inventory. I need a number.”
“Basically your entire net worth. Eight hundred sixty thousand dollars. Plus my hundred fifty back… And I want it in the next week. Oh, and you pay his bill too.” Shelby nodded toward the private eye.
“I’m good,” the man said. “But very expensive.” He finished the scone and brushed the crumbs onto the sidewalk.
Shelby leaned forward. “One more thing: my watch.”
Schaeffer stripped off the Rolex and tossed it to Shelby.
The couple rose. “So long, detective,” the tourist said.
“Love to stay and talk,” Mrs. Shelby added, “but we’re going to see some sights. And then we’re going for a carriage ride in Central Park before dinner.” She paused and looked down at the cop. “I just love it here. It’s true what they say, you know. New York really is a nice place to visit.”
THE NEXT BEST THINGBY JIM FUSILLI
George Washington Bridge
He was a nasty bastard and everybody knew it, but she fell for him anyway. He had blue, blue eyes and he knew how to take his time and, of course, she loved the way he played piano. She thought everybody loved the way he played piano.
She didn’t know he’d been run out of Kansas City and that he worked in Jersey because he couldn’t cut it on 52nd Street, up at Minton’s or at the Café Bohemia in the Village. One time, she followed him to Broadway, knowing Bud Powell was playing Birdland, and she cozied up to him at the bar between sets and slid her hand onto his broad shoulder. He turned hard, his face going blank with a pure, powerful rage. Taking it simple, figuring he didn’t want her catching him doing something or hearing something he didn’t want her to know, she slid off the stool, pushed through the chattering crowd and walked back downtown, and she never asked why. She was learning it was better to let him be.
They were in Hell’s Kitchen, and she wore a slip, and his scent surrounded her like mist, and one evening she said, “Maxie, do you ever-”
“No,” he said as he brushed his shoes. Maxie put on his shoes before his trousers, and she liked that too.
Later, he slipped the straight razor into its leather sheath, dusted his face and neck with Pinaud talc, and headed out to Port Authority for the 8:05 bus to Fort Lee. Three sets at the Continental Lounge for six bucks a night and whatever ended up in the brandy snifter. He would’ve done better in tips if he wasn’t such a nasty bastard. He had those blue, blue eyes.
Maxie had his shot, but it didn’t take, and soon he was just another guy with his hat in his hand.
He wasn’t going to get a gig in New York City. He knew that before he caught the train. His old man called it from the day Maxie was born. A gristled rail, an Okie to his soul, he used to sit by the Franklin stove, wind whistling through the shack, and as firelight danced on his sorrowful face, he’d say, “Man was born to fail, son. There ain’t no way around that.”
Thumbing, he made his way to Missouri, thinking it’d be all right. But Bird told him kindly he couldn’t play, so he hustled and found work with the Benny Walters band, passing through K.C., their pianist coming down with shingles. But soon every musician and big-time booking agent was hearing how Maxie had taken off Bippy Brown’s left ear with a.22. Bippy had a mouth on him, but it was Maxie who got the gate, Benny bouncing him in a diner outside Chickasha. Maxie could’ve walked home.
He’d arrived at Pennsylvania Station with thirty-eight cents in his pocket, figuring if he was going to fail, he’d make it look like he failed at the top.
Big, big city, he thought, as he stepped into the sun, catching a breeze from the IND running below. Buzz buzz buzz, and he looked up at the Empire State, and then at the Western Union Telegraph building in the distance. Yeah, a real metropolis, he thought, as he spit through his teeth onto Eighth Avenue. They got a bank on every corner.
A merciless winter and he caught a cold, and she made him hot lemonade and brought a therapeutic lamp to his two-room flat.
By then, he was set at the Continental, and she thought he’d hung the moon.
He’d sleep until 11 and walk until supper, and sometimes she’d eat with him. He liked the steam-table dives, so she said she did too.