Priscilla shrugged. “I know,” she said. “Just don’t seem right, is all.”
Rizzo grunted. “Let me explain about that, partner. There is no right. There is no wrong. There just is. ”
She angled the Impala toward Gordon’s, accelerating across the sparsely occupied parking lot.
“Yeah,” she said. “Mike told me about that. Said it was some of the nonsense your old man handed you when you were a kid.”
Rizzo opened the glove compartment and reached for his pack of cigarettes.
“It was my grandfather,” he said. “My old man died when I was nine, so me and my mother and sister moved in with my grandparents. Right here in Bensonhurst, over on Eighty-fourth Street and Seventeenth. Matter a fact, the high school where that guy Jacoby was wavin’ his joint, New Utrecht High, that’s my alma mater.”
“Oh, yeah?” Priscilla asked, parking the Chevy twenty yards from Gordon’s side entrance doors.
Rizzo nodded and undid his shoulder harness. “Yeah,” he said. “I went from high school to the army for four years, then into the NYPD.”
Priscilla put the car into park and shut it down. “I got my associates at Bronx Community, then went on the cops,” she said.
They climbed out of the car, Rizzo spitting out Nicorette and lighting his Chesterfield. They both leaned against the Chevy as he smoked.
“So what made you pick the cops, Cil?” he asked. “With me, it was a family thing. My grandfather was a cop for most of his life. I grew up with it. It was all I ever wanted to do. I was even an M.P. when I was in the Army.”
Priscilla nodded. “Lotsa guys come on the job like that. Me, I was brought up in a pretty fucked-up environment. My mother was wild, drunk, always runnin’ with men.” She turned to Rizzo and smiled sadly. “But I knew this old black beat cop when I was real young. His name was Ted and he always treated me special. Sometimes I would pretend he was my father, bein’ how I never actually knew my real one.” She shrugged. “So I guess, in a way, we got the same reason, kinda a family thing.”
“Yeah, kinda,” Rizzo said. “But, tell you the truth, if I was a kid now, twenty, twenty-one, I’d never wanna come on this job. It’s apples to oranges from when I started.” He looked out over the flat waters of the bay, nestled under the darkened sky and dragged deeply on the cigarette. “Apples to oranges,” he said again, a wistful note in his voice, an unfamiliar tone to Priscilla’s ear.
She nodded. “Lots of old-timers feel that way. Down on the job, sayin’ it’s changed, too political, can’t trust nobody, all that. But, you know what, Joe? It’s the times that’ve changed. Some for the good, most for the bad. But the job has always been good for me. Gave me order, structure. Somethin’ to be proud of. I know it can eat people up and spit ’em out-I’ve seen plenty a that-but if you tough it out, it’s meaningful. It’s real, Joe. Real. ”
Now Rizzo, the wise-guy edge back in his tone when he spoke, patted her arm.
“Yeah,” he said, tossing the cigarette away. “Real. Just keep in mind what my grandfather said. What I say about no right, no wrong. That ain’t nonsense, like you called it. That’s wisdom, kiddo. Wisdom.” He glanced at his watch.
“Now,” he said, his eyes twinkling under the artificial lights of the parking lot. “Lets us go do something meaningful. Somethin’ real. Let’s go lock up this shit-bag.”
Rizzo leaned back casually, resting his shoulders against the stacked boxes behind him. He, Priscilla, the store manager, and a sullen Carl Jurgens were gathered in the stockroom at the rear of Gordon’s Sporting Equipment. After standing in awkward silence for a moment, the manager cleared his throat.
“Well,” he said, glancing from one to another. “I’ll leave you here, then?” The man, tall and thin, in his mid-thirties, smiled at Rizzo. “If this is okay with you, that is. As I said, if you want more privacy, my office is…”
Rizzo held up a hand. “This is fine,” he said. “Thanks.”
“Okay, then,” he said, and left the room quickly, closing the door behind him.
Rizzo folded his arms across his chest and looked at Jurgens.
“So, Carl,” he said in a pleasant conversational tone. “Got any idea why we dropped by to see you?”
The man flushed slightly and avoided eye contact. “No,” he said flatly. “I don’t.”
Priscilla, to the man’s right, said, “Why don’t you tell us where you were on Monday night? Around nine o’clock.”
The man glanced nervously at her, then swung his eyes to Rizzo.
“Sounds like a reasonable question, Carl,” Rizzo said. “Why don’t you answer her?”
Jurgens looked back at Priscilla, a sheen of perspiration glistening on his forehead. He cleared his throat before answering. “Monday? Monday night?” he asked.
Priscilla nodded. “Yeah. Monday night. Columbus Day. ’Bout nine o’clock.”
Jurgens nodded. “Yeah, okay. Monday, Monday night at nine… I was home. With my wife.”
Rizzo eased away from the boxes, unfolding his arms. “Is that right, Carl? Home with the wife?”
“Yeah,” he said, his voice gaining strength. “You can ask her. She’ll tell you.”
Rizzo nodded. “I bet she will, Carl. I bet she will. But you know, your wife might not be gettin’ the whole picture. She may not know that legally, the only right she has is she can’t be forced to testify against you. But she can be charged as an accessory after the fact if she lies to cover for you.”
Jurgens’s flush deepened. “Accessory to what?” he said. “Cover for what?”
Rizzo glanced at Priscilla. She looked quickly to Jurgens, saw the anger stirring. Discreetly, she slipped her cuffs from where they were tucked in her belt at the small of her back.
Rizzo stepped in closer to Jurgens. “Turn around,” he said, his voice deep and threatening. “You’re under arrest.”
Priscilla moved quickly, cuffing first Jurgens’s right hand, then twisting it to meet his left wrist. She snapped on the second cuff, deftly adjusting its grip. Rizzo ran his hands rapidly over Jurgens’s body, keeping his own left leg angled inward to protect his groin.
Jurgens blinked in disbelief, straining against the Smith amp; Wesson handcuffs.
“Under arrest? What the fuck for?” he stammered.
Rizzo reached a hand into Jurgens’s front pants pocket, extracting a six-inch folding knife with a scarred bone handle.
“Two counts of attempted murder, second degree, two counts criminal use of a firearm, two felony counts assault, one misdemeanor count.” Now Rizzo gave a slight smile. “And what ever else the college boy A.D.A. can find in his penal code Cliff notes.”
Jurgens compressed his lips. “I want a fuckin’ lawyer,” he said. “A lawyer!”
Priscilla took the knife from Rizzo. “Okay, Carl,” she said. “We heard you.”
“What’s that?” Rizzo asked Jurgens, indicating the knife.
The man’s eyes darted to the weapon. “That’s my pocket knife,” he said. “I’m a sportsman.”
Rizzo nodded his head. “Yeah, Carl,” he said, taking the man by the arm and turning toward the door. “We already figured that out.”
As they walked him out, Priscilla began Jurgens’s Miranda warning. “You have the right…”
CHAPTER FIVE
It was astonishing, really. After all the fear, apprehension, and doubt, all the painful reflection.
The man grunted with satisfaction. Killing, as it had turned out, came easily to him. It was the simple enactment of a well-conceived plan, oddly not unlike any other plan, financial or professional, for instance, one faced as one’s life progressed.
He looked down at the lifeless mass collapsed at his feet. How strange, he thought, that he had never before realized his capacity.
Imagine, to have lived a lifetime within the confines of his own consciousness and not have been aware of such a rich and useful resource-the ability to kill without remorse, without misguided sympathy, without the inconvenience of weakness or moral dilemma.