Axel had already told her he had been in prison for a very long time, along with Mackie whom she had met. He had also disclosed the story of my having shot the thug on the steps outside the courthouse, and that we had spent four years together inside. That I had been pardoned and Axel paroled. She seemed unconcerned by any of that. I liked her. But then I expected I would. In prison, Axel always sized up the new cons and new bulls right off and he rarely pegged them wrong. He had made a good choice in befriending Hillie.
By the time dinner was finished I had employed Hillie to go to the Whittaker’s and meet with Charles to go through the information on the old soldiers. I had a hard time explaining to her what I wanted her to look for. Without being sure it would prove true, I told her the old standby adage: you’ll recognize it when you find it. When it came time for her to meet with the nursing home administrator, Axel would go along. I felt certain she could handle it if the people there gave her an even break. Given her youth, I couldn’t be certain she’d be viewed as an adult, so Axel would ease that part of it. Axel also told me that for those few hours Buddha alone could handle keeping an eye on Eddie.
After we got home from dinner, I called Fidge to see if I could meet with him for coffee in the morning. We agreed on eight. I suggested a coffee shop not far from his house. Fidge suggested his kitchen table. By eight-fifteen his two teens would have left for school.
Chapter 20
The morning began at seven with my expanded plan in full blossom. Axel and Buddha were in position ready to tail Eddie Whittaker. I called Charles prepared to apologize for waking him, but it turned out the general had experienced a difficult night and they had both been awake since four. He said the doctor had just left and at the bottom of the stairs had shaken his head and said, “maybe a week, maybe.”
I told Charles that Hillie would be there at ten. Then I called Hillie to get her on her way. She seemed excited for the opportunity to do something akin to what she used to do for her father. I would be meeting with Fidge in a little over an hour to fan the flames on another idea.
*
By eight-fifteen, Fidge’s children were off to school and by eight-thirty I had shared pleasantries with his wife, Brenda. I love that woman. Not in the I-wish-she-were-my-wife kind of way, but in the, I’m-glad-she’s-my-best-friend’s-wife kind of way. She wasn’t gorgeous, but she was sensuous and she loved that big galoot. Fidge had the largest feet of any man I’d ever known. He wore fifteen double EE shoes. I’ve often told him that when he walks he should use those red flags that trucks hang when hauling long loads. His other distinguishing characteristic was a pencil-thin mustache, the kind worn by Boston Blackie, the fictional jewel thief and safecracker who became a private detective in books, movies and a television series. Blackie got a renewed dose of fame in a Jimmy Buffett song, “Oh I Wish I Had a Pencil-thin Mustache, the Boston Blackie kind, then I could solve some mysteries too.” I doubt it was because of his mustache, but Fidge had solved some mysteries too.
While Fidge and I slathered a couple of bagels that Brenda put on the table, he confirmed that Chris Timmons, known in police circles as Chunky, still ran the outside lab the department sometimes used for overflow DNA testing. I could have found that out without going to see Fidge, but I thought we should touch base on his investigation into the murder of Cory Jackson and mine into Ileana Corrigan, the law’s hook into my Eddie Whittaker assignment.
“Yeah,” Fidge said, “the department made the connection between the dead Cory Jackson and his past role in being the claimed eyewitness to the murder of Ileana Corrigan. We just don’t see a link there. Jackson was discredited over ten years ago as a witness against Eddie Whittaker. If somebody out there had gotten pissed about that, they would have put Jackson down a long time ago. I mean, he’s been right here in plain sight all these years.”
He got up and kissed Brenda, then got the coffee pot and two cups from the cupboard and came back to the table, while asking, “You agree, don’t you?”
“I guess. According to his half brother, Jackson does have some history with drugs.”
“Also gambling, small change stuff, but we confirmed he owed the bookies some money. Nothing much, more likely kneecaps, not kill-ya money. Still, you can never be certain about that stuff. The bookie could have rubbed him out to make the point to a bigger better with a bigger past due balance. The Jackson homicide is going through the motions, but we’ve found nothing and even the effort’s fading.”
“Shouldn’t be that way,” I said, “but with the case load you guys carry it happens.”
I went on to tell Fidge about the two million dollar shakedown of General Whittaker to buy Eddie’s original alibi. Fidge hadn’t known it, but he had always wondered about the synchronized timing of the witnesses against Eddie. His arrest, quickly followed by three witnesses who stepped up a few days later to put Eddie in that restaurant, out of the range of the murder, all followed neatly by his subsequent release.
Fidge stroked his chin like he always had while sifting information. I had forgotten about him doing that, but surviving over time is what makes something a habit. “Could Jackson and Tommie Montoya have cooked this up on their own to shake down the general? If so, Montoya might have dropped Jackson to get the entire take for himself, and to eliminate the only person who could rat him out?”
“On paper that could work, but no, I’ve spent time with Montoya, he’s definitely not bright enough to develop the shakedown, likely Cory Jackson isn’t either. If these two guys had raked in two million in cash, there’s no way they could have sat on it and stayed in their dead-end lives for the past eleven years.”
Fidge nodded. “I remember Cory Jackson from back when he claimed he saw Eddie kill the Corrigan woman. That dunce was incapable of brainstorming a fast food dinner, let along that kinda shakedown. He had a taste for drugs then and owed the bookies now. He couldn’t sit on that size bundle for eleven days let alone years.”
“I still feel like someone’s missing from the game, but I can’t put anyone in the empty chair.”
“You still picturing mystical poker games with empty chairs?”
“It’s a way of saying there may be a player we haven’t identified.”
“So, whatdaya got for Chunky?” Fidge asked, while Brenda put her hand on his shoulder to lean in and refill our cups. Talking cases in front of Brenda was nothing new, as a homicide cop’s wife she knew to keep quiet about what she heard.
“You got me to thinking when you said the department ran a paternity test to be sure Eddie was the father of Ileana Corrigan’s unborn son. It got me wondering if the general is his daughter’s poppa.”
“Really? You got anything saying he isn’t?”
“Nope. Just trying to match up my thises and thats. You know the dance. To be the poppa, the general would have procreated late in life-”
Brenda interrupted to ask how old the general would have been.