The Dead Don't Talk Read online

  Then I pushed my arm into the office, reached down, and unlocked the door. Once inside, I put the glass back in place, and used adhesive tape to keep it there in the unlikely case that a guard walked by. I wasn’t a professional. Lucey’s staff would know immediately about the break in, but since they wouldn’t find any materials missing, they might just be confused.

  I walked over to the file cabinets. They no doubt had a lock mechanism that relied on lowering the metal bar down the cabinet’s length so that the drawers could not open.

  I tilted the front of the file cabinet up. It was heavy and I could have used Ari to hold it for me. It was all an education in burglary. As it was, I had no choice. Straining, I held the cabinet up and felt along the bottom on the right side near the front. There it was, the hole. My left arm was tiring, but it wouldn’t take long. I put my finger in the hole and reached in until I could feel the end of the cabinet’s metal rod. I pushed the rod up and heard the locking mechanism release. Then, very happily, I lowered the cabinet and opened the top drawer.

  It was all campaign material. No good.

  The personal stuff was in the third drawer, under some empty folders. I took out a file, sat down, and began reading. If Lucey had paid off the mob for a gambling debt, it wasn’t there. I couldn’t find material that wasn’t already available to Janet and me.

  There were some envelopes that looked interesting because the return address was that of an adoption agency.

  I removed all those envelopes and began reading.

  Pay dirt.

  The agency had declined to allow the Luceys to adopt a child.

  And yet he had one.

  The agency said they would re-consider his request in 1985.

  So how did he get the kid?

  I kept looking, but couldn’t figure it out. This was a job for Cromwell. I’d call him when I got home. He wouldn’t mind being awakened. He owed me. I wrote down the agency name and the name of the guy who had written the letter. I listed the dates of the letters. Cromwell needed to look soon after the last date.

  I was ready to go.

  Then I heard a guard in the hall, so I bent down behind the desk. The door opened, and the guard looked inside for a few seconds. I froze, fearing the glass in the door would fall out. But then the guard closed the door and moved on to the next office.

  The guard in the hall had turned around. What happened to his drinking? Maybe he had seen me through the glass. Maybe he had seen that the glass had been cut. I heard the sound of keys jingling.

  He was coming for me.

  I charged toward the window and opened it. There was a narrow ledge. I crawled outside, stood up, and began walking, careful not to look down. I heard the noise of the guard in the office. I hadn’t been able to close the window behind him, and the guard would look outside in a few seconds and see me. It was time to leap.

  I looked around me. There weren’t buildings nearby. The roof was too high. I might walk along the ledge to get to another office, but how would I get inside? The darkness would help, but only until his eyes adjusted.

  “Hey, you. Stop!”

  I didn’t plan to listen to him.

  It was time to play Tarzan.

  All I saw was a tree. It looked pretty far. If I didn’t reach it I’d be flat on the ground. I could see the headlines: CONGRESSMAN’S SPEECHWRITER DIES IN BURGLARY ATTEMPT AGAINST POLITICAL OPPONENT. Great. On the other hand, if I didn’t jump, the guard would catch me and the headline would still appear. Only I’d be in jail instead of dead.

  Okay, tree, be good to me. Why not stretch your limbs out a bit more? I put my arms out and jumped.

  I grabbed a branch and was dangling in the air. It didn’t help that I had lifted the file cabinet. My arms were burning.

  I pulled myself up into the tree and then slowly went down. At least the guard wasn’t shooting at me.

  I trotted over to where Ari was parked and got in the car, lying flat on the back seat.

  “Get out of here!” I yelled.

  “You don’t look so good.”

  “Out.”

  “I’m going.”

  He drove slowly back to my house.

  Betsy Revere was still up. Without a word, she began boiling some water for coffee.

  I held up my hand.

  “Wait. I haven’t fully returned to the land of the living.”

  I steadied myself, calmed down, and got ready

  Then I picked up the phone and called Cromwell.

  “This better be the lottery,” he said, not too clearly.

  “Almost. It’s Danny Ryle.”

  “God will punish you for waking me up.”

  “Don’t worry, Cromwell. The punishment has already taken place.”

  “You’re a terrible human being, Danny.”

  “That does seem to be the consensus.”

  “And you couldn’t wait until the morning to tell me what I have to do for you because all you did was save me from ten years in jail?”

  “Oh, yes, Cromwell. I did do that. I’d forgotten. My, how much you do owe me.”

  “What is it, Danny?”

  “The Congressman is running against a guy named Ken Lucey.”

  “Yes, Danny. Shockingly, I do read Newsday.”

  “I’m going to give you a date in 1978.”

  “Why are you going to do this?”

  “Because on July 12th of that year, Ken Lucey got a letter saying his request for an adoption had been turned down.”

  “Hold the presses. You want me to call the Times?”

  “Just listen, Cromwell. He was turned down, but miracle of miracles, he did adopt.”

  “Ah. And you want to know where the kid came from.”

  “I’m amazed, Cromwell. All those terrible remarks people make about your intelligence turn out to be untrue.”

  “I don’t know about adoptions.”

  “I’m playing a hunch here. He gets turned down by an agency. He figures other agencies, at least legitimate agencies, will also turn him down.”

  “So he finds himself a pregnant girl. Then he pays her for the kid. You know, Danny, that was more common than you’d think a hundred or so years ago.”

  “I’m just concerned with Lucey.”

  “So I take a close look at who he paid money to.”

  “Yes. Checks is my bet. I don’t think he’d pay cash. She could just leave. He gives her a check and tells her this is proof about what she agreed. Maybe he had a lawyer draw up some contract. I don’t know that. I want to find out what happened.”

  “It won’t take long.”

  “Not with a genius like you working on it, Cromwell.”

  “Shucks.”

  “This afternoon?”

  “With luck. Without luck, Danny, I won’t find anything. People I pay will ask me why Lucey. Obviously I don’t mention you or the Congressman. But what do I say?”

  “You say almost the truth. You say Lucey hired you to see what the Congressman could find if he went looking.”

  “You’re a sneaky man, Danny Ryle.”

  “It’s a survival skill.”

  “I’ll get back to you.”

  I put down the phone.

  It took me a good twenty seconds to fall asleep.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  This time Cromwell woke me up. Ari was out running. Betsy was doing sit-ups. I felt like the weak link in our little group.

  “Hello.”

  “How does it feel, Danny? You’re in a nice dream, under the warm covers. And some guy goes and gets the phone to make its annoying ring. Were you in the next room? It took you a long time to answer.”

  “Tell me you’ve got something, Cromwell.”

  “I am The Great Cromwell. Of course I’ve got something. Even better, you’ll like it.”

  I sat up.

  Betsy stood up. She looked at me and said, “Don’t ask. You want the woman to go fetch a cup of coffee for you.”

  “Hold it, Cromwell.” I looke
d at her. “I didn’t ask.”

  “Your eyes were pleading.”

  “My eyes would have pleaded with Ari as well. And he’s a man.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. Helpless. You are totally helpless, Danny.”

  She went to the stove.

  “I’m back, Cromwell.”

  “Little domestic crisis, huh?”

  “What did you find?”

  “There’s no record of the birth in a hospital. But there is a birth certificate. It was a home birth. This girl must have had the baby in Lucey’s home and just handed the kid over. Got paid for it. Quite a bit as a matter of fact. And Lucey had a birth certificate filed in Smithtown. That’s easy stuff. No one’s going to argue with money. It’s a baby with a home.”

  “And you know this how?”

  “I have copies of checks Lucey made out to a woman named Marilyn Park. Maybe Korean. That’s a popular Korean surname. He paid her every month for the final five months of her pregnancy and then a big payment at the end that matches the birth date on the certificate.”

  “And where is Miss Park?”

  “That I couldn’t do. You have the people for that. I don’t. I can tell you she was twenty-one when she had the baby. So 1978 minus twenty-one and she was born around 1957. So she’s maybe twenty-five or six. Something like that. And maybe she got married. If so, you have to check for marriage licenses. And that will take a bribe. Maybe she didn’t get married.”

  “Good, Cromwell. You have her description?”

  “No. But I’m guessing Lucey wanted someone pretty. Smart if possible. Good health. Not an unseemly sort.”

  “You’ve been hitting the dictionary again, Cromwell?”

  “Hey, I almost made it through eleventh grade.”

  “I should call you Einstein.”

  “I did my part, Danny. Are we almost even?”

  “Sure. I kept you out of prison, and you found a birth certificate. Yeah, I’d say that makes us about even.”

  There was a big sigh at the other end of the phone.

  “Good-bye, Danny.”

  “Good-bye, Cromwell.”

  I hung up and had the coffee.

  “I have an assignment for you, Betsy.”

  “What? Wash the dishes? Vacuum the floor?”

  “That wouldn’t be bad, but what I had in mind was that you try to find a Marilyn Park, age maybe twenty-five.”

  “Is that her married or maiden name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is she from around here?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You really need me, Ryle.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  She sat by the phone and began smiling and dialing.

  I had to consider what to do. The simple answer was to leak the story. I knew the reporters. Suffolk Life would throw a party. There would be very attractive banner headlines.

  But it was a kid. I would ruin Lucey, sure. And we would win. But the kid’s life would be ruined forever. A lot of flashbulbs. A lot of crying.

  Still, I knew my job. I should have at that moment been calling Ennis and telling him. He’d tell the Congressman. And the wheels would start. It would all be over in twenty-four hours.

  Ari came back, said hello, ate some eggs, and began lifting weights.

  It was enough to make me hate him.

  Betsy came over to me.

  “She didn’t get married. She isn’t listed. It took a few calls.”

  “You cops are the best.”

  “Ex-cop in my case. But I still have a few friends.”

  “So where is she?”

  “A waitress. Works in a diner in Centereach. Right on Middle Country Road. You want to go over there and talk to her?”

  “No, not at the moment. We may eventually.”

  “Why are you sitting there? Shouldn’t you have called your office?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  I stood up. “I’m going out to get a sandwich. You want me to bring stuff back for you?”

  “No. I shopped for what I need.”

  Ari stood up.

  “I’ll go with you.”

  “You want to shower first?”

  “I’m ready.”

  “Don’t sit with me at the restaurant.”

  We got to a kosher restaurant I liked in Lake Grove. I ordered a turkey sandwich on rye. A friend of mine told me to put some cole slaw right on the sandwich, a habit I had quickly acquired. I had a Coke with it. Completely ignoring my wishes, Ari sat across from me, enjoying the fullness of the pastrami sandwich he had ordered.

  “The way you’re eating that sandwich, I have to know. Are you sure you weren’t born Jewish?” he asked me.

  “It’s like that old Lenny Bruce line. Everyone in the New York City area is Jewish whether they’re Jewish or not. I don’t think I’m Jewish. I wasn’t raised anything and my parents never talked about religion or where their parents came from.”

  Ari shook his head. “You should ask your father. We all need an identity. But I’m telling you. That sandwich is a clue.”

  We sat in silence. The customers in the restaurant were eating away, chatting over family gossip or politics or baseball. I tried to remove all the noise from my mind.

  I had almost finished the second half of the sandwich when I made up my mind.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Lucey himself opened the door. Ari was in the car. I told him I didn’t want Lucey and me to be disturbed.

  Lucey smiled at me. “Have you come to surrender?”

  “I came to speak with you about an important matter.”

  His face turned serious.

  “Come on in, Danny.”

  I nodded and walked in.

  An older woman was seated in the living room. Lucey’s wife and daughter weren’t in the room.

  “Without trying to be impolite, Mr. Lucey, I think you’d prefer if we spoke alone.”

  The older woman spoke up.

  “You have barely come into the house, young man, and already you have offended me. Do you young people take classes in that?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “I’m not a ‘ma’am.’ I’m Gertrude Lucey. I paid for this house. I paid for a good part of my son’s campaign. I’ve gotten my friends to make large donations. Do you seriously think you could say something that I don’t know?”

  “I don’t know what you know.”

  She made a sound of disappointment.

  “Sit down and have your say. It’s Mr. Ryle, isn’t it? You have quite a reputation, young man.”

  I looked at Lucey.

  He shrugged. He wasn’t going to tell his mother to leave the room.

  “It’s very personal,” I said to him. “About your daughter.”

  “Get on with it,” Mrs. Lucey said. “I want to get back to the book I was reading.”

  Lucey signaled for me to sit down.

  I hadn’t expected this.

  “Mr. Lucey, I am doing oppo research on you. You’re disappointingly clean.”

  “I’m sorry to make your life so difficult, Danny.”

  “And then I found out about your daughter.”

  He was good. No muscles moved in his face.

  “If we’re going to have a serious talk, we need to be honest, Mr. Lucey.”

  “We don’t know what you know,” his mother said.

  “Fair enough. Let me tell you what I know. You wished to adopt. You were turned down by at least one agency that I know of. I suppose I could find several more if you applied to them. You paid a young woman named Marilyn Park to give her baby to you. She did. You managed to get a birth certificate for the child. She lives with you as your adopted child. But she’s not adopted. You got her on the black-market. What you did is illegal. I was told it was once common in this country. I think the police or the voters will find it interesting.”

  “You’re on dangerous ground, Mr. Ryle.”

  “I didn’t realize the truth was dangerou
s ground, Mrs. Lucey.”

  “It can be.”

  “I know where Miss Park is now. I have copies of the checks you made out to her. I can get copies of the letters the agency sent to you rejecting your application. Need I go on?”

  Lucey’s face had fallen apart.

  “What do you expect, Danny? You want me to drop out of the race or you’ll bring these so-called facts to the public?”

  “Mr. Lucey, my job is to destroy you. Politics isn’t for the soft. You should have considered your daughter and your own reputation before you entered the race.”

  Neither Lucey nor his mother said a word.

  “But I won’t win like this. I won’t destroy your family. I won’t harm your little girl. I won’t have her torn from her new mother.”

  “So what are you saying?”

  “Mrs. Lucey, I wanted to tell you that the facts are out there. I don’t know if anyone else will find them. I suspect your son can find a way to make sure no one finds out the information, and he can find some way to legally adopt the girl and backdate that adoption.”

  “Have you told anyone about this?”

  “A very few of my associates know. No one will be speaking.”

  “And you don’t want me to drop out of the race?”

  “I want a tough battle. I won’t let up. I’m going to try to beat you. But you’re a good man. Let the voters decide, not me.”

  “You’re a very surprising young man, Mr. Ryle.”

  “Trying to help a family shouldn’t be surprising, Mrs. Lucey.”

  “And yet it is.”

  Lucey looked at me. “My wife and daughter are upstairs doing their best to rest. I don’t know how to thank you, Danny.”

  “First of all, don’t tell anyone that I was here. That will help. Give us a hard, honest race. And love your daughter.”

  Mrs. Lucey stirred. “Your father, is he that Ryle?”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “You have reclaimed the honor of the name.”

  “It’s a life-long task, Mrs. Lucey.”

  I got up, shook hands with both of them, and went outside. The air had turned chilly.