Reversible Error Read online

  Bloom began to speak. Like many men who enjoy the sound of their own voices and have the confidence attendant on a captive audience, he was not succinct. There was a good deal of “this great city” and “this scourge of drugs that is sapping the vital energy” and “citizens working together for the common good.” Wharton took, or seemed to take, voluminous notes. Karp doodled idly on the pad placed before him, while his mind drifted.

  His eyes lit on Reedy. He knew the man slightly by reputation, as someone who had made a lot of money in the sixties and continued to grow richer in the various ways that lawyers can grow rich in New York. He was on committees. He owned a good deal of property in Harlem and was a close political ally of Marcus Fane.

  He looked the part: a square, ruddy Irish face, a big nose, a broad brow, a humorous twist to the mouth, shrewd blue eyes. He looked up and met Karp’s stare. There was a moment of sizing up; Karp felt he was being explored by an intelligence both cynical and amused. His eyebrow twitched upward a fraction, his eyes rolled slightly toward Bloom and then up toward the ceiling: the universal facial gesture signaling that one is suffering a bore.

  Bloom ran down at last. “And now, I’d like to turn the gavel over to my very dear friend Rich Reedy. Rich has done so much, so much for the people of this city. I’m just tickled to death that he’s gone ahead and volunteered his valuable time to help us out in this so important undertaking. Rich?”

  Reedy cleared his throat and spoke in a pleasant tenor voice. “Thanks, Sandy. I don’t have much to say. I’m flattered myself to have been asked to serve. I see our role, mine and Congressman Fane’s, mainly as support, getting the word out to the community that something’s being done to clean up this mess, to stop these monsters from thinking they can flout the law and kill with impunity on our streets.

  “That, and generally overseeing the conduct of these cases, so that citizens can believe that the … processes of the law retain their integrity. The police, the courts, and so forth. Right now we’re in the early stages. It’s a police matter, so let’s hear from the police.”

  He turned and looked across the table at Manning. Manning glanced briefly at his partner and said, “All right, as many of you know, we finally have an arrest in one of these killings. A man named Tecumseh Booth. The police picked him up night before last. He’s got a long sheet. He was spotted at the scene of the crime by an informant. Right now we’re keeping him on ice; maybe when he sees we’re serious about this he’ll want to talk.

  “On the other seven murders—not much, but we have people working on them. We have other likely victims—major traffickers—under surveillance. Sooner or later somebody’s going to make a mistake.”

  Manning spoke further about the details of the surveillance operation, what resources were being applied to it, and then summarized the circumstances of the eight killings, focusing mainly on the most recent one. “We think we have some real chances with the Joker Brown hit. It’s fresh, anyway. We got a witness says he saw Brown talking to a black male shortly before he disappeared.”

  “That sure narrows it down,” said Hrcany, as if to himself. All eyes turned his way.

  “Did you have a comment, Roland?” asked the D.A.

  “No … actually, yes, I did have a comment. I didn’t catch the charge on this Booth

  guy.”

  “Charge?” asked Manning.

  “Yeah. What did you charge him with? Intentional murder? Driving without a license … what?”

  A barrage of looks was exchanged around the table. Papers were thumbed through. Finally Manning said, “We actually haven’t decided yet. It depends.”

  Karp spoke up. “Another point of clarification, Detective Manning: are you or Detective Amalfi the arresting officer here?”

  “No.”

  “But the arresting officer was in your squad? Or out of your precinct?”

  Manning paused for several seconds before replying. “Not exactly. An associated unit.”

  “An associated unit,” Karp repeated. “Does this associated unit have a name?”

  Manning slowly pulled out a small loose-leaf pad and paged through it. “Detective Maus was the arresting officer,” he said.

  “That’s interesting,” said Karp. “And since Maus doesn’t work for you, he works for … ?”

  Manning paused again, waiting for someone to say something. No one did, so he said, “Ahh … Lieutenant Fulton, over at the Two-eight.”

  “Thank you,” said Karp. “That’s what was confusing me. I was wondering why Lieutenant Fulton was not present, since I was given to believe that he had been placed in charge of the dope-dealer murders.”

  Dwight Hamilton now spoke for the first time. He had an elegant voice, quiet but nevertheless commanding attention. “Fulton won’t do.”

  “What does that mean, Mr. Hamilton?” asked Karp.

  Hamilton smiled sadly and shook his head and said, “I’m very much afraid you’ll have to get that from the police, Mr. Karp.”

  Karp had turned inquiringly toward Manning, when Bloom said peevishly, “Would you please tell me what’s going on here? Why are we getting bogged down in these details? Let’s stick with the big picture, people!” He might have said more, had not Wharton leaned over to him and begun whispering rapidly behind his cupped hand, like a Shakespearean villain.

  Karp resumed his conversation with Manning. “Detective, can you illuminate us here? Why won’t Fulton do?”

  Manning shrugged. “Hey, I just go where they send me, boss. Maybe they think Fulton is unreliable. There’s a lot of money floating around up there, around drugs. Maybe some of it ended up in the wrong place.”

  “Who’s ‘they,’ exactly? Is there an active investigation now on Lieutenant Fulton?” Karp snapped back.

  “That would be confidential information,” said Manning.

  “Fine,” said Karp “Let’s talk about nonconfidential information, then. Our prisoner, Booth. My colleague here asked a question about the legal situation with respect to Booth. What’s the charge, and what’s the evidence?”

  Bloom broke in again. “Butch, could we move on? All these legal games can be dealt with later.”

  “Oh, legal games? Sorry, I thought legality was the point of this operation. But since you bring up ‘games,’ I’d like to have a turn. See if anyone remembers this one: in all criminal prosecutions the accused shall have a right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law; and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor; and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense. Ring a bell?”

  Bloom relieved himself of a small chuckle. Wharton assumed a pitying grin. No one responded, and Karp went on. “What I’ve heard here is that somebody has been arrested and imprisoned for going on forty-eight hours without a charge, and without, to my knowledge, anybody from the D.A.’s office interviewing him, or even being informed of the arrest—”

  “Hold on, Butch,” Bloom spluttered. “I was informed.”

  “Right, I forgot. So you’ve personally interviewed the prisoner and determined that there’s sufficient evidence to support a charge under law? No? Gosh, that’s a shame. Because when I call Tom Pagano over at Legal Aid and tell him that we’re holding a prisoner who hasn’t even seen a D.A., much a less a defense lawyer, and is being held without charge, God knows what kind of shit is going to hit the fan!

  “Besides which, we have omitted to invite either the arresting officer on our big breakthrough, or his superior, and we have hanging in the air an innuendo against the reputation of that superior, who happens to be one of the most decorated members of the NYPD.”

  “Fulton’s dirty,” said Manning flatly.

  Karp turned on him, eyes narrowing, and met Manning’s defiant gaze. “Is he? Are you from Int
ernal Affairs?”

  Manning smiled. “You know I wouldn’t tell you if I was.”

  “No, you seem like a pretty tight-lipped guy,” said Karp. He was about to go on, but something nagged at him—the last conversation he had had with Clay Fulton. Fulton was certainly not himself. Could it be true? It took some of the steam out of him. Damn Fulton! Why hadn’t he kept in touch?

  Reedy jumped into the tense silence. “What we have here, it seems to me, is an example of why we need this task force. There’s an accusation in the air, unfounded maybe, but there it is. There may be others. We’re all grown-ups here. I don’t think it implies any disrespect for the police department to say that corruption has been a problem, especially in the drug area. We also see what happens when there isn’t coordination. Everybody starts playing their own game, running their private systems, their private deals.

  “Let’s start over. We have a suspect. Obviously, the thing to do is what Mr. Karp has suggested so eloquently—bring him into the compass of the law, but at the same time being conscious of the need for the utmost security. I’m sure the business about who’s running the police end can be straightened out by consultations with the NYPD at the highest levels. But above all, let’s keep talking to each other! I trust that will suit both Mr. Karp and Detective Manning?”

  Karp had to admit it was smoothly done. He met Reedy’s eye and saw once again that amused twinkle. What Reedy had said made a certain amount of sense, given the information Karp now possessed. Besides that, he had realized (somewhat to his surprise) that he wanted Reedy to see him as a reasonable man. He nodded and said, “Sure,” and so did Manning.

  That essentially wound up the meeting, except for some administrative details. Karp left Hrcany to deal with those, and went out to wait for the elevator. As he watched the lights, he felt someone come up behind him. It was Reedy.

  “That was quite a performance,” Reedy said. “Do you have the whole Constitution by heart, or just the Bill of Rights?”

  Karp grinned and replied, “Still working on it. I think you might’ve been the only guy in that room who got the reference, God help us.”

  “I’m afraid you’re right. Sandy, dear man that he is, is something of a dim bulb in the legal firmament. And he does go on!”

  The car arrived and they stepped in. Karp said, “I’m surprised you think so. To hear him talk up there, you’re like his closest friend.”

  Reedy laughed lightly. “Anybody Sandy is with at the moment is his closest friend. He likes to be liked. As for me, I agree with Moliere, ‘the friend of all the world is not to my taste.’” He paused. “Nor to yours either, I’ve been told.”

  “Yeah? Let’s just say that the district attorney and I have had some professional differences over the years.”

  “He’s no Phil Garrahy, that’s for sure,” said Reedy sadly.

  “Who is?” Karp replied, recording, as he was meant to, that Reedy was one of the select group who had known that Francis Garrahy liked his friends to call him Phil. The elevator door opened. Karp turned and extended his hand. “This is my floor. Nice meeting you, Mr. Reedy.”

  Reedy returned the handshake warmly and then placed his finger on the door-hold button. Karp paused in the elevator doorway. Reedy said, “I’ll tell you what—Butch, is it?—I’d like to buy you lunch. We can talk about the Constitution and other things of mutual interest. How about tomorrow, noon?”

  “OK,” said Karp after the briefest pause, intrigued by what had turned out to be an odd twist to the morning’s doings. And at least Reedy hadn’t said “Call my girl.”

  “Is the Bankers’ Club all right?” asked Reedy. Karp was about to make a smart remark, when someone hailed him from the corridor. It was a small fat man of about forty-five, with a sallow homely face, big ears, thinning black curls, and a mouth of prodigious width from which stuck the stump of one of those dense black cigars known in the city as guinea stinkers. He was wearing a red tie and red suspenders that strained to their limit against the hard gut that protruded over his belt line. Numerous reddish stains specked the white acreage between his tie and his suspenders.

  “I’ll be there,” said Karp to Reedy, who smiled again and released the door. To the fat man he said curtly, “What is it, Guma?”

  Guma waggled his hand as if it were loose and hanging by a thread from his wrist. “Ooooh! He’s got the rag on today! What happened, another tiff with our glorious leader, the scumbag?”

  “You got spaghetti sauce on your shirt, Goom,” said Karp. The transition from trading quips with Richard Reedy to kanoodling around with Raymond Guma was proving hard for him to handle. Was he just a hair embarrassed about Guma? Was there something mocking in Reedy’s farewell smile?

  “It’s marinara sauce and I wear it like a badge of honor,” replied Guma, lifting his chins proudly. “You’re marrying a guinea, you should get used to it. Who was the suit on the elevator?”

  “Guy named Reedy. The scumbag, as you call him, has him working on these drug killings, some cockamamie task force. Interesting guy, by the way. He’s buying me lunch.”

  “Yeah? He’s gonna eat pizza off the truck?”

  “Uh-huh. I’m gonna see if he’ll spring for two slices with pepperoni. Let him show a little class.”

  “Ah, these white-shoe types are all dick-heads. You know, you shouldn’t be seen with guys like that. People might start thinking you’re selling out.”

  Karp looked pointedly at his watch. “Thanks for the advice, Goom. You wanted to see me about something.”

  “Yeah, speaking about fucking Italians. Petrossi fishtailed on us.”

  “What! When was this?”

  “Hearing this morning. We had it worked out he would plead guilty on the intentional murder charge and we’d drop the felony murder charges for the other two guys who were killed at the scene. Now he says he wants a trial. I guess he got to thinking why take fifteen, twenty in Attica for free. He could be in there a real long time if we convicted him on all three counts, but he could also beat it entirely and walk.”

  “Not a fucking chance!”

  “We think so, but there’s no law against the asshole betting on the come. That’s what makes Vegas. Meanwhile …”

  “Yeah, we got a trial we didn’t expect. But you should be in good shape—you’re prepped and all.”

  Guma inspected his feet and said hesitantly, “Yeah, that’s what I wanted to see you about. I’m really strapped here, Butch. I got the Rubio Valdez trial, the world-famous burglar and amateur lawyer wants his twenty-third trial. I got that abduction thing from Washington Heights, I got to go on the appeal in Bostwitch—”

  “Goom, what is this shit?” Karp cut in. “This is a multiple homicide. It’s your case. The kids can handle fucking Valdez.”

  “Um, and also there’s the judge in Petrossi. Judge Kamas.”

  “Who? Oh, yeah, the new one they got to replace Birnbaum. What’s wrong with her?”

  “Nothing, but … ah, there’s a conflict, with me. I mean, I know her.”

  “Yeah, she’s a judge, of course you know … Oh, you mean outside. She’s a friend of yours?”

  “Ehhm … somewhat more.”

  Slowly Karp’s eyes widened and he placed his hands carefully over his ears. “I don’t want to hear this, Guma.”

  “Butch, it was fate. How the fuck was I supposed to know she was going to be moved into Supreme Court? She was a Family Court judge. We met in a restaurant, for Chrissakes.”

  “I can’t believe this. You’re schtupping the judge in Petrossi. But now she knows you’re her ADA. What’d she say?”

  “Well, to tell the truth, she doesn’t know. That’s the point. That’s actually why I can’t do the trial. Look, it’s a long boring story …”

  Karp casually wrapped a long finger around one of Guma’s suspenders and said, “Bore me, Mad Dog, I think I need to hear it.”

  “Butchie, believe me, someday we’ll laugh about this whole business. Anyway, the thi
ng of it is, we met in this restaurant, we fell into this conversation about her kid’s teeth—she’s divorced, right?—a common interest there, and I was giving her all this advice because of what I went through with my kid’s teeth. I mean, did you ever see her? Kamas? Forty years old, but a terrific body, you know?

  “Anyhow, we were making good progress, a couple, three drinks, and then she says, gosh, you must be an orthodontist, and—so help me, Butch, I didn’t think—I pulled out this card I happened to have on me and gave it to her. Yeah, I am an orthodontist, ha-ha, et cetera, et cetera. So she thinks I’m him.”

  “Who, Guma?” asked Karp, fearing he already knew the answer.

  “Well, remember when Marlene was nice enough to refer me to her brother John … ?”

  “Oh, that’s a relief!” said Karp, his hands clenching stiffly before him, his voice rising. “There’s no problem, then. You’re fucking the judge in what is probably the most famous and press-ridden murder case in the last six months, and you told her that you were my future brother-in-law. It’s perfect. Guma, just tell me one thing: most guys only got one cock to worry about. How come I got to concern myself with yours?”

  Guma said, “C’mon, Butch, that’s not fair.”

  “No, you’re right. My apologies. I’ll calm down in about a fucking week!”

  “So I’m off the case?”

  “Yeah, Goom, go play with the burglars.”

  “Who you gonna give it to? Be a shame to blow it at this late date.”

  Karp gritted his teeth and took a long, slow breath. He patted Guma softly on the shoulder. “Goom,” he said, “you’re … a one of a kind. Don’t worry, I’ll think of something.”

  Two hours later, his mood in no way improved, Karp was sitting in front of a gigantic desk in a gigantic office on the fourteenth floor of police headquarters. Across the desk was a smallish man wearing a neat blue suit and hard blue eyes, who looked enough like Karl Malden to use his American Express card. The man’s name was William Denton, and he was the chief of detectives of the New York City Police Department.