Outwardly, Nelle nodded she was hearing Parker out. Inwardly, Nelle listened. Listened to strangled screams, which came from two tortured women. Scarred women, viciously raped. Left for dead or headed-to-getting-there by Parker’s heinous henchmen.
Just as her surrogate uncle, Doc Nelson – former bootlegging partner of her deceased mother, Eastern seaboard’s daring Angel Towse – had informed her one of the New Orleans maimed ladies had lived and named names… he coolly counseled to play these three, stretch for time while he arranged to send over a keep-quiet medical man. One from the old bootlegging gang. One packed for pressure moments and how to break them in.
Indeed, Nelle kept cool. Kept undecipherable eyes pinned on Parker. Cringing inside though at vile sexual crimes against women was hot, hotter than -
Nelle put thoughts on hold to better to get hold of current situation. “There’s more to that article, right Ford? G’head. Read it out. Lemme get their facts straight ‘fore I figure how best to convey yours.” She plopped absorbed nonchalance to her chair. Pulled canary yellow pad closer to ruby red manicure. Poised her Parker fountain pen, smiling at the irony. Nodded him to read on.
Nelle Callahan wrote notes, though not pertaining to what Parker read. Should something happen to her in crossfire sure-as-shooting to ensue – (Smiled at puns popping, even at terse times) – she was going to identify two hard-core rapists who thought they’d outrun terrors they’d ravaged. She did. Signed. Dated. That would hold them up until justice caught up. Sometimes the most you can do is the least you can do.
Ford Parker’s articulate voice orated his pre-condemning article. Nelle had no idea how he got fingered for this, but it didn’t look good:
“Brussel was a Freudian. He lived on Twelfth Street, in the West Village, and smoked a pipe. In Mexico, early in his career, he had done counter-espionage work for the F.B.I. He wrote many books, including “Instant Shrink: How to Become an Expert Psychiatrist in Ten Easy Lessons.”
Finney put a stack of documents on Brussel’s desk: photographs of unexploded bombs, pictures of devastation, photostats of F.P.’s neatly lettered missives.
“I didn’t miss the look in the two plainclothesmen’s eyes,” Brussel wrote in memoir-notes, “Casebook of a Crime Psychiatrist.” “I’d seen that look before, most often in the Army, on the faces of hard, old-line, field-grade officers who were sure this newfangled psychiatry business was all nonsense.”
He began to leaf through the case materials. For years, F.P. had been fixated on the notion that Con Ed had done him some terrible injustice. Clearly, he was clinically paranoid. But paranoia takes some time to develop. F.P. had been bombing since 1940, which suggested that he was now middle-aged. Brussel looked closely at the precise lettering of F.P.’s notes to the police. This was an orderly man. He would be cautious. His work record would be exemplary. Further, the language suggested some degree of education. But there was a stilted quality to the word choice and the phrasing. Con Edison was often referred to as “the Con Edison.” And who still used the expression “dastardly deeds”? F.P. seemed to be foreign-born.
Brussel looked closer at the letters, and noticed that all the letters were perfect block capitals, except the “W”s. They were misshapen, like two “U”s. To Brussel’s eye, those “W”s looked like a pair of breasts. He flipped to the crime-scene descriptions. When F.P. planted his bombs in movie theatres, he would slit the underside of the seat with a knife and stuff his explosives into the upholstery. Didn’t that seem like a symbolic act of penetrating a woman, or castrating a man-or perhaps both? F.P. had probably never progressed beyond the Oedipal stage. He was unmarried, a loner. Living with a mother figure. Brussel made another leap. F.P. was a Slav. Just as the use of a garrote would have suggested someone of Mediterranean extraction, the bomb-knife combination struck him as Eastern European. Some of the letters had been posted from Westchester County, but F.P. wouldn’t have mailed the letters from his home town. Still, a number of cities in southwestern Connecticut had a large Slavic population. And didn’t you have to pass through Westchester to get to the city from Connecticut?
Brussel waited a moment, and then, in a scene to become legendary among criminal profilers, he made a prediction:
“One more thing.” I closed my eyes because I didn’t want to see their reaction. I saw the Bomber: impeccably neat, absolutely proper. A man who would avoid the newer styles of clothing until long custom had made them conservative. I saw him clearly-much more clearly than the facts really warranted. I knew I was letting my imagination get the better of me, but I couldn’t help it.
“One more thing,” I said, my eyes closed tight. “When you catch him-and I have no doubt you will-he’ll be wearing a double-breasted suit.”
“Jesus!” one of the detectives whispered.
“And it will be buttoned,” I said. I opened my eyes. Finney and his men were looking at each other.
“A double-breasted suit,” said the Inspector.
“Yes.”
“Buttoned.”
“Yes.”
“Fordham Paarcházková,” Nelle interrupted, “you always dress to-the-nines. Like a dandy, you preen attention. You express literary flair. Why, you still keep your address as mama’s boy – ”
“Like I said when I stumbled into your tacky office with the classy Aubusson – Can it, Nelle! What you know and what flatfoots swarming New York and New England have dug up is precisely that. My history’s my history and when delved through time, precedes me. But these event dates – particularly West 64th, Grand Central, Radio City – You’re my alibi, Babe. Got no grumbles with payin’ electric bills either, both my mother’s and when holed up in a bonafide apartment, kinda like when we – ”
“Can it yourself, comrade,” Nelle cut in. “Much as I hate to be the damsel coming to de-distress your distress, I’ll vouch what you need vouching for.” She paused, considering her former mentor. “Jim’s good though. He’s on to someone, somewhere. I think the boys-in-blue just read his call wrong.” She up-and-down eyeballed Ford’s chest, took note of dark splotches splotching splotchier than when he’d first struggled in. “So this explains the flashy vintage uniform look you’re sporting now, Ol’ Sport? How’re you strutting official stuff now? Major? Lieutenant?”
Nelle’s laugh spiraled to cover sounds climbing the back staircase. “Forgive me if I don’t deliver a snappy salute.”
Doc Matty Heltone didn’t knock. No need to. Door was open. He came in with a raised shotgun and a battered black leather bag. Threw off Jasper Brattleboro and Harvey Highwater for just a split. Fast enough though, those boys were up. Rugged. Action-ready. Chairs toppled, but guns steady.
Ford Parker signaled his men to chill. “S’all right. Nelle did good. I’m real acquainted with Doc. Heltone’s seen plenty rough action himself. He’ll fix me up.” He peered at the grizzled force leaning in before him. Nodded recognition to knowing eyes that likewise roused places best not spoke of… “Doc.”
“Ford.” Matty Heltone was all business, it seemed. Gripped Parker’s shoulder. Ripped open splotched uniform fabric above his heart. Thought fast. Worked faster from what came out of his battered black leather bag. Stitches in time. Then a small brown bottle. “Going to apply astringent now, Parker. Gonna sting. But hell, you’ve felt worse.”