“I won't tell you that. I can't tell you because, if I did, I might be compromising myself.”
“More likely incriminating yourself,” Rebecca said.
Jack slipped the photograph of Lavelle back into the envelope. “I've been wondering about your brother Dominick.”
Gennaro Carramazza seemed to shrivel and age at the mention of his dead brother.
Jack said, “I mean, he was apparently hiding out, in the hotel here, when Lavelle got to him. But if he knew he was targeted, why didn't he squirrel himself away at his own place or come to you for protection? Under the circumstances, no place in the city would be as safe as your house. With all this going down, surely you must have a fortress out there in Brooklyn Heights.”
“It is,” the old man said. “My house is a fortress.” His eyes blinked once, twice, slow as lizard eyes. “A fortress — but not safe. Lavelle has already struck inside my own house, in spite of the tight security.”
“You mean, he's killed in your house—”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Ginger and Pepper.”
“Who're they?”
“My doggies. A matched pair of papillons.”
“Ah.”
“Little dogs, you know.”
“I'm not really sure what they look like,” Jack said.
“Toy spaniels,” Rebecca said. “Long, silky coats.”
“Yes, yes. Very playful,” Carramazza said. “Always wrestling with each other, chasing. Always wanting to be held and petted.”
“And they were killed in your house.”
Carramazza looked up. “Last night. Torn to pieces. Somehow — we still don't know how — Lavelle or one of his men got in, killed my sweet little dogs, and got out again without being spotted.” He slammed one bony hand down on his attache case. “Damnit, the whole thing's impossible! The house is sealed tight! Guarded by a small army!” He blinked more rapidly than he had done before, and his voice faltered. “Ginger and Pepper were so gentle. They wouldn't bite anyone. Never. They hardly even barked. They didn't deserve to be treated so brutally. Two innocent little creatures.”
Jack was astounded. This murderer, this geriatric dope peddler, this ancient racketeer, this supremely dangerous poisonous lizard of a man, who had been unable or unwilling to weep for his dead brother, now seemed on the verge of tears over the slaying of his dogs.
Jack glanced at Rebecca. She was staring at Carramazza, half in wide-eyed wonder, half in the manner of someone watching a particularly loathsome creature as it crawled out from under a rock.
The old man said, “After all, they weren't guard dogs. They weren't attack dogs. They posed no threat. Just a couple of adorable little toy spaniels…”
Not quite sure how to handle a maudlin mafia chieftain, Jack tried to get Carramazza off the subject of his dogs before the old man reached that pathetic and embarrassing state of mind on the edge of which he now teetered. He said, “Word on the street is that Lavelle claims to be using voodoo against you.”
Carramazza nodded. “That's what he says.”
“You believe it?”
“He seems serious."?
“But do you think there's anything to this voodoo business? “
Carramazza didn't answer. He gazed out the side window at the wind-whipped snow whirling past the parked limousine.
Although Jack was aware that Rebecca was scowling at him in disapproval, he pressed the point: “You think there's anything to it?”
Carramazza turned his face away from the window.
“You mean, do I think it works? A month ago, anybody asked me the same thing, I'd have laughed, but now…”
Jack said, “Now you're wondering if maybe…”
“Yeah. If maybe…”
Jack saw that the old man's eyes had changed. They were still hard, still cold, still watchful, but now there was something new in them. Fear. It was an emotion to which this vicious old bastard was long unaccustomed.
“Find him,” Carramazza said.
“We'll try,” Jack said.
“Because it's our job,” Rebecca said quickly, as if to dispel any notion that they were motivated by concern for Gennaro Carramazza and his blood-thirsty family.
“Stop him,” Carramazza said, and the tone of his voice was the closest he would ever come to saying “please” to an officer of the law.
The Mercedes limousine pulled away from the curb and down the hotel driveway, leaving tracks in the quarter-inch skin of snow that now covered the pavement.
For a moment, Jack and Rebecca stood on the sidewalk, watching the car.
The wind had abated. Snow was still falling, even more heavily than before, but it was no longer winddriven; the lazy, swirling descent of the flakes made it seem, to Jack, as if he were standing inside one of those novelty paperweights that would produce a neatly contained snowstorm anytime you shook it.
Rebecca said, “We better get back to headquarters.”
He took the photograph of Lavelle out of the envelope that Carramazza had given him, tucked it inside his coat.
“What're you doing?” Rebecca asked.
He handed her the envelope. “I'll be at headquarters in an hour.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Two o'clock at the latest.”
“Where are you going?”
“There's something I want to look into.”
“Jack, we've got to set up the task force, prepare a—”
“You get it started.”
“There's too much work for one—”
“I'll be there by two, two-fifteen at the latest.”
“Damnit, Jack—”
“You can handle it on your own for a while.”
“You're going up to Harlem, aren't you?”
“Listen, Rebecca—”
“Up to that damned voodoo shop.”
He didn't say anything.
She said, “I knew it. You're running up there to see Carver Hampton again. That charlatan. That fraud.”
“He's not a fraud. He believes in what he does. I said I'd get back to him today.”
“This is crazy.”
“Is it? Lavelle does exist. We have a photo now.”
“So he exists? That doesn't mean voodoo works!”
“I know that.”
“If you go up there, how am I supposed to get to the office? “
“You can take the car. I'll get a uniform to drive me.”
“Jack, damnit.”
“I have a hunch, Rebecca.”
“Hell.”
“I have a hunch that… somehow… the voodoo subculture — maybe not any real supernatural stuff — but at least the subculture itself is inextricably entwined with this. I have a strong hunch that's the way to approach the case.”
“Christ.”
“A smart cop plays his hunches.”
“And if you don't get back when you promise, if I'm stuck all afternoon, handling everything myself, and then if I have to go in and face Gresham with—”
“I'll be back by two-fifteen, two-thirty at the latest.”
“I'm not going to forgive you for this, Jack.”
He met her eyes, hesitated, then said, “Maybe I could postpone seeing Carver Hampton until tomorrow
“If what?”
“If I knew you'd take just half an hour, just fifteen minutes, to sit down with me and talk about everything that happened between us last night. Where are we going from here?”
Her eyes slid away from his. “We don't have time for that now.”
“Rebecca—”
“There's a lot of work to do, Jack!”
He nodded. “You're right. You've got to get started on the task force details, and I've got to see Carver Hampton.”