Vinny nodded again. “And I’m stuck in the middle.”
“Maybe not.”
He gave me that annoyed look again.
I reached into my coat pocket, pulled out the sheet of paper, and unfolded it. I began to read to him the particularly pertinent parts, concluding with, “That’s why your package was so helpful to him.”
I thought Vinny might start to cry, and I knew if he did, it wouldn’t be because I had just saved his sorry and substantial ass, but because of the paper, which is just another reason why I love him so, even if I’d never want a conjugal visit.
“I have my receipt,” he said, nearly in disbelief. “Holy shit, I have my goddamned receipt.”
He simply stared at me in wonderment, the way a dog might stare at the master that just gave him a particularly meaty bone. Then he said, “Next time I’m about to think something negative about you, which will probably be within the next thirty minutes, I’ll think of how you got this letter.”
“Good policy,” I replied.
He said, “Now, in case they charge me, did you bring bail?”
I reached deep into my pants pocket and pulled out three single dollar bills and thirty-nine cents, holding it all out to him. “You think this will cover it?”
“Forget what I said,” he replied. “You really are still a horse’s ass.”
I ignored that, which is my right, and instead gave him the Reader’s Digest version of the Elizabeth Riggs saga. He shook his head in disbelief and said, “This thing’s out of control.”
I changed my tone and said, “Vinny, think back for a second to this past Tuesday, to Lauren Hutchens’s place on Park Drive. When you went down to meet the cops, you never even made it to the elevator, right?”
He replied, “Right. They were just getting off.”
I asked, “Had you pressed the call button yet?”
“No.”
I stayed quiet for a moment. He was looking at me suspiciously, squinting, the wheels turning inside his head just as they were already turning inside of mine.
I said, “I never told Foley on the phone what apartment Lauren Hutchens lived in. It wasn’t on the mailbox. It wasn’t in the phone directory. It wasn’t in any information I could find online.”
I paused, looking at Mongillo sitting there looking at me in the locked confines of a Boston Police visitation room. I asked, “How did they know to come to the fourth floor?”
Mongillo said nothing. He said nothing for many long moments until he asked, “You’re sure you didn’t tell Foley?”
I nodded. “Positive. Something’s been bothering me for a while on this, and I couldn’t figure it out. It came together when I saw Foley walking with Elizabeth toward her room tonight — at the same time I got the driver’s license saying she was a Phantom victim.”
I paused, thinking of the absurdity of it alclass="underline" the detective as a serial killer, then and now. Then I said, “I never told the cops, but they knew exactly where to go. How?”
Mongillo looked at me hard and said, “Fair Hair, this is a pretty fucking extraordinary allegation you’re bantering about here —”
“Let me check something,” I said, cutting him off. I pulled out my cell phone, snapped it open, and called Elizabeth Riggs. It was three in the morning, but I was pretty certain she wouldn’t be asleep yet. Hell, she and Hank were probably replaying their favorite Jack Flynn moments — or at least that’s what I wanted to think.
Elizabeth picked up on the second ring, sounding not like I woke her up.
“Jack here,” I said, all business now. “Let me ask you something. Were you supposed to meet Mac Foley earlier today instead of tonight?”
Hesitation, then she said, “Yeah. I did. Early this afternoon. We met for an interview in the hotel. But I got a call from the national desk and had to run out on something else just as it began. So he agreed to come back later.”
She paused, then asked, “Why?”
“I’ll explain later,” I said. “Is Hank right there?”
“Yeah, we were just talking about you.”
See?
Hank got on the phone and I said, “I’ll explain this later, but don’t let her out of your sight, and don’t let Mac Foley within it.”
He replied in his easy voice, “I’ll be waiting to hear this one.”
When I hung up, I said to Mongillo, “There was a cop at the scene of the Lauren Hutchens murder who you seemed to know pretty well — Woody, if I remember right. I need you to ask him how he knew the apartment number.”
“Woody Garner,” Vinny replied. He looked at the clock on the wall, which said 3:05, and asked, “Now?”
“As soon as you can.”
He got up, walked over to the Plexiglas, and rapped on the window. The same cop as before came to the door, and Vinny said, “Hey, Ralphie, any chance you could check when Woody Garner’s on the clock again? Knowing him, it’s probably sometime next month.”
Ralphie laughed as if this was funny, then disappeared. He came back two minutes later and said, “Computer shows he’s doing an overnight detail for the gas company as we speak.”
Vinny, sitting across from me again, asked for his cell number.
“Always needing something else,” Ralphie responded. Then he gave it to him and disappeared again.
I offered Vinny my phone, but he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his own.
“They let a prisoner keep a cell phone?” I asked.
“Hey, it’s one thing to take away my liberty. It would be cruel and unusual punishment to take away my cell phone. Ralphie understands that.”
A moment later he said into the phone, “Woody, baby, Vinny Mong here. You never call, you never write.”
Silence.
“You kidding me?” he said. “It works like a dream. I’ve lost two pounds already. I’ve got to hook you up with this guru I have. You’ll love her.”
Silence.
“Listen, I’ve got an odd question.”
Silence.
“Yeah, I’m an insomniac. At least you’re making money for not sleeping. Anyway, like I said, odd question. When you were courageously and heroically the first one to arrive at that murder scene Tuesday, how’d you know what apartment that dead girl was in?”
Silence.
“You’re sure?”
Silence.
“Hundred percent?”
Silence.
“Thanks, Woody. Cut down on the fruits. That’s the whole key. I know you have this thing for applesauce. No more applesauce, okay? We’ll get together and play a little handball.”
He hung up and said to me, “Woody says the order came down from Mac Foley with the street address and apartment number. He’s sure.”
I shook my head, got up, and rapped on the Plexiglas, at once incredulous at what I was thinking, exhilarated that I was finally seeing little cracks of light, and nervous over what was to come.
Ralphie appeared again and I said, “I’m ready to go, sir.”
Mongillo called out, “What the fuck? What about me?”
Good question. “When they’re ready to let you out, call.”
I got outside, climbed into the awaiting cab next to a snoring dog, and promptly fell asleep before I ever got home. The day that wouldn’t end was finally over.
Well, almost.
35
I staggered through the door to my condominium at three-thirty in the company of a guard dog newly named Huck — a combination of Hank and Buck, the two bodyguards who were no longer at my side.
The two of us stumbled into the kitchen and both had a long drink of water — Huck from one of Baker’s old bowls that I could never bring myself to throw away, me from a bottle of Poland Spring that represented the only food in my refrigerator. My excuse could be that I had been planning on being on my honeymoon for two weeks, but in truth I never had anything in my refrigerator. Maybe that’s one reason I had wanted to get married. A full refrigerator makes for a full life — or something like that.