“Sure sounds like it,” I said as Catherine rose from her chair and slipped around behind me to move the endangered cup farther from his elbow. “Did you ever report on what he did?”
Another snort, or whatever it was. “Huh! Tried, but that rich prick father put the lid on. Payoffs, payoffs, all over.”
“Did the Martindales try to buy you off?”
That drew a wheezing laugh. “Nah, didn’t hafta, Chrissake. Got to the bosses.”
“Your bosses?”
“Everybody’s bosses. Cops... editors... everybody. Lotsa dough. Lots. Spread around.”
“Uh-huh. Do you know how many children Martindale messed around with?”
The tongue clicking began. He drank coffee, set the cup down deliberately, and sat back, lacing his hands over his stomach. “Ask him again,” Catherine prompted.
“Steel Trap, stay with me on this. Do you know how many children Martindale did things to?”
More clicking as he came forward in his chair. “Two, maybe more. Two, yeah, two.”
“Do you know who they were?”
“Two, ’least two.” He leaned back again, nodding slowly.
“Boy or girls, Steel Trap?” I persisted.
“Both. Yeah, both.”
I turned to Catherine. “Am I losing him?” I asked.
“I think you should keep trying,” she urged. “Actually, you’re doing at least as well as I did over more than two days. He responds to you.”
If this was what she called responding, I began to realize just how difficult her life with the old guy must be. “Do you remember who those children were?” I asked him, spacing the words and giving each equal stress, as though I were talking to a four-year-old.
“Girl nex’ door,” he slurred. “Little girl.”
“Next door to Martindale?”
He nodded — at least it seemed like a nod — and drank more coffee. “Nex’ door. Bastard.”
“Do you remember the girl’s name?”
He shook his head and closed his eyes.
“And was there a boy?”
Steel Trap kept his eyes closed but started making that clicking noise again with his tongue. “Yeah, a boy. Older’n the girl.”
“Was he a neighbor, too?” I prompted. His eyes stayed closed, but there was no more tongue noise, just deep, slow breathing. “What do you think now?” I asked Catherine, who had risen silently and was standing next to my chair.
“He’s tired. But all in all you caught him at a good time. For some reason, he talks more after dinner than at any other time of the day — if he’s not listening to the radio, that is. I know it probably didn’t seem like much to you, but for him, this is talkative, believe me. If you want to go into the front room, I can give you what Daddy has said to me the last few days.”
We carried our coffee cups into the living room, leaving Steel Trap with whatever dreams he was able to enjoy in a mind that was all but used up.
“All right,” Catherine said, clearing her throat as she sat next to me on the davenport and opened a small spiral notebook. “Daddy mentioned the little girl to me, too, and he told me she lived next door to the Martindales, which you also just heard. I asked what her name was, and he said something like ‘Kiki;’ he repeated it two or three times. But he couldn’t remember, or didn’t know, a last name.”
“Did he recall who the boy was?”
She nodded, studying a page in her notebook. “It was ‘Chess’ or something like that, but again, no last name.”
“Did he say where Martindale lived in those days?”
“No. I asked him that, too, but got no response at all from him. I tried three or four times.”
“That’s okay. Seems like I read in his obit that he grew up down in Beverly Hills, which would figure, given that it’s the nicest area out south, and his father had that big mill down in South Chicago. Anyway, I can find that out easily enough.”
“Steve, I’m truly amazed that Daddy could remember all that he did about an event that so many people were trying to hush up.”
“I’m not amazed at all. From everything I know or have heard about him, your father was one hell of a reporter, one hell of a digger. And he had great sources all over town: cops at every level, from patrolmen right on up to the commissioner, as well as probably aldermen, judges, bailiffs, bondsmen, and so on. In a situation like Martindale’s, no matter how much his old man tried to keep the lid on, there were bound to be more leaks than a rusty bucket — and your father likely would have found them all. Although he probably paid for a few drinks now and then and laid on a few bucks in the right places to help those leaks get bigger.”
“Do you really mean Daddy would have done that — pay people, I mean?” She looked doubtful.
I raised my shoulders and let them drop. “Just about everybody else did, and just about everybody still does. Why not?”
Now it was Catherine’s turn to shrug. “I don’t know. I just suppose I always thought all you reporters were somehow...”
“Above greasing a few palms or maybe wetting a few whistles to get some information?”
She colored slightly. “Well, Daddy never mentioned anything like that. I guess I just never realized how things really worked in his world.”
“He probably wouldn’t have mentioned it,” I said gently. “It’s not something any of us like to go around bragging about. But on occasion, it’s the only way to loosen tongues and get the story.”
“Oh, I know you’re right,” she sighed, closing the notebook and resting a palm on it. “I didn’t mean to go sounding like some sort of prude. It’s just that I’ve always sort of idealized Daddy.”
“And with good reason, Catherine. To repeat what I told you when I came here the other night, from all I’ve heard and from what little I’ve seen first-hand, your father was the classic reporter — tough, fair, honest, and accurate to a fault.” I might have been laying it on a little thick, but there was enough truth in what I said about Steel Trap Bascomb to keep me from feeling like a liar.
“And look at him now, poor man,” she whispered, inclining her head in the direction of the sitting room. “He can barely speak a complete sentence, let alone remember what happened yesterday. Or even an hour ago.”
“Has he had a stroke?”
“No, Steve, not according to the doctors. They’ve told me there’s nothing very physically wrong with him, other than old age and its usual ailments. Daddy’s seventy-one, which isn’t young, but they say his heart’s still strong, and his other organs seem to be in good shape, too. And he was never that much of a drinker, unlike a lot of the men he worked with. For him, it was just a bootleg beer now and then.”
“Well, he sure hasn’t lost his appetite,” I observed.
“Oh, no, he eats as much as he ever did. And we take a walk together around the neighborhood most days, which really isn’t difficult for him — he enjoys it. It’s just that he’s senile, and the doctors say there’s nothing that can be done about that.” She put her palms to her mouth and shook her head in a gesture of helplessness.
“Well, it’s good that he’s got you to look after him.”
“I really don’t mind it,” she said, sitting up straight. “Are you terribly disappointed that you didn’t learn more from him tonight?”
Now I did lie. “Not at all, no. I’ve got a few things to go on now — it’s a real good start,” I said with a confidence I didn’t feel.
“Steve, I realize that I don’t know you very well, so maybe I’m being presumptuous, but I want to ask you something.”
“You don’t strike me as the presumptuous type. By all means, ask.”
She sucked on her lower lip and did the looking-around-the-room routine. “You seem to be very sure that Lloyd Martindale was not murdered by the crime syndicate, aren’t you?”