A Cast of Killers

CHAPTER EIGHT



Homefront turned out to be a storefront on Tenth Avenue near the Port Authority bus terminal. Bob Fleming unlocked the door and led Auntie Lil inside. The place was deserted and just this side of clean. A circle of empty chairs stood in the front picture window, and there were neatly folded piles of clothing on a table that ran along one side wall. Donated sneakers and shoes of all styles and sizes were heaped beneath the same table. There was a counter running across the front third of the room. It was cluttered with a large coffee urn, soft drinks in a Styrofoam cooler, a plate of stale-looking doughnuts and stacks of brochures featuring cover photos of smiling youths. Beyond the counter, a battered wooden desk dominated one corner of the room. Three army cots were lined up neatly against the back wall, beside a stack of extra folding chairs. A number of telephones were mounted against the remaining side wall and penciled numbers were scrawled across the paint above each instrument.

"Home sweet home," Bob Fleming said as he guided Auntie Lil to the rear of the store. "Used to be a dry cleaner's. I kept the twenty-four-hour-service sign in the window. It seemed appropriate."

"You sleep here?" Auntie Lil asked. Army cots were narrow and uncomfortable.

"No. I have a small apartment over on Tenth. This is just for the kids who are too tired to go any further. They can rest here for a couple of hours while I find a place for them in one of the regular city or private facilities. We haven't got enough money to open a bed facility of our own. Yet. Right now, I'm just an outreach and referral program. But that was more than they had. Plenty of people are willing to help runaways, but no one is willing to stand in the open and offer it. It's easy to burn out."

"Why so many telephones?" Auntie Lil nodded toward the row of instruments as she settled into a plastic chair across from his enormous desk.

"That's the one thing I can offer them. A free phone call home. Sometimes that's all it takes. But not very often. We're part of a corporate-sponsored program that pays for toll-free calls anywhere in the U.S. I encourage them to at least touch base with their parents and let them know they're okay."

"What about getting them to go home?" Auntie Lil suggested.

"Home is not such a great place for some of these kids to be." He folded his hands and stared at her. "Frankly, many are better off on their own."

Auntie Lil did not ask him to elaborate. She'd been around the world dozens of times and seen many, many different kinds of homes, including what modern psychologists liked to call dysfunctional ones. She'd seen and heard enough horror stories to last until the day she died.

"So you want to help out?" He was gazing at her strangely.

"Not exactly," she confessed, finding it impossible to lie. Which was a switch. She was usually an outrageous and prolific liar, untouched by pangs of conscience. "Why are you looking at me that way?" she asked defensively.

"Because I knew you were lying earlier when you said you wanted to volunteer," he told her calmly. "Believe me, I've met every kind of liar there is in this world and I can usually spot even the good ones. You're a pretty good one, you know. I bet the little old lady act throws everyone off."

"That's true," Auntie Lil confessed. "Obviously, not you."

"Yes. But you've redeemed yourself by immediately telling me that you are a liar. Why, and what is it that you really want?"

"I'm looking for someone. Three people actually. Do you know them?" She rummaged around in her bag and produced two photographs. The first, of Emily, received only a cursory glance from Bob Fleming.

"Can't help you," he said quietly, handing it back to Auntie Lil. He did not ask how she had obtained the gruesome photo. He stared more closely at the dime store strip showing two young boys. His eyes flickered across the series of small photos, but his expression was unreadable. "Why do you want to know?" he asked. "Are you a relative?

"No. Not exactly." She hesitated, unsure of how to proceed. With one woman dead, how could she afford to trust someone she didn't even know?

"You don't want to tell me," he answered his own question. "Have they done something to you? Snatched your pocketbook? Broken into your apartment? Do you work for the police?"

"The police! Good heavens, no. I'm far too old."

"They used a seventy-nine-year-old woman two years ago to expose nursing home fraud," he pointed out. "And you look just like the type who could handle it."

"You're a very suspicious man." Auntie Lil couldn't decide whether to feel complimented or insulted. "But for your information, there is no love lost between me and the New York Police Department."

"Me, either." He was silent. They stared at one another and just as it looked like it would be a dead end, Bob Fleming sighed and combed his beard absently with roughened fingers. "How about if I lay my cards on the table, then you lay yours beside them?"

She considered his proposition. "All right," she agreed. "But you go first."

"Something funny is going on and I think it has to do with me." His voice was level, but his eyes had narrowed to hard slits. "People who used to talk to me won't talk to me anymore. People I don't even know are giving me the cold shoulder. You saw how that deli owner treated me." He stared at Auntie Lil. "Some woman has been snooping around and asking the kids questions about me. She's middle-aged. Small. Dark hair worn to the shoulders. Who is she? What does she want?"

"I assure you I have no idea," Auntie Lil replied. "I'm here on an entirely different matter. If I wasn't already up to my elbows in a different mystery, I'd try to find out for you."

"Why? Are you a private investigator?" His eyes narrowed even more. He did not like private investigators any more than the public kind.

"No. Sometimes I get involved with… puzzles. But I'm not affiliated with any sort of investigative company or bureau at all."

Bob Fleming's eyes darted to the street and he automatically scanned the sidewalks.

"Looks like business is slow," Auntie Lil offered.

"I wish it was. But it's always like this in the middle of the day. But they'll be here. Like vampires. When night falls. That's when they have to face what they've become. That's when they start remembering that they're only twelve or thirteen or ten years old. Night is when they have to stop playing video games and start making money. It's when childhood starts to look pretty damn good as an alternative to the streets."

"You take it hard," Auntie Lil observed. "You look like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders."

Bob Fleming nodded. "I have a lot of weight on my shoulders. And then some. So I don't need any more. It's your turn. Why do you want to find these boys?"

Having no choice, Auntie Lil told Bob Fleming the story of Emily's death. She omitted the part about breaking into her apartment and simply said that she'd found the strip of photos among her personal belongings. "I just want to find the boys and ask them what they knew about her. Maybe they know her real name. We have to find out who she is before we can find out why she was killed."

"And the police don't care." He was not asking a question. He was stating a fact.

"They don't seem to care very much. I guess she isn't very important in the grand scheme of things." Her tone made it clear that Emily was, at least, important to Auntie Lil's grand scheme of things.

Bob Fleming sighed again. He scrutinized Auntie Lil, seemed to decide she was harmless, then ran a calloused finger down the images. "The white kid is Timmy," he told her. "Only his hair's not black anymore. It's blond. Almost white. He's been working out of this neighborhood for about a year, I think. Been on the streets for around two in all, I'd say. He hangs out with the black kid a lot. That's Little Pete. Timmy's from somewhere in the Midwest or maybe the Southwest. I think Little Pete is from around here. I've gotten them to talk to me a couple of times, but it's no use. They're not ready to give up the game."

Auntie Lil didn't have to ask what game. Despite T.S.'s belief that she be kept innocent, Auntie Lil was well aware of the darker side of life. When you've seen six-year-old prostitutes in Thailand being pushed upon strangers by their mothers, the thirteen-year-old ones in New York can seem pretty tame. "Why is it no use talking to them?" she asked.

"They've got someone taking care of them. A pimp, maybe. A sugar daddy, your generation may have called them. I don't know for sure. But he gives them money. New sneakers. Quarters for the video games. Dollars for the cheap double features. Feeds them junk food, like they like. Forget about broccoli or eating your peas. In return, they keep their mouths shut and do what he wants. They won't give up the game until he pulls the rug out from under them."

"What if he doesn't?"

Bob Fleming laughed bitterly. "The one thing I can absolutely guarantee you is that Big Daddy will pull the rug out from under them. I'm surprised they've lasted this long. They've hardened and it shows on the outside. Look at them—you can see the cracks. Any day now they'll start stealing or figuring out how they can up their score. They'll start doing drugs, if they're not already. And then they won't be of use to this guy—whoever he is—or any of his friends."

"You don't know who he is?"

Bob Fleming shook his head. "If I did, he wouldn't still be around. I have a policy about people like him. Take them out any way that you can."

"You don't mean that," Auntie Lil protested. "That would make you as bad as them."

Bob Fleming shrugged. "My conscience is clear. And it would still be clear if I personally rid this neighborhood of another scumbag. I have no confidence in the court system to deal with these slime. And I have no trouble helping to hasten their demise."

He was a hard man, but Auntie Lil wasn't going to argue with his position. It probably took a lot more than desire to keep on trying to clean up the streets. Obsession and a fair amount of hatred would be essential, too. "Do you know how I can get in touch with them?" she asked him. "I just want to ask them a few questions about Emily."

He stared at their photos. "I might be able to get Little Pete to talk to you. I doubt Timmy will bite, though. He's cagey and suspicious. Something's going on with him. I don't know what. He got real friendly and now he's been avoiding me. Like a lot of other people I know." He slid the photos back across the desk to Auntie Lil. "I'll see what I can do about Little Pete. How do I get in touch with you?"

Auntie Lil gave him her name and phone number, then T.S.'s number as a back-up. "In a pinch, you can always get word to me through Father Stebbins or some of the soup kitchen regulars," she added.

He nodded. It was early afternoon and he already looked exhausted. "If you really want to volunteer," he said with just the tiniest spark of hope, "I could use some help."

Auntie Lil nodded her head. She didn't like to promise what she couldn't deliver, but she knew the man needed something to go on. "When all this is over," she said, "I'll see what I can do. I assume you'll take either money or time."

"Lady, I will take whatever I can get."

He accompanied Auntie Lil to the door and they shook hands farewell. As she was leaving, she noticed a young girl not more than twelve years old waiting in the shadows of a nearby doorway. Her blonde hair was greasy and limp, and her tiny midriff top barely covered a childish chest and an even more childlike rounded tummy. Her hot pants were a wrinkled and grimy lime green. She wore high heels and watched Auntie Lil pass by from under a curtain of dirty bangs. Her eyes were not childish at all.

Auntie Lil walked slowly to the corner before turning around for a peek. The young girl was shyly knocking on the front door of Homefront. Bob Fleming stuck his head out and, for the first time, Auntie Lil saw him smile. His face was transformed, exhaustion giving way to hope. He nodded and gestured for her to come on inside.

Auntie Lil wondered if the young girl would be one of the few who decided to call home.


Like lemmings, they converged across the street from Emily's building: Auntie Lil, Herbert Wong and T.S. The team of volunteer tails was still at St. Barnabas, consuming their meal of the day. "Any luck?" T.S. asked Auntie Lil.

"I've got names for the two young boys." She stared at the collection of pocketbooks held by both men. "Not very chic," she admonished them. "One well-matched accessory is usually more than enough."

"Very funny," T.S. acknowledged. "Your pal, Franklin, found these. He thinks one of them might be Emily's."

Auntie Lil's face lit up. "Excellent. I must remember to thank him."

"You'll have plenty of opportunities," T.S. assured her. "Haven't you heard? He's joined the team. Adelle has consented to let him have a bit part."

His little dig at Adelle was lost on Auntie Lil. She had caught sight of Herbert Wong's new tie pin and was busy oohing and aahing over the craftsmanship. T.S., who was not in the mood to hear from what exotic port the pin had hailed, suggested firmly that they adjourn to a more private spot before they began rummaging through the pocketbooks. "Otherwise, we'll look like a gang of thieves," he warned them. "And lord knows Lieutenant Abromowitz would seize on any chance to give us trouble."

The mention of the lieutenant reminded Auntie Lil of her need to talk with Det. George Santos. "Let's go to the Westsider and examine them," she decided for them all. "Detective Santos hangs out there and I need to have a word with him."

She led the way confidently westward, as if she frequently paraded down to the waterfront for a visit to the friendly neighborhood dive bars. Along the way, she explained the mystery of Emily's apartment. Neither T.S. or Herbert could figure it out.

"A young actress said she'd been there for over three years?" T.S. asked.

"According to my reliable source," Auntie Lil confirmed.

T.S. sighed. Auntie Lil never gave away a name when the chance to show off a "reliable source" arose. She had seen All the President's Men once too often. But he had no doubt that her source probably was reliable. Which wasn't the same as being infallible. "Maybe they made a mistake," he warned her. "The police might have gone to the wrong apartment."

"That's what I want to check out." She was scanning the signs of the decrepit handful of bars that dotted the Westside Highway. Most were carved out of abandoned warehouses or deserted terminals. "What a colorful neighborhood!" she cried out gaily, but her attempt fell flat. Both T.S. and Herbert were distinctly uneasy. It was as if Hell's Kitchen had abruptly given up its fight for respectability. Only danger, dirt and drunken dreams could be found along this particular stretch of lonely sidewalk.

"Why would someone choose to imbibe at such a place?" Herbert Wong wondered out loud. They had found the Westsider. It was a corner bar with windows thickly coated over with black paint. The sign, faded and dangling from a single chain, slapped against the side of the building with a dull thud every time a truck roared past— which was frequently, since the only barrier between the bar and the Westside Highway was a narrow concrete sidewalk.

Inside the Westsider was even less uplifting. For starters, it smelled sour, and old, like the bottom of a long forgotten keg of beer. The floor was cracked linoleum and coated with a sticky scum that made little sucking noises every time they lifted their feet. A row of torn fake-leather booths lined one wall and the tables between the ripped, overstuffed seats were marred by years of scratched-in initials and vaguely disreputable stains that were clearly visible even given the almost nonexistent lighting. The bar was nearly as dark as a tomb and only slightly more lively. A television at one end blared championship wrestling. The only other patron was a toothless old man perched at one end of a long bar. He was sucking down a juice glass full of watery draft beer as he watched the televised action. Occasionally, he'd grunt with satisfaction or hoot in glee at a particularly nasty body slam.

The bartender was a barrel-shaped woman clad in a too-tight yellow knit shirt and bright blue polyester pants. She wore black glasses of a cat-eye style popular thirty years before. Her obviously dyed blonde hair swirled above her head like the top of a frozen custard ice cream cone. Some sailor had left her there in 1944, T.S. decided, and never looked back.

Engrossed in the wrestling, the bartender hardly looked up when they entered. Apparently, a little old lady dressed in expensive clothes and accompanied by an impeccably clad Asian gentleman and middle-aged executive type was not an unusual sight around the Westsider. Nor did the bartender seem interested that, between them, they were hauling seven pocketbooks.

"Hear no evil, see no evil," Herbert remarked.

They chose the booth closest to the door where the air was a little bit fresher. T.S. piled the pocketbooks into a heap in the middle of the battle-worn table.

"Drinks?" Auntie Lil suggested brightly.

"Not without an inoculation first," T.S. declared.

"Where do we begin?" Herbert picked up a small green suede bag. "Examine the contents and guess which one is hers?"

"No. We can do better than that," Auntie Lil decided. "The other actresses insist that Emily always carried a matching handbag. She was wearing a light blue dress with black trim that day."

"Are you sure?" T.S. asked. Last time he had seen Emily, she was wearing a rubber sheet and nothing more. Details on her dress had flown right out the window after that.

"It was a Walter Williams original," Auntie Lil announced confidently. "First appearing in his Fall '59 line. Available at Saks and Bergdorf Goodman's in New York. And at selected finer establishments across the country. Retailing at $130, which was not peanuts back then."

Herbert hee-heed quietly as if he had just heard an irresistible joke and T.S. had to be content with rolling his eyes. He should have known better than to question her ability to remember a dress.

"So, it was either this black one here…" she placed it to one side and continued, "or this black one. Possibly this brown one, though I would certainly disapprove. The white one is out. She had better sense than that. And this straw bag might have passed… but not these." She pushed a purple job and the green suede to one side. "Dig in."

Herbert opened up the straw pocketbook and emptied out the contents in a small heap in front of him, revealing a small rayon wallet, now empty except for a photo of a chubby baby of indeterminate sex. The bag also contained three pencils, a nearly empty purple lipstick, a small compact of garish eyeshadow and a $10 coupon off weekly sessions at a nearby tanning salon. "Not hers," he decided, shaking his head.

Auntie Lil was quick enough to empty out two. But the brown bag held a prophylactic and was ruled out on that basis. The other, a black one, held an address book that inexplicably contained only male names. A matching wallet was crammed with photographs, though no money or credit cards. Most of the photographs were of beefy young men in macho poses. The inscriptions on these photos quickly eliminated the pocketbook as being Emily's, in Auntie Lil's opinion.

"You're sure?" T.S. asked. "After all, this one fellow's written: 'Thanks for an evening I'll never forget.' Maybe she took him to the theater."

"It has to be the one you're hoarding," Auntie Lil insisted. "Empty it before I burst."

T.S. did not answer. He was too busy staring at the clippings he'd pulled from the small black pocketbook.

"What is it?" Herbert asked.

"These clippings," T.S. began. He spread them out across the table top.

"What are they? Just a columnist for one of the local papers if I remember right," Auntie Lil replied. She held one up and examined it. "This one is about corruption in awarding liquor licenses in Manhattan."

"This one is about a schoolteacher who beats children with a paddle," T.S. added. "And this one exposes inferior test scores of Catholic high-school graduates."

"What's so special about that?" Herbert asked. "The author is an investigative reporter, correct?"

"Correct," T.S. replied. "But not just an investigative reporter. She's my favorite reporter. Margo McGregor. I was just trying to read her column today, but she's been away on vacation."

"Well, I doubt it's important," Auntie Lil decided, scraping the pile of possessions her way. "There's no way Emily could have had a connection to any of those stories. Perhaps she simply liked to cut and save interesting articles. If this is even her purse." She quickly sorted through the small stack of items. "A tasteful shade of mauve lipstick. Could be Emily's… Here's a small pocket Bible, so we're still in the running … and… bingo! This is her pocketbook. And this is the proof." She spread out an entire handful of theater ticket stubs that had been carefully bound together with a large paper clip. "She was saving them for her collection."

"Notice what's missing," T.S. pointed out. "No wallet, no identification, no address book."

"No way to know who she is or where she lives," Herbert summed up.

"Yes," Auntie Lil agreed. "He stole this to make it harder, if not impossible, for the police to find out who she was."

"That means we're right back where we started," Herbert said sadly.

"Not quite," T.S. broke in. They looked up at him expectantly. "We now know she liked Margo McGregor's writing."

Auntie Lil did not have time to be irritated. The bartender had finally roused herself from her pro wrestling stupor and was standing by their table. "Sorry to keep you waiting," she boomed in a nasal voice. "Most people around here don't exactly expect table service. Which is good since my feet are killing me." She stopped abruptly and stared at the pile of discarded pocketbooks, then looked from T.S. to Auntie Lil to Herbert Wong. A wad of gum worked itself from one cheek, across her tongue, and into the other cheek as she puzzled the situation out. Finally, she shrugged and addressed Auntie Lil. "Now that's a switch," the bartender admitted. "Usually, it's the little old ladies who get their pocketbooks snatched. Not the other way around."

"We didn't steal these," T.S. interrupted firmly. "We found them in the trash and are now trying to determine the owners." It didn't sound very convincing, not even to his own ears. Herbert even winced and T.S. resisted the temptation to ask if he could have done any better on such short notice.

"That so?" The bartender shifted on her aching feet and stifled a yawn. "Takes all kinds, I guess. Now, what d'ya want?" she demanded with a crack of her gum. Then, noticing their expensive attire, a brief smiled curled the corners of her mouth. Perhaps this group had actually heard of a tip before. She'd give it her best shot. "Afternoon special is on," she added politely. "Draft beer's sixty cents."

"Is there a minimum?" Auntie Lil inquired politely.

"Yeah. Two drinks per floor show. And here comes the first show." The bartender's right foot darted out and she crushed a large roach firmly beneath her plastic shoe. It crunched and she whooped at her own joke. When no one else laughed, she coughed, straightened up, and added in a get-tough-quick voice, "People don't get to sit here who don't buy nuthin', if that's what you mean, honey."

"My nephew and I will have the special," Auntie Lil quickly decided. The bartender stared at T.S. like she'd never run across the concept of a nephew before.

Herbert Wong politely ordered a glass of water. The bartender shifted her stare to him, then ambled behind the bar, busied herself over an unseen sink and returned carrying a tray that held three small smudged glasses. Herbert's water was tepid and slightly brownish. In fact, it looked a whole lot like the beer.

"One water for Mr. Rockefeller here," she said, plunking the glass on the table. "And here's a couple of brews for you two mad, mad party people."

"We're looking for a Detective George Santos," Auntie Lil said.

"Yeah? You family? Or planning to confess?" The bartender eyed the pocketbooks again and cackled loudly. "Well, Georgie don't usually come in until five." She snapped her gum and squinted at them to get a better view. "Say, what do folks like you want with a guy named 'Santos'? You don't look like no Spaniards to me." Herbert Wong received a particularly thorough once-over.

"We're friends," T.S. said.

"Georgie's got no friends. Just an ex-wife, a couple of suspects and a lot of acquaintances." The bartender followed this gloomy pronouncement by marching back to the bar and pouring herself a healthy shot of vodka. She slammed it back in one gulp and banged the glass down on the bar.

T.S. watched the bartender's gesture with envy. Such blatant uncouthness! Such freedom! An irresistible urge overcame him. "Allow me," T.S. yelled to her from across the room. He peeled off a few bills from the small wad in his pocket and threw them on the table for effect. "Have another on us. And what the heck—buy the house a round of drinks!" He returned Auntie Lil's stare and confessed in a low whisper, "Sorry. But I've always wanted to do that."

The house—which consisted entirely of the toothless old man— cackled its gleeful approval. He pounded the bar, hooting and grunting with an enthusiasm far surpassing his demonstrated zeal for wrestling.

"You for real?" The bartender eyed the bills as if they might be counterfeit, then shrugged and poured herself another. "Sure you won't join me?"

"No, thank you, madam. This will do us just nicely." T.S. raised his beer glass in salute and nudged Auntie Lil until she did the same.

"Have you lost your mind?" she whispered to her nephew.

"Not at all. You're always telling me to loosen up." T.S. took a deep breath, followed by a tiny sip, which ended up in a fine spray over the pocketbooks. "This beer tastes like it should be tested for steroids," he said, swabbing his mouth out with his handkerchief.

Auntie Lil took his word for it. "Let's come back later," she decided. "I can think of better places to kill a few hours."

"A good idea," Herbert said. "Perhaps by then the rust will have settled to the bottom of my glass of water. I have no doubt it will still be on this table." He led the retreat by hopping up and waving to the bartender. "We shall return," he promised as he bowed his head at her. She bowed hers back, the chain on her cat-eye glasses jingling as she did so.

"We'd like to surprise Detective Santos," T.S. added, throwing a few more bills onto the pile.

"Sure you would. Wouldn't we all?" She slammed back her second shot of vodka as her cat-eyes followed them out the door.

"I could hardly breathe in there!" Auntie Lil gasped as she gulped in bursts of air that, while not exactly fresh given they were standing by a major highway, were at least foul in a more familiar way.

"They ought to mop the floor once in a while," T.S. observed. "It wouldn't hurt the atmosphere any."

"Your Detective Santos must be one depressed man," Herbert Wong added. "A healthy person would not frequent such an establishment."

"I'll say. I feel like having a few tests run on myself after that visit," T.S. declared.

Auntie Lil just sniffed. She'd seen worse in her day. "I'm coming back early this evening," she announced. "Are you with me or against me?"

"Damn right, I'm with you. You're not prowling around here after dark alone." T.S. looked up and down the deserted sidewalks. Cars whizzed by every few seconds without slowing. It was a lonely place for a bar and a great place for a mugging.

"I must begin the surveillance," Herbert apologized. "I will not be able to join you."

"Then it's just you and me, kid," T.S. told Auntie Lil. "But if we're coming back here, I've got to confess that I definitely need to find a nice bar and have a few drinks first."

Several drinks, several hours and several dinners later, T.S. and Auntie Lil returned to the Westsider. A few hours had made a big difference. Not necessarily a positive difference, but a big one just the same. They could hear the loudest change as they approached. Behind the black-painted windows, jukebox music blared and they were assaulted by a fresh wave of pulsating sound when they pushed open the front door. The female bartender was gone, replaced by two fat balding men in dirty white aprons who scurried back and forth serving the thirsty crowd. Nearly every stool at the bar was taken and many of the booths were occupied as well. The patrons were an odd mixture of construction workers, sanitation and traffic department employees, neighborhood rummies and an occasional waitress still in her uniform. The smell of old beer had been replaced by the odor of bodies packed together après ten hours of manual labor.

They found Detective Santos sitting alone at a booth, staring at a soundless baseball game on the television. Three empty highball glasses sat before him. He held a fourth, filled only with ice, cradled in both hands.

Without asking, Auntie Lil and T.S. slid into the seat across from him. He looked up with bleary eyes. "No hope," he told them, shaking his head sadly. "They're twelve games out and only have ten games left. Another magnificent season is at end for the New York Yankees." He raised his glass of ice cubes toward the television set in toast.

"Do you know who we are?" Auntie Lil demanded. She was furious to find her friendly detective replaced by this boozing, discouraged human being.

Detective Santos stared at her, mystified. "Is this a scam?" he asked. He answered his own question by flipping open a small wallet and displaying a gold detective's badge. "If it is, better find a new mark."

"Young man. You're drunk and it's not even eight o'clock." Auntie Lil was truly indignant. She did not believe in getting drunk until ten o'clock, at the earliest.

"I remember you," George Santos said suddenly. He leaned forward and blinked. "You're the lady that Lieutenant Abromowitz hates."

"That's me. And this is my nephew, Theodore. The lieutenant hates him, too," she added helpfully.

"Is that so?" Santos looked T.S. up and down and smiled drunkenly. "In that case, it's a pleasure to meet you."

"The pleasure is all mine," T.S. returned drily.

"Are you on duty?" Auntie Lil demanded.

Santos tilted back his head and stared at her through red-rimmed eyes. "Of course I'm not on duty. I'm piss-ant drunk. Can't you tell?"

"Yes, I can tell," Auntie Lil replied. "And it's a shame, because we wanted to ask you some questions."

"Ask away," the detective told them casually, waving a hand in the general direction of the bar. One of the bartenders scurried over and set a fresh drink in front of him. "Thank you, my good man," Santos told the bartender. "Would any of you lovely people care for a drink or two?"

"No, thanks," T.S. said. "I'll let you have my share."

"Most kind of you," Santos admitted with exaggerated politeness. He belched lightly and covered his mouth, then sighed. His shoulders slumped as if a plug had been pulled and all of his energy drained out at once. "What do you want to know?" he said glumly. "It's about the old lady, right?"

"Right," Auntie Lil answered crisply. "What have you found out?"

"Nothing. Nothing at all." The detective shook his head and murmured into his drink. "Perhaps I should explain," he said.

"Perhaps you should," Auntie Lil pointed out.

He sighed and banged his glass back on the table, sloshing out a small wave of alcohol that emanated an unmistakable odor. Ye gads. The man was drinking straight gin. No wonder he looked and acted like hell. "Your friend was killed two days ago," he began slowly, as if warming up to relate a fairy tale. "And since that time, two more murders have landed on my desk. Murders of people with names and families and addresses. And clues. Which is no small consideration."

"In other words, Emily's death has been put on the back burner," T.S. said.

"I didn't say that." Santos held up a hand as if to stop any protests on their part. "We've sent her fingerprints to Quantico, but nothing will come of it. Not unless she has a record, which is unlikely. I've called every shelter in New York and distributed a Wirephoto of her over police wires. No luck yet, but that's all I can do. Plus, I personally investigated an anonymous tip today. Someone called claiming to have her address."

"That was no anonymous tipster," Auntie Lil said indignantly. "That was me."

"You?" He stared at her closely. "You wasted two hours of my time."

"You went to the wrong address," Auntie Lil stated flatly.

The detective fumbled in his pocket and produced his notebook. "326 West Forty-Sixth Street," he read. "Apartment 6-B."

"That's right," T.S. confirmed.

"I went there," he said calmly, sounding more sober than before. "A young girl answered, late twenties. An actress. Said she'd been living there for over three years. There was no little old lady. The apartment looked completely normal. You people are mistaken."

"The place was totally ransacked!" Auntie Lil insisted. "Didn't you see?"

Detective Santos stared at her for a long moment. "How do you know?" he asked evenly.

"Know what?" Auntie Lil demanded.

"That it was ransacked?"

T.S. intervened. "We just heard, that's all. Never mind." He kicked Auntie Lil under the table, not anxious to be booked for breaking and entering by a drunken detective. "Are you sure that the young woman lived there?"

"Look. I talked to the resident. I talked to the super. There's no old lady living there at all. Just some babe with dyed blonde hair and an aerobically fit actress body."

Auntie Lil was angry; T.S. was mystified.

"What about The Eagle?" Auntie Lil demanded. "Have you found him?"

"The Eagle?" Santos shook his head like he thought she was crazy and looked to T.S. for confirmation.

"Don't you look at him like I'm insane," Auntie Lil ordered. "A man swears he saw The Eagle behind Emily that day. He's probably the one who poisoned her."

The detective sighed. "We don't know anything about an eagle. No one we interviewed mentioned an eagle." He was quiet, staring into his drink. "My guess is that you people were given the wrong apartment number. Sounds to me like you went there. I wouldn't want to know if you did." He shrugged. "Maybe it was burglarized, maybe it wasn't. If it was, the woman who lives there doesn't want me to know."

"Why wouldn't she?" T.S. asked.

"You must be joking." The detective took a healthy swig of gin. "It was probably drug-related. What's she going to do? Report ten grams of coke missing?" He laughed as if he'd said something funny, but neither T.S. nor Auntie Lil was amused. He fell silent, staring into the bottom of his drink.

"Can't you tell us anything?" Auntie Lil demanded after a moment of fruitless silence.

Santos jumped, as if he'd forgotten they were there. "I can tell you that if this case had ever mattered in the least, they would not have given it to me." He raised his large brown eyes to them and blinked sadly. "I am not at the bottom of the barrel, you understand. I still manage to stay sober during my shift. But I'm pretty damn close. Everyone knows that I'm a drunk, no one gives me any real work and the only reason I'm probably still on the force is that the lieutenant is too stupid to figure out yet what a loser I am." He shrugged. "And that's nothing but the facts, ma'am."

There was nothing more to say. They left the detective behind and snagged cabs that could take them home and away from the Westsider as quickly as possible.

T.S. was thoroughly depressed by the time he reached his apartment. Brenda and Eddie met him at the door and he was so distracted that he opened two cans of wet cat food and they snagged a bonus feast. But he was immediately cheered by two minor developments. Lenny Melk had called and tracked down the building's real owner. He'd divulge the information the following morning, as soon as T.S. met him with payment in cash. So much for trust. But at least he had the information.

The second message was even more uplifting. Lilah had called to say that her day had been productive but boring, and that she'd missed the chance to detect by his side. It wasn't the same as saying that she'd missed him, technically speaking, but it was enough to inspire him to sing the theme song from The Impossible Dream in the shower before he hit the sack.