I got up and looked steadily at him. “You don’t want to know what I’ve learned? If I’m right, Montgomery and Furey could be involved in one of the ugliest little scandals to hit this department in a long time.”
Bobby scowled ferociously. “Spare me. I hear enough trash in here every day without listening to you fling garbage around about one of my own men, I’ve told you dozens of times that you’re in a line of work that’s bad for you, and this is perfect proof of it. You don’t know how to reason, how to follow a chain of evidence to a conclusion, so you start making up paranoid fantasies. If I tell you I think you need a good man and a family, you get on your high horse, but women your age who don’t marry start getting strange ideas. I don’t want to see you ending up like that crazy aunt of yours, propositioning young men for the price of a bottle.”
I stared down at him not knowing whether to scream or laugh. “Bobby, that psychology was old before you were born, the old repressed-spinster routine, and even if it were true, it sure wouldn’t apply to me. I just hope you aren’t laying that line on Officer Neely, or about the time I hit West Madison you’re going to be facing a harassment suit so big it’ll make your head spin. Anyway, if you have to think of me as a crackpot virgin to keep your faith in the department intact, remember when the pieces come breaking around you that I tried to warn you.”
Bobby was on his feet now, too, panting, his face red. “Get out of my office and don’t come back here. Your parents were two of my best friends, but I’d have broken every bone in your body if you talked to me the way you spoke to them, and look where it’s led—how dare you talk to me like this. Get out!”
The last few words were on a crescendo so loud that they must have heard them on the street, let alone in the adjacent room. I managed to keep my head up and my steps steady and even to shut the door gently behind me. Everyone in the room turned to stare as I made the long walk from his office to the unit-room exit.
“It’s okay, boys and girls. The lieutenant got a little excited, but I don’t think there’ll be any more fireworks this afternoon.”
42
Mourning Becomes Electra
I walked slowly up State Street. Anger dragged at my steps, anger and depression both. Someone laid a bomb in my engine and no one in the police department had tried to get a word from Mr. Contreras about the men he’d seen. Instead, Roland Montgomery assaulted me physically while Bobby did it mentally. Break every bone in my body. Oh, yeah. That’s how you get people to stop asking questions and do as you say, you break every bone in their bodies.
I was angry with myself too—I hadn’t meant to talk to Bobby about Furey until I had some proof. Of course Bobby wouldn’t listen to me spreading stories about his fair-haired boy. It would be hard enough to get him to listen when I could really back them up. And even though I was furious right now with Bobby, I didn’t look forward to bringing him that much pain.
Maybe I’d feel better for food. It had been six hours since I’d eaten and I’d thrown that up. I wandered into the first coffee shop I came to. They had a variety of salads on the menu but I ordered a b.l.t. with fries. Grease is so much more comforting than greens. Anyway, my weight was still down—I needed to pack a few carbs to build myself back up.
Because I’d come during off-hours they made up the fries fresh just for me. I ate them first, while they were still hot and crisp. Halfway through the fries I remembered I was supposed to check in with my answering service every hour to see if the Streeter Brothers could fit me into their schedule soon. I carried the last handful of potatoes to the pay phone at the front of the coffee shop.
I got Tim Streeter this time. “We can start for you first thing in the morning, Vic, but we’ll need you to brief the boys, give them a description, and maybe show them the kind of place your aunt would likely pick.”
My stomach fell. Morning seemed an awfully long time away just now. I couldn’t protest, though—they were doing me a mighty big favor. I told Tim I’d meet him at the corner of Indiana and Cermak at eight and hung up.
Maybe it would still be light enough for me to do some hunting on my own tonight. I could stop at August Cray’s office and then head home to pick up the Tempo. I called my neighborhood car rental. They closed at six but said they’d leave the Tempo out front for me with the keys taped underneath the front bumper. If someone stole it before I got there they weren’t going to be out much.
I paid my bill—under ten dollars, even though I was perilously close to the upscale part of the South Loop— and took the sandwich to eat on my way to Cray’s office.