An Eye For Justice Page 12

  Daly watched her, then reached over and clinked his tumbler against her bottle and took another sip, grimacing. Then he said, ‘Calver’s guilty as hell, and even you know it.’

  She didn’t say anything because she knew from his tone that there was a question mark floating around in there somewhere. She’d let him torture it out, see if he could articulate it.

  ‘That Schmidt guy in the bar. So he’s capable of murder, I’ll buy that, but so what? He wasn’t there, Calver was, with the Vic, in her room, raping and strangling her with that poncy green silk tie.’

  Pascal grabbed another bottle from the harassed waitress as she went by on her rounds, then she looked up and noticed three guys at the next table, a few metres away. They were looking at her, talking and smirking. They looked like redneck gym bunnies, probably steroid poppers. They wore designer jeans and tight singlet’s showing off lots of bulging, oiled, inked up bicep. Daly clocked them as well, looking down, smiling to himself.

  ‘You know about John Palmer, Daly?’ she said, dismissing the sports jocks with a toss of her head.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Helena Palmer’s brother.’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘You don’t know, do you, Daly?’

  ‘Don’t know what?’ he said, irritation creeping into his voice.

  ‘He drove into the harbour here few months ago. Coroners tagging it suicide. Toxicology says blood alcohol level was off the graph.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Just before Helena was murdered, she told Calver, John wasn’t a suicide. Never, nada, no chance.’

  ‘You know I do remember reading something about that, but never tied it to our Vic. Never needed to, because this was always a slam-dunk. Anyway, she’s family and they never admit a relative might be dumb enough to commit suicide.’

  ‘Yeah. Well get this, Daly. John Palmer never drank alcohol, never. Apparently got sick drunk as a kid and wouldn’t touch it after that.’ She had Daly’s full attention now. ‘So how’s about you dig out that police report and let me have a copy?’

  It was then that one of the trio of sports jocks chose to hassle Pascal. She hadn’t seen him come over, but now he was standing in front of her, swaying slightly on his feet, intermittently looking back at his two buddies who were sat there with goading smirks on their faces. ‘Me and my buddies was wondering what you was doing in here, cause this is a mans bar, and we don’t like no feminazi in here. Specially not bull dikes,’ he said, giggling, looking back at his buddies. Daly was trying not to smile, leaning back on his stool, watching and waiting. He wasn’t going to intervene, he was enjoying it too much.

  Pascal regarded the guy. ‘Well I’m truly sorry you don’t like girls,’ she said, solicitously. ‘That’s too bad. Especially if maybe someday you wanted to start a family. But never mind. How’s about you go back to your buddies and I’ll buy you all a drink?’

  He seemed disappointed by her response and his face dropped, then a red flush of anger appeared, followed by a sly, calculating look. He slowly reached over to her blouse and took hold of her nipple - she wore no bra - and began to squeeze it, watching her face all the time. His buddies giggled some more, then whooped. For a second Pascal did nothing, just watched him, then she reached over and took Daly’s tumbler, recently replenished with Scotch, and slowly tipped the contents over the guys head.

  For a moment he stood there looking shocked and stupid, face dripping with scotch, while Pascal watched him, thin enigmatic smile on her lips. She casually stepped away, edging back towards the jocks table, watching for the tell. It came with a subtle downward shift of his eyes and then he was coming. As he reached her, Pascal stepped inside, grabbing his arm, stooping and turning, letting the guys momentum work for her. Then she pulled him into a swing up and over her shoulder, and then swung him down so that he landed across the centre of the jocks table with a huge crash. His two shocked buddies scuttled out of the way as his body rolled and then slid off the table top onto the floor amongst the broken bottles and spilt drink.

  Pascal turned to the two other guys, eyebrow raised, and said calmly, ‘you want some?’ They backed away, eyes scared, then they knelt down and lifted the other guy, throwing some notes on the table, whilst apologizing to the waitress who was now stood there with the manager.

  Daly watched chuckling as the manager mentioned compensation for damage, until he saw Daly’s NYPD badge. Daly said, ‘I saw it all. These hillbillies were trying to throw a scare into this little lady, and she just about kicked the shit out of them. They’ll be paying,’ he said, looking at them ominously. They nodded and quickly anted up some more notes and then left in a hurry.

  As Pascal and Daly stood on the sidewalk outside, as her cab pulled up, he said, ‘its been interesting.’ As he watched her there was a new look of respect in his eyes. He looked down at his shoes, perhaps embarrassed. ‘Look, maybe I should have leant a hand in there, but frankly you didn’t look like you needed it. So, maybe I’ve got some penance to do to make up for that. Listen, I’ll take a look at that police report, no harm in it. You enjoy the rest of your day now,’ he said. Then something else seemed to occur to him. ‘Man, and I didn’t even ask you about the fire,’ he said, shaking his head with that slow smile. Then he leaned down and slammed the car door.

  Pascal relaxed as the cab pulled away, reflecting that perhaps Daly wasn’t such an asshole after all.

  Chapter 12

  Southern District Court

  Hannah paused in her testimony to take a sip of water. Morganna had asked her to tell the jury about life in Jodenhoek, and any particular incidents that stuck out in her mind from that time. Browder had objected as she’d known he would, and she hadn’t held out much hope of getting it in, but Friedman had surprised her. Maybe he’d taken a liking to Hannah, because he seemed somehow less abrasive in his dealings with her. He had looked over at her sitting quietly in the witness box, and then he’d nodded and said he’d allow it. He explained that a certain leeway was permissible in cases involving testimony covering events from so long ago where a jury might need some context to assist with their deliberations.

  Morganna, now glowing inside, turned back to Hannah sitting calmly in the witness box and said, ‘earlier you were telling us about the arrival of your cousin Rudi from Germany?’

  ‘Yes, it was late summer of 1939 and I only mention it because it is the first time that I became aware of Nazism, but also because Rudi brought with him a painting which later also disappeared, along with the gold pendant, which I guess makes it relevant,’ she said looking up pointedly at Friedman.’

  ‘Go on,’ Morganna said.

  ‘Well at supper that first night after he arrived, he shocked us with talk about how bad life was for Jews in Germany and how he had had to leave his job at the art museum in Magdeburg. He said it was getting worse by the day, and he’d only managed to get out of the country by forging exit papers.

  ‘Then he talked about the art exhibitions the Nazi’s were running all over Germany, trying to run down Jewish impressionist and abstract art, labeling it degenerate. And I couldn’t believe it when he told us that at the end of each exhibition they would take all those beautiful paintings out and burn them.

  ‘But what really intrigued me was what he told us that night,’ Hannah said, pausing again for another sip of water.

  Morganna smiled to herself. She didn’t think there was much she could teach the old lady about creating dramatic suspense. ‘What did he tell you?’ she said.

  ‘Well, he said that he’d taken the best picture in the Magdeburg gallery where he worked, during the exhibition, and replaced it with a beautiful copy in his own fair hand, and he said, “the dumb Nazi’s never even noticed.”’

  ‘He forged it?’ Morganna said.

  ‘That’s what he said. And then later they took the forged work out with all the others and burned it.’

  ‘What was the work and who was it by? Morganna asked.

  ‘Well
, that’s just it. That’s the mystery. He wouldn’t tell me at the time, and he didn’t have it with him. He couldn’t have taken it out of the country with him for fear of being searched by border guards, so he arranged for it to be sent out later by a close friend, with a consignment of export goods.

  ‘He treated it all as a kind of mysterious joke to tease me with, always asking me whether I had guessed who the picture was by. And even when the picture arrived he would never show it to me or identify the artist. He was just kidding around and I am sure he would have revealed all eventually, but he never got the chance because of what happened later, after the Nazi’s invaded Holland and occupied the country.’

  ‘We’ll come to that later, Hannah, but you said earlier that this painting, whatever it was, also disappeared along with the golden pendant and brooch, that are the subject matter of these proceedings. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes it is.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Miss Fedler,’ Judge Friedman said, looking at the clock. ‘Might this be a good time to adjourn for the day.’

  ‘Yes indeed your honour,’ Morganna said, relieved, but also quietly pleased with how things had gone. She was still learning and there was a long way to go. She bundled up her books and waited for Hannah.

  * * * *

  Brad Fedler’s Tribeca loft apartment was on the fifth floor of a large building off

  Hudson Street, not far from Broadway, and I was finding it hard to get used to the place. Maybe it was a bit too luxurious for me, especially after Rikers. I kept worrying I was going to break something or soil the bed. That night we were all there eating Chinese takeout and having a drink. Morganna had been talking about Hannah’s trial, worrying about what raking over such painful old history might be doing to her, but Hannah seemed strangely unmoved by those sentiments. She said, ‘maybe I’ve been waiting all my life to talk about these things. When I’m in that witness box strange things happen to me. I don’t know what I am going to say until I am sitting there, and then it just seems to pop out.’

  ‘But you’re having nightmares, aren’t you?’ Pascal said, chewing on a fortune cookie. ‘I know, because you’re shouting and moaning in your sleep, and you wake up soaked in sweat with the sheets all twisted around you.’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Hannah said, dismissively, looking around the table at all of us. ‘And really, I have to do this. And you must help me.’

  We all nodded and mumbled assent to that, the mood around the table muted and subdued.

  I turned and watched Pascal for a beat as I sipped a single brandy, all I would allow myself these days. I could feel the alcohol starting to affect me, a slight edge of unreasonable resentment at Pascal rising up in my throat. She might as well have been on holiday for all the good she seemed to be doing me I thought, awash with maudlin self pity. ‘So you got anything for me?’ I blurted out, not worrying too much about the tone of my voice.

  Instead of answering she flicked something across the table at Christoff who snatched it out of the air and turned it over in his palm. It was a memory stick. ‘Take a look at that will you, Christoff,’ she said. ‘See what you can find.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘Its a copy of everything on John O’Leary’s laptop, but maybe its best you don’t know that, right?’ she said, acid tone.

  I smiled. Maybe she hadn’t just been sitting on her ass twiddling her thumbs after all. I noticed Morganna’s questioning look, but we needed to be careful. Morganna had a future at the local bar, so we had to avoid compromising that, so we needed to keep her out of the loop.

  ‘We’ll talk about it later.’ I said. ‘O’Leary’s finished testifying, but we can recall him if we need to. I reckon Detective Daly will be up next.’

  ‘You know, Calver,’ Pascal said. ‘I’ve got a hunch about Daly. I think he could turn out to be an ally, if handled right. So you might want to go easy when you cross examine him.’

  I’d have to think about that; it was my ass on the line. Then Pascal was abruptly getting up and excusing herself, saying she had some errands to run. I checked my watch. Where the hell could she be going this time of night?

  * * * *

  Outside on the street corner, Mayberry Wilkins looked up at the lighted windows of the fifth floor apartment and wondered what the hell he was doing out there. What was the point of standing outside and watching the joint? They knew the crew were all inside, so why the fuck did he have to stand outside watching the place? But the swarthy fuck, Schmidt, had insisted, so here he was.

  Ever since Wilkins had set eyes on Pascal at JFK when she’d arrived in the country, Schmidt had been on his case, wanting reports 24/7, and frankly, he had better things to do. His mind started to wander as he thought about his best friends girl who he’d just started fucking. Boy was she hot, and betraying his friend like that gave him that extra jolt he seemed to need these days.

  ‘Anything?’ a voice suddenly said from the darkness, so near he almost jumped out of his skin. Jesus! The fucking freak had come up from nowhere and he hadn’t heard a damn thing. He turned as Schmidt stepped out of the shadows.

  ‘Nothing, boss,’ he said, quickly, subserviently. Schmidt had that look in his eyes, as if he knew exactly what Wilkins was thinking.

  ‘I want you to observe the old lady specifically, yes?’ Schmidt said, lazy brutal eyes scanning the frightened man. ‘I want to know her routine and her movements so that if it becomes necessary. If, for example, her testimony were to become dangerous, uncomfortable or even mildly inconvenient for us, you will be in a position to liquidate her immediately, yes?’

  ‘No problem, boss. I’m on it,’ Wilkins said.

  ‘I hope so,’ Schmidt said.

  When Wilkins looked back Schmidt had gone, just as silently as he had arrived. Wilkins let out a relieved sigh. Jesus! The guy was the only person who had ever managed to frighten him. As he flicked his cigarette butt into the gutter he noticed light glint off the main door as it opened and Pascal came out, dressed in black, head to foot. He quickly stepped back into the shadows. For a moment he wondered whether to follow her, then remembered Schmidt’s orders to concentrate on the old lady.

  * * * *

  Pascal sipped black Turkish coffee, trying to clear her head. She didn’t really know where she was, had just given the address to the cab driver. She looked around. It was a dingy bar with twenty or so people in ones and twos, the sound of their conversation muffled and understated as if they didn’t wish to be overheard. She had been watching the door, but Bob Jeffreys came out the back rolling down his shirt-sleeves and fastening his cuffs.

  ‘Hey, you found me then?’ he said

  ‘Apparently. What are we doing here?’

  ‘Poker game, and I did pretty good as it happens,’ he said, sliding into the seat opposite and transferring a wad of notes to his wallet. ‘You said you wanted to see the city. Well here it is, the bit the tourists don’t see.’

  ‘Yeah, I can see why. So, what have you got?’

  ‘Hey, not so fast. Good news, what, old girl, as I guess they might say in limey land. You’re on the team, hunting down ex-London Jihadi’s who may be holidaying in New York. Let’s drink to that,’ he said, raising his hand and signaling the waiter. A moment later a tray arrived with two scotches on board.

  Pascal grimaced. ‘Boy, is my liver getting a pounding,’ she murmured, putting the glass to her lips and took a drag.

  Bob nodded appreciatively. ‘Hey, maybe its not glamorous stuff, but its important. It gives you something to do, and, you help me, I’ll help you. And I got a little taster for you. Some bits and pieces I picked up, to foster our little arrangement.’

  ‘What have you got, Bob?’ she said, interest starting to kindle.

  ‘Okay. Angel Milken, founder of K Corp, first shows up in our records in August 1945 in a displaced persons, or DP camp in Seedorf. There he was known as Franz Bauer, or to give him his full title, Major, or Sturmbannfuhrer, Franz Baue
r of the Waffen SS. And before you leap to any hasty conclusions, this was the military branch of the SS, elite combat troops, not concentration camp guards. This guy had been at Stalingrad, in Manstein’s relief column that never got through, and then he’d been at Kursk, biggest tank battle in history and then in the defence of Berlin, which is where he was picked up. OSS or Office of Strategic Services, forerunner of the CIA, liked the look of him, apparently, and he was co-opted for a time. Could speak perfect English, so they used him initially in the DP camp, and picked his brains for a time. Then he seems to go off the grid, before being picked up again, entering the US, perfectly legally, in August 1947 as a legitimate immigrant with a visa. Soon after he is naturalized and changes his name to Angel Milken.’

  Bob looked up from his tablet. Pascal was staring into space, deep in thought. Then she said, ‘there were no SS divisions at Stalingrad. And what’s with the name, Angel? Seems an odd choice.’

  ‘He seems to have been peripatetic and moved around, attached to various divisions, bit of a troubleshooter you might say, so my guess is he was seconded to a Wehrmacht unit. As for the name, who knows. Could be a nickname of a loved one.’

  Pascal finished her drink. ‘Is that all?’ she said.

  ‘No, its not all. You’ve got a job to do here as well remember? There’s some mug-shots on this tablet which you can take away with you, and have a look at. See if you recognise any from your days in London?’

  ‘No problem,’ she said. ‘I’m grateful, Bob.’

  ‘Good,’ he said, rolling his sleeves back down. ‘I think we’ll work well together, Courtney. Incidentally, I’ve got one other tidbit for you. Its all on the tablet. Its about Angel’s early life in New York, and a couple of run-ins he had with the law that, shall we say, never got any publicity, if you know what I mean,’ he said, with an exaggerated wink.

  ‘Now I’ve got to resume my poker game and win some more money,’ he added, getting up, finishing his scotch and placing the glass back on the table. ‘I’ll be seeing you,’ he said, walking away with that jaunty step. Pascal was beginning to like Bob, even though he could be highly irritating.