woman spoke with a light Italian accent.
That was no surprise. From Berry’s personnel file, Lindsey had learned that Berry’s wife was the former Ester Lazarini, an Italian citizen. Berry had married her in 1979, when he was serving as a warrant officer in the US Army, attached to a satellite NATO headquarters in Rome doing liaison work with the Italian Ministry of Defense.
Lindsey made his appointment with Mrs. Berry and hung up. He studied his wristwatch. It was a little after nine. He looked up another contact in his pocket organizer, punched Detective Sokolov’s number and introduced himself.
Marcie Sokolov had a pleasant voice but spoke with the hard-driving intensity that Lindsey thought typical of New Yorkers. “You’re with International Surety, interested in the Berry shooting.”
Lindsey acknowledged that was so.
“I already talked to your—” she must be fumbling with papers on her desk “—Morris Zissler. Have you spoken with him?”
Lindsey said that he had, that Zissler had briefed him on the case, but that he was representing the company now in the matter of Berry’s death.
“Zissler has the facts. This is a law enforcement matter.”
“Still,” Lindsey said, “if you could spare a few minutes of your time. I flew in from Denver and if I go back empty-handed.…” He let it hang there.
Sokolov took the bait. “Okay. I’m at Midtown North. Where are you coming from? You know your way around New York? You taking a cab or the subway?”
“Uh—I’m on 58th Street. Near Seventh Avenue.”
She laughed. “Never mind. Welcome to our lovely city. You can walk here. Midtown North is on West 54th between Eighth and Ninth. Enjoy your stroll.”
He walked to the corner and stopped to buy a copy of The New York Times. He tucked it under his arm and started down Seventh Avenue.
The walk was invigorating. Detective Sokolov might have meant to be ironic, but Lindsey really did enjoy it. He’d never seen such varied people jammed onto a single strip of pavement. He passed a group of teenagers in a full gang regalia, watch-caps and hooded sweatshirts. They glared at him, but they didn’t do anything more than that. Maybe God was watching over Hobart Lindsey.
He reached Midtown North in a matter of minutes. The police were housed in an utterly characterless building that Lindsey quickly labeled as Postwar Functional. He gave his name to a bored civilian receptionist and sat down with his New York Times while he waited for Detective Sokolov.
National and world news were the same as they’d been a day ago in Denver, but the local stories were enticingly different. The most intriguing was a piece on the expected announcement of a race for the US Senate by a Congressman named Randolph Amoroso. The resignation of the incumbent Senator in the face of charges of sexual malfeasance and financial hanky-panky had left a vacant seat. Even though the Christmas season was generally quiet politically—who wants to compete with the Christ Child for headlines, or with the Jolly Old Elf for campaign contributions?—would-be Senators were scurrying to qualify for a special election slated for June.
Lindsey had heard of Amoroso—barely—but apparently he was hot news in New York. A big Amoroso rally was planned for noon in Times Square. Lindsey looked at his watch. If he didn’t spend too long in Sokolov’s office—if Sokolov ever got around to talking with him—he might take a look at the event. He wasn’t sure where Times Square was, but he suspected that it was fairly nearby.
Amoroso’s Congressional district was Dutchess County, wherever that was, but he was expected in New York to accept the endorsement of a right-wing radio personality. The event would be broadcast live on national radio and TV. Lindsey tracked back through the story to make sure that he’d got it right. He had. Amoroso was not an announced Senatorial candidate—not yet—but he was issuing campaign manifestos and lining up endorsements anyway.
Reading the article about Amoroso, Lindsey felt a chill. An opponent was quoted as accusing the Congressman of Fascist leanings, and Amoroso’s comment was only, “I think I could make the trains run on time.” The Sons of Italy had disowned Amoroso, but a splinter group that claimed affiliation with a neo-Fascist party in Italy had proclaimed its enthusiastic support, and Amoroso had welcomed it.
“These are true Americans,” the Times quoted him, “and true Italian-Americans. These are the people who built our great land. In this age when welfare loafers, drug peddlers and deviates of every sort are wrecking our cities and our nation, it is time for real Americans to stand up and speak loud and clear, to City Hall, to the Congress and the Senate, and to the White House itself.”
Lindsey shook his head. The article went on like that, with periodical references to the greatness that once was Rome. A potential rival accused Amoroso of wanting to impose an Imperial Pax Americana on the world and on the country. Congressman Amoroso’s rival was the mayor of the upstate community of Newburgh Heights. The rival’s name was Oliver Shea. If Lindsey had barely heard of Amoroso before coming to New York, he was positive he’d never heard of Oliver Shea.
Amoroso responded to Shea’s charge by stating that a return to the age of the Pax Romana would mean the salvation of American civilization.
Lindsey laid the newspaper back on the hard composition bench. He watched a couple of uniformed cops drag a pair of women past. If these were hookers they were cut from a different cloth than Julia Roberts or the whores-with-hearts-of-gold who turned up so often on Barney Miller reruns. Lindsey opened the paper again and leafed through it searching for coverage of the dual murder of Cletus Berry and Frankie Fulton.
He found the killings mentioned in a roundup piece on crime in the city. The article quoted Marcie Sokolov to the effect that the death of Frankie Fulton was one just more gang-related execution. Sokolov didn’t say as much, but Lindsey got the feeling that she was perfectly happy to see mobsters removing one another from circulation. Berry’s death was more puzzling, but Sokolov implied that even a solid citizen such as Cletus Berry seemed to be, could get mixed up with the wrong type and find himself in big trouble.
The civilian receptionist caught Lindsey’s attention with a shrill whistle and a sharp, “Hey, you!” Lindsey dropped his newspaper. “Hey, help us keep this place tidy, willya?” the receptionist complained. “Upstairs, third floor, just ask for Sokolov. Here, don’t forget to wear this visitor’s badge.”
Lindsey folded his Times neatly and left it on the bench.
Detective Sokolov’s office wasn’t an office at all, but a desk in a noisy bullpen. Marcie Sokolov was a petite woman with glossy black hair, an olive complexion and sharp features. She was wearing a pale blue blouse and a patterned pull-over sweater. Her detective’s badge was pinned to the sweater; beside it, she wore a plastic Santa face. Instead of eyes, Santa possessed green micro-lights that flashed on and off at random.
Sokolov put down a heavy coffee cup and stood up when Lindsey approached her desk, and extended her hand. She had a hard grip, gave Lindsey’s hand a single tug up-and-down, and released his hand.
“I suppose you have ID.”
He nodded and showed Sokolov his driver’s license and I.S. credentials.
“You related to the mayor?”
“No.” He shook his head.
“What’s wrong with
