Badge of Honour 06 - The Murderers (36 page)

She had a kerchief around her head, and was wearing a cotton raincoat.

He walked quickly to the booth and slid onto the seat facing her.

“Hi,” he said.

She looked up at him and smiled wanly, but didn’t speak, and when he touched her hand, she pulled it away.

“Tell me exactly what happened,” he said.

“My mother came into my room. I hadn’t heard the phone ring, it’s downstairs in the hall. And she told me I had a call—”

“When was this?”

“Just before I called you.”

“You were in bed?”

“Of course I was in bed. It was…God, I don’t know. Late. Of course I was in bed. Everybody was in bed. My mother had to get out of bed to answer the phone…”

“Take it easy, honey,” Milham said gently.

“I’m frightened, Wally.”

“Tell me exactly what happened.”

“He said, he said, ‘Keep your…’ Wally, he said, ‘Keep your fucking mouth closed, bitch, or you’ll get the same thing your fucking husband did.”

“Sonofabitch,” Milham said. “Did you recognize the voice?”

Helene shook her head.

“Honey, do you know something about—what your husband was doing, something dirty, that you haven’t told me?”

“No. But, Wally, they must know I went to see Sergeant Washington.”

“You did what?”

“Oh, God, I didn’t tell you, did I?”

“Didn’t tell me what?”

“That I went to see Sergeant Washington.”

“No, you didn’t,” Milham said. “What exactly did you tell Washington?”

“I told him that the Narcotics Five Squad is all dirty, that Jerry was dirty, and that they probably are the ones who killed him.”

“Jesus!”

“I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to involve you,” Helene said.

“Honey, I’m involved,” Wally said, and added, “You’re probably right. Somebody knows you talked to Washington. What did you do, call him up?”

“I went to see him.”

“Well, somebody from Five Squad was at Special Operations, and recognized you, or somebody at Special Operations told somebody at Five Squad…”

“I went to his house,” Helene said. “I didn’t go to Special Operations. Which means that if Five Squad knows, he told them.”

Milham considered that for two seconds.

“No. Not Washington. He’s a straight arrow. He didn’t tell anybody, except maybe somebody at Internal Affairs.”

“What’s the difference? They know.”

“What are they afraid you’ll tell somebody?”

Helene shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I don’t know what they’re doing dirty, just that they are.”

“Your husband never told you where the money came from?”

Helene shook her head.

“Wally, I don’t want them to do anything to my mother and father.”

“They won’t. The dumbest thing they could do is try to do something to you. Or them. The whole Police Department would come down on them.”

“Huh!” she snorted. “They don’t want to go to jail; there’s no telling what they’ll do.”

“They’re just trying to scare you, is all. Christ, I wish you had told me about this. I could have got to Washington and nobody would ever have known.”

“I told you, I didn’t want to involve you.”

“And I told you, I’m involved in whatever you do,” Milham said. He reached out for her hand again, and this time she did not move it away.

When he looked at her face, tears were running down her cheeks.

“Honey, don’t do that. I can’t stand to see you cry.”

“Wally, what am I going to do?”

“The question is what are we going to do. You understand?”

“OK. We,” Helene said, and tried to smile.

“OK. So you’re not going back to your mother’s. That’s one thing.”

“What is she going to say? What do I say to her?”

“What did you say when you left the house?”

“I told her I had to go somewhere, and that I would call. She didn’t like it at all.”

“OK. So you call her again, and tell her you have to go away for a couple of days, and that you’ll call her.”

“She won’t like it.”

“Honey, for Christ’s sake! They called you there because they knew you were there.”

She nodded a grudging acceptance of that.

“So where do I go?”

“My place,” he suggested without much conviction in his voice.

“I can’t do that, and you know it,” Helene said.

“OK. We’ll talk about that later. Tonight we’ll go to a motel.”

“Not we, Wally. I’m not up to anything like that.”

“OK. We get you in a motel. You go to bed. Get your rest. I’ll think of something.”

“Something what?”

“I don’t know. Something,” Milham said. “One thing at a time.”

She looked at him and squeezed his hand.

“Helene,” Wally said. “Everything’s going to be all right. You’re not alone.” She squeezed his hand. “I love you,” Wally said.

She squeezed his hand again.

He stood up.

“Come on, let’s get out of here.”

“You think maybe they followed me here?”

“Of course not,” he said.

But when they went to his car, he looked up and down the street to make sure there was nothing suspicious, and as they drove to the Sheraton Hotel, on Roosevelt Boulevard and Grant Avenue, he made three or four turns to be absolutely sure no one was following them.

He didn’t like the idea of leaving her alone, but he understood why she didn’t want him to stay with her, and he knew that he couldn’t press her about that; she would think that all he wanted to do was get in bed with her.

He got the key from the desk clerk, who sort of smirked at him, making it clear he thought that what they were up to was a little quickie.

He stood outside the motel door.

“Get the room number off the phone, and I’ll call you in the morning,” Wally said.

“OK,” she said, “wait here.”

She came back with the number written inside a match-book, and handed it to him.

“I’ll call you in the morning,” he said.

“Yes.”

She looked at him, and leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek.

“Thank you, Wally,” she said.

“Aaaah. I’ll call you in the morning. Just lock the door and get some sleep.”

“Right.”

“Good night, Helene. I’ll call you in the morning.”

“Right.”

He had taken a dozen steps toward his car when she called his name.

“Wally?”

“Yeah?”

He walked back to her.

“Wally, I love you, too,” Helene said.

“I know,” he said. “But thank you for saying it.”

“I don’t want you to go,” Helene said.

She took his hand and pulled him into the motel room.