Escape (7 page)

"Hey, fu-fu-fuck ass shit," the newsstand operator said, "you gonna pay for that... crap, oohhh boy, oohhh boy ... paper or what?"

Dirty Warren didn't necessarily mean to curse; he suffered from Tourette's Syndrome—faulty wiring in his brain that caused, along with a variety of involuntary muscle tics and random noises, a compulsion to spew a seemingly endless and colorfully imaginative torrent of profanity. Every once in a while, Karp was pretty sure that Warren threw a few extra expletives in for effect, but he couldn't prove it ... and besides, he liked the little guy's moxie.

Fishing into his pocket, Karp pulled out two dollars. "Keep the change," he said, slapping the bills on the newsstand counter.

"Gee, thanks... lick me asswipe ... think you can afford it?"

Karp's eyes narrowed. This was one of those times when he was pretty sure the foul language wasn't necessary. But Dirty Warren just smiled innocently as if he'd politely inquired what Karp thought of the Yankees' season so far. "You're welcome," Karp said. "I think."

Dirty Warren's face grew serious. "In the movie
Contact,
the scientist, Dr. David Drumlin, is ... oohhh boy, you're a whore ... killed by a religious fanatic trying to prevent him ... penis vagina ooop ooop ... from contacting an alien civilization. How does Drumlin die?"

Karp rolled his eyes. They'd been playing the movie trivia game since they first met years ago. He had yet to lose a single round, but today he wasn't in the mood, especially for this particular line of questioning. "Uh, let's see ... given the present circumstances ... the assassin wrapped himself in explosives.... It was a suicide bombing.... Come on, Warren, maybe now's not the time for this."

"Yeah, well ... fuck you balls and titties ... humor me," Dirty Warren insisted. "Tom Skerritt played Drumlin, but who played Dr. Eleanor Arroway, the scientist who travels to the star Vega and makes contact with an alien?"

Karp looked at his watch in the universal sign language for he didn't have the time or patience, but answered, "Jodie Foster. Now, Warren, I really need to get going."

"Okay, but what reason did ... oohhh boy MOTHER FUCKER! ... the alien give for his civilization to bring Arroway to them ... no shit bastard?" The question stumped Karp. "That's not the game, Warren, that's script, not trivia.... And I don't like science fiction movies."

Warren waved the protest off. "I know, I ... piss off ... know. This doesn't count but I just wanted to ... ah crap bite me eat my shorts ... tell you anyway." The man's face screwed up in a knot of concentration as he fought off a wave of tics and grimaces.

"The alien tells her that the human race is an interesting species ... oohhh BOY...." He waited patiently as the muscles in his face went through a series of spasms before he could continue. "Capable of such extremes of love and hate and it was that ... God dammit! ... mix that prompted their curiosity about us. It wasn't a ... oohhh oohhh ... trick, or a test, it's just that the im-im-im-immensity of space is lonely, and the only thing that makes it bearable ... oohhh please oohhh please ... is each other."

For a moment, Karp thought Dirty Warren might pass out from the strain of trying to hold it together to get his message across. But the little man got it out and stood there panting from the exertion. Only then did Karp notice the tears in his eyes.
Yeah, we're all a little scared, Warren,
he thought. "I hear you, pal," he said. '"The only thing that makes it bearable is each other.' Thanks, that's a good one to remember on a day like today."

The newspaper vendor wiped at his nose and eyes and held out Karp's dollars. "Paper's on me ... asswipe," he said, his voice raspy.

Karp started to protest but realized it was a point of pride with the newspaper vendor. He took the bills and put them back in his pocket, then stuck out his hand for Dirty Warren to shake. The little man had looked at the hand for a moment, like he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do, but then accepted the offer and shook hands.

They stood there hand in hand until Dirty Warren shyly let go. Karp tried to recall if he'd ever made the gesture to Dirty Warren before. He couldn't recall a single instance.
That has to change,
he thought.

The newspaper vendor seemed to sense Karp's discomfiture. "Better hur-hur-hurry ... twat did you say I cunt hear you ... to your meeting," he sputtered with a grin.

Karp nodded and saluted with his rolled-up newspaper. "Yeah, I better do that. Take care, Warren, and thanks again for the thought."

Turning, Karp straightened his shoulders and looked up at the Criminal Courts building, a massive monument to simple linear architecture on a grand and imposing scale. To some—usually those who had good reason to fear justice—it was a frightening place. But to Karp, it had been home for more than thirty years, a rock-solid anchor in an unstable world.

As he passed the concrete barriers erected around the front of the building post-9/11, he reflected on how long it would be before such barriers would be necessary in front of synagogues, churches, and schools. Would going out to dinner mean passing through metal detectors and allowing bomb dogs to sniff ladies' purses?

The synagogue bombing was more real to him than even the attack on the World Trade Center, where the number of victims had just been so massive, so incomprehensible, that five years later he still had a hard time getting his mind around it. It was easier to visualize a single man blowing himself up and killing six other men, including Rabbi Greg Romberg, as gentle a soul as Karp had ever known. Twenty others had been injured, half of them seriously, by flying ball bearings and bits of wood; only the fact that they'd been seated and partly shielded by the heavy wooden pews saved more.

The twins had been devastated by the news that the friendly rabbi had been murdered. They couldn't comprehend that their friend's death had been caused by a man who in his last moment had claimed to be acting on behalf of God, and they had insisted on joining in a candlelight ceremony in front of the synagogue after sundown on Saturday.

Inside the Criminal Courts building, Karp hurried through the lobby, which, given the hour, was empty of the usual potpourri of jaded lawyers; angry, frightened, or indifferent defendants; confused citizens "just trying to pay a parking ticket and get the hell out of here"; and frustrated fathers reminding weeping mothers, "I told you that damn kid was no good." He rode an elevator to the eighth floor, which housed the administrative offices of the New York District Attorney.

Opening the door leading to the reception area outside his office, he hardly got a foot inside before Mrs. Milquetost handed him his first message. "Mr. Newbury called," she announced. "He said to tell you that his mind is made up and that he intends to let the others know at this morning's meeting."

She was obviously upset by the news and dying to know more, so he thought he'd add to the rumor mill. "What a wonderful beginning and end to the weekend," he growled. "Somebody decides to commit murder by blowing himself up in a synagogue on Friday, and Monday one of my best prosecutors decides to take the money and run. Lovely."

As he turned to go into his office, Mrs. Milquetost wrinkled her nose. "Oh, and Mr. Guma is waiting for you. I tried to get him to wait out here, like everybody else, but he just won't listen." It was obvious from her tone that the receptionist was hoping that he'd promise to give Ray a good talking to, if not order his outright dismissal. "That's okay, Mrs. Milquetost," he said. "He hasn't listened to anybody for years. But he's a damn good prosecutor, and I guess that and longevity have earned him certain forbearance." Mrs. Milquetost frowned, obviously disappointed. Karp tried to ease the sting. "Look, I know Guma's rough ways can wear on a person," he said, "but honestly, he's a good man at heart. The best way to handle him is to ignore him, and he'll give up and go find someone else to pick on."

The receptionist blushed. "I'll do my best," she sighed.

"I'm sure you will, as you have since the day you started here," Karp replied, pleased to see her smile broaden.

The office had changed little since the days of Francis Garrahy. Karp was usually indifferent to decor, but there was something about the dark wood and the preponderance of leather furniture that made him feel connected to the past. The massive mahogany desk looked like it belonged to another era, as did the stuffed bookshelves that went from floor to ceiling along an entire wall. A large window overlooked Centre Street below. Other than that, the only light source was provided by green-shaded floor and desk lamps; Karp did not like fluorescent lights any more than his mentor had. A visitor with a keen nose may have also noticed the lingering ghosts of old cigar smoke and hard liquor, even though Karp rarely touched either.

Not so with Ray Guma, who lounged in one of the leather chairs facing his desk, chomping on a sausage-sized cigar. Not that Karp, who disliked tobacco smoke, would have let him, but "Goom" wasn't allowed to light the things up anymore. New York law prohibited smoking in public buildings, and his doctors had ordered him not to anyway; cancer had already nearly killed him once, and they warned that it might return to finish the job. The cigar was as much a part of Guma's hand as one of his fingers, however, and even what he referred to as "unwarranted government interference in personal habits" couldn't remove it.

Tough, irreverent, and unself-consciously loud, Ray Guma had grown up in the Bath Beach section of Brooklyn, one of six children of an Italian plumber. Rumor had it that some of his family members and childhood friends were "made men" in the mob; nevertheless, Goom had wanted to work homicide cases for the New York DAO ever since he could remember, and he'd prosecuted Mafioso with the same fervor as he had the unaffiliated criminal element. The rumor mill also said he'd maintained "an understanding" with mobbed-up members of his family and friends. They kept their business out of Manhattan, or risked prosecution, and helped out with certain delicate requests—like supplying information—and he showed up for Sunday spaghetti and meatballs with his cornucopia of cousins. He even occasionally went to the neighborhood bar to shoot the breeze with his old high-school buddies.

As Guma turned to him with his usual sly smile, Karp took a moment to study his friend. Goom always sort of resembled an ape with his large protruding ears, thick Mediterranean features, and permanent five o'clock shadow. Although a former college baseball player, he even carried himself like an ape—bowlegged and swinging his long arms in great arcs when he walked. But he'd changed a lot physically over the past few years.

They were about the same age and had even started working for Garrahy within months of each other. However, Guma now looked like a spent old man with his wizened frame; snow-white hair; sunken, dark eyes; and loose, pale skin—all compliments of the radiation and chemotherapy nightmare he'd lived through to beat colon cancer.

The disease was currently in remission, but Goom didn't have the energy for full-time work anymore. So Karp let him work "cold cases," as well as special assignments, on a part-time basis. Part of that was because, as he'd told Mrs. Milquetost, his colleague was a damned fine prosecutor—one of the best, especially in the knock-down, drag-out brawl types of trials. But Karp also gave him the assignments because he knew Guma needed to work. Assistant District Attorney for the County of New York was who Goom was, and Karp believed that if that had been taken from him, the cancer might have won the fight, or might outlast him in Round Two.

After the suicide bombing at the synagogue, Karp had assigned Guma to head up the case for the DAO, working with the NYPD and the feds, who weren't exactly playing nice. Within an hour of the attack, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security had taken over the investigation. It was definitely a "keep the locals happy" political afterthought when somebody thought to invite Karp to send someone to "act as a liaison," as well as take over the case should they decide to give it back for local prosecution. But the square-jawed types at Homeland Security weren't interested in including New York City law enforcement in the investigation, barely deigning to share some information at carefully controlled "briefings."

Guma knew the score. He'd made a few choice remarks to the feds in Italian, disguising their meaning behind his crocodile smile—not that he cared if they had somebody who could interpret, except that Karp had asked him to play along and get what he could. Then, with his boss's approval, he had shrugged off Homeland Security's "suggestion" that New York City law enforcement "let us handle this" and started his own investigation with the aid of Clay Fulton, who headed the NYPD detectives assigned to the DAO, and his team.

Given Fulton's abilities and Guma's mob connections, Karp was betting on his old friend putting the case together before the feds could. "Morning, Goom. I hear you're still working at getting under Darla Milquetost's skin." He took a seat next to his friend rather than behind his desk.

Guma grinned. "Actually, doesn't require any work," he replied. "I swear I don't know why, but that broad has it in for me."

"Uh, maybe it's because you still think of women as 'broads.'"

"I'd never say that to their faces ... at least not any more. But she's one of them old-school broads—uptight, overcompensating because she thinks everybody is looking down their noses at her, needs a good banging to get over herself." He studied his cigar as if his comment had constructed a new idea in his head. "In fact, I bet she'd be a real tiger in the sack."

Karp shook his head. "Same old Guma ... Some things never change. Death, taxes, and the certainty that Ray Guma will remain an unrepentant male chauvinist pig.... But Darla Milquetost? Are there any women you don't consider having sex with?"

"Not many—but only out of professional curiosity these days. I'm afraid the glorious era of the Italian Stallion is over; the vast majority of my current fantasies will remain, alas, unfulfilled, because where the mind is willing, the flesh is weak."