House of Ghosts (38 page)

Joe fast forwarded through the want-ads of September 5, 1948. “America is supposed to be the liberator of the oppressed and the champion of the downtrodden.”

“Governments are all the same,” Alenia spat.

“I hate Russian philosophers,” Joe said, thinking that the retired exotic dancer was correct. “Shut up and keep reading.”

“Stalin,” Alenia said, pointing to the dictator’s picture on the screen. The connected article concerned Soviet domination of Poland and Hungary. “The West did nothing to stop him. Maybe Swedge had his hand in that too.”

Joe loaded 1949. “Preston was many things, but a commie-pinko, I doubt it.”

“Nich-o-las Spag-no-la,” Alenia said, twirling a lock of hair.

Joe spun toward Alenia’s screen. March 23, 1948. He read, “Nicholas Spagnola and Jacob Rothstein were sentenced by Judge Marvin Hirschhorn to twenty years for the murder of Mordecai Stein. Their attorney, former Congressman Benjamin Goodman, said he would appeal immediately.”

“This is what we’re wasting our time?” Alenia asked.

“I think so.” Joe continued to read. “Stein, owner of a business in the Manhattan garment center, fell out of an eighth floor window during a fight with Rothstein and Spagnola. The duo with known connections to waterfront boss and loan shark Thomas Bavosa paid a visit to Stein to collect on a loan that had fallen in arrears. The jury deliberated for just half an hour, convicting the defendants on the testimony of Selma Stein who referred to Rothstein by his alias Ted Steele as the one who had beaten her husband with a baseball bat three months prior.”

“Jesus Christ!” Joe said. “If Rothstein did the minimum time he could have been paroled in 1960.” He stared at the article. “1960 is when he surfaced in Princeton and when Preston had his nervous breakdown.”

Alenia smoothed a nail with an emery board fetched from her Louis Vitton bag. “Now can we go?”

Joe made a copy of the
Times
article. “In a minute,” he said, flipping open his cell phone. It was a few minutes to eleven. Stored in his contact list was the number for David Cohen. The phone rang twice.

“This is your fourth call to my number,” the craggy voice answered.

Joe envisioned the eighty-plus accountant sitting at his kitchen table with the paper and a tall glass of prune juice. Joe said the magic words, “Ted Steele.” There was dead silence. Joe waited for the sound of Cohen’s dentures hitting the floor.

“I have business in the city and will be free by twelve-thirty. Do you know the General Motors building?” Cohen asked sarcastically.

Joe twisted his tongue holding back the F bomb. “Fifty-eighth and Fifth, across from the Plaza.”

“There’s a coffee shop on Fifty-eighth—Blintz. Be there.”

Cohen was gone, no good-bye not even a drop dead. Joe looked to see if the call was dropped. “Let’s go into the city.”

“Harry will be back by seven. Okay, we go.” Alenia ran her hands over her chest, drawing an ogle from a senior citizen who wandered into the archive room. “We’ll have fun.”

Cajoled into driving, Alenia maneuvered the Mercedes along the New Jersey Turnpike, weaving between ten wheelers to maintain a steady seventy. With the morning crush long over, they zipped through the Lincoln Tunnel.

“Harry took me to the Plaza when we first met,” Alenia said, pulling into a parking garage adjacent to the hotel. She handed the attendant a twenty. “Keep the car on
this
level. I don’t want to wait an hour when we return.”

Joe smiled. The girl had learned the value of money from Harry. “I’ll call you when I’m finished. Give Harry a break and don’t buy out Bergdorf Goodman’s.”

“I’m going to replace the bra your dog ripped apart,” she said with a snarl. “Give me a kiss.”

Joe planted a light smoothie on her cheek, avoiding the red gloss that accentuated her lips. Painstakingly climbing the ramp to Fifty-eighth Street, he turned right for Fifth Avenue. Across the street, a line stretched from the F.A.O. Schwartz toy store located on the ground floor of the General Motors building. A banner hanging above its door announced the rollout of the latest video game Joe never heard of.

Following the stream of pedestrians crossing to the east side of Fifth, Joe bypassed the video queue. Blintz was four doors down. Despite Alenia’s race driving skill, he was fifteen minutes late.

The Greek run breakfast-lunch bistro was narrow as a submarine. Third in line to be seated behind two couples and a woman balancing a hatbox and a large brown shopping paper bag from Macy’s, Joe studied the faces of the diners. None came close to the picture of Dave Cohen clipped from the N.Y.U. alumni newsletter.

“Looking for someone?” the slender olive skin cashier asked, chomping on her chewing gum. A red stripe highlighted a head of bleached blonde spiked hair.

Joe showed her Cohen’s picture. “Supposed to meet the man for lunch.”

“You a cop?”

“Not after a perp tried to blow off my leg,” Joe said, leaning on the five-iron.

She pointed to the rear. “Last row of tables.”

With tables crammed inches apart, Joe turned sideways to make it through the aisle without knocking coffee cups off the tables. Cohen sat with his back to the wall. “Mr. Cohen.”

Cohen hovered over a plate of eggs over-easy and a slice of whole-wheat toast. “I’m never late for appointments,” he said, pointing his fork.

Cohen was the epitome of an accountant: square black-rimmed glasses, navy shirt with contrasting blue tie, and conservative gray suit. Notwithstanding a bad comb over, Joe gauged that for a man his age, Cohen was in good shape. He put the alumni article on the table. “Congratulations. The Weinsteins send their regards.” He sat, hanging the five-iron on the edge of the red Formica table.

“My God!” Cohen said between chews. “It must be fifty years since I’ve seen them.”

“Times Square, 1945 to be exact. After not seeing your good friends for nearly three years, you couldn’t spare the time to talk. Ring a bell?” Joe said, pushing silverware toward the middle of the table.

Cohen put his fork down. “I don’t remember.”

Before Joe could utter “bullshit,” the waitress came by with a carafe of coffee and two cups. “Everything all right?” she asked Cohen.

Cohen didn’t answer, staring at the front of the room. “Everything is hunkydory, but I could use a cup,” Joe replied. The girl poured the coffee and moved to her next station. “Ted Steele rang a bell this morning. Do you know where I can find him?”

The octogenarian came back to earth. He fiddled with his right ear. “Damn hearing aid picks up all the background noise. What were you asking?”

Joe wasn’t sure if Cohen was busting his chops or his hearing aid really wasn’t working properly. “Ted Steele.”

“Why the interest?” Cohen asked, finishing his eggs.

Joe wasn’t in the mood to play twenty questions. “I stumbled into some papers that included your friend Jake and his moniker Ted Steele.”

Cohen took a sip of coffee, then nonchalantly said, “I haven’t seen Jake since 1948 when he went to prison. After he was paroled, I heard he was killed somewhere out west.”

“When was that?”

“Sixty-two or sixty-three,” he mumbled.

Having interviewed more than a few suspects, Joe had a feel for scripted responses. Cohen was playing with him. Joe wanted to look under the table to see if his new best friend was holding a cheat sheet. “And you didn’t make arrangements to see him?”

“Why would I? It wouldn’t have looked good for me professionally to associate with a felon. I’m an accountant, not an attorney.”

The waitress returned with a fresh pot of coffee, topping off their cups. Joe poured a splash of milk into the coffee that had the density of roofing tar. “How did you end up in debits and credits? You were supposed to be an attorney?”

Cohen shrugged his shoulders. “Things changed after I came back from the army. I had a wife and son. Going back to school, even at night, would have been impossible.”

“What about Sarah?” Joe asked, studying Cohen.

“The Weinsteins really filled you in about the old crowd,” Cohen mused. “When I got home at the end of 1945, she had moved upstate and I never saw her again. I heard she took ill and passed away a young woman. Tragic.”

“You were Paul’s best friend and you didn’t want to know what happened to his widow?” Joe said, fixing Cohen with a glare. “What about Paul’s parents?”

“Abe Rothstein passed shortly after Paul and I went into the service. Paul’s mom didn’t last long after his death.”

“I thought all you guys were tight, the old neighborhood togetherness routine. Let’s not forget about blowing up the Bund.”

The color drained out of Cohen’s face. He shot Joe a puzzled look. “The Weinsteins weren’t that close to me or Paul to know such things. Where did you get your information?”

The lunch crowd filtered back to work. The Blintz was now three-quarters empty. “I got it from Paul Rothstein’s diary.”

Cohen choked on a piece of toast. He drank half his coffee. “Paul’s personal effects were sent home to his mother after he died in 1944.”

“I hate to break the news to you,” Joe said, lighting a cigarette. “I found his diary in a pile of trash at an estate sale.”

“In Westfield?” Cohen cautiously asked.

Joe edged close to the table. “A matter of fact, it was.”

“You don’t seem the type to go to estate or garage sales.” Cohen white-knuckled the spoon as he stirred his cup.

“I like silk underwear, too.” Joe’s smart-alecky comment didn’t draw a blink.

Cohen drained his cup. He slammed a hand on the table. “I remember. Paul had a buddy in his unit who came from New Jersey. I’m at a loss for the name.
Who owned the house?”

It was Joe’s turn. They were in a chess match, each skirting the truth. Joe ran through the exchanges. Hitting Cohen with Jake’s alias didn’t compare to the effect of Paul’s diary. “The house changed hands seven times after it was built in the mid-1950s.” He considered making up a name, but didn’t. “Preston Swedge. Ever hear of him?”

Cohen unconsciously took a deep breath, eyes darting left to right. “No.” He pushed his plate to the middle of the table, unfolded his napkin, and then carefully wiped his mouth. “Paul was big on keeping a journal in college,” he paused. “I wonder if he kept one during his time in the service.”

Joe had gone to the Blintz with Jake Rothstein and or Ted Steele in mind, nothing more. Cohen had just put him on another track—there had to be more than one set of Rothstein diaries. His father’s words, uttered at his graduation from the police academy reverberated, “Never let up, keep punching the bastard in the ribs.” Joe kept punching, “Pretty amazing stuff. Paul Rothstein was a hero. I should have brought the four volumes, stupid me.”

“I have to use the facilities,” Cohen announced. “I’ll be right back.”

The rest rooms were located down a hallway out of Joe’s sightline. He checked his watch—ten minutes had passed. Cohen was about the same age as Joe’s father who needed time to do his business. At the fifteen minute mark, Joe became concerned, not over the possibility that Cohen had keeled over the bowl, but that he skipped out. Joe made a quick check of the men’s room. The pair of feet under the stall were wearing Nikes. Joe stuck Cohen’s picture in the face of a Latino busboy mopping the hallway. He pointed to the fire exit. Joe shouldered open the door to face a garbage dumpster in the alley running behind the building. Joe laughed. The old guy had stuck him with the check.

“I THOUGHT AN AFTERNOON AT THE PLAZA would’ve gotten you in a better mood,” Alenia said, looking at Joe from the corner of her eye. The Mercedes sped through the E-Z pass lane in the New Jersey Turnpike interchange at Newark Airport.

“I was preoccupied,” Joe pouted.

Alenia switched lanes for Route 22. “I could’ve been with Harry.”

Joe opened the passenger window and lit a Marlboro. “It was the wine.”

Alenia laughed. “Maybe you have the diabetes like Harry.” She laughed again. “It’s alright Jozef. I’m used to old men.” She held out her hand palm up, indicating that she wanted Joe’s cigarette. “This Swedge business is driving you crazy.”

Joe handed her the cigarette, lighting another for himself. “There’s no way that Cohen doesn’t know what happened to Sarah Rothstein, and I don’t believe Jake Rothstein just up and went out west. The guy never ventured outside New York City.”

Alenia took a deep drag on the cigarette. “You’re being a schmuck.”

“I’m hearing Harry.”

Alenia zipped past the lake in Newark’s Weequahic Park. “Don’t you know someone in
the
secret police?”

“We don’t have
the
secret police in this country,” Joe said, flicking his cigarette out the window. “I know a guy in the FBI.”

Mimicking Joe, Alenia popped her cigarette out the driver’s window. “KGB, FBI same thing. If they want to arrest you, they arrest you. Your guy will find Sarah Rothstein and the bad man Jake. The KGB would have them in two hours.”

Hitting the power button on the fourteen speaker CD, Joe settled back, wrapping himself in the hand sewn leather. Classic rock and roll filled the cabin. “I used Ted Steele as bait for Dave Cohen, but he met me with an agenda. He was ready with his quips and attitude, but not for my possessing Paul’s diaries. I’d bet the
thing between my legs that Cohen knew they existed but was shocked that I have them.”