The Only Good Lawyer - Jeremiah Healy (20 page)

"Of course," I
said, reaching for my wallet.

* * *

Once on the third floor, I went directly to Mantle's
door. Nobody else was in sight, though more wheezing came from the
room on the landing below where Dufresne had said a man with
emphysema was living. Or dying.

After knocking twice, I
used the master key to open Mantle's door. The place still looked
like it had been shot at and hit. Hard to say for sure, but nothing
seemed to have been moved, and the towel at the foot of the bureau
remained dry to the touch.

* * *

As I went back downstairs, I heard another wheezing
cough from the second-floor room. I thought, Nothing ventured.
Pocketing Dufresne's master key, I knocked on the door. If I hadn't
been listening for the response, I'm not sure I'd have recognized it
as a word. Or even a human voice.

"Come."

I turned the knob and pushed, the smell inside
yanking me back to grade school, when I had bronchitis and my mother
had plastered facecloths slathered in Vicks VapoRub to my chest. The
room appeared to be a duplicate of Alan Spaeth's former one overhead,
but it contained the clutter of a man who'd minimized the number of
steps required for basic existence. Next to a red, seam-burst easy
chair were stacks of newspapers and magazines. In front of the chair
stood two TV trays, one holding envelopes and papers, a mate with
plate, fork, and coffee mug.

The boarder himself was propped up in bed, three
pillows behind his back. An old western movie rolled and flickered on
the screen of a dinosaur black-and-white threatening to collapse its
rickety stand. The man's face was round and flushed, the gray hair on
his head two inches long and bristling in the spikes of a man long
between the sheets and short of shampoo. His chest seemed nearly
concave under an old robe, the nose running freely from one nostril
and not at all from the other.

"Name?" in the croaking, almost-voice.

"John Cuddy. I'm a private investigator"

"Remember your . . . tread."

"My tread?"

A jerking nod. "Tread on . . . the stairs."
The old man's throat contorted, as though he were swallowing
something. "From this morning .... Like a signature."

"I understand." Dufresne had mentioned his
name, but I couldn't remember it. "And you are?"

"Hank."

I didn't have the heart to prompt him for a last
name.

"Hank, you might be able to help me, but I want
to make this as easy for you as possible."

The jerking nod.

After closing his door behind me, I moved deeper into
the room. "Can I get you anything?"

One shake of his head as the index finger of a
veined, liver-spotted hand pointed toward a full water glass and
half-full pitcher on a nightstand.

I stopped next to the bed. "Let me ask you
mostly yes or no questions, then. Nod or shake, okay?"

The nod.

"Did you ever meet Alan Spaeth?"

Pointing to the ceiling, Hank nevertheless gave a
shake.

"You knew he lived on the next floor, but you
never met him?"

Nod.

"How about Michael Mantle?"

Another nod, the pointing finger now aimed diagonally
up and toward the front of the building. "The Mick."

"Right." I looked at the door. "When's
the last time you saw Mantle?"

A shrug of the face, but something like a twinkle in
his eye, too.

"You haven't seen him for a while, but you have
heard his . . . tread?"

The twinkle and a nod, plus a smile that showed two
separated canine teeth on top, three others bunched on the bottom.

"When's the last time you heard Mantle walking?"

"A week . . . at least." Swallow. "Went
down."

"Meaning down the stairs?"

Nod.

"And out of the house?"

Shrug.

"How sure are you that he hasn't been back for a
week?"

"Pretty sure .... Can't sleep . . ."
Swallow. "Much anymore."

"Was anybody with Mantle when he left?"

Shake.

"Have you heard anyone else walk to his room?"

“
Vincennes .... You."

I couldn't see what more the man could tell me.
"Thanks for the help, Hank. Anything I can do for you before I
leave?"

The jerking nod.

"What?"

He raised his right hand, pointing the index linger
now at his temple. Using the thumb, Hank pantomimed the cocking and
fall of a pistol hammer.

I looked into the face of old age and illness.

Shrug. Twinkle. Smile.

Back downstairs, I knocked on Dufresne's "parlor"
door. He opened it, wineglass still in hand, but now full, a woman
singing a French ballad on the stereo.

"The hell took you so long?"

I gave him back the master key. "Have to be
thorough."

"Thorough."

"Speaking of which, it seems to me you haven't
seen Mantle now for a solid week."

“
About right."

"You said he had money a month ago. Could he
have gone on a trip?"

Dufresne's honking laugh. "No way. The Mick
wasn't a traveling kind of guy. And besides, he'd paid up in advance.
Who's he to waste that kind of money by not living here, eh?"

It was a good question, I
thought.

* * *

After telling Vincennes Dufresne that I'd still make
it worth his while to let me know if he saw Michael Mantle, I decided
to visit the bars within walking distance of the Chateau.

Just off Broadway near Flanagan's Market, the closest
was a tavern in the same sense that a mud hut is a house. If the air
at the threshold made you gag, the atmosphere inside urged you to
follow through. I managed ten minutes of putting questions to the
night bartender (who didn't know who the real "Mickey Mantle"
was) and two patrons (each of whom was contributing his own special
something to the environment).

The next place was called "O'B's," a little
farther west on Broadway, and evidently part of the area's recent
renaissance. The air was clean, the bar top cleaner. The keep behind
the taps nodded to me in a "take-any-stool" way as he drew
two pints of Harp. The pints were destined for a couple in their
fifties at the end of the bar who couldn't have looked more married
to each other if they'd been yoked at the necks. I sat down, and
after the keep finished with the newlyweds he came over to me.

"Haven't seen you before, have I?"

A thick brogue that matched the red, curly hair and
the muzzy freckles across his thirtyish cheeks.

I said, "First time. How's the Harp?"

"Fresh as a morning's dew."

“
One, please."

He drew the pint, poured off, and topped it with a
quarter-inch of head. Setting the glass on a shamrock coaster, he
said, "You've the sound of the neighborhood in your voice."

"Grew up within blocks of here."

A hammy hand was extended across the bar. "Paul
O'Brien."

I shook with him. "Paul, John Cuddy. You the
proprietor?"

"I am. Tended bar till I had the hang of it and
enough money to open a pub of my own. 'O'B's' for 'O'Brien's.' "
He rested both palms on the bar, gave me a measured look. "You'd
be police, then?"

"Not for a long time." I took out my ID.
"I'm in business for myself now. Like you."

O'Brien read the holder's laminated card and nodded
in an "I've-seen-enough" way. Expressive nodder, Mr.
O'Brien. He said, "Which means you're here for something more
than a pint from the auld sod."

"I'm looking for a man named Michael Mantle."

"The Mick, you say?" O'Brien turned toward
the couple. "Leo, this fella's after the Mick."

"Good," said Leo. "You find the little
weasel, remind him he owes me a round from last Monday."

I looked over at the husband as his wife said,
"Tuesday, Leo. It was Tuesday last."

The man didn't have the brogue, but the woman did. I
said, "You haven't seen him since?"

Leo closed his eyes briefly. “Moira?"

She said, "Not since, no. Maybe he's gone down."

I looked from one to the other. "Down?"

O'Brien interpreted. "As in 'down the line,'
John. To one of the less . . . pricey establishments on the avenue."

"Mantle drink here often?"

"Never," said Leo, "at least not until
maybe a month ago. Then he'd be in here with a bunch of other guys,
buying them rounds."

Moira put in, "Or them buying him."

O'Brien waved his hand at the taps. "Guinness,
mainly. A black-and-tan upon occasion."

I went back to the couple. "Any idea where he
might be now?"

Moira said, "Drinking or sleeping, that one."

"He's not at his rooming house, and probably
hasn't been there for a full week."

"Since last Monday?" said Leo.

Moira cleared her throat. "Tuesday last. Have
you gone deaf on me as well as senile?"

"Tuesday," Leo agreed.

O'Brien shook his head. "The Mick, he went
through money like a hot knife. Could fool the drop-ins with his
birth-certificate routine, but the regulars wised up to his tricks
pretty quick."

"All except my Leo," said Moira.

Her husband didn't look at his wife. "An act of
charity, and she'll never let me forget it."

I tried to take in all three of them at once. "So,
no sign of him here since Tuesday of last week."

Consensus, but consistency is not always a virtue.

I said, "Any other ideas?"

"Try the drunk tank," offered Leo.

Moira grunted a small
laugh. "And you with the word 'charity' falling from your lips
not a minute past."

* * *

I didn't have any more luck at the other watering
holes, so I walked to Alan Spaeth's new apartment building. The
address was a three-decker, his name on a yellow Post-it over the
second-floor button, no names identifying the other two. I tried the
first and third anyway, getting no response for my trouble.

Then I thought of something. According to Spaeth, he
and Mantle had been drinking together upstairs. If Mantle were hiding
from something—or someone—maybe he'd use his friend's empty
apartment. I pushed the middle button, but got nothing again.

I was about to leave when the front door opened on a
chain and yanked taut, a dour woman in her forties looking out
tentatively through the four-inch gap.

"What do you want?"

"The name's John Cuddy." I held up my
license folder. "I wonder if I could ask you a few questions."

"It's about that horrible man on the second
floor, isn't it?"

"Maybe if I could come in—"

"Not a chance. I can tell you all I want to
through this chain." She glanced behind her. "I live on the
first floor here. I was coming in from a shift at the hospital,
dog-tired and dirty, when that man tried to proposition me."

Alan Spaeth, making friends wherever he goes. "Look—"
 

"He wouldn't take no for an answer, either."

"I'm sorry. Truly, Ms .... ?"

"No. No, I'm not giving you my name. He's a
horrible man, and I'm glad he's in jail."

"Did you hear anything upstairs last Wednesday
evening? It's very important."

She chose her words carefully. “I was on the
four-to-midnight, but we had a carryover case, so I didn't get home
until almost one A.M. Then all the commotion with the police woke me
up at five." Careful yielded to petulant. "Only four hours
of sleep after the night I had at the hospital. Now, I ask you, is
that fair?"

"It sure isn't. You know of anyone else here I
could talk with?"

"There was a nice old lady—Mrs. Crawford—who
lived on the third floor, but she died two months back, and nobody's
moved in yet."

Last hope. "You said you live on the first floor
and Mr. Spaeth on the second?"

"That's right. Had to keep my door to the back
stairs locked because of him trying to proposition me. Never needed
to do that before."

I waited until she finished. "Since Mr. Spaeth
was arrested, have you heard anyone moving around up there?"

Her features scrunched together. "That . . .
really . . . sucks."

"I'm sorry?"

"Scaring me with 'Is anybody living up there in
secret?' That really sucks, you know?"

"Look—"

"I mean, this is my home you're talking about.
My life, even, and you have to ask me that?"

"But have you heard—"

"No. No!"