Dirt

Chapter 40

Stone and Bob Cantor arrived at the 19th Precinct on time and were sent to Dino’s office right away. Both men still knew detectives working there, and they said a few hellos along the way. Stone hadn’t often been back to the 19th since he’d taken retirement, and he’d never been really close to anybody there but Dino, so his reception was on the cool side. Once they were in Dino’s office, the reception got hostile.

“You remember Ernie Martinez, Stone,” Dino said.

“Sure. Hi, Ernie.”

Martinez nodded. He was a portly detective of Puerto Rican extraction who didn’t like anybody who wasn’t Puerto Rican. He didn’t like Dino much, and he certainly didn’t like Stone.

“Ernie’s the lead detective on the burglaries.”

Stone and Cantor took chairs, and Dino moved a stack of files to the middle of his desk, not a high stack, because each of them was thin, containing only a sheet or two of paper.

“Stone,” Dino said, “three of the eight burglary victims made the Dryer guy. Turns out they all met him at the same party, which took place in one of the burgled residences.”

Stone nodded; he wasn’t surprised.

Dino continued. “He was with Arrington Carter on that occasion; she introduced him around.”

“Were any of the other victims at the same party?”

“No. But we’re going to have to talk to Arrington. You want to bring her in?”

“I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” Stone said.

Martinez sat up, bristling. “You don’t think it’ll be necessary! Since when does anybody give a shit what you think is necessary, Barrington?”

“Shut the fuck up, Ernie,” Dino said. “For starters, I care what he thinks. I’ll get to you in a minute.” He turned to Stone. “Talk to me about Arrington.”

“I talked to her at length this morning about Dryer, so right now I know what she knows; that’s why it won’t be necessary to get her in here.”

“So what does she know?”

“Not a whole lot; this Dryer character is real good at not letting anybody know anything about him that counts. Arrington did take him to some parties, though; several of them.”

“Could you ask her which parties, in which apartments?”

“I’ll get a list, and we can compare them to the files. My hunch is they’ll match up.”

“Okay, I want you and Bob to take a look at each of these files, and I will, too.” Dino passed out the files, and they all read each of them, which didn’t take long, since each consisted of a burglary report and a list of stolen items.

“Money and men’s jewelry,” Cantor said. “Three watches out of eight hits.”

“Arrington says he likes watches, that he had three or four,” Stone said.

“He could be wearing yours on his charm bracelet right now,” Martinez said.

“Probably not,” Stone said. “It had my name engraved on the back, so he’s probably tossed it. He’s too smart to get caught with that. Same thing with Arnie’s watch; he didn’t take that either.”

“Arnie’s watch?” Martinez asked.

“That’s another case,” Dino said. “Don’t you worry about it; stick to burglary.”

“All the entries were through the front door,” Cantor said, “and alarms didn’t stop him, so the guy’s a mechanic.”

“Not much doubt about that,” Martinez said.

“Did you dust anything, Ernie?” Stone asked.

Martinez grimaced. “You know we don’t have time for fingerprinting at small-time jobs like this.”

“One of them wasn’t so small time,” Stone said. “He lifted thirty-five thousand dollars in cash from a wall safe.”

“That, I dusted,” Martinez said. “Nothing there but the owner’s prints.”

“The watches were all Cartiers,” Cantor said. “Two Tank models and a Panther. The guy’s got taste.”

Dino spoke up. “Anything else to ask Ernie, Stone? Bob?”

“Not right now,” Stone said.

Cantor shook his head.

“That’s all for now, Ernie; I’ll get back to you.” Dino waited until Martinez left, then he turned to Stone. “What’s this about Arnie?”

Stone nodded. “There’s something I’d like Ernie to ask the victims about, but I think it’s better if the suggestion comes from you.”

“Right,” Dino agreed. “What is it?”

“I’d like to know if any of the victims lost a twenty-five automatic in the burglaries.”

Dino nodded slowly.

Cantor spoke up. “There’s nothing in any of the reports about a stolen gun.”

Stone shrugged. “Maybe it didn’t happen, but if the gun was unregistered, the victim would be reluctant to mention it; it wouldn’t be a big loss. If Ernie could let each of them know he’s not interested in pursuing the lack of registration, somebody might admit to it.”

“Good point,” Cantor said.

“In fact, Dino, I think it might be best if you called each of these people. Ernie just might not be the kind of guy these people would feel comfortable talking to about this. Rank would impress them.”

Dino shrugged. “Okay, I’ll phone them.”

Cantor spoke up. “Are we talking about Arnie Millman here?”

“Possibly,” Stone said. “Dino, can we talk to the cop who interviewed Dryer?”

Dino got up, opened his door, and shouted, “Gleason! In here!” A moment later a fit-looking fifty-year-old detective came into the office. “Kevin, you know Stone, Bob.”

Gleason shook hands cordially with both men.

“You got your notes on the Dryer interview at Arnie’s scene?” Dino asked. “Give us your impressions.”

Gleason produced a notebook. “Looked to me like Dryer was in the rack with somebody when I rang the bell. He was still getting dressed when he came to the door, and he made a point of closing the bedroom door after I got in. He seemed willing to be helpful, but said he didn’t hear anything, didn’t know anything. Said he’d been in the house all evening and had a witness to that effect, if I really needed it, but he obviously didn’t want to involve the girl, so I let it go. I bought his story.”

“You think we might pull up a print or two in that apartment?” Dino asked.

Cantor spoke up. “I doubt it very seriously; the place has been cleaned and painted.”

“Stone, you got any questions?” Dino asked.

“This was what time, Kevin?”

Gleason looked at his notebook. “I talked to him around eight-thirty.”

“And what time did Arnie buy it?”

“ME says between seven and eight.”

“That’s a pretty tight fix.”

“It was body temperature. We reckon we got there pretty quick; a neighbor who was taking out his garbage found Arnie’s body.”

“Did you get any kind of look at all at the woman in the bedroom?” Stone asked.

“No, nothing.”

“Was there anything in the living room that looked like it belonged to a woman?”

Gleason closed his eyes and thought for half a minute. “Yeah, there was a woman’s brown tweed overcoat on a chair. I didn’t note that at the time; I just remembered it now.”

“How about a scarf?”

“Yeah, a yellow one.”

“Thanks, Kevin, that’s all I’ve got.”

“Okay, Kevin,” Dino said, “that’ll do it.”

“Did I miss anything, boss?”

“No, you didn’t,” Dino said. “Good job; the coat was good.” When Gleason had left, Dino turned to Stone. “What?” he asked.

“It may be nothing; I want to check something out first.”

“Stone, don’t you hold out on me.”

“I promise I won’t; I just think I can learn more about this by treading softly than you can with a standard interview.”

“Okay, I’ll trust you on that,” Dino said. “But the minute you’ve got something, I want to know.”

“I promise. I assume you ran a check on the Jonathan Dryer name?”

“Yeah; nothing.”

“That’s what I figured.”

“Well,” Dino said, “we’ve made a start, I guess, but I don’t have enough evidence to arrest Dryer for the burglaries.”

“Assuming you could find him,” Stone said.

“Right. I don’t even have enough evidence to start looking for him. This all sounds good, but it’s very tenuous.”

“You’re right, Dino,” Stone said. “I’ll stay on it and see if I can come up with something else. And I’ll get that list from Arrington. You’ll let me know about the gun?”

“Sure. We having lunch?”

“You’re on. Bob, join us?”

“Okay.”

Dino stood up. “I got to go to the can; I’ll meet you guys outside.”

Stone and Cantor left Dino’s office and walked through the squad room and out the front door.

“Stone,” Cantor said.

“Yeah?”

“The other night when I clocked Martha going into her apartment building, she was wearing a brown tweed coat and a yellow scarf.”

“I know,” Stone said. “Don’t bring it up at lunch.”