The Helper

FIFTEEN

‘So let me get this straight. .’ says Cesario.

Doyle and Holden sit opposite the Lieutenant in his office. This is their first task of the day: to bring the boss up to speed without causing him to wet his pants over what a nightmare this is becoming.

‘Both the Mellish girl and Hanrahan go to see Vasey as patients-’

‘Clients,’ says Doyle.

‘Whatever,’ says Cesario, giving Doyle a withering look. ‘They’re both connected to the psychologist.’

Yeah, thinks Doyle. They’re shrink-linked.

‘So you bring him in, he lawyers up, and you get nothing.’

Doyle looks at Holden. Holden looks at Doyle. Doyle feels they should have something to add. That word ‘nothing’ seems a little harsh. It sounds less than the emptiness it represents. In fact it resounds with negativity. Only he’s not sure how to nudge it over the line and into the positive zone.

Cesario continues his narrative: ‘And then Vasey gets whacked. Does that about sum it up?’

Doyle would have phrased it differently. He thinks it’s like summarizing the movie Jaws as Fish attacks bathers, sheriff kills fish. Where’s the fine detail? Where’s the emotion? Where’s the stuff that makes it interesting? But he shrugs nonetheless. Says, ‘I guess.’

Cesario sits in silence for a while, then says, ‘So where are you going with this, Detectives?’

‘We think. .’ Doyle begins, emphasis on the we, ‘we think these could all be the work of the same perp.’

Cesario sighs. ‘See, that’s what I thought you were gonna say. I didn’t like it when I thought it and I hate it even more now. Do you understand the enormity of what you’re asking me to accept?’

Holden says, ‘We understand, Lou. But we have to at least consider the possibility.’

‘All right, so let’s consider it. Go ahead. Convince me.’

Doyle finds the ball rolling back to him again. Thanks, Holden.

‘Okay. We have three DOAs, not counting Vasey’s doorman, who we’ll put down as collateral damage for now. Admittedly, they were all killed in different parts of the city, and with completely different MOs. A multiple stabbing, a shooting and a guy thrown through his window. On that basis alone, I agree, there’s nothing there. But toss in the Vasey connection and it changes the whole picture. It’s just too much of a coincidence that a shrink and two of his clients should all take hits from separate, completely independent killers. And there’s something else they have in common, too.’

‘Go on.’

‘These murders weren’t spur of the moment. There’s no obvious motive for any of them. What we do know is that they were planned. These people were targeted. In each case, the killer seemed to befriend them or at least get them to trust him before he whacked them. The bookstore girl let the killer get really close to her, close enough to write a fake number on her arm. Hanrahan and Vasey allowed him into their apartments. Maybe they all knew him, or maybe he’s just an excellent con artist. Whatever, to me this sounds like the work of one killer or group of killers.’

Cesario leans back in his chair and puts his arms behind his head, bringing them perilously close to two tall cactus plants flanking him. Just like his predecessor often did, thinks Doyle.

‘There’s a lotta supposition here, fellas,’ says Cesario.

He rocks a little, ponders some more, makes a decision.

‘I can’t ask the Chief of D’s to give us the other cases. Not on what we got so far.’

Doyle is almost out of his seat. ‘Lou-’

Cesario raises a warning finger.

‘But I want you to look into this. Talk to the precincts working the other cases. Talk to Homicide. You find anything more concrete that ties these DOAs together, then I’ll put in that call to the Chief of D’s.’

Doyle realizes it’s the best they’re going to get. He can’t blame Cesario. After all, what they’re talking about here is a possible serial killer. The task of stopping someone like that is a heavy responsibility for any squad commander to take on.

He sees Cesario reach for a file from his in-tray. He’s moving on to his next job. Meaning this discussion is over. Holden starts to rise from his chair.

‘Something else,’ Doyle says.

Cesario raises his eyes just as Holden lowers himself back onto his seat, like they’re on opposite ends of a see-saw.

Doyle says, ‘If we’re right, and this is a serial killer, what if it’s not just these three?’

Both Cesario and Holden stare at him. ‘You got somebody else in mind?’ Cesario asks.

Doyle hesitates. He wonders, Is this a step too far? Maybe I should quit while I’m ahead.

‘Lorna Bonnow,’ he says.

‘Who?’

‘Lorna Bonnow. A DOA up in the Two-Seven. She was rammed by a car.’

‘Uh-huh. And you single her out because. .’

Because the same guy wasted her too. Because he told me so.

‘She was also targeted. A guy called her up, told her that her husband needed her. When she got to the street, he took her out. It was clever, it was planned. Just like the others.’

‘Anything that connects her with Vasey?’

‘Not that I’m aware of.’

‘Anything that connects her with Vasey’s patients?’

Clients, thinks Doyle. He shakes his head.

‘Has the Two-Seven been in touch to say they think this might be the work of a monster terrorizing New York?’

No, not that, although they did wonder why my name cropped up in their investigation.

‘No.’

Cesario breathes out heavily through his nose. ‘Cal, this is already bigger and badder than I would like. Please don’t go roping in every unsolved DOA simply because it doesn’t smell right. Work on what you got already. When you’ve tidied those away, I’ll think about letting you loose on the rest of the city’s problems. Dinner first, dessert later. Now get out of here.’

They step out of Cesario’s office. Holden says, ‘Lorna Bonnow? How did she get into this?’

Doyle shrugs. ‘I heard about the case. It sounded like it might be the work of our man.’

Holden looks as though he doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. ‘It sounded like. . Man, you are one seriously fucked-up individual. I am truly starting to regret agreeing to work with you.’

‘I could be right, though.’

‘Yeah, and maybe he shot JFK too. Maybe he sabotaged Apollo 13. Hey, maybe he’s got green hair and a permanent smile and he’s about to blow up Gotham City.’

As Holden walks away, Doyle calls after him, ‘Did I ever tell you I was thinking about changing my name to Bruce Wayne?’

When Doyle gets back to his desk, he finds he has a visitor. As he approaches, she affixes a welcoming smile. He could fall for a smile like that. If he were fifty years older.

‘Hello, Mrs Sachs. How are you?’

‘How am I? I’m alive. At my age, I don’t have much else to be grateful for. If this body were a building, it would be condemned as unsafe. Not fit for human habitation. The aches and pains I have, you don’t want to know. A young man like you wouldn’t understand the purgatory I go through every day. And why should you? You have your whole life before you. Enjoy. Don’t worry yourself about poor schmucks like me.’

Doyle smiles. ‘The way I see it, you got a lot of mileage to get through yet.’

‘Mileage? What I got left you can’t measure in feet, let alone miles.’

Doyle laughs. ‘So what can I do for you?’

‘I saw Mr Repp again yesterday.’

Good, thinks Doyle. That clown finally saw the error of his ways.

‘Did he put your mind at rest?’

‘Well. . not exactly.’

Uh-oh, Doyle thinks. What’s the idiot done now?

‘What did he say to you?’

‘He told me that. . that my Patricia isn’t in Chicago.’

Oh. Okay, Travis. So maybe I misjudged you. Maybe you did the decent thing after all.

‘No?’

‘No. Apparently she’s moved to Hawaii.’

I take that back, Travis. You’re an asshole.

‘Hawaii?’

‘Yes. Waikiki.’

‘He offer any proof?’

Mrs Sachs reaches for her purse. The same one she brought to their first meeting. The leather one with the silver clasp. Click, it’s open. She dips a leathery hand inside. Takes out a photo, just as she did last time.

Doyle looks at the picture. A beach that could be any beach. A woman that could be any woman. But she has a face that presumably belonged to Patricia Sachs.

Doyle asks, ‘Do you think it’s her?’

‘I want it to be her. It looks like her.’

‘What does Repp say?’

‘He’s pretty sure it’s Patricia. He says the man who traced her there is good at his job. But he wants to be sure, so he’s offered to go out there himself.’

‘Which he’ll bill you for, I suppose.’

‘I have no doubt of that, Detective. But as I said to you before, this isn’t about money. It’s about my daughter. If he’s right, and Patricia is alive. .’

Mentally, Doyle groans. He wants to take this old woman by her bony shoulders, look her in the eye and say, Mrs Sachs, your daughter is dead. It’s tragic, it’s upsetting, but it’s true. Now cut your ties with Repp and get on with your life.

But that’s the problem. Because he’s not sure how much life she will have in her once she learns the truth. It’s as though there’s a current running from daughter to mother: switch off one and maybe the other’s lights go out too. Doyle isn’t sure he wants that responsibility. And if he’s wrong about Repp. . If, by some slim chance, Repp is not scamming her. .

‘What do you believe, Mrs Sachs? Deep down, what do you think? Do you believe your daughter is alive or not?’

‘What I think is that I’m getting too old. My mind, it doesn’t function like it used to. It’s like it’s given up thinking about things that are too hard or too upsetting. Now, it’s just willing to believe whatever comes its way. I rely on other people now to tell me what is true and what is false. Tell me, did you go to see Mr Repp?’

‘Yes, I met with him.’

‘And what did you think? Does he seem reputable to you?’

Doyle’s thoughts are that he wouldn’t put it past Repp to take the last dime from a blind beggar, but he doesn’t say so. He had hoped his little visit to Repp would have been sufficient to scare him back onto the path of the righteous, at least as far as his relationship with Mrs Sachs was concerned.

‘I didn’t get to know him real well. Tell you what, why don’t I go see him again, see if I can offer him a little police help to track down Patricia?’

She smiles again, and this time it looks to Doyle as though her watery eyes are ready to overflow.

‘Thank you, Detective. You don’t know how much this means to me.’

Doyle wonders how much it will mean to her to discover that her daughter really did suffer a terrible fiery fate in the Twin Towers. He makes a mental note to advise Repp in the strongest terms that he will need to let her down gently — so gently she doesn’t shatter.

He helps the old lady out of her chair and sees her out of the squadroom. Before he can retake his seat, his cellphone rings. He looks at the screen. No caller ID. He presses the button to kill the call. Fuck you, he thinks. I ain’t playing. This game is over.

It reminds him that there’s work to be done on the homicides. Now that he’s got the lieutenant’s consent to push ahead, he can investigate properly, unfettered by a need to keep things to himself.

You’re mine, you sonofabitch, he thinks. It’s only a matter of time.

Not again.

This is starting to get annoying.

Doyle gets to his car, reaches for the door handle, and — surprise! — he’s there again. At his side like a faithful dog welcoming home its master.

Just don’t start humping my leg, he thinks.

‘Gonzo, what the hell are you doing here? Did you spend your whole lunch hour just waiting out here in case I should show?’

Gonzo scratches his head and puts on a pained expression. Like he’s just been asked to solve the riddle of the origin of the universe.

‘Well, yeah. I needed to speak with you.’

‘Why didn’t you just call me on my cell?’

‘I didn’t want to disturb you. You know, while you’re working. I know how busy you are. I know how important your cases are. I thought I’d wait until you take a lunch break.’

Doyle sighs. ‘Get in the car.’

They both get into what seems to have become Doyle’s makeshift private office.

‘What is it, Gonzo?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What do you mean, you don’t know? You wait outside my building for an hour, and you don’t know why you want to see me?’

‘I. . I just needed to talk.’

‘About what?’

‘About. .’ He waves his arms wildly, causing Doyle to duck. ‘About all this. I’m not used to this kind of thing, you know.’

‘You need counseling? Maybe you should go see a shrink.’

Gonzo glares at him. ‘That’s not funny, Detective Doyle. What I witnessed last night was traumatic. It may have affected my mental stability for the rest of my life.’

You mean, Doyle wonders, it can get quirkier than this?

‘What do you want me to say, Gonzo? I didn’t ask you to put a constant watch on Vasey. In fact, I don’t recall asking you to get involved in this at all. All I wanted was for you to find one lousy thing on a computer. How did that develop into you becoming the city’s secret protector?’

‘I’m not trying to be a superhero. Or even a cop. I’m just trying to help. I sit over there in 1PP, looking at computer screens day after day. Except for Lonnie and a few of the other guys, I hardly see a soul. And the only reason they talk to me is when they need me to look at a computer. I never go out of the building. When you came in and asked me to look for that diary, I thought here we go again. One more request to add to the pile. But when it became obvious that you had reasons for keeping it under wraps, I thought this was my chance to prove that I’m more than just a brainy guy who knows about computers. That’s all. I was just trying to be of assistance.’

‘Yeah, well, maybe I’ve had my fill of people trying to push help on me lately. Maybe it’s more trouble than it’s worth.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Nothing.’

They lapse into silence. Both staring out of the car windows, watching the people walk by.

Doyle’s phone rings again. He takes it out of his pocket. No caller ID, so he kills it, scowling as he does so.

He notices that Gonzo is watching him, additional puzzlement on his permanently bewildered features.

Doyle doesn’t want to get into it, so he throws out a random thought: ‘Why do they call you Gonzo, anyhow?’

The pained expression again.

‘I forget.’

‘So what’s your real name?’

Gonzo thinks some more.

‘I forget.’

Doyle can’t help himself then. He cracks up. He knows it’s probably doing untold damage to this individual’s fragile mental state, but the absurdity of it all just keeps hammering the laughter out of him.

And when he looks again at Gonzo, he sees that he too is wearing a smile. At last, a point of agreement. A small meeting of minds which interpret the world in very different ways.

Says Doyle, ‘What you saw last night? Try to put it out of your mind. We’re working on it. We’ll catch whoever did that.’

Gonzo nods, says nothing.

‘You want me to drop you off at the Big House?’

‘No. Thanks. I’m good.’ He opens the car door. ‘Do me a favor, will you, Detective? If you ever need a little job doing — I mean, nothing too dangerous or anything — do you think maybe you could consider me?’

‘Sure, kid. You’ll be top of my list.’

And then Gonzo closes the door and is gone. Back to his lab. Back to his computers. Back to his lonely little existence.