Hail to the Chief

Chapter Two

The man on the telephone was a free-lance writer doing a magazine article on The Relationship of Television to Acts of Violence. That was not to be the title of his piece, he explained hastily. It was merely a statement of theme. The title would be something shorter and snappier. A title, he went on to explain, was almost as important as the first line of any written work, the hook that grabbed the reader at once and refused to let him go, no matter how he wiggled or squirmed.

The man's name was Montgomery Pierce-Hoyt.

Detective Meyer Meyer, normally a patient man, distrusted him at once, and listened to his long explanation of intent with boredom bordering on somnambulance. The first thing he distrusted was the man's name. Meyer Meyer did not know anybody who had a hyphenated family name. On his block, everyone had a very simple last name, no fancy hyphenation. Hyphenation was for companies like Colgate-Palmolive or Dow-Jones. Nor had he ever met a person with a first name like Montgomery. The only Montgomery he had ever heard of was Montgomery Ward, and that was another company. Who was he talking to here? A person or a company?

Meyer Meyer was very name-conscious because his own name had caused him no end of trouble and embarrassment. His father (bless his soul, his heart, and his sense of humor) had thought the double-barreled monicker would cause his offspring to stand out in a world of largely anonymous people, and (being something of a practical joker) had thought it funny besides (May he rest in peace, Meyer thought). Meyer had grown weary of telling people it was no fun to be raised as a Jew in a largely Gentile neighborhood, where his name inspired the chant 'Meyer Meyer, Jew on fire' and on at least one occasion almost led to a backyard barbecue when it was thought necessary by various and assorted goyim to test the validity of the chant. Tying Meyer to a pole, they started a fire at his feet and then went off to their catechism class, where they were being taught devotion to Jesus, even though he might possibly have been a Jew. Meyer prayed, but nothing happened. Patiently, he prayed more fiercely and devoutly, and still nothing happened. It was beginning to get very hot down there near his sneakers. Patiently, never losing faith, he kept praying, and finally it began to rain, a veritable downpour that put out the flames at once. Oddly, Meyer did not become a religious man after his experience. Instead, he developed a deep sympathy for firemen and for hapless cavalry officers tied to the stake by savage Indians. He also developed an attitude of patience bordering on saintliness, which was perhaps a religious outcome, after all. His patience was wearing quite thin at the moment. Completely bald, burly, with china-blue eyes (the lids of which were dropping to half-mast) he listened to Montgomery Pierce-Hoyt on the telephone, and debated whether he should answer in cop talk.

'What I'm deeply interested in knowing,' Pierce-Hoyt said, 'is whether in your experience the acts of violence that confront you daily are in any way influenced or stimulated, consciously or unconsciously, by something the criminal may have seen on television.'

'Mmm,' Meyer said.

'What do you think?' Pierce-Hoyt said.

'Who did you say you were doing this story for?' Meyer asked.

'Nobody yet.'

'Nobody yet,' Meyer repeated, and nodded.

'But I'll sell it, don't worry,' Pierce-Hoyt said. 'So what do you think?'

'You want me to answer this on the telephone?' Meyer said. 'Right this minute?'

'Well, yes, if…'

'Impossible,' Meyer said.

'Why?'

'Because first of all, I have to check with the lieutenant. And second of all, how do I know you're really Mr. Pierce-Hoyt and not somebody else? And third of all, I have to gather my thoughts.'

'Well, um, yes, I see,' Pierce-Hoyt said. 'Well, do you want me to come up there?'

'Not until I talk to the lieutenant and see if it's okay.'

'When do you think you'll be able to talk to him?'

'Sometime today. Let me have your number and I'll get back to you in the morning.'

'Fine,' Pierce-Hoyt said, and gave Meyer the number. The other phone on Meyer's desk was ringing. He said an abrupt goodbye to Pierce-Hoyt and picked up the receiver.

'87th Squad, Detective Meyer,' he said.

The caller was a woman who had seen the photographs of the multiple-murder victims in that morning's newspaper, and said she knew who the white man with the beard was.

The woman's name was Phyllis Kingsley.

She lived in Isola, near the River Dix, which formed the southern boundary of the island. Had she lived two blocks farther uptown, she'd have been in that exclusive and luxurious section known as Stewart City. As it was, she lived in a tenement on a block with several furniture warehouses and two parking garages. Carella and Kling got there at eleven o'clock that Tuesday morning, January 8. The thermometer had risen only slightly; the temperature hovered in the mid-twenties. Phyllis Kingsley greeted them wrapped in a handwoven afghan, and told them something had been wrong with the heat all night long, and it still hadn't been fixed. They went into the living room, where the windows were covered with rime.

'We understand you can identify one of the murder victims,' Carella said.

'Yes,' Phyllis answered. She was a woman in her late thirties, with carrot-colored hair and green eyes that made her look very Irish. Her complexion was fair and sprinkled with freckles. She was not a pretty woman, and there was something about her manner that indicated vulnerability. The detectives waited, expecting her to say more than the single word 'Yes.' When it became apparent that nothing further was coming Carella asked, 'Who was he, can you tell us?'

'My brother,' she said.

'His name?'

'Andrew Kingsley.'

'How old was he?' Carella asked. He had exchanged a silent glance with Kling the moment the woman began talking. It was Kling, seated slightly to the left of her and beyond her field of vision, who now jotted the information into a notebook while Carella asked the questions, a technique that made the person talking feel more at ease.

'He was twenty-eight,' Phyllis replied.

'Where did he live?' Carella asked.

'Here. Temporarily. He just arrived from California a few weeks ago.'

'Did he have a job?'

'No. Well, on the Coast he had one. But he quit that to come here.'

'What kind of work did he do?'

'I think he was a carhop. At one of the hamburger places they have out there.'

'Why did he come to this city, Miss Kingsley, can you tell us?'

'Well, he said he'd been into a lot of things out there that helped him to find where his head was at, and he was anxious to get back East and put some of his ideas to work.'

'What sort of ideas?'

'Well, he had ideas about the ghettos and of what he could do to help the people living in the ghettos. He was doing work in Watts out there.'

'What kind of work?'

'He organized a drama group for the black kids in Watts. He was a drama major in college. That's why he went to California to begin with. He thought he could get work in the movies or in television, but you know…' She shrugged, and then clasped her hands in her lap.

'When did he arrive exactly, Miss Kingsley? From California, I mean. Would you remember?'

'It was two weeks ago yesterday.'

'And he was living here? In this apartment?'

'Yes. I have an extra room.'

'Did he know anybody in this city? Besides you?'

'He was born and raised here. He knew a lot of people.'

'The other pictures in the paper…'

'No,' she said, and shook her head.

'You didn't recognize any of them?'

'No.'

'You wouldn't know whether any of them were your brother's friends."

'None of them looked familiar.'

'Did he have black friends? Or Puerto Ricans?'

'Yes.'

'Did you ever meet any of them?'

'No.'

'Did you ever meet any of his friends?'

'Yes, he brought a man home with him one night.'

'A white man?'

'Yes.'

'Would you remember his name?'

'David Harris.'

'Did your brother introduce him as one of his friends?'

'They had just met, I believe.'

'Do you know what kind of work he did?'

'He didn't say. I got the feeling…' She shook her head.

'Yes, go on.'

'I didn't like him very much.'

'Why not?'

'I don't know. He seemed… I felt he was not a good person.'

'What made you feel that, Miss Kingsley?'

'He seemed… violent. I had the feeling he was capable of enormous violence. He made me extremely uncomfortable. I'm glad Andy never brought him back here again.'

'How old was he?'

'In his thirties, I would guess.'

'Any idea where he lives?'

'In the Quarter, I think. He mentioned Audibon Avenue. That's in the Quarter, isn't it?'

'Yes. What else can you tell us about him?'

'Do you think he killed my brother?'

'We have no ideas about that as yet, Miss Kingsley."

'I'll bet he did,' Phyllis said, and nodded gently. 'He seemed like the kind of person who could do murder.'

'What did he look like?'

'He was very tall and quite good-looking. A dark complexion, longish brown hair.'

'When was he here with your brother?'

'A week ago? Six days ago? I'm not sure.'

'When did you last see your brother alive?'

'Sunday night.'

'Did he say where he was going?'

'He said he had business uptown.'

'Where uptown?'

'He only said uptown.'

'What kind of business?'

'He didn't say.'

'What time did he leave here?'

'About six o'clock.'

'Did he say what time he'd be back?'

'No.'

'Were you expecting him back?'

'I had no expectations either way. He often stayed out all night He had his own key. He was an adult, I never questioned him about his comings and goings.'

'What was he wearing the last time you saw him?'

'A Navy pea jacket, a plaid shirt, dark trousers… brown or blue, I'm not sure.'

'Hat? Gloves?'

'Black leather gloves, no hat.'

'Muffler?'

'No.'

'Wallet? Keys?'

'He had a black leather wallet, I assume he was carrying it with him. The only key he had was the key to this apartment.'

'We're very anxious to know where he might have been heading on the night he was killed, Miss Kingsley. Would your brother have kept a diary, or an appointment book, or even a calendar on which he might have marked…?'

'I'll show you his room,' Phyllis said, and rose, and pulled the afghan tighter around her shoulders, and led them through the apartment. There were four rooms altogether: the living room in which they had interrogated Phyllis, a kitchen, and two bedrooms. Andrew Kingsley's room was at the end of a long windowless corridor. The corridor was hung with photographs of people dressed in clothing of the thirties, forties, and fifties. Carella assumed they were family pictures. The pictures could have been taken anywhere in the city. Or anywhere in any city, for that matter. There was one picture of a very young boy standing before what looked like a late-forties automobile. Carella hesitated before it, and Phyllis immediately said, 'My brother. He was only four when the picture was taken.' In the next breath she said, 'It's hard to believe he's dead. He's been gone from this city for a long time, first to college and then California, it's not that I saw him that often. And yet… it's hard to believe. It's very hard to believe.'

'Are your parents alive, Miss Kingsley?' Carella asked.

'No. They were killed in an automobile accident in France, seven years ago. It was the first time they'd been to Europe. My mother had wanted to go all her life, and they'd finally saved enough money.' She shook her head and fell silent

'Do you have any other brothers or sisters?'

'No. I'm alone now,' she said.

Andrew Kingsley's room contained a dresser and a bed. There were very few articles of clothing in the dresser, and even fewer in the closet. There were no diaries, notebooks, appointment books, or calendars. A package of cheap stationery was in the top drawer of his dresser. One sheet of paper had been pulled from the others and a letter had been started. The beginning of the unfinished letter read:

Dear Lisa,

How are you, Golden Girl? I am enjoying every minute of being here. The only sad part is that you're not with me and I hope you've been giving some serious

'Is this your brother's handwriting?' Carella asked.

'Let me see,' Phyllis said, and looked at the page he extended. 'Yes.'

'Any idea who Lisa might be?'

'No.'

'Are these all his personal belongings?'

'Yes, he… didn't have very much.'

'Miss Kingsley,' Carella said, 'I don't wish to compound your grief, but if you could find it in yourself to go over to the hospital and identify your brother…'

'Yes, but… do I have to do it today? I'm not feeling too well. That's why I'm home from work.'

'What kind of work do you do?'

'I'm a bookkeeper. I felt something coming on last night, and I took some cold pills, and I'd probably have been all right if the heat hadn't gone on the fritz. I felt absolutely awful this morning. In fact, I was still in bed when my neighbor came in to show me the newspaper. And my brother's picture.'

'You can go over there tomorrow, if you like. If you're feeling better,' Carella said.

'Yes. Which hospital is it?'

'Buena Vista. On Culver Avenue.'

'Yes, all right,' she said. 'Was there anything else?'

'No. Thank you, Miss Kingsley, you've been very helpful.' As she led them to the front door, she said, 'He was a good boy. He hadn't found himself yet, but he was trying. I loved him a lot. I'm going to miss him. It's not that I saw him that often…' She began weeping then. She fumbled with the door lock, managed at last to twist it open, and then covered her nose and her mouth with one hand, the tears spilling from her eyes, and let them out of the apartment, and locked the door behind them. As they went down the steps they could hear her still weeping behind the locked door of the apartment in which she lived alone again.

The Isola telephone directory listed one David Harris on South Philby, and another on Avenue Y in the Quarter. A look at a street map of the city showed that Avenue Y crossed Audibon at one point, and they assumed that this was the address they wanted. They hit the apartment at close to noon. They knocked five times in succession before they got an answer, and then the voice was muffled, as though it were coming from someplace deep inside the apartment. They knocked again.

'Okay, okay,' a voice shouted.

They heard footsteps approaching the door.

'Who is it?' the voice asked.

'Police,' Kling said. 'Want to open up, please?'

They were totally unprepared for what happened next.

If they considered Harris a possible suspect, it was only because Phyllis had described him as a violent person. Other than that, they had no reason to believe that he had killed six people. They were here to ask questions about the extent of his relationship with Kingsley. They were here, too, because Harris was the only link to the life Andrew Kingsley was living outside his sister's apartment. They wanted to know what, if anything, Harris could tell them about that life, in the hope that the information would shed some light on how or why Kingsley had ended up dead in a ditch with five other people. Their intentions were peaceful.

They changed their minds in the next ten seconds.

In the next ten seconds, or eight seconds, or six seconds, or however long it took the person behind the door to squeeze the trigger of a gun three times in rapid succession, they changed their minds about peaceful intentions, suspects, and laws that prohibited the kicking-in of doors. The explosions were shockingly loud, the wood paneling on the door shattered, the bullets struck the plaster wall opposite and began ricocheting wildly in the narrow corridor. Kling and Carella were already on the floor. Carella's pistol was in his hand, and Kling's was coming out of its holster. Three more shots splintered the wooden door, buzzed overhead, whistled in ricochet.

'That's six,' Carella said.

He scrambled to one side of the door and got to his feet. Kling, following his suit, crawled to the other side of the door and stood up. They looked across the door at each other, and hesitated, only because the decision they made in the next several seconds could cost either one of them his life. Six shots had been fired. Had the man inside exhausted the ammunition in a six-shot revolver, and was he now reloading? Or was he armed with an automatic, some of which had a capacity of eleven cartridges? Carella heard his watch ticking. If he waited any longer, the man would have reloaded even if he were toting a revolver. He made his move instantly, and Kling picked up on it like a quarterback following his blocker. Carella moved swiftly to the wall opposite the door, put his back against it for support and leverage, lifted his knee like a piston, and kicked out flat-footed at the lock. The lock sprang on the first kick, and Carella rushed forward at once, following the door as it opened into the room, Kling peeling off immediately behind him as he passed the doorjamb.

A huge and hugely handsome man was inserting a cartridge into the cylinder of what looked like a Colt .38. He was standing about five feet from the door, and he was wearing only pajama bottoms, and the moment Carella and Kling burst into the room, he dropped the cartridges he was holding in the palm of his left hand and swung the gun hand into position. Carella, because he had learned over the years that yelling had more effect than whispering, shouted 'Drop it!' and right behind him Kling yelled 'Drop the gun!' and the man, who they assumed was Harris, hesitated a moment, and looked from one to the other of them, and made his own decision in the nick of time because each of the cops would have given him only another second before they shot him down where he stood. He dropped the gun. It clattered to the floor. He was wearing only pajama bottoms, but they threw him up against the wall anyway, and tossed him, and then slapped him into handcuffs.

They were both breathing very hard.