Manhunt. Volume 6, Number 4, June, 1958

Killer Cop by Arnold English

Things were hot enough in town — what with all the editorials about police brutality. And then a hero cop like Penner had to beat his wife to death...

Penner dialed the number at his usual speed, not faster, not slower. His heart was beating normally. His eyes hurt a little, pinching at the corners somehow, but that was the only strain.

“Hello? I’ve just killed my wife. Send a man out here.”

The voice on the other end (a desk man whose name he didn’t know) said calmly, “Yes, sir, of course. And the name and address, please?”

Like a store clerk asking where to make a delivery! Penner almost smiled.

“Robert Penner, 1218 Locket Drive. I,” he paused, “I’m attached to the 30th precinct.”

The desk man said only, “We’ll have a man right out.”

Penner nodded uselessly and hung up. He knew what would happen now. The Signal 32 would be passed to a nearby squad car, and a couple of cops would come right over. He had answered plenty of calls like that.

In his left hand he still carried the nightstick, red-tipped now. The uniform wasn’t stained, as he saw, looking down at it in sudden concern.

Outside, softly, a car pulled up. Penner looked thankfully at the door. He hadn’t known the tension in him that seemed to dribble out of his body as he heard firm steps up the drive followed by gentle knocking at the door. He opened almost gratefully.

The cop had retreated to one side after knocking, of course, just in case the self-admitted killer was crazy enough to try for another victim; but when Penner stood in the doorway, hands outstretched, the cop loomed up large.

The newcomer asked, surprised, “What the hell are you doing... Penner? You?”

“That’s right, Fred. Tell your partner to come in, too.”

Fred turned and signalled with a hand to the blue uniformed man back of the wheel of the white-and-green police car. It was a cool clear night, and a wafer-thin moon seemed to follow the second cop as he approached quickly.

“What’s the story?”

“My wife. Magda. She’s dead.”

Fred Garfein glanced down at the nightstick. He grew rigid and, oddly enough, the tips of his ears reddened.

“Inside.”

Penner looked surprised at the tone of voice, but turned and led the way into the hall. When the door was slammed shut back of him, he turned.

“Keep your gun on him,” Garfein told his partner. “Be right back.”

Fred Garfein’s big boots clumped into the other room, the living room. The other cop, a young guy, drew out his gun and looked Penner up and down for signs of gun-bulges. Finally he nodded and rested his own gun almost negligently in a hand.

Penner ran his tongue over dry lips. “Let’s get it over with. I just want to lay down someplace. I’m tired.” No reaction. Penner looked at the youngster’s firm chin and narrowed eyes. “Your name’s Crisp, isn’t it? I remember hearing the captain talk about you. Joe Crisp, that’s right.”

Crisp said nothing, but brought up the gun as Penner ducked a hand to his uniform.

“Just going to prove I’m not carrying my gun.” And he added foolishly. “You should’ve searched me before this.”

He sounded angry about it. From the living room came the sound of a phone receiver being set back on its cradle, and heavy steps announced Garfein’s return. His eyes were shaded with faint worry. He talked to Crisp.

“It’s a mess. Ramsey’s coming down in person.”

“The captain?” Penner’s hands went automatically to his uniform, open at the throat, then he put them down. He had already set down the nightstick on the small table nearby.

“Why can’t we get it over with by ourselves? Take me downtown and book me.”

Garfein didn’t answer, but talked to Crisp, instead.

“Trouble is,” he said heavily, “you know the way the newspapers been riding us lately. All cops are sadists, that kind of guck. You can see how this is going to look in the papers: cop bashes in wife’s head with his nightstick.”

Crisp, eyes always on Robert Penner, nodded slowly. They were light eyes, blue.

Penner was out of it, of course. Whatever the papers said about cops in general, that couldn’t be any of his business from now on. He coughed, cleared his throat.

“I’d like a glass of water.”

He wasn’t thirsty at all, but he knew a grim pleasure in seeing Garfein turn and clump into the kitchen for it.

A faint smile touched his lips when Garfein, coming back, was suddenly attracted by a small table and what lay under its glass covering. The cop stared and moved his lips in a slow count, then looked up almost awed.

“Christ Almighty! I forgot about the citations.”

“What’s that, Fred?” Crisp asked, gun still up.

“Five citations for bravery here. All of ’em handed out by the captain himself, I remember.”

“This is going to make a big stink.”

Garfein handed over the water glass, wet on the outside as well, and wiped his hand with a dirty handkerchief. Penner waited for the clouded water to clear before drinking up. His hands were steady.

Garfein talked to Crisp as he moved around, and Crisp answered. Nobody spoke to Penner.

The sound of a television set warmed on in a nearby house, came through to them. A singing commercial. A weather broadcast. Every word was clear.

Garfein drew a deep breath at the sound of a car approaching outside and slowly parking. Crisp ran a forefinger under his collar. Only Penner didn’t seem to care, staring into space.

“The captain,” Crisp said.

Setting down the drinking glass on a nearby table napkin, so as not to leave a ring, Penner looked up wearily at the door. It opened so quickly that he was caught by surprise all the same. For a second or so, Captain Ramsey was silhouetted against the darkness cut by a slice of moon in the doorway at right of his head. Then he closed the door back of him.

He turned to Garfein. “Where is it?”

“Living room, captain.”

Ramsey grunted and walked in; like many heavy men, he walked slowly. Penner felt moisture on the palms of his hands but didn’t want to wipe them as it meant drawing young Crisp’s gun.

Ramsey came back. He took off his hat and sailed it onto a peg on the clothes tree.

“You son of a gun, Penner, I could kill you!”

Penner was so startled at being spoken to that he drew a loud breath that was almost a whine.

“With my own hands I could kill you!” Instead, Ramsey patted his stomach furiously, then a little more slowly. His voice became more reasonable. “What happened?”

Nobody had asked him yet, but he hadn’t expected the question so soon. He shrugged. Ramsey’s eyes narrowed in renewed anger. Penner cleared his throat.

“I don’t know, Captain, honestly. I got home and Magda, my wife, began to argue with me. You know the way it is between man and wife sometimes, Captain.”

Ramsey jerked his bullet head toward the living room. “Not that way.”

“Well, she started yelling at me about how I should give up the cops. It seems she’s got a brother in the real estate business and he’s doing good. She wanted me to go into it, too.”

He could hardly remember the argument. He couldn’t even recall Magda’s face or voice. He was close to swaying where he stood.

“So you let her have it with the nightstick,” Ramsey said softly. “Why?”

“I don’t know, Captain. It’s just one of those things you do. For years I’ve had it drilled into me to keep the peace with my nightstick. Keep the peace, keep the peace, there’s more law at the end of a nightstick... you know the way that goes. And there was Magda yelling at me, screaming in my ears so I couldn’t hardly think any more.”

“Wait till the newspapers get hold of this.” Ramsey took a stiff chair. Again a hand tapped his stomach. “They’re after my skin and if they get it, they’ll get drunk with power and if the next captain doesn’t kiss a reporter’s feet they’ll go after him, too.”

He drew in his breath sharply, as if in pain.

“They want us to stop using nightsticks on the beat. They don’t know that nightsticks on cops have prevented God knows how many crimes because a lot of punks know that cops have got ’em. They’re even saying cops ought to be off Civil Service because cops are so brutal.”

He put up a hand to shade his eyes. Suddenly he smashed the hand down hard on his lap.

“They want to aggravate cops so that morons will have what to read in the papers every morning. That’s what they want. And you, Penn, you do a thing like this and you help the newspapers. Some bright reporter’s going to win himself an award out of this story, I wouldn’t be a bit surprised.”

His eyes narrowed as Crisp glanced toward the living room. “I know she’s dead, fella,” he said softly. “It’s been rougher on her.”

The television set next door was turned slightly louder to a quiz program. Outside a horn blared. Somebody played chromatic scales on a piano. An ice cream vendor’s truck stopped nearby, its presence announced by tinkling bells. Voices of children grew louder, then lower. The television set was lowered in volume; apparently there was a quarrel next door about how loudly it should be turned on.

The normality of it all caught at Penner more than anything else that had happened so far, since he had done it to Magda. He looked around wistfully, eyes lingering on every piece of hall furniture as if he was memorizing its position.

“We take him downtown,” Ramsey said heavily. “We fingerprint him, put him on the line-up, maybe the PBA gets him a lawyer — and the papers start to scream for our heads.”

He rose, hands behind his back. Garfein, wide-eyed, stared at him.

“For all I know,” Ramsey said, “this could spark the governor into signing some crazy law to get at every cop in the state. The governor’s no friend of ours.”

Ramsey fumbled in his pockets for a cigar, drew it out of the cellophane, looked at it sourly and put it away.

“On this man’s police force,” he said finally, “it’s a rough thing to get promoted. You gotta make decisions and, come right down to it, you’re as smart as the guys below you and no more.”

He would probably never again make such a remark in the presence of two subordinates. Garfein looked embarrassed. Crisp shrugged.

Ramsey paused. “There’s a way out of it, one way.”

Garfein, who was sweating, said, “Tell us what it is, Captain.”

“It means that we’d all be taking a hell of a chance,” Ramsey said. “But I want to remind you two again, that we can’t afford to let it get in the papers that a hero cop, with five citations for bravery, killed his wife with a nightstick because he got so used to being a hard guy on the beat.”

“Sure, Captain, we know,” Crisp said, and flushed when Ramsey looked sourly at him.

Ramsey said a little more sharply, “Garfein, get a sheet of paper and bring it here. Then go into the next room. Close the windows and turn down the blinds, then mess up the room, kick the furniture, knock things upside down, throw things on the floor.”

Garfein, after a pause, nodded slowly. His eyes looked hurt.

Seeing it, Ramsey said with surprising gentleness, “Give me a better suggestion, Fred, and I’ll take it.” Garfein looked away. Ramsey nodded firmly. “Hop to it. And when you get finished with the living room, go into the bedroom and do the same thing. You’ve got gloves with you?”

“Sure thing, Captain.”

He stumbled off, first to bring back a clean sheet of lined white paper and a ball point pen, all of which he set down on the small table.

Ramsey looked up at Penner. “Sit down there and write out your resignation.”

“My resignation?” Penner’s hands trembled out of tiredness. He tried to force his mind to think, but nothing happened.

“Listen to me, boy.” Ramsey kept his temper. “You are the luckiest son-of-a-gun cop I ever heard of. I’m not going to have a lot of good men loused up when this hits the papers. Instead, I’m going to take your resignation. Garfein will make the house look like burglars came in and while they were at it, they killed your wife. You’ll say you came home from a hard day’s work and found her dead. Kapeesh?”

“Sure, sure.”

“Get busy and start writing. You’re resigning out of grief. You can’t carry on. Put tomorrow’s date on it.”

Penner sat down on the hard-backed chair and adjusted the paper so that the top-left was inclined to his left. He wrote slowly. Once he looked up to see young Crisp’s eyes on him, then on Ramsey.

“Captain, this is all wrong! We can’t let ourselves do this.”

Penner wrote listlessly. His eyes were half-shut and he paused at the end of every word.

From the next room, Garfein began his job of destruction. The sounds rose in tempo. With each rise, Penner sighed.

“I don’t get this.” Crisp’s jaw was set almost mutinously. Penner saw his fingers stiffen on the gun, and looked away. He wasn’t tempted to move or to call out.

Ramsey, who saw everything, had seen this, too. “You’re liable to shoot somebody with that brand-new gun of yours, Crisp. How about handing it over to me if you can’t do what you’re told?”

Crisp walked across the room and handed over the gun with butt foremost. Ramsey sniffed down at it and dropped it into a suit pocket-then swivelled around to Penner.

“Finished?”

Garfein had proceeded to the living room and the wrecking sounds were more faint.

“When we get back downtown,” Ramsey told Crisp, “you’ll get hold of the desk man who took the message that Penner phoned in. Have him see me. And take Penner’s nightstick with you. Wrap it up in newspapers and get rid of it.” He put up a hand to his throat and turned to Penner. “I’m thirsty. Get me some water.”

“Of course, Captain. Sure.” Penner rose and walked tiredly toward the kitchen. Crisp started out to call something, but smothered it. There was a shot and pain seared Penner’s back. He turned slowly, and sank to the floor.

Ramsey stood over him, looking down. “Sorry, fella.” He raised the gun and fired twice more. Penner was still.

From the living room, Garfein ran in with his usual heavy steps. “Burglars shot a hero cop in the back and beat his wife to death,” Ramsey said. He shrugged. “When Penner thought he had a chance to get out with a whole skin, he didn’t want it. He wanted things to be finished for him. I tried to arrange it so he wouldn’t know when the bullet was coming.”

Ramsey glanced down to the resignation Penner had written, folded it and put into a pocket. “I hope I did the right thing. I sure as hell hope so.”

“In a way, I’m sorry for him,” Crisp said finally. “I guess he’ll get a hero’s funeral.”

“Deserves it,” Ramsey snapped. “He was a good cop.”