Wireman

CHAPTER 27

SAM BARTHOLOMEW sat in an unmarked car across the street from the Ringer residence. Next to him in the driver’s seat was Officer Trumbine, who after three days had confessed his nickname on the force was “Patty” and it was all right if Bartholomew called him that. Patty barely made the five-ten height requirement for the department, and weighed, soaking wet and with his clothes on, a slight hundred and thirty pounds.

In the backseat, against Garbo’s direct orders, Jack DeShane reclined smoking a cigarette. He slept in the car during the eleven-to-seven shift and after a brief run home to shave, shower, and eat, he climbed back into a police car to take up vigil. The officers assigned to watching the Ringer residence understood Jack’s involvement and were charitable about his constant presence, though it would have been easier if he were not around. He made them all feel as fidgety as hot grease popping in a skillet.

Sam always took the evening shift. Out of the four murders, two were committed at night, two during the day, so he wasn’t working percentages. He was responding to gut-level instinct. He felt convinced the next attempted murder would occur during the evening.

All three men were weary and disgruntled. Since the evening Sam talked Garbo into a seven-day, twenty-four-hour surveillance on the Ringers, there had not been a single movement from the house. There were plenty of boring hours used up on suppositions, none of them very logical. The fact was no one understood why neither Ringer brother had come out of the house.

The 1970 navy Chrysler Imperial registered in Daley’s name had a tracking device clamped beneath the back bumper. But they had not been tracking the car anywhere. The door of the house stayed closed, the shades drawn, and there was nothing to do on the eight-hour rotating shifts but sit and watch the street.

Garbo did not like it. Earlier in the morning he complained to Sam, “I’m using thirty men, and I’m shifting everyone in the precinct for this. If they don’t move soon, I’m afraid I’ll have to call it off. We can’t afford it. Around here they’re referring to these three days of do-nothing as the ‘Dead Ringer Runaround.’ I can’t justify the cost and time if something doesn’t happen soon.”

“Something’s brewing, Garbo. Trust my instincts. They can’t stay locked up in there forever,” Sam pleaded.

“Screw forever. If they don’t come out within the next twenty-four hours, I’ll have to call my men off, and let you bring this Nick to the station for questioning.”

“If you do that, Garbo, you’ll be making a mistake. We only have circumstantial. You’re not going to close down this case on what we have.”

“I also have some tired men who’d rather be at home with their wives to say nothing of a commissioner who’s going ape-shit every three seconds.”

“He’ll come out,” Sam promised. “And when he does he’ll go after number five.”

“Sam, if it was anyone else but you telling me this I’d have him hauled off to a fantasy island. I hope to Christ you know what you’re doing. I know it all sounds right, but thirty men!” Garbo shook his head.

Sam peered through the closed window at the dark house and refused to believe he was wrong. They had Nick Ringer’s record from the reconnaissance division he was in during his time in Vietnam. They had the information from the Tacoma, Washington, V.A. It all fit. Not perfectly, not so close the edges dovetailed, but it fit. Nick was a mental case. He had used a garrote in the war. Not only used it, but beheaded his enemies with it. He had a job where he was free to do as he pleased while in the company van. He had the background, the time available, the expertise, the intelligence, and the training to be a killer.

Whether other people knew it or not, Sam realized the veterans of Vietnam were different from the veterans like himself who had lived through World War II and Korea. He expected in the decades to come these differences would make themselves known more and more, and some of these men would need a lot of therapy.

“Maybe they’re playing Parcheesi in there,” Patty remarked, slurping coffee from a Styrofoam cup.

“We’ve already gone over the possibilities of what they might be doing” Weariness had taken Jack’s voice hostage.

A light pattering of rain fell onto the car. Sam stared into the dismal night. He could no longer referee for his two companions. Let them argue, he thought. It passed the time.

“You want to play another hand of solitaire with me?” Patty asked of Sam.

Sam turned swollen eyes on him and blinked slowly. Had he ever been as young as Patty and Jack? He sincerely doubted it. “No, thanks, Patty. I’ll pass this time.”

“What about you, Jack? Try your luck?” Patty asked.

“What the hell. Climb back here and let me beat you.”

Patty crawled over the front seat, head first.

“Why don’t you get out and go around sometimes?” Sam asked testily. “Why you always crawling over the damn seat?”

“Aw, fuck, Sam, lay off, will ya? It’s raining out there.”

Sam slid across the seat to sit behind the steering wheel just in case Nick came out of the house.

“I’ll deal ’em,” Jack said, more amicable than he had been for the previous four hours. “After this hand, let’s play blackjack.”

Sam settled into the warm vinyl depression where Patty had been sitting. The windows kept steaming over from their breathing and had to be wiped with a towel. It had been raining for three days, and Sam wondered if it would ever end. Drizzles, showers, drip, drip, drip. Wet nights that made his bones ache.

Maybe it was the rain that kept the Wireman from fulfilling his mission. As Sam thought about it, he could not recall any of the murders happening during wet weather. Just his luck. Thirty sodden men playing blackjack and a waiting game with the Houston weather.

Sunday, March seventh, dawned clear and fresh. When Sam rolled from bed, Maggie was already up brewing coffee in the kitchen. Sam brushed his teeth, scratched the hair growing over his belly, and wandered through the house in his shorts. Maggie embraced him and poured coffee for him into the awful pink-breasted mug.

“I’m growing to like this cup,” he said, giving Maggie a lopsided grin. He meant it too.

“Marty always liked it,” she said defensively. “He bought it in a Mexican market in San Antonio.”

“You still miss him, don’t you?”

“Marty was one of a kind,” she said evasively.

“And me? Am I one of a kind, Maggie?”

“If you weren’t, you wouldn’t be sharing my bed, Sam Bartholomew.” She swatted at him with mock fierceness.

“Has anyone ever told you you’re pretty special yourself?”

Sam hugged her around the waist from behind. She swayed her hips against him and leaned her head to the side so that he could nuzzle her neck. “No one, but you, Sam. Only you.”

“When this thing’s over…” His sentence went unfinished.

Maggie moved the frying pan of eggs onto a cold burner and turned in his arms to kiss him. “What are you planning?”

“I’m not good at planning, but I was thinking maybe we could take a trip. Do you have some vacation time coming?”

“I can take the time. Where do you want to go?”

Sam kissed her once then released her to drink his coffee at the table. Maggie returned the eggs to the heat and flipped them.

“Oh, I don’t know. Georgia, the Florida Keys, Atlantic City—someplace east of here where there aren’t any cowboys.”

“I’ve never been to the Keys,” she said dreamily, sliding the fried eggs onto Sam’s plate.

Sam spoke between bites while Maggie prepared her own eggs and bacon.

“Okay, the Keys. That’s where a lot of old fogies retire, along the Gold Coast.”

Maggie turned from her cooking to stare at him. “You retired once, Sam. You can see it didn’t work out too well.”

“You know why I’m on this case.” He sounded defensive.

“And what will the excuse be on the next case?” Maggie asked, bringing her plate to the table and sitting across from him.

“No next case, Maggie. They have my papers. I’m not going back on the force.”

“Bull.” Maggie vigorously cut up her eggs until the yokes ran and soaked into her toast.

“What does that mean, ‘bull’?”

“You never retired, Sam, don’t you know that? You might’ve fooled yourself, but you haven’t fooled me.”

“It’s just because of Willie and Jack…”

Maggie put down her fork and stared incredulously at him. “If it hadn’t been Jack, it would have been someone else, even a stranger. I watched you unravel for six months, Sam. You tried crawling into the bottle, but you didn’t quite manage it. You’ve never had enough practice giving up. You don’t know how to give up. You might have thought you did when you asked for early retirement, but you’re a lousy liar.”

“I’m sixty years old, Maggie. The system beat me. Not once, but a dozen times. I’m too old to fight anymore.” But Sam did not sound quite sure about what he said.

“One more word like that and I’ll dump these eggs right on your head, Sam Bartholomew! Do you hear what you’re saying? Do you hear how asinine you sound? Since when did sixty years signal the end of a life? All it means is that you have forty years of experience as a cop. I’m sixty, and I don’t damn well think of myself as…” Suddenly Maggie realized what she had admitted, and lowered her eyes in embarrassment.

Then she laughed. “Okay, so I’m sixty too. You knew that anyway, didn’t you?”

Sam reached across the lace tablecloth and took her hand. “What do I care how old you are?”

“I look pretty good for my age,” she said defensively.

“You feel pretty good too, considering.”

Maggie squeezed his hand for the compliment and blushed. “But we were talking about you.” She stood up and went to Sam, making him scoot his chair back so that she could sit in his lap. “You’re not the old-fogie type,” she said, running a hand over his face. “I can’t see you retiring to Florida to play shuffleboard and bridge. There’s too much going on up here.” She lightly tapped his head. “Maybe you don’t have to rejoin the police department. There are other alternatives for a man with your experience and talents.”

“For instance.”

“For instance, a private detective agency. Houston needs a good one.”

The idea was so foreign to Sam that he was speechless.

“I’ve been talking to some people I know,” she continued. “Don’t forget I’ve been involved with the law for almost as long as you have, and I have a few connections in this town too. You don’t spend your life as a court reporter without knowing some of the best people on a first name basis.”

“What have you done, Maggie? Fixed me up with a job?”

“Not a job, Sam. A profession. Not everyone has forgotten the Bartholomew legend.”

Sam grunted, his brows knitting.

“I know you don’t like that designation, but it’s something that’s happened whether you wanted it to or not. Why do you think they wanted you as consultant on this Wireman thing? If you were washed up, they would have told you so. You have a reputation, Sam, and you should use it. There are people who would love to invest in your future, and you’re sitting around talking retirement. You want to pretend sixty years makes a handicap. But you’re wrong, and you’re proving it by working with Garbo.”

Sam knew Maggie was right. What did he want—a rotten end to his life with a bottle of Old Kentucky in his paw or no reason to get up in the morning? “You realize it’s unforgivable to interfere without talking to me about it first, don’t you?” he asked.

Maggie ignored the criticism. “If I could get the backing you need to open an office, would you do it? I’d even throw in my services as your secretary, accountant, file clerk—anything you want me to be. I’ve been in court one too many days as it is, and I’m ready for a change. Can’t you see the sign on the door? Bartholomew Investigations.”

“Maggie, you’re not only the sexiest woman around, but you’re the craziest too. ”

“Why don’t you think it over? ” Maggie drew her plate of cooling eggs across the table and began to eat.

Sam caressed the swell of her hip and wondered if he had time to take her to bed before she left for the courthouse.

“Well?” she persisted. “Will you think about it?”

“Bartholomew Investigations, huh?”

“Yep, gotta trade on your name, Sam. It’ll bring in business, ” Maggie said.

“Okay, I’ll think about it. No promises…” He held up a finger in warning when he saw her eyes light up.

“But I’ll give it a little thought.”

“Finish your breakfast, and if we hurry, you might give a little thought to something else.”

Sam grinned at the woman on his lap. She was an absolute mind reader. For the first time in months he did not feel his age. Sixty was not the end of life after all.