W.E.B Griffin - The Murderers

“I remember it,” Atchison said, triumphantly calling it forth from his memory.

“If you give that to me again,” Matt said, “I’d be happy to call him for you.”

“Would you, please? Tell him what happened here, and ask him to meet me at Hahnemann.”

Matt took a small notebook from his pocket and wrote the number down.

“Can I see you a minute, Payne?” Wally said, and took Matt’s arm and led him out of the office. “Be right with you, Mr. Atchison.”

He led Matt a dozen steps down the corridor, then stopped.

“I don’t know who the hell you think you are, Payne,” he snapped. “But shut your fucking mouth. This is my job. When I want some help, I’ll ask for it.”

“Sorry,” Matt said. “I was just trying to help.”

“Do me a favor. Don’t.”

“OK. Sorry.”

Wally’s anger had not subsided.

“I’ll tell you what I do want you to do,” he said. “First, give me that lawyer’s phone number, and then get your ass down to the Roundhouse and wait for me there. I want your statement. I may have to put up with that ‘I’ll get my statement to you in the morning’ shit from Washington, but I don’t have to put up with it from you.”

Matt, his face red, tore the page with the phone number from his notebook and handed it to Wally. Wally took it and went back down the corridor.

Matt watched him a moment, then went up the stairs, as two uniformed officers, one carrying a stretcher, came down them.

Chief Lowenstein was gone. Jason Washington, alone at the table where they had been sitting, stood up when he saw Matt.

“Well, did you learn anything?”

“A,” Matt replied, “Detective Milham has all the charm of a constipated alligator, and B, he wants my statement tonight, not tomorrow.”

Washington’s right eyebrow rose in surprise.

“Shall I have a word with him?”

“No. No, thanks. Now that I think of it, I’d just as soon get it over with now. I’ve got a busy day tomorrow.”

“All right. Walk me back to your place, and I’ll drop you off at the Roundhouse on my way home. Or you can get your car.”

“I’ll take the ride, thanks. And catch a cab home later.”

Jason Washington was surprised and just a little alarmed when he quietly let himself into his apartment to see that there were lights on in the living room.

Not only is the love of my life angry, but angry to the point where she has decided that marital justice demands that she wait up for me to express her displeasure personally, immediately, and in some detail.

As he walked down the corridor, he heard Martha say, somewhat formally, “I think that’s him.”

Someone’s with her. Someone she doesn’t know well. Who? And who else would it be at this hour of the morning?

He walked into the living room. Martha, in a dressing gown, was sitting on the couch. There was a coffee service on the coffee table. And a somewhat distraught-looking woman sitting in one of the armchairs, holding a coffee cup in her hands.

“Martha, I’m sorry to be so late. I was tied up.”

“That happens, doesn’t it?” Martha replied, the tone of her voice making it clear she thought he had been tied up by a slow-moving bartender.

“Good evening,” Jason said to the distraught-looking woman.

“More accurately, ‘good morning,’” Martha said. “Jason, this is Mrs. Kellog.”

“How do you do?” Jason said.

Kellog? As in Officer Kellog?

“I’m sorry to have come here like this,” Mrs. Kellog said. “But I just had to.”

“How may I help you, Mrs. Kellog?”

“Jerry Kellog was my husband,” she said.

That’s precisely what I feared. And what are you doing here, in my home?

“May I offer my condolences on your loss, Mrs. Kellog?”

“I didn’t have anything to do with him being killed,” she said. “And neither did Wally.”

Washington nodded sympathetically.

“Martha, I’m sure you’re tired,” he said.

“No. Not at all,” Martha said, smiling sweetly, letting Jason know that even if this was business he wasn’t going to dismiss her so lightly in her own home.

“Wally told me, not only Wally, but Lieutenant Sackerman, too, especially him, that you’re not only the best Homicide detective…”

“That was very gracious of Jack Sackerman,” Washington said, “we were friends for a long time.”

“…but the only cop you know is honest.”

“That’s very kind, but I cannot accept the blanket indictment of the rest of the Police Department,” Washington said. “I like to think we’re something like Ivory Soap: ninety-nine and forty-four one hundredths pure.”

Helene Kellog ignored him.

“That’s why I came to you,” she said. “I didn’t know where else to go.” She looked at him, took a deep breath, and went on: “Jerry was dirty. I know that. And-what happened to him-had something to do with that. They’re all dirty, the whole Five Squad is dirty.”

“Mrs. Kellog, when you were interviewed by detectives investigating the death of your husband, did you tell any of them what you just told me?”

She snorted.

“Of course not. They all acted like they think that I had something to do with it. Or that Wally did. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if they were in on it.”

“In on what?”

“Covering up. Maybe trying to pin it on Wally or me. Wally and me.”

“Does Detective Milham know that you’ve come to see me?”

“Of course not!”

“Why do you think anyone would want to ‘pin’ what happened to your husband on you? Or Detective Milham?”

“I just told you! To cover up. To protect themselves. They’re all dirty. The whole damned Five Squad is dirty! That’s probably why Jerry was killed. He never really wanted to get involved with that. They made him! And maybe he was going to tell somebody or do something.”

“By dirty, you mean you believe your husband was taking money from someone?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Did he tell you he was?”

“No. He wouldn’t talk about it at all.”

“Then how do you know?”

“He was getting the money from someplace.”

“What money?”

“All of the money. All of a sudden we’ve got lots of money. You’re a cop. You know how much a cop, even with overtime, makes.”

“And Jerry had large sums of money?”

“We- he -bought a condo at the shore, and there’s a boat. And he paid cash. He didn’t get that kind of money from the Police Department.”

“Did you ask him where the money came from?”

“He wouldn’t tell me. That’s when we started to have trouble, when he wouldn’t tell me.”

“Have you told anything about this to Detective Milham?”

“No.”

“May I ask why not?”

“Because if I did, he would have done something about it. He’s an honest cop.”

“Then wouldn’t he logically be the person to tell?”

“I didn’t want Jerry to go to jail,” she said. “And besides, what would it look like, coming from me? Me living with Wally. I’d look like a bitch of a wife trying to make trouble.”

“Did you come to me for advice, Mrs. Kellog?” Washington asked.

“For help. For advice.”

“If what you told me is true…”

“Of course it’s true!” she interrupted.

“…then the information you have should be placed in the hands of the people who can do something about it. I’m sure you know that we have an Internal Affairs Division…”

“If I thought I could trust Internal Affairs, I wouldn’t be here,” she said. “They’re all in on it.”

“Mrs. Kellog, I can understand why you’re upset, but believe me, you can trust Internal Affairs.”

At this moment, unfortunately, I’m not absolutely sure that’s true. And neither am I sure that what I so glibly said before, that the Department is ninety-nine and forty-four one hundredths percent pure is true, either.