and corruption, a cruel oxymoron. Then there’s a dimension no one outside the system itself really knows or understands, guided by precedents and protocols both ancient and improvised, where there’s plenty of justice in the true sense meted out every day, though the process defies common wisdom and experience.
It was in this context that I found myself sitting at a large, beat-up wooden table in a precinct house somewhere in Bridgeport chatting with investigators from two different judicial districts. One Fairfield, which included Bridgeport, and one Stamford, my former hometown.
My legal status at that point was cloudy at best. They’d brought me in on a warrant from Stamford in connection with a massive act of vandalism. It was committed at a house in the leafy section of town known for its stone-walled colonialism and pre-postmodern cubes.
“That’s my house. You can’t arrest me for gutting my own house,” I told the guy from Stamford, who was frowning into a manila folder full of paperwork.
“The complaint was signed by an Abigail Acquillo.”
“That’s my wife. Until she divorces me. Then she’ll likely get what’s left of the house. On a very nice lot, she’ll tell you.”
“It says here you two’re divorced.”
“Not until I sign something. And I haven’t signed anything.”
The guy looked unconvinced.
“You can’t just tear apart a woman’s house.”
“You can if you’re properly motivated.”
“While you’re here,” said the cop from Bridgeport, impatient with his colleague from Stamford, “we thought you might tell us what you know about Darrin Eavenston.”
“He’s dead.”
“We know that. We told you that.”
“Not me. You told Antoine when you arrested him and his crew.”
“You weren’t on the list. We didn’t know about you,” said the Bridgeport cop.
“Pays to keep a low profile,” I told him.
“Not low enough,” said the cop from Stamford.
“Besides the vandalism thing, you’re apparently a missing person,” said the Bridgeport cop. “Your wife is seriously looking for you.”
“Wants me to sign something.”
“So what about Darrin?” he asked.
Then I realized what was going on.
“You want me to tell you about the shooting in return for help on this Stamford thing?” I asked.
“We’re not saying that. You’re saying that. We’re just asking you if you know anything about Darrin Eavenston, right Cliff?” he asked the Stamford cop.
“Yeah,” said Cliff. “Before I haul you back home.”
I still wasn’t feeling all that great, having had only a little of Eclair’s cooking and coffee and a few hours to move from partial intoxication to an all-out hangover. I wondered what the precinct policy was on serving cocktails to vandalism suspects.
“You guys have any coffee?” I asked. “Black’s fine. Espresso’s even better, if you have it.
“You want that in a demitasse?”
“Go ahead, Bernie,” said Cliff. “I’ll watch him.”
Bernie shrugged and left us.
“There’s a bit of a flaw in your strategy here,” I told Cliff. “What’s that?”
“You’re trying to threaten me with something I’m not afraid of, to coerce me into talking about something I’d talk about for free.”
Cliff’s confidence might have wavered at that point, but it didn’t show. What he knew was that he had a warrant in his pocket. Anything else he heard was for somebody else to sort out.
My admiration for the Bridgeport police went up considerably when Bernie came back with an excellent cup of French vanilla.
“Okay Bernie,” said Cliff, “we had a little talk while you were out. He’s ready to give it up.” And then he winked at me.
“Excellent,” I said, toasting the air between me and the cops.
Bernie pulled out a small pad and a pen.
“You talk, I write.”
I spent the next hour describing the scene in the apartment the way I thought it probably unfolded. I didn’t know how well any of it would be corroborated by the other guys, but I had some faith that the Bicks would stick to the story Walter had laid out at Eclair’s, knowing it was the only one I had to work with and, if believed, sympathetic to their cause. As it turned out, my narrative, designed to flow seamlessly into an unimpeachable case of self-defense, turned out to fit neatly with the cousins’ testimony.
That it came from me, a white, heretofore law-abiding corporate executive, albeit recently degraded, was probably the deciding factor in ultimately absolving the whole crew. None of which I knew at the time, or even cared about as the world inside the interrogation room blurred around the edges and the two cops started to sound like they were talking inside an echo chamber.
I tried to point this out to them, but they didn’t seem to notice until I threw up Eclair’s breakfast and Bernie’s cup of French vanilla and passed out face down in the result.
——
So I got my hospital stay anyway, which settled the question of internal injuries, which I didn’t have, and raised the issue of a concussion, which I did.
I was surprised to learn from Cliff McCloskey, the Stamford cop, that I hadn’t signed the divorce papers, but I had signed over the house in a quit-claim transaction weeks before. With all the frivolity this had slipped my mind. Not that remembering would have changed what I did.
Cliff was there to greet me back into reasonable consciousness. He escorted me over to Stamford, where I was scheduled to consult with the Stamford DA. She’d just had a meeting with her counterpart in Bridgeport, who’d asked for her help in brokering my ongoing cooperation in the Darrin Eavenston thing.
So I spent a few agreeable hours with Cliff and the DA, a young woman aging before her time under the stress of her job. We hit it off for a bunch of reasons, including some shared marital difficulties. The upshot was she offered me a deal. Cliff told me most people would recommend I get a lawyer, but if it was up to him, he’d just take the deal and thank his lucky stars. I told them I’d used up my lucky stars, but her deal sounded fine—a little time in detox, a fat check to Abby and a year’s probation, which included some time on the couch after the drying-out phase.
I took Cliff’s advice.
The abrupt end to my bottle-a-day medicinal program wasn’t the worst of it. It was the regular visit of the staff psychiatrist for whom I developed a thorough and abiding hatred, which eventually he came to devoutly return. A corruption of his professional standards over which I still feel a certain pride.
On the day they let me out another doc came to visit, this one a neurologist. He told me to try to avoid getting bashed in the head for at least the next few years.
“Nobody knows for sure, but concussions like this could lead to Parkinson’s, or worse,” he told me. “You won’t be the first boxer to be mumbling in his beer before you’re out of middle age. Though judging from your blood alcohol at admittance, booze’ll probably get there first.”
“That’s the competitive spirit for you.”
“It’s your life. Though you might think about the people who love you before you throw it all away.”
“Too late for that, doc,” I told him. “Nobody does and it’s already gone.”
——
I did manage to live long enough to get another concussion about four years later when a thug named Buddy Florin sucker punched me while I was standing at a urinal. The doc that time said it had to be my last one if I had hopes of keeping my faculties, acuities or any other mental function reasonably intact.
So Ross Semple was at least right about one thing.
There was something wrong with my head that getting hit wouldn’t likely improve. And it frightened me, to a
