“A fair assumption. What are you getting at, Mr. Cone?”
“Here’s what I need. … There’s got to be an association of all the property and casualty insurance companies in the country. Some outfit that lobbies in Washington and also collects statistics on property and casualty losses and the insurance business in general.”
“Of course there is. The Central Insurance Association, a trade group.”
“The CIA?” Cone says. “That must raise a few eyebrows. But I’ll bet they’ve got all the facts and figures on their industry on computer tapes-right?”
“I would imagine so, yes.”
“Well, here’s what I’d like you to do: Call your broker, ask him to contact the trade association and get a list of the ten companies in the country that suffered the heaviest property and casualty losses in the last year.”
There’s a long pause. Then: “You think there may be a connection with our losses, Mr. Cone? That there may be some kind of a conspiracy directed against large corporations?”
“Something like that,” Cone says. “Look, Mr. Trale, I wouldn’t blame you for thinking I’m a bubblehead after I fell on my face on that corporate raider suggestion.”
“Don’t apologize for that,” the old man says. “It was a very ingenious idea that just didn’t work out. Happens to me all the time. But now you feel there may be a link between our accidents and those of other companies?”
“Could be.”
“All right,” Trale says without hesitation. “I’ll call our broker and ask him to get the information.”
“Lean on him if you have to,” Cone says.
Trale laughs. “I don’t think that will be necessary; I’m sure he’ll be happy to cooperate. Shall I have him contact you directly?”
“Yeah, that’d help. I want to move on this as fast as I can, Mr. Trale, but I’m not promising anything.”
“I understand that. I’ll call immediately.”
Cone hangs up, satisfied he’s started things rolling. Now he’s got to wait for Davenport and the insurance broker to get back to him. He could do it all himself, but it would take weeks, maybe months, of donkeywork. And he has the feeling that something is going down that better be squelched in a hurry.
Having done a morning’s labor for Haldering amp; Co. with two phone calls, he feels no great obligation to occupy his desk at the office. So he has a whore’s bath, shaves, and dresses at a languid pace, pausing to make a small aluminum foil ball for Cleo to chase. He even has time for a morning beer to excite the palate and cleanse the nasal passages.
He ambles downtown, frowning at a summer sun that beams back at him. It’s a brilliant day, and he might glory in it if he was not a man of a naturally morose nature, a grump still studying joy and how to achieve it. The brimful day is an indignity; he still prefers sleet and wet socks.
The snarly Haldering receptionist gives him a glare for his tardiness, and his cramped office is no great solace. There’s a chilly memo from Samantha Whatley on his desk: “Your progress reports for the past three weeks are overdue. Ditto expense account vouchers. Please remit ASAP.”
He folds the memo into a paper airplane and sails it up. It flutters, falls. Just like his mood. He wonders if he might not improve his lot in life by learning how to slice Nova thin in a high-class deli. He could force that career switch by marching in and slamming Hiram Haldering in the snout. Attractive thought.
He knows why he is suddenly afflicted with a galloping case of the glooms. Having set the wheels in motion on the Dempster file, there’s not a damned thing he can do until Neal Davenport and Simon Trale respond to his requests. The inaction chafes, and he hopes to God his second brainstorm isn’t going to prove as big a blunder as his first.
He grimly sets to work on those accursed progress reports, trying not to think of the possibility of another balls-up on the Dempster case. But when his phone rings about 11:30, he reaches for it cautiously as if it might bring news of disaster.
“Yeah?” he says warily.
“Davenport. You got pencil and paper? I got names to go with those license plates you gave me.”
“Jeez, that’s quick work,” Cone says. “I didn’t expect you to get back to me so soon.”
“Well, you said it might have something to do with Dempster. You know how to jerk my chain. I’ll give you the names, but I also got addresses if needed. Ready? Samuel Folger is the first. The second is Jerome K. Waltz. That’s W-a-l-t-z. Like the dance. The third plate is a company car registered to an outfit named Simon and Butterfield, Incorporated. Got all that? Now never say I don’t deliver.”
“Yeah,” Cone says, “thanks.”
“Those names mean anything to you?”
“They’re all Wall Street guys. They call themselves investment advisers or financial consultants or whatever. But what they really are is money managers-other people’s money.”
“They’re legit?”
Cone doesn’t answer directly. “They’re all heavyweights,” he goes on. “Mostly in trust and pension funds. I mean we’re talking about billions of dollars.”
“So what’s the connection with the Dempster homicide?”
“Well, uh, it’s iffy right now.”
“You bastard!” Davenport shouts. “I knock myself out getting this stuff, and you clam up on me. You got nothing to trade? What kind of horseshit is that?”
“Calm down, Neal,” the Wall Street dick says. “I got something to trade. You ever hear of a scabby joint over on the West Side called Paddy’s Pig?”
Silence. It goes on for so long that Cone says, “Hey, are you there?”
“I’m here. You said Paddy’s Pig?”
“That’s right.”
“You think it might be tied to the Dempster kill?”
“Yeah.”
“You and I better have a meet,” the city detective says.
Six
Cone provides the lunch. He’s standing outside the office with a shopping bag when Davenport drives up. He double-parks his unmarked blue Plymouth and props up a “Police Officer on Duty” card inside the windshield. Timothy climbs in with the bag.
“Hey, sherlock,” Davenport says, “that smells good. What’d you get?”
“Rare burgers on soft buns with a slice of onion-just like you ordered. Also, French fries, a couple of dills, and a cold six-pack of Bud.”
“Sounds good,” the NYPD man says, tossing a chewed wad of Juicy Fruit out the window. “You can diddle your expense account?”
“No problem.”
“Then let’s get at it.”
They open up the smaller bags, pop two beers, divide the paper napkins, and start gorging.
“There’s mustard and ketchup in those little packs,” Cone says.
“I’ll skip,” the city bull says. “I’m on a diet. Listen, I haven’t got much time, so I’ll give you the background fast. There’s a gang up in Hell’s Kitchen-only it’s Clinton now-called the Westies. Mostly Irish, and a meaner bunch of villains you never want to meet. I mean they make the outlaws in Murder, Inc., look like Girl Scouts. There’s a story that one of the Westies walked into a bar up there carrying the head of a guy he had just popped.”
“And the bar was Paddy’s Pig?”
“You got it. That’s where the Westies hung out. They were mostly into gambling and loan-sharking on the piers. But when the West Side docks dried up, the Westies went into everything else-drugs, prostitution, porn-you name it. Then, about ten years ago, they got into contract killings, including some for one of the Mafia families. We figure they pulled off at least thirty homicides. Most of the victims were chopped up. One guy had his head put in a
