A Piece of the Action

quickly, he worked his way back through the pages until he found the story on page three. Roy Campanella, the veteran Dodger catcher, had been on his way home (the old J. R Morgan estate on East Island) at three in the morning. He was within a mile of his house when his car had skidded off the road and slammed into a light pole. Now, his neck was broken. Not only would he never play baseball again, the doctors felt he’d spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair.

Moodrow let the paper drop to his knees. Roy Campanella, the second Negro player in the major leagues, had come to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1948, a year after Jackie Robinson. Short and squat, always smiling, life seemed to roll off his broad shoulders. Jackie may have paved the way, but Campy was the steamroller who’d held everything in place. In the ten years since he’d come to Ebbets Field, Campanella had been named National League MVP three times.

“Damn,” Moodrow said aloud, “Goddamn.”

“What’s the matter, you got a twitch or somethin’?”

Moodrow looked up at a scowling Sergeant Goldfarb. “You hear about Campy?” he asked.

“Yeah, I heard he missed a curve on Long Island and now he’s a loaf of bread.” Goldfarb leaned forward, grinning wildly. “That’s one nigger who ain’t gonna play in Los fucking Angeles.”

The intercom on Goldfarb’s desk buzzed once, a sharp jolt that brought the sergeant up short. He waved toward the door behind him. “Batter up, kid.”

Moodrow crossed the room quickly, took a deep breath and opened the door. Deputy Chief Milton Morton was seated behind an enormous wooden desk. The dark wood gleamed with polish. A gold fountain pen lay on a square of black marble. It, too, gleamed, drawing Moodrow’s attention. As, he understood, it was meant to do.

“Sit down, detective,” Morton said.

Moodrow obeyed. Just as he’d obeyed Captain John McElroy in that hallway. What he’d come to understand over the past month was that he wanted two incompatible things. He wanted to be independent and he wanted to be a cop. That couldn’t happen. Somewhere along the line, he was going to have to pay for his independence. Milton Morton’s job, as Moodrow understood it, was to name the price.

“You did well, detective,” Morton said.

Thin and sallow, Deputy Chief Morton looked like anything but a cop. The story, among the rank-and-file, was that his lofty position was a gift to the Jews of New York. Pure politics, from beginning to end. Moodrow had gotten another story from Allen Epstein. According to Epstein, Morton had been a decent patrolman, as willing as any to wade into a bar brawl or mediate a violent family dispute. Not that he stayed a patrolman very long. Within twelve years, he’d passed the sergeant’s, lieutenant’s and captain’s exams. At age thirty-six, he’d been appointed deputy inspector. Then full Inspector. At each stage, he’d demonstrated an ability to command.

“The point is,” Epstein had explained, “that whenever Morton was in charge, things went smoothly. He controlled his cops. Kept his statistics up. Never went on the take. Never made a complaint against anyone who did. The guys walking a beat think you have to break heads to be a good cop. That’s why they stay patrolman. Morton was smart enough to know that the New York Police Department is one giant headache waiting for an aspirin. He dedicated himself to being that aspirin.”

Moodrow looked over at Chief Morton, noting the folded arms and the patient expression. “Did well at what?” he asked. “I thought I was here to walk the plank.”

Morton smiled. “I’m talking about Pat Cohan. The reporters have been in touch with you, right?”

“Yeah.”

“And you must have been tempted, at some point or other, to put the whole thing on the table. Patero, Accacio, Jake Leibowitz-the whole thing. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“But you didn’t. You held it back. You protected the Department instead of protecting yourself. You did well.”

“Thanks.” There wasn’t anything else for Moodrow to say He settled his bulk in the chair and let his hands drop into his lap.

“You have a package, I believe,” Morton said.

“A package?”

“Patero’s statement, the Leibowitz case file, the other evidence against Pat Cohan. A package.” Morton paused, his eyes fixed on Moodrow, obviously waiting for a response.

“Yeah,” Moodrow finally said. “I’ve got your ‘package.’ ”

“Well, I want it. I want you to give it to me.” Morton fished a cigarette out of his shirt pocket and tapped it on the desk a few times before lighting it. “Coffin nails,” he said, blowing out a thin stream of smoke. “Now, I’ve told you what I want. Which also happens to be what the Department wants. The only question is what do you want?”

“You don’t waste much time.”

Morton managed a quick smile. “I don’t have much time to waste.” He gestured at the neat stack of paperwork on his desk.

“What if I don’t give you the ‘package’? What if I decide to hold onto it?”

“I believe we’re here to negotiate, detective,” Morton answered without blinking an eye. “But let me take it a step further. Pat Cohan is dead. The murder of Rose Cohan has been solved. Salvatore Patero has decided to seek employment elsewhere. As has Lieutenant Rosten. A year down the line, your evidence will be about as useful to you as five pounds of cat shit. If you’re going to survive, you’re going to need friends. You’re going to need a rabbi to protect you. I want the evidence you’ve accumulated. I want it dead and buried, just like the man it implicates. The only question, as I said before, is what you want.”

“I want to stay where I am. I want to stay in the Seventh Precinct and be left alone to do my job.” Now that it was out in the open, the request seemed modest enough.

“Is that it?” Even Morton seemed surprised. “No promotion? No transfer to Homicide or Narcotics?”

“Look, Chief.” Moodrow, suddenly annoyed, leaned forward. “I never set out to get Pat Cohan. Whatever I did, I did to survive.”

“I know all that. Believe me, I know everything that happened.”

“Then maybe you also know that what I hear you saying is that you can’t trust me. You’re afraid I’ll call in the reporters, that I’ll embarrass the Department. Let me ask you this, why should I trust a man who doesn’t trust me?”

“A good question.” Morton tapped the gray ash at the end of his cigarette into a glass ashtray. “Would you be willing to give me a copy of the evidence? To show good faith.”

“Done.”

“Good. Now tell me, Detective, do you understand the traditional relationship between a rabbi and his protege?”

“I’m sure you’ll tell me.”

Once again, Morton failed to respond to a verbal jab. “The protege,” he said, “functions as the rabbi’s eyes and ears. He does favors for his rabbi and expects favors in return. A protege’s favors usually involve an advantageous transfer or an out-and-out promotion, but in your case, I suspect that you’ll be more interested in protection. Am I right?”

Moodrow sat back in the chair. No matter what you did, it always came back to the same thing. The politics of the job reached into every cop’s working life. There was no way to get around it. What you had to do was find a way to satisfy the Department. And there was no magic formula. One day the tightrope would be as wide as the Brooklyn Bridge and the next it would be a single strand of wire suspended over the Grand Canyon.

“There’re no rules, are there?” he asked.

“There are nothing but rules,” Morton responded. “Pages and pages and pages of rules. The only question is which of them apply to what situation.”

“All right. You can call in your marker whenever you want. Only I’m not a trained poodle so don’t expect blind obedience. You ask and I’ll check the rules to see which ones apply to the situation. In the meanwhile, I expect to do my job.”

Morton puffed on the cigarette, sucking the smoke deep into his lungs before slowly exhaling. “Did I tell you that Captain McElroy is being transferred out of the Seventh?”