Fun House

Now Ceepak gets an uncharacteristically devilish glint in his eye. “How can you be so certain of that, Mr. Mandrake?”

Mandrake looks a little flummoxed. “Because, like I just told you: we texted the threat ourselves. There’s no real danger.”

“That’s one theory,” says Ceepak. “Here’s another.”

Oh, man, Ceepak is pissed. I have never seen him jump this ugly in a suspect’s face. Of course, this is the first killer we’ve confronted while he was popping champagne to celebrate his diabolical plot to cash in on a double homicide.

“What if,” says Ceepak, “you, through your known Atlantic City connections in the Lombardo crime family, hired a team of professional hit men to murder Peter Paul Braciole?”

All of a sudden, the room goes silent.

“What if,” Ceepak continues, “upon seeing the ratings success of that first murder, you requested another act of violence from your known crime associates to ensure your ongoing income stream?”

Now Marty Mandrake’s nose twitches. “So, Acting Chief Ceepak, what the hell have you been drinking tonight?”

“Iced tea and non-alcoholic Coors beer, a taste I acquired while on combat duty in Iraq, dealing with individuals nearly as duplicitous as you.”

Okay, as much as I’ve enjoyed seeing Ceepak get steamed, I’m realizing-it may not have been our smartest move. Mandrake is puffing up his chest. Tugging up on his belt.

“Grace?” he snaps.

“Yes, sir?” says the script lady.

“Call Rambowski. Tell him I want to sue this pissant cop for libel, slander, and whatever the hell they call it when a jarhead asshole says unsubstantiated crap he’s gonna regret when I drag the sorry son of a bitch into court.”

“You should also ask your lawyer to accompany you to police headquarters this evening,” says Ceepak.

“What?”

“We need to ask you a few questions about your dealings in Atlantic City.”

“You’re fucking kidding me, right?”

“No, sir. I am in no way kidding.”

Mandrake squinches up his eyes. “You know, Ceepak, this isn’t the first time jackbooted Gestapo thugs like you have kicked in my door and tried to frame me. I dealt with Tricky Dicky and his CIA goons back in seventy-one. I can sure as shit handle you.”

“Be that as it may,” says Ceepak, “I suggest you-”

Mandrake cuts him off. “Officer, am I free to go?”

“Excuse me?”

“Am I free to go?”

“We’d like you to come to police headquarters.”

“Officer,” says Mandrake, using the terse but polite tone some ACLU lawyer probably coached him to use back in the seventies when his anti-Vietnam movie came out, “you did not answer my question: Am I free to go?”

Ceepak’s jaw joint starts popping in and out.

Mine too.

Do we have “reasonable suspicion,” which would give us the right to detain Mr. Mandrake for investigatory purposes?

We have no hard evidence of Mr. Mandrake making contact with members of the Lombardo crime family.

We have no sales receipts from Murder, Inc. for the rental of two contract killers.

We have no confession from even one of the hired hit men, identifying Mr. Martin Mandrake as the person who paid for his or her services.

Basically, we have a hunch.

One Ceepak probably shouldn’t have played so publicly so soon.

“Officer,” says Mandrake, “I will repeat my question one last time: Am I free to go?”

Ceepak swallows hard. “Yes.”

And, without saying another word, Marty Mandrake walks out the production trailer door.

36

We sit outside the production trailer in Ceepak’s banged-up Toyota for a few very long, extremely quiet minutes.

I can hear the ocean, and it’s a block and a half away.

“Danny?” Ceepak finally says.

“Yeah?”

“I must apologize. I fear I let my personal feelings interfere with my judgment.”

“Well, there’s a first time for everything, I guess.”

Ceepak shakes his head. “There shouldn’t be. Not for that sort of unprofessional behavior.”

The thing about Ceepak and his rigid honor code is this: he mostly imposes it on himself. My partner holds himself accountable to a higher standard than he’d ever hold, say, me. I think this comes from being in the military, where all your decisions could be life-and-death ones-for other people, not just for yourself. So when Officer John Ceepak occasionally blows it, it totally bums him out.

“Well,” I say, digging through the treasure trove of sage Springsteen snippets, “tomorrow there’ll be sunshine and all this darkness past.” I go with “Land Of Hope and Dreams” because I know it’s Ceepak’s favorite.

Ceepak looks over at me. “I take it you have seen tomorrow’s weather forecast?”

And then he finally cracks half a smile.

At least Marty Mandrake didn’t skip town after he heard that we suspect him of masterminding two murders.

First thing Friday morning, when Acting Chief Ceepak and I show up on Pier Two to supervise the security detail (which is mostly for show, since we now suspect the death threat is a phony one), we see Mandrake working with his crew, organizing things up at the Fun House. I’m dressed in khaki shorts and a navy blue Engine 23 FDNY T-shirt that this guy who helped us out at the Hell Hole last summer, Captain Dave Morkal, sent me for Christmas. Even though I have my badge clipped to a belt loop, I look sloppy enough to work on Mandrake’s crew.

Ceepak, in his golf shorts and white polo shirt, looks more like a Boy Scout working on his country club merit badge.

The big-shot producer is, of course, avoiding and ignoring us. And we can’t force him to talk to us until we have some kind of incriminating evidence proving Ceepak’s theory.

So Mandrake and his crew are running cables, rigging up cameras, acting important. I see another swarm of guys in baggy shorts, hiking sneakers, and T-shirts-with radios, tool belts, and duct tape hanging off their hips- pushing lights on rolling tripods, practicing camera moves, or noshing at the craft services table. All thirty or forty members of the Fun House camera crew have deer-hunter orange CREW I.D.s draped around their necks, showing that they have already been cleared through security.

I see that rookie, the guy in the knit hat, the one who didn’t know what a “half-apple” was. He’s hanging out under a pop-up tent munching on what appears to be a breakfast burrito, yukking it up with the ponytailed cameraman Jimbo, a guy leaning on his microphone pole, and another dude who’s stuffing fistfuls of free popcorn into his face. Looks like the knit-hat kid caught on to how this production gig works pretty quickly: you work a little, then you stand around and snack.

Now Ms. Shapiro comes over to the tent, waves and points. I think they call it gesticulating. Anyway, Jimbo