“No one’s accusing you. It’s information I need to aid an investigation…”
“I can’t help you. I don’t have any police information.”
“Let me decide that. Is Twenty-eighth Street inside your delivery area?”
Burgger hesitated, then nodded slowly and reluctantly as though he were being forced to reveal a state secret.
“Do you have any Chinese messenger boys?”
“No.”
“But you have had at least one Chinese boy working for you?”
“No.” He scratched on a board, ignoring Andy. Perspiration beaded the top of his bald head and collected in droplets on the strands of gray hair. Andy didn’t enjoy putting on pressure, but he could do it when he had to.
“We have laws in this state, Burgger,” he said in a low, toneless voice. “I can drag you out of here right now and take you over to the station and throw you into the can for thirty days for interfering with an officer. Do you want me to do that?”
“I haven’t done anything!”
“Yes you have. You’ve lied to me. You said you never had a Chinese kid working here.”
Burgger squirmed in his seat, pulled two ways by the conflict between his fear and his desire to remain uncommitted. Fear won.
“There was a Chinese kid, worked just one day, never came back.”
“What day was that?”
The answer came reluctantly. “Monday of this week.”
“Did he deliver any telegrams?”
“How the hell should I know?”
“Because that’s your job,” Andy said, putting a snap into his words again. “What telegrams did he deliver?”
“He sat around all day, I didn’t need him. It was his first day, I never send a new kid out the first day, let them get used to the bench first so they don’t get ideas. But we had a rush that night. I had to use him. Just once.”
“Where to?”
“Look, mister, I can’t remember every telegram I send out. This is a busy office and besides, we don’t keep records. A telegram is received, delivered, accepted, that’s the end of it.”
“I know all that, but this telegram is important. I want you to try and remember where it went. Was it to Seventh Avenue? Or Twenty-third Street? Chelsea Park…?”
“Wait, I think that was it. I remember I didn’t want the kid to go to Chelsea Park, they don’t like new kids there, just the regulars, but there was no one else in, so I had to use him.”
“Now we’re getting someplace,” Andy said, taking out his notepad. “What’s the kid’s name?”
“Some Chink name, I forget now. He was only here that one day and never came back.”
“What did he look like, then?”
“Like a Chink kid. It’s not my job remembering what kids look like.” He was sinking back into his sullen hatred.
“Where did he live?”
“Who knows? Kid comes in and puts up his board money, that’s all I know. Not my job—”
“Nothing seems to be your job, Burgger. I’ll be seeing you again. Meanwhile try to remember what the kid looked like, I’ll want some more answers from you.”
The boys stirred on the bench when Andy went out and Burgger flashed them a look of pure hatred.
It was a thin lead, but Andy was cheerful; at least he had something to talk to Grassy about. Steve Kulozik was also in the lieutenant’s office when he went in, and they nodded to each other.
“How’s the case?” Steve asked.
“You can do your gossiping on your own time,” Grassioli broke in; the tic in his eye was going fine today. “You better have come up with something by now, Rusch, this is a case, not a holiday and a lot of brass up and down the line are getting peed off.”
Andy explained about the disconnected burglar alarm and the timing necessary for anyone to have visited the apartment. He quickly ran through the unproductive interviews he had had until he came to the Western Union boy: this he told in detail.
“So what does it add up to?” the lieutenant asked, both hands clasped on his stomach, over the spot where the ulcer was.
“The kid might have been working for someone. Messenger boys have to put up ten D’s board money — and how many kids have that kind of loot? The kid could have been brought in, maybe from Chinatown, and paid to snoop the apartments he brought telegrams to. He hit the jackpot first time out when he saw the disconnected alarm on Big Mike’s door. Then, whoever hired him pulled the job and the killing, after which they both faded.”
“Sounds pretty slim, but it’s about the only lead you’ve managed to come up with. What’s the kid’s name?”
“No one knows.”
“Well, what the hell!” Grassioli shouted. “You come up with this fancy damned complicated theory and where does it go if you can’t find the kid? There are millions of kids in this city — so how do we find the right one?”
Andy knew when to be silent. Steve Kulozik had been leaning his bulk against the wall, listening while Andy explained. “Could I say something, lieutenant?” he asked.
“What do you want?”
“Let’s just for a minute think of this whole case as being inside this precinct. The kid could have come from Chinatown or from anywheres, but let’s forget about that. Say he came from Shiptown, right here, and you know how those people are about sticking together, so maybe there’s another Chink who was using the kid. Just suppose.”
“What are you trying to say, Kulozik? Get to the goddamn point.”
“I was just about to, lieutenant,” Steve said imperturbably. “Let’s say the kid or his boss comes from Shiptown. If they do we may have fingerprints on them. It was before my time, but you were here in seventy-two, weren’t you, lieutenant, when they brought all the Formosa refugees in after General Kung’s invasion got its ass blown off on the mainland?”
“I was here. I was a rookie then.”
“Didn’t they fingerprint everybody, kids and all? Just in case some Commie agent slipped in with them before the airlift?”
“It’s a long shot,” the lieutenant said. “They were all fingerprinted and so were all the kids for a couple of years after that just in case they might defect. Those cards are all down in the cellar here. That’s what you were thinking about, wasn’t it?”
“That’s right, sir. Go through them and see if the prints from the murder weapon can be matched up with one of the cards. It’s a long shot, but it doesn’t hurt to try.”
“You heard him, Rusch,” Grassioli said, pulling over a stack of reports. “Get the weapon prints and get down there and see if you can find anything.”
“Yes, sir,” Andy answered, and he and Steve went out together. “Big buddy you are,” he told Steve as soon as the door had closed. “I should be knocking off soon and instead you got me buried in the cellar, and I’ll probably be there all night.”
“It’s not that bad,” Steve said complacently. “I had to use the file once, all the prints are coded so you can get to the ones you want fast. I’d help you except my brother-in-law is coming to dinner tonight.”
“The one you hate so much?”
“That’s the one. But he’s working on one of the fishing trawlers now, and he’s going to bring a fish he stole. Fresh fish. Doesn’t your mouth water?”
“Just for a bite out of your hide, you ratfink. I hope you get a bone stuck in your throat.”
The fingerprint files were not in quite the same condition that Steve had described. Others had used them since and whole groups of cards were filed out of sequence and one entire boxful had been spilled and afterward
