Rizzo’s Fire Read online

  “Yeah,” Rizzo said. “Brooklyn streets aren’t known for their genteel ambiance. Anyway, Frankie must be pushin’ thirty by now. Lives with his mother in a basement apartment near Our Lady of Guadalupe. He helps out around the rectory, cleans up, shit like that.”

  “Guadalupe? The church on Fifteenth Avenue?” Priscilla asked.

  “Yep, that’s it. On the southeast corner of Seventy-second Street. Right across Seventy-second is Public School one-twelve. On that northeast corner is the schoolyard where Frankie Fits spends most nights, sitting alone in the dark on the high steps that lead to the janitor’s office.”

  “Are you kiddin’ me, Joe?” Priscilla asked.

  “No, really. A few years back, Frankie started hanging around the schoolyard when the kids were on recess. Some of the mothers freaked out, afraid Frankie might hurt one of their little darlings. They complained to the Six-Two cop assigned as school safety officer.”

  “What came of it?” Priscilla asked.

  “The cop worked it out. He told Frankie if he stayed clear of the school during the day, he could be the night watchman. Like an assistant to the cop, you know, keep an eye on things. And Frankie went for it. Guess he figured he was helping out the little kids, protecting the school, what ever.”

  “So you figure he was there on the night the Homs got robbed?” Priscilla asked.

  Rizzo nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I figure. Frankie’s there most nights, even in the worst winter weather. Sits on those steps till midnight, then goes home.”

  “That is some pitiful shit, Joe.”

  “Yeah, well, to us, sure. But to Frankie, it gives him a sense of purpose, a sense of worth. Like his church work does. And the guy’s got the character to stick to it.”

  Priscilla stood. “So, let’s go talk to him,” she said. “If the perp is some neighborhood asshole, maybe Frankie can make him for us.”

  “Yeah,” Rizzo said. “Maybe. Only thing is, all the local kids know Frankie sits up there at night, in the dark, on the steps, looking down at that corner.”

  She frowned. “So you figure it’s a newbie or a transient?”

  “Could be,” Rizzo said. “Or maybe just somebody figures Frankie is too stupid for it to matter. Or the perp could be somebody Frankie’d be too scared to rat on.” He shrugged. “We’ll see. But it’s too early now. Frankie doesn’t get there till after he has dinner, and I’d rather not go to his home and rattle his old lady. I’ve got some paperwork to do and calls to make. Relax awhile, we’ll head out a little later.”

  Priscilla nodded. “Okay. I’ve got some DD-fives to catch up on. Let me know when you’re ready.”

  After she walked away, Rizzo turned back to his desk. The folded Daily News caught his eye. He picked it up and again scanned the photograph and report of Councilman William Daily’s impressive election victory.

  Things would have been different, Rizzo thought. Things should have been different. Had the microcassette hidden away in the Rizzo basement followed its rightful course after he and McQueen had first found it, the newspapers would be singing a different song about William Daily right now.

  Rizzo tossed the paper angrily into the wastebasket at his feet.

  “Fuck it,” he said in a barely audible hiss. “His time’ll come. It’ll come.”

  Reaching for his paperwork, Rizzo tried to ignore the voice nagging at him, a soft, questioning voice.

  “Fuck it,” he said again. He turned to his work.

  FRANKIE CORVONA was twenty-eight years old. The youngest of three siblings, he had been what the neighborhood women referred to as a “change of life baby,” born unplanned to a forty-four-year-old mother. Complications at birth involving a strangling umbilical cord had deprived Frankie’s new brain of oxygen, causing irreversible damage. In addition to his severely reduced intellectual capacities, he had also been rendered epileptic. Later, additional problems arising from cranial pressures had further tormented him, resulting in a series of operations. The operations had preserved his life but further damaged his already ravished brain.

  Frankie lived with his mother, drawing a disability stipend from Social Security. His father, long deceased, had left a modest pension behind. Frankie’s two older siblings were only sporadically involved, bringing gifts of money for birthdays and holidays.

  Rizzo pulled the Chevy to the curb on the north side of Seventy-second Street and shut down the motor. He peered into the darkness of the Public School 112 schoolyard.

  “I can’t see if he’s there,” he said.

  Priscilla shrugged. “It’s so fuckin’ dark, I can barely see the steps.” She opened the car door. “Let’s go see,” she said.

  The two detectives crossed the sidewalk and climbed the three worn concrete steps leading to the schoolyard. Stepping through the open gateway of the six-foot iron fence that surrounded the yard, they paused, allowing their eyes to adjust to the blanketing darkness. The moonless night was cold and damp, illumination cast only from the corner streetlight where Seventy-second Street intersected with Fifteenth Avenue. Rizzo noted that the corner itself was well lit, the streetlight giving off a warm, blue-white glow.

  They crossed the yard to the steep, narrow high steps nestled against the side of the ancient school building. In the cold darkness enveloping the steps, nearly halfway up, they saw the huddled mass of Frankie Corvona.

  As they reached the base of the staircase, they paused, Rizzo placing a foot onto the second step and leaning forward, his right elbow laid casually across his knee.

  “Frankie?” he said, his voice friendly and soft. “Is that you up there?”

  In the darkness, they could barely make out the pale, round, full face of the man. His large, wide-set eyes flitted from one cop to the other.

  “It’s Frankie,” the man said in response. “Frankie.”

  “Well, I figured you’d be here, Frankie, keeping an eye on the place for us,” Rizzo said. Then he turned to Priscilla. “See, what’d I tell you? We can always count on Frankie.”

  Turning his gaze back to the young man, he said, “I’m Joe. I’m a policeman. A detective. And this is my partner, Cil. She’s a detective, too. We work for the Sixty-second Precinct. Sort of like you do, Frankie.”

  A small smile came to the man’s lips. “I watch the school at night,” he said, pride in his voice. “I watch the school.”

  “Joe told me about that, Frankie,” Priscilla said. “And he told me you do a real good job, too.”

  Frankie turned his eyes to her. “You’re black,” he said.

  “Yes, Frankie. I am.”

  He appeared to think about that for a moment.

  “Dr. Towner is black,” he said.

  “Who’s Dr. Towner?” Priscilla asked.

  Frankie’s face brightened. “He’s my friend, he gives me medicine so I don’t spin around too much.”

  Priscilla nodded. “That’s good, Frankie. Real good.”

  Rizzo straightened up. “Frankie,” he said, “you mind if we come up there? We’d like to talk to you a little.”

  Now Frankie’s face clouded, his smile faded, his eyes darted nervously.

  “I didn’t go around the children,” he said, a childlike defiance in his tone. “I didn’t.”

  Rizzo nodded. “I know that, Frankie. It’s not about that. It’s something else. Something important that we need you to help us with.” Rizzo leaned forward, glancing around, lowering his voice.

  “It’s police business, Frankie,” he said. “We need your help with some police business.”

  Once again, the face brightened. “Oh,” he said. “Oh.”

  “Can we come up?” Rizzo asked again.

  “Sure,” Frankie said, sliding across the step, leaning his left side against the school wall, making room.

  They climbed the fifteen steps, and Rizzo sat down next to him, Priscilla one step above.

  “Can I see your badge?” Frankie asked Rizzo.

  “Sure,” Rizzo said, reaching i
nto his left pants pocket. He flipped the case open, the gold detective sergeant shield catching the faint light and twinkling against the worn black leather.

  Frankie raised his eyes from the badge to Rizzo’s face.

  “Can I hold it?”

  Rizzo extended the badge, pressing it into Frankie’s hand.

  “As a matter of fact,” Rizzo said, “you should hold it. After all, this is official police business you’re helping us with. Like a deputy, sort of.”

  Priscilla watched as Frankie raised the badge tentatively to his eye level, studying it, his face glowing with happiness. She pursed her lips and shook her head slightly, saddened. She glanced at Rizzo, but his face, neutral, remained on Frankie.

  Frankie lowered the badge, holding it tightly in both hands.

  “I went to Shea Stadium once,” he said, some pleasurable memory swirling to the forefront of his thoughts. “When it used to be there.”

  “You root for the Mets, Frankie?” Rizzo asked.

  Now Frankie appeared confused. “Mets?” he said, frowning. “I think so.” After a pause, his smile returned. “Mets,” he repeated. “They play baseball.”

  Rizzo nodded, glancing at Priscilla. She gave a small shrug in acknowledgment of the look, but remained silent.

  Aware that stress could trigger a seizure in the man-child, Rizzo very gradually moved the conversation to the business at hand.

  “So, Frankie, were you here last Thursday?” he asked. “Last Thursday night, around nine-thirty?”

  Frankie frowned, dropping his eyes to the badge he held, running his finger across the embossed surface.

  “I don’t know,” he said flatly.

  Priscilla leaned forward, laying a gentle hand on Frankie’s right shoulder.

  “Do you know what day today is, Frankie?” she asked.

  He raised his eyes from the badge to meet hers. He looked confused.

  “It isn’t day,” he said with an assertive shake of his head. “It’s night.”

  Priscilla nodded. “Yes, Frankie, of course. You’re right. It is night. Do you know what night this is?”

  His lips turned down, and he dropped his eyes from her. For a moment, shame sat heavily on his shoulders, but then, suddenly, he brightened. He laid Rizzo’s badge carefully on his lap, then rummaged through his pants pockets.

  Pulling out a chainless pocket watch, he smiled up at Priscilla and pointed to its large, round white face, the Roman numerals contrasting in bold black relief.

  “When this hand is here,” he said, pointing carefully to the crystal, “and this hand is here, I go home.”

  Priscilla glanced at Rizzo. Turning to Frankie, she smiled kindly and patted his shoulder.

  “Good, Frankie,” she said. “That’s very good.”

  Frankie smiled proudly and returned the watch to his pocket, again taking Rizzo’s badge in his hands.

  Rizzo ran a hand through his thinning brown hair. “Okay, Frankie,” he said gently. “Let me ask you this: Did anything happen over there? Over by that corner there?” Rizzo pointed a casual thumb over his shoulder, indicating the intersection. “Did anything bad happen over there that you can remember?”

  Tension began to enter the man’s eyes. Frankie glanced over his shoulder to Priscilla. She smiled and gently squeezed his arm.

  “It’s okay, Frankie,” she said. “You can tell us.”

  He swallowed hard, glancing once more at Rizzo’s badge, gripping it more tightly, then began to rock gently back and forth, his breathing becoming shallow.

  “I didn’t do it,” he said softly.

  Rizzo nodded, leaning closer.

  “Of course you didn’t, Frankie,” he said. “But … did you see it?”

  Frankie looked quickly from one detective to the other, then back to Rizzo’s badge, then, lastly, into Priscilla’s face.

  “One of the bad kids,” he said to her. “One of the gang kids. He pushed the people from China. They fell down. He ran away. I think … I think … he took their money. Their money for food.”

  “What’s his name, Frankie?” Rizzo asked gently.

  Frankie’s face saddened. “I don’t know. I don’t know all their names.”

  “Whose names, Frankie?” Rizzo pressed.

  “The bad kids,” Frankie said softly. “The Rebels.”

  He again looked from one cop to the other. Slowly, a smile came back to his lips.

  “You use money to buy food,” he said, proud of this wonderous knowledge. “You use money to buy food.”

  RIZZO SLAMMED the car door closed and slipped the key into the ignition.

  “Most people,” he said, twisting the key and bringing the engine to life, “get made heroes by death. Not some great thing they do. Just by death.”

  Priscilla tugged at her shoulder harness, searching for the buckle in the darkness of the interior.

  “What?” she said.

  Rizzo shrugged, scanning the sideview mirror for traffic.

  “We all know we’re gonna die eventually, Cil, but we still get up every day, go to work, play with the kids, brush our teeth, pay our taxes, all that shit. Even though we know we’re gonna die. That’s what makes us heroes, knowing that death is waitin’ for us.”

  He turned to Priscilla. “But Frankie, he probably don’t even know. Doesn’t really know he’s gonna die. But that kid, he’s a hero anyway. Even outside his own little fucked up universe, he’s a real fuckin’ hero.”

  Priscilla smiled. “Joe, that don’t even make sense, but, I gotta tell ya, I know exactly what you mean.”

  Rizzo nodded, turning his attention back to driving, easing the Impala from the curb.

  “You ever have some kid ask to see your badge, hold your badge, and then not ask to see your gun in the next breath? Ever?” He shook his head sadly. “That kid Frankie never even thought to ask about the gun. It don’t interest him.” Again Rizzo shook his head. “Maybe all of us shoulda got less fuckin’ oxygen at birth. Maybe we’d all be too stupid to find shit to fight wars over. Too stupid to kill each other.”

  “You may be right,” Priscilla said. “Better fuckin’ world it woulda been, that’s for sure. We coulda been just a bunch of two-legged deer, or a bunch of catchers in the rye, just like Frankie is.”

  Rizzo looked puzzled. “ ‘Catcher in the rye’? Like the book?”

  “Somethin’ like that,” Priscilla said, turning and gazing through the window to the slowly passing, darkened streets.

  “I don’t get it,” Rizzo said. “What, did you talk about that book last night at your class? What’s it got to do with Frankie?”

  Priscilla turned back to face him. “Don’t get me started on last night, Partner. Don’t get me started.”

  Rizzo swung his eyes back to the road, smiling. “Sore subject? What happened, dog eat your homework?”

  Priscilla hesitated, and after a moment Rizzo glanced her way.

  “Was it that bad? You gonna clam up on me about it?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “The guy who teaches the class, his name is Thom Carlyle. Ever hear of him? Wrote a bunch of novels all the critics loved but nobody bought. Not that he gives a shit, his family is old money. Anyway, he comes up to me after class, tells me how good my stuff is, how impressed he is. Wants me to come to his place Saturday night for a party he’s throwing. Lots of writers, agents, editors, people like that. He wants to introduce me to his literary agent. He thinks she can help me.”

  “Well,” Rizzo said, “I can see why you’re so pissed off. Imagine the nerve of the son of a bitch, tryin’ to help you out like that.”

  “That’s not the issue, Joe. He leads into this invite by tellin’ me how he originally didn’t even want to accept me into his fuckin’ class at all. Says my entry submission was weak—how’d he put it?—‘Rankly amateurish.’ ”

  “But he took you in anyway.”

  “Oh, yeah, he took me. Right after he got a phone call. Seems like Karen’s old man knows a board member at t
he Y, so the wheels got greased for me and my weak entry submission.”

  Rizzo widened his eyes in mock surprise. “I’m fuckin’ shocked. You mean, shit like that really happens? Wheels get greased? There goes my last shred of faith, right out the fuckin’ window.”

  “I don’t wanna discuss it,” Priscilla snapped. “Shouldn’ta brought it up. Leave it at this, it just pisses me off, okay? Karen shoulda known better than to go to her old man behind my back. What am I, the little black poster child? The charity of the fuckin’ week? What?”

  Rizzo shrugged as he drove. “Maybe you’re just family, Cil. Maybe the guy’s doin’ what he’d do for his daughter. What I’d do for my daughter.”

  “Well, I ain’t his fuckin’ daughter.”

  “Daughter-in-law, then.” Rizzo turned briefly to her and winked. “Son-in-law, what ever the fuck. Relax. Welcome to the world. Besides, this guy, this teacher, now he’s singin’ a different tune, right? Now he figures you got the goods. You want my advice?”

  “No. Not really.”

  “My advice,” Rizzo went on, ignoring her, “is to go to that party. Kiss some ass, or maybe get your own ass kissed. This could be the break you need if you’re serious about this writing stuff.”

  She sat silently for a moment. “I’m serious, Joe. Real serious.”

  “Okay, then. End of discussion. Go do what you gotta do. And thank Karen’s old man. The guy did just what he shoulda done.”

  After a few moments of silence, Priscilla spoke up, her tone leaving Rizzo no doubt: the discussion was over.

  “What now? About this Hom case, I mean.”

  He shrugged. “Well, we’ll follow Frankie’s lead to The Rebels. But we’re going to have to develop this in de pen dent of him. Even if we could get the D.A. to use Frankie as an eyewitness, which, by the way, we could never do, can you imagine him on the stand? The newest, greenest Legal Aide lawyer could tear him apart, probably make him seize out right in the witness box.” Rizzo shook his head. “No, Frankie’s done his part. He’s out of it from now on. We gotta work it from some other angle. An angle that plays out with the perp copping.”

  “No argument here, Partner,” Priscilla said. “We’ll just leave Frankie in his happy place.”