Twelve
City planners created Government Center in the belief that they could free the world of vice by bulldozing vice-infested buildings. They destroyed Scollay Square, the old red-light district, and replaced it with a brick plaza surrounding an inverted pyramid of a building. Apparently the planners had missed the irony of replacing a whorehouse with City Hall.
The whorehouses had moved over to Washington Street to create a new neighborhood of debauchery. This new neighborhood, the Combat Zone, did a flourishing business in porn and prostitution until it was finally destroyed by DVDs and the Internet. Today all that’s left of the Combat Zone is Centerfolds—a men’s club where, I’m told, they have ladies who dance with no clothes on.
After crossing Government Center, I saw a break in the traffic on Cambridge Street and jogged across, a perfectly legal move in Boston where pedestrians run wild and free. Bobby’s office building followed the curve of Cambridge Street. I entered and took the elevator up to the FBI lobby, a plain, carpeted room that showcased large gold FBI letters along the back wall.
The receptionist was a prim woman with small reading glasses. Her short hair exposed dangly earrings made of colored glass. I smiled and told her, “My name’s Tucker. I’m here to see Bobby Miller.”
“What’s the nature of your business with Agent Miller?” she asked.
I raised the bag of groceries and took out the eggplant. “I’m here for his therapy session.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Eggplant therapy?”
“Oh yeah, it’s all the rage. We’re hoping to have his hair all grown back in six months.”
“What do you do with the eggplant?”
“Well, that’s a matter of patient/doctor confidentiality.”
“I see.”
“Let’s just say that the eggplant doesn’t survive the procedure.”
She picked up the phone and dialed. “Agent Miller, a Mr. Tucker is here with your eggplant … No sir, he’s standing right in front of me. I think you should tell him to do that yourself. I’ll bring him in.”
The receptionist brought me to Bobby’s door. I waggled the eggplant at him and asked it, “Did you miss your daddy?”
Bobby said, “Did Monique tell you to shove the eggplant up your ass?”
Monique giggled and walked away.
“No,” I said. “She’s obviously too much of a lady.”
“Well, shove the eggplant up your ass.”
“I’ve got other vegetables, you know.”
“Why do you even have vegetables?”
I walked into Bobby’s office and said, “I’m making dinner for Lucy. The girl from the ballgame.”
Bobby sat in an unadorned box of an office behind an aluminum and Formica desk. His sad and abused work chair squeaked whenever he moved. Bobby motioned me to sit and asked, “So, is John Tucker your brother?”
“I have no idea. My dad’s best friend says that I don’t have a brother.”
Bobby poised his pen over a legal pad. “Who’s that?”
“Walt Adams. He worked with my dad at GDS and said that my dad didn’t screw around.”
Bobby said, “Hmmph.”
“Then I talked to Cathy Byrd, John Tucker’s mother.”
“Yeah? What did she tell you?”
“Nothing. I’m going out to Pittsfield to have lunch with her tomorrow. When my cousin Sal heard, he got all pissed off and called her a whore. Something’s up.”
“What’s Sal’s last name?” asked Bobby, pen poised.
“Rizzo. He’s Sal Rizzo.”
“Your cousin is Sal Rizzo? North End Sal Rizzo?”
“Yeah, I guess. He lives in the North End.”
“Is there any reason you never told me you were connected?”
“Connected? Connected to what?”
Bobby rolled his eyes. “Connected to the Mafia. You’re telling me that you don’t know that Sal Rizzo runs the Mafia in the North End?”
“Cousin Sal? That’s ridiculous.”
“I’m sorry. I’m just an FBI special agent who investigates organized crime. I guess I should just go back into the war room and tear down that whole fucking org chart with Sal Rizzo at the top of it.”
I crossed my arms. “This is bullshit.”
“Shit, Tucker. You got a dead brother you never heard of and a cousin you didn’t know was in the Mafia. That is one screwed-up family life. What do you do on the holidays?”
“I hadn’t thought about it, actually.” It would be my first holiday season since I lost my wife.
“Thanksgiving is coming.”
“I guess I’ll watch some football games.”
“You’re welcome to come to my place.”
“I’m fine. I don’t need to come to your house for Thanksgiving.”
“At least have coffee with me tomorrow in Pittsfield. You could even be useful.”
“Why are you going to Pittsfield?”
“I’m talking to some people about your non-brother’s work. I could bounce some ideas off you.”
“I thought Lee was investigating John Tucker’s murder. What’s your angle?”
“I’m working on a different problem.”
“What problem?”
“I really shouldn’t tell you about it.”
“But you will anyway.”
“I think John Tucker was a spy.”
“Holy shit. This just gets better and better.”
“That information is between us.”
“That’s why you were in front of my house last night.”
“Will you help me?”
I gathered my vegetables and stood. “See you in Pittsfield.”