6

In Long Island City a man, preparing for his annual week’s deer hunting, went into his closet to bring his guns down for cleaning. They were stacked neatly on the shelf over a row of his wife’s frocks, and the smart thing would have been to get the kitchen stool, but the man was tall—and a bit lazy—so he reached up on tiptoe and began to bring them down. One was a bit further back than the others, and as he was bringing it down, insecurely held, he stepped on one of his wife’s shoes and allowed it to slip. The jar as it struck the floor somehow discharged the weapon, and the charge struck him squarely in the throat. According to the hospital report, his recovery was doubtful.

His wife, horrified at the accident, later took his guns and threw them on the dump, where they were quickly rescued by a group of fifteen-year-olds from the neighborhood. They took them to their club, amazed at their good fortune. They had expected to wait years before they could afford anything better than bicycle chains as weapons.

Tuesday–4:30 P.M.

Young Martinez was about seventeen years old, short but quite well-built, tightly packed into his clean, faded Levi’s, with a loose-flowing black rayon shirt open at the throat and buttoned tightly at the wrists with neat rows of white buttons. His hair glistened in a curling duck-tail; his soft black eyes with sweeping lashes were expressionless in the mahogany face. He stood facing Clancy at complete ease, one hand on his hip, a slightly contemptuous smile on his full lips.

“You wanted to see me?” he asked. He jerked his head slightly in Stanton’s direction. “It must have been pretty important, sending a real live detective out for me.”

“It was,” Clancy said quietly. “Sit down.”

“If you don’t mind, I’ll stand.” The boy’s smile widened sardonically. “I got things to do when I leave here.”

Clancy’s voice hardened without increasing in volume. “I said, sit down!”

Kaproski moved closer; the boy’s smile faded a bit. He saved his face, at least to some extent, by shrugging lightly before slumping indolently in a chair across from Clancy. “All right, so I’m sitting down. So what’s the big idea?”

Clancy just stared at him. The kid’s eyes tightened a bit at the corners; he turned his head to the two large detectives standing behind him. He began to work up a frown of indignation, of innocence unjustly accused. “I haven’t done anything,” he said, his smile now gone. “Not a thing. You can’t hold me. What’s the big idea?”

“Sixteen dollars is the big idea,” Clancy said evenly.

“What sixteen dollars?”

Stanton leaned over him; his tone was surprised. “You don’t know what sixteen dollars?”

The boy looked up, scowling now. “I said I don’t know!”

“Of course you know what sixteen dollars,” Kaproski said. His face looked slightly pained at the denial; his tone indicated that everyone in the whole wide world knew what sixteen dollars.

“I tell you I don’t know anything about any sixteen dollars,” the boy insisted. His face had become molded into a rigid brown mask; his shoulders had hunched up a bit.

Clancy leaned forward, his tone and attitude professing amazement at this statement. “You mean you don’t know about the sixteen dollars your grandfather is missing?”

The boy clenched his jaw and stared at his feet. Stanton bent over him again, a hard expression now on his hatchet-face. “That’s the sixteen dollars we’re talking about!”

“He must of lost it,” the kid said stubbornly. “Keeping it in a stupid old tin can!”

“You see?” Clancy said almost brightly. “You did know about it, didn’t you? You probably just forgot.” He leaned over the desk, staring fixedly at the boy. “When did you find out about it?”

The kid was silent, biting his lip, his brain working at lightning speed. “I think I heard some kids at school talking about it this morning,” he said. He nodded firmly, trying his best to appear convincing. “Yeah, that was it. I heard them talking about it at school. This morning.”

“What kids? What were their names?” Clancy became efficient, reaching for his pad and pencil, eyeing the worried face sharply.

Stanton bent closer; his harsh voice beat in the kid’s ear. “Exactly what time did you hear it? And where? Think hard. You want to remember that if those kids you heard knew about it, they’re probably the ones that swiped the dough. Think hard—what class were you in? Who were they? What did they look like? How many were there? Think! Two? Three? Four? What did they say? Come on, think!”

The boy stared at his feet; fear had begun to creep into his eyes.

Kaproski moved over, getting into the act. “What’s the matter you can’t remember? What’s the matter you’re keeping your mouth shut? It’s your own grandfather, your own flesh and blood! He supports you with that dough. Don’t you want to help your own grandfather? I thought you people all stuck together in your family beefs! It’s your own grandfather!”

The boy seemed to have shrunk on the edge of his chair; his shoulders hunched higher, as if avoiding blows. He wet his lips and swallowed convulsively.

“All right,” Clancy said quietly. “Why did you take it?”

The boy looked up, completely beaten. “I was only borrowing it,” he said sullenly. He looked at least five years younger at the moment. “I was going to pay it back.…”

“When?” Stanton asked witheringly. He pushed his hat further back on his forehead. “In 1975? When you got out of reform school?”

The kid looked at him blankly. Clancy raised a conciliatory hand.

“Well, now,” he said in a reasonable tone of voice. “If you were only borrowing it, that’s a different matter. There’s no law against borrowing money.” The boy watched him with eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Of course,” Clancy continued, “there’s a law that says you have to pay it back. Just how do you plan on doing that?”

The boy looked at Clancy bitterly. “I said I’ll pay it back and I will. Don’t worry.”

Clancy shook his head. “I’m not worried. I know you’ll pay it back. And a lot sooner than you think.” He stared at the boy coldly for a moment and then rose to his feet. He motioned Stanton and Kaproski to follow him into the corridor, looking back over his shoulder. “And you, stick around. I’ll be right back.”

He closed the door behind him, took out his billfold and extracted a bill. There was a faint smile on his face. “Kap—is the Woolworth’s on the corner still open?”

Kaproski shrugged, puzzled. “I don’t know, Lieutenant. I think they close at five or thereabouts. There’s a neighborhood hardware store down there stays open until ten, and a drug store stays open pretty late, if that’s any use. Why? What do you want?”

Clancy handed him the bill. “The hardware store ought to do it. I want you to go out and buy the complete fixings for shining shoes—polish, rags, brushes, the works. And don’t forget to bring back a receipt. And the change.”

A grin of understanding began to split Kaproski’s broad face. He took the bill. “I gotcha, Lieutenant.” He winked and went down the corridor toward the front. Clancy turned to Stanton.

“How many men do we have in the precinct, Stan?”

Stanton stared at him in surprise. “Full complement ninety-four. You know that, Lieutenant.”

“Now that you mention it, I do indeed.” The faint smile on Clancy’s face broadened a bit; he brought it under control. “Well, tell the desk sergeant to advise each man as he comes in that I’m not satisfied with the appearance of this precinct. Shoe-wise. From now on, Stanton, this is going to be the shiniest precinct in the city of New York.”

Stanton looked at him as if he had suddenly gone mad. “I know what you have in mind, Lieutenant, but personally I think a good boot in the pants would do the kid a lot more good.”

“Personally, I think I told you to relay a message to the desk sergeant,” Clancy said equably, and opened the door to the office again. He walked around his desk, sank into his chair, and pulled out a cigarette. He lit it and flipped the match away, facing the sulky boy.

“Tell me, son, what’s your name?”

“Paulo.”

“Paulo Martinez?”

The dark eyes flashed for a second. “Paulo Ignácio María de Martinez y Bertrand.”

Clancy nodded his head pleasantly and wiped ash into the ash tray. “That’s quite a name.” The sullen face across from him remained granite-like. “Well, Paulo, tell me: have you ever shined shoes?”

“Who, me?” The young voice was hesitant. “No.”

Clancy took a deep puff on his cigarette and allowed the smoke to trickle from his lips. “Well,” he said philosophically, “it’s never too late to learn.”

“What do you mean?” The suspicion in the young voice owed everything to fear of being made fun of. Clancy disabused him of this notion at once; both his words and tone cleared the matter up decisively.

“I mean what I say,” he said coldly, and crushed his cigarette out in the ash tray as if to add to the finality of his statement. “I mean you’re going to earn back the money you swiped from your grandfather. By shining shoes. All the shoes in this precinct.”

The boy stared at him wordlessly, his black liquid eyes pools with endless depths. Clancy pulled the folder of reports toward him, opened the top one and reached for a pencil. The eyes of the boy followed every move.

“Sit back and relax,” Clancy said, “while I do some work. One of the men went out to get you some equipment and he’ll be a while getting back.” He bent to his papers.

The boy wet his lips, stared about the small room for several moments, and then concentrated on his feet. Ten minutes ticked slowly by before Kaproski came in with a bundle; the kid looked at it as if it might contain dynamite. Kaproski placed the package on the desk, handed Clancy the receipt, and stepped back. Clancy studied the receipt a moment and then tucked it into his shirt pocket. He shoved aside his pile of folders and unwrapped the bundle; a moment’s verification to make sure it was complete and he pushed the contents across the desk towards the boy.

“You’re in business.” He glanced up at Kaproski. “Our young friend here is going to earn back the dough he borrowed from his grandfather by shining coppers’ shoes. I think you’d better be the cashier. I’m not so sure he has a good head on him for financial matters.”

“How much do we charge?” Kaproski asked, interested.

“Twenty cents,” Clancy said.

The boy started to say something and then had to stop and clear his throat. His black eyes were steady in his glance at Clancy. “The old—I mean, my grandfather gets twenty-five cents for a shine. And tips.”

Clancy looked at him coldly. “Your grandfather knows how to shine shoes.” He thought about it a moment and then came to a conclusion. “On the other hand, if you don’t do them right the first time, you’ll just have to do them over. We’ve got some pretty fussy men in this precinct, and I’m the fussiest.” He glanced up at Kaproski and nodded. “All right. I’ll go along with the twenty-five cents. But no tips.”

The boy got to his feet slowly, pulling the open bundle closer to him. His liquid black eyes came up, expressionless, fathomless. “What do I do about school?”

“You’ll go to school the same as always,” Clancy said. “This job is going to be moonlighting. You’ll come here right after school each day until you’ve made up the dough you swiped.”

“How about today?”

“Well,” Clancy said with a faint shrug, “since you’re already here, you might as well get started. Detective Kaproski, here, will introduce you to the squad-room.”

The kid picked up the cans of polish and the two brushes wrapped in a clean cloth. He looked about for a waste-basket and then dropped the crumpled wrapping into it as Clancy watched. Without another word he turned toward the door. Clancy’s voice caught him.

“By the way, is there anywhere we can get in touch with your grandfather and let him know you’ll be getting in late tonight?”

The boy looked at him blankly. “He never expects me before midnight, anyway.” He paused uncertainly, as if wondering how to bring up the next subject. “He usually leaves me something on the table to eat when I get back from school. Can I go home to eat?”

“I’ll send out for a sandwich for you,” Clancy said. “And milk. That’ll be another fifty, sixty cents.” He sighed deeply, shaking his head, his gray eyes sad. “You keep borrowing at this rate and you’ll never get out of debt.”

“I’ll see to it he gets something to eat, Lieutenant,” Kaproski said. “You want me to get you a sandwich, too?”

Clancy looked up at him with a smile. “Not tonight, Josephine. I’ve got a date tonight.” He sounded pleased with himself. “My fourth decent meal in a week. And my second today.”

The boy stood like a rock watching the two men; it was impossible to tell what he was thinking. Kaproski looked at his superior wisely. “A date? With Mary Kelly, Lieutenant?”

Clancy nodded. “With Mary Kelly.”

“You better watch out, Lieutenant …”

“Why?” Clancy asked. Only a part of his querying tone was in banter.

“Because you’ll get fat, all them meals, Lieutenant,” Kaproski said with a grin, and herded his charge out of the door.