CAPRIATI'S BLOOD (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 1) Page 14

  “I never even seen the old man. I tell you, I’m down the end of the chum line. No, it was the kid, Nando. Just said to follow you around. He went fucking bananas when you made us. I’m off the job. Probably won’t use me for anything now. He’s crazy. Wouldn’t pay me or even help me out with my car. And they got the body shops and all. Cheap fucking guinea bastard.”

  “My mother was Italian.”

  Hey, no offense, Mr. Rhode. So’s my Angie.”

  “They can be a pistol, can’t they?”

  “You got that right. She’s been tearing me a new one over the car.”

  “Give me something else, Porgie. You haven’t told me much more than I already knew. Did the name Capriati ever come up?”

  I could see by the look on his face that it had.

  “Don’t ever play poker for big money, Porgie. Tell me about Capriati.”

  “I don’t know anything about him. But Jerry mentioned the name.”

  “Who’s Jerry?”

  “He’s the partner of the guy in the hospital.”

  “You mean Benny? His cousin?”

  Porgie was stunned that I knew so much. It made the rest easy. He wouldn’t lie now, figuring I’d catch him out. Ben and Jerry. Christ.

  “Yeah. Jerry gave us your description. I asked him what was up and he said you had been asking questions about this Capriati guy and Nando didn’t like it. That’s all I know. I swear on my kids.”

  “You learn anything following me around?”

  “Hell, no. You got the most boring life I’ve seen. Except for the drive down that fucking cliff. You must be psycho.”

  “Who was in the car with you? Jerry?”

  “No. He doesn’t work without Benny. They’re real close. It was just some guy I brought along for company.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “He’s just a guy.”

  “Porgie.”

  “He’s got problems. Semi-retarded. He actually liked driving down that hill. He’s a friend. You got no business asking.”

  He wasn’t going to tell me. Good for you, Porgie.

  “I’ll let it go. Am I ever going to see you again? In my rear view mirror or anywhere?”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  Guys like Carmichael take their lumps and move on. When they get dealt a shitty hand they’re just happy it’s not shittier. They’ve neither the time nor the inclination for getting even with people out of their league, who may have friends. In many ways, they are smarter than guys like me.

  “Here,” I said, handing him the cuff keys.

  He took off the bracelets and placed them carefully on the dash and handed me back the key. To his credit he didn’t rub his wrist. But he took in a deep breath and let it out. I didn’t blame him. It had been a trying 15 minutes.

  “OK, Porgie, vamoose.”

  He opened the driver’s side door and got out. So did I.

  “Wait a minute,” I said, walking over to him. I opened the envelope and took out $500. “Take this.” I handed him the bills.

  He seemed surprised, but recovered quickly.

  “Why not the entire grand?”

  “It will cover your deductible. You can even claim the headlight from the same accident. I won’t tell. The rest of the money will cover my damage. I lost the passenger side mirror coming down the hill.”

  He looked over at it and almost smiled.

  “Serves you right.”

  I kind of liked the guy.

  “Take my advice, Porgie. Think career change.”

  “Yeah. That’s what Angie says. But I can’t make enough dough just fishing, and it’s tough out there. No jobs. And I got a record, you know.”

  “Bullshit excuse. Half the guys on Wall Street have a record now.”

  I had put the gun away. Just two guys talking in a parking lot. How about them Knicks? He looked at me and nodded. Then he turned and headed to his car. His head was down and despite his height looked oddly diminished. Oddly, I felt the same way.

  He stood for a moment just looking at his car. I could imagine what was going through his mind. From a Volvo to a Kia. He’d probably thought that getting a simple tail job for Carlucci would be a stepping stone to bigger things after a life as a second-rater. Instead, he screwed up the tail, pissed off a mob chieftain, mashed his wife’s car and lost his kids’ Christmas money. It was the kids he was thinking about, not Nando. I believed him about the bikes. Nobody lies about their kids. Now he’d probably have to choose between fixing the Volvo or buying the two-wheelers. He opened the door of his car.

  “Hey, Porgie!”

  He turned as I walked over to him. He had a what-else-can-go-wrong look on his face. I handed him the other $500.

  “I have a low deductible,” I lied. “Make sure you also buy the kids helmets.”

  I headed back to the diner. The apple pie had looked spectacular.

  CHAPTER 18 – SHADY VIEW

  The next morning I sat in my office with my feet on my desk drinking coffee. I had a problem. Looking for Capriati had stirred up Nando Carlucci. But why? Was he trying to protect an old college buddy? From what I knew about Nando, he was not the sentimental type. Or was he also looking for him, and piggybacking on my efforts? Capriati was an embezzler. He could have gone to work for his wrestling pal after college. Had he stolen from the Carluccis? Not a productive use of a college degree, but it would explain his move to Atlanta. But how did Nando find out I was looking for Billy?

  I called Ellen James. After asking how Savannah was doing, I said, “Have you told anyone on Staten Island that I’m looking for Capriati?”

  “No. Why would I? I don’t know anyone there, except you. What’s the matter?”

  “Did Billy ever mention the name Carlucci to you? Nando or Ferdinand Carlucci? From his college days.”

  “He never mentioned anyone from his past to me. Who is it?’

  “Carlucci is a local crook and he and Billy were close at Wagner. He knows I’m looking for Billy and I’d like to know why. Either he knew you came to me or someone I spoke to alerted him. Think hard, Ellen, did you tell anyone, either before or after you came to me? What about the other people you’ve hired. Or the cops. Did you mention Billy’s connection to Staten Island or Wagner College?”

  “I told the police and F.B.I. in Atlanta years ago. And, of course, the other firms I’ve hired. They know about Wagner and where Billy lived. But not a soul knows I went to you, except Savannah. And she hasn’t spoken to anyone. How did you find out that what’s his name knows?”

  “Carlucci. He’s had people following me. I spoke to one of them.”

  “And they want you to stop looking?”

  “I haven’t had that discussion yet. But I may have to if they keep annoying me. It’s been a distraction.”

  “Won’t that be dangerous?”

  “Not as dangerous as not knowing what the hell is going on.”

  “Mr. Rhode. Alton. Perhaps you should drop the matter. I’ll think of something else. I don’t want to put you at risk. I’ll understand.”

  “Ellen, the only reason I’m looking for a connection is because it might help me find Capriati. I can’t let some goombahs run me off a case. It’s bad for business. Besides, I may have discouraged them for the time being.”

  “Do you think Savannah is in danger? I mean, do they know about us?”

  I considered that.

  “No. Some people know why I’m looking for Billy, but it would be a stretch to think they could find out who you are. I haven’t mentioned your names.”

  “Please be careful.”

  After I hung up I went back to thinking about who might have told Nando about my inquiries. It could be anyone. I took out a pad to start a list. Cormac was asking around for me, and it wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility that Nando had sources in the Police Department. The same for Wagner College. Perhaps it had been mentioned in the Alumni newsletter, in the Mafia Classmates section. And, of course, in the age of Face
book, Twitter, LinkedIn and the rest of the social media word spreads fast. I put the pad away. I’d run out of paper if I made a list. The hell with it. If I found Capriati I’d probably find all the answers. And save Savannah.

  When I had done my earlier Internet searches, a slew of Capriatis had popped up, including a famous woman tennis player. The mailman said Billy’s mother’s name was Flo and I vaguely remembered a Florence. So I searched the full name. It turned out that the only Florence Capriati listed between the ages of 60 and 90, my rather optimistic parameter, was a Professor of Romance Languages at Harvard. I doubted that she’d ever heard of a zeppole. Probably more into croissants. I was almost glad I didn’t have Flo’s maiden name, because with my luck it would be Smith or Jones. Besides, Billy didn’t appear to be the sort who would keep in touch with his mom’s family. But had he kept in touch with his mom?

  I did a search of all the nursing homes and assisted living facilities in Ocean County, NJ, where Seaside Heights is located. I didn’t know if Flo Capriati was in a nursing home there or if she was even still alive. But it was the only solid lead the mailman gave me. If you consider a woman who is either dead or probably can’t remember her own name a solid lead.

  There were 33 nursing homes in the county, which, because everything about the case was a hairball, was the most of any county in New Jersey. But it was a place to start. As my initial web search depressingly revealed, there were 357 nursing homes in Jersey and 15,531 nationwide. I might be in one of them before I found her.

  I printed out the county list, which listed the town in which each facility was located. When confronted by an unpleasant task involving an alphabetical list, I’m often tempted to start at the end, on the assumption that the gods will do their best to thwart me. But since they might figure that out, the target might be right at the beginning. So I got out a map of New Jersey and started with nursing homes in and around Seaside and Toms River, which is connected by a causeway to that barrier island town. There were five. None of them had a Florence Capriati staying with them. And none of the people I spoke to recalled anyone by that name dying recently. They all had death records, of course, and so did they county. I decided to cross that bridge later, if necessary. Ever hopeful, I expanded my radius, town by town.

  I found her in Lakehurst, on my 11th call. After I left my office I drove around Stapleton aimlessly for a few minutes trying to spot a tail. I didn’t. Either the Carluccis had raised their game, or they were running short of bodies. Then I took the Staten Island Expressway to the Outerbridge Crossing. No one in the borough calls it the Outerbridge Bridge. The span, which links Tottenville to New Jersey, is named for Eugenius Outerbridge, the first chairman of what eventually became the Port Authority. I’m just glad they didn’t use his first name. Eugenius Bridge sounds like someone in a Dickens novel. There wasn’t much traffic on the Garden State Parkway and I made Lakehurst in just under an hour. I had never been to the town. All I knew about it was that the Hindenburg had exploded there in 1937. I was hoping my luck would be better.

  After I left the Garden State Gladys restored my faith in GPS by guiding me effortlessly down local rural roads. She even navigated a couple of New Jersey’s notorious traffic circles without a hitch, a feat I rank with splitting the atom. But I did give her fits at the last one by circumnavigating it repeatedly and then suddenly cutting from the inside lane out the correct exit. Anyone following me would probably want to shoot me on general principles. But I was pretty sure no one could have made it through without me knowing. Ten minutes later I drove down a two-lane road on Lakehurst’s western edge flanked by ranch houses and the occasional small farm. I pulled up to the nursing home where hopefully the Florence Capriati I wanted lived.

  Nursing homes tend to have sylvan, calming names and this one was no exception: Shady View Manor. I presume something called the River Styx Nursing Home would be in poor taste. If you’ve seen one nursing home you’ve seen them all. I could add that if you’ve seen one you’ve seen enough. The two-story, red brick building looked more like a barracks than a manor, and promised a depressing visit. It was near a copse of trees that would indeed provide some shade in an otherwise barren plot of land. The trees also provided a lot of fallen leaves that covered the wide expanse of lawn in front of the facility and gave it an unkempt look.

  I parked my car in a small gravel lot to the side of the building and walked around to the front. There were a dozen or so patients heavily bundled against the chill sitting in wheelchairs near the entrance. A few acknowledged me with a wave of the hand or a smile, but the majority just stared vacantly. Most were of the age one expected at such a place, but there were a couple that appeared to be not much older than I was. They had the tremors or distorted faces common to victims of devastating strokes or some other neurological deficit. A male nurse walked the lawn, occasionally stopping to speak to a patient or adjust a blanket. With pneumonia “the old man’s friend,” I wondered about the advisability of having such frail people sit outside at this time of year. But they looked comfortable enough; perhaps only the most-fit were allowed to do it. It probably beat the hell out of being cooped up inside all the time.

  Inside, the first thing I noticed was an overflowing trash bin. The second was the smell. It wasn’t noxious. I’d been in nursing homes before, and this one smelled…sour.

  There were two nurses at the main desk. One of them kept working at her computer but the other one, a tall black woman wearing a name tag that said “Betty” looked up at me and smiled.

  “Can I help you?”

  “I’d like to see Mrs. Florence Capriati.”

  “You the one I spoke to a couple of hours ago? The detective?”

  “Yes.”

  The other nurse, tagged “Irene,” looked up from her monitor and said, “Mrs. C? You’re wasting your time, Sherlock. She has advanced Alzheimer’s. Nobody’s home.”

  “That’s not true,” Nurse Betty said, “she has her moments.”

  “I must have missed them.”

  “I can see her then?”

  “I don’t see why not,” Betty said. “It’s nice somebody wants to visit the poor lady. No one ever does.’’

  “She had a son. I’m looking for him.”

  “Must be that ‘Billy’ she talks about. But I’ve never seen him, except in some pictures she has in her albums. Somebody told me he used to stop by, but not for years. Maybe he’s dead. If he ain’t, he’s a lousy son, leaving her all alone like this. What he do that you’re looking to find him?”

  I ignored the question.

  “Who pays her upkeep?”

  “Medicare.”

  The Government probably took her assets when she went into the home. Her husband undoubtedly had Social Security survivor benefits as well.

  “No one visits her now?”

  “Not that I can recall.”

  I looked at Irene.

  “Me neither. But I don’t think he’s dead. Somebody still sends money.”

  “Money ain’t visiting,” the black nurse said. “It’s an easy way out.”

  “When did that start?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe two years ago.”

  “How much money?”

  The nurses looked at each other.

  “You’d have to ask Mr. Patchett,” Irene said.

  “Who’s he?”

  “Runs the place.”

  “And a bunch of others,” Betty said with a frown.

  I got the impression Mr. Patchett was not their favorite person.

  “Who handles the checks?”

  “Patchett,” Irene said. “And no checks, just cash in an envelope.”

  “Does she talk about her son?”

  “That’s a stretch,” Betty said, laughing. “When she first got here she would look at her albums and point to the boy and say his name. But now any man walks into her room, she says ‘Billy.’ Could be the janitor.”

  “It’s sad,” Irene said. “Such a sweet thing when she’
s not agitated.”

  CHAPTER 19 – ORANGE YOU GLAD

  I sensed someone behind me. From the look on Betty and Irene’s faces, I had a problem, who turned out to be a short, ferret-looking man with wire-rimmed glasses.

  “Earl Patchett. I’m director of this facility. Who are you?”

  He was wearing an expensive three-piece blue pinstripe suit. The Mont Blanc chronograph on his wrist had so many dials and bezels he probably had to ask people the time. Under his arm he was carrying a brown leather portfolio that didn’t match the suit, though I suppose there was no reason it should.

  “My name is Rhode. I’m a private investigator looking for Florence Capriati’s son.” I gave him my most winsome smile. “I’d like to talk to her.”

  “There is no next of kin listed for the woman.”

  I wondered how a director of so many nursing homes could be so sure, so quickly, about any one patient.

  “I may be able to update that list.”

  “Do you have identification?”

  I would have to work on winsome. I showed him my license. He yanked it from my hand, which I didn’t like, and studied it for so long I was tempted to tell the nurses to get a room ready for another stroke victim.

  “This is a New York license,” Patchett said, thrusting my I.D. back to me. “You have no jurisdiction here.”

  “New York and Jersey have reciprocity for private investigators.”

  “Am I supposed to take your word for that?”

  Patchett made it sound like he’d be a fool to fall for the old reciprocity gag. I soldiered on.

  “Mr. Patchett, even if there was no reciprocity, which there is, private detectives don’t need it when conducting investigations involving missing persons, background checks or a myriad other tasks that are legal for everyone. I can do it in any state at any time. Now I don’t tell you how to empty bedpans, so why don’t you let me do my job.”

  I thought I heard a snicker from one of the nurses. Patchett shot a look at them and they buried their heads in paperwork.

  “We respect the privacy of our patients, Mr. Rhode. I’m under no obligation to allow you visiting rights. I think you’d better leave.”