Back Story. Part 2

"Shocking, isn't it. How was it when you were a cop?"

"Politics affected police work," I said.

"How disappointing," Quirk said.

"Lead investigator was a guy named Bennati," I said. "He still around?"

"Retired," Quirk said. "Lives up on the North Sh.o.r.e now."

I looked at Quirk. He was scanning the crime scene photos again.

"That's why you offered me the case files," I said.

"Spirit of cooperation," Quirk said.

"That FBI reference bothered you, too, but it didn't seem like a good idea to pursue it. But you don't forget anything. So when I finally came along. "

Quirk continued to study the photos.

"I'm supposed to be an executive now," Quirk said. "Manage the division. Let the detectives do most of the hands-on stuff. But I like to stay late, couple nights a week, and look at the crime scene coverage while it's quiet, and see what I can see."

I nodded.

"Woman and two children killed in this one," Quirk said, nodding at the pictures. "Woman was raped first."

"I'll call you tomorrow," I said. "Get Bennati's address."

"Call Belson," Quirk said. "He'll get it for you."

5.

Mario Bennati lived in Gloucester in a small, gray-shingled house with a deck where you could sit and drink beer and look at the Annisquam River. He and I were sitting there, doing that, in the late afternoon. With us was a large friendly German shepherd named Grover.

"Wife died four years ago," Bennati said. "Daughter comes up from Stoughton usually once or twice a week, vacuums, dusts. " He shrugged. "Mostly it's me and Grover. I can cook okay and do my laundry."

We were drinking Miller High Life from the clear gla.s.s bottles.

"I don't smoke no more," he said, looking at the boats moving toward the harbor across the wide water below us. "Ain't got laid since she died." He drank some of the Miller High Life with an economy of motion that suggested long practice. "We done fine, 'fore she got sick." Grover put his head on Bennati's thigh and looked at him. "Watch this," Bennati said. He tilted the bottle of beer carefully and Grover drank a little. "Right from the bottle," Bennati said. "Huh?"

"Cool," I said.

"Don't let him drink much," Bennati said. "Gets drunk real easy."

I patted Grover on the backside. His tail wagged, but he kept his head on Bennati's lap. "I'm looking into an old murder," I said. "One of yours. September 1974. Woman was killed in a bank holdup in Audubon Circle."

Bennati drank the rest of his beer and reached down and got another one out of the cooler under the table. He twisted off the cap and drank probably four ounces of the beer in one long pull. He looked at the bottle for a moment and nodded.

"Yeah, sure, bunch of f.u.c.king hippies," he said. "Stealing money to save America. Killed her for no good reason."

"I read the case file yesterday," I said.

"So you know we didn't clear it." He drank some more beer. "They're always a b.i.t.c.h, the f.u.c.king cases where s.h.i.t happens for no good reason."

I nodded. "Anything you remember, might help me?" I said.

"You read the case file, you know what I know," he said.

"I used to be a cop," I said. "Everything didn't always get included in the case file."

"Did in mine," Bennati said.

"What happened to the FBI intelligence report?" I said.

"Huh?"

"In your notes you say the FBI was sending over an intelligence report. It's not in the file and you never mentioned it again."

"FBI?".

"Uh-huh."

"For crissake, we're talking like thirty f.u.c.king years ago."

"Twenty-eight," I said. "You remember anything about the FBI intelligence report?"

"Too long," he said. "I'm seventy-six years old and live alone except for the dog, and drink too much beer. I can barely remember where my d.i.c.k is."

"So you don't remember the FBI report?"

"No," he said and looked at me steadily. "I don't remember."

I took a card out of my shirt pocket and gave it to him.

"Anything occurs to you," I said, "give me a buzz."

"Sure thing."

As I walked toward my car, he took another High Life out of the cooler and twisted off the cap.

6.

The Boston FBI office was in Center Plaza. The agent in charge was a thin guy with receding hair and round eyegla.s.ses with black rims named Nathan Epstein. It was like finding an Arab running a shul. We shook hands when I came in, and he gestured me to a chair.

"You're the SAC," I said.

"I am."

"At least tell me you went to BC," I said.

"Nope." He had a strong New York accent.

"Fordham?"

"NYU," Epstein said.

"This is very disconcerting," I said.

"I know," he said. "People usually a.s.sume I'm from Accountemps."

He was wearing a dark blue suit, a white shirt, and a powder-blue silk tie.

"I am looking into a murder during a bank holdup in 1974," I said.

"Tell me about it," Epstein said.

I told him about it.

"Why did she come to you," Epstein said when I finished.

"Mutual friend."

"And why did you take it on?"

"Favor to the friend," I said.

"Favor to a friend?" Epstein said. "The case is twenty-eight years cold. You have some reason to think you can solve it?"

"Self-regard," I said.

Epstein smiled. "So they tell me," he said.

"You checked me out?"

"I called the Commissioner's Office, they bucked me over to the Homicide Commander."

"Martin Quirk," I said.

Epstein nodded.

"You check out everyone you have an appointment with?" I said.

"I remembered the name," Epstein said. There was something very penetrating about him.

"You recall the case?"

Epstein smiled and shook his head. "Wasn't with the Bureau then," he said.

"Would it be possible for me to get a copy of the case file?"

He sat and thought about it. He was a guy that was probably never entirely still. As he thought, he turned a ballpoint pen slowly in his hands, periodically tapping a little para-diddle with it on the thumbnail of his left hand. Then he leaned forward and pushed a big khaki envelope toward me, the kind that you close by wrapping a little string around a little b.u.t.ton.

"Here's the file," he said.

"Quirk?" I said.

"He mentioned you might be looking into the Gordon killing."

"Have you read it?"

"The file?" Epstein said. "Yes. I read it this morning. I a.s.sume you've read the BPD case file."

"I have."

"You'll find this pretty much a recycle of that."

"Someplace I can sit and read this?"

"Outside office," Epstein said. "One of my administrative a.s.sistants is on vacation. My chief administrator will show you her desk."

"Was there a time when we would have called your chief administrator a secretary?"

Epstein smiled his thin smile and said, "Long ago."

I took the folder and stood.

"I think I know what you're looking for," Epstein said.

I raised my eyebrows and didn't say anything.

"I don't know where the Bureau intelligence report is either," he said.

"The one that was supposed to be delivered to Bennati?"

"Yes."

I sat back down, holding the file envelope. "You noticed," I said.