13
I had been hand-cuffed and folded gently into the back of an NYPD cruiser. Someone may have asked me a question or two beforehand, someone may have told me to watch my head as I got in. I could still smell corned beef.
The ride to the 17th Precinct was loud. The sirens and the lights made us, or me I guess, a curiosity for pedestrians. I had never been in custody before. A small boy on a corner wearing a Mets’ hat, holding onto his mother or his nanny with his left hand waved to me with his right. My ears rang and my eyes watered. I tried and failed to wave back. I rested my forehead against the window and smiled instead. We went through a red light. I don’t think we had to.
Someone called me by name. I responded.
“Mr. O’Keefe, I’m Detective McLain and this is Detective Fishman.” Fishman had removed my cuffs and was standing by the door. McClain sat opposite me. Both men were fit; McClain was well dressed.
“Yeah, OK,” I said rubbing the back of my left wrist under my chin.
The irregularly shaped room had walls of small alternating black and white tiles from the worn wood floor extending up about three feet. Soundproofing tiles, a number having come loose of their glue creating a giant cross word puzzle effect, went the rest of the way to the water and tobacco stained plaster ceiling. There was an empty metal cage in the corner. I hoped it would stay that way.
“Did you shoot those people, Mr. O’Keefe?”
“No, sir, I did not. May I have a cup of tea?”
“Tell us what happened.”
“I am a private detective from Boston… tea?” my synapses were firing randomly.
“We know that, Mr. O’Keefe.” McClain placed my ID on the table. “Were you working for someone here?”
“The woman who had been sitting to my left. Mislava Hrvat was her name. She shot the man on the other side of the table and then herself.”
“How did…”
“At least I think she shot herself. I was under the table with the dead guy when I heard the second shot. He is dead isn’t he?”
“Yeah.” McLain had returned his attention to me. “What were you doing for Hrvat?”
“She asked me to witness a conversation she was going to have with a man here in New York.”
“That’s it? Listen to her talk?”
“That’s it.”
“What was she going to talk about, Mr. O’Keefe?”
“I don’t know, but that’s what she hired me to do.”
“Who was the man?”
“All she said was that he was from the Croatian Mission to the UN, I think. It’s right around the corner from the deli where…”
“Did she have that conversation before she opened fire, Mr. O’Keefe?”
“Well, she had a conversation, yes. But, it was in Croat. I didn’t understand a word they said to one another.”
“So, this woman employed you to come to New York with her to listen to a chat, a chat the subject of which you don’t know with a man you did not know in a language you do not understand for reasons you are unable to give us?”
“Yes." The two cops looked at each other. " I know how that sounds.”
“I hope you got your fee up front.”
McClain sat back in his chair shaking his head. He asked Fishman to make me a cup of tea.
“Mr. O’Keefe, how did you know this woman?”
I recounted the story of my two visits to Maine. Portland PD Detective Whitney’s name popped into my head and I gave it to him. I could not remember the name of the Massachusetts state cop who had briefed the press.
“So, someone from the city, the Croat Mission, came to Boston to ID the girl’s corpse?”
“My understanding is that her father worked here and it was he who did…Bevilaqua…Sergeant Armand Bevilaqua was the state cop who talked to the press.” I hated it when New Yorkers said the city as if there were no others; size envy I guess.
Detective Fishman placed a cup of tea on the maple table in front of me. I took the bag out of the water and looked around for a trashcan.
“May I throw this away?” I asked pointing at the can.
“Sure, whatever. How do you spell that name?”
As I walked, more or less straight, across the room I spelled Grdesic for him. “Ivana Grdesic. I don’t know his – the father’s - first name. Is it OK if I throw this in here? There’s no liner in this can.”
“It’s OK, Mr. O’Keefe. Ga’head.”
McClain chortled, shook his head yet again, and folded the paper on which he had taken his notes. He slipped it into the pocket of his white shirt.
“Would you mind staying here for a while, Mr. O’Keefe?”
“No. I’ll stay as long as you need me.”
The detectives left, slipping their jackets back on as they did. A uniformed officer entered the room with a copy of the New York Daily News. I thought it was for me. It wasn’t.
I felt my breathing returning to normal. I sipped my tea.
“My legs are sore. Would you mind if I put my feet up?” I asked the cop now seated on the other side of the table drinking coffee from a mug he briefly rinsed.
“Whatever the fuck…”
I took that for a yes. Fifteen minutes later he rose, slid the folded tabloid-style paper under his arm and walked toward the door.
“Why are you still here?” He asked without turning around.
“The detectives asked me to stay.” My answer was equal parts question and statement. He turned to face me.
“Not here,” he said pointing at the floor. “Here.” He opened his arms in a sweeping exaggerated circle. “They want you to stay in town.”
“You weren’t sent in here to keep an eye on me? I thought…”
“I was in here for coffee, shit head. You can go if you want. Could have fifteen minutes ago.”
I thought it prudent to wait a moment after he left to walk out. The desk sergeant returned my wallet, keys and cell to me. I gave him a slip of paper with the phone’s number on it and walked out, past a cluster of blue sharing a laugh at someone’s expense, onto what turned out to be 51st Street.
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