Mark Mills - Amagansett

Hollis felt a little cheated; the Sunday afternoon scene before him was hardly different from those being enacted all over the country, though the setting was surely grander than most.

‘May I help you?’

The gentleman from the front desk had reappeared. He was accompanied by a colleague, a younger man with a thin, reedy voice.

‘I don’t know, can you?’

‘You want to see Anthony Cordwell.’

‘I think we’ve already established that.’

‘Is there a problem?’

‘Not unless you don’t go get him for me.’

Anthony Cordwell had been playing tennis, and judging from his complexion he was being given a run for his money.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said warily.

‘I won’t take up much of your time,’ said Hollis. ‘Though it looks like you could do with the break.’

Hollis was led through to the bar, which to Cordwell’s evident relief was deserted. Cordwell wiped his face with a towel.

‘Couldn’t this have waited?’ he asked.

‘You’re a bright boy. You’ll think of something to tell them.’

Hollis handed him a buff envelope. Of the two photos inside, the first was a close-up of a dress shoe, Cordwell’s name clearly embossed inside. The second showed the shoe beside a hydrangea bush, the Rosens’ defaced front door visible behind, the crude, dripping white Star of David clearly in focus.

‘What is this? Blackmail?’

‘Think of it as a gift.’

Cordwell eyed him suspiciously. ‘And in return…?’

‘I have a few questions, then I’m gone. Those stay.’

‘And the negatives?’

Hollis patted the breast pocket of his uniform. ‘When we’re done talking.’

Cordwell nodded, as if accepting a deal from the Devil himself.

‘Justin Penrose, you know him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well?’

‘As well as anybody, I suppose.’

‘Meaning?’

‘He’s what you might call private. Why?’

‘How long was he with Lillian Wallace?’

‘A year, two years.’

‘Try and be more specific.’

Cordwell thought on it. ‘Just under two years.’

‘Why did they break off their engagement?’

‘Differences. I don’t know. She ended it.’

‘You must have heard something.’

‘You know,’ said Cordwell, casting his mind back, or at least appearing to, ‘it really wasn’t discussed.’ He paused. ‘It was never going to be easy, what with Gayle.’

‘Gayle Wallace? What about her?’

‘They were an item once, Justin and Gayle.’

‘What are you saying, he switched horses in mid-stream?’

‘It was over with Gayle by then, but she still wasn’t happy when she heard about Lillian.’

I bet she wasn’t, thought Hollis.

‘What does Penrose do?’

Cordwell snorted, amused by the notion. ‘He doesn’t have to do anything. His family has a bank.’

‘And what do you do, Mr Cordwell?’

‘Me?’

‘Aside from persecuting Jews?’

Cordwell was too angry to manufacture any kind of response at first. ‘Are we finished here?’ he asked sharply.

‘No, we’re not. Penrose came to see Lillian about a month ago.’

‘Did he now?’ sighed Cordwell.

‘Why would he do that?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean did he still carry a torch for Lillian?’

Cordwell hesitated before replying. ‘It’s possible. He was pretty upset when it ended.’

It was a hard image to conjure up, Justin Penrose upset by anything.

‘What’s this all about?’ asked Cordwell.

‘I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention this conversation to anyone.’

‘And I’d appreciate it if you gave me those negatives now.’

Hollis handed them over.

If Cordwell had bothered to examine the negatives before slipping them into the envelope he would have noted that they didn’t match the incriminating photos. Rejects from the batch of shots taken by Abel, one was of the Rosens’ daughter, a ravenhaired beauty with whom Abel, in characteristic fashion, had been mightily and momentarily taken; the other showed Hollis on his hands and knees in a flower border, the crack of his ass just showing above the waistband of his pants.

A print of this last shot now hung on the wall of Hollis’ kitchen. Framed up and presented to him at the time by Abel, the handwritten title on the matt proclaimed: The Thin Blue Line.

Fifteen

As he mounted the steps to the library, Conrad’s knee buckled under him. He swore, then gathered up the books that had spilled from beneath his arm.

‘Good morning, Mrs Emerson,’ he said, approaching the front desk.

She looked up from the typewriter, peering at him over the top of her spectacles. ‘Mr Labarde. Returning, are we?’

‘Yes.’

‘Overdue, are they?’

‘How did you guess?’

She pulled the sheet of paper from the typewriter and handed it to him. He scanned it.

‘I was going for a note of mild outrage,’ she said.

‘Mild, huh?’

She smiled.

‘I’ve a confession to make,’ said Conrad.

‘Unless you want the whole town to know, I’m probably not the person to share it with.’

Conrad handed her one of the books. ‘I think I just broke the spine.’

‘No,’ she said, examining it. ‘You definitely broke the spine.’

‘I’ll replace it, of course.’

‘What, and deny Mrs Cartwright the challenge? She’s a whiz with the glue, you know.’

Conrad settled the fine, then asked where the back copies of the East Hampton Star were stored. Because the dates he was after were more than six months old, he was sent through to the Reading Room, Mrs Emerson appearing a few minutes later with two bound volumes on a trolley.

Conrad hefted them on to the table. He could see her itching to ask what he wanted them for, and he’d prepared an answer for her, but it wasn’t required. She fought her curiosity, returning to the front desk.

Conrad took a seat and stared at the spines: April-June 1946, July-September 1946. He found the initial newspaper report without any difficulty. News of Lizzie Jencks’ tragic death had, of course, made the front page of the Star. Two issues later, the story still warranted the front page, though it had been relegated to the bottom right-hand corner, rolling over into a handful of column inches on page three.

By now, Chief Milligan of the Town Police Department was reluctantly conceding that the investigation had produced no concrete leads in the past couple of weeks, and possibly never would. The incident had occurred on a Saturday night when the roads of the South Fork were notoriously infested with drivers who had flooded in for the weekend from up-island or New York City. Questions remained, however. The Medical Examiner had placed the time of death at somewhere between midnight and two o’clock in the morning, and no one seemed to know what a young girl was doing walking a country road at that hour of the night.

Come August, coverage of the story had all but petered out. The last mention Conrad could find of it was in an editorial that leveled its sights at the ‘people from away’ crowding this quiet corner of Suffolk County. The piece had the hollow report of a blind, scatter-gun blast into the night, the intruder long gone.

Conrad worked his way back through the newspapers, sifting for signs. The first issue with news of the incident had come out on the Thursday, young Lizzie already five days dead. In the same edition, there was a brief report of a wedding that had taken place in Sag Harbor on the Saturday in question. The festivities, complete with impressive fireworks display, had rolled on into the early hours of Sunday morning. The names of the happy couple, not known to Conrad, suggested summer people, the kind of society event Lillian might have attended.

The geography was wrong, though. There was no way you could end up on Town Lane when driving from Sag Harbor to East Hampton, not unless you had completely lost your way. Still, it was the best he could come up with, and certainly better than nothing.

He almost left it at that. Thankfully, he cast a quick eye over the Thursday issue from the week predating the accident. Buried on page seven was a small announcement, no more than a few lines, announcing the first dinner dance of the season at the Devon Yacht Club on Gardiner’s Bay, set to take place that Saturday night.

The Devon Yacht Club, one of Lillian’s favored haunts.

He experienced no surge of relief, no sense of elation. Rather, he felt a chill descend upon him, the stillness and clarity a hunter experiences when first sighting his quarry, his world narrowing to a point, the periphery blurring, all else forgotten.

He stared at the page for a good while, not focusing on the print, but deep in thought, weighing his various options. They shared one piece of common ground: whichever way he chose to proceed, it was time to start drawing Deputy Hollis into the hunt.

Sixteen

Hollis had seen Chief Milligan angry before, but never like this—puce with rage, spittle flying.

‘He’s just a big old blowhard,’ he said to himself. Mary Calder’s description of Milligan had proved a source of comfort in recent days, somehow consigning the Chief to the ranks of the ridiculous, emasculating him. Confronted with the volcanic presence before him, however, her words had lost their sting.

‘Well!?’ bellowed Milligan.

Hollis groped his way back to reality. An official complaint from the Maidstone Club. Unseemly conduct. Hollis throwing his weight around.

It wasn’t looking good. Just one thread of hope. There was a chance the complaint hadn’t come from Anthony Cordwell. No. Odds were the complaint had come from the club itself, probably without Cordwell’s knowledge.

‘Well!? What in the hell do you have to say for yourself!?’

‘It’s a bit embarrassing, sir,’ he said, buying himself time to think.

‘Embarrassing!? Is that what you call it? I’ve got the President of the club on the phone accusing you of goddamn intimidation.’

‘I was acting in the club’s best interests, sir.’

He had it now, a story that should just about hold up.

‘Stop mincing your words, man.’

‘It’s like this, sir. The night of Lillian Wallace’s funeral I was on duty here in town. There was an incident on Main Street involving two young ladies. One of them had her dress torn.’

‘What?’

‘She was pretty upset.’

‘Just tell me what in the hell happened.’

‘I didn’t witness it, but it seems they were approached by a group of young men who’d been at the Wallaces’ place, you know, the funeral reception. They were a little…upset.’

‘You mean tight.’

‘As drums. Anyway, they invited the girls to a bar, and when they refused there was some kind of scuffle. That’s when the dress got torn and the men ran off.’

Milligan was going off the boil now. It was time to start boring him into submission with details.

‘I went looking for them, saw four men in a car fitting the description, and tailed them. They ended up at the Maidstone Club. Maybe I should have, but I didn’t do anything at the time. I talked the girls into not pressing charges if the dress was paid for. That’s why I went back to the club the next day, looking for this Anthony Cordwell.’

‘Cordwell, huh?’ Milligan clearly knew the name. ‘Still, it didn’t give you the right to storm right on in there.’

‘Cordwell had been dodging me all morning. If I hadn’t leaned on him he’d be up on a charge of assault right now along with his friends. This way everyone’s happy. Everyone except the Maidstone Club it seems.’

‘You didn’t tell them what you were after Cordwell for?’

‘It didn’t seem right, fair. Sure, they were drunk, they messed up, but they’d just seen their friend put in the ground.’

It was good, good enough, especially the last bit—the note of sympathy for a bunch of grief-stricken drunks tearing at a girl’s dress. That was the sort of thing Milligan could relate to.

‘Why didn’t you come to me with this?’

‘It was Sunday, I didn’t want to bother you.’

He was safe now, but it wasn’t over yet. Milligan would have the last word. He always did. Hollis could see him working up to it as he rounded his desk and settled into his chair.

‘I don’t like you, Hollis. Can’t say I ever have. And it’s not ‘cos you’re a weasely know-it-all little prick.’ He paused for effect. ‘It’s ‘cos I know what you are.’

Hollis felt the blood drain from his cheeks.

Milligan smiled. ‘That’s right. You think I’d have them dump you on me and not check you out? I know people, don’t think I don’t.’ He began playing with a letter-opener, twisting the point into the palm of his hand. ‘Hell of a cover story you New York boys came up with,’ he said, laying the sarcasm on thick. ‘Damn near fell for it, I did.’

Hollis was helpless. Anything he said would be shot down in flames. Milligan mistook his silence for fear.

‘Don’t worry, it stays in this room. Last thing I need is the good people of East Hampton knowing there’s a crooked cop on the force.’

‘Yeah, one’s enough for any town.’

Thankfully, the words died before they reached Hollis’ lips. It would have meant the end. He didn’t care about the job, but he was damned if he was going to jeopardize the investigation, even if it did mean taking abuse from a hypocrite. It was well known that the fortunes of the Milligan household had experienced a marked upturn during Prohibition.

‘Go on,’ said Milligan, ‘clear out.’

Hollis stopped at the door and turned. ‘It’s not true. What you heard about me.’

‘Now how did I know you were going to say that?’ smirked Milligan.

As Hollis crossed the squad room, Bob Hartwell shot him a sheepish glance.

Hollis entered his office and pushed the door shut behind him. He shed his jacket, reached for the mug of cold tea on his desk, but thought better of it. He didn’t want to sit, he didn’t want to stand; he didn’t know what he wanted to do.

The breeze through the open window rattled the blind against the frame. He wandered over, peering down through the slats at the street below. A few people came and went, entering and leaving the Post Office, which occupied the ground floor of the building. Across the way, a dog cocked its leg against the wheel of a parked car.

Cursed.

It would pursue him for the rest of his life.

The crooked cop.

It had tracked him down, sniffed him out, even here. Why should it ever let up?

It was so ridiculous. If people only knew the truth.

But that wasn’t the way things worked. Once tarred with the brush of scandal there was little to be done to allay their suspicions—not even a full exoneration could do that—some small splinter of doubt always remained lodged in their brains. His parents had been no different. Not that he blamed them; he had rubber-stamped his own guilt when he’d signed up to the lie: a detective second-grade looking for a quieter life on a country force.