Too Many Murders(112)
“No watch,” said Corey, mentally deducting lieutenant’s points.
“What about Netty?” Abe asked hollowly.
They gazed at each other in dismay. Then Carmine shrugged.
“We’ll just have to hope that she heard something really tasty at Buffo’s wine cellar. There’s a good chance. It was a women’s lunch with plenty of libbers present. Pauline Denbigh on the menu?”
“One thing we never do,” said Corey. “Whoever sees Netty doesn’t so much as breathe Bart’s name.”
On the morrow Carmine, Danny Marciano and John Silvestri had to attend one of the Mayor’s “ceremonials,” as the Commissioner had named them. Ethan Winthrop was a true Connecticut Yankee by birth, but he owned the temperament of a P. T. Barnum. His much loved mayoralty was as stuffed with pomp and circumstance as he could persuade his councilors to condone, which meant there was plenty; his councilors were thoroughly cowed and didn’t honestly care, so long as they could enjoy councilors’ perks. Thus Taft and Travis High Schools received fat subsidies for their bands, a benefit all around: Taft or Travis marched off with all the band trophies far and wide, while the Mayor could fill Holloman’s air with the sounds of brilliant brass during his ceremonials.
Having to attend these events irked the police chiefs, and was one of the few disadvantages Carmine suffered after his promotion to captain—lieutenants didn’t need to go, captains did. Worse than that, it meant digging out his uniform. Under normal circumstances only Danny Marciano was in uniform, as he headed the uniformed cops. Silvestri, a law unto himself, was prone to wear a black suit and a black polo-necked sweater. Carmine stuck to chinos, shirts without a tie, a tweed jacket with a Chubb tie in one pocket, and loafers. Neat and comfortable.
Since the police dress uniform for such senior cops was encrusted with silver braid and detail, it was navy blue rather than black, to avoid any Gestapo connotations. Women like Delia Carstairs, Desdemona Delmonico and Simonetta Marciano privately thought that the three senior officers looked terrific in dress uniform; all were trim-waisted, broad-shouldered and handsome. Netty had a full wall of photographs of her Danny in full dress uniform, with a few of Silvestri and Carmine to round them off. This view was not shared by the martyrs encased in the uniforms, which had high Chinesestyle collars that Carmine, for one, swore had been sharpened on a wheel.
However, needs must. Carmine, Danny and Silvestri attended on the Green while both high school bands played and marched, and the Mayor did his thing alongside M.M. of Chubb in all the glory of his President’s gown and cap. It was Town’s tribute to Gown as the academic year drew to a close. Luckily the day was fine and calm; the Green was in bloom, the grass springy and still lush. Best of all were the copper beeches, back in leaf and towering over Mayor Winthrop’s celebration of an amity that sometimes had its fragile side.
They were bunched on or around a dais swathed in purple and blue, purple being the color of Chubb, blue of Holloman. On top of the dais the really important people stood, with the Mayor and M.M. in pride of place. The three police chiefs were three steps lower, their capped heads level with the knees of the dignitaries on the dais; the Fire Commissioner and his deputy, in lighter blue uniforms, flanked them.
“Typical Ethan,” said Silvestri to his opposite number, fire chief Bede Murphy, “posing us like fucking flowers in an arrangement.”
Carmine paid scant attention; his collar was simultaneously cutting him and choking him. He craned his neck, shifted his head from side to side, then tipped his chin up as far as it would go. Something flashed in the high branches of the closest copper beech. He stopped moving and stared, his face suddenly expressionless, an old reflex that went back to the lawless days during the war, when soldiers cracked and started shooting up hated figures like officers and MPs. There! Another flash as someone lying on a branch adjusted his weapon; it was the glass end of a telescopic sight catching the sun.
“Down!” he roared. “Everybody down, down, down!”
His right hand had cleared his long-barreled .38 from its holster, and out of the corner of his eye he saw John Silvestri doing the same, with Danny a little behind. The speeches had begun and the two bands were silent, kids sitting demurely on the grass as if they’d never heard of a joint or a hubcap.
It was not Carmine’s words that sent the dignitaries diving in a flutter of robes; it was the sight of three fancy-dress cops, weapons drawn, running like sprinters in the direction of the copper beech, Carmine in the lead. The kids were scattering wildly, girls shrieking, boys yelling, while the watching crowd vanished save for Channel Six’s news crew, gifted with the best footage since that memorable day the year before.