Detective

place, there was nothing I could do. I could go to the police, I suppose, but what could I tell them? I had a story, but no names, no places, no facts. What was I gonna tell ’em, the guy who killed Albrect was probably Bambi or Pluto?
    No, there was nothing I could do. And that was the problem. That was what was gnawing away at me. Because if I were a real detective, I could do something. I didn’t know what. But something. If I were a real detective, I’d at least know what I could do. But I wasn’t a real detective. I was a failed writer and successful ambulance chaser, who’d never had the gumption or the balls to be anything else. So there was nothing I could do.
    And yet I really wanted to do something. It really mattered to me. Not for Albrect—Albrect was just a bungling clod who’d brought it on himself. No, I wanted to do it for me.
    Just for me.
    The phone rang and I picked it up.
    “Three-four-one-four,” I said, reciting the last four digits of my phone number, a neutral greeting that allowed me to reveal myself as the Hastings Detective Agency if I found I was dealing with someone from whom the announcement would not evoke laughter.
    “Good morning, Stanley,” came the perennially cheery voice of Susan, one of Richard Rosenberg’s secretaries. Richard Rosenberg was the lawyer I worked for. Susan and Kathy were the secretaries who called me with new assignments. Susan was always cheerful. Kathy was always sour. I was never sure which irritated me more.
    “Hi, Susan,” I said. “What’s up?”
    “I have a new case for you,” she announced in the manner of one informing someone they have just won the lottery.
    Like Pavlov’s dog, I reached for a pen.
    “The client tripped on a crack in the sidewalk in front of her building and broke her leg. She’d like to see you today. She’s home now, and I told her you’d be giving her a call. The number is 718—”
    Seven-one-eight was the message I’d been waiting for. Ever since the phone company split the area code for New York City, the numbers 212 and 718 held special meaning for me. Two-one-two meant Manhattan or the Bronx. Since our clients are usually not particularly wealthy—people who call a lawyer they see advertised on TV rather than their own or some friend’s recommended lawyer are generally less than wealthy—most of our Manhattan clients were from Harlem, and most of our Bronx clients were from the South Bronx. In either case, it usually meant slums or housing projects, areas in which I was liable to be the only white man for blocks. I’m not prejudiced, but I’m not crazy either.
    Seven-one-eight meant Queens or Brooklyn, and though there are bad neighborhoods there too, the odds of getting a good one are a little better. And somehow, they just seem safer, probably unrealistically so, but they do. So 718 was the announcement that always came as a relief. It was kind of like not getting hit over the head.
    Susan went on to confirm that the client lived in Brooklyn. A Mrs. Rabinowitz on Ocean Parkway, out by Coney Island. Better and better. An elderly Jewish woman living in a tenth-floor apartment in what was bound to be a perfectly respectable building. This was a dream assignment. Safe, secure, and way the hell out in Brooklyn. I could put it in for four hours and forty miles, easy.
    I told Susan I’d take it and hung up the phone. I leaned back in my chair, took a deep breath, and blew it out again. I knew I had to pick up the phone and call Mrs. Rabinowitz, but not just yet. First I had to get my head clear. This is a godsend, I told myself. This is exactly what I needed—a nice, cushy, routine assignment, a nice bit of busywork to immerse myself in. Business as usual.
    The only thing stopping me from picking up the phone was the nagging thought of the late Mr. Albrect. The late Martin Albrect—I’d been right to doubt the Morris—unless the Post was wrong, which was quite possible.
    Put it out of your mind, I told myself. Fuck Albrect. He was a fool, and he got what was coming to him. Get your mind on Mrs. Rabinowitz. That’s your business. This other business, it’s got nothing to do with you.
    “Yeah,” I said aloud. “It’s got nothing to do with me.”

5.
    T HE R ECEPTION A REA AT F ABRI -T EC I NC . was large and lavish. The walls were lined with plush couches, where the clientele could wait comfortably to be ushered into the presence of the powers that be. Current, rather than backdate, magazines