Inherit the Dead

above his income. He didn’t drive a fancy car. If he was dealing, nobody knew what he was doing with the money. The more time Perry spent going over the records, the more certain he was that the preacher was being framed. But he couldn’t see what the crooked cops would have to gain, and he didn’t know why Bayer wasn’t protesting his innocence from the rooftops. On the contrary: according to what Perry heard, Bayer was in plea negotiations.
    And so Perry, never one to turn away from risk, took what the lawyers called an inevitable step: he went to visit the pastor in jail.
    As soon as they were alone, the first thing Bayer said was that there was no need to check on him. He was keeping his side of the deal. He would plead guilty “as promised.” And when Perry asked what deal he was talking about, Bayer said he should tell the others not to worry. Then he sent for the guard and went back to his cell.
    It took Perry a week and a half, mostly on his own time, to put the clues together. One informant after another had told detectives that a Harlem preacher was moving significant weight. Nobody knew the name of the pastor, but two or three said they’d heard the church was up around 160th Street.
    Bayer’s church was on Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard near 132nd.
    And there was something else. A missing-persons report. A six-year-old black girl had vanished on her way home from school two days before the raid. Looking closer, knocking on doors, Perry discovered what nobody else seemed to know: the missing girl was Bayer’s niece.
    So he went to his lieutenant to report that things might not be what they seemed, that it looked as if Bayer was taking the rap for somebody else. Somewhere there was another Harlem preacher who was really dealing, and who had arranged with a couple of theNarcotics boys for Bayer to take the fall. His lieutenant told him to sit tight and give him a chance to look into it. The next day Bayer’s lawyer was on television, reporting that one of the detectives on the raid had been to visit his client in lockup, slapping him around and demanding a bribe.
    The press loved it: “Rogue Cop Beats Preacher!” The way the newspapers had it figured, Perry was the bad cop, trying to cover his ass by getting Bayer to inculpate the good ones. That the story made no sense once you thought about it didn’t matter to the guardians of public integrity. The brass preferred to avoid a hearing, and, on the advice of counsel but especially of his wife, so did Perry. Uncle Jackie still had a string or two to pull. Noreen pleaded with her husband to accept the offer of resignation that the department put on the table. They were seated in the television nook of their small house in Flushing. Alex Trebek was apologizing to a contestant whose points were coming off the board because he had mispronounced Bouvier.
    I didn’t do anything wrong, Perry had said to the one person in the world who might listen. They knew what I’d been looking into, and they set me up.
    So what?
    Perry blinked. This was the last response he had expected. He tried to keep his voice gentle, an unnatural act that he committed only in the presence of those he loved. I’m a cop. My uncles were both cops. It’s the family business. I’m good at it. I care about the force. I have to stay and fight so I can find out who really took the money.
    Noreen’s face was locked against his entreaties. If you stay and fight, there’s a good chance you’ll lose, she had said.
    I know that. I’ve given this a lot of thought, Norrie. I have friends on the force. We’ll get the evidence.
    She shifted ground. He had rarely known her to be so adamant. Have you given any thought to your family? To Nicky?
    That’s who I’m doing it for, honey. I don’t want her to be ashamed of her father.
    She’s too young to understand, Perry. If you fight this—if there’s a hearing—all she’ll understand is that every morning when she goes to school, the other kids will ask her why her dad was on the news last night. Do you really want to put her through that?
    Perry was stunned. Not by the argument, although his wife had a point. What broke his determination—and, let’s be frank, his courage—was the look in Noreen’s beautiful dark eyes.
    His wife didn’t believe him, either.

    Perry had hit the Hamptons at last, but the traffic had not eased, an accident or roadwork, or both. Maybe this was the reason Julia Drusilla hardly ever saw her