Yesterday's News

behind is guys beaten to death or stabbed in the heat of passion over cigarettes or a couple of returnable empties, net the guy a quarter maybe.”
    “I wasn’t aware that Coyne was homeless.”
    “Next thing to. He was shacked up with a girl and a kid she claims is his. You saw the place, you wouldn’t let your dog run loose in it.”
    “Mind giving me her name and address?”
    Hagan came forward again, all business. “Look, Cuddy, I can see the position you’re in. This girl Rust comes to see you, ends up dead that night. You maybe feel a little responsible, or that you owe her something. Fine. I’d feel that way myself if I were in your shoes. That’s why I’ve been so open talking with you about things. But everybody—me, the medical examiner, the statie attached to the DA—everybody has Coyne down as a simple death by stabbing.”
    “And Jane Rust?”
    “Autopsy and lab report came in by hand an hour ago. She swallowed enough sleeping pills to drop an elephant.”
    “Except she couldn’t.”
    “Swallow them you mean.”
    “Yes.”
    “We found a mug and a tablespoon on her kitchen table. One of the latents on each matched her index finger. The girl ground up a handful of the pills like an old-fashioned pharmacist with the mortar and pestle things.”
    I thought about it. “Seems a hell of a complicated way to take your own life.”
    “Rust was a complicated girl under a lot of stress, ; most of it self-inflicted. Besides, maybe she didn’t have a razor handy.”
    “Any note?”
    “No.”
    “Strike you as odd a reporter didn’t leave one?”
    “No.”
    “Aside from the paper, was she under any stress you know of?”
    Hagan shook his head. “She’s dead now. Whether it was intentional or accidental, it was by her own hand. Whatever problems she had won’t get helped by me airing them to a guy I met ten minutes ago.”
    “I talked to her landlady. She says Rust had two visitors the night she died.”
    “I spoke to Mrs. O’Day. Personally, face to face. Even with her ‘distance specs,’ she couldn’t tell me how many arms I had.”
    “She told me she heard car doors slam. Two different cars, two different times.”
    “The house is in a neighborhood, not the sticks, for chrissakes. She keeps her windows open and ears cocked, she’ll hear David Letterman swing by, she stays awake late enough.”
    I tried a different tack. “I understand you and a man named Schonstein were partnered a while ago.”
    Hagan got his back up a little. “You understand correctly.”
    “It’s Schonstein’s son that supposedly was on the take from the porno peddler, right?”
    “That’s right. And you be real careful to say ‘supposedly’ or ‘allegedly’ every time you ask about that around here, because Coyne and Rust were both full of shit about Mark.”
    “Mark’s the son?”
    “That’s right. He’ll never be the cop his father was, but then nobody will. Schonsy was a god around here, buddy. The kind of cop doesn’t just keep the order, he makes the order. He trained every cop in this department’s any good at all, including me, from the ground up.”
    “Mind telling me where young Mark was the nights Coyne and Rust died?”
    Hagan ground his teeth. “I hope that’s your last question, because it’s the last one I’m going to answer. Mark was here, in the station, both nights. Doing paperwork in front of six other officers because his partner was home, sick. Now get out.”
    I thought better of asking if he meant out of his office or out of his town.

    I’d just closed the hallway door to Hagan’s office when I heard a gruff voice say, “Hey!”
    I turned. A monstrous uniformed officer was beckoning to me, so I walked toward him. The plastic name tag read “Manos.”
    He said, “Captain wants to see you.”
    “I just saw him.”
    The officer moved his hand toward a doorway at the end of the corridor. “Other captain.”

    “My name is Hogueira. You’re Mr. John Cuddy, private investigator from Boston .”
    I shook his hand and we sat down, the uniform staying inside the office but at the door behind me. Hogueira was about five-eight, probably just over the minimum back before sex discrimination suits wreaked havoc with that requirement. Pushing fifty, mainly around the waist of his uniform pants and Sam Brown belt, he had the same black wavy hair as the desk sergeant downstairs, but with little sideburns and less mustache. His eyes were a warm, chocolate brown, like a