Tradition of Deceit (17 page)

Twenty-Four
July 1918

“You really should consider
moving,” Tomasz said, looking from Lidia's mother to her grandfather. “Rent is higher on the hill, to be sure, but the advantages—”

“I don't believe we will,” Grandfather Pawel said. Again. They were all speaking English because Tomasz preferred it, but that wasn't the only reason his voice was stiff.

Lidia flushed. Tomasz meant well. He wanted the best not just for her, but for her family. And she agreed with him, really. It was unusual for a family to stay in Bohemian Flats for so long. The spring floods this year had been as bad as any, and lugging all their valuables to a friend's house higher up the hill had been a struggle. No one down here had electricity or indoor plumbing. Would Mama and Grandfather Pawel be able to manage once she was married and gone?

“We just worry for you,” Lidia said softly. “That's all.” She finished drying the last of the dinner dishes and draped the cloth near the stove.

Some of the tension eased from Mama's face. “We can talk about houses another time,” she told Lidia and Tomasz. “It's your engagement night! We should be celebrating.”

Grandfather Pawel looked to Mama. “Frania? I think this would be a good time to …”

Mama nodded and hurried into the next room.

Lidia saw Tomasz's apprehension. “
Matka
likes the old traditions,” she whispered. “It's harmless.”

Mama reappeared with a loaf of bread on a plate and two white scarves. She put the plate in the middle of the table.

Grandfather Pawel cleared his throat. “All right, you two. Stand across the table from each other and clasp your right hands.”

Lidia stepped into place and reached over the bread. Tomasz took her hand. His grip was firm, steadying. He was a handsome fellow, with muscular arms and tiny black curls at the nape of his neck. His eyes glinted with pleasure whenever she walked into a room, and what girl could resist that?

Then Pawel used the scarves to tie Tomasz's and Lidia's hands together—once, twice. “May you always work together to prepare your bread.” His voice was husky.

Lidia knew one wild moment of panic and almost jerked her hand against the loose bond. Tomasz squeezed harder, as if to say,
Oh, no. We shall face the rest of our lives together
.

I will remember this moment forever, she thought: the intensity of Tomasz's eyes in the lamplight, the warmth of his skin pressed against hers.

Mama cut two pieces of bread from the loaf. “The larger is for Lidia,” she said. “May she always have bread for her children.”

Lidia ate her piece, feeling every crumb on her tongue, her gaze still locked with Tomasz's.
Children
. It was hard to imagine.

Grandfather Pawel slipped the scarves off and handed one to each of them. She was to keep her white cloth forever. In hard times, it would remind her that she'd pledged her life to Tomasz.

Mama began cutting the rest of the loaf into small pieces. “I'll put these bits into a basket,” she told Lidia and Tomasz. “Take them to our neighbors so they may bless your upcoming marriage as well.”

“I'm afraid Lidia and I must be going,” Tomasz said.

Mama looked startled. “So soon?”

“I'm due at the mill before long.” Tomasz stood up. “Now that I'm a millwright, I work longer hours. Lidia keeps me company.” He walked to the peg where she'd left the adorable hat he'd given her as an engagement gift. “Lidia?”

Lidia could feel the intensity of her mother's gaze. “Why don't you go along,” she suggested. “I'll be along shortly.”

Pleasure and … was it relief? … spread over her mother's face, but the muscles in Tomasz's jaw tightened. She could tell that she'd disappointed him. But I can't take it back now, Lidia thought. She'd have to apologize later. Surely Tomasz would understand.

“Very well,” he said. He bowed formally to Mama and Grandfather Pawel, picked up his own hat, and walked out the door.

Mama reached for the coffeepot. “That one will never be content, I fear.”

“
Matka
, that's not fair,” Lidia protested. “He just wants the best for us. For all of us.”

“I understand that he has to work,” Grandfather Pawel put in, “but why must you be there too? It seems a lot, when you've already put in a full day.”

It
was
a lot, actually. Like all the other women packers, she worked every day except Sunday. Her quota was six five-pound bags filled, sealed, and packed in a crate per minute.

“All for thirty-five cents an hour!” Tomasz complained. “To earn an extra dollar, you'd need to pack a thousand more sacks!”

“I'm content,” Lidia had said mildly, and it was mostly true. She was proud of her crisp white cap and apron, proud of how fast she could pack. She liked earning money, liked the other girls working with her, liked that everyone called the fifth floor No Man's Land. The girls had their own private sitting room there, which was quite pleasant.

“Well, my sweet, innocent, and most beautiful girl, I am
not
content.” Tomasz had taken both of her hands in his. “And I promise you, I will work to get the life we deserve.” And he'd delivered one of his long and delicious kisses, which had left her too breathless to speak.

Now Lidia said, “The promotion to millwright was a good one, but with staggered shifts, Tomasz and I have little time together. I like keeping him company while he works.”

“Young love,” Grandfather Pawel said. He kissed Lidia's cheek and walked stiffly toward the door. “I believe I'll sit outside.”

Both women watched him leave. Through the front window Lidia saw him settle onto the bench. He'd done so every fair night for as long as she could remember. Sometimes he visited with friends who stopped by. Sometimes he whittled. Sometimes he gazed up toward the Washburn Mill, as if waiting for someone to come home.

Lidia swallowed hard. Pawel wasn't related to her by blood, but no man could have been a better father to Mama, or grandfather to her. He was a dear man, and she'd miss seeing him every day after she married. Mama too, and even the little house that smelled of mud and
kiełbasa
and roses.

Mama spoke into the quiet. “Must the wedding take place so soon?”

“Yes,” Lidia said firmly. “Now that the horrible war is over, we don't want to waste a moment. Life can be too short.”

“I know that well.”

Lidia knew Mama was thinking of her own mother, her own husband, both gone much too soon. “I know you
do
understand. Tomasz and I want to snatch happiness while we can.”

“Well, then.” Mama pressed her lips together as if to hold in further objections, and nodded. “We must make plans for a
kołacz
.”

The wedding bread, she meant. The traditional ornate loaf was prepared with tender care and watched over with worry and ceremony. If the top cracked while baking in the oven, the omen was bad for the marriage. Lidia couldn't help smiling as she pictured the small
kitchen crowded with old Polish women, each with her own opinions.

Then she pictured Tomasz rolling his eyes when confronted with yet one more old-world custom. “Please don't fret about a
kołacz
,” Lidia said. “We are Americans now.”

“
Bez kołacy nie wesele
,” Mama said firmly: Without a
kołacz
, there is no wedding
.

“Fine! Fine. Whateve
r you and the other women prepare will be lovely.”

Mama nodded. “Yes, we shall take care of it. But tonight, I have some bride-gifts for you.”

She fetched a basket and they sat down together. Mama stroked Lidia's temple with a gentle finger. “You've grown into such a fine young woman.”

“
Matka
, please,” Lidia said. “You're going to make me cry.”

“That is not my intent.” Mama smiled and pulled a square of folded wool from her basket. “This shawl belonged to your grandmother Magdalena. It's nothing fancy. Pawel says she was wearing her best shawl the night the mill exploded. Still, I'd like you to have it.”

“Thank you.” Lidia pulled the shawl into her lap. Tomasz would shudder if she ever wore something that had come across the Atlantic with Grandmother Magdalena. But it was sweet of Mama to pass it on to her.

Mama reached into her basket again. “These also belonged to your grandmother.” She placed sheep shears on the table.

“But Mama … I don't plan to raise sheep!”

“My mother didn't have sheep either. Not here, in the new country. I do remember her, you know. She was very beautiful. I can still see her, leaning toward the fire and snipping at bits of paper with these sheep shears. I so wish you could have known her.”

“Me too, Mama,” Lidia said.

“When I look at these shears, I see both strength and beauty. She used a rough tool to make the most lovely
wycinanki
flowers. I want you to have them, and this, too.” Mama placed a paper cutting gently beside the shears.

Lidia caught her breath. This
wycinanka
had always hung over the front door.

“I imagine that my mother learned to make such lovely cuttings from
her
mother, and so on,” Mama said. “I want you to put this one up over your own door. Let it remind you of your family, and where you came from.” For the first time, Mama's voice trembled. “I'm afraid you might lose your way, up there on the hill.”

Lidia threw her arms around her mother, not caring now that tears spilled down her cheeks. “I won't lose my way,” she whispered. “I promise.”

Twenty-Five

“So,” Ariel said. “That
was your policeman.”

“That was him,” Chloe agreed, trying not to reveal that the conversation with Roelke—unexpected, over the phone, with Ariel standing three feet away, with that inexplicable detour into Polish folk art—had been extraordinarily frustrating.

“My grandmother gave me a wonderful piece of
wycinanki
, but
it's packed away somewhere. I can show you some examples,
though.” Ariel ran her finger along the spines on a nearby bookcase, removed a heavy volume, and began leafing through it. “Paper cutting is one of the best-known Polish folk arts.”

“
Scherenshnitte
,” Chloe said. “That's the Swiss word for paper cutting. They're pretty good at it, too.”

“Polish work from some regions is one color, like the Swiss usually do,” Ariel said. “But some of it … here.” She held up the book.

Chloe's jaw actually dropped with awe. “That's
spectacular
.” The spread showed an intricate circular piece featuring two roosters and lots of flowers. The design had been formed layer by painstaking layer, each a different, rich color. The result was vibrant and cheerful.

“As I told Roelke, roosters are very common in Polish work.
But he said the birds on the card he has are chickens.”

“He spent summers on his grandparents' farm,” Chloe said, “so I'm pretty sure he knows the difference. But—what was he trying to discover?”

“I think he wanted to know if the artwork he had was Polish.” Ariel looked chagrined. “I couldn't say without seeing it, so I don't think I was much help.”

Chloe dropped onto the sofa. “I don't understand what's going on in his head right now. But I do know he'll keep searching for answers until he finds them.” She sighed. Rick's death was personal, and being kept out of what was going on in Milwaukee made her feel lonely.

The loneliness also came from not being able to talk to him about what was going on here in Minneapolis. Like finding a dead man on the top floor of a huge flour mill. A man who had somehow drowned before being hauled to the mill's eighth floor and hidden away. She wanted to plunk all the information down in front of her personal cop and hear what he had to say. But her personal cop was not available. He would not be available until he learned who had shot Rick. She didn't even want to
think
about what would happen if the murder went unsolved.

Chloe gave herself a long moment to feel very sad. Then she straightened and looked at Ariel. “Okay. I think it's time we get to work on that interpretive plan.”

Dobry and Tina Banik lived in Bayview. Roelke parked at the curb just as Dobry pulled into the detached garage.

They met on the driveway. Dobry approached with a grocery bag in his arms and a quizzical expression on his face. “What are you doing here?”

“I need to talk to you.”

Dobry put the sack down. “Let's talk out here so we don't disturb Tina.”

Roelke pulled his notebook from his pocket and turned to the page where he'd copied the two words penciled on the back of the card. “You speak Polish, right? Are these Polish words?”

Dobry leaned toward the light mounted on the garage. “
Linka
is a name. I think
Małgorzata
has to do with painting, redecorating, something like that.”

So maybe Erin met a Polish folk art painter named Linka, Roelke thought. That was not even a tiny bit helpful.

Dobry pulled the ever-present pack of cigarettes from his pocket, followed by a lighter. “What's this all about?”

“I have no idea,” Roelke admitted. “Did Rick ever mention someone named Joanie?”

“Don't think so. Who is she?”

“Remember I asked you about Erin Litkowski? It's the same woman. I met Erin back when I worked for MPD. Evidently she's changed her name to Joanie. I don't know what last name she's using.” He should have asked Danielle.

Dobry shook his head. “Sorry. Doesn't ring a bell.” He lit up and slid the lighter away.

Roelke felt half disappointed and—childishly—half relieved that Rick hadn't left
him
out in the cold while confiding whatever there was to confide about Erin to Dobry. “Her husband's name is Steve Litkowski. He's a first-class asshole. Could you check and see if any calls have come in about him in the past few months?”

“Sure, I can do that. You think he tangled with Rick?”

“It's possible.”

“How does that jibe with the gun coming from Evidence?”

“It doesn't,” Roelke admitted. “Yet, anyway. Maybe he has a buddy on the force.” A sickening thought.

“Shit,” Dobry muttered.

“Yeah. When was the last time you went to the Bar?”

“Just last week. Wednesday, I think. Rick and I grabbed a bite there. Why?”

“Anything odd about Kip when you were there?”

“Not that I noticed. I didn't really talk to him. All I cared about right then was a burger and onion rings.”

Roelke clenched his teeth, watching two cooler-than-cool teenaged boys slouch down the street. If Rick didn't confide in me about Erin coming back to Milwaukee, he thought, and he didn't confide in Jody, and he didn't confide in Dobry … there's no one else to ask.

He forced himself to let Erin's return to Milwaukee go, for the moment. “Listen, don't mention any of this to anybody, okay?”

“No problem.”

“Anything new?”

“No.” Dobry glanced over his shoulder, as if someone might be lurking on the lawn. “It's gone quiet. Too damn quiet.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just that. The sergeant on graveyard shift last night said at roll call that we all need to put Rick's death behind us—”

“Behind
you
?
Rick's killer is wandering around out there, and everybody is supposed to—”

“I know, I know. Don't kill the messenger.”

“Is Con Malloy saying that?”

“He is,” Dobry said soberly.

“Damn,” Roelke muttered. Sergeant Con Malloy was not one to hush himself. Roelke heard the sergeant's terse comment in his memory:
I've got to protect the living.
“Is Malloy covering something up, do you think? Protecting somebody?”

“I wish I knew.”

“What about Captain Heikinen?”

“How should I know? He doesn't talk to us grunt coppers, and he hasn't made any press statements.”

If that had some meaning, Roelke didn't know what it was.

“I'll tell you, walking into that building feels like walking into a powder keg.” Dobry inhaled like a man in need. “The heat's on the detectives, but even more on Heikinen. Rick died on his watch, and four days later, we don't seem to know squat.”

That reminder—
four days
—pounded Roelke like a mallet. With every passing day, the trail got colder. With every passing day, the killer could be farther away. “Could you sniff around? Maybe ask Malloy if he thinks Heikinen might—”

Dobry threw his butt to the cement. “This is not a good time for me to ‘sniff around' anything. I am certainly not asking Malloy about the captain.”

“If you just—”

“Roelke? Maybe you should back off.”

“And maybe you should do more than sit on your ass behind a desk while the bastard that killed Rick is still out there!”

They stared at each other in the gathering gloom. Roelke felt a weary sense of déjà vu—hadn't he just been through this with Kip? What the hell was the
matter
with everybody? Dobry's little-boy face looked hard. Roelke felt his hands curl into fists.

A light over the back steps flicked on. Tina opened the door.

Roelke turned and stalked to his truck.

“Roelke,” Dobry began.

Roelke got in the cab, slammed the door, and drove away.

Roelke didn't have any place left to go in this city, so he drove aimlessly and tried very hard not to think. He turned on the radio, hoping to drown out the questions banging about his head. Pat Benatar sang with gritty enthusiasm, inviting someone to “fire away” at her. He punched the knob off again.

Left alone with himself, he had to acknowledge that he'd screwed up. Again. He'd been out of line to suggest that Dobry ask a sergeant about anything, much less an ongoing murder investigation,
much
less the district captain. Out of line when he'd accused Dobry of sitting idly on his ass. Out of line to get so angry. He'd have to make things right. “But not tonight,” he muttered. He did not have the energy to go back to the Banik house and apologize.

He ended up back in Lincoln Village and parked by Kozy, on Becher Street—the edge of his and Rick's old beat. Roelke remembered his friend laughing with kids, slamming a mouthy drunk against the wall, buying Christmas gifts for a family that had been robbed, checking in on a nervous shopkeeper, barking orders in Spanish to cool down a few testy Latino teens, comforting a weeping woman after her grandson had been hit by a car. Rick was dead now. It felt like an Independence Day sparkler had just fizzled out.

“And I've got
nothing
,” Roelke muttered.

He'd spent time trying to make sense of a card with two chickens on it, but honestly, there was no proof that Erin had been the one who dropped it. There was no proof that Rick's murder had anything to do with Erin or her husband or the mysterious Lobo. Rick's FI cards disappearing was evidence of something, but he didn't know what. Some cop had taken the murder weapon out of Evidence, but he didn't know who. He was at a total loss.

Roelke's cheeks grew warm when he remembered convincing Chief Naborski that he, Roelke McKenna, needed to be in Milwaukee:
I know the way Rick worked. How he thought. How he interacted with people. Also, I know the beat. I haven't been gone all that long, so lots of people will remember me. And I'm pretty sure that a couple of people I know in the neighborhood will be more willing to talk to me now, since I'm not MPD anymore …

Roelke sat up straight. I, he thought, am an idiot who does not deserve to wear a badge.

His first instincts had been good. He knew Rick, and he knew this neighborhood, as well as anyone. He'd gotten sidetracked with speculation about Mexican cocaine rings and chickens and the glimpse of Erin Litkowski, but he was
not
out of options. It was time to do what he did in the old days: start walking the streets and wait for something to present itself.

It was a cold night, but being here felt as familiar as an old sweater. I love this neighborhood, he thought. He loved the tidy rows of narrow houses on narrow lots, gable walls facing the streets so the steep-pitched roofs zigzagged like saw teeth. He loved the fact that it was an actual neighborhood, where men walked to work in factories, women walked to corner markets to buy groceries, and families walked to the Basilica of St. Josaphat for mass on Sunday mornings. He loved the sense of community in an area that included a European butcher shop, a restaurant featuring Mexican food, and a boxing gym run by an Ojibwe man.

He walked south toward the Kinnickinnic River, nodding at pedestrians. He was about to turn west when a woman trudged past with a murmured “Good evening,” then stopped and turned back. “Officer McKenna?”

He turned, too. “Mrs. Dombrowicz! How are you?”

“Good, all in all. But just sick at heart about what happened to Officer Almirez.”

“Yeah.”

Mrs. Dombrowicz was a widow with a tired set to her shoulders, hands reddened by her work at a local dry cleaner's, a face creased with worry, and kind eyes. She gripped Roelke's gloved hands in her mittened ones. “You were partners, weren't you?”

“Yeah.” Not for long, but there at the end of Roelke's time in the MPD. What they'd always hoped for.

“What are you doing in the old neighborhood?”

“Just walking, Mrs. D. Thinking about my friend and walking.”

“You come along home with me,” she said briskly. “I'll put on the teakettle.”

Roelke couldn't think of anything finer right now than a mug of hot tea served by Mrs. Dombrowicz. “Thank you, ma'am. I'd like that.”

Mrs. D had lived in Lincoln Village all her life. After her husband died of cancer she'd raised five children alone. Her youngest child, Donny, was constantly in trouble. “Is Donny still living at home?” Roel­ke asked as they turned a corner.

“He is. He's got a job, cooking burgers at the sandwich place over on the Grutza block.” She flapped one hand in a helpless gesture. “We'll see if he can hang on to this one.”

Roelke had his doubts. Donny wasn't really a bad kid, but the numbnut had not inherited his mother's work ethic, and he was constantly screwing off. Roelke had arrested him for stealing hubcaps, for spray painting a bakery's window, for smoking marijuana on a school playground. Stupid stuff like that. More than once Roel­ke had responded to a call and thought,
Donny D.
More than once he'd knocked on Mrs. D's door and explained he was looking for her son. If Donny was home, Mrs. D marched him from his bedroom by the ear and handed him over. If he wasn't home, she promised to call when he showed up. He always showed up, and Mrs. D always called.

Now Roelke found himself back in the familiar living room—small, crowded, spotless. A picture of the Virgin Mary graced a small shrine in one corner. A television on a rolling stand filled another. Framed family snapshots covered the walls. A coffee table held a knitting basket and a paperback romance novel.

Mrs. D served tea with a plate of store-bought chocolate chip
cookies. “Thank you for your kindness,” Roelke said. The simple but heartfelt gesture meant more than he could say.