Read Online They Don't Play Stickball in Milwaukee by Reed Farrel Coleman - Free Book Online Page B

headlines from the three New York City dailies. Atop page two, there was a handwritten message from Feld advising me that the headlines first appeared in the papers between March 14, 1972 and January 4, 1973 and that they appeared in chronological order. This is what I looked at:
    March 14, 1972—
    Post BOY-NAPPED          News RIVERDALE TEEN TAKEN
    Times CARDIOLOGIST’S SON TAKEN
    March 16, 1972—
    Post RING FINGER, RANSOM NOTE
    News RANSOM IN RIVERDALE
    Times MACABRE NOTE RECEIVED
    March 19, 1972—
    Post FEDS BLOW IT         News DELIVERY DISASTER
    Times CAPTURE ATTEMPT GOES AWRY
    March 22, 1972—
    Post NEW FINGER, NEW DEMANDS
    News GRISLY DO-OVER            Times NEW DEMANDS
    March 23, 1972—
    Post SPOOKED          News NAPPERS-NO SHOW
    Times KIDNAPPERS REFUSE RANSOM
    March 28, 1972—
    Post HOPES FADE         News GOING, GOING . . .
    Times FEDERAL AGENTS PESSIMISTIC
    April 22, 1972—
    Post HERO COP FINDS BODY
    News . . .GONE, BOY’S BODY FOUND     Times TRAGIC ENDING
    April 23, 1972—
    Post COWARD’S WAY OUT—KIDNAPPER EATS BULLET
    News KIDNAPPER SUICIDE ONLY FITTING
    Times ALLEGED KIDNAPPER FOUND DEAD
    April 28, 1972—
    Post KIDNAP BOY BURIED—HERO COP PROMOTED
    News BOATSWAIN BOY LAID TO REST TODAY
    Times BOATSWAIN BURIAL TODAY
    June 30, 1972—
    Post HERO COP UNDER GUN
    News POLICE TO PROBE CRUSADING COP
    Times INVESTIGATION IN BOATSWAIN KIDNAPPING
    October 12, 1972—
    Post FAMILY AFFAIR—KIDNAPPER’S BROTHER FOR MACHETE KILLING
    News HERNANDEZ BROTHER UP FOR MURDER ONE
    January 4, 1973—
    Post HERO COP CLEARED        News MACCLOUGH IS CLEAN
    Times BOATSWAIN CASE CLOSED
    The final page of the fax was a grainy photostat of a redacted NYPD document dated May 7, 1972. It was a formal complaint and request for investigation sent to the Internal Affairs Division of the NYPD located on Poplar Street in Brooklyn. The name of the officer requesting the investigation was blacked out as were all the names on the document. But one thing was clear, one police officer was accusing another of executing a suspect in a high-profile case. Given the date of the complaint and the headlines on the previous pages, filling in the redacted names became rather easy guesswork. Fazio had made the complaint against MacClough.
    I was pretty sure I now had a grasp on everyone’s attachment to the Hernandez or Boatswain or whatever-you-wanted-to-call-it case. MacClough would never consider himself a hero for doing his job. Furthermore, John would consider himself a failure for getting to the boy too late. And even though he’d been cleared of wrongdoing, MacClough would see the investigation as a black mark, a scar on his reputation. I don’t think this was the type of thing he would discuss with anyone. As for my eternally pragmatic brother, his motivation for involving MacClough was apparent. If MacClough had been willing to risk so much for the Boatswain boy, a boy he had no obvious emotional ties to, then imagine what MacClough might do when trying to locate his best friend’s nephew. Jeffrey also knew that MacClough would look at this as a second chance. This time he might get to the boy before it was too late. The reason for the tension between Fazio and MacClough was palpable, and now, completely understandable.
    So why was it, if I had such a strong grasp on all the players’ motivations, that I felt so uneasy? Because I couldn’t get Larry’s caveat out of my head: “When you reach a conclusion, you’ll be wrong.” Of course, if Larry had bothered to forward the actual newspaper articles along with the head lines, I might have felt a bit more secure in my analysis. But that wasn’t the way Larry operated. He needed to be needed. It’s why he did favors for me at all. It was