Stanley jabbed a finger onto Nathan’s chest. “It is very much my business, Mr. Smart-mouth. What did Preston tell you?”
Nathan smiled and raised his eyebrows. “He told me he didn’t like you, that you were an asshole, and I can now confirm that his description was accurate.”
“How dare you! Sonny, you don’t know who you’re dealing with. I want answers.”
“Look, I don’t have to answer your questions, Mr. Stanley. You’re not a cop. This is a wake for my best friend, and you’re bothering me. And if you poke that finger at me again, I’ll break it off. Go away.”
Stanley took a step back. “You’re walking a dangerous line here, sonny. You better watch what you say and who you talk to. You can get yourself and your girlfriend in a whole world of trouble. If I was you, I’d keep my mouth shut.”
Nathan scoffed and walked away. He waited for Mimi to finish expressing her condolences and they left.
“Did you see that creep who cornered me?” Nathan said. “The guy who thinks he’s Joe Friday?”
“It’s Mike Stanley.”
“I know; he made that clear. No wonder Preston didn’t like him. What a jerk. He kept asking me what Preston told us. He threatened me, told me to keep my mouth shut. It makes me think he was right in the middle of the major shit that Preston kept talking about.”
“Is there any doubt in your mind, Nate?”
* * *
Though the wind had calmed, a large group of mourners stood by the grave sites, shivering in the morning cold. Congressman and Mrs. Zielinski sat with Mrs. Roberts under a canopy. A portable heater had been placed beside them. Mrs. Roberts was bravely fighting to keep her composure. The congressman had his arm around his wife, who sobbed and continually mumbled prayers for their daughter. To his left and slightly behind him stood Michael Stanley.
The roadways of Holy Angels Cemetery were lined with cars and limousines. Well over one hundred people had come to the graveside service. As the priest was offering his final prayers, Mimi glanced to her right and spotted a man standing on the roadway beside a tree.
“That’s Mr. Rosen,” she whispered to Nathan.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
CHICAGO
ALBANY PARK NEIGHBORHOOD
JANUARY 1966
Barely four weeks had elapsed since the funerals, but Mimi’s pain was still appreciable. After taking a few days off, Mimi had returned to her desk. The Tribune valued her work, and she was now an editor in addition to her occasional staff-reporter assignments. Every day when she arrived, the morning paper and several galleys were sitting on her desk. The Tribune had been running follow-up stories on the Roberts homicides, focusing on the intense efforts of the Chicago Police Department to solve the crime. The stories usually appeared in a one-column box on the lower right quadrant of the front page. Quotes attributed to Congressman Zielinski or the police investigators urged the public to help find the killers. The congressman offered a generous reward.
Multiple theories about the double murder, one more improbable than the next, were bandied about on TV, on talk radio and in print, particularly in the supermarket tabloids. Preston and Christine were killed by the Russians in an act of revenge against the congressman. They were killed by a jealous lover of one or the other, who was probably engaged in a torrid but deadly affair. They were the most recent victims of a nationwide serial killer who had murdered three Native Americans in Oklahoma the week before. They were killed by a burglar caught in the middle of the act. They were killed because of a gambling debt or a drug transaction or by hippies tripping on LSD. The police assured the news channels that they were following up every lead, no matter how bizarre.
Time had done little to diminish the sorrow that consumed Mimi’s thoughts. She struggled to maintain her focus. She searched for understanding, an explanation, a reason, but it wasn’t there. She unfolded the morning paper and stared at the front page with blank eyes. The lead story detailed the previous evening’s State of the Union address. The banner headline read LBJ SEEKS MORE FOR WAR. The president had emphasized the need for more tax dollars for the ever-mounting costs of supporting the troops in Vietnam.
“Ever-mounting costs,” thought Mimi. Ever-mounting shipments of military supplies from Nicky’s terminals. Ever-mounting baskets of cash in Nicky’s office. Who was divvying up the cash? What CEOs, what government officials, what congressman from Albany Park?
There were other front-page stories. Negotiators for the Transit Workers Union in New York had ended their strike. Former president Eisenhower was recuperating at Fort Gordon Army Hospital, where he had been admitted for chest pains. Numerous stories covered battles in Vietnam. But it was the continuing story of Dorothy Kilgallen’s death that grabbed and held Mimi’s attention this day, engrossing her thoughts. The fifty-two-year-old syndicated columnist and television star had been found dead in her New York townhouse bedroom recently. To all accounts, she had been in a chipper mood before she retired for the evening, but the medical examiner attributed her cause of death to alcohol and barbiturates. A suicide.
The night before Kilgallen’s death, she had appeared on What’s My Line? and was said to be in excellent health and spirits. There was no reason for her to take her life; a suicide was definitely out of the question, her family said. Conspiracy theorists jumped into the fray and reasoned that someone, as yet unidentified, snuck into her home and forced her to take the pills. After all, hadn’t she been working on the JFK assassination for two years, and hadn’t she told associates that she was about to break the case wide open?
As far as Mimi was concerned, it was another woman mysteriously found dead in her bedroom. Another family shocked and forced to come to terms with the senseless, sudden loss of a loved one. It was all too much for Mimi, and she took the rest of the day off.
She didn’t want to go home. She didn’t want to answer questions from her grandmother about why she left work early, or hear her suggestions on ways to cope with grief. It was at times like this that she would have picked up the phone and called Christine. She could hear the conversation play out in her head. “Chrissie, this has been a real bad day,” she would say, and Christine would have immediately come to her. Together they would have taken a walk, shopped for shoes, perused the sale rack at Field’s or just met up for a glass of wine. Lord, how she missed her friend.
She walked down Michigan Avenue and took the steps down to the river. She watched an old woman throw corn to the pigeons until the seagulls swooped down and forced her to another location. The weather had been frigid, and the river was starting to form ice floes. The gloom of winter—it mirrored her state of mind. Finally, she raised the courage to do what she had been contemplating for the past two weeks.
* * *
She hesitated for a moment outside his door. Did she really want to do this? All of her suppositions could be way off base. She might be making a total fool of herself. Then, as though some outside force picked up her hand and thrust it forward, she rapped on the door. She felt like running away, but she stood her ground. Eli answered and invited her in.
His smile was warm and empathetic. “How are you doing?” he said gently.