Death in Dyker Heights: A Hal Silver Mystery

By S.K. Saks

Hal Silver is back and hes crankier than ever. But who can blame him? Hes been hired by a mob kingpin who wants him to find out who murdered his son Vinny Viano and he doesnt have a clue where to start. And his only help is the dim witted gangsters assistant whose only concern is how many pieces he wants to break Hal into should he fail to solve the case.

Wandering the south Brooklyn streets of Dyker Heights, Hal meets neighborhood characters and cronies, babes and bumblers. No one has a bad thing to say about Vinny, but someone clearly didnt like him as much he let on. And if Hal doesnt find the killer soon, the next corpse may be his own.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 13, 2012
• ISBN: 9781477138816

S.K. Saks

Mr. Saks lives in a cave of his own making somewhere deep in the county of Kings. His unrepentant Brooklyn accent marks him as an outcast whenever he wanders too far away from his lair. He only comes out occasionally on spring and summer evenings to cry over losses by his beloved Mets. During the rest of the year he cries for no apparent reason other than boredom.

Book preview

Copyright © 2012 by Stephan Saks.

ISBN:    Softcover   978-1-4771-3880-9

             Ebook       978-1-4771-3881-6

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

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Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 1

Once again, I would like to thank my friends Tom Bourke and Shel Young for their editorial suggestions and steadfast support. And special thanks to my wife Marisol for showing me where the on button is.

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Chapter 1

Remember me? I’m Hal Silver and you might have heard my name bandied about the neighborhood a few months ago when I somehow got involved in a murder case the police were investigating. The fact that I was able to solve it and produce the culprit still shocks me as well as everyone who I’ve come in contact with over the last 50 years, nursery school napmates included. In fact, I’ve become almost a mini-celebrity around the dingy streets of Southern Brooklyn, mini being apropos both to my fame and stature. As long as my 15 seconds (time’s speeding up in these electronically laden days) hasn’t elapsed, I jotted down the notes of the adventure in a snappy little volume called A Murder in Gravesend. Previous to that effort, the only literary works I felt capable of producing were serious tomes on thoroughly researched subjects such as Legendary Snoozes or Great Pimples I have Popped. Proust it ain’t, but you gotta write what you know, right?

In case you’re not familiar with me, a situation highly recommended by all but my most intimate associates (and perhaps even one or two of them), I live in the aforementioned garden spot known as Gravesend. It’s a neighborhood with a bad rap but that’s mostly because it sucks. In truth, it’s a long way from the glamour of Manhattan, or even the hot spots of Northern Brooklyn where the funkiness has spilled across the East River like the red tide. If one of the hipsters or hopestirs from Williamsburg or Dumbo overshot their subway ride by about a dozen stops, the conspicuous absence of closet sized art galleries and pop-up restaurants run by excessively tattooed adolescents would alert them they entered the no-man’s-and woman’s-land of the culturally afflicted and they should run, or rather saunter for their souls. There is really nothing much to do here except contemplate man’s drab and meaningless existence or fret if that filly in the third at Belmont is going to shred more of your hard earned cash by dying in the stretch yet again. But that’s the way its’ down and outers like it, yours truly included. Around here we rate the desirability of an area in inverse proportion to the number of Starbucks cafes and chi-chi chocolate shops it has. We’ve got our third generational pizzerias, our not as yet condemned by the Board of Health Chinese take out joints, and our cardboard signed, corner Korean fruit markets, fuck you very much, and we’re all just fine with it that way. Or at least that’s we’d say if you asked us, if you ever did.

I had been hoping my new found notoriety might translate into a few extra bucks as I do a little unofficial detective work in my spare time, which just happens to be all my time, as I am an enforced retiree of our perennially overburdened civil service. However, as the biggest job I’d taken on lately had been locating my next door neighbor’s lost Labrador retriever—the only thing it retrieved was a few thousand fleas which it passed on to its me, its now thoroughly soaped savior—I wasn’t expecting any more of a bounce in my woebegone business. So I was a little surprised to receive a summons to appear at the abode of Jimmy Viano, the well known gangster, bookie, loanshark and all-around good guy. This was transmitted in the form of sharp-suited, pistol-packing hood, approximately the size of the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. He had knocked on my door—he may have been able to blow it down if necessary—and after looking down (way down) on the unimpressive blot of humanity that answered, politely requested my attendance in his bosses’ presence. I decided to look favorably upon this submission since my alternate option might have been slumbering amidst our underwater native sea-life. After allowing me time to change to a slightly less dirty t-shirt, contemplate a religious conversion, and locate the last bit of my courage cowering in the back of my closet, I accompanied this behemoth down to the street where I found one of the few vehicles short of a Pershing tank that could accommodate his bulk, a 60’s era Cadillac Eldorado. Holding open the door, itself nearly as large as many current day cars, was another stone-faced minion on hand to ensure my cooperation. Even if I had the 31st Airborne regiment at my disposal, it looked like I wouldn’t be missing whatever proceedings were awaiting me. Slamming the door behind me with a thunder clap that might have been heard in New Jersey or its transatlantic namesake, Stoneface got in the driver’s seat while Gigantor got in beside me. Even with his gargantuan frame comfortably cushioned, it looked like there was enough room to fit the combined square-footage of three apartments inside the Caddy with the closet space more than amply accounted for by the trunk. Thus ensconced in our now mobile home, we headed for my captor’s employer, and my would-be persecutor’s residence.

After a short and tomb-like silent ride, we found ourselves in Dyker Heights. This is a neighborhood in southwest Brooklyn, sandwiched between Bay Ridge on the west and Bensonhurst on the east, not necessarily the meat between those two arid loaves. It had been affected less by the recent demographic changes in our unfair city than either of those communities, retaining its conservative Italian essence, like an anchovy surprise in a ball of pizza dough. It is comprised mostly of single family houses, a low density alternative to much of the rest of the apartment-house-stuffed, population-busting borough. Some of these houses, especially along 10th, 11th or 12th Avenues, were mansion sized and gaudily elaborate; the kind it was reputed that only the flatter-nosed and better connected of our inhabitants occupied. It was alongside one of those that we pulled up and parked next to, there being six other aircraft carrier like craft filling every square inch of the driveway. Due to the plushness of our seats, and my ass’s understandable reluctance to leave mine, my bear-like companion had to nearly drag me out and shove me up the vertiginous steps, whose elevation would have winded me even in the best of circumstances.

Inside, it looked as though we had entered the shooting set of The Godfather IV. There was a dark elegance that spoke of large piles of hard money earned that would not easily be forsaken. By the sound of muffled conversation in the indeterminate distance, there seemed to be a crowd lurking somewhere in the recesses of that enormous den although it might have taken hours to pinpoint it. I was ushered into a side room dominated by a large ornate wall clock that might have been counting down my last seconds. A chair was positioned next to the desk facing the clock and I was deposited into it, glad to see it was not plugged into the wall socket. There was a round, heavily leathered chair behind the desk and it swiveled to face me, allowing me to view the grim visage and deathly black wardrobe of Jimmy Viano. Although I knew he would be waiting for me, I still had to stifle a scream just south of my esophagus. Prayer would do me no good, so I swooned and belched instead.

Viano smiled at me, the kind of smile that would make a shark turn tail and head for its mommy. It is good of you to come, Mr. Silver. I’ve been expecting you, he said, the words not matching the foreboding expression he presented.

Thanks, Mr. Viano. I’ve been looking forward to seeing you again too, I replied haltingly. Uh huh, sort of like a two by four looking forward to seeing a buzzsaw.

Chapter 2

Everyone in Brooklyn had heard of Jimmy Viano and those who hadn’t were either willfully ignorant or blissfully moronic. Controlling much of the organized crime activity in the southern reaches of that borough, his tentacles extended into such spheres as garbage removal, construction and demolition, meaning his operation could be one-stop shopping for building some motley structure, having it torn down and carting off the debris in time for the insurance payoff. But his major source of income was the loan sharking and bookmaking businesses, and he had managed to elude the many commissions, task forces and gung-ho police lieutenants assigned to root out corruption or at least convince the public that something more than supine resignation towards it was on the agenda. No one was untouchable in this