Strangled - Brian McGrory [140]
It was Sunday, early in the afternoon, and as such, the newsroom was operating on a skeletal staff, meaning few editors, no copy editors yet, and just a handful of reporters chasing down the typical fires, car crashes, and press conferences by especially opportunistic politicians who know that the competition for coverage is always weakest on a weekend. I instructed Huck to lie down, which he did with a long groan, followed by a loud sigh, and I made my way through the long newsroom and into Peter Martin’s glass-walled office.
When I walked in, Vinny Mongillo was lovingly unwrapping what we in New England would call a tuna-fish submarine, but those in less educated parts of America might refer to it as a grinder, a melt, or possibly a hoagie. In any part of the country, this wouldn’t have smelled good, so I simply tried to put it out of my mind. Meantime, Justine gave me a look that I believed to be one of apology. Martin sat at the head of the table, peering down at a legal pad peppered with notes. No one said anything, unless you counted Mongillo’s soft moan of satisfaction after his first bite.
Finally, Peter kicked things off, saying, “All right, Vinny, put down the food for a minute and tell us what the hell is going on here.”
Vinny put down the food, in itself an uncharacteristically selfless act. He looked around at the three of us and said flatly, “My mother was a Strangler victim in 1963. I was a baby. I never got to know her. I was ten years old when I overheard my aunt and my grandmother talking about it — right after Albert DeSalvo was killed.”
He drew a breath and continued. “I studied the hell out of the case when I was a teenager. I wrote to police officers. I read books. I called prosecutors. I was convinced, like a lot of others were, that DeSalvo didn’t kill my mother — that DeSalvo didn’t kill anyone at all.
“When Jack received these letters, I was going to tell you — all of you. But then I decided, you know what, this is my chance to do something about what I always thought was a massive deceit. This was my chance to have an impact on behalf of the woman who brought me into this world, but who I never got the chance to know. So I kept my mouth shut. Because if I told you about my history, you rightfully wouldn’t have allowed me to work on the story.”
I sat there spellbound, staring at a guy who never, ever stops surprising me in one good way or another. You think you know someone, you think you’re giving him more credit than he could possibly deserve, yet under all that flesh is someone who’s even better, smarter, and more sensitive than you can possibly allow yourself to believe.
Peter Martin, I could see, was also enraptured, but not to the point of silence. He didn’t have that luxury. He tapped his pen a few times on the legal pad that sat on the coffee table before him and said, “Thank you, Vinny. That’s all very understandable. But why were you arrested? What did you do?”
Vinny flashed me a knowing look, mostly because, well, I already knew. Then he said, “The knife. Many years ago, I was given the blood-soaked knife found in Walpole State Prison that was used to stab Albert DeSalvo to death. One of the lead detectives on the case, Bob Walters, the guy who was trying to help Jack out before he died, he gave it to me.”
More silence. I couldn’t peel my eyes off of Vinny, which may seem a little weird, but so be it. Justine looked from Vinny to Martin to me. Martin bounced his pen on the legal pad a few more times and said, “But Vinny, how did the cops suddenly find out in the middle of this investigation that you had the knife?”
He told them that story as well. Still more silence. Martin nodded a whole lot. He exchanged a long look with Justine Steele, but neither said anything.
Finally, Martin looked at me