Читать книгу Gladyss of the Hunt - Arthur Nersesian - Страница 12
ОглавлениеThe next day at roll call, Sergeant McKenner informed me that my prayers had been answered, if only conservatively—my thirty-day reassignment to homicide had just come through.
“Thirty?” I replied. “It was supposed to be ninety.” That was what I had put out into the universe à la Maggie.
“No problemo, I’ll just tear this up.”
I grabbed the reassignment order. It ended on the exact day I was scheduled to have my eye surgery. A coincidence? I thought not.
O’Ryan had a frozen smile on his face, hovering somewhere between jealousy and envy.
“If you like I’ll buy you a blonde wig,” I mocked him. He’d been so sure I wouldn’t get the job. He called me a lucky stiff.
“If I get killed,” I shot back. “I’ll just be a stiff.”
“Are you still going on your surreptitious date with the lady-killer?”
“Yeah, and I’ll call you when I get home, just like I promised.”
I cleared out my locker and headed over to Manhattan South Homicide, at Thirty-fifth Street near Ninth Avenue.
I checked in with the desk sergeant, who had me fill out a short stack of paperwork. Then I was directed up to Sergeant Farrell’s squad room on the fourth floor. I felt like a child as he introduced me to the other two investigators assigned to the case; I’d seen them briefly at the murder scene two days before. Annabelle Barrera and Alexander Oldfield were both third-grade detectives. Annie, as she liked to be called, was an attractive middle-aged Latina; I would learn that she watched her diet and maintained an exercise routine as best as she could while fighting crime and raising two high school-age boys. Alex, who was African American and lived in Orange County, seemed intent on going the other way. As I witnessed throughout the first day, his large flabby body was constantly being fed from a bottomless drawer filled with extra large bags of cheese puffs. The one uncanny thing about them was that though they were of different races and sexes and had different body types, their faces were weirdly similar.
Hopping slowly around on his one good foot, Bernie led me into his small corner office, which had the name Herbert Q. Kelly painted on the glass door. It was his old partner’s.
“Kelly?” I asked, “Herbert wasn’t related to Ray?”
“He liked to be called Bert, and no, he was not related to our commissioner.”
“Bert and Bernie?” The pair of them sounded a little Sesame Street.
“The reason you’re here”—he was done with the chitchat—“is that yesterday we got a call from a downtown madam who said she had a john asking for a tall blonde.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Annie pulled on a wig and we went in. The guy took one look at her and said she was too short, and too old.”
“So you lost him.” I only wished O’Ryan could hear this.
“No, we brought him in anyway, checked out his prints and his alibi for the three murders. So it wasn’t a complete loss. But Annie agreed that we should find some sexy blond giraffe. So thank her for your assignment.”
“I will.”
“So here’s the background. The first murder was reported a little over a year and a half ago, when a maid at the Olympian Arms on Fifty-third Street found the body of Mary Lynn MacArthur.” He slid some gruesome photos over to me. “A few weeks later, a cleaning lady at the Spartan opened another door and discovered the grisly remains of Denise Giantonni.” More horrific photos. Both women had been decapitated, like the one I’d seen at the Templeton, and large, crude numbers had been savagely carved into their limbs. “Both women were drugged,” Bernie continued. “Mary bled to death while Denise was strangled and mutilated afterwards.”
“I wonder why he only made this cut on the first vic,” I said, pointing to a close-up picture that showed a long V-shaped scar running down MacArthur’s right inner thigh.
“There are other differences, like Denise has a sock hanging from the toes of her left foot, but at this point we’re focusing on the similarities between all three scenes.”
I jotted down the dates of the first two murders so I could check and see if Noel Holden was around.
“Even though the killer was more brutal with the second vic, the crime scene was a lot messier with the first girl,” Bernie said. “He probably strangled the second woman so there was less bleeding.”
As Bernie flicked through the pages of his notebook, I took the opportunity to scan his dusty office. Above a stack of boxes was a wall full of commendations and pictures. At the center, I spotted a small picture frame holding a photo of a beautiful young Latina girl. Under it a caption read:
Juanita Lopez Kelly
Sleep with the Angels
(1968-1998)
It had to be a memorial card for his ex-partner’s daughter. Apparently she had died just four years before her father.
Looking up from his notes, Bernie continued: “For some reason the killer cut what looked like a number seven in the carpet between the legs of victim number two, although considering all the knife marks it could’ve been accidental.
“The first two women were both naked, and their bodies were positioned beside the bed. The top of their bodies pointed north and their feet always point south. He also taped up the limbs in both cases.
“The main differences between the three murders are: one, the location, and two, the numbers he carved into their foreheads,” he said, repeating what he’d told me at the crime scene.
“Are there any defensive wounds?”
“No, nor was there any epidermis under their nails. He drugged and strangled Mary Lynn MacArthur. Actually, first he stabbed her with a screwdriver.”
“How’d he decapitate her?”
“The cuts indicate a knife, but I don’t know why he didn’t also use it as the murder weapon.”
“Did they find prints, hair, fiber, anything like that?” I asked. I was hoping to match Noel’s hair with something.
“Oh yeah, all that stuff. But the problem is, there are no matches between any of the three locations.”
Bernie continued giving me background: Initially they had canvassed the area looking for witnesses and surveillance tapes from surrounding businesses. Nothing turned up. They had tracked down the escort services that handled the girls, and found that the killer had used stolen credit cards, never the same one. All three guys who’d had their cards stolen worked in midtown; other than that, no connections. The squad had spent the last few weeks going through the list of the victims’ regulars. Again, no cross clients. They found johns with records, but nobody with anything serious. In short, the trail was cold.
A week ago, a profiler from Police Plaza, Barry Gilbert, had been assigned to the case. I remembered him from the academy, where he’d taught a class in forensic psychology: an intense guy with a shiny widow’s peak.
“Barry thinks we’re looking for a young white guy who is organized and modestly up on forensics,” Bernie continued. “He probably has a history with hookers. He might have some priors for drugs, prostitution, and maybe credit card fraud, since he’s used them for paying the ladies. Considering the hot-sheet dives he takes them to, I’m guessing he’s broke. And he probably has sexual problems, seeing how he hasn’t screwed any of the vics.”
“Did Dr. Gilbert say anything about the taped-up limbs or the carved numbers?”
“He said considering the way the limbs were lassoed and the numbers looked branded on, we might be looking for a cowboy. I think he was kidding.”
“It’s so strange,” I thought aloud, recalling my academy classes, “that one day, out of the blue, some john plans not just a murder, but the whole mutilation and post mortem numbering thing. In cases like this, isn’t there usually an earlier version of the murder?”
“Crystal Hodges,” Bernie responded. “Barry thinks I’m way off, particularly ’cause it was so long ago, but she was the only blonde hooker I could find whose murder could’ve been an early draft of the current ones.”
“Was she tall?”
“Six feet and blonde. She was drugged and strangled, and her head was nearly hacked off. It all fits the M.O. But it was in the early Eighties.”
“They never found the killer?”
“Everyone figured her pimp did it, because he was later arrested for killing another hooker, but he swore up and down he didn’t, even though he confessed to the other murder.”
“Shouldn’t you interview him?”
“He died in jail in ’87, so who the hell knows.”
Bernie’s phone rang. He said he needed a moment, so Annie took me into her office. She said their top priority today was finding out the identity of victim number three. They had taken her fingerprints and were waiting for her arrest record to turn up.
I said I was amazed they hadn’t found more evidence at the scene.
“Her purse was missing, so there was no ID or anything. The killer must’ve took it,” Annie said.
“Or the maid,” Alex muttered.
“Maybe the killer dropped her lipstick. I found some on the staircase,” I told her. “But it wasn’t in the actual crime scene so Bernie chucked it.”
“And Alex said Bernie was just looking for someone cute to work with . . . Then here you are finding lipstick.”
“What kind of guy is Bernie?”
“Neither sleazy nor easy. He’s actually a great cop who’s going through a tough patch.”
“He said his partner died?”
“Bert passed away late last year, yes.”
“How did Bert’s daughter pass away?”
“What daughter?”
“Juanita?” I asked.
“That was Bert’s wife, his third wife,” Alex interjected.
“He liked them young,” Annie added.
“Where’d you hear about her?” Alex asked.
“I just saw the memorial card in Bernie’s office.”
“She died of AIDS about five years ago,” Annie confided. “It’d be wise not to mention any of this to Bernie. One of the many things that will suddenly make him explode.”
“He can be very moody, but he wasn’t always that way,” Alex said. “Things started going bad after the Towers came down.”
“Both of them went down there. Bernie and Bert were pulling as much overtime as they could to boost their retirement package,” Annie completed. “Then Bernie came back with a cough that wouldn’t go away—”
“—And a firm decision not to resign,” Alex tossed in.
“—But Bert just got sicker.”
“You have to understand,” Alex said, “Bert was more than the captain here—he really was a father to us all. He ran the show and we all loved him.”
“He only just died,” Annie replied.
The two of them really did finish each other sentences, it was kind of annoying.
“But he had been fighting cancer for years,” she went on. “Thin as a rail. Always going in for more treatment.”
“Actually I think it was the foot injury . . .” It was Alex’s turn. “That’s when Bernie started getting grouchy.”
“He said it felt like a snake had bit him,” Annie added.
“What happened to his foot?” I asked.
“Toward the end of the recovery period, Bernie fell through a hole at the Pile—that’s what they called Ground Zero—and shattered his foot in a million places,” Alex explained.
“It’s been operated on like a half a dozen times.”
“No sooner had he checked out of the hospital the last time, his foot still in a fucking cast, then Gayle moved out.”
“So within three months he loses his partner and his wife files for separation. Now he’s gasping for air, forced to stop smoking, and he’s got a bum foot, no running around.”
“He’s barely able to walk. But what’s worse is that he’s as angry as a Tasmanian Devil on steroids.”
“Someone said he had a nickname,” I hinted.
“Burnout Farrell,” Annie answered. “Don’t ever say it in front of him.”
“After Bernie had punched out a couple suspects and almost shot a young detective who was going to be his partner,” Alex said, “the new captain put him on modified duty, hoping he’d get tired and quit with disability.”
“Then these murders started popping up,” Annie said.
“Bert was a truly great investigator, and this was their old turf,” Alex concluded, “so the captain put Bernie back on the case.”
As if sensing a disturbance in their vaudeville routine, both of them fell silent. Sure enough, the distant bumping quickly grew closer until Bernie limped in. He announced that he had spoken to the captain and got authorization for a one-week surveillance team on the two hot-sheet hotels in the area that still didn’t have cameras in their lobbies.
Then he asked, “Do we have Jane Doe’s name yet?”
“Still waiting,” Annie replied without looking up.
“Get your coat,” he said to me. “We’re hitting the bricks.”
“Where you going?” Annie asked as I wrapped my scarf back on.
“Back to the Blank,” he said. “Shake some monkeys out of the tree.”
Soon we were driving up Eighth Avenue in a dark blue Chevy Lumina. I spotted O’Ryan on patrol with old Lenny Lombardi, the cop who’d been first on the scene the other day. I suppressed the urge to flip Eddie off as we drove past.
The Blank was actually the Templeton Hotel. Bernie called it the Blank because the name had been pried from the rusty metal sign that hung over its entrance on Forty-second Street. Florescent red lettering still flashed the word HOTEL underneath a frame that now only held icicles.
It felt like ten degrees below when Bernie and I left the car and walked up the street. I thought the limp would slow him down, but the pain seemed to be a stimulant. We visited the neighboring shops, where Bernie showed his shield and our Jane Doe sketch to various clerks. None of them remembered her.
As we walked eastward, Bernie’s exposed ears turned as red as brake lights. I wanted to tell him that most of our body heat escapes through our head and that he should wear a hat, but he was clearly the kind who didn’t care for unsolicited advice. As we passed Holy Cross, his right index finger palsied out a slight up-down-right-left motion, the way a lapsed Catholic might from force of habit.
By the time we reached the old McGraw-Hill Building, I was hoping we’d return to the car, but just then Bernie spotted something. A guy wearing a black vest over his old trench coat was passing out business cards to the V.I.P. Club on the corner of Fortieth and Eighth Avenue.
“These guys sometimes are good sources, ’cause they’re stuck out here,” Bernie said. Walking over, he showed the guy the sketch and asked if he remembered seeing her around.
“Sorry,” he replied, handing Bernie a card advertising the nearby strip club.
“Already wanked today, thanks,” Bernie replied. Turning to me he seemed to notice my casual attire for the first time and said, “Listen, we try to dress kind of officey. Dark, loose-fitting slacks and a conservative jacket should do the trick.”
“Fine,” I assured him.
Feeling acutely self-conscious, I caught our reflection in a store window as we walked past. I was wearing an off-white hat and a new suede jacket. Bernie, who was a little shorter and darker than me, was exhaling into his cupped palms to keep them warm. All I needed was a pair of cowboy boots and together we’d look like a tall, androgynous Jon Voight and an older Dustin Hoffman from Midnight Cowboy.
We turned right on Eighth Avenue and walked past the Port Authority. Since 9/11 it had been surrounded by a dozen big concrete planters to protect against possible car bombers. Wishful thinking, I thought. Over Bernie’s head, I saw a billboard that the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association had recently put up: “NYC Cops Ranked #1 in fighting crime. Ranked #145 in Salary. It’s Time to Fix the Injustice.”
“See this?” Bernie said, pointing at the giant turquoise grill of the old bus depot. “When I first started working here, it was the newest, most modern building on the block, now it’s the—”
“No! You’re not supposed to eat sushi on a Sunday,” some young cell-phone retard babbled as he walked beside us. “Cause the last catch is on Friday.”
“It wasn’t until cell phones were invented that I realized exactly how dumb most people are,” Bernie declared.
“Yeah, we went out last night, but absolutely nothing happened!” the cellphoner either didn’t hear or just ignored him.
“’Cause you’re a fucking idiot!” Bernie yelled right in his face. The kid stopped dead on the sidewalk, allowing us to continue without his moronic accompaniment.
Along the east side of Eighth Avenue, from Forty-second down to Fortieth Street, almost all the buildings had either been torn down or were boarded up.
“Bert, my old partner, told me he once dreamed that somewhere on the north slope of Alaska there was a place where all the buildings that are torn down here miraculously reappear.”
Did that include all the rats and roaches, and the riffraff?”
Bernie laughed. “Can you imagine, in the middle of some vast wasteland coming upon a frozen city consisting of all the old tenements and office buildings that this city has sloughed off over the years?” he asked. “The old Penn Station, the two former Madison Square Gardens. . .”
“I guess the Twin Towers would be there . . .”
“I wouldn’t mind going there after I die,” he said. “If you don’t look carefully, I mean really look, you can miss how quickly this city shakes off its old skin. It’s always growing another, taller, glistening new one. In a matter of months there’ll be a row of shiny new office buildings there.” Bernie pointed across the street. Word was, the New York Times was going to move its offices to somewhere along Eighth Avenue.
When we reached Forty-first Street, I noticed Bernie was staring dead ahead. Like a pitbull after a rat, he had caught a scent.
I tried to figure out who he was looking at, but before I could ask him, he pulled out an inhaler and gave it a hard shake, then pressed it three times while inhaling deeply.
“Would you mind looking behind me and tell me if you see any cops?”
“Why?” I asked as I turned, wondering if we needed back-up.
An older African American man in an army coat brushed by me, holding a pair of old shopping bags in each hand. Bernie whipped his arms up in a mock yawn, clocking the poor guy right on the jaw and sending him to the pavement.
“Hey! I don’t see many faces from the old days,” Farrell said, eagerly helping the poor man to his feet. The contents of his shopping bags—packaged bundles of new tube socks—three for ten dollars—were scattered along the icy ground.
“Please, I don’t want no trouble,” the guy said, searching for the black knit beanie that had fallen off his head. I wasn’t sure what to do.
“Say hello to Youngblood Barnett,” Farrell said to me. “Twenty years ago, he helped hookers off the mean streets of Brooklyn.” Youngblood was no longer young.
“Officer,” he replied, “I’ve been out for ten years and I don’t do nothing no more.”
“Hold on,” Bernie grabbed him. “Last time we talked was in Queens Criminal Court.”
“Yeah, and I didn’t get out for twelve years.” Youngblood replied.
“We still have to catch up about Lily,” Bernie said, and he lunged forward, causing Barnett to jump back and smack his head into a bronze statue of Jackie Gleason’s famed TV character, Ralph Kramden, which had been temporarily installed in front of the bus depot.
“You’ve got to be careful,” Bernie said with a friendly grin.
“Look, I didn’t know she worked for you, did I?” Youngblood winced, holding his scalp. “And why would I deliberately kill my best earner?”
“Let’s see, that was around twenty years ago,” Sergeant Bernie replied, “Lily would’ve been near forty now. She’d probably have two kids and a husband somewhere in Elmhurst.”
“I’m not the only one here who wasted someone,” Youngblood answered, loud enough for the few bystanders to hear.
Crazed, Sergeant Farrell pulled the guy backwards over his knee, knocking him to the ground again, then he bent his knee on the guy’s chest. He leaned slowly on Youngblood’s turkey gobbler with his other knee. A crowd started forming.
“Lily told me she wanted a little boy and girl, so that’s two other people you killed.” He smacked the old guy in the face. At that point I heard someone in the crowd mutter, “police brutality.”
“Come on Bernie, we’ve got an audience,” I nudged.
“Take a fucking look at a killer,” Bernie yelled to me, but really to the surrounding crowd. “he used to beat up on innocent white girls for a living.”
“The AIDS would’ve killed her by now anyway.” Old Youngblood mumbled, squeezing out from under him and struggling to his feet. “It got them all in the end.”
Bernie made a pained expression, then smacked the former pimp upside his skull, knocking a small flesh-colored wedge out of the old man’s head.
“I know what you did in Bushwick,” the ex-con squealed. “You wasted Tyrone saying it was a holdup, but we both know he never woulda drawn on you!”
When a pair of Port Authority cops came out of the bus station, I showed them my badge and explained that a drunk and disorderly situation had turned into resisting arrest. Bernie backed off, and the ex-con spat bloody saliva on the icy sidewalk. With the PA cops and the crowd watching, we couldn’t just let the guy walk, so I pushed Youngblood against a wall and read him his rights.
As I cuffed him, I saw Bernie pick up the thing that had fallen out of Youngblood’s head.
“Give it here,” I said, before he could stomp on it. He tossed me a waxy hearing aid.
Somehow I sensed that I was now doing his old partner’s job—reining Bernie in. After a minute, when most of the people had dispersed, I uncuffed Youngblood and handed him the hearing aid. The former pimp grabbed the one shopping bag that wasn’t ripped apart and scooped up a handful of the bagged socks. Several packages had disappeared into the black slush in the gutter. Then he hurried off down the block.
“Isn’t this the kind of shit that got you assigned to desk duty in the first place?” I said to Bernie.
Silently he led us back to the car. As we were heading downtown, his cell phone rang and he answered it, even though he was driving. From the awkwardness of his tone, I figured he was talking with his estranged wife. In a clear, somber tone, he started talking about his failures as a husband. I quickly pulled out my cell and called my brother.
Seeing my name on his display, without even letting me say hello, Carl began: “I know that sometimes I get a little manic, and you’re always the first to warn me, but this time it’s you. You went from one extreme to the other with this scorpion guy.”
“Stop calling him that, asshole!” I shouted. Bernie looked over and abruptly ended his conversation.
“All right, I’m sorry,” my brother replied. “I just worry about you. Are you still in that weird cult?”
When I’d told Carl about Kundalini and its alleged psychic properties, he insisted that it was dangerous and said I should stop attending immediately.
“It’s just yoga,” I said, and told him I had to go.
“Annie discovered our Jane Doe is one Nelly Linquist,” Bernie said. Apparently it wasn’t his wife but his fellow detective he’d been talking on the phone with. After establishing the vic’s identity, Annie and Alex had called escort houses until they located the one our victim had worked for. Annie had just given him the address, so Bernie and I drove to a luxury high rise in Gramercy Park to break the news.
The madam was a big-breasted Southern magnolia with a head of stiff dyed red hair. When Bernie showed his badge at the door, she gasped.
“Relax,” Bernie said, “We’re homicide. We’ve found Nelly Linquist.” He showed the sketch of her face.
“Damn! Nelly was such a special gal, you know?” she eulogized. “A lot of fellas will really miss her.”
Using a rolled-up Kleenex, she dabbed her tears before they could erode the dried layers of mascara. It looked as if they had been plastered on her face one over the other for years.
Bernie cut to the chase.” Who was Nelly’s last customer?”
The poinsettia-haired office manager went to a little card catalog box, rummaged in it, and exclaimed, “Oh, yes! I remember now. This guy couldn’t spell his own gosh darn name—Dhaka.”
“Couldn’t spell his own name?” Bernie echoed, glaring at her.
“Yeah, he had to do it a couple times till it came out right for the credit card.”
“You’re a fucking moron,” Bernie spat ferociously. “I should arrest you as an accomplice.”
She gave him a sour look.
“I don’t care that you run a whorehouse, but at very least you should protect your girls! Which means if a guy calls up and can’t spell his own fucking name, I’d expect you to be a little suspicious.” I could see the madam looking puzzled.
“How would this guy have found out about your place?” I asked softly, since Bernie had immediately alienated her.
“We advertise on cable TV, and in the back pages of newspapers. We’re trying to run a business.”
“Why did you send Nelly?” Bernie asked.
“He asked for a big blonde.”
Bernie reached into his pocket and located a photo of the crime scene, something he hadn’t shown to anyone else because it was so disturbing and handed it to her. “First he strangled her slowly, then he cut her up like a piece of meat.”
“I don’t see her . . . face.”
“That’s because he chopped her head off,” Bernie said bluntly. Pointing within the photo, he added, “See! That’s where he stuck it.”
She covered her mouth in horror then started weeping painfully. Bernie snatched the photo back.
“There’s no possibility he saw any of your other girls?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t know who he was,” she said as she staggered into a seat.
“Do you recognize that?” Bernie asked, handing her a close-up photograph of Nelly’s wrist that showed her blood splattered bracelet.
“No.”
“No, it’s not hers? Or no, you don’t recognize it?” he pushed.
“I don’t recognize it. It could be hers. I just don’t know.”
“And you didn’t recognize the client’s voice?”
“No, I don’t remember anything unusual about it.”
“Did he sound educated, foreign? Regional?” Bernie asked.
Looking grim, she stiffly nodded no.
Bernie handed her his business card, and said she should call him if anything relevant came to mind.
As we headed back to the car, Bernie called Annie who contacted VISA headquarters and tracked down one Mr. Ahmed Dhaka. Though he had used his credit card about a dozen times in the past week, the only place he’d used it recently, prior to paying for the vic, was at a porn arcade across from Penn Station. It turned out Mr. Dhaka worked for an investment firm on Times Square, Dunleavy Money Management. Bernie got the address: 3 Times Square. He thought it would be a good idea to pop in unannounced, just in case the guy really was a crazed murderer. Since our killer had already established a clear MO of stealing credit cards, he agreed this was a long shot. Still, Bernie pointed out that this was the first guy who hadn’t bothered to report his card missing, and it seemed odd that the two sex-related expenses were back to back. The killer had never used a stolen card more than once.
We parked in a small police lot on Forty-second and headed to 3 Times Square, which turned out to be the new Reuters Building, an artsy-fartsy modern structure that curved every which way. It occupied the northeast corner between Forty-second and Forty-third. As we approached the entrance on Seventh Avenue, Bernie halted abruptly.
“What’s up?” I asked, looking around nervously in case he had spotted another shady character from his angry past.
“I just need a moment,” he said, going over to one of the many food carts that lined the curb. I watched him buy a cold can of Coke and reach into his shirt pocket. He took out a small pill, put it in his mouth, opened the Coke, took a sip to wash the capsule down, then tossed the remainder into the garbage can on the corner. Next he pulled out a cigarette, lit it, took one puff, then dropped it, crushed it underfoot, and walked past me into the building. When he looked up at the building index to check where we needed to go, I could see his forehead was covered in sweat.
Since 9/11, all modern buildings had installed security turnstiles, much like the subway, that everyone had to pass through to gain entrance. We showed our IDs, got sticker badges and went inside. As we took the elevator up to the 26th floor, I noticed Bern’s jacket collar had flipped up so I reached over and folded it down.
“I don’t mind you doing that when we’re alone,” he said, “but not when we’re with anyone.”
“I know.”
When we stepped out in front of the firm’s large, circular receptionist desk, Bernie flashed his badge. I belatedly took out mine as well. He asked for Ahmed Dhaka and we were redirected down to the sixth floor. During the elevator drop Bernie said, “When I show my shield, don’t show yours.”
“Why not?”
“Cause it makes us look like the fucking Bobbsey Twins.”
The elevator door opened into a smaller reception area. Bernie asked for Mr. Dhaka.
“Who shall I say is asking for him?”
“Bernie Farrell,” he said, without announcing he was a cop. He wanted to catch the guy off-guard.
As the receptionist buzzed Mr. Dhaka and repeated the name, I could see Bernie discreetly put his hand inside his jacket, checking his gun. A few minutes later a dark-skinned, heavy-set guy in a loose suit appeared in the doorway.
“Detective Farrell,” Bernie introduced, discreetly flashing his shield.
“Bloody hell,” Dhaka said with a clear accent, “You’re not with Homeland Security, are you?”
“No, why?”
“I’m just tired of being suspected of being a terrorist.”
“Nothing like that,” I reassured him.
“We can sit over here, he said, nodding toward a group of chairs in the corner of the reception area.”
As he turned, I saw that the right sleeve of his jacket was sewn up, just below the shoulder. His arm was missing.
“With this new Patriot Act, I’m utterly terrified of being deported. Immigrants are totally unprotected now.”
“Your credit card was just used in a murder that we’re investigating,” Bernie said.
Mr. Dhaka hunched tightly in his chair and lowered his voice nervously. “You’re kidding.”
“Can we talk about a purchase you made at Penn Video?”
“What? I mean . . .” he glanced nervously at the receptionist, who was busily typing into her word processor. “I never broke any laws in my life.”
Bernie asked him where he was on the night that Nelly Linquist was murdered.
“At home in Jackson Heights, with my wife and two little girls.”
“Mr. Dhaka,” the receptionist said getting off the phone, “Hector Beck is waiting for you.”
“Oh my God, my team supervisor is urgently expecting a progress report. All I’ll need is ten minutes with him.”
“You know the Starbucks across the street?” Bernie asked.
“On Forty-third?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“How about we meet there in fifteen minutes?”
“That would be bloody great!”
As we took the elevator back down, Bernie muttered something about being glad to be out of there.
“Why?”
“Sometimes interrogating someone successfully is as simple as finding a place where they feel comfortable,” he replied. But I sensed it was more than that.
As we approached the coffee shop, I watched a group of men in Teamster jackets assembling a small platform on the traffic island across from the MTV window, while another group of contractors on the east side of Forty-third Street were dismantling a makeshift stage that featured the logo of the ABC morning show. The neighborhood that once epitomized crime and scum had been taken over and transformed into the glamorous showcase of corporate America.
No sooner had we reached the front of the line when Ahmed Dhaka came in the door. Bernie asked him if he would like a coffee.
He shook his head—“Stains my teeth”—and joined us at a table that had just opened up.
“According to our records,” Bernie replied, staring at him, “Last week you paid twenty dollars for a tape at a video outlet near Penn Station.”
I didn’t correct him, but it was actually a DVD. The guy was clearly embarrassed, and unable to look up. Personally I did not think pornography necessarily led to violent behavior. If a man was able to release his tension, I was inclined to believe that it usually made him more manageable.
“Why didn’t you call the card in as missing?”
Ahmed silently took his wallet out of his pocket and flipped through his credit cards. “Which one is it?”
“Your Bank of America VISA card.”
To our surprise, Dhaka held up the card.
“Oh wait, “he said, nodding. “I remember now. The clerk couldn’t slide it through his machine for some reason, and he had trouble reading the numbers, so I read it out to him.”
“There you go,” Bernie said to me. “Our boy was there.”
Dhaka shrugged.
“You don’t remember anyone standing nearby,” I asked. “Maybe even writing it down?” After all, who could memorize a sixteen-digit number, along with an expiration date and a three-digit security code, all being spoken quickly aloud?
“I’m sorry, I honestly don’t remember,” he said. “And I don’t want to be rude, but if I don’t get back to work soon, Beck’s going to notice my absence.”
We both thanked him for his time and watched him cross the busy street, back to the giant wavy fish tank he worked in.
“I know this sounds disgusting,” Bernie said with a grin, “but while I was talking to Mr. Dhaka, I had this awful image of the guy masturbating with his one remaining hand.”
“Hey, physically challenged people get horny too,” I replied.
“Physically challenged—that’s what I love about you kids today, you’re all so fair and sensitive.”
I zoned him out as we walked down the north side of Forty-second, past the New Victory Theater and the American Airlines Theater across from Madame Tussauds and Ripley’s Believe It or Not, then crossed at the newly established crosswalk between the two Avenues.
When we got back to the car I thought we’d head back to the precinct, but Bernie suddenly turned on Thirty-fourth and parked on the corner of Eighth, across from the New Yorker Hotel. Looking up, I realized we were idling in front of a porn arcade.
“This is where Dhaka had his credit card number taken. Come on. Maybe we can catch our boy in the act.”
I couldn’t help wondering if he was doing this just to toy with me. Half the establishment was crowded and the other half was empty. This was the amusing result of Giuliani’s crusade to clean up Times Square. Current laws stated that only forty percent of any video store could be devoted to porn. To take advantage of this sticky loophole, sixty percent of these shops now stocked a cheap archive of dumb Kung Fu flicks or Bollywood musicals—films none of their customers wanted.
Even though the G-rated side of the place was unpopulated, I pushed into the smutty side of the store to show Bernie I wasn’t timid. Apparently self-conscious in the presence of a female, many of the men discreetly vanished. Images of fucking and sucking were plastered on every box cover. The video tapes and DVDs were shelved by category: Anal, Oral, Group, Gangbang, Asians, Toys, and so on, but when I examined the dirty pictures on the wrapping, I realized how useless some of these divisions were. Asian women were clearly thinking outside the box, brazenly performing lesbian acts. Gangbangers could be seen multitasking, performing both oral and anal sex. Others used a wide array of plastic toys. Most the films seemed to be big sexual free for alls, though their titles, like Pussy Lickers #43 and Assgaper’s Holiday, indicated the intended themes.
“Cut it out,” Bernie said softly as I began to slip misplaced boxes into their correct sections.
“We’re checking on a credit card theft from last week,” Bernie said inaccurately, showing his shield to the clerk. I knew he’d be pissed if I corrected him. “The victim was a one-armed Indian.”
“Yeah, I remember him. I wasn’t able to get a phone connection, so I took the number down and called it in later.”
“Do you remember anyone standing nearby when he made his purchase?”
“No, and I was careful not to say it out loud.”
Bernie nodded and took a step toward the door. I said, “So you wrote the guy’s number down?”
“Yeah, he’s been in a bunch of times, so he knows me. He pre-signed it and took the receipt.”
“So our suspect might’ve waited around and then, after you were able to call it in, taken the number out of the trash when you weren’t looking.” I pointed to the can sitting right before me.
“What are you saying?”
“She’s asking if you have a video camera focused on your cash register,” Bernie asked, looking up for a lens.
“No we don’t,” he replied, then added, “Long as she’s not suggesting it was my fault.”
“Relax,” I replied as we turned to leave.
“Hold on,” Bernie suddenly stopped. “That’s exactly what she’s saying—and she’s right, asshole!”
“Hey, don’t call me—”
“You’re a fucking moron who helped one guy get ripped off and assisted in the murder of a young girl,” he yelled, compelling everyone to look over. “And the next time one of these pudpullers trust you with their credit card info, you should reward their patronage by tearing up the information before throwing it out.”
I wanted to tell him that his outburst was counterproductive, but I knew he’d start yelling at me, so we returned in silence to the car and drove the few blocks back to the precinct.
“What were you doing with those porn boxes?” he asked.
My OCD had gotten the better of me. “Oh . . . I was just wondering if any of our vics had done any films.” It was the only bullshit answer I could think of, and I didn’t want to admit to my mild disorder.
As we pulled into the precinct’s restricted parking area, Bernie spotted Annie getting into another car.
“Where are you going?” Bernie asked.
She said she had just located Nelly Linquist’s apartment, in Bushwick, and she was going to look for information there that might enable us to contact her family.
“Gladyss will go with you.”
As I was getting into her car, Bernie added, “I need to know if the killer is putting bracelets on these girls, or if it’s their own stuff. Check out her jewelry box and see if she has any bracelets like the one she was wearing.”
We drove down Broadway, over to Delancey, and then took the Williamsburg Bridge until we were driving under the Elevated J/M train trestle. We pulled up outside a rundown tenement off Myrtle Avenue. Annie got the super to give us access to Linquist’s place. We found a tiny stash of pot, various pills, and a small bag that looked like heroin. She had a lot more drug paraphernalia—roach clips, bongs, syringes. I pushed through a drawer of cheap jewelry that looked like it had been picked up in endless thrift shops. It was an eclectic collection and gave us no clue as to whether the bracelet she was wearing was actually hers. Despite a thorough search, we couldn’t find an address book, journal, or letters. The only items we found regarding her home life were a dozen or so sad old snapshots of her as a kid, smiling or playing with other kids, in what looked like a trailer park.
As we were pulling up the mattress and looking to see if she had anything taped under her drawers, Bernie called to ask if the bracelet was hers. I told him it could be, there was no way to know for sure. And we hadn’t found anything that would enable us to contact her family.
“All right, get back over here. There’s still a lot to do.”
I hung up and told Annie that Bernie wanted us back, but she only searched harder without making eye contact. I sensed that over the years Annie had burnt out her tear glands on cases like this. All I could see was a faint gloss in her eyes. After a while longer, Annie finally gave up. And that was it. Now that Nelly’s life was over, there seemed scant evidence that she had ever even existed.
“I don’t care as much about the older ones or the high-priced girls, but the kids are just runaways,” Annie said on the drive back over the bridge. “And we’re their last chance to return their bodies to someone who might’ve loved them. After us, it’s usually Potter’s Field.”
Back at the precinct, Bernie had us divvy up a comprehensive list of all Manhattan escort services. Stationed next to a phone, each of us worked our way down our part of the list. Speaking to the madam, or the manager, we explained that a serial murderer was on the loose. If any new johns asked for a tall, blonde-haired gal, we needed to be notified immediately, while the john was still waiting. Grateful that we weren’t going after them, the purveyors of women were usually pleased to oblige.
“Bring some kind of sexy outfit with you on Monday,” Bernie said to me as I was leaving for the weekend.
“Is that a joke?”
“That’s why we got you, remember? Just keep the outfit in your locker, so if the killer calls you can throw it on.”
As I was walking out of the building, looking forward to a seven o’clock yoga class, I heard, “So how’s your big case coming?”
O’Ryan had just finished his shift as well. I told him we’d had no breakthroughs and asked how he was coping without me.
“They got me paired up with Lenny Lobotomy,” he said as we walked south together. I didn’t mention that I had seen them on patrol earlier.
“Are you getting along with him?”
“Oh yeah, he’s great. He’s offered to set me up on a date with his neighbor.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, but I am kind of seeing someone.”
“Really? Who?”
“A girl.” He obviously didn’t want to be more specific. “But it’s all still up in the air. Anyway what’s up with your case?”
“Well,” I said trying not to sound distressed, “We’re setting some traps.”
“That’s right, you’re blond pross bait,” he said. “Nervous?”
“Not really.” Then remembering my homework that night as we approached my building, I figured I might have another shot with O’Ryan. “Actually I have to find something sexy to wear for the stakeout.”
“Sounds like fun.”
“Wanna help?” I asked trying to sound seductive.
“How?”
I simply pointed into my apartment and opening the door, he followed me inside. As we headed up the stairs, I was shaking my ass in front of him, but instead of trying anything, he was busy recounting Bernard Kerik’s meteoric rise to police commissioner.
“In 1994, he totally lucked out by getting posted to Giuliani’s protective detail . . .” On and on he went. Little could O’Ryan guess at the time that in just a few short years, Kerik’s stunning career would end with him being sentenced to four years in federal prison.
When we reached my landing, Maggie’s door abruptly flew open. I could see her eyes widen instantly at the dimwitted hulk following me.
“Eddie, this is Maggie,” I introduced them.
He nodded coolly. Maggie batted her long lashes and continued downstairs, probably to meet her non-boyfriend/bartender Rick. In a moment we were alone inside my place. I grabbed some clothes and dashed into the bathroom.
“So your neighbor’s a little hottie,” he said from the bedroom as I slipped into a corduroy miniskirt and skimpy halter top I’d bought but never had the nerve to wear.
“How does this look?” I asked, standing before him, revealing far more than I ever recalled doing before.
“Where are you going to hide your wire?”
“Thanks Eddie, you’re a real confidence builder.” The man was one frozen fish stick.
“Sorry,” he said, then looked awkwardly to the floor. “I think you’re beautiful. But my head’s still on the job.”
“Was your head on the job on New Year’s Eve, ’cause you made me feel like crap then too.”
“That was different,” he said.
“Not to me.”
“Can I make a confession?” he asked. “It might sound strange . . .”
As he usually was so guarded, I nervously nodded yes.
“That night something weird happened to me.”
“What night?”
“You know. . . New Year’s Eve.”
“What happened?”
“Well . . . this is really embarrassing, so I don’t want you to freak out or nothing.”
“I won’t freak.”
“After you mentioned your . . . circumstances”—he was awkwardly referring to my virginity—“I was trying to go slow, and then your brother called.”
“I remember.”
“And I thought it was odd that you chose the call over me.”
“I’m sorry, he hasn’t been doing well lately . . .”
“No, that’s okay. It when you showed me that photo of you and him, your twin . . .”
“Carl?”
“Yeah, it just kind of took the wind out of my sails, if you get my meaning.”
“What took the wind out of your sails?”
“Seeing that photo of the two of you side by side . . .”
“What about it?”
“Well, first telling me you were a virgin sort of knocked me out, but then afterwards, when he called and you showed me that photo. How can I explain, it was like seeing you as a . . . as a man.”
“What?”
“I’m sorry.”
“What, are you . . .”—I wasn’t even sure what to call it—“twinophobic?”
“No . . . I mean, if you had a twin sister it’d be hot.”
“So you’re homotwinphobic?”
“I don’t think so. I have gay friends. I just didn’t expect it. It kind of hit me out of left field.”
“But I already told you I was a twin.”
“I know you did. It was a spontaneous, visceral reaction and I’m truly sorry.”
What could I say?
“The important thing is, I do really like you. I think you’re hot and I want another shot.”
“We’ll see,” I replied. What was I suppose to say—let’s jump in the sack? Without asking for another date, he gave me a peck on the cheek and left, just like that.
I finally decided on my old high school shirt and skirt uniform, which I was now barely able to squeeze into, and packed it for work.
