Which was exactly what Lieberman had counted on. Had she gone to work, he had another stop to make that might have worked just as well.
“Just take a few minutes,” Lieberman said.
The wait was long with a hum on the intercom to let the two men know the connection hadn’t been cut.
“A few minutes,” she said, and the door buzzed and clicked.
The detectives walked up the two flights of stairs and found the door. Even though she was now expecting two policemen, she had not opened the door and didn’t do so till they knocked and again identified themselves. Only then did she open the locks and let them in.
She was a mess, hardly recognizable as the woman he had spoken to at the T&L. Her dark hair was uncombed. There was a definite smudge on her glasses. She wore a robe heavier than the weather and the heat of the apartment called for.
The detectives went in and looked around. The apartment was neat, expensively decorated in whites and blacks, very modern, not to either detective’s taste.
“Sorry about your illness,” Lieberman said, standing to face the woman. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m just sick,” she said. “Sometimes a person is just sick.”
“Have you read the papers this morning, listened to the news, watched television?” asked Lieberman.
“No,” she said.
“Mind if I ask ‘Why?’ ”
“I’m sick.”
“Rita, Clark Mills, the man who threatened you on the street day before yesterday, is dead.”
Lieberman took the folded-up newspaper Kearney had given him and handed it to her.
“I was eating crackers,” she said, not seeming to absorb the information, not looking at the newspaper in her hand. “Would you like some?”
“No, thanks,” Abe and Bill said together.
Rita went to sit down on the chrome-and-white leather sofa. The detectives weren’t invited to join her but they did, sitting on furniture that was as uncomfortable as it looked.
“Rita,” Lieberman said gently, “do you know who killed Clark Mills?”
“No,” she said emphatically, shaking her head.
“Want to know how he was killed?” he asked.
“No.”
“Then maybe you’ll be interested in knowing that he was leaving the city today, if he had lived,” said Lieberman.
Rita looked up in disbelief from detective to detective. “That’s not true.”
“It’s true.” Hanrahan came in. “He called me last night, said he’d be gone today. I believe him.”
“So do I,” said Abe. “Can we get you something?”
“Crackers are dry. Maybe some water.”
Hanrahan rose and moved toward the kitchen that could be seen beyond the open door of the dining area.
“In the refrigerator,” she said. “Not the tap.”
“Your father was in the Korean War,” said Lieberman.
“Yes,” Rita answered.
“He bring back any trophies? Guns, flags, you know.”
“I don’t remember.”
“I’m going to make a statement,” he said softly. “You don’t have to respond. I believe you or your father killed Clark Mills last night in the alley across the street.”
Hanrahan was discreetly taking his time in the kitchen. He had caught a sign from Lieberman, almost imperceptible, that he wanted to be alone with the woman.
“No,” she said. “Was he really leaving?”
“He was.”
“Oh my God,” she said, looking at the newspaper in her hand and scanning the article on Mills the paper was folded to reveal. “He had a family. He was famous.”
“He was a man,” said Lieberman. “He could have been better, but he could have been worse.”
She looked away and said, “Ten years ago I was raped. I didn’t report it. I was … I needed a lot of help and some hospital time. My parents were at my side, paid for everything. Eventually I came out and climbed back.”
“And I understand that you’ve done very well,” said Lieberman.
“I thought so until the other night,” she said. “Now I’m afraid to go out, afraid to go to work. He’s dead, but there are others. There’ll always be others.”
Hanrahan returned with a glass of water and handed it to the woman, who took it with a cracked-lip, vacant smile.
“Rita, I’m afraid we’re going to ask you to come with us to answer a few questions,” Lieberman said gently.
“I know the law,” she said. “I don’t have to go. I don’t have to talk to you.”
“We can get a warrant for you as a possible witness to murder,” said Lieberman.
Hanrahan continued to stand though he took several steps back to give the woman room. She downed the water in one long gulp and closed her eyes.
“I didn’t kill him,” she said.
“And you don’t and didn’t have a gun in this apartment?” Lieberman asked, knowing he was walking thin, but she was still only a possible witness. If he was going to charge her, he would need more evidence, and then he would come back with a warrant and deliver the Miranda.
“No,” she said, putting down the empty glass and looking at it.
“You know, don’t you?” asked Lieberman. He had not said what it was he thought she knew. It could have been a thousand and one things, but there was no doubt for either one of them.
“Nothing more to say,” she said. “Sorry he’s dead. No, he did this to me. He set me back a decade. I’m not sorry. He was just going somewhere else to terrorize other people and eventually hurt some woman like me. I’m not sorry he’s dead.”
“Maybe you want to think about it,” said Lieberman. “Maybe you’ll be interested in talking to his mother. We’re going to invite her to come and take the body back to Georgia after the autopsy.”
“No,” said Rita. “Why should I want to talk to his mother? Everybody has a mother.”
“Suit yourself,” Lieberman said, rising. “Thanks for talking to us. If you don’t mind, Detective Hanrahan has a few more questions about what happened that night and some of the other people in the neighborhood who might have been confronted by Clark Mills.”
“I don’t know anyone in the neighborhood,” Rita said. “And this isn’t a neighborhood. It’s houses and apartments where people generally leave each other alone.”
“Indulge me,” Lieberman said. “Your father and I have known each other a long time.”
The woman did not see the look between the two men, but Hanrahan gave that almost imperceptible nod that showed he understood.
As soon as he was in the hall, Lieberman moved ahead quickly, down the stairs and across the street. Hanrahan’s job was to keep Rita Blitzstein talking and away from the phone. The second he was in the car Abe radioed for a phone number and then dialed it. There was no answer. He hit the button after six rings and called the station to ask that a couple of uniforms go to Robert Blitzstein’s office in his children’s furniture shop in Wilmette. They were to bring him in immediately for questioning in the Clark Mills murder. They were to keep him from making any calls, and no one was to talk to them.
Hanrahan came out fifteen minutes later, enough time for the uniforms, if they hurried, to get to Blitzstein. Abe hoped they had hurried. Hanrahan got in the car with a tired grunt.
“You kept her long enough,” Lieberman said.
“Wasn’t easy, but from deep inside my old man, the Irish charm burst like … gotta stop talking like this.”
They drove back to the station quickly.
“David Donald Wilhite,” said Lieberman.
“David Donald Wilhite,” Hanrahan repeated. “Could be nothing. Could be Stashall worked something out with him. Could be he did it on his own. Could be lots of things, but we look for Wilhite. I got more than a feeling the kid’s in Chicago, and one way or the other way my boy, our David, has some answers.”
“It’s a lead,” said Lieberman.
“Maybe a good one,” s
aid Hanrahan. “Want to handle Mr. Blitzstein by yourself? I need a few hours on the sofa at home.”
“Make it the rest of the day if you like,” said Lieberman. “I’ll get someone in the squad to take the interrogation room window.”
“A tempting offer.”
“I’m not always this generous.” Lieberman pulled into the small parking lot behind the station. “Maybe I’ve been taken by the muse.”
“Escape,” said Hanrahan. “Take the advice of your priest. Muses lead you astray. I know.”
Hanrahan and Lieberman got out of the car and Hanrahan headed for his own. Lieberman went through the back door of the station, passed a few uniforms, went up the stairs and into the squad room, which was relatively busy. The people he would have liked to back him were tied up or out of the office. He could ask Kearney or a uniform, but it would go down better with a detective who could put in for decent overtime if he had to testify.
The only one who was there without a witness or suspect next to his desk in the middle of the room was Tony Munoz. Tony was big. Tony was tough. Tony was nearly fearless, which was a bad idea in a cop. Tony also lost control, let his sense of justice kick in and come out with a rage directed at a suspect or reluctant witness. He had been disciplined three times, suspended once, but Tony was the youngest member of the squad. There was a chance he would change. Everyone knew Tony would take a bullet for you and that if he thought there was any chance of tracking down a felony, he would stay with it without asking for overtime and working double shifts.
“Tony,” Lieberman said, approaching the young man’s desk. “You got a minute to give me a hand?”
“You got it,” Munoz said, putting aside the report he was working on and rising.
“I need you behind the mirror to witness an interrogation.”
That, Tony knew, might mean testifying in court down the road, but he didn’t hesitate and didn’t ask where Hanrahan was.
“Let’s go,” he said.
And they went, Tony to the room behind the interrogation room window and Lieberman to the interrogation room. Blitzstein was already there sitting behind the table, his back to the wall facing whoever sat across from him and the mirror. He kept glancing over Lieberman’s shoulder as they talked.
“How are you, Bob?” Lieberman said before Blitzstein could ask for a lawyer.
“I’m fine,” said the thin, gaunt man whose face and movements Lieberman knew well from dozens of temple committee meetings.
Lieberman and Bess had bought Lisa’s baby bedroom furniture from Blitzstein when Blitzstein was a very young man working for his father. Later Lisa and Todd had bought furniture for Lieberman’s grandchildren. Bob Blitzstein had given them a very generous discount.
“I just came back from talking to Rita,” Lieberman said, sitting across from the man. “She told me.”
“No.” Blitzstein shook his head.
“Yes,” said Lieberman. “Your daughter is distraught, torn between loyalty, anger, and an upbringing by you and your wife that taught her to do the right thing.”
Blitzstein looked as if he wanted to say something. His thin white fingers were folded on the table in front of him. The tabletop was a mess. It had been thrown around by cops and criminals. It looked as if it had been through some major violence. Suspects and witnesses did not like the table. Before Blitzstein could get out a word, Lieberman stopped him by saying “I’m going to read you your rights. When I’m done and you sign the form saying you understand, I’ll listen to you. I want to listen to you, Bob. I want to help.”
“This is —” Blitzstein shouted, rising from the chair.
Lieberman found the performance sad. He had seen much better righteous indignation from street kids and drug dealers who had done each other in with large guns at close range. Lieberman read the rights at an even pace, pausing to ask Blitzstein, who had resumed his seat, if he understood. He nodded his head yes the first time and Lieberman asked him to say yes or no. When he was done, Lieberman passed the sheet to Blitzstein along with a click pen. Blitzstein looked at it and signed.
While Blitzstein was writing, Lieberman said gently, “Did he come after you in the alley, Bob?”
Blitzstein looked up and pushed the paper back. His eyes were moist and his hand shaking. “Can I ask for a lawyer now?”
“You can,” said Lieberman. “May I say something before you decide?”
“Speak.” Blitzstein rubbed his thin neck with his left hand, a nervous habit Lieberman had noted at many a meeting.
“Clark Mills was leaving Chicago today,” said Lieberman. “He called my partner, told us where he was going. He wasn’t going to be a threat to anyone anymore.”
“That doesn’t change anything,” Blitzstein said, forgetting about asking for a lawyer. “My only child was set back ten years and I don’t know if she can ever recover. You have an only child Abe, a girl. What would you do?”
“What did you do, Bob?” Lieberman asked.
“You know.”
“I think things’ll go easier if you talk to me. You had provocation. You were distraught, maybe temporarily out of your mind. The gun is yours, Bob. I recognize it. You showed it to me once.”
Nothing of the sort had ever happened. Lieberman held his breath.
“I showed it to a lot of people,” said Blitzstein. “I was proud of what I did in Korea. That’s the forgotten war. All that’s left of it is M*A*S*H reruns. I saw … what does it matter.”
“You killed Clark Mills,” Lieberman said. He didn’t ask.
“I don’t care if he was a football star, if he had a family, if he was leaving town. He destroyed my baby. The goddamn city is full of people like that, and the police don’t do anything about it.”
“You admit that you shot Clark Mills in that alley?” Lieberman asked.
“Yes,” said Blitzstein. “Forty years ago when I was a kid, I shot North Koreans and went back behind the lines for a hot meal, a few hours’ sleep, and a beer or two. I’m too old for what I did last night. I’m still shaking, Abe. God help me, I killed a man. I told myself I was killing an animal, but it was a man.”
Blitzstein’s head hung down. He bit his tongue to keep from crying.
“I think you better call a lawyer now. Bob. Don’t say anything more.”
“Yes. I’ll call my sister. She’ll get a lawyer. I’ll lose the business, go to jail, be in all the newspapers. Abe, I love kids. You know that.”
“I know it,” Lieberman said, acting as if he understood the relevance of the remark, which, at some level, he did.
“I did the right thing,” Blitzstein said, lifting his head. “I’d —”
“Stop talking, Bob,” Lieberman said. “You want a phone?”
“A phone?”
“To call your sister, whoever you want.”
Blitzstein nodded yes and Lieberman leaned over the table to touch his shoulder. Lieberman did understand what the quivering man in front of him had done and why. Lieberman had done worse, choosing to act as God, determine life and death for people who he thought deserved immediate extinction instead of a trial and a prison term that would get them back out on the street. Lieberman had exacted old-fashioned revenge more than once. Lieberman understood.
Lieberman waved a finger at the mirror to signal Munoz that the interview was over. Then he led the disoriented Blitzstein out and to his desk. He backed away to give Blitzstein some privacy in the noisy, now-crowded squad room.
“Lieberman,” Munoz said with a grin, “that was the fastest turnover I’ve ever seen.”
“You’re still young.” Lieberman watched Blitzstein pause, probably forgetting his sister’s phone number, and then start to dial. “The man wanted to talk. He wants the world to forgive him. He wants me to forgive him. He wants the members of our temple to forgive him. He thinks I’m his friend.”
“Are you?” asked Munoz.
“In a way,” said Lieberman.
“Righteous,” said Munoz. “Like me.
Turn him over if he did the felony, even if he’s your best friend.”
Lieberman said nothing. Not only had he exacted his own sentences on more than one occasion, he had arranged for the unrighteous and the unholy to walk free when it promised a more long-range payoff down the calendar.
“You lock him up while I fill out the papers?” Lieberman asked, not wanting to face Blitzstein, not now.
“Sure.”
Lieberman walked to Hanrahan’s desk. There was an envelope on it, a special delivery one-day. The return address was to Elizabeth Wilhite in Rockville, Maryland. Lieberman opened the package and found himself looking at the face of a young man. The young man was pudgy with straight blond hair. David Donald Wilhite was wearing a suit. David Donald Wilhite was wearing a smile. Lieberman didn’t care for the suit or tie with little clocks on it. He didn’t care for the smile either.
He sat at his partner’s desk and single-finger-typed a simple note as Blitzstein finished his call and was led away from the desk. He needed Munoz’s hand on his arm to keep from stumbling. Lieberman would visit him later. Now he composed a note asking if a David Donald Wilhite were registered at the hotel or motel. He asked if whoever received the fax of the notice and the photograph would check with the staff to see if anyone recognized him. The young man, he explained, was wanted for questioning in a possible felony. A computer downtown would check the name with the computers of every hotel and motel in and around the city. Circulating the faxed photograph would take longer. The big hotels could get the photograph on their computer screens, but that covered only a small number of possible places Wilhite might be staying.
When he was finished, Lieberman wove his way out of the squad room and walked down to communications and dispatch where the fax machine was. He sent the copy of the photo downtown. If they weren’t backed up at the moment, it would go out in minutes. The cost would be more than a few hundred dollars, maybe much more. Abe would worry about that later. Now he had a kidnapper to catch and at least one life to be saved.
He vaguely heard the dispatcher on the radio behind him and the hum of the computer in the corner. Maybe he should have been pleased with how quickly they had put this homicide into the black. Rutgers would be happy. It would look good to the brass and the media, but Abe wasn’t pleased. He desperately wanted a cup of coffee and a big, fat lox and cream cheese sandwich on a garlic bagel with a thick slice of sweet onion. He decided not to have the sandwich before the faxing was even halfway through. He would settle for the coffee and a bagel with sugar-free jam from the Bagel Barn.
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