“No way, counselor,” Markowitz said. “We’ll drop the assault I charge, but he still takes a felony.”
“Your ‘assault with intent to kill’ is bogus, and you know it. You won’t even go to trial with that.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Evans said. “He wasn’t playing games. He said he would kill her, and he hurt her seriously. I think we can convince the jury of his intentions. Besides, if we find Alberta ourselves, and we will sooner or later, he’ll go down for murder.”
“Second-degree assault,” Judith Wilson said.
The two men looked at each other and Evans nodded. “We’ll go for that, provided your client takes us to the body, and the evidence doesn’t lead back to him.”
“You have to be more specific than that,” Wilson said. “Obviously if somebody knows where the body is, that person may have had some role in the death.”
“If that somebody killed the girl,” Evans said, “the deal is off. If he stood by and watched or just helped stash the body, the deal is on.”
“We agree to that,” Wilson said. “Now, if you have a typewriter that we can use, Detective Markowitz, we’ll write this up. I think everybody wants this over.”
“You can use this one if you want to,” Markowitz said as he pushed away from his desk.
“How’s your typing, Evans?” Wilson asked.
“First in my high-school class.”
“Good,” she said. “I was dead last.”
As the two men busily changed seats and set up the typewriter, Wilson winked at Katherine.
With Evans ready to type and Judith Wilson looking over his shoulder, Markowitz motioned with his head and walked away from the lawyers. Katherine followed him. He stopped beside the windows facing west. For a moment he seemed particularly interested in the view of Third Avenue below them, but then he turned and faced her.
“I want to thank you for putting us straight last night. We were so impressed with ourselves about our big drug bust that we forgot what we were supposed to be solving. The mother and the baby are the important people here. I don’t know how we forgot that.”
“You would have remembered soon enough.”
“I’m not so sure. All that brass here, from the chief on down. Getting the divers out to look for Fisher. I don’t know. Alberta and Olivia kind of got lost in the commotion. Glad you set us straight. Anyway, I paid a little visit to Wilson’s client early this morning. He didn’t need a lot of encouragement to see that it might be a good time to save his scrawny neck. If we had waited, somebody else might have gotten to him first and settled him down some. I’m not sure how much he knows, but I think he knows plenty. I’ve got him downstairs in a holding room.”
“Did you get any sleep last night?”
“I took a nap in the lounge while we were waiting for Wilson. I’m surprised Wright isn’t here. Do you want to give him a call?”
“I think we’ll leave him alone today,” Katherine said. “He’s got quite a bit on his mind right now.”
“Am I supposed to understand what you mean?”
“No. Nobody could understand. And don’t ask me any more about it. It doesn’t have anything to do with this. He’ll tell you when he’s ready.”
She looked out to the same street that had drawn Markowitz’s attention. There were trees on both sides, and their green leaves broke up the dismal black asphalt. A single bird darted from one branch to another, and she wondered what it was doing. It seemed to pay no attention to the traffic or to the people on the sidewalks. It had its own business. She wondered what the business of that busy little bird was.
Markowitz had become silent, and she saw his dark eyes within his glasses. With Markowitz, she had her own business, too, but she wondered if she would not prefer to be the little bird in the top of the tree.
“You don’t look like it’s real good news about Sam,” Markowitz said.
“Oh, it’s hard to say,” she said, then looked back outside. “What do you suppose that bird is doing?”
Markowitz moved closer to the window.
“I don’t know. Building a nest, maybe.”
“It’s almost fall. It wouldn’t build a nest in the fall.”
“City bird, you know. It might have things mixed up.”
She smiled with that observation. It did look as if it were building a nest. Transporting leaves and twigs in its beak, it moved so rapidly that it was difficult to follow. Finally it flew off, and the tree seemed much less alive.
“Do you like this job?” she asked.
“I guess so. Why? Having second thoughts?”
“I’m not sure I ever had first thoughts.”
“I’ll be glad if we find out what happened to Alberta. So will you.”
“Yes. I will. I don’t know why, but I will.”
“Animals like Pierre and Rutherford shouldn’t be on the street.”
“No, they shouldn’t. It’s just that I hate knowing how many there are.”
The desk chair rolled away from Markowitz’s desk, and she knew the noise meant it was time to go to work. She took one more look at the tree, but the bird had not returned.
Richard Rutherford sat in the backseat of the compact car between Katherine and Judith Wilson. Rutherford’s hands were cuffed behind him, and he squirmed to find a comfortable place. Each time he moved, his body pressed Katherine at different points. No point was welcome. Markowitz drove, and Evans, who had decided that Wilson was not going to be the only lawyer along, sat in the front passenger seat.
“Keep going on First Avenue,” Rutherford said. “I’ll tell you when to turn.”
“Where are we going?” Markowitz asked as he turned his head. Rutherford’s insistence on giving one direction at a time was beginning to annoy him.
“I’ll show you when we get there. I don’t want you to get lost.” It was not clear if he smiled or sneered, but he, alone, seemed to enjoy the show.
“We can still call this off, you know,” Markowitz said. “You haven’t shown us anything yet.”
“Yeah, right,” Rutherford said while giving his best scornful imitation. He was quite good at it. “And you can spend the rest of your life looking for that bitch.”
Katherine wondered who should hit him first. She felt like it, and her hands almost hurt from holding back.
“That’s enough, Richard,” Wilson said through a clenched jaw. “If you refuse to cooperate, the detective has a right, at any time, to take you back. Now answer his question.”
“It’s right up here. Here! Turn in here.”
Markowitz pulled into the parking lot behind the Donut Shop and stopped abruptly in the middle of the driveway. He turned around so quickly that Katherine wondered if his next move would be to jump into the backseat. Rutherford, along with the two women on either side of him, sank back into his seat as far as the cushion would allow.
“If this is a joke, punk, you and me are going to have a talk.”
“It’s here. All right? You want me to show you or what?”
“We’ve looked everywhere around here.”
“Yeah, well, you didn’t look so good then.”
Markowitz took a breath that all could see. “All right, Mr. Rutherford. You will show us.”
When Markowitz parked the car, Rutherford intended to follow Wilson out her side. Katherine pulled him out through her door instead. He bristled with the forced change of direction and even more when Katherine made him stand by the car door until the others joined them.
“You ready for me to show you?” he asked.
“Yes,” Markowitz said. “We’re ready for you to show us.”
“Down there.” He nodded with his head and tried to move his hands. Katherine’s fingers were around the handcuffs. “In the basement.”
Clearly Markowitz did not believe him. “All right, let’s take a look.”
Markowitz led the way, followed by Rutherford in Katherine’s grasp. The lawyers came behind. They made an odd procession, and t
he people in and around the parking lot stopped what they were doing and watched. At the stairway yellow tape marked off the entrance, and there were police signs prohibiting entry. Markowitz unlocked the police padlock that secured the entrance.
“Counselor, I’ll want you to stand right beside your client. We’ll stop inside the door. I don’t want him to go any farther than that.”
“I understand,” Wilson said.
“I don’t like where this is going.”
“I understand,” she repeated.
Markowitz pushed the door open and stepped inside. The cool smell of the basement drifted past them while they waited in the sunshine. It had the smell of darkness. Markowitz turned on the light switch and then stuck his head back outside. “Okay,” he said and motioned them in.
They crowded past the front door and shuffled, step by step, farther inside until everyone was in. Evans shut the door behind them. In a few moments, their eyes adjusted to the dimmer light, and they looked around the dreary room.
“What’s next?” Markowitz asked. He stood directly in front of the boy.
“You have to go into the next room,” the boy said.
“I was there yesterday. There’s nothing there.”
“I need to show you,” the boy said, losing patience with his confinement.
“No. You’re going to stay right here with your lawyer. You can tell me. So far, you’ve been real good at telling me where to go.”
The boy chafed within his handcuffs as though verbal instructions were beyond his ability. “In the next room, there’s a ceiling. Look, I can show you.”
“Keep talking. A ceiling.”
“In one place, the boards are loose. You can’t see it from the floor.”
“All right, let’s say I find those boards. Then what?”
“You push them out of the way and crawl up. There’s space between it and the floor up above.”
Two sentences seemed to be the maximum the boy could speak at one time without being reminded what he had said. Markowitz provided him the clue. “I’m up in the ceiling. What do I do then?”
“You crawl a little ways and there’s some more boards that are loose. They go to the basement next door. There’s no other way to get in there.”
“Next door?” Markowitz asked.
“Yeah. Pierre had it all worked out. You wouldn’t find it in a million years. There’s even a ladder there. We didn’t need it, but Pierre was too fat to pull himself up. Now you want me to show you?” the boy asked after finishing his longest speech of the day.
Markowitz ignored him and spoke to Wilson. “We’ll go to the next door, and your client can direct from there. He doesn’t go in the room though.”
In single file they walked to the next door. The pace was too slow for Rutherford, who could not get his shuffle properly under way. When they stopped, Markowitz put on a pair of rubber surgical gloves.
“That corner,” Rutherford said.
“Which corner?” Markowitz asked.
“Over there.” He nodded with his head.
Evans followed Markowitz into the room. The ceiling boards were low enough for Markowitz to tap with his flashlight.
“Farther. All the way to the wall. Shit, you guys never would have found it.”
Markowitz finally found the loose boards. Carefully he pushed them away. He muttered something under his breath. He pulled a table that was against the wall beneath the hole and was about to climb up on it when Rutherford yelled, “Hey! I forgot to tell you. You’re going to need a shovel.”
Markowitz paused for a moment, then abruptly climbed onto the table. He disappeared into the hole.
Wilson chose to ignore her client, and Katherine was willing to follow her example. Evans didn’t move away from the opening in the ceiling. Markowitz called back his progress. He let them know when he found the other room. Then there was a long period of silence. Rutherford wanted to speak several times, but Wilson wouldn’t let him. No one spoke.
At last they heard Markowitz coming back. When he got off the table, he brushed off his hands and then the knees of his trousers. He walked over to the boy.
“There’s some new concrete in the floor,” he said. “Is that where she is?”
“That’s it.”
“What happened to the old concrete?”
“We carried it out in buckets and put it in the Dumpster.”
“I hate to say this, Detective Markowitz, but we have to be careful what questions my client answers,” Judith Wilson said.
“No problem. Let me know when I’ve crossed your line.”
She nodded her head.
“I’d like to know how they got her over there.”
“She crawled, just like you,” Rutherford blurted out. He was eager to emerge from his silence. Markowitz looked at Wilson and raised his eyebrows as if to ask if the reply was appropriate.
“Richard, I can’t help you if you run off at the mouth like that.”
“Hey, you said if I didn’t kill her, they couldn’t do anything to me. I was right here. I never went in there until it was all over. I was supposed to be standing guard at the door outside, but I snuck over here anyway.”
“I think we’re okay then, Detective Markowitz,” Wilson said.
“Who went in there with her?” Markowitz asked. He signaled with his head that he meant the opposite room.
“Pierre and Morris.”
“Why would she go with them?”
“She wasn’t happy about it, I’ll tell you that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Bawling like a baby. But she wanted out, and they said they’d let her out—her and her kid. Shit, can’t nobody get out.”
“So why would she go into that room?”
“That’s where we split the dope. She knew about that. She carried it.”
“So maybe they told her she had to carry it one more time?”
“Maybe.”
“Do you know how they killed her?”
“I was standing here, remember?”
“Yes, Richard. I remember. We all remember. What did they use to kill her?”
“You should have heard her when she saw that hole. I dug it, man, and it was deep.”
“How deep?”
“Five, six feet. Took me all day. You should have heard her.”
“Yes. I almost can,” Markowitz said.
“Hollering like that. It wouldn’t do any good.”
“Somebody might have heard her. You heard her.”
Rutherford snickered from what he had heard. “They shut her up quick. It sounded like they put something over her mouth. You could still hear a little, but it wasn’t nearly so loud. That must be when they threw her in the hole.”
“What did they use to kill her? What happened to her?” Markowitz asked.
“They didn’t kill her like that. They just tied her up and threw her in the hole. He said that’s what he’d do if anybody squealed or wanted out. Shit, you should have heard her.”
“That’s enough, Richard,” Judith Wilson said.
“Why? I stood right here. I didn’t do anything. Those guys had balls. When they threw the dirt on her, she squealed like a pig.”
He began to laugh, and before anyone could respond, Wilson hit him across the mouth with the back of her hand. He fell back against Katherine and looked with amazement at his lawyer.
“She hit me,” he said.
The others looked at Judith Wilson with similar amazement. Evans was the first one who gathered himself enough to step in front of her. “I think we’re done here,” he said.
“Absolutely,” Markowitz replied. “Let’s get young Richard out of here. Judith, you won’t mind staying here with Officer Murphy until we get the lab people down here, will you?”
“I won’t mind,” Judith Wilson said. Her voice sounded like it was deep in a hole.
“The bitch hit me. She hit me. I’ll sue her for that.”
Katherine jerked Rutherford
toward the door. He didn’t want to go, however. He had discovered a newfound desire for justice, and he wanted to have his say. He had it, off balance, all the way out the door. Markowitz caught up with her there and took over the escort. Evans followed helplessly behind.
“I’ll get back as soon as I can,” Markowitz said over his shoulder. “I’ll send you a patrol car to watch the door.”
Rutherford began walking as fast as he might ever have wished. Besides having a grip on the handcuffs, Markowitz had taken possession of one of Rutherford’s little fingers and bent it each time Rutherford lagged. Rutherford danced neatly on his toes down the walkway to the stairs and then up. Judith Wilson remained at the basement door. Her face looked particularly pale in the sunshine.
“I apologize for that, Officer,” she said.
“No need to apologize.”
“Yes, there is. If you had done that, or Markowitz, I would be all over you.”
“Really?”
“Well, not this time, but another time. That little bastard should be strung up, but that’s no excuse for what I did. It put all of you in a difficult position.”
“I’m glad you did it before me,” Katherine said.
“I guess I’m glad for that, too.”
“We can always say there was a bug on his face and you brushed it away.”
Judith Wilson smiled, but she was not buying Katherine’s excuse. “It’s not that simple.”
“None of this is simple. I haven’t had a simple day since I started this job.”
Judith Wilson smiled again, this time as if she knew exactly what Katherine meant. “A bug? Have you used that before?”
“No.”
“A really big bug?”
“Big,” Katherine confirmed, and she held her hands apart as the men did when sizing their mythical fish.
Chapter 41
One of the organ notes was off-key, but the organist played through it bravely. Her head, tilted at an angle so that she could see the music through the bottom of thick glasses, moved in time with the melody. Sunlight penetrated the tall stained-glass windows on either side of her, and thin columns of dust rose in the light beams. Opposite her the casket stood on a metal stand. A wreath of garden flowers, woven together by caring hands, draped over the casket and touched the tile floor. Inside the substantial box were ashes—mother and daughter.
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