Knife Music

by David Carnoy

  “Well, she saw about twenty seconds’ worth,” Madden replies. “But she got a good look.”

  Pastorini sits down at the table and tears open the pack of Twizzlers he bought and peels off a strip of red licorice. “The friend,” he says, pointing at the diagram with the drooping twine, “what’s her name?”

  “Carrie Pinklow. Parents are recently divorced. Lives mostly with her mother. Father’s living in an apartment in Los Altos. That’s where Kristen was coming from when she got into the initial accident that landed her at Parkview Medical.”

  “You sure that wasn’t a suicide attempt?”

  “Doesn’t seem so from the diary. She wrote that someone cut her off and she swerved to avoid the car.”

  “Bizarre,” Pastorini says. “And you think the bruise on her arm is from the father?”

  “He says he might have grabbed her arm pretty tightly at one point the day before. They were arguing. She tried to walk away and he didn’t let her go.”

  “This Carrie girl, she credible?”

  “She was pretty composed, all things considered.”

  “But there is a jealousy factor.”

  “Sure. There are a lot of factors.”

  “You ever dealt with something like this before?” Pastorini asks.

  “What?”

  “Trying to squeeze a homicide out of a suicide?”

  Pastorini made it sound like Madden was trying to get orange juice from apples.

  The hint of a smile appears on Madden’s lips. “Not really,” he says. “Remember, we had that case a few years back where the kid decided to walk in front of a Caltrain and the parents sued the company that made his nasal spray? But nothing where an individual was involved.”

  “What’s the term you used on the phone?”

  “Foreseeable harm.”

  “Right.”

  “The intent doesn’t have to be there,” Madden explains again. “When Cogan slept with the girl, he didn’t think his actions would cause her to later kill herself. But in committing the crime of statutory rape, he was aware—or at least, should have been aware—that his actions could potentially cause her emotional injury.”

  “And in its most extreme form,” Pastorini finishes for him, “those emotional wounds could trigger her to kill herself.”

  “Exactly. All injuries flow from the initial injury. You stab a hemophiliac in the arm and she bleeds to death. So what if you didn’t know she was a hemophiliac, I can charge you with killing her. Murder three.”

  “But you’ve got to prove I poked her first.”

  “Well, I’m not sure that’s the word I’d use.”

  Pastorini smiles, taking pleasure in Madden’s glum reaction. “Cheer up, Hank,” he says. “You sound a whole lot better than you did when you called me this morning.”

  “I didn’t know we had a witness then.”

  Pastorini nods in agreement, his seriousness returning.

  “When did Kristen tell Carrie she had sex with Cogan?” he asks.

  “The next day.”

  “That’s good. That’ll help. And she’ll talk to the doc for us?”

  “She’ll talk.”

  “And you spoke to the frat?”

  “I was over earlier today. Carrie’s brother is a member.”

  At first, the brother was the only one who was talking. But with a little prodding from school officials who promised even harsher penalties if the frat didn’t cooperate, a couple of the guys confirmed what Carrie and the brother had said: the girl, Kristen, got hammered and threw up, then became a problem. The president of the frat told Carrie she had to get her friend out of there, that he “didn’t want any underage chicks dying on him.”

  “Nice,” Pastorini says. “The brother was over at the doc’s house, too, right?”

  “No, but another girl from the university was. Gwen Dayton. I haven’t contacted her yet. But I will.”

  He pulls out a photo from a folder that’s sitting on the table under the yellow legal pad. It’s a blown-up version of the young woman’s driver’s license photo. She’s got long dark hair, a small nose, and cheerleader looks. Her height is listed as five-eleven.

  “Giddyup,” Pastorini says expectedly, using his favorite Seinfeld expression. “Don’t let Billings see that. He’ll beg you to tag along.”

  “Don’t worry.”

  Pastorini takes the photo in one more time, then, getting back to business, says, “You think there’s a chance Cogan’s heard already?”

  “Sure, there’s always a chance.”

  “Well, I’d say we’ve got one more day before it really breaks. We’re looking at Tuesday morning’s papers. And then probably the evening news.”

  “If we’re lucky.”

  Pastorini sits down and chews on a couple of Twizzlers while he thinks. Madden can’t watch. There’s something grotesque about the way he chews, with his mouth ajar, and that little smacking sound he makes.

  “It’s your call, Hank,” he finally says. “I don’t know. I talked to Gill. We could stick the friend on the phone with him and see what happens.” Gill is short for Gillian—Gillian Hartwick—the commander of their division, a tall, attractive, and well-spoken woman who will field any questions from the media. Respected by officers for her warm, confident demeanor and straightforward management style, she’s been with the force for over twenty years. “You’d have to get an OK from the DA’s office first,” Pastorini goes on. “It’s tricky. It’s always better to have the victim. Like Open Wide.”

  Madden feels himself grimace, then stops. He doesn’t like the expression, though he’s grown used to it, or at least thought he had.

  “Open Wide” was a case from almost a year ago. It had been well covered by the press, the story of a dentist who’d molested at least one and probably several of his patients while they were under anesthesia. That patient—a thirty-one-year-old woman—had woken up prematurely and caught a glimpse of the guy putting his pecker back in his pants.

  The sad thing was that if he’d been smart, he’d still be practicing. But when the woman called to accuse him of raping her, he panicked. Instead of denying the charge—there was, after all, no proof he’d done anything wrong—he begged her to meet with him and “work things out.” A few days later, they got him on tape offering her ten grand, and it was over. He was finished.

  Billings had nicknamed the case Open Wide for obvious reasons, and the name had stuck, much to Madden’s displeasure. He hadn’t been sexually assaulted in the same manner, but every time someone made the reference, he couldn’t help but picture the detectives who’d finally caught his doctor sitting around, trying to come up with a nickname for the case and having a good chuckle with each new candidate (“The Big Prick” was the one that kept sticking in his head). If he’d complained, Pastorini might have put a stop to it. But he hadn’t, it wasn’t his practice to let people know they were getting under his skin, and Pastorini had let it go, quietly content to watch his number one detective squirm.

  “I don’t think we should put the friend on the phone,” Madden says. “Not right away, anyway.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “I’ve got a plan.”

  Pastorini chews a little slower.

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  18/ VISITORS

  April 2, 2007—2:52 p.m.

  MONDAY AFTERNOON. A LITTLE BEFORE THREE. COGAN IS SITTING out in the courtyard of the hospital, drinking coffee with Dr. Kim.

  “I had my hand on her belly,” he’s saying to Kim. “And her boyfriend is giving me this look like: don’t go any further or I’m going to kill you. Big black guy. And I say to the woman, ‘Are you hungry?’ And she says, ‘Yeah.’ And I say, ‘I sure could go for a couple of Egg McMuffins right now. That sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?’ And her mouth’s practically watering. I mean, they’ve been there all night, and they haven’t given her anything to eat. So I ask her
a couple more questions, and it turns out her brother and mother have had the flu recently. So I tell her it doesn’t look like anything serious. If she had appendicitis, she wouldn’t be hungry. That’s one of the symptoms. And meanwhile, as I’m explaining all this, I want to fucking kill Allison.”

  Allison is an attending physician, a gastrointestinal surgeon a few years younger than Kim and Cogan.

  “Did you say something to her?”

  “Hell yeah. Right after I got through with the woman, I went up to Allison and I said, ‘Why are you pulling me in on this bullshit stuff? If someone had taken five minutes to talk to this woman, I wouldn’t be wasting my time. This is shit a first-year could handle and you’ve got me in on it because you’re too fucking lazy to ask a couple of questions. The woman’s hungry. She’s ready to slam down five Big Macs. What does that tell you?’”

  “Consider yourself lucky,” says Kim. “She’s got me in on shit like that all the time. I mean, all the fucking time.”

  “It’s just lazy. I hate it.”

  “Dr. Cogan?”

  Cogan looks over. It’s Janine, a young nurse who only started last week.

  “Yes.”

  “There are two men asking for you. Police officers.”

  “What are their names?”

  She looks at him, a little puzzled. “Oh, I don’t know. They said they were police officers.”

  “Are they wearing uniforms?”

  “No. Just regular clothes.”

  He turns to Kim. “Detectives,” he says. “Probably Reed.” Then to the nurse, “Did they say what they want?”

  “To ask you a couple of questions.”

  “OK, thanks. Tell them I’ll be right there.”

  Cogan reluctantly gets up, groaning a little as he does so. He hates to be interrupted during a nice relaxed session of coffee and venting.

  “You think they want to talk to you about that old lady?” Kim asks after the nurse has gone.

  “Maybe. They caught the guy who did it, didn’t they?”

  “Yeah, two days ago.”

  The police occasionally interview him about victims he’s treated, especially the ones who died (“Did she ever regain consciousness, say anything to you?”), and by now he knows many of the cops by name and has his favorites. Usually, they come to the hospital shortly after the victim arrives and sometimes at the same time. But every once in a while they show up later.

  Cogan downs the little coffee he has left and tosses the cup into a garbage can. “All right, Dr. Kim. We’ll resume our bitching later. I’ll see you tomorrow at the club.”

  “See ya.”

  The cops are sitting in the surgery waiting room. There are only five people in the room, including the receptionist, and it isn’t hard to pick out the two detectives: both are wearing dark sport jackets and ties. What surprises Cogan is that he hasn’t seen either of them before. For a second he wonders if he has seen them and just forgot. But he’s good with faces and neither registers. One is older, a slight, balding guy with glasses and a neatly trimmed mustache. The other, an earnest, clean-cut black guy, looks like he could be a Jehovah’s Witness. He has a warm, friendly smile.

  “Hello, gentlemen. Ted Cogan.”

  They stand up and introduce themselves—Detectives Madden and Burns.

  “Come on back,” Cogan says. “My office isn’t very big, but I think we’ll all fit.”

  As he leads them down the hall, he notices that the older guy, Madden, is limping. And then he notices he’s wearing a special shoe—he has a dropfoot. Strange, Cogan thinks. He’s never seen a handicapped cop. He has an urge to ask about it, but before the urge gets too strong they reach his office.

  The room is small, about the size of a jail cell. It has a minimal amount of furniture: a desk, two chairs, filing cabinet, waste bin, and a desktop computer and printer. Really, all he uses the room for is to make phone calls, do paperwork, and check his email. He’s rarely in his office for more than twenty or thirty minutes at a time, so it doesn’t bother him that it’s small. But it gets a little tight when he receives multiple visitors.

  Cogan pulls in a third chair from Dr. Diaz’s office, and when the cops are settled, he closes the door and sits down behind his desk.

  “What can I do for you gentlemen today?”

  The older one, Madden, speaks. “Do you recall a young woman named Kristen Kroiter?”

  Cogan blinks with surprise. The name registers—he knows it, well even—but he can’t put a face with it. Why do I know that name? he thinks.

  Madden continues, “You treated her about six months ago. She was in a car accident. Sixteen. I believe she ruptured her spleen.”

  Cogan remembers. And as soon as he remembers, he realizes he shouldn’t remember too quickly.

  “OK. Yeah. I think I know who you’re talking about. She’s a student at Menlo-Atherton High. Why? Did something happen to her?”

  “Well, it’s complicated,” Madden says. “How do you know she goes to Menlo-Atherton?”

  Cogan feels the heat rise in his face. But his voice remains steady. “Oh, I think she told me at some point. I think I asked her if she knew my neighbor’s kid.” As he speaks, he notices that the second detective is taking notes, scribbling on a small notepad. “I live in Menlo Park,” he adds after a beat. “He goes to MA.”

  “Have you seen her since you treated her?”

  “Well, she came in for a check-up about a month after the accident. That’s standard. And then I may have run into her a couple times at Safeway. Or was it the mall? I can’t remember exactly. Maybe one time at the mall and one time at Safeway.”

  “You spoke to her?”

  “Yes, briefly. I asked her how she felt. How things were going. She seemed to be doing well.”

  “And those are the only times you spoke to her.”

  Cogan looks up at the ceiling, his heart pounding hard. The longer he waits, the greater their suspicions will be. So he says, “I think I may have spoken to her and her friend in front of my house a couple of times. They were visiting my neighbor’s kid.”

  “And those are the only times you saw or spoke to her? The ones you’ve told us about?”

  “Yes. Why? What’s this all about?”

  Neither detective speaks for a moment. Then Madden looks at his partner, Burns. Burns looks back at him, then turns to Cogan and asks, “Is there any reason Miss Kroiter would say she had sex with you?”

  Cogan’s eyes open wide. He laughs. “Sex? Are you kidding me?”

  “No,” Burns says, his warm smile gone, replaced by stern eyes.

  Cogan looks at him dumbfounded. “You’re fucking kidding me.”

  “We’re not doing that, either.”

  Cogan falls silent, a depressed look coming over his face. A hundred thoughts run through his mind at the same time. A dozen emotions. They had promised not to say anything, he thinks. They were never there. It was weeks ago. Back in February, wasn’t it? What had happened? Stay calm, Cogan. Stay calm.

  “What exactly did this girl say I did?” he says at last.

  “Well, it’s complicated,” repeats Madden.

  “How complicated could it be? What did she tell you?”

  “Well, that’s just it. She didn’t tell us anything. She died. Saturday.”

  If the reference to sex had felt like a punch to the gut, this one is more like a Mike-Tyson-in-his-prime uppercut to the chin. The lights go out for a second; he’s truly in shock. “Come again?” he says.

  “Looks like a suicide,” Burns replies.

  Cogan stares at them in utter horror.

  “What police department are you guys from?”

  Burns looks at Madden, and Madden says, “Menlo Park.” “No, I mean what unit?”

  “Homicide.”

  By the time they met, Madden had known Cogan for two days. He didn’t know him know him, of course. But he’d built an image of him: from a driver’s license photo, from what two parents had thought, from what
one girl had said and one had written, and from his own insights. In plotting Cogan’s downfall, he’d taken that image and put it through the paces, running it over and over through a scene he’d carefully constructed in his mind. Take after take, he’d watched Cogan walk toward him in the hospital waiting room. Sometimes Cogan was apprehensive. Sometimes courteous. Sometimes jovial. And sometimes impatient. It didn’t matter. For whichever Cogan showed up, Madden was prepared.

  “What if he’s hostile?” Burns had asked, driving to the hospital. Madden didn’t think he’d be hostile. He thought he knew him well enough to know that. He counted on him to be calm. That’s, after all, what he was paid to be: calm during a crisis. There was no reason to expect him to be overly jittery or nervous, especially since he didn’t know why they wanted to see him. The alleged incident took place over a month ago, he reminded Burns. There was a reasonable chance Cogan would have concluded he was past it.

  The plan was simple: get Cogan to answer as many questions as possible before he demanded to know what was going on. Madden knew from talking to Carrie that the one thing he feared the most was that people would find out he’d let the girl, a former patient, spend the night at his house. That was not a crime, but it looked bad, and he’d told both girls that he could lose his job if the hospital brass found out about it. So Madden doubted Cogan would be forthcoming about the girls’ visit. And if they could get him to lie about that, they were in business. It would show he was hiding something.

  Of course, they might never get there. As soon as they mentioned Kristen Kroiter, Cogan might tell them he had no comment and they should speak to his lawyer. He might have thought long and hard about what transpired that night and what he would say if anybody ever asked him about it. Madden had met a few like that. The thinkers. The ones who’d rehearsed what they were going to say, knew exactly how they would react once they were confronted, even months after a crime. And sometimes it wasn’t to deny their deeds, but to accept them.

  He remembered the dentist, Parker. When they’d arrested him at his home, the guy hadn’t looked the least bit perturbed. There was even the hint of a smile on his lips as they read him his rights. It was as if he knew this day had been coming and was resigned to it. Even when his wife broke down in shock, the guy’s face had remained placid. He’d reached the end of a story that he knew the ending to—that he’d watched many times over—and he seemed to have found some release in finally living it out.