Corpus Corpus

by H. Paul Jeffers

  The captain's smile stretched into a broad grin. "I know the drill, Chief. Whatever Johnny wants, Johnny gets!"

  With a little bow, Bogdanovic said, "At the moment, Johnny wants the assistance of Leibholz and Reiter."

  "I'll flash the Bat Signal for the dynamic duo immediately."

  "Now, if you'll excuse me," said Goldstein, "I need a Batmobile to take me down to headquarters. I've got some phone calls to make that are going to mess up the rest of this weekend for a certain district attorney, not to mention His Honor the mayor."

  THE NEXT HALF hour brought the arrival at the crime scene of the tall, slender figure of red-haired Detective Joseph Reiter and his partner, Detective Albert Leibholz, whose appearance had been altered by more than a year and a half of strict dieting as demanded and enforced by his wife from bearlike to nearly as thin as Reiter's.

  With them came all the men, women, and equipment required to carry out all the procedures developed over more than a century and a half of criminal investigating. Using the techniques that forensic sciences had devised, they would work to answer all the questions raised by the act of murder.

  First into action, a photographer spent fifteen minutes documenting the scene in general and the body in particular on color film from every possible angle.

  An earnest young woman in the white coveralls of the crime scene unit used a small brush to apply a gray powder to the door of the car in hopes of discerning fingerprints, only to announce a disappointing outcome. "Lots of prints," she said. "None of them is more than a smudge."

  "It's a small entrance wound," declared medical examiner Hassan Awini, leaning into the car. "This is interesting. I note that there has been a surprisingly minor effusion of blood from the wound."

  "I want the body removed as soon as possible," Bogdanovic said. "I expect the press to start showing up at any minute. I'll have an area set up for them as far from here as possible until after the body's gone. The last thing we need is a bunch of pain-in-the-ass reporters getting in our way and news photogs elbowing one another aside to grab a shot of that cigar in Janus's mouth as they did a few years ago when mobster Paul Gigante was gunned down after he lit up a stogie in the garden of Umberto's Clam House."

  He turned to Leibholz. "Round up some uniforms to set up a corral in front of the hotel. If they start screaming about the trampling of their First Amendment rights to sensationalize, tell them somebody will brief them on all the gruesome details."

  As Bogdanovic spoke, Captain Tinney arrived at his side. "All we've gotten so far from canvassing the residents is that a few heard what they thought was a car backfiring. Saturday nights there's always a heavy flow of traffic on the north side of the park where Lexington Avenue dead-ends and the cars have to make a right turn either to get over to Park Avenue South or to go around the park to Irving Place. We also turned up an elderly gentleman who lives on the west side of the park who said he also heard a loud bang and that when he took a look out his window he saw a flash of light on this side of the park. It could have been the muzzle flash."

  "Not if it came after the bang." He turned to Reiter. "Red, I want you to interview that gentleman again about the timing. Then meet Leibholz at the hotel and between the two of you find out if anybody recalls what time Janus left the hotel. Also ask if anyone saw him leave and if so whether Janus left with anyone. Or if it appeared he might have been followed."

  As Reiter departed, Tinney added, "To locate late-night dog walkers, joggers, anyone who was out for a walk or anyone else who might have been passing by, we'll be posting notices on doors, poles, trees, and park fences that will have a phone number for possible witnesses to call."

  WITH THE BODY removed, a criminalist entered the car to dictate his findings to a second criminalist, who jotted them into a notebook. "All doors locked. Driver's side window down. Key in the ignition. Nothing remarkable about the rest of the interior. Glove compartment closed. Contents of same: a New York state road map, a New York Police Department parking permit, a leather travel humidor with capacity for a dozen cigars. I count only ten. Same gold and black bands as the one in his mouth."

  "I'll stick to Phillies," said the criminalist as his partner passed him a box of plastic evidence bags. Inserting the humidor into one of them, he added, "You had better post a guard on this, Sergeant, or somebody in the property room will burn up your evidence one at a time."

  Presently, Leibholz and Reiter returned.

  "The old gentleman says he's positive the bang had to come first," Reiter reported. "He says it was the sound that made him look through the window. He says he saw the flash a few seconds later."

  "Did he tell you what sort of flash it was?"

  Nodding, Reiter answered, "He said it was like somebody was using a flash camera."

  "Didn't that strike him as a little odd? Who snaps a picture in Gramercy Park at night on Saturday?"

  "I asked him that. Apparently, it's not that unusual. A lot of fashion photographers use the park and the surrounding houses as backgrounds. Quite a few movies are made here, as well."

  Bogdanovic looked to Leibholz. "Any luck with the people at the hotel, Al?"

  "There were a lot of people leaving the hotel, on account of a big banquet of some kind that was held there last night."

  "That was the Wolfe Pack dinner. They are devotees of Nero Wolfe, the famed fictional crime solver. I was there myself with Chief Goldstein."

  "If I recall correctly," said Leibholz, "you and the chief were also present at another of those mystery fan shindigs. I also recall that someone who'd attended that affair turned up murdered not long after."

  "What is your point, Detective?"

  "It occurs to me," Leibholz said, chuckling, "that the rate of murders in this town might go down appreciably if you and the chief were to stop accepting invitations to banquets."

  "Very droll, Detective. May we now get on to the business of the murder at hand? What else did you learn at the hotel?"

  "One of the bellmen thinks Janus left with a young woman."

  "Thinks is not helpful."

  "There's a lot of press over there," Reiter said.

  Bogdanovic ruined his head in the direction of the hotel and said, bitterly, "The ubiquitous Fourth Estate, voracious as ever to bite into and chew on the latest atrocity in the naked city of eight million stories."

  "Somehow they learned whose body was in that car."

  Bogdanovic's eyes narrowed. "Nobody but our own people have been near this scene since the moment Officer Wieser discovered the body. Who the hell could have tipped them off so quickly?"

  "Maybe one of those reporters killed him," Leibholz joked. "I wouldn't put anything beyond them if it meant getting a byline on a juicy story."

  "As tempting as that notion may be," Bogdanovic said, "we're going to have more than enough work to go around in getting to the bottom of this case without adding the entire membership of the New York Press Club to our list of suspects."

  "Maybe a news photographer did it," declared Reiter with an impish grin. "That would explain the mysterious flash."

  "I see. A guy with a camera in one hand and a pistol in the other just happened to be hanging around Gramercy Park awaiting a chance to kill the most famous defense lawyer since the days of Clarence Darrow."

  "Someone obviously was hanging around waiting for him," said Leibholz. "From all I've seen, this was not a spur-of-the-moment killing. It was an assassination."

  "As usual you've got it exacly right, Al," Bogdanovic said, jamming his hands into the pockets of his overcoat. "But if you'd care to accompany me as I meet with the press you will hear that it is the settled decision of the police that this was a matter of Janus's having been in the wrong place at the wrong time. After all, murder by a stranger is hardly unheard of on the streets of li'l of New Yawk, is it?"

  WHEN THE RINGING of the telephone startled Maggie Dane awake she shared the unnerving experience of all those who travel long distances across several time zones.
For a moment she had no idea where she was, nor the time. But in the seconds required to lift the bedside phone and answer it with a sleepy "Hello," she remembered where she was, why, and everything that had happened in the hours before she had tumbled wearily into a Waldorf-Astoria bed.

  "Sorry to wake you up so early," said Bogdanovic, thereby resolving the question of whether it was morning or evening. "I have some terrible news that I wanted you to hear from me before it gets in the newspapers or on radio and TV."

  Sitting up, she blurted, "Has something happened at home?"

  "Don't worry. It's not about your kid or anything bad out in California. It's your friend Theodore Janus. He's been murdered."

  "But we were with him just a few hours ago," she said, realizing immediately the senselessness of what she had said, as though Janus's having been in their company somehow had rendered him immune to murder. Her next words were the logical questions expected by a homicide detective when making an official notification, as well as by a prosecutor for whom a report of a murder was a familiar cause for a phone to ring early in the morning. "When? Where? Do you have a suspect in custody?"

  "He was found shot to death in his car around four o'clock, not far from where the Wolfe Pack dinner was held. We are fairly certain it was not a robbery attempt. All the signs point to the shooters having followed him, or laid in wait. It also looks as if they were engaged in a conversation. The car window was lowered. That suggests he either knew the shooter or felt no reason to be concerned about whoever it was that walked up to the car. He was obviously feeling safe enough to be looking straight ahead when he was shot. He was also smoking. He still had one of his Cuban cigars in his mouth."

  "The smoking explains the open window. Theo always rolled it down when he smoked in the car."

  "As I said, I wanted to let you know about this, rather than have you find out through a news account. The vultures known as reporters, photographers, and TV news crews showed up in droves."

  "That will have Theo smiling, wherever he is. Nothing ever pleased him more than seeing that leathery face of his spread all over the front pages or on the TV screen."

  "Maggie, I know this has to be a shock to you, but because you knew him so well, and because it's possible that he was shot by someone he knew, and because you two were so close—"

  "You want my help in compiling a list of possible suspects."

  "Whenever you feel up to it, of course."

  "Tell me where you want me to be and when."

  "What about ten o'clock this morning in my office? That's at One Police Plaza, sixteenth floor. I'll send a car to fetch you."

  "Save taxpayers money, John. I'll get there on the subway."

  "Right! I keep thinking of you as a Californian, even though I know you were born and bred a New Yawk-uh"

  "I'm looking forward to renewing my acquaintanceship with the good old downtown number six."

  AT NINE O'CLOCK, with the practiced indifference of untold hours spent behind the bulletproof glass of a subway token booth at Grand Central Terminal, a middle-aged female clerk ignored Maggie's "Good Morning" and wordlessly exchanged three dollars for two small brass discs. Fifteen minutes later, she waited on the platform with a small group of Sunday-morning travelers who gazed impatiently toward the black mouth of a tunnel as though by looking they could will the arrival of a train. When it came they heard a screeching of steel wheels rubbing against curving tracks well before its blunt nose emerged from the dark.

  Unimpeded by the teeming throngs that on workday mornings surged into the already packed downtown local, slowing its pace, the nearly empty train carried her with what seemed breathtaking speed to the City Hall-Brooklyn Bridge station. There, as if all the years since she had left the city for California had been erased, habit led her through familiar passages and up a flight of stone stairs into a thicket of sturdy columns and soaring arches opposite City Hall.

  Built in 1914, the twenty-five-story Municipal Building, the architectural masterpiece of the renowned firm of McKim, Mead 8c White, had been hailed at the time as the solution to the problem of how to house all the agencies of a mushrooming city government. Now, it was but one of many city office buildings built or rented in a seemingly futile effort to keep up with the demand for even more space.

  Emerging out of the shadowy, cathedral-like underpinnings of the towering Municipal Building, she faced another manifestation of that expansion. In the shape of a huge block of red brick with a honeycomb of square windows, police headquarters was known as One Police Plaza. But rather than crossing the broad plaza itself, she walked toward St. Andrew's Church. A neo-Georgian structure, it was a graceful remnant of the 1920s. Entering it in the middle of the Mass, she thought there was no more fitting place to contemplate and give thanks for the life, work, and inspiration of her friend, mentor, and adversary, Theodore R. Janus.

  He had labored long and hard in the cause of equal justice under law that was the solemn promise of the state and federal courthouses of nearby Foley Square and along Centre Street, and the sacred duty of those who argued cases in them.

  Now, he was dead.

  God willing, she prayed, his murderer would stand in one of the hallowed chambers to answer for his crime and, reap the punishment prescribed by law.

  First, however, he had to be caught.

  Leaving the old church's assurances that good shall always triumph over evil, she stepped into December sunlight that shone brilliantly but without warmth on the red brick plaza and walked boldly toward police headquarters with a determination to provide as much assistance as possible in that cause.

  To her surprise as she stopped at the security desk just inside the lobby and reached into her handbag for identification, she was greeted by the portly middle-aged police officer behind the desk with, "Good morning, Miss Dane. Glad to see you again."

  Embarrassed at not remembering him, she said, "Thanks. It's nice to be back. I've got an appointment with—"

  "I know. Sergeant Bogdanovic. Go right up. Sixteenth floor. His office is straight ahead and down the hallway, last door on the right, next to Chief Goldstein's office."

  DISCOVERING BOGDANOVIC'S DOOR wide open, Dane peered into an office that seemed overwhelmed by computers and their associated equipment. Behind a gray government-issued steel desk, his head bent down as he read Officer Wieser's report on the discovery of Janus's body, Bogdanovic was coatless. A patterned tie was loose, revealing the undone top button of a pale blue cotton shirt with sleeves neatly folded back to the elbows.

  Giving a single rap on the door with a knuckle, she said, "Excuse me, mister. Do you know where a lady might find a cop in this half-assed town?"

  He looked up with a scowl. "The police department is closed on Sundays. Come back tomorrow."

  "Oh, that's too bad. In that case, do you know the way to the Statue of Liberty?"

  "Why? You don't look to me like you're one of the tired, the poor, or the homeless refuse of a teeming shore. Wait. On second thought I could be wrong about that. You do look like someone who might have come from that burg out on the other coast. Give me a second and I'll think of the name of the place. You know the one. The sleepy little town where they make movies about car crashes, exploding buildings, and cops filled with angst and snappy one-liners like 'Go ahead, make my day' You look as if you might be a movie star."

  "Actually, I'm known for my television appearances."

  "Take my advice. Shoot for the big screen."

  "Speaking of shooting," she said, coming into the office, "I suppose it's too early for there to have been developments."

  "All I've got so far is a report by the officer who found the body and summaries of the canvass of the neighborhood and the hotel employees. A few people may have heard the shot, but nobody saw anything. The only exception is a man who lives on the west side of the park who said he heard a bang and then saw what he called a light, as if somebody used a flash camera."

  "May I read the reports?"


  "Of course. That's why you're here," he said, gathering them from his desk and handing them to her. "Then we'll go next door and hash 'em over with the chief."

  She looked surprised. "Harvey's in his office?"

  "He's been here all night. He's convinced there's a link between Janus's being shot and Paulie Mancuso's fatal attempt at flying. He doesn't believe in coincidences."

  "What about you?"

  "I believe in facts. But at this point I don't have enough of them to know which way to go in either investigation."

  "To paraphrase another detective, if you want to make bricks you need clay."

  "Don't tell me who said it, let me guess. Nero Wolfe!"

  "No cigar for you, Sergeant. Sherlock Holmes."

  LEAVING BOGDANOVIC'S SMALL, sparely furnished office with its overcrowding computers, Dane entered a space as commodious as she had expected the New York Police Department to provide for its chief of detectives. But as Goldstein stood to greet her from behind an expansive desk of highly polished wood, she saw in the contrast of the spaces a definition of the men working in them.

  A corner bookcase attested to Goldstein's unbridled passion for reading and learning from fictional mysteries. Each met the romantic requirement that all crimes be solved through intuition and ratiocination, followed by a confession. In bringing villains to justice, an observant detective's intellect would set aright a world whose morality, equanimity, and peace had been upset. Chief of Detectives Harvey Goldstein was, she decided, the very embodiment of a breed of detectives who would have been known and grudgingly respected by Nero Wolfe.

  Bogdanovic's office represented a latter-day kind of sleuthing. His world was microprocessors, computer chips, screens, keyboards, printouts, and modems connecting him to law enforcers around the globe, if need be. It was an electronic universe in which the criminals might be tracked down and arrests sustained, not only because of a smart detective employing time-tested ways but also on the basis of scientific analysis of data. Bogdanovic was, she mused, the detective Sherlock Holmes might have been if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had lived into the age of computers.