Ed McBain_87th Precinct 22 (14 page)

The suspect began running.

Genero fell to the ground and the dog licked his face.

Willis got out of the sleeping bag and Eileen Burke buttoned her blouse and her coat and then adjusted her garters, and Hawes came running into the park and slipped on a patch of ice near the third bench and almost broke his neck.

“Stop, police!” Willis shouted.

And, miracle of miracles, the suspect stopped dead in his tracks and waited for Willis to approach him with his gun in his hand and lipstick all over his face.

The suspect’s name was Alan Parry.

They advised him of his rights and he agreed to talk to
them without a lawyer, even though a lawyer was present and waiting for him in case he demanded one.

“Where do you live, Alan?” Willis asked.

“Right around the corner. I know you guys. I see you guys around all the time. Don’t you know me? I live right around the corner.”

“You make him?” Willis asked the other detectives.

They all shook their heads. They were standing around him in a loose circle, the pretzel man, two nuns, the pair of lovers, and the big redhead with a white streak in his hair and a throbbing ankle in his thermal underwear.

“Why’d you run, Alan?” Willis asked.

“I heard a shot. In this neighborhood, when you hear shooting, you run.”

“Who’s your partner?”

“What partner?”

“The guy who’s in this with you.”

“In
what
with me?”

“The murder plot.”

“The
what?”

“Come on, Alan, you play ball with us, we’ll play ball with you.”

“Hey, man, you got the wrong customer,” Parry said.

“How were you going to split the loot, Alan?”

“What loot?”

“The loot in that lunch pail.”

“Listen, I never seen that lunch pail before in my life.”

“There’s thirty thousand dollars in that lunch pail,” Willis said, “now come on, Alan, you know that, stop playing it cozy.”

Parry either avoided the trap, or else did not know there was supposed to be
fifty
thousand dollars in the black pail he had lifted from the bench. He shook his head and said, “I don’t know nothing about no loot, I was asked to pick up the pail, and I done it”

“Who asked you?”

“A big blond guy wearing a hearing aid.”

“Do you expect me to believe that?” Willis said.

The cue was one the detectives of the 87th had used many times before in interrogating suspects, and it was immediately seized upon by Meyer, who said, “Take it easy, Hal,” the proper response, the response that told Willis they were once again ready to assume antagonistic roles. In the charade that would follow, Willis would play the tough bastard out to hang a phony rap on poor little Alan Parry, while Meyer would play the sympathetic father
figure. The other detectives (including Faulk of the 88th, who was familiar with the ploy and had used it often enough himself in his own squadroom) would serve as a sort of nodding Greek chorus, impartial and objective.

Without even so much as a glance at Meyer, Willis said, “What do you mean, take it easy? This little punk has been lying from the minute we got him up here.”

“Maybe there really was a tall blond guy with a hearing aid,” Meyer said. “Give him a chance to tell us, will you?”

“Sure, and maybe there was a striped elephant with pink polka dots,” Willis said. “Who’s your partner, you little punk?”

“I don’t
have
no partner!” Parry said. Plaintively, he said to Meyer, “Will you please tell this guy I ain’t
got
a partner?”

“Calm down, Hal, will you?” Meyer said. “Let’s hear it, Alan.”

“I was on my way home when …”

“From where?” Willis snapped.

“Huh?”

“Where were you coming from?”

“From my girl’s house.”

“Where?”

“Around the corner. Right acrosss the street from my house.”

“What were you doing there?”

“Well, you know,” Parry said.

“No, we
don’t
know,” Willis said.

“For God’s sake, Hal,” Meyer said, “leave the man a little something personal and private, will you please?”

“Thanks,” Parry said.

“You went to see your girl friend,” Meyer said. “What time was that, Alan?”

“I went up there around nine-thirty. Her mother goes to work at nine. So I went up around nine-thirty.”

“You unemployed?” Willis snapped.

“Yes, sir,” Parry said.

“When’s the last time you worked?”

“Well, you see …”

“Answer the question!”

“Give him a chance, Hal!”

“He’s stalling!”

“He’s trying to answer you!” Gently, Meyer said, “What happened, Alan?”

“I had this job, and I dropped the eggs.”

“What?”

“At the grocery store on Eightieth. I was working in the back and one day we got all these crates of eggs, and I was taking them to the refrigerator, and I dropped two crates. So I got fired.”

“How long did you work there?”

“From when I got out of high school.”

“When was that?” Willis asked.

“Last June.”

“Did you graduate?”

“Yes, sir, I have a diploma,” Parry said.

“So what have you been doing since you lost the job at the grocery?”

Parry shrugged. “Nothing,” he said.

“How old are you?” Willis asked.

“I’ll be nineteen … what’s today?”

“Today’s the ninth.”

“I’ll be nineteen next week. The fifteenth of March.”

“You’re liable to be spending your birthday in jail,” Willis said.

“Now cut it out,” Meyer said, “I won’t have you threatening this man. What happened when you left your girl friend’s house, Alan?”

“I met this guy.”

“Where?”

“Outside the Corona.”

“The what?”

“The Corona. You know the movie house that’s all boarded up about three blocks from here, you know the one?”

“We know it,” Willis said. “Well, there.”

“What was he doing there?”

“Just standing. Like as if he was waiting for somebody.”

“So what happened?”

“He stopped me and said was I busy? So I said it depended. So he said would I like to make five bucks? So I asked him doing what? He said there was a lunch pail in the park, and if I picked it up for him, he’d give me five bucks. So I asked him why he couldn’t go for it himself, and he said he was waiting there for somebody, and he was afraid if he left the guy might show up and think he’d gone. So he said I should get the lunch pail for him and bring it back to him there outside the theater so he wouldn’t miss his friend. He was supposed to meet him outside the Corona, you see. You know the place? A cop got shot outside there once.”

“I told you we know it,” Willis said.

“So I asked him what was in the lunch pail, and he said just his lunch, so I said he could buy
some
lunch for five bucks, but he said he also had a few other things in there with his sandwiches, so I asked him like what and he said do you want this five bucks or not? So I took the five and went to get the pail for him.”

“He gave you the five dollars?”

“Yeah.”

“Before
you went for the pail?”

“Yeah.”

“Go on.”

“He’s lying,” Willis said.

“This is the truth, I swear to God.”

“What’d you think was in that pail?”

Parry shrugged. “Lunch. And some other little things. Like he said.”

“Come on,” Willis said, “do you expect us to buy that?” “Kid, what’d you
really
think was in that pail?” Meyer asked gently.

“Well … look … you can’t do nothing to me for what I
thought
was in there, right?”

“That’s right,” Meyer said. “If you could lock up a man for what he’s thinking, we’d
all
be in jail, right?”

“Right,” Parry said, and laughed.

Meyer laughed with him. The Greek chorus laughed too. Everybody laughed except Willis, who kept staring stone-faced at Parry. “So what’d you
think
was in the pail?” Meyer said.

“Junk,” Parry said.

“You a junkie?” Willis asked.

“No, sir, never touch the stuff.”

“Roll up your sleeve.”

“I’m not a junkie, sir.”

“Let’s see your arm.”

Parry rolled up his sleeve.

“Okay,” Willis said.

“I told you,” Parry said.

“Okay, you told us. What’d you plan to do with that lunch pail?”

“What do you mean?”

“The Corona is three blocks
east
of here. You picked up that pail and started heading
west
. What were you planning?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why were you heading
away
from where the deaf man was waiting?”

“I wasn’t heading anyplace.”

“You were heading
west.”

“No, I musta got mixed up.”

“You got so mixed up you forgot how you came into the park, right? You forgot that the entrance was
behind
you, right?”

“No, I didn’t forget where the entrance was.”

“Then why’d you head deeper into the park?”

“I told you. I musta got mixed up.”

“He’s a lying little bastard,” Willis said. “I’m going to book him, Meyer, no matter
what
you say.”

“Now hold it, just hold it a minute,” Meyer said. “You know you’re in pretty serious trouble if there’s junk in that pail, don’t you, Alan?” Meyer said.

“Why? Even if there
is
junk in there, it ain’t mine.”

“Well, I know that, Alan,
I
believe you, but the law is pretty specific about possession of narcotics. I’m sure you must realize that every pusher we pick up claims somebody must have planted the stuff on him, he doesn’t know how it got there, it isn’t his, and so on. They all give the same excuses, even when we’ve got them dead to rights.”

“Yeah. I guess they must,” Parry said.

“So you see, I won’t be able to help you much if there really
is
junk in that pail.”

“Yeah, I see,” Parry said.

“He knows there’s no junk in that pail. His partner sent him to pick up the money,” Willis said.

“No, no,” Parry said, shaking his head.

“You didn’t know anything about the thirty thousand dollars, is that right?” Meyer asked gently.

“Nothing,” Parry said, shaking his head. “I’m telling you, I met this guy outside the Corona and he gave me five bucks to go get his pail.”

“Which you decided to steal,” Willis said.

“Huh?”

“Were you going to bring that pail back to him?”

“Well …” Parry hesitated. He glanced at Meyer. Meyer nodded encouragingly. “Well, no,” Parry said. “I figured if there was junk in it, maybe I could turn a quick buck, you know. There’s lots of guys in this neighborhood’ll pay for stuff like that.”

“Stuff like what?” Willis asked.

“Like what’s in the pail,” Parry said.

“Open the pail, kid,” Willis said.

“No.” Parry shook his head. “No, I don’t want to.”

“Why not?”

“If it’s junk, I don’t know nothing about it. And if it’s thirty G’s, I got nothing to do with it. I don’t know nothing. I don’t want to answer no more questions, that’s it.”

“That’s it, Hal,” Meyer said.

“Go on home, kid,” Willis said.

“I can go?”

“Yeah, yeah, you can go,” Willis said wearily.

Parry stood up quickly, and without looking back headed straight for the gate in the slatted railing that divided the squadroom from the corridor outside. He was down the hallway in a wink. His footfalls clattered noisily on the iron-ranged steps leading to the street floor below.

“What do you think?” Willis said.

“I think we did it ass-backwards,” Hawes said. “I think we should have followed him out of the park instead of nailing him. He would have led us straight to the deaf man.”

“The lieutenant didn’t think so. The lieutenant figured nobody would be crazy enough to send a stranger after fifty thousand dollars. The lieutenant figured the guy who made the pickup
had
to be a member of the gang.”

“Yeah, well the lieutenant was wrong,” Hawes said.

“You know what I think?” Kling said.

“What?”

“I think the deaf man
knew
there’d be nothing in that lunch pail. That’s why he could risk sending a stranger for it. He
knew
the money wouldn’t be there, and he
knew
we’d pick up whoever he sent.”

“If that’s the case …” Willis started.

“He
wants
to kill Scanlon,” Kling said.

The detectives all looked at each other. Faulk scratched his head and said, “Well, I better be getting back across the park, unless you need me some more.”

“No, thanks a lot, Stan,” Meyer said.

“Don’t mention it,” Faulk said, and went out.

“I enjoyed the plant,” Eileen Burke said, and glanced archly at Willis, and then swiveled toward the gate and out of the squadroom.

“Can it be the breeze …” Meyer sang.

“That fills the trees …” Kling joined in.

“Go to hell,” Willis said, and then genuflected and piously added, “Sisters.”

If nobody in the entire world likes working on Saturday, even less people like working on Saturday night.

Saturday night, baby, is the night to howl. Saturday night is the night to get out there and hang ten. Saturday night is when you slip into your satin slippers and your Pucci dress, put on your shirt with the monogram on the cuff, spray your navel with cologne, and laugh too loud.

The bitch city is something different on Saturday night, sophisticated in black, scented and powdered, but somehow not as unassailable, shiveringly beautiful in a dazzle of blinking lights. Reds and oranges, electric blues and vibrant greens assault the eye incessantly, and the resultant turn-on is as sweet as a quick sharp fix in a penthouse pad, a liquid cool that conjures dreams of towering glass spires and enameled minarets. There is excitement in this city on Saturday night, but it is tempered by romantic expectancy. She is not a bitch, this city. Not on Saturday night.

Not if you will love her.

Nobody likes to work on Saturday night, and
so the
detectives of the 87th Squad should have been pleased when the police commissioner called Byrnes to say that he was asking the D.A.’s Squad to assume the responsibility of protecting Deputy Mayor Scanlon from harm. If they’d had any sense at all, the detectives of the 87th would have considered themselves fortunate.