Rundown (14 page)

“It's against the law, Jennifer, to file a false police report.”

She turned and looked right at me, full face.

“It's a misdemeanor under the California State Penal Code,” she said. “Falsely reporting a crime, Section 148.5. Punishable by six months in jail, or imprisonment under the appropriate youth authority. And if you happen to lie under oath—under Penal Code Section 118, that's perjury. A felony.”

Chapter 28

We pulled into the parking lot of the police station, the cheap motel frame of the building looking even less promising by daylight. A man in a gray jumpsuit was hunched over a car engine, wiping the dipstick with a soiled rag.

Detective Margate went over and said something to the mechanic, her fingers opening and closing, then pointing back at her unmarked car.

I tried to read the posture of Detective Ronert. He held the door, courtly, giving a little bow, as though I were a figure in petticoats and a bonnet.

Detective Margate carried her folder close to her breast, not putting it into her briefcase. The place was exactly like the Department of Motor Vehicles when I got my learner's permit, in/out trays and people in no hurry on the way to the photocopying machine.

Would an innocent person begin to weep? I wondered.

Not me.

I would be angry.

“I had trouble visualizing it from the beginning,” she said. “The attacker chased you, ran you down, and put out his hand. He was running along with his arm out. He grabbed your shoulder.” She paused meaningfully.

I was sitting in the same comfortable chair with the padded arms. It was upholstered in durable plastic with a mock leather grain. “That's right,” I heard my voice say.

“He seized you with his right hand, and you spun, did a three-sixty and hit him.”

“In the face.”

“The trouble we're having with your story is this. Look at this photo, Jennifer, and this one. They show the bruising on your shoulder, front and back. The bruises are muted, possibly not fresh bruises, but that isn't the problem. I was looking at the evidence all this time and not seeing.”

I didn't respond to this silence, and I could tell that my expression was hard for her to read. The pause went on one heartbeat too long.

“This is not the print of a right hand, Jennifer. Look—this is the thumb, very dim, But you can see it.” She ran a pencil point along the blue-pink shade in the photo. “This is a left hand.”

I waited.

“And the hand is someone my size,” she continued. “Look at the width of the print, palm and fingers. This isn't a man's hand, Jennifer.”

I didn't have to fake my irritation. I crossed my arms and told myself to stay quiet.

“Do you know what I think, Jennifer?”

I kept my mouth shut.

“I think you filed a false police report to attract attention. I think you did that for a reason we can all sympathize with.”

The detective looked at me from under her dark eyebrows. I tried to read what was coming.

“Because,” she said, “your mother abuses you.”

I was trembling inside, but I don't think it showed in my fingers, my eyes.

“Tell us,” said Detective Margate, sitting on the edge of her desk, “what really happened. Explain how it is that a woman's left hand—”

She stopped and leaned forward.

I stared at the floor. The legs of the desk rested in metal coasters so they wouldn't dent the tile.

My throat closed. I shook my head, like someone hit with a skull punch, and nobody moved.

“My mother has never hit me in her life,” I said at last.

That was true, almost. I could recall a slap of my hand, reaching for Christmas cookies, pale white star shapes sprinkled with green and red sugar crystals. I could still feel a fervent shake, Mom warning me not to play in the street.

“We contacted a few people at your mother's place of business,” said Detective Margate, “and we talked with a couple of former secretaries. Your mother is a woman with a temper.”

Detective Ronert's eyes were on me, a track star waiting for the starting pistol.

“Never,” I said.

“Explain these pictures to us,” said Detective Margate.

A throaty catch in her voice told me how badly she wanted to believe me.

A knock on the door, and someone opened it, a uniformed officer. Detective Margate speared him with a glance, and he backed away, shutting the door carefully.

I felt sick.

“The bruises are from my sister's hand,” I said.

“Your sister?” The detective puckered her lips doubtfully. “You let your sister claw you like this?”

“Cass and I have arguments.”

“This looks like more than an argument,” said Detective Margate, trying to sound matter-of-fact, unable to keep the hope from her voice.

“I said I would do anything to get out of being maid of honor.”

The two detectives waited.

“It was in the hall, on the way to my room. She wouldn't let me walk away. She got a hold of me—” Digging her fingers into me, through the cotton of my blouse. Hissing into my ear. Telling me she'd tell Mother that Dad was having an affair with his producer.

I kept my voice steady. “She has a strong grip. I tend to bruise.”

“Does your sister get violent with you often?” asked the detective. A new note had entered her voice.

I continued, “The attacker had me for only a second, and I was running hard. I was wearing a sweatshirt with thick cloth, and he didn't have half of Cass's intensity.”

I was looking at the floor, but I could sense the two detectives locking glances.

“Has your sister ever sought help?” asked the detective.

“Cass is studying psychology,” I said. Cass had never had a moment of doubt, never an instant of stage fright.

“Your family doesn't intervene?”

“Intervene in what?” I said.

“My brothers and I were always horsing around,” said Detective Ronert after a silence. “Maybe it's not a big deal. Kids get hurt.”

Detective Margate fumbled through her folder and found what she wanted.

I had thought this would be over now, the bruises explained, everybody happy.

As she extended her hand I caught a glimpse of her wedding band, rose-gold, and an engagement ring, a small diamond. I wondered what she told her husband about her work, and what it would be like if she had children, how she would explain her job to them.

“This won't be a surprise. You've had a look at this already,” she said. “On the news.”

I did not want to see, but it was too late.

Chapter 29

A man's face gazed out of a mug shot, full color, a weary, harried expression, before an ascending line of ruled marks along the margin, indicating his height. He was five feet nine inches tall. It was a stare that almost appeared wise, a runner after a losing marathon. He had lost, but he had finished. He looked like the composite drawings in the news, but more gaunt, as though he strained to keep in shape. His features were powder-puffed with rose and blue markings.

“The officers involved used excessive zeal,” said Detective Margate.

“Why did they arrest him?”

“He has a good alibi for the night he attacked you,” said Detective Margate. “He can name witnesses, friends he was with in a Chinese restaurant in San Lorenzo.”

His left cheek was bruised, right where my fist would have struck it.

“Why is he in jail?” I asked.

“All the other attacks were in a distinct geographical area. Look here.” She shook out a map of the East Bay, and a blue X marked locations in East Oakland, near the zoo, in San Leandro near the hills.

“The attack on you was several miles north of his territory.”

“He was wearing a ski mask.”

“Recognizing his face doesn't matter,” said Detective Margate.

“You can look at him all you want,” Detective Ronert chimed in, relaxed, now, hands in his pockets. “His facial features are public knowledge.”

“Why did they arrest him?” I insisted.

“We can't discuss the case in detail,” said Detective Margate. “We can't tell you why he is a suspect. But without your help, this man will be out of jail this time tomorrow.”

I held the mug shot out to her, and when she didn't take it immediately it fell, spinning to the floor.

“I can't do it,” I said.

“Oakland Police are making a tape of his voice according to the script we've created. You won't have to see him, or be in his presence. You'll sit in a room like this—” She gestured, a realtor showing off a room with a stunning decor.

“A little bigger,” offered Detective Ronert.

“The suspect's attorney will be there,” she continued. “And one of your parents or their representative, an attorney or a counselor, should be there with you. We'll be there, too, Dave and I. We're on your side, Jennifer. And we'll have Duncan Pierce along, too, the forensic psychologist. We're your friends.”

Detective Ronert blinked, acknowledging all this.

“It won't be difficult, Jennifer,” she said.

“I won't.”

“You'll listen to a tape of various voices. You will say which voice sounds most like him. You'll be able to take as long as you need.”

“No.”

She didn't move or make a sound right away.

“That's fine,” she said finally, putting a pencil back in the holder on her desk, a Berkeley Police coffee mug stuffed with writing implements. “You've convinced us. The strain will be too great. We'll drive you home. You've been very cooperative. Dave, go on down and see if the car's ready.”

When he had gone, she told me, confidingly, “The red
oil
alarm keeps blinking.” She made that gesture with her fingers again, a motion like a bird's beak opening, shutting, showing how the light flashed. “We keep topping it off with multigrade. I think it must be an electrical short. A burned out fuse under the dash. What do you think?”

I almost told her that I didn't know that much about cars, but I recognized the tactic,
Get her talking about anything and she's hooked
.

“I was sure you were protecting your mother,” she said. “And now I see that you're protecting yourself.”

I already missed Detective Ronert.

“You're going to cooperate with us, Jennifer. I'll show you why.”

She didn't have to tell me that these women were dead. Photo after photo, in lurid color, the faces of women looking sodden, people plunging out of depths for a gasp of air, unable to open their mouths.

I stayed in my fake leather chair, files open in my lap, spilling onto the floor. I tried not to focus too hard on the images, protecting myself. The pictures trembled in my hands.

“Our suspect didn't do these women,” she said. She used
do
in a flat, vile way. “These are other cases, rape and murder, open files, technically. But we'll never find who committed these crimes, Jennifer. These voices cannot speak.”

I stopped looking, closing a folder. The thought swept through me: I could tell Detective Margate everything, now. I wrestled to convince myself that the truth would be easier than this.

“Here in this cardboard box I have old files, more open cases, rape victims, no arrest ever made. We have a fallout shelter here at the police station, left over from the Cold War. We use it as storage for old, unsolved crimes, and the place is packed. This is why I'm a detective, Jennifer. I could make better money selling insurance, like my sister Julie. I could teach school, like my mother.”

I tried to imagine Detective Margate in a wedding dress, in white satin Kenneth Cole footwear.

“I wouldn't talk like this in front of Dave. Men don't like it when you get emotional. It makes them nervous. Dave's a good detective, though, so I thought I'd spare him the pain of watching you aiding and abetting a criminal. Hindering an investigation.”

I tried to imagine her with friends, deciding she'd have a piece of the whiskey chocolate cake.

“You can walk out of here and let us give you a ride home, but I'll never forget you, Jennifer. I'm coming after you, week after week. I'll send you clippings of the rapes and brutal attacks this criminal makes on other women, Jennifer. That's why you'll be a witness against this felon. I'm not giving you any choice.”

Chapter 30

After the fluorescent light of the police department, the late afternoon sun was heirloom gold, and our shadows fell ahead of us over the parking spaces carefully designated with yellow stripes.

The unmarked car had been washed, filmy towel swipes drying on the windshield. Detective Ronert drove, and I sat in the front seat, my knee against the empty shotgun bracket on the dash.

“It's still broken,” said Detective Ronert.

Detective Margate, leaning over from the back seat, didn't say anything. I couldn't keep myself from looking.

Oil
kept flashing red.

“Jennifer, tomorrow we'll pick you up in one of our new Chevies,” said Detective Ronert. “Tinted glass in the back. Our prime-witness car. We'll impress the hell out of the Oakland police.”

They dropped me off at Animal Heaven at my request. I wasn't supposed to come in that afternoon, and neither was Marta. Mr. DaGama was glad to see me, telling me the African Gray had made a noise that morning that sounded just like me.

“What did he say?”

“The actual word was hard to understand,” said Mr. Da Gama, working a twenty-pound bag of wild bird seed into a paper sack. “But it was your voice.”

Byron was hanging by his beak from the side of his cage, eyeing me as I approached. Without disconnecting his beak, he made a chuckling, ripped-steel noise, loud enough to stop me in my tracks.

A happy parrot is generally noisy, cackling, yelling. I picked a peanut from an open bag of East Bay Pet Wholesale seed, selecting a fine, fat one, and all the birds began to sound off, each wanting food and attention.