Stella broke off this eerie connection to glance at her watch.
When she looked up again, she saw the reflection of his baseball cap just visible above the heads of female shoppers as he moved backward, blending into the crowd, a player doing his walk-on in reverse.
Mesmerized, Stella did not move until he was out of sight. Again, she looked at her watch. More time had passed than she would have believed possible. Other customers were moving toward the cash registers. She ran full-out to beat a slow-moving elderly woman to the checkout counter. Hunched over, neck-and-neck with the stooped, white-haired shopper, Stella unconsciously mirrored the sudden alarm in her opponent’s eyes. The old woman put on some speed toward the end, then gave up the foot race to youth; panting and wheezing, support hose bagging at the ankles, the loser stood in line behind the grinning actress.
When it was Stella’s turn to be waited on, her mouth dipped down on one side, copying the face before her, and she also assumed the overly efficient air of the sales clerk. ‘I’m in a big hurry. Just cut the tags. I’ll wear it.’ Stella pushed her old skirt across the counter. ‘And bag this, okay?’
‘Suit yourself The clerk’s voice was the monotone of a telephone company recording. ‘No returns on sales.’
Stella held out one pale blue sleeve so the other woman could snip off the price tags. ‘You be careful with those scissors, all right?’
The clerk’s voice betrayed a sudden annoyance. ‘Like I said, lady – no returns.’ Not quite so efficient anymore, the woman allowed Stella’s arm to hang in the air. Taking her own maddening time to put the blond actress in her place, the clerk picked up the old skirt ‘twixt thumb and forefinger, then held it at the distance of a bad smell before dropping it into a bag. Finally, she reached for her scissors and slowly cut the tag strings from Stella’s sleeve. The cashier glanced at the mirror behind the line of customers, saying, ‘You know this jacket is damaged, right? Stained?’
Oh, the makeup smudge.
‘No problem. I can get that out.’
‘Yeah, sure you can.’ The clerk watched the blonde walk away with a black X scrawled on the back of the new suit. Then she turned a merciless eye on the next customer in line, an elderly woman slowly approaching the counter. ‘Move it, lady!’
Lieutenant Coffey watched the last actress leave the squad room in company with two detectives, the number of men it took to escort a pretty woman downstairs. The deputy commissioner’s son-in-law passed them at the stairwell door, and now he walked toward the private office.
So Mallory and Riker had managed to lose Deluthe again.
While the lieutenant checked his list of blondes for the second day of interviews, the younger man stood at a respectful distance and waited to be acknowledged. Coffey liked the deference to rank, but he had his doubts that this youngster was going to make it as a detective.
‘I thought you were watching Lars Geldorf’
‘He’s staying home today. I’m looking for Sergeant Riker.’
‘He’ll be here in half an hour.’ Coffey held up a tabloid with the headline: actress stabbed in broad daylight. ‘Okay, kid, make yourself useful.’ He pointed to the handwritten notes and a telephone number scrawled across the top of the front page. ‘This Midtown precinct never called back with a name on the actress. Find out who she is, then check the interview list. If we haven’t talked to her, get her down here today.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Paper in hand, Deluthe swooped down on the nearest vacant desk and picked up the phone.
Jack Coffey had only a few minutes to settle in behind his desk before the rookie rapped on the frame of his open office door. The lieutenant waved him inside. ‘What’ve you got, kid?’
‘The actress is Stella Small. I talked to a police aide, Eve Forelli. She says it was just a publicity stunt.’
The lieutenant nodded toward the tabloid in the younger man’s hand. ‘Did you read that article?’
‘No, sir. I thought you wanted – ’
‘Read it. You’ll find the first mention of blood in the opening paragraph. It’s a puddle on a hotel carpet.’ He leaned over the desk and ripped the paper from Deluthe’s hand, then pointed to the photograph of an unconscious woman. ‘Oh, and the dark stain on her sleeve? That’s blood too.’ He slammed the newspaper down on his desk blotter, yet his voice remained calm. ‘In my experience, very few actresses ever mutilate themselves for a mention in the tabloids.’ And now he stopped, for it was not his job to train the rookie from Lieutenant Loman’s squad. ‘At least you got her name. That’s something.’ He consulted his list of blond interview subjects and found Stella Small among them. ‘Her agent set up an interview, but Small was a no-show. Apparently this woman doesn’t watch the news or read the papers. Find her.’
‘The police aide already took her statement,’ said Deluthe. ‘The actress told her she had a street altercation with a tourist. You see, the guy hit this woman with his camera, and she needed a few stitches. That’s it. So then her agent shows up at the hospital and gets the idea to make the wound a little more newsworthy. That’s when it turned into a stabbing.’
‘A police aide did the interview? A civilian! Well, that’s just great.’ He tossed the newspaper to the rookie. ‘Get a copy of that statement from Midtown, and get that actress down here.’
‘But it’s just – ’
‘Busywork? Most of my damn day is busywork. I’m one goddamn busy man. Now can you handle this or not?’ What he had really wanted to ask Deluthe was why the man dyed his hair.
And of all the colors in the world, why choose glow-in-the-dark yellow?
Detective Janos stood at the front of the squad room and addressed the rest of the men. ‘We got a thirty-second spot on the morning news and a full minute on radio. We might get lucky with the tip lines.’ He held up the newspaper page that listed the dates and locations of open casting calls. ‘And there’s two auditions today. We got twenty minutes to make the one on – ’
‘Hey!’ Detective Desoto, who sorted the tip-line calls, yelled, ‘Listen up! A woman with an X on her back just passed the corner of Sixtieth and Lex. I got a guy calling from a payphone. He says she was headed for the subway. She’s got blond hair, and she’s wearing a light blue suit.’
‘A suit,’ said Riker. ‘I’ll bet she’s on her way to the midtown audition.’
‘It’s on the West Side.’Janos was heading for the door, issuing orders on the run. ‘Get a unit over there. She’ll make the crossover over at Forty-second Street.’
‘Maybe not.’ Arthur Wang grabbed his gun from a desk drawer. ‘If she sees that X on her back, she might pack it in. I know my wife would – ’
‘Subway!’ yelled Janos.
Every man but Deluthe was up and running. Sergeant Riker stopped to tap his shoulder, saying, ‘You’re with us, kid.’
And they were off. Lieutenant Coffey’s busywork errand was forgotten as Deluthe fell in with the gang of running detectives heading downstairs for the cars. One by one, the unmarked vehicles raced their engines. Mobile turret lights were slapped on to the roofs as they sped down Houston, zooming toward the West Side Highway.
Heading uptown.
What a ride!
The police cars were strung out in a wedge, forcing cabs to dodge and weave, and terrifying the amateur drivers. Five sirens screamed, and bullhorns shouted, ‘Outta the way! Move it! Move it? Every cross-town light was magically green until the convoy pulled to the curb in front of Forty-second Street Station.
The men left their cars at a dead run, hustling down the subway stairs in close formation, flying through the long tunnel, leather slapping cement, adrenaline rushing, hearts on fire, finally emerging in the shuttle bay.