‘Okay,’ said Janos, ‘but you know this whole town is one wall-to-wall crowd.’
When the big man had left the room, Riker turned back to the wall and the job of merging the paperwork of all the cases. Janos was right. New York City was one big swarming -
‘Crowds of hookers,’ said Mallory.
He jumped in his skin. She was standing right behind him.
‘If you see one hooker,’ she said, ‘you see eight or nine.’
Riker shook his head. ‘No, Daisy said Sparrow was out of the life. Maybe the scarecrow marked her while she was – ’
‘Sparrow was still working the streets.’
‘And how do you know that, Mallory? Were you stalking her again?’ Only someone who knew her well would see the sign of damage in her face, her frozen stance. And now Riker added his words to the list of things he wished he had never said.
Years ago, Sparrow had told him about being covertly followed and catching the young cop in the act from time to time. Mallory had the bizarre idea that she could shadow people unnoticed, that she could walk down any street, enter any room, without attracting stares. At Riker’s last meeting with Sparrow, the prostitute had turned to her own gaunt reflection in a store window, then covered her eyes with a bone-thin hand and said, ‘I know why Kathy’s following me. The kid thinks I’m dying – and she wants to watch.’ Two years had passed since then, and he should have known that Mallory had not stalked Sparrow recently, for she had not recognized the crime-scene address or the surgically altered face. He had wounded her for no good reason.
Her voice was mechanical when she said, ‘I found the plastic surgeon. He does a lot of work on battered women. Sparrow’s new face wasn’t free, but he gave her an installment plan. That’s where all her money went. She was still turning tricks to pay for the operations and chemical peels. So Daisy lied to you. What a surprise, huh?’
‘But you don’t know – ’
‘Yes, I do. Those payments weren’t cheap, and hooking was the only trade Sparrow ever had. That and one pathetic acting gig. She never had a pimp, so she always hung with other whores, lots of them. Safety in numbers – in the crowd. Then you’ve got the summer conventions, the boat shows, car shows. Lots of men – hooker heaven – crowds.’
‘All right,’ said Riker. ‘I’ll find her hangout whores.’ Even in a coma, Sparrow still had the magic to string him along, and the price of being blindsided was very high. ‘I’ll chase down Tall Sally and talk to Daisy again.’ If one of them could point him to a likely street corner, he would do a raid. He would wait until it was too late for arraignments and bail. Most prostitutes were junkies who would shop their own mothers before they would spend eighteen hours in lockup.
Deluthe pulled the new reports from the wall on Riker’s instructions to copy updated material for Charles Butler. He was careful to keep his distance from Mallory, and she had almost forgotten he was in the incident room, until she found another mistake – his.
She stared at the front page of a newspaper pinned to the wall. The actress in the photo was a blond stabbing victim. Deluthe’s initials appeared on a brief companion note in longhand, a few lines for the actress’s name, her address and the words publicity stunt. But that would not square with the dripping blood reported in the article. ‘Where’s the follow-up interview for Stella Small?’
Deluthe looked up from the Xerox machine. ‘I never got to talk to her. But I left a message on her answering machine.’
Mallory searched the wall for other paperwork. ‘Where’s the statement from the midtown precinct?’
‘A police aide was supposed to fax it from the – ’
‘This article mentions an ambulance. Where’s the attending physician’s report?’ She turned to look at him. It was obvious that he had no answers. Still, she would not follow her first inclination, which involved a bit of violence. Mallory never lost control of her temper. The incident with the fireman did not count, not in her scheme of denial. She had not struck Zappata in anger. That blow had been the simple expedient of getting Riker through the day without a suspension. Yes, Riker was the one with the bad temper, or so she decided, founded on absolutely no proof of this defect in his character. And she, of course, had reined in her own temper, safely gauging her punch to harm no more than the fireman’s ego. She had hardly tapped him. Though Mallory had created this version of events only moments ago, she found no flaws in it.
The whiteshield detective stood beside her, nonchalantly gazing at the photograph of a recently assaulted blond actress, who lived in the East Village. Could this woman have more precisely fit the profile of the next murder victim?
Deluthe had his excuses ready now. ‘I was going to call the actress again. But I had to put it off. Sergeant Riker – ’
‘That was a mistake.’ Mallory’s words all carried the same weight, and she kept her eyes on the board when she spoke to him. ‘Don’t phone her. Go to her apartment. Get a statement.’
Still he lingered, and then she said, ‘Now, Deluthe. Before she dies.’
Mallory followed in the wake of the running rookie, though at a slower pace. Her feet were dragging, and she was feeling other effects of lost sleep. She pulled out a cell phone and placed a call to the police station with jurisdiction on the actress’s assault.
Ten minutes after making contact with a midtown sergeant, she was sitting in the squad room. Her head rested on the back of her chair, and her eyes closed as she waited for the man to locate paperwork on Stella Small’s stabbing. Finally, he returned to the phone, saying, ‘Sorry, Detective. I found the statement, but it won’t help. Our police aide, Forelli – she’s been doing creative writing on the job again.’
One hand tightened around the phone, but Mallory’s voice was calm when she said, ‘Read it to me.’
‘All right. „Professional bimbo collides with camera. Damn every tall blonde ever born.“ You see the problem?’
Mallory’s face was devoid of expression as she studied her right hand. The pain had ebbed away since decking Zappata. She flexed her fingers, then curled them tight, and her fist crashed down on the desk, bringing on fresh hurt and restored focus. And then, so that clarity would last a while longer, she smashed her fist into the wood a second time – crazy naked pain.
CHAPTER 16
A fence of iron bars protected a tiny courtyard and the red door to Stella Small’s apartment building. Mallory stood outside the gate and pushed the intercom buttons. When none of the residents responded, she pulled a small velvet wallet from the back pocket of her jeans, then unfolded it and perused her collection of lock picks. At the age often, she had stolen this set from her mentor Tall Sally, then lost it for a time – the rest of her childhood. The velvet wallet had turned up in the safety deposit box of the late Louis Markowitz. Sentimental man, he had not been able to throw away baby’s first toys.
Before she had made her selection of tools to work the fence lock, Ronald Deluthe came through the red door and crossed the small courtyard to open the gate. ‘There was nobody home,’ he said, ‘so I left my card under her door.’
‘How do you know she’s not home?’
‘I’m telling you,’ he said, ‘there’s nobody in there. I checked.’
Mallory pocketed the velvet wallet, though she did not believe that he would recognize burglar tools. ‘You checked. And how did you do that?’