Tonight, if he has time, Landsman can saunter over to his section of the board and stare contentedly at a thick block of black ink. Twelve closed cases in a row, and this one-this bizarre stabbing inside a Broening Highway factory while three hundred employees worked the evening shift-well, he isn’t going to allow such a sillyass case to end his streak. A girl gets killed inside a factory during working hours and it comes up a whodunit? No fucking way, thinks Landsman. There’s a dunker in here somewhere; all I have to do is find it.
Arriving at the Lever Brothers plant earlier that night, Graul and Kincaid were ushered to the second floor of the main building to find the body of Ernestine Haskins, the thirty-year-old cafeteria manager, lying dead in a nearby men’s room. A series of wounds riddled the torso, but the most lethal cut had slashed the jugular. The blouse and brassiere were pulled up, suggesting sex as a motive, just as blood spatter on a bathroom stall partition and defense wounds to the hands suggested a brief struggle. The weapon, probably a long kitchen blade, was missing.
The cafeteria had closed after serving dinner, although the area wasn’t locked and it was accessible to anyone in the building. Just before the discovery of the murder, Haskins and two male employees were cleaning up and preparing to leave; for that reason alone the cafeteria employees deserved some special attention. One had discovered the body, the other had been with Haskins in the kitchen only minutes earlier.
Waiting for the factory shift to end, the two detectives processed the scene, walked the length of the cafeteria and checked the rest of the second floor, looking for a blood trail or anything else out of the ordinary. At the shift change shortly before midnight, Kincaid walked down to the plant’s outer gate to watch the entire workforce sign out at the security gate and parade past him. He looked every male employee directly in the face, then down at the worker’s shoes and pants cuffs, hoping for a few telltale specks of reddish brown.
Meanwhile, Graul acted on a tip provided by one of the cafeteria employees in an initial interview at the scene. Asked if Ernestine Haskins had any boyfriends or suitors at the plant, the employee offered the name of one man who, sure enough, happened to be on shift at that moment. Summoned by security guards, the man appeared in the cafeteria and expressed no immediate surprise at being informed of the murder. That alone didn’t mean much: word of the killing had raced through the plant even before the detectives’ arrival. More intriguing, however, was his willingness to admit that he had been interested in Ernestine Haskins. He knew she was married; still, she had seemed a little more than friendly and he thought she might go for something.
Kincaid and Graul gave the man’s clothes a close inspection but found no stains or tears. His hands were clean and uncut, his face unscratched. Even so, he would have had time to clean up before the body was found. A radio car was called; the suitor and both cafeteria employees were sent downtown.
After more than two hours at the crime scene, the two detectives drove back to the office. Landsman had deposited the three arrivals in separate rooms, where in Landsman’s considered opinion they had all displayed rodent-like behavior.
Squirrel No. 1, the cafeteria employee who had given Graul the tip about the woman’s suitor, remained solicitous of the investigators and continued to suggest all kinds of motives that could have inspired the man to murder. The second cafeteria worker, Squirrel No. 2, seemed to know damn little about the murder of his boss other than that it happened. And Squirrel No. 3, the plant employee who had lusted for Ernestine, was now strangely indifferent to her violent death, as if it were just something else that happened at work that day.
Having spent an hour or so traveling between the offices and interrogation rooms, balancing one story against another, Landsman has already formed some opinions. Squirrel No. 2 in the large interrogation room? Brain-dead, thinks Landsman. Maybe brain-dead and guilty. Squirrel No. 1 in the small interrogation room? Too fucking helpful. Color him helpful and guilty. And Squirrel No. 3, waiting in the fishbowl, is an asshole, probably a guilty asshole at that.
Now, three hours into the investigation, Landsman watches Kincaid return to the room where Graul is still listening patiently to lies. It’s into early morning now, and Landsman has so far been the very picture of earnest patience. No shouting. No wild rant. No twisted homicide humor amid the chaos of criminal investigation.
Landsman’s restraint comes in small part because this is Graul’s second case and Landsman is trying hard not to crowd a new detective, and in larger part because Ernestine Haskins-like Latonya Wallace-appears to be a real victim. And whatever else two decades in the department have done to Landsman, they have at least taught him that difference between a killing and a murder. It’s one thing, after all, for a detective to cut up with the uniforms when they’re gathered around some dead yo; it’s another entirely to behave that way when the case involves a young wife with her blouse pulled up, her throat slit open and her husband waiting in the company lot. Even for Landsman, certain things remain decidedly unfunny. Likewise, despite his reputation, he does understand that there are moments when a rant does more harm than good. For hours, he lets Graul and Kincaid lead the charge, waiting until they’ve run out of fresh questions before beginning his own pursuit. Only in the earliest hours of the morning, when the cafeteria company officials call the homicide unit to reveal that the day’s receipts are missing from the kitchen strongbox-only then does Landsman revert to form.
“What the fuck is this bullshit I’ve been listening to?” he mutters, storming back down the hall.
Squirrel No. 1 looks up in dismay as Landsman bursts into the small interrogation room.
“Hey, what the hell are you telling us?”
“What?”
“This is a robbery.”
“What is?”
“This fucking murder. The cashbox is missing.”
The employee shakes his head. Not me, he assures Landsman, though you might want to talk to that other boy who works in the kitchen. He was always talking about stealing that money. He tried to talk me into it.
Landsman takes that in, pivots, then charges past the large interrogation room, where the dead girl’s suitor-now suddenly forgotten-is banging on the door, asking to go to the bathroom.
“Hey officer…”
“One minute,” yells Landsman, turning the corner into the fishbowl, where the second cafeteria employee has been sitting between interviews.
“You,” he tells Squirrel No. 2. “Get up.”
The man follows Landsman back down the corridor and into the small interrogation room, now vacant because Graul has returned the first employee to the fishbowl through the main office. Musical witnesses.
“What happened to the money?” says Landsman, full of menace.
“What money?”
Wrong question. Landsman jumps in the face of Squirrel No. 2, railing on about how much they know about the robbery, about how serious a crime this is, about how they’ve already heard about how he wanted to steal that strongbox, about how Ernestine Haskins discovered the theft and confronted the thief in the men’s room and was killed for the trouble.