“Officer Spoon?”
“Yes?”
“Dennis Mallory, NYPD retired. I was wondering if you could help out a fellow cop here.”
“What did you retire as?”
“I was a detective first grade when I took the package.”
“First grade, huh? My name’s Darrel.”
“Darrel, I know you’re on your way home, so I’ll keep this short.”
“Thanks.”
“I’d like to show you some additional pictures of the man you saw tonight.” Mallory pulled the comps and images from the manila envelope he had with him. As Darrel scrutinized them, he nodded.
“Yeah, from these photos he looks more and more like the guy. How come the FBI didn’t have all these?”
“My people took the originals. Tell me, how did you happen to spot him?”
“I was manning the concourse desk when I saw him coming up the stairs from the tracks.”
“Which tracks?”
“Seventeen-eighteen. I observed him cross the concourse and before I could rustle up the FBI pic, I lost him in a bunch of pickled-to-the-gills yahoos fresh out of the hockey game. By the time we locked down the station, he was gone.”
“In your opinion, was he going home or heading somewhere?”
“How would I know that?”
“Was he walking slow? Did he know where he was going?”
“Well, now that you mention it, yeah, he was stepping lively. He took the escalator two steps at a time. So, yeah, he was heading somewhere on a schedule. Wow, you’re good. I think the FBI thinks he was coming home to New York.”
“Well, I’ve had a little more experience. Where did the train on either seventeen or eighteen come in from?”
“Another good question.” They went to ask the stationmaster.
“Train number 4713 platformed at 10:14.”
“Where did it come in from?”
The white-haired railroad veteran ran his finger across a time schedule as he lifted his glasses up to read the fine print.
“Ronkonkoma.”
“Do you have the list of stops?” Darrel asked.
“You can pick up a schedule downstairs.”
“Better yet, where is the crew?” Dennis said.
“They’re in the yard on turn-around. They go out on the
12:37 local.” Dennis looked at the clock. It was 12:36. “Can you hold that train?”
“On whose authority?” Darrel flashed his badge. “On mine. This is a police matter.” The stationmaster picked up a yellow phone marked “dispatcher.”
“Fred, hold the 12:37. It’s police activity.” He turned to Darrel. “How long?”
“Just ’til we get onboard?” the young cop said, looking to the old cop for approval.
“We?” Dennis said, smiling in surprise.
Three minutes later they were down on track twenty-one and stepping onto the train. Darrel instructed the brakeman to notify the engineer of their arrival and release the hold on the train.
“Officer Spoon, how did you know I wanted to get on the train?”
“Million to one.”
“As in, it was a million to one shot?”
“No, as in our guy is lost in New York City. That gives him a million directions to go in and get lost. Where he came from, though, that is only one. So, yeah, I like the odds.”
“Keep thinking that way officer and you’ll be a detective soon.”
As the cars clanged and banged over switches deep within the bowels of Manhattan, Dennis interrogated the trainman. He was sitting in an engineer’s cab that doubled as the conductor’s cab when positioned at the rear of the train. Behind him, the receding rails were swallowed up by the tunnel’s darkness in the wake of the train. Dennis held up one of the photographs. “On your trip in this evening, did you see this man?”
“What’s this all about, what’s he done?”
“We just want to ask him some questions, that’s all.”
“Fare beater?”
“Now, why would you say that?” Dennis had found over the years that these first utterances were usually worth their weight in gold.
“He looks like a guy who jumped on at the last second … in either Deer Park or Happaugue.”
“You saw him?” Darrel said.
“Danny, my conductor, had that end of the train.”
“Can you ask Danny to come to this car, please?”
The brakeman leaned over and spoke into the train’s intercom. “Danny, come to the west end.”
Dennis continued, “Why fare beater?”
“He looked disheveled, like a nut case. He jumped on right before the doors closed. These guys try to time it when we’re looking the other way. It’s stupid, but they think they can fool us.”
“So did this guy pay his fare?”
“Danny didn’t mention anything, so I assume he did.”
Danny came into the car at the far end and approached the men. Darrel held out his badge and identified himself and Dennis as his partner. Dennis liked this kid. He thought fast and learned even faster.
“Did you see this man tonight?”
“Let me see those others?” Danny reached for the rest of the pictures on the motorman’s pedestal in the cab and inspected the shots. “It’s hard to say for sure but he looks like a guy we had on the last trip.”
“Was he traveling alone?”
“Yeah.”
“Did he pay his fare?”
“Yeah.”
“Anything unusual about him, anything that stuck out?”
“No, not that I was looking. He just sat there, hand on his chin, looking out the window, you know, like he had something on his mind.”
“But you weren’t looking?” Darrel said.
“Well, he was breathing heavy when he got on, just made the train.”
“Do you remember what stop?”
“Let’s see, it had to be before Deer Park, ’cause I went up front when we passed Divide, the switch tower east of Bethpage. Yep, he got on at Wyandanch. I remember now, ’cause I announced Farmingdale next stop as he was running up the steps. I had to toggle the doors not to hit him as he jumped on.”
“Does this train stop at Wyandanch?” Dennis asked, pointing down at the floor.
“Yeah, we make Wyandanch at …” he checked his schedule, “14. 1:14 AM.”
“When’s the next train back to NY?”
“That would be the 2:20.”
“Looks like we’ll have an hour in beautiful downtown Wyandanch,” Darrel said.
“Don’t say I never took you to all the swankiest places,” Mallory said. “Let’s sit.”
They distanced themselves from the crew and any other passengers and sat in the middle of the car. “So why are you — we — after this guy?” Darrel asked as the train made every stop a train could make in the middle of the night.
“I work as head of security for a big high-tech concern. I think our bearded wonder may be the author of some threatening letters that have been ruining my CEO’s granola and yogurt every once in an AM.”
“Where did you get the flattering pictures?”
“One of my guys snapped him at a charity event honoring my boss. After the party was over, we found a .25 under a table.”
“You think he was there to cap your guy?”
“I didn’t see anybody else there who would risk getting gun oil on their Halstons and Purinas … or whatever they were wearing.”
“Great.”
“What?”
“You’re telling me this guy could be A and D. You still carry?”
“Wouldn’t leave home without it,” Dennis said, referring to the snub-nosed .38 clipped to his belt. That accessory was almost surgically attached for life to anyone who was ever a cop.