At such times-now was one of them-he would stand by the front windows with Rachel in his arms and together they would look out at the familiar street. He'd done the same thing dozens of times with Isaac, Jacob and Orel when they were babies, but now he did it to try and convince himself that he was the same person with Rachel that he'd been to his sons, and that his home was not foreign soil.
He opened the shutters and looked down the street toward its intersection with Lake. The rain had kept up throughout the night, but the wind had finally abated with the first sign of light. Now outside it was all heavy mist under high clouds that would hang on all day if not longer. Glitsky stared out through it, holding his daughter up against him, patting her back gently.
A pedestrian appeared at the intersection and turned into his street. Though he wore a heavy raincoat that hid the shape of his body and had pulled a brimmed hat down over his face, Glitsky knew who it was as soon as he saw him.
"What's grandpa doing here?" he asked his daughter. His own brow clouding-this could only be bad news-he watched his father plod slowly up the street, hands in his pockets, head down. When he was out front, Glitsky moved to the front door and opened it. Nat was already coming up the stairs, the dripping hat in one hand, lifting his feet, one heavy step after the other.
"What?" Glitsky asked.
His father stopped before he got to the landing. He raised his eyes, but something went out of his shoulders. "Abraham." The way he said his son's name made it sound as if just getting to him had been his destination. He let out a breath. "Sam Silverman," he said, shaking his head. "Somebody shot him."
Nat walked the last few steps up and Abe stood aside to let him pass. While Nat hung his coat on the rack by the door, his son went in to wake Trey a and give her the baby. When he came back out, his father was sitting forward on the edge of the new love seat, his hands clasped between his knees. He looked feeble, a very old man.
In fact, he was eighty years old, but on a normal day, no one would guess it. Abe went down on a knee in front of him.
"Did you get any sleep, Dad?"
Nat shook his head no. "Sadie called me about midnight. I went over there."
"How's she holding up?"
His father lifted his shoulders and let them drop. A complete answer. Treya was holding the baby and came up beside them. "How are you holding up, Nat? You want some tea?"
He looked up at her, managed a small smile. "Tea would be good," he said.
Treya moved around her husband and sat down next to Nat. Rachel reached out a tiny hand to touch his face, said "Gapa," and got a small smile out of him. Treya put an arm across his shoulders and rested her head against him for a beat, then kissed the side of his head and stood up again. "We'll be right back."
The men watched them leave. Nat turned to Abe. "Why would somebody do this? To Sam of all people. Sam who wouldn't hurt a fly."
Glitsky had heard the refrain hundreds of times when he'd been in homicide, and the answer was always the same. There was no answer, no why. So Abe didn't try to supply one. Instead, as though knowledge could undo any of it, he asked, "Do you know how it happened?"
"I don't know what you want me to do. I'm not in homicide anymore."
"What, nobody remembers you over there?" The two men were at the kitchen table. Rita had arrived and could be heard reading a children's book in Spanish to Rachel in the living room. Treya was getting dressed for work. Abe had no intention of snapping at his father, but it took some effort. Even after four months on the new job, the topic of his employment with the police department still tended to rile him up. He forced an even tone. "People remember me fine, Dad, but I don't work there. It'll look like I'm meddling."
"So meddle."
"In what way exactly?"
"Just let people know this one is important. People care who shot Sam."
Abe turned his mug. "They're all important, Dad. Most people who get shot have somebody who cares about it."
With his index finger, Nat tapped the table smartly three times. "Don't give me with everybody cares, Abraham. I've heard your stories. Most are what do you call, no humans involved. I know how it is down there. I'm saying go make a difference. What could it hurt?"
"What could it hurt."
"That's what I said."
"I heard you." Abe sighed. "You want me to what exactly?"
"Just keep up on it. Keep them on it." Nat put a hand on his son's arm. "Abraham, listen to me. If they see it's family…"
Abe knew that wouldn't help, not in any meaningful way. The inspectors on the case-and he didn't know who they were yet-were either good at their jobs or they weren't, and that more than anything else would determine whether they succeeded in identifying and arresting Sam Silverman's killer. "Then what?" he asked. "They look harder?" He shook his head. "They'll look as hard as they look, Dad. They'll either find him or not. That's what will happen, period. Me butting in won't make any difference. It might, in fact, actually hurt."
Nat's eyes flared suddenly, with impatience and anger. "So what, then? You can't even try? You let the animals who shot Sam walk away?"
Abe couldn't completely check his own rush of frustration. He bit off the words sharply. "It's not up to me. It's not my job anymore."
"I'm not talking job. I don't care from job! I'm talking what's right." He drew a deep breath, again rested his hand on Abe's arm. "Just so they know. That's all. This one matters."
Abe glanced down at his father's hand. Since he'd started with payroll, he hadn't even shown his face once in homicide, even for a social visit. He realized now that his reluctance with his dad was probably more about his own demons than whether he could actually have any effect in turning the heat up on any given investigation. It might not hurt after all. He put his own hand down over his dad's. "All right," he said. "But no promises."
"No, of course not. Heaven forfend."
The Payroll Detail had four entire rooms, each twelve feet square. Glitsky was the sole occupant of his. He had a standard, city-issue green desk, four wooden chairs, a computer and his own printer (which also served the rest of the detail), and natural light through the windows that made up the back wall. These overlooked the ever-scenic Bryant Street and the rest of the industrial neighborhood to the south. All the free space around the other three walls was taken up with mismatched black, gray, or green filing cabinets, except for one metal floor-to-ceiling bookshelf filled to overflowing with bound computer payroll reports going back four years.
An hour after he got to work, he was talking to Jerry Stiles in his office. Stiles was the lieutenant in charge of narcotics. Before that, he had been in many people's opinion the absolute best narc in the city. Certainly his arrest record backed that up, his seizures of illegal substances. Three years ago, before his promotion, he'd been named "Police Officer of the Year." Stiles was thirty-eight years old.
In spite of his administrative role, he often found an excuse to get back on the street, and today he wore a ratty beard and looked as though he hadn't combed his greasy brown locks since the World Series. In fact, currently he could have been mistaken pretty much exactly for a typical street drunk, but that came with the territory.
Making Glitsky's small, airless office a less than optimal spot to talk to him.
That office was one floor up from homicide, on the fifth floor of the Hall of Justice. Glitsky's normal staff in his new role in payroll included five civil service secretaries, two half-time sergeants of police, and one rotating patrolman-grade gopher. This morning, he'd been planning to check in at his desk, then zip on down to homicide while the motivation held, but instead he found a note from Frank Batiste on his chair telling him to expect Stiles within the hour. Glitsky and Batiste had already discussed Stiles's situation with some heat.