Final Justice boh-8 Read online

  “Just about nowhere,” Washington said, finally.

  “How come?” Amal al Zaid asked.

  Washington shrugged.

  “We’ve done-and are still doing-everything we can think of. We’re going to get them eventually. But the sooner we do, the sooner we can get them off the streets, the sooner they won’t be able to do the same sort of thing again. We don’t want any more people to die.”

  Amal al Zaid nodded his understanding.

  “An investigation is something like taking an automobile trip,” Washington said. “You can make a wrong turn and wind up in Hoboken when you really want to be in Harrisburg. I’m beginning to suspect that we’ve made a wrong turn, early on, and this is what this is all about.

  “What we have here, where this trip began, are the only two witnesses who seem to know what they’re talking about; the only two who kept their cool in terrifying circumstances-”

  “I was scared shitless,” Amal al Zaid corrected him.

  “Make that two of us,” O’Hara said.

  Amal al Zaid looked at him with gratitude.

  “Who kept their cool in terrifying circumstances,” Washington repeated, “the proof of which, Double-A Zee, is your behavior in this from the beginning. And Mr. O’Hara’s attempt to take a photograph when they came out of the restaurant-”

  “Attempt’s the right word,” Mickey said. “All I got is an artsy fartsy silhouette.”

  Washington ignored the comment.

  “So what we’re going to do now,” he went on, “is start from the beginning, once again, to see where we took the wrong turn. We’re going to do this very slowly, to see where what you saw agrees with what Mickey saw, or where it disagrees. Detective Harris”-he pointed to a huge salesman’s case on the banquette seat beside Harris-“has brought with him records and reports that he and others have compiled that he thinks will be useful. We’re going to see if what you and Mickey saw agrees or disagrees with what other people saw, or thought they saw, and if it disagrees, how it disagrees. You still with me, Double-A Zee?”

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  “If either you or Mickey thinks of something-anything- or if you have a question while we’re doing this, speak up. I’ll do the same. Okay?”

  O’Hara and Amal al Zaid nodded their understanding.

  “Let’s get some more coffee,” Washington said, waving for the attention of the shift manager, who was hovering nearby to see what he could see, “and then Tony can begin.”

  Tony Harris took a sheaf of paper from the salesman’s case, took off a paper clip, and divided it into four.

  “This is the chronology as I understand it,” he said, as he slid copies to Washington, O’Hara, and Amal al Zaid.

  “We know for sure that Mrs. Martinez called 911 at eleven-twenty P.M. We have that from Police Radio. And we know that at eleven-twenty-one, Police Radio dispatched Officer Charlton. So I sort of guessed the time of the events before that.”

  He waited until the shift manager had delivered a tray with coffee.

  “If I get any of these details wrong, Double-A Zee, even if it doesn’t seem important,” Harris said, “speak up. Same for you, Mickey.”

  Both nodded again.

  “Okay. Sequence of events,” Harris said. “Double-A Zee was standing there”-he pointed-“mopping the floor, when he saw the doers come into the restaurant. How long had you been there, Double-A Zee, when they came in?”

  “A couple of minutes.”

  “A couple is two. Maybe several?”

  “I keep the mop bucket right inside the kitchen door,” Amal al Zaid said. “What happened was when I cleaned the table-”

  “This table?” Harris interrupted.

  “Yeah. I see that the people who’d left had knocked a cup of coffee-what was left of one-on the floor. So I went in the kitchen, got the mop and bucket, and come back. It wasn’t a big spill, but it was right in front of the kitchen door-”

  “The one on the left?” Harris interrupted.

  “Yeah. The Out one, they come through with full trays and they couldn’t see the spill.”

  “I understand,” Harris said.

  “So I figured I better clean it up quick, and I did.”

  “And you’d been there a couple, like two, minutes and the doers came in?”

  “Right.”

  “Why did you notice, Double-A Zee?” Washington asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You were mopping the floor, paying attention to doing that. Why did you notice these two?”

  Amal al Zaid thought that over carefully before replying: “I looked at the clock over the door. They was standing under it.”

  “And why did you pay attention to them?” Washington asked, softly.

  “I could tell they was bad news,” Amal al Zaid said.

  “How?”

  “The way they was standing, looking around. Nervous, you know? And the… I dunno. I just didn’t like the look of them.”

  “Okay. So then what happened?”

  “Then they split up. The one stayed in front, and the short fat guy came toward the back, toward here. That was funny.”

  “You had finished mopping the spill by then?” Harris asked.

  “Yeah. Right. So I pushed the bucket back into the kitchen. And then I looked through the window and saw…”

  “The window in the right door, the In door?” Harris asked, pointing.

  “Yeah,” Amal al Zaid said. “And I saw him take off his shade-”

  “His glasses?” Harris interrupted. “Double-A Zee, I don’t remember you saying anything before about him wearing glasses.”

  “Not glasses, his shade.”

  When he saw the lack of understanding on Harris’s face, Amal al Zaid explained patiently, almost tolerantly: “You know, like a baseball cap, without a top.”

  “Oh,” Harris said, understanding.

  “The shade part was in the back,” Amal al Zaid went on. He pointed at his neck. “I guess it got in his way.”

  “How was that?” Washington asked, softly.

  “The wall,” Amal al Zaid said. “He was sitting where you are. That cushion is against the wall.” He pointed. “I guess when he sat down, his shade bumped into the wall. Anyway, he took it off.”

  “Okay,” Harris said. “I’m a little dense. Then what happened?”

  “Tony, would you hand me Mickey’s pictures?” Washington asked.

  “Any particular one?”

  “Better let me have all of them.”

  “I thought,” Amal al Zaid said, “the last time, you told me he took only one picture of these guys.”

  “There was only one image, Double-A Zee,” Washington explained. “But they made a number of different prints, trying to see if they could come up with something useful. You know, they blew up different parts of the picture.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Amal al Zaid said.

  "I tried that myself,” O’Hara said, “and got nowhere.”

  “What are you looking for, Jason?” Harris asked.

  “I want to see if this fellow left the scene wearing his shade,” Washington said. “Maybe Mickey’s pictures will at least show that.”

  Tony Harris rummaged through the salesman’s case and came out with a manila envelope stuffed with prints. There were, in all, about twenty prints of the one digital image Mickey O’Hara had made as he walked up to the Roy Rogers restaurant. Most were eight by ten inches, and most of them concentrated on the heads and shoulders of the doers, although the process had failed to overcome the bad quality and bring out more details than in the original print.

  Washington began to examine each print carefully. After looking at perhaps ten of them, he set one aside.

  “You got something?” Mickey asked.

  Washington didn’t reply.

  After a moment, Mickey took the pictures Washington was finished with and started looking at them. As he finished the first one, he slid it across the table to Amal al Zaid, who loo
ked at it and slid it to Harris. When Washington finished, he had set two more prints aside. He slid the rest to Mickey, then patiently waited until they were all through, before handing Mickey the three prints he had set aside.

  “So far as I can determine from these,” Washington said, “neither of these gentlemen was wearing anything on his cranium as they left the scene.”

  “I don’t think a jury would fall in love with these,” Mickey said. “But I do see silhouetted heads, and there ain’t nothing on either of them.”

  Washington again waited until both Amal al Zaid and Tony Harris had examined all three prints.

  “So what?” Amal al Zaid asked.

  “This poses the question, Double-A Zee,” Washington said. “If this fellow came into the restaurant wearing a shade, where is it now?”

  Harris went back into the salesman’s case.

  He came out with a typewritten list.

  “Here it is,” he said, “On the unclaimed property list. Number fifteen. ‘One black sun visor, make unknown, gray cotton-covered visor, plastic headband.’ They found it under the table. So far as prints are concerned… ‘One partially smudged print, possibly index finger, on rear of headband.’ ”

  “That won’t be enough, will it?” O’Hara asked.

  “Oh, ye of little faith,” Washington said.

  He took out his cellular telephone and pushed an autodial key.

  “Has Captain Quaire gone for the day?” he asked, and then a moment later, “Would you switch me to him, please?”

  There was a brief pause.

  “Lieutenant Washington, sir,” he said, “with a request.”

  There was another pause.

  “On the list of unclaimed property found in the Roy Rogers, as item fifteen, there is ‘One black sun visor, make unknown, gray cotton-covered visor, plastic headband.’ We have reason to believe it was left behind by one of the doers. The lab reports one partially smudged print, possibly index finger. I would like to inspire them to greater effort. This might be possible if you took the item down there personally, sir…”

  There was another brief pause.

  “Thank you very much. And may I suggest that you tell them I will be in later tonight to check on their progress?” Pause. “Thanks, Henry. It’s all that we have right now.”

  He pushed the End key and turned to Amal al Zaid.

  “Double-A Zee, I think we’re at the point where the doer took off his shade. What happened next?”

  At twenty after six, just as he turned onto I-95 South, Matt’s cellular rang.

  “Payne.”

  “Sergeant, this is Lassiter.”

  “I have a surfeit of bad news, Detective Lassiter. With that caveat, you may proceed.”

  He thought he heard her giggle, and found it charming.

  “No bad news. I just left the Williamsons’…”

  “And?”

  “Everything’s under control. Their minister is there. I don’t think she’s going to change her mind about the uniforms being right in not taking the door. And I’m going back in the morning-she asked me to.”

  “You get a gold star to take home to Mommy, Detective Lassiter,” Matt said.

  “Sergeant,” she said, a tone of exasperation in her voice, “Northwest wants their car back, that’s one thing. The second thing is, Mrs. Williamson told me Cheryl used to hang out in a bar called Halligan’s Pub. I’d like a look, but thought I’d better check with you first.”

  “Do they serve food in Halligan’s Pub?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose so.”

  Matt looked at his watch.

  “I’ll meet you at Northwest in twenty-five, thirty minutes,” he said. “You can give them their car back. Where is this Halligan’s Pub?”

  “In Flourtown.”

  “Okay. Then we will go together to Halligan’s Pub. And after that, we’ll see. Washington called. I can pick up my car at the Roundhouse.”

  “Fine,” she said. “Anything else?”

  “Call Joe D’Amata and tell him we’re going to check out the saloon.”

  “Right.”

  A uniform sergeant put out his hand to stop the silver Porsche as it rolled into the POLICE VEHICLES ONLY parking lot at the Thirty-fifth District Building. Except for a few rooms used by the Inspector for the North Police Division, Northwest Detectives occupied most of the second floor of the building.

  The driver of the Porsche rolled down the window.

  “I think it’ll be all right, Officer,” he said. “I’m just here to pick up my date.”

  He pointed toward Detective Olivia Lassiter, who was leaning against the wall by the entrance.

  The uniform sergeant whistled shrilly, attracting Detective Lassiter’s attention.

  “You know this guy, Lassiter?”

  She looked, and then nodded.

  “Yeah.”

  She walked to the Porsche.

  “Next time, find some other place to park,” the sergeant said.

  “Yes, sir,” Matt said.

  Olivia got in the Porsche.

  Where the hell did he get this car? A Porsche on a detective’s pay?

  “Have a good time, Lassiter,” the sergeant said.

  Matt grinned, but didn’t say anything as he turned the Porsche around.

  “What was that all about? ‘Have a good time’?” Olivia asked.

  Matt shrugged.

  “What did you say to him?” Olivia challenged.

  “Nothing,” Matt said.

  The hell you didn’t. You’re really a smart-ass. “You get a gold star for Mommy!” Jesus!

  “Did you get anything from the Williamsons besides the name of this saloon?” Matt asked.

  “The names of half a dozen guys Cheryl dated,” she said. “And of a couple of her girlfriends.”

  “You’ll have to give them to Joe.”

  “I already did.”

  “Where exactly is this saloon?”

  “It’s called Halligan’s Pub. At Bethlehem Pike and College Avenue in Flourtown. I’ve been there. Sort of a neighborhood bar for the young and unattached.”

  “Spend a lot of time in places like that, do you?” Matt asked, innocently. “Looking for a little action?”

  You sonofabitch!

  She glared at him but said nothing.

  If he thinks I’m looking for action, and so much as lays a hand on my hand, I’ll knock him into next week.

  “Hey, I’m kidding!” Matt said.

  “I haven’t been amused,” Olivia snapped.

  “Look, this is my first time,” Matt said.

  “First time for what? Working with a female detective, you mean?”

  “Yeah. Or at least a good-looking one.”

  “Can we keep this professional?”

  “I worked a couple of jobs with an Intelligence detective, a female,” Matt said. “But she was old enough to be my mother. We got to be friends. So I asked her-we were having a couple of drinks-how I should behave with a younger female cop. And she said treat her like you would treat any other cop. That’s what I was doing. Making a little joke.”

  Why do I believe him?

  “What kind of a little joke were you making with Sergeant Pinski?”

  “The uniform in the parking lot?”

  “Yeah. What did you say to him?”

  “I told him I was just picking up my date.”

  “You thought that was funny?”

  “He believed it. And my other choice was to tell him I was on the job and show him my badge. Thirty minutes later, every uniform in the Thirty-fifth, and all your pals in Northwest Detectives, would have heard about the Homicide sergeant driving a Porsche picking up Northwest’s good-looking Detective Lassiter.”

  He’s right. That’s exactly what would have happened.

  “Where did you get this car, anyway?”

  “When I finished college. It was my graduation present.”

  “It looks brand-new.”

  “It�
�s five years old. I take pretty good care of it.”

  “It’s beautiful,” she said in genuine appreciation.

  That was dumb. What’s the matter with me?

  “They’re nice,” Matt said. “Look, let’s spell this out. I was not making a pass at you. I will not make a pass at you. I just got promoted, and I just transferred to Homicide. The last thing I want is for somebody to say Payne walked in, hung up his hat, and started hitting on Lassiter. That’s the truth.”

  “Okay. Just so we understand each other.”

  “So what were you doing in Halligan’s Pub? Looking for a little action?”

  “You sonofabitch!” Olivia said, but she laughed.

  And they found themselves looking at each other. And both looked quickly away.

  “What can I get you?” the bartender at Halligan’s Pub asked when they had taken stools at the bar.

  “I don’t know about Mother, but I would like a Famous Grouse on the rocks and a menu.”

  “You want to eat at the bar?” the bartender asked.

  “I want to talk to you, and you’re here,” Matt said.

  “And what for you, honey?” the bartender asked.

  I will not ask what a famous whatever is.

  “The same, please,” Olivia said.

  “You’ve been in here before, right?”

  “Indeed she has,” Matt said. “Mother tells me this is where the action is. Presumably there will be a shill’s fee for her?”

  The bartender chuckled, then turned to make their drinks. He put them on the bar and then laid two plastic covered menus on it.

  Olivia picked up her glass and sipped it.

  Scotch. Probably one of those very chic, very in, single malts or whatever they call them that the in people drink.

  “Hot roast beef sandwich, please,” Matt ordered after a ten-second perusal of the menu. “French fries, green beans. What about you, Mother?”

  What the hell is that Mother business?

  Damn it, a hot roast beef sandwich sounds good. But I’ll sound like his echo.

  To hell with it.

  “The same, hold the fries,” Olivia said.

  “Coming right up,” the bartender said, and walked down the bar to a computer.

  Matt picked up his glass and raised it to Olivia.

  “Mud in your eye, Mother.”

  “What’s with ‘Mother’?” Olivia asked.

  “Even the Casanova of Center City does not make a pass at a mother,” Matt replied.