Slaughter - Lutz John (читать книги без txt) 📗

Up close the boy looked to be in his teens. Willie, with his aging linebacker’s body, dwarfed him. The kid wasn’t the cleanest, but he probably hadn’t planned on seeing a help-wanted sign. The hand-printed sign also said “part-time,” down at the bottom, but that was okay, if a person was getting desperate.

“What’s your name?” Fran asked.

“Pablo Diaz.”

She looked at him for what seemed a long time. Then: “You don’t look Mexican.”

“On my father’s side,” he said, as if that explained any questions about his ethnicity.

Fran was the practical one, but there was something about this boy that made her feel maternal. A basic goodness that was more than youthful idealism. On the minus side, there was something he was holding back.

Fran decided to put it aside, for now. “If he’s not afraid of hard work, I say we hire him.”

“Can we do that on our own?” Willie asked. “Remember, there’s three of us that own this place.”

“Henry might make it two out of three, if it comes to a vote. But I don’t think he would. Ain’t no reason not to hire this lad.”

“What about the girl?” Willie asked.

When no one answered, Fran said, “She tells me her name’s May, and she and the boy are married.”

“We hiring her, too?” Willie asked.

“Not likely. She don’t look strong enough to lift a pea.”

“They’ll fool you, though, those country girls.”

“You think any of that’s true?”

“I dunno. Do you?”

“Like I’m married to Robert Redford,” Fran said.

50

New York, the present

Despite the effectiveness of Lido’s software, the composite image of the alleged Gremlin struck a note with no one. Possibly when finally they ran the Gremlin to ground, there would be no real resemblance.

“This guy,” Harley Renz said, “is at least as lucky as he is tricky.”

He and Quinn were seated on a bench in one of Manhattan’s pocket parks. Though it was near a busy street, the park had a lot of greenery. It seemed more private than it was. A man in a gray suit and a woman with a ponytail sat on another bench, side by side and facing away from Quinn and Renz. The woman appeared now and then to toss bread crumbs to the pigeons. Three of the birds seemed to take turns in pecking at the gift of bread. Others stood nearby and solemnly observed. Quinn knew what they were thinking, like all the earth’s creatures: It might be a trap.

“Nobody’s called in with any information or identification of our artist’s rendering of the Gremlin,” Renz said. “Probably if anybody gets a good look at him, they still won’t have paid enough attention to recognize him from that composite.”

“It hasn’t worked so far,” Quinn admitted. He was wondering why Renz had suggested this meeting.

He didn’t have to wait long to find out.

“We’ve got another victim,” Renz said. “Woman over on West Seventy-seventh Street. Dora Palm.”

Quinn felt the stab of anger and sadness that he always felt when informed of a victim, especially a victim given a name. Somehow the name made the murder even more grotesque, the victim more real and alive—a person with a past and present. Until a short time ago, a future. “Any doubt it was the Gremlin?”

“None. The ME even says he can tell it was the same blade. Says the killer used a sharp knife here and there, but a jigsaw for hard to reach parts or heavy-duty cutting.”

“When did it happen?”

“Last night around ten o’clock. After a steak dinner with a good Merlot. At least she got that.”

“We all get that,” Quinn said, “sometimes not knowing when it’s coming. Maybe it’s better that way.”

“Or not.”

“Crime Scene techs find anything useful?”

“Not yet. But they’re still looking. Why I called you about this one was to warn you to be careful.”

“Careful of what?”

“What you say. Who you say it to. Extra careful. This is a somewhat complicated case.”

Quinn leaned back on the bench, watching the woman with the ponytail feeding the pigeons. “Tell me what I need to know, Harley.”

“You like dogs?”

“Depends on what kind.”

“Greyhounds.”

“A couple of them have run fast enough to win me money—but not much.”

“We’re talking about a racing dog,” Renz said. “Here’s to You.”

“Huh?”

“That’s the dog’s name.”

“This a racing dog?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Renz said. “It’s a dog.”

“How old?”

“About eight years.”

Quinn understood now what Renz was trying to say. “Here’s to You was probably a rescue dog, saved from an abbreviated life by some animal lovers’ organization that arranged homes for dogs that found themselves without owners. Here’s to You was probably adopted by Dora Palm when it retired from racing. Along with its new owner, it had been killed by the Gremlin.”

“You might say the killer autopsied the dog,” Renz said.

Quinn thought that over. “The bastard wanted to see why it could run so fast.”

“You know, that might be possible,” Renz said. “It was a greyhound, poor thing.”

Quinn knew Renz was making a joke by stating the obvious about his concern for an aging racing dog that had come to a bad end. That was contemptible but not unexpected.

Renz was aware that Quinn was a dog lover. A simple all-around pet lover. While Quinn felt genuine concern about Here’s to You, Renz felt none. What scared him was that Quinn might say or do something the public or some organization like PETA might build into an issue. Renz knew that if it helped to nail the Gremlin, however the dog was used would be okay with him. He would not be thinking of the dog.

Quinn would be.

That was a weakness.

Renz glanced at his watch and stood up, buttoning his voluminous suit coat. “Uniforms are still at the victim’s apartment. They and the ME know you’re on your way.” Renz tried to impress Quinn with an unblinking stare, but Quinn stared back mildly, unimpressed.

Beyond Renz, the pigeons had finally gotten out the word. Over a dozen now hopped and pecked around the bench where the ponytailed, beneficent woman sat casting out bread.

“I’ll swing by and pick up Pearl,” Quinn said.

Renz grinned. “Make sure she behaves.”

“Like always,” Quinn said, and walked toward where his black Lincoln sat gleaming in the blazing sun.

51

Once in the hushed quiet of the Lincoln, Quinn called Pearl on his cell and told her he’d be by the office to pick her up for the drive to Dora Palm’s address. Pearl said she was having lunch with her daughter, Jody, and would take the subway there as soon as possible.

Quinn told her he’d meet her at the victim’s address but to take her time, the person they wanted to see wasn’t going anywhere. “Better, too,” he said, “if you don’t bring Jody.”

“She wouldn’t be interested anyway,” Pearl said, sotto voce. “She’s all involved in an animal rights case. Can lizards be classified as pets that—”

“Never mind,” Quinn cut in. “I don’t want to hear it.”

“The lizards just might have a case. Of course, the roaches wouldn’t—”

“Still don’t want to hear it,” Quinn said, using his thumb to break the connection and turn off his phone.

He hadn’t told Pearl that the medical examiner assigned to the case was her antagonist, Dr. Julius Nift.

She was, after all, eating lunch.

Dora Palm’s apartment was in a midtown brick and stone structure that had once been an office building. Like many midtown buildings these days, its face was made temporarily anonymous by scaffolding.

Quinn saw a uniformed cop within the maze of scaffolding about the same time the cop saw him. When he flashed his ID, the cop motioned him over.

After parking the car, Quinn went on foot and zigged and zagged through the scaffolding, along a temporary plank walkway.