An Imperfect Process (23 page)

"Barkley didn't mention any of that. He seemed to think you were busy with the baby and not noticing anything else."

Kendra's mouth twisted. "He had decided I was lying, so anything that didn't fit his theory he ignored. After Jason was washed and dried, I put him to bed. His crib was in the comer of the living room. We were thinking about getting a larger place soon, when... when we got married. After I put the baby down, Daniel and I—well, we went to bed, too, but not to sleep. We had just gotten up and put on some clothes, and I was going to rustle up a snack when the cops came."

"What time was that?"

"A little before nine o'clock. A TV show we liked came on then, and I was trying to think what I had in the kitchen that would fix up fast so we could watch the show while we ate."

"The murder took place just before eight, so the police moved fast," Rob observed. "Onward to the crime scene. Kendra, what do you think would be the most logical route for Daniel between here and the site of the shooting? I want to see how long it takes to cover the distance."

"Will you question along the route to see if anyone saw a running man that evening?" Kendra asked. "I'm sure that the police never questioned anyone."

Rob shook his head. "Maybe if I had the time and manpower, but it wouldn't help our case. The time for questions was then. Everyone for blocks around the murder should have been questioned because the murderer ran somewhere, though not necessarily in this direction. Not much point in doing it now."

"Now what would the best route be?" Kendra oriented herself before setting off at a brisk walk down the block. She turned left, then crossed the street and cut into the alley that ran down the middle of the next block between narrow fenced backyards and a few small garages. "We used this alley a lot," she explained to her companions. "It would have been the most natural way for Daniel."

As she led the way, she admitted to herself that this was probably an exercise in futility, but physical activity gave her the feeling that she was doing something useful.

Five minutes of walking brought them to the scene of the crime. It was a quiet street of brick row houses with cars parked in a solid line on both sides, leaving a narrow driving lane in between. Each house had a small roofed porch several steps above street level, most adorned with hanging plants and kids' toys.

Rob had visited before, but his skin still crawled. This street seemed too quiet, too safe, for murder. "It took us five minutes to walk, so a fit young man could have run the distance in a couple of minutes. I suppose that supported Barkley's theory." He stopped under a sycamore in the middle of the block. "It happened right here."

"There ought to be a black mark on the sidewalk or a cross. Something else to say that a man died here." Kendra turned slowly, scanning the quiet street. "I never came here after the shooting. Couldn't stand the thought. You have the police files, Rob. Exactly what happened?"

"That's what we're going to walk through. Val, will you play the part of Brenda Harris? She was heading east on this side of the street. She had gotten off work and taken a bus home, and she was tired. Not paying a lot of attention to her surroundings because she was almost home and felt safe."

Rob scanned the street. "Even now there aren't a lot of lights on the block. The assailant was lurking in this cross alley. It was pretty dark and a bit chilly. Dusk on a cloudy day. A lot of people would have been eating supper, so the street was almost empty.

"Kendra, would you cross the street to the second house from the end? That's where Malloy was when Brenda Harris was attacked. He had been patrolling around the Crabtown center and decided to visit the residential streets nearby so he wouldn't be too predictable. He was conscientious. When I pull Val back into the alley, you come running as if you've heard her scream."

Kendra trotted across the street while Rob withdrew into the alley and waited for Val. Getting into her part, Val trudged along the sidewalk with her head down, a tired woman at the end of a long day.

Rob tried to put himself in the mind of the assailant. Maybe he was hopped up with some kind of drug, itchy inside his skin, looking for trouble. Here comes a woman, youngish, not bad-looking, not watching what was going on. An easy mark.

He darted from the alley. A half dozen steps to grab her.

She stiffened in his grip. "Should I fight?"

He looked down at her small face, felt her petite body between his clamped hands. How could any man wish to injure an innocent woman? God, how would he feel if someone attacked Val? Brenda Harris had a husband and two children. How had they been affected by the incident? "If you like, but not too hard. No one gets hurt tonight."

She began to wriggle and flail, but he easily overpowered her and forced her back into the alley. He imagined himself as the kind of man who was aroused by resistance. He was excited by what he was doing, not thinking about consequences. "Brenda wasn't as small as you, but she wasn't huge, either. The attacker clamped his hand over her mouth, but she managed to turn her head and call for help just as he was getting her out of sight of the street."

He signaled to Kendra, who raced toward them with the grace of a natural athlete. As she joined them, she snapped, "Halt in the name of the law!"

"The bad guy swears and slams Brenda down so hard she's stunned." He set Val aside and whipped around to face Kendra, imagining rage at the sheer bad luck that put a cop on the scene.

"You try to pull me away, but you've gotten too close.

I'm bigger than you and a lot meaner, so I slug you in the jaw. You reel back and before you can go for your weapon, I pull out my fancy European handgun." Rob whipped out a purple plastic water pistol from the small of his back, where it had been concealed by his jacket. "I blast you in the head at point-blank range, and you fall to the ground."

Miming shock and horror, Kendra dropped onto the narrow edging of lawn. Rob aimed the empty water pistol into the grass, unable to point even a toy weapon at another human.
"Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!"

Heavy silence fell, along with aching awareness that a young man had died here, a victim of casual, meaningless violence. A hole had been left in the lives of everyone who knew him. Complete strangers had mourned the loss of a brave man who had sought to serve and protect. Kendra and her son's lives had been changed irrevocably.

The silence was broken by a husky voice saying, "Then you ran back into the alley, swearing."

Chapter 16

Startled, Val glanced up from her spot on the grass to see a white-haired man smoking a pipe on the porch of the right-hand house. "You know what we're doing?"

The man exhaled a mouthful of aromatic apple smoke. "You're acting out the Malloy murder."

Val got to her feet, brushing off her full skirt. "If you lived here then, did you see something?" The police files hadn't mentioned that a neighbor saw the shooting.

"I heard a scream and came out just as the first bullet was fired, so I ducked back into the house and called 911. All I said was that I heard shots. I didn't want to get involved, so I told myself that I hadn't seen enough to tell the police anything useful." The man drew on the pipe again. "Now I'm kinda sorry I didn't speak up."

"But you heard him swearing and saw which way the shooter ran?" Rob asked.

"I could hear his voice through an open window, and I saw him run off, but I was looking through curtains so I couldn't see much except the direction he was moving." His gaze moved to the cracked asphalt of the alley. "In all the years since, I've never once come or gone from the house without thinking of what happened here."

"How do you stand it?" Kendra asked softly.

The old man sighed. "You can get used to anything. What are you all up to? Odd sort of thing to do for fun."

"I'm the lawyer representing the man who was convicted of the murder," Val explained. "We're investigating his possible innocence, so we're walking through the crime to get a better feel for what happened. You say the killer ran back into the cross alley. Did you have any sense of his build, or the way he moved?"

"Tall. Broad. Probably young because he sure moved fast. As I said, nothing useful." He gestured with the stem of his pipe. "Once the killer ran back there, he could continue straight across to the next block, or turn north or south behind the houses. By the time the police arrived, he could have been anywhere."

Rob asked, "Did you see the two men who were witnesses?"

"Nope." He pointed the pipe stem again, down the street to the left. "They were supposed to be down there."

Noting the wording, Val asked, "Did you have any reason to doubt their claims?"

The older man snorted. "They were a couple of useless troublemakers who were regulars at a crack house round the corner. When they testified at the trial, the prosecutor made 'em both out to be Boy Scouts, but they weren't. I wouldn't believe either of 'em if they said the sun rises in the east."

"You're saying they were unreliable witnesses?" Val asked, interest quickening.

"Yeah, but no one asked my opinion." The old man emptied the charred embers of his pipe into an ashtray on the railing. "I don't know any more now than I did then. But whoever killed Malloy deserves to die." With that, he went inside.

Rob looked at his notes with a frown. "The report implies that one of the policemen recognized Daniel from the description so they went right to the apartment, but the report is ambiguously written. Maybe it wasn't a policeman who originally fingered him."

Guessing where his thoughts were going, Val said, "Do you think one of those helpful eyewitnesses could have suggested Daniel? I'm using my imagination here, but what if they recognized the shooter as some kind of buddy of theirs? To cover for him, they might have decided to throw blame on Daniel. It would be easy to stick to the story if they agreed on the details in advance."

"Your theory would explain a lot," Rob said thoughtfully. "Assume that Brenda Harris was mistaken, which is very possible given the circumstances. If she was wrong, and the other two witnesses colluded in a lie, the whole case against Daniel collapses. But how the heck can we prove it with Darrell Long dead and Joe Cady vanished?"

"Maybe I can help with Cady." Kendra gazed along the darkening street. "If the guys were down there, they couldn't see much unless there were no cars parked along the street, and in row house neighborhoods like this, there are always cars parked."

"Val, come with me. I want to see how much was visible from there."

Silently Val took Rob's hand and they crossed to the second house from the end. The reenactment was depressing her, and she felt better touching him. When they reached the right spot, Rob turned and looked back at Kendra. "In this light and with the cars in the way, it's almost impossible to see any detail."

"I can't see anything," Val said. "I wonder how tall Long and Cady were?"

"Taller than you." Rob caught her around the knees, boosting her up so she was perched on his shoulder.

She clutched at head and arms, both alarmed and amused. He knew how to sweep a girl off her feet. "Even this high, I can't see much except that someone's standing there. Since Kendra is wearing slacks, I couldn't even swear to the gender. Hard to believe those two crack-heads saw much of anything."

"I suppose they might have recognized the shooter by the way he moved or dressed." Carefully Rob set Val back on the pavement. "But no way did they see his face clearly."

Val frowned as they rejoined Kendra. "We need a lot more than the possibility they were lying to get Daniel off. Has inspiration struck about finding Joe Cady?"

"I know someone who might know where Cady is. Care to have dinner at a soul food bistro?" Kendra smiled a little. "Even if I'm wrong, you'll get the best smothered pork chops and peach cobbler in Baltimore."

"It's a deal," Rob said. "Where is the restaurant?"

"On the west side. I'll take you in my car," Kendra said. "Your pickup would be tight for three, and Val, you do not want to take your Lexus into this neighborhood."

"Okay, you drive and I'll pick up the check. Now that I'm becoming self-employed, I'm up for deducting everything I can find."