Saints Of New York (8 page)

Down
in the Two Unit squad room Valderas sat with Radick and Parrish, asked if Radick
wanted coffee. He declined.

'Take
it,' Parrish said. 'It'll be the last time he offers.'

'You
are such a fucking wiseass,' Valderas said. 'Not so fucking clever when it
comes to your stats.'

'I
have a sixty-eight as of yesterday,' Parrish replied.

'And
I have Hayes and Wheland with an eighty-two percent, Rhodes and Pagliaro with a
seventy-nine.'

'And
you give them the slam dunks.'

Valderas
hesitated.

'See?'
Parrish said. 'It's what I say. Give them the slam dunks, give me the
ball-breakers and the heartachers. You are such a transparent motherfucker.'

Valderas looked
at Radick. 'See what I have to contend with? Maybe a bit of your stabilizing
influence might bring this guy around.'

Radick turned
his mouth down at the corners. 'I don't know, Sergeant,' he said. 'I was told
that you were the one who needed help.'

Parrish laughed.

Valderas rolled
his eyes.

'Enough
already,' Parrish said. 'We have work to do.'

'Your alley
shooting,' Valderas said. 'Wasn't he a CI sometime back? Didn't he used to work
for Charlie Powers over at the 17th?'

'No, that
must've been some other Lange. This one I knew - didn't know his sister, but I
knew Danny. He was just a user, a small-time thief. Seven-Elevens, liquor
stores, shit like that. Did a coupla turns around the yard way back, but he
wasn't someone to write a Report about.'

'Got anything?'

'On him or the
sister?'

'Either.'

'Danny got a
.22. I figure the slug will have pancaked, won't give us nothin'. I'm checking
up on his friends, all bullshit so far. His sister I ain't gotten to yet. She
got choked in Danny's apartment. Sixteen years old, real pretty.'

'He could've
done it?' Valderas asked.

'I don't think
so, no. If it'd been some rich girl in there, then maybe, just
maybe
Danny
might've choked someone for enough cash, but his sister? Uh-uh, I don't think
so.'

'And the
parents?'

'Both dead, I
heard. Car crash a few years back. Seems the girl had some woman looking after
her in Williamsburg.'

'So what are you
going to make some progress on today?'

'Well, far as I
can tell, the subway guy just caught an opportunist psycho. I spoke to his
wife, his kids, people at his work, everyone I could think of. He was just a
regular schmuck. No gripes, no grievances, didn't drink or smoke, no hookers,
no drugs. Sort of guy who'd die and his wife would forget him by the weekend.

'The hooker we
got a lead on from a friend of hers, another girl who reported a john making
noises about killing one of them for kicks. A real party boy, you know? The kid
at the college - the one who got stabbed - seems he ripped off a coupla
dealers. He wasn't the good little boy that his folks would have us believe. He
took a couple of grand off of someone who was supplying the campus. Anyway,
that's gonna resolve by the end of next week I'm sure.'

'So the only one
you got right now that hasn't moved any place is the brother and sister?'

Parrish nodded.

'Get on that for
today then,' Valderas said. 'Spend a couple of hours with Jimmy here. Take him
round the place, show him where the john is, where he's gonna sit. The usual.
Then get your lazy asses out on the street and find out who wanted Danny Lange
and his kid sister dead.'

Parrish got up.

'And you,'
Valderas said to Radick, as he rose to leave the squad room, 'it's good to have
you here. You come with an honest reputation. Let's keep it that way, okay?'

Duggan, the DC
from the call-out wasn't in. Parrish got someone else. He asked to see the
Lange girl.

'You can wait
ten? I got someone else doing something down the hall, and I'm gonna need to be
with you.'

They waited
twenty, paced up and down the corridor, hands in pockets, nothing much of
anything to say.

The guy came
back, showed them into Theater 4, walked through to the iceboxes and opened the
drawer.

'She
is
pretty/ was
Radick's first comment. He leaned close, his
face
inches from
hers, almost as if he hoped to absorb the truth of
her death from her skin.

Then he
commented on her fingernails.

'Toenails are
the same,' Parrish said. 'Professional job.'

'She was raped?'

'Nope. Had sex,
no rape.'

'She wasn't
turning tricks?'

'Can't see it.
Not the way she looks, not unless she was a real newcomer. No hooker I ever saw
looked that good.'

'But she looks
younger than she is,' Radick said.

'You think?'

'My brother has
three girls. Eleven, thirteen, fifteen. They spend all their time trying to
look twenty-five. This hairstyle is young for sixteen, makes her look twelve or
thirteen. Doesn't fit with the nail varnish. Her clothes?'

'Found her in
her underwear,' Parrish said.

'She had clothes
in the brother's place?'

'Dunno, haven't
been back there. Got confirmation of COD yesterday, rape kit, stomach contents
. . . there was nothing out of the ordinary there.'

Parrish zipped
up the body bag, pushed Rebecca back in her slot and asked for the Danny Lange
autopsy report before they left.

'Nothing that
will help us here,' he said, after skimming through it. 'Slug was as flat as a
shadow.' He folded it up and tucked it into his jacket pocket. 'Let's go see
the apartment.'

Radick
wouldn't do the stairs. 'Nine floors?' he said. 'No fucking way.'

They took the
elevator, shuddered and stuttered all the way up.

Parrish still
had the apartment key, though the word 'apartment' suggested something
altogether more functional and appealing than the sight that greeted them.

'I still cannot
understand how the fuck people can live like this,' Radick said. He snapped on
latex gloves, started turning over greasy fried chicken boxes, empty cans . . .
found a coffee cup with half an inch of coffee under an inch of mold.

'Girl wouldn't
have been here long,' Parrish said. 'Very few girls would tolerate a place like
this. She'd have cleaned it up some, I'll bet.'

'You think maybe
someone killed her, then went after him because he could put her and the
strangler together?'

Parrish didn't
reply. He was on his hands and knees looking along the line of the carpet.

Radick shrugged.
He walked on through to the bedroom where the murdered girl had lain. He
produced a small digital camera from his jacket pocket and started taking
pictures.

'You always take
your own?' Parrish asked as he came through the doorway.

'Helps to have
extras. Sometimes I can't wait for the crime scene snaps to be delivered.'

Parrish left him
to it, saw the flash out of the corner of his eye every time it went off. He
put gloves on too, started through the kitchen, rifling drawers, opening the
cooker, the microwave. The cupboards were pretty much empty - one can of chili,
another of adzuki beans, half empty pack of Uncle Ben's. In the fridge he found
one egg and a carton of milk five days past, already swelling a little. On the
shelf beneath was half a head of lettuce in Saran wrap and three slices of
brown bread, stale and stiff and upright at the corners. How could people live
like this, Radick had said. Easy, Parrish thought, considering that his fridge
looked pretty much the same. He didn't know what he would find here, especially
as Crime Scene had already been through, but he kept on looking regardless.

Half an hour and
Radick was done.

'Got what I
wanted,' he said. 'What d'you want to do with this now?'

'Well, we need
to find this woman in Williamsburg, get Rebecca's school, talk to her friends,
anyone she hung out with,' Parrish replied. 'See if a Missing Persons report
has turned up.'

'You think she
died because of him, or he died because of her?'

'He died because
of her I should think, but hell, it's just guesswork until it's something else,
right?'

Three hours and
they had a name and an address in Williamsburg. They managed to trace Rebecca
through Child Services to the Williamsburg Schools Register. They called
Student Information, had them fax over a copy of her registration form, and
there - top right-hand corner - was as clear a photograph as they could have hoped
for. They called the school back, got the name and contact number for a Helen
Jarvis, filed with the school as Rebecca's legal guardian: the woman they were
looking for.

At five, Parrish
and Radick sat in a kosher delicatessen up on Prospect Street near the
Manhattan Bridge. Parrish had pastrami, open-face with melted Swiss cheese;
Radick had a bagel, toasted dark, with peanut butter.

'So Rebecca
lives over in Williamsburg, Danny lives in South Brooklyn. They see each other
rarely. She's a good girl, goes to school, grades are fine . . . and then she
vanishes.'

'I think we go
talk to this Helen Jarvis,' Radick said. 'I'm all for going now.'

'Sure,' Parrish
said. 'Let me finish my food.'

The traffic was
better than usual, and at a quarter of seven they pulled up outside 1256
Ditmars Street.

The woman who
opened the door was the better part of forty- five, maybe older. Parrish
immediately recognized her from the photograph he had found in Danny Lange's
apartment.

Helen Jarvis
knew who they were before the badges came out.

'It's Rebecca,
isn't it? Has she gotten into some trouble with Danny?' She stood right there
in the doorway despite the chill. She didn't invite them in.

'Could we come
in please, Miss Jarvis?' Radick asked.

Helen Jarvis
stepped back without speaking, showed them into the living room.

Parrish asked
about her relationship with Rebecca, whether she was a family member.

'No,' she
replied. 'I knew her parents . . . many years ago, of course. They're dead, you
know. Tragic really. Car crash, both of them killed instantly. Anyway, Danny
was eighteen at the time, Becky was eleven.'

'And she's been
living with you since then?' Parrish asked.

'Yes, she has.'

'And you are her
legal guardian?'

Helen Jarvis
looked awkward. 'I'm in deep, right?'

Parrish frowned.

'Child
Services?'

'I'm sorry, I
don't understand, Miss Jarvis.'

'I knew this was
going to happen. One day it had to happen, didn't it?'

'What, Miss
Jarvis? What had to happen?'

'That it would
be discovered that I'm not her legal guardian. I mean, I couldn't very well
leave her to be looked after by Danny, could I? He was already . . . well, he
already had his own problems to deal with. He didn't want a little girl
hanging around the place, did he? And anyway, there was no money. What little
there was got swallowed up with bills and God knows what else. Child Services
came down here, asked Danny if he would take care of his sister. He was already
eighteen by then, and legally he could do that. I told him to tell them yes,
he'd take her, and they went away glad not to have the problem. I then told
Danny to leave her with me. He went off to Brooklyn and she stayed here.'

'And you know
she's been missing from school for a week, Miss Jarvis?'

Helen Jarvis
bowed her head. 'Yes,' she replied. 'I know.'

'And you didn't
file a Missing Persons Report?'

'Well, I called
the school on Tuesday and the principal called me back and said that she hadn't
been into school since the previous Friday. I called the local police down
here, and they said I had to wait forty-eight hours before I could file a
report. Then it got to Thursday and I thought that I'd give it just one more
day, and then Thursday came and went. I called Danny, no answer, so I even
thought of going down to Brooklyn to see if she was with him.

'She's done this
before, you see, run off to Danny's . . . done it at least half a dozen times,
but she always comes home. I just imagine that that's what has happened. I
thought I'd give her until Saturday to phone. I knew she would phone
eventually, and she will. She will phone and tell me what happened, and she'll
be sorry for all the trouble she's caused. She's a good girl really. And Danny
is a live wire, you know? Danny is always exciting, always has something going
on, but I don't think he's a good influence - not that he's a bad person, of
course. I wouldn't want you to think that he was a bad person by any account,
but I don't think it's good that Rebecca looks up to him so much. And it isn't
like she's incapable of taking care of herself. She's older than her
years, If you know what
I
mean. And
I trust her. I just assume
she's run off to Danny's again . . .'

'And
you
last saw her when?'

'Monday morning.
Early. She went off to school as usual.'

'And there was
nothing strange in her behavior? Nothing out of the ordinary you noticed?'

Helen Jarvis
shook her head. 'Nothing that I can think of, no. I mean, she's a teenager, and
I know that sometimes teenagers can be difficult—'

'Miss Jarvis,'
Radick interjected, and Parrish could see in that moment that she knew.

They always
knew. When the police appeared on their doorstep, they knew. When the
black-and-white pulled up outside the house, they knew. When the kids didn't
come home from school, and friends didn't know where they were, and so-and-so
wasn't having a sleepover, and there was no after-hours football practice, they
knew.

Helen Jarvis had
that expression. Defeat. Overwhelm. Pained resignation. Her words - nervous,
too fast, all too eager to explain the what and where and how - had been merely
a delaying tactic. She had spoken of the girl in the present tense, the past
tense, the present tense once more.

'No,' she said
quietly, her voice barely a whisper. And then again, 'No.'

'We found her in
Danny's apartment,' Parrish told her. 'On Monday. We found Danny a few hours
earlier.'

Helen Jarvis's
eyes widened.

'Both of them,'
Parrish said. 'Danny was shot at close range, and Rebecca had been strangled.'

'Strangled?'
Helen asked, and it wasn't that she misunderstood the word, or was unable to
appreciate the concept, it was that she was hit broadside by the image of
her
Rebecca
choking to death with someone's hands around her neck.

She started to
breathe then, fast and short, started to hyperventilate, and Parrish told her,
firm but gentle, to stand up, to walk around, to take deep, deep breaths. He
told Radick to fetch her a drink of water, but Helen said she wanted a glass of
whiskey. It was there in the cupboard above the sink, the glasses to the right.

She sat down,
she stood up again, and then she started to cry.

She cried for
half an hour, her chest heaving, her voice strained, her eyes red and swollen
and desperate. She kept looking at Parrish as if he could say or do something
to make her feel better, but he could not, and she knew it.

Never once did
she ask if she was in trouble. Never once did she enquire as to whether she
would be under investigation from Child Services. That fact alone told Parrish
that Rebecca could not have found a better home after the death of her parents.

As they were
leaving Parrish held back a moment. He sent Radick on to the car.

'I need to ask
you something about Rebecca's appearance,' he said.

'Her
appearance?'

'I wanted to
know whether she wore nail varnish.'

Helen Jarvis
frowned. 'Not that I'm aware of. I mean, she might have done, but I don't
recall ever having seen her wearing nail varnish. Why?'

Parrish shook
his head. 'And her hair was cut short in back and then close in to her face,
right?'

'No, her hair
was quite long. Straight down her back, parted in the middle.'

'Okay,' Parrish
said. 'Someone is going to be in touch with you, Miss Jarvis. Unfortunately,
you might be the only person who can make a formal identification, and then
there'll be the funeral arrangements to take care of.'

Helen Jarvis
raised a handkerchief to her face.

'Is there
someone who can come and be with you?'

Helen
looked vacant for a moment, and then she shook her head. 'I'll be okay,' she
said, but Parrish knew she wouldn't.

Parrish reached
out and touched her hand, and then he left her standing in the hallway and made
his way to the car.