The Broken Window (4 page)

“Class evidence?”

“Yeah, class. Traces of shave cream, snack food chips, lawn fertilizer from his garage. Exactly matched what was at the vic’s apartment.”

No, it didn’t
match,
Rhyme reflected. Evidence falls into several categories. “Individuating” evidence is unique to a single source, like DNA and fingerprints. “Class” evidence shares certain characteristics with similar materials but they don’t necessarily come from the same source. Carpet fibers, for instance. A DNA test of blood at a crime scene can definitely “match” the criminal’s blood. But a comparison of carpet fiber at a scene can only be “associated with” fibers found in the suspect’s house, allowing the jury to infer he was at the scene.

“What was your take on whether or not he knew her?” Sachs asked.

“He claimed he didn’t, but we found two notes she’d written. One at her office and one at home. One was ‘Art—drinks.’ The other just said ‘Arthur.’ Nothing else. Oh, and we found his name in her phonebook.”

“His number?” Rhyme was frowning.

“No. Prepaid mobile. No record.”

“So you figure they were more than friends?”

“Crossed our minds. Why else only give her a prepaid number and not his home or office?” He gave a laugh. “Apparently she didn’t care. You’d be surprised what people accept without asking questions.”

Not that surprised, Rhyme thought.

“And the phone?”

“Toast. Never found it.”

“And you think he killed her because she was pressuring him to leave the wife?”

“That’s what the prosecutor’ll argue. Something like that.”

Rhyme compared what he knew of his cousin, whom he hadn’t seen in more than a decade, against this information; he could neither confirm nor deny the allegation.

Sachs asked, “Anybody else have a motive?”

“Nope. Family and friends said she dated some, but real casual. No terrible breakups. I was even wondering if the wife did it—Judy—but she was accounted for at the time.”

Page 18

“Did Arthur have any alibi?”

“None. Claims he went for a run but nobody could confirm seeing him. Clinton State Park. Big place.

Pretty deserted.”

“I’m curious,” Sachs said, “what his demeanor was during interrogation?”

LaGrange laughed. “Funny you bring that up—the weirdest part of the whole case. He looked like he was dazed. Just blown away by seeing us there. I’ve collared a lot of people in my day, some of ’em pros. Connected guys, I mean. And he was, hands down, the best at playing the innocent-me game.

Great actor. You remember that about him, Detective Rhyme?”

The criminalist didn’t reply. “What happened to the painting?”

A pause. “That’s the other thing. Never recovered. Wasn’t in his house or garage, but the crime-scene folks found dirt in the backseat of the car and his garage. It matched the dirt in the state park where he went jogging every night near his house. We figured he buried it somewhere.”

“One question, Detective,” Rhyme said.

A pause at the other end of the line, during which a voice spoke indecipherable words and the wind howled again. “Go on.”

“Can I see the file?”

“The file?” Not really a question. Just stalling to consider. “It’s a solid case. We ran it by the book.”

Sachs said, “We don’t doubt that for a minute. The thing is, though, we understand he’s rejected a plea.”

“Oh. You want to talk him into one? Yeah, I get it. That’s the best thing for him. Well, all I have is copies, the A.D.A.’s got everything else and the evidence. But I can get you the reports. A day or two okay?”

Rhyme shook his head. Sachs said to the detective, “If you could talk to Records and okay it I’ll go down there and pick up the file myself.”

The wind filled the speakers again, then stopped abruptly. LaGrange must have moved into shelter.

“Yeah, okay, I’ll give ’em a call now.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem. Good luck.”

After they’d disconnected, Rhyme gave a brief smile. “That was a nice touch. The plea bargain thing.”

“You gotta know your audience,” Sachs said and slung her purse over her shoulder, heading out of the door.

Page 19

Sachs returned from her trip to Police Plaza a lot faster than if she’d taken public transportation—or paid attention to stoplights. Rhyme knew that she’d slapped a flashing light on the dash of her car, a 1969

Camaro SS, which she’d had painted fiery red a few years ago to match Rhyme’s preferred shade for his wheelchairs. Like a teenager, she still looked for any excuse to fire up the massive engine and sear rubber off the tires.

“Copied everything,” she said, carrying a thick folder into the room. She winced as she set it on an examining table.

“You okay?”

Amelia Sachs suffered from arthritis, she had all her life, and popped glucosamine, chondroitin and Advil or Naprosyn like jelly beans but she rarely acknowledged the condition, fearful that the brass might stick her behind a desk on a medical if they found out. Even when she and Rhyme were alone she downplayed the pain. But today she admitted, “Some twinges’re worse than others.”

“Want to sit?”

A shake of the head.

“So. What’ve we got?”

“Report, evidence inventory and copies of the photos. No videos. They’re with the D.A.”

“Let’s get everything on the board. I want to see the primary crime scene and Arthur’s house.”

She walked to a whiteboard—one of the dozens in the lab—and transcribed information as Rhyme watched.

ALICE SANDERSON HOMICIDE

ALICE SANDERSON APARTMENT:

· Traces of Edge Advanced Gel shave cream, with aloe

· Crumbs determined to be Pringles, fat free, barbecue flavor

· Chicago Cutlery knife (MW)

· TruGro fertilizer

· Shoeprint of Alton EZ-Walk, size 10 1/2

· Fleck of latex glove

· References to “Art” and a prepaid mobile number in phonebook, now no longer active. Untraceable (Possible affair?)

· Two notes: “Art—drinks” (office) and “Arthur” (home)

· Wit saw light blue Mercedes, partial tag NLP

Page 20

ARTHUR RHYME’S CAR:

· 2004 light blue Mercedes sedan, C Class, New Jersey license NLP 745, registered to Arthur Rhyme

· Blood on door, rear floor (DNA match to victim’s)

· Bloody washcloth, matching set found in victim’s apartment (DNA match to victim’s)

· Dirt with composition similar to dirt in Clinton State Park

ARTHUR RHYME’S HOUSE:

· Edge Advanced Gel with aloe, shave cream, associated with that from primary crime scene

· Pringles barbecue-flavored chips, fat free

· TruGro fertilizer (garage)

· Spade containing dirt similar to dirt in Clinton State Park (garage)

· Chicago Cutlery knives, same type as the MW

· Alton EZ-Walk shoes, size 10 1/2, tread similar to that at primary crime scene

· Direct-mail flyers from Wilcox Gallery, Boston, and Anderson-Billings Fine Arts, Carmel, about shows of Harvey Prescott paintings

· Box of Safe-Hand latex gloves, rubber composition similar to that of fleck found at primary crime scene (garage)

“Man, it’s pretty incriminating, Rhyme,” Sachs said, standing back, hand on her hips.

“And using a prepaid cell? And references to ‘Art.’ But no address where he lives or works. That
would
suggest an affair… Any other details?”

“No. Other than the pictures.”

“Tape them up,” he instructed while scanning the chart, regretting that he hadn’t searched the scene himself—vicariously, that was, with Amelia Sachs, as they often did, via a microphone/headset or a high-definition video camera she wore. It seemed like a competent CS job, but not stellar. No photos of the nonscene rooms. And the knife… He saw the picture of the bloody weapon, beneath the bed. An officer was lifting a flap of dust ruffle to get a good shot. Was it invisible with the cloth down (which meant the perp might logically have missed it in the frenzy of the moment) or was it visible, suggesting it had been left intentionally as planted evidence?

He studied the picture of packing material on the floor, apparently what the Prescott painting had been wrapped in.

“Something’s wrong,” he whispered.

Sachs, standing at the whiteboard, glanced his way.

“The painting,” Rhyme continued.

“What about it?”

“LaGrange suggested two motives. One, Arthur stole the Prescott as a cover because he wanted to kill Alice to get her out of his life.”

Page 21

“Right.”

“But,” Rhyme went on, “to make a homicide seem incidental to a burglary, a smart perp wouldn’t steal the one thing in the apartment that could be connected to him. Remember, Art had owned a Prescott.

And he had direct-mail flyers about them.”

“Sure, Rhyme, that doesn’t make any sense.”

“And say he really
did
want the painting and couldn’t afford it. Well, it’s a hell of a lot safer and easier to break in and cart it off during the day when the owner’s at work, rather than murder them for it.” His cousin’s demeanor too, though not high in Rhyme’s arsenal when he assessed guilt or innocence, nagged.

“Maybe he wasn’t playing innocent. Maybe he
was
innocent… Pretty incriminating, you said? No.
Too
incriminating.”

He thought to himself: Let’s just postulate that he didn’t do it. If not, then the consequences were significant. Because this wasn’t simply a case of mistaken identity; the evidence matched too closely—including a conclusive connection between her blood and his car. No, if Art was innocent, then someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to set him up.

“I’m thinking he was framed.”

“Why?”

“Motive?” he muttered. “We don’t care at this point. The relevant question now is
how
. We answer that, it can point us to
who
. We might get
why
along the way, but that’s not our priority. So we start with a premise that someone else, Mr. X, murdered Alice Sanderson and stole the painting, then framed Arthur. Now, Sachs, how could he have done it?”

A wince—her arthritis again—and she sat. She thought for several moments, then said, “Mr. X followed Arthur and followed Alice. He saw they had an interest in art, put them together at the gallery and found their identities.”

“Mr. X knows she owns a Prescott. He wants one but can’t afford it.”

“Right.” Sachs nodded at the evidence chart. “Then he breaks into Arthur’s house, sees that he owns Pringles, Edge shave cream, TruGro fertilizer, and Chicago Cutlery knives. He steals some to plant. He knows what shoes Arthur wears, so he can leave the footprint, and he gets some of the dirt from the state park on Arthur’s shovel…

“Now, let’s think about May twelfth. Somehow Mr. X knows that Art always leaves work early on Thursdays and goes running in a deserted park—so he doesn’t have an alibi. He goes to the vic’s apartment, kills her, steals the painting and calls from a pay phone to report the screams and seeing a man take the painting to a car that looks a lot like Arthur’s, with a partial tag number. Then he heads out to Arthur’s house in New Jersey and leaves the traces of blood, the dirt, the washcloth, the shovel.”

The phone rang. The caller was Arthur’s defense lawyer. The man sounded harried as he reiterated everything that the assistant district attorney had explained. He offered nothing that might help them and, in fact, tried several times to talk them into pressuring Arthur to take a plea. “They’ll nail him up,” the man said. “Do him a favor. I’ll get him fifteen years.”

“That’ll destroy him,” Rhyme said.

Page 22

“It won’t destroy him as much as a life sentence.”

Rhyme said a chilly good-bye and hung up. He stared again at the evidence board.

Then something else occurred to him.

“What is it, Rhyme?” Sachs had noticed that his eyes were rising to the ceiling.

“Think maybe he’s done this before?”

“How do you mean?”

“Assuming the goal—the
motive
—was to steal the painting, well, it’s not exactly a onetime score. Not like a Renoir you fence for ten million and disappear forever. The whole thing smells like an enterprise.

The perp’s hit on a smart way to get away with a crime. And he’s going to keep at it until somebody stops him.”

“Yeah, good point. So we should look for thefts of other paintings.”

“No. Why should he steal just paintings? It could be anything. But there’s one common element.”

Sachs frowned then provided the answer. “Homicide.”

“Exactly. Since the perp frames somebody else, he has to murder the victims—because they could identify him. Call somebody at Homicide. At home if you need to. We’re looking for the same scenario: an underlying crime, maybe a theft, the vic murdered and strong circumstantial evidence.”

“And maybe a DNA link that might’ve been planted.”

“Good,” he said, excited at the thought they might be on to something here. “And if he’s sticking to his formula, there’ll be an anonymous witness who gave nine-one-one some specific identifying information.”

She walked to a desk in the corner of the lab, sat and placed the call.

Rhyme leaned his head back in his wheelchair and observed his partner on the phone. He noticed dried blood in her thumbnail. A mark was just visible above her ear, half hidden by her straight red hair. Sachs did this frequently, scratching her scalp, teasing her nails, damaging herself in small ways—both a habit and an indicator of the stress that drove her.

She was nodding, and her eyes took on a focused gaze, as she wrote. His own heart—though he couldn’t feel it directly—had speeded up. She’d learned something significant. Her pen dried up. She tossed it onto the floor and whipped out another as quickly as she drew her pistol in combat shooting competitions.

After ten minutes she hung up.

“Hey, Rhyme, get this.” She sat next to him, in a wicker chair. “I talked to Flintlock.”

“Ah, good choice.”

Page 23

Joseph Flintick, his nickname intentionally or otherwise a reference to the old-time gun, had been a homicide detective when Rhyme was a rookie. The testy old guy was familiar with nearly every murder that had been committed in New York City—and many nearby—during his lengthy tenure. At an age when he should have been visiting his grandchildren, Flintlock was working Sundays. Rhyme wasn’t surprised.