coming back to the job. He wasn't. No one ever did from a triple. Not at fifty. Not in Homicide. Not in Philly.
I miss you, Clutch, Byrne thought, knowing that he was going to meet his new partner later that day. It just ain't the same without you, man.
It never will be.
Byrne had been there when Jimmy went down, not ten, powerless feet away. They had been standing near the register at Malik's, a hole-in- the-bricks hoagie shop at Tenth and Washington. Byrne had been loading their coffees with sugar while Jimmy had been macking the waitress, Desiree, a young, cinnamon-skinned beauty at least three musical styles Jimmy's junior and five miles out of his league. Desiree was the only real reason they ever stopped at Malik's. It sure as hell wasn't the food.
One minute Jimmy had been leaning against the counter, his young- girl rap firing on all eight, his smile on high beam. The next minute he was on the floor, his face contorted in pain, his body rigid, the fingers of his huge hands curling into claws.
Byrne had frozen that instant in his mind, the way he had stilled few others in his life. Over his twenty years on the force, he had found it almost routine to accept the moments of blind heroism and reckless courage in the people he loved and admired. He had even come to accept the senseless, random acts of savagery delivered by and unto strangers. These things came with the job: the steep premium to justice sought. It was the moments of naked humanity and weakness of flesh, however, he could not elude, the images of body and spirit betrayed that burrowed beneath the surface of his heart.
When he saw the big man on the muddied tile of the diner, his body skirmishing with death, the silent scream slashed into his jaw, he knew that he would never look at Jimmy Purify the same way again. Oh, he would love him, as he had come to over the years, and he would listen to his preposterous stories, and he would, by the grace of God, once again marvel at Jimmy's lithe and fluid abilities behind a gas grill on those sweltering Philly summer Sundays, and he would, without a moment's thought or hesitation, take a bullet to the heart for the man, but he knew immediately that this thing they did-the unflinching descent into the maw of violence and insanity, night after night-was over.
As much as it brought Byrne shame and regret, that was the reality of that long, terrible night.
The reality of this night, however, found a dark balance in Byrne's mind, a delicate symmetry that he knew would bring Jimmy Purify peace. Deirdre Pettigrew was dead, and Gideon Pratt was going to take the full ride. Another family was shredded by grief, but this time the killer had left behind his DNA in the form of a gray pubic hair that would send him to the little tiled room at SCI Greene. There Gideon Pratt would meet the icy needle if Byrne had anything to say about it.
Of course, the justice system being what it was, there was a fifty-fifty chance that, if convicted, Pratt would get life without parole. If that turned out to be the case, Byrne knew enough people in prison to finish the job. He would call in a chit. Either way, the sand was running on Gideon Pratt. He was in the hat.
'The suspect fell down a flight of concrete steps while he attempted to evade arrest,' Byrne offered to Dr. Hirsch.
Avram Hirsch wrote it down. He may have been young, but he was from Jefferson. He had already learned that, many times, sexual predators were also quite clumsy, and prone to tripping and falling. Sometimes they even had broken bones.
'Isn't that right, Mr. Pratt?' Byrne asked.
Gideon Pratt just stared straight ahead.
'Isn't that right, Mr. Pratt?' Byrne repeated.
'Yes,' Pratt said.
'Say it.'
'While I was running away from the police, I fell down a flight of steps and caused my injuries.'
Hirsch wrote this down, too.
Kevin Byrne shrugged, asked: 'Do you find that Mr. Pratt's injuries are consistent with a fall down a flight of concrete steps, Doctor?'
'Absolutely,' Hirsch replied.
More writing.
On the way to the hospital, Byrne had had a discussion with Gideon Pratt, imparting the wisdom that what Pratt had experienced in that parking lot was merely a taste of what he could expect if he considered a charge of police brutality. He had also informed Pratt that, at that moment, Byrne had three people standing by who were willing to go on the record that they had witnessed the suspect tripping and falling down the stairs while being chased. Upstanding citizens, all.
In addition, Byrne disclosed that, while it was only a short ride from the hospital to the police administration building, it would be the longest few minutes of Pratt's life. To make his point, Byrne had referenced a few of the tools in the back of the van: the saber saw, the surgeon's rib- cracker, the electric shears.
Pratt understood.
And he was now on the record.
A few minutes later, when Hirsch pulled down Gideon Pratt's pants and stained underwear, what Byrne saw made him shake his head. Gideon Pratt had shaved off his pubic hair. Pratt looked down at his groin, back up at Byrne.
'It's a ritual,' Pratt said. 'A religious ritual.'
Byrne exploded across the room. 'So's crucifixion, shithead,'he said. 'What do you say we run down to Home Depot for some religious supplies?'
At that moment Byrne caught the intern's eyes. Dr. Hirsch nodded, meaning, they'd get their sample of pubic hair. Nobody could shave that close. Byrne picked up on the exchange, ran with it.
'If you thought your little ceremony was gonna stop us from getting a sample, you're officially an asshole,' Byrne said. 'As if that was in some doubt.' He got within inches of Gideon Pratt's face. 'Besides, all we had to do was hold you until it grew back.'
Pratt looked at the ceiling and sighed.
Apparently that hadn't occurred to him. Byrne sat in the parking lot of the police administration building, braking from the long day, sipping an Irish coffee. The coffee was cop-shop rough. The Jameson paved it.
The sky was clear and black and cloudless above a putty moon.
Spring murmured.
He'd steal a few hours sleep in the borrowed van he had used to lure Gideon Pratt, then return it to his friend Ernie Tedesco later in the day. Ernie owned a small meat packing business in Pennsport.
Byrne touched the wick of skin over his right eye. The scar felt warm and pliant beneath his fingers, and spoke of a pain that, for the moment, was not there, a phantom grief that had flared for the first time many years earlier. He rolled down the window, closed his eyes, felt the girders of memory give way.
In his mind, that dark recess where desire and revulsion meet, that place where the icy waters of the Delaware River raged so long ago, he saw the last moments of a young girl's life, saw the quiet horror unfold…
… sees the sweet face of Deirdre Pettigrew. She is small for her age, naive for her time. She has a kind and trusting heart, a sheltered soul. It is a sweltering day, and Deirdre has stopped for a drink of water at a fountain in Fair- mount Park.A man is sitting on the bench next to thefountain. He tells her that he once had a granddaughter about her age. He tells her that he loved her very much and that his granddaughter got hit by a car and she died.That is so sad, says Deirdre. She tells him that a car had hit Ginger, her cat. She died, too. The man nods, a tear forming in his eye. He says that, every year, on his granddaughter's birthday, he comes to Fairmount Park, his granddaughter's favorite place in the whole world.
The man begins to cry.
Deirdre drops the kickstand on her bike and walks to the bench.
Just behind the bench there are thick bushes.
Deirdre offers the man a tissue…
Byrne sipped his coffee, lit a cigarette. His head pounded, the images now fighting to get out. He had begun to pay a heavy price for them. Over the years he had medicated himself in many ways-legal and not, conventional and tribal. Nothing legal helped. He had seen a dozen doctors, heard all the diagnoses-to date, migraine with aura was the prevailing theory.
