Tully plucked the radio mike from beneath the dashboard and began checking with the other units spread throughout the predetermined red-light districts. Nothing. Not a nibble. And it was beginning to get late. Another hour and they would be out of the time frame in which the perp had operated on the previous Sundays.
“No luck, eh?”
Tully shook his head. Mangiapane, eyes alternately on the road and scanning the neighborhood, didn’t catch Tully’s response. No matter, the question had been rhetorical.
“Think we’ll get home in time to see some of the Pro Bowl?” Mangiapane asked.
“Where they playin’?”
“Hawaii.”
“They’re about six hours behind us, aren’t they?”
“About.”
“And the damn game goes on forever.”
“Pretty much.”
“Yeah, I’d say we’ll either get to see the last quarter or the late movie.”
Mangiapane laughed, somewhat more heartily than was called for. He wasn’t quite conscious of the fact that he was trying to ingratiate himself with Tully.
“Speaking of movies,” Mangiapane was off again on one of his vignettes, “. . . you know that movie they’re filming in town now?”
“Uh-huh.” Everybody was painfully aware of the movie now being filmed in Detroit. The local news media, ordinarily extremely professional, lost measurable cool when it came to those rare instances when Hollywood invaded Detroit.
“Did you know that Lieutenant Horan was in charge of the squad assigned to the film crew?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, I got this story from Hughes at lunch. He’s a friend of one of the guys on that squad. And he was talkin’ about the filming the other night. It was about ten o’clock. They got those whatchamacallits—klieg lights?— whatever, and they’re gonna shoot right outside the Book Cadillac on Washington Boulevard.
“Anyway, they get all set up and ready to go when all of a sudden this car comes crashing through the barricades and plows into the set. Damn lucky thing nobody got hurt. Drunk driver.”
“I read about it.”
“Yeah, Zoo, and they had it on TV that night, too. But there was more to it than that. When they were setting up that shot, the director of the movie . . . uh . . . what’s his name?”
“I don’t know, but he’s a major-league jerk.”
“You heard this story before?”
“No, but I heard about that guy.”
“Right. Well, the jerk has five, six marked cars come screechin’ up to the hotel every which way. Some are parked facin’ north, some south, some south-by-southwest, some east. So Lieutenant Horan, tryin’ to be helpful, comes up to the director and tells him, ‘You know, the police never park like that.’
“So, the jerk says, ‘Get off my back, willya? This is Show Biz. This is the way the customers are used to seein’ dungs. I’ll direct the movie and you be a cop, okay?’
“Well, it’s all the lieutenant can do to keep from kickin’ the guy right where the sun never shines. Then this drunk comes plowin’ through everything. And of course nobody can respond because everybody’s radiator is kissin’ everybody else’s radiator.
“So then Horan comes back to the jerk and says, ‘See why the cops never park that way?’“
They chuckled.
“Anyway,” Mangiapane continued, “the Lieutenant got the last laugh. By the time they got everything untangled, it was too late for the shoot. So they wasted all that time and money.”
“Nice when the good guys win one.” Tully again reached for the mike.
If Mangiapane had been alert, he would have noticed a slight tremor in Tully’s hand. It was getting late and Tully was getting anxious.
He checked with the other units. All present and accounted for. No one had sighted anything out of the ordinary.
“Gettin’ late, ain’t it?” Mangiapane noted.
“Uh-huh.”
“There was one more.”
“One more what?”
“Story. It happened to Wolford.”
“That must’ve been some lunch you guys had.”
“It was.”
“Did you eat anything?”
“Sure, Zoo.”
“Sounds like all you did was talk.”
“No, no . . . we had, let’s see . . .”
“Never mind. What was Wolford’s story?”
“Yeah, well, he was in Wink’s Chevy body shop. Had to get a headlight for his car. The manager’s a friend of his. So while he’s waiting, this lady comes in to pick up her car after repairs. But she tells the manager her radio won’t work. Which is news to the manager ’cause there was nothin’ wrong with her radio in the first place. But he gets one of the guys to go out to her car with her. They’re all tryin’ to figure out what went wrong with the radio. Then, as she and the mechanic are goin’ out the door, she says, ‘. . . at least I think there’s something wrong with my radio: I can’t turn it on . . . maybe that’s because I never turned it off.’
“Can you imagine that, Zoo? She never turned her radio off! The damn thing was on when she bought it and she never turned the goddam thing off!”
Even though he did not feel like it, Tully smiled, picturing the scene. “What that lady needed was three minutes of silence.” He massaged his brow. A headache was building. “And that’s what we need too, Mangiapane. I got some thinkin’ to do.”
“Sure thing, Zoo.”
And so, in silence, they continued to drive the familiar streets: Montcalm, St. Antoine, Adams, Brush, Columbia, Beaubien, Elizabeth—over and over, changing only the order.
The area was only a few blocks from headquarters. Not much was going on in that neighborhood. They passed a warehouse, storage tanks, some boarded-up structures, a few buildings still occupied—although one wondered by whom—and a couple of residences that were being used almost exclusively by prostitutes.
It might not have been much of an area but, unless Tully was badly mistaken, it contained just what the perp would be stalking.
Not many women worked these streets, nor was there much of a selection. But one thing you were quite certain to find in an area like this was that rarity—an older prostitute. And here the prostitutes came in both black and white. Low-profile, elderly white prostitutes. Little chance of any intervention from either a pimp or a hooker’s buddy. Just the right kind of place.
Tully’s stomach growled. Maybe it was nerves. Maybe he needed a good meal. He thought of Alice, a nice blaze in the fireplace, the football game on TV, the aroma of good food on the stove. Who needed this shit, anyway?
“Bingo.”
It was the way Mangiapane said it. Unlike the way he said almost everything, this held almost a tone of reverence. The sort of tone a dedicated angler might use after waiting hours and finally getting a bite from the very fish he’d been after.
Instantly, the queasy feeling left Tully’s stomach. His every sense tingled.
He glanced at Mangiapane, who was studying the rearview mirror. Tully would not turn and look. He did not need to. In his mind’s eye he could see the black Ford Escort to the rear of their unmarked Pontiac.
Almost as if he could be heard by their quarry, Tully spoke just above a whisper. “Can you make the guy?”
Mangiapane hesitated. “Not quite. He ought to get his windows cleaned once in a while. From here, looks like
