The Chalk Girl

doctor came in to pronounce the boy dead, you told him you were there the whole time. Isn’t that what happened? Isn’t that what Rolland told you to say?’

‘Rolland loves me.’

‘The guy really planned ahead,’ said Mallory. ‘So he was the last one to see the kid alive. But guess who’s getting hung out to dry, Annie. It’s all on you now. You – the crazy lady who can’t even leave her apartment. The nutcase with a pharmacy of drugs in her purse and a—’

‘No! I’d never—’

‘A nurse who kills her patients,’ said Mallory. ‘That’s how it’ll play out in court. You felt bad for a little kid with amputated hands. You wanted to spare Ernie all that horror – when he woke up from the coma. So you took a pillow, and you—’

‘No! I wasn’t even there when the Nadlers’ son died!’

‘It’s gonna be okay, Annie.’ Riker pushed a yellow pad across the table. ‘I’ll help you. Just write down what happened that night. Your side of the story.’ He handed her the pen.

She took it.

There were only two watchers in the dark on the other side of the glass, and they remained there while the woman in the interview room wrote out her statement. Lieutenant Coffey locked the door. Now that privacy and secrecy were assured, he turned to the chief of detectives. ‘We’re still building the case. I don’t wanna rush it.’

‘What’ve you got for motive, Jack?’

‘We think the Nadler kid was a witness to a wino’s murder. If he ever came out of the coma, the boy could’ve blown up Mann’s case against Toby Wilder. Mann would’ve done jail time for witness tampering, withholding evidence, obstruction.’ Coffey held back on Mallory’s alternate theory. Not everyone shared her love of profit motives, and she had given him no solid proof for that idea – nothing beyond a series of promotions for a mediocre cop’s rise to the top of the NYPD food chain.

‘Okay,’ said Chief Goddard. ‘So far, so good. Rocket Mann marries the nurse for insurance. If things go sour, she takes the fall. I call that long-range planning – like the Hunger Artist. But first you gotta nail him for killing the Nadler kid.’

‘Yeah,’ said Jack Coffey. ‘Just one problem. Why smother the boy? Mann was a detective. He had to know the forensics would point to murder. Even a drunken hospital pathologist noticed hemorrhaging in the kid’s eyes.’

‘Petechial hemorrhaging wasn’t in Rocket Mann’s vocabulary back then. I remember him in those days. He didn’t know shit about forensics, and he couldn’t bother to learn a damn thing. Never attended an autopsy, never cracked a book. And the guy couldn’t keep a partner for more than a week. Nobody wants to work with the screwup cop. That’s why he was riding solo when he was still a probie. I was the captain who assigned him to the wino murder.’

‘I know that,’ said Coffey. ‘My detectives are very thorough. They also tell me you started your vacation that same day . . . sir.’

‘And you wondered why I never volunteered that information.’ Joe Goddard waved one hand toward the window on the next room, where Annie Mann was still writing out her statement. ‘So this was staged for my benefit. I heard you guys do suspect interviews on both sides of the glass.’ He laughed, not a scoff – a belly laugh.

Jack Coffey would never have predicted that response. ‘Why did you assign a homicide to a white shield with no partner, no oversight?’

‘The wino murder was busywork, a case nobody cared about. If Mann screwed up – and I knew he would – no harm done. Then I could bust him back to a beat cop. I was on a fishing trip in Oregon when he pinned that murder on the Wilder kid. I could smell the stink all the way across the country. By the time I got back, strings had been pulled to get Mann transferred out of my precinct. And that little fuckup was sporting a gold shield. That’s when I knew he was dirty.’

‘How much did you know about Ernest Nadler? When he went missing, the parents—’

‘When I got back, I only knew a kid got lost, and he was found alive. That bastard Mann worked the assault off the books. No paperwork. I always knew he didn’t have the makings of a cop, and I was right about that . . . but I didn’t give him credit for brains. That was my mistake. I never knew what happened to that little boy, not until your detectives dug up the old ViCAP questionnaire. Satisfied, Jack?’

‘Yes, sir.’ No, sir. Lieutenant Coffey knew this was a lie, but his only proof was the chief’s relief when this story went unchallenged.

‘Your guys better make a strong case, Jack. I don’t want Rocket Mann getting off ’cause the public watches too many cops shows on TV. If you had a problem with the forensics, so will the damn jury. And I don’t want your case blowing up on a technicality of spousal privilege. Find out if he’s legally married to the nurse.’

‘He is. The marriage was registered in Toronto, Canada. My detectives knew that before they walked into the interview. And Mallory’s right about spousal privilege. It won’t apply to what Annie Mann saw, and she saw Rolland Mann in that hospital room with the dead boy.’

‘Then it’s his word against hers. You need more to charge him on the kid’s murder. And I wanna see some evidence for the murders of Humphrey Bledsoe and Aggy Sutton.’

‘We’ve got no connection between Mann and the Hunger Artist.’

‘Make one. Dump the wife in Witness Protection. I don’t want word getting out she was ever here. Don’t let her go home to pack a bag. Take her straight to a safe house.’

Coffey nodded to say he was following this. ‘So Rocket Mann goes home tonight. No wife, no missing suitcase. All her clothes are still in the closet.’

Goddard grinned. ‘What’s he gonna do? Everybody thinks he’s single. He let that game go on too long. And now he can’t even file a report on a missing wife, not without explaining why he erased her on paper. He’ll wonder where she is – and who’s she talking to? He’ll come unglued.’

Jack Coffey’s detectives were already busy rattling Rolland Mann, and they needed no help from Joe Goddard. But it would be impolitic to tell the chief of D’s that his plan was already in the works. Mallory and Riker had unpacked Annie Mann’s suitcase and then enlisted the aid of the neighbor across the hall. Mrs Buford was thrilled by the whole idea of becoming an agent for the police, and her silence was guaranteed, should Rolland Mann come to her door.

Joe Goddard had never been inclined to micromanage any homicide investigation. So why the change of style? Did Goddard miss the chase of a street-level cop? No, not likely. Jack Coffey decided that the chief of D’s had something to hide – and keep hidden.

The two detectives sat at their facing desks, doing paperwork on the most recent interview. Riker pushed aside the conflicting statements of Rolland and Annie Mann. ‘Are we missing something here? When Rocket Mann took Annie to Canada – you think he had a plan to kill her and dump the body up there? Maybe he chickened out? Killing isn’t his best thing. He bungled the forensics on Ernie’s murder.’

‘I think Annie was right,’ said Mallory. ‘He wanted to save her.’

‘So . . . you don’t think he smothered Ernie?’

‘Oh, yeah. He did it, all right. The bastard’s a stone killer. He’s just not real good at it. That’s what bothers you.’

‘I have a headache,’ said Riker.

THIRTY-SEVEN

The dead man in the Ramble is the last thing I think about when I go to bed – but not to sleep. I lay awake and wonder – did somebody close the wino’s eyes before he was buried? Or do bugs get into his coffin and crawl on his eyeballs? I wake up my parents to ask them.

—Ernest Nadler

Hoffman lingered in the drawing room, not liking the looks of the visitor, and who could blame her?

Grace Driscol-Bledsoe rose from her chair to tower over her son’s former – schoolmate, co-killer – oh, what