The DeadHouse

didn't want to miss the chance to score a few bucks off you, Coop. You allowed to drink yet, Detective Wallace, or does it still pour out through that mean-looking exit wound in your back?' He headed back to the bar to fix a club soda for Mercer.

I had visited Mercer at his home at least once a week since the shooting last summer, and I knew his recovery from the chest wound that had threatened to rip him apart had progressed well. He was due to come back to work on modified duty early in the new year, but I thought it would take more than a holiday party to bring him to my doorstep.

Chapman was in the den pouring drinks against the background noise of Win Ben Stein's Money on the Comedy Central channel. The brainiac host was, as usual, about to knock off all the contestants with a string of good answers to tough questions, while I watched Mercer-still limping slightly-walk ahead of me and sit down. 'Just took enough money off Coop to buy you a Kwanza present, Detective Wallace.'

Mercer raised his glass and we all clinked. 'To a better year for each of us. And to Lola Dakota, may she rest in peace.'

'Mercer started beeping me this morning with a million things he wanted to know. Said he was coming into the office to bring his case folder and notes for us, so I figured he might as well make a guest appearance at the armory.'

We spent close to an hour talking about all the facts Mercer remembered from handling the domestic assault investigation that was part of Lola's original complaint. She had loved the quiet calm and dignified manner of the detective, which had made him such an outstanding member of the Special Victims Unit, the police department's companion unit to my bureau. Lola had called him often when she was indecisive or frightened, and he had talked her through some of the toughest moments of her ordeal with Ivan. I could tell how it pained him that, in the end, nothing he could do had saved her.

'Time to bundle up and boogie.' Mike was on his feet, taking our coats out of the closet and getting ready to leave. 'Who gets the first dance, Chief Allee or Inspector Cutter?'

'What are you doing tomorrow night, Alex?' Mercer asked.

'No plans. I had been thinking about going to DC. to meet Jake, just for Saturday night, until Mike got that preliminary report from the ME this morning telling him this was probably going to be declared a homicide. I called Lola's sister, Lily, right after I got the news, to see whether we could go out to her house to talk with her. It's not a very smart time for me to leave town.'

'Come out to my place for dinner. Mike'll drive you. I'm having some friends over to do my tree. Seven o'clock.'

'Sounds good.'

'Still nice to get a crack at Miss Lonelyhearts when her own personal talking head is out of town, isn't it, Mercer? Just like old times.'

I rode with Mike and Mercer to the Seventh Regimental Armory, an enormous fortress on Park Avenue, built in 1879, which took up an entire city block. The interior was a throwback to another era, its vast halls-designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany-lined with plaques honoring war dead from the last century, and its rooms decorated with moose heads and other dusty antlered animals whose glass eyes stared down at the festivities. The original function of its drill hall had given way to use as rental space for endless rounds of weekend antiques shows and the occasional rubber-chicken dinner meetings of organizations too penny-wise to engage private salons at real restaurants.

As we entered the fourth-floor room in which the squad party was being held, we were swamped by detectives and cops who had not seen Mercer since the shooting. I stepped back and walked over to greet the chief of detectives before I made the rest of the rounds.

'Heard you and Chapman were up at King's College this afternoon. Any headway?'

'They're beginning to see the light.'

We talked for several minutes until I felt my beeper vibrating on my waistband. There was a phone booth on the main floor and I excused myself to go downstairs to return the call. I recognized the number displayed as the main line from ECAB-the Early Case Assessment Bureau-which was the intake unit through which every arrest in Manhattan entered our office. The expediter answered.

'Hey, it's Alex Cooper. Any idea who beeped me?'

'Ryan Blackmer's looking for you, Alex. Hold on a minute.'

'Sorry to bother you, but I figured you'd want a heads-up,' Ryan said. He was one of the brightest and best lawyers in the division, and had drawn the Friday night supervising position in ECAB. 'Uniformed guys in the Sixth Precinct just collared a mope for sex abuse tonight.'

'You got the facts yet?'

'The complaining witness was walking home from a friend's house, right along Washington Square Park-on the north side near the Arch-when this clown grabbed her from behind and started to rub against her, trying to drag her into the park. She was able to break away and get home. Called nine-one-one from her apartment. Cops drove her around for almost an hour and she ID'ed him a few blocks from the square.'

'Make any statements?'

'Yeah, claims he's gay. Not guilty.'

'Anything I can do to be useful?'

'No. Just didn't want you to read about it in the morning papers. The victim's a graduate student at NYU. It's probably not related to what you're working on, but I thought you ought to know about it. Seems like it's open season on college campuses this week.'

I hung up and took the elevator back to the fourth floor. Lieutenant Peterson had just arrived and was talking to the chief, who summoned me to them with his forefinger.

'I'm surprised you and Chapman didn't stay for the service.'

'What service?'

'Peterson's just telling me that President Recantati called for a prayer session and candlelight vigil tonight, then canceled all the classes and exams next week, and dismissed the students for the Christmas recess.'

I was livid. Recantati and Foote must have made those plans before we saw them in the early afternoon, and they had chosen not to tell us. I thanked Chief Allee for the news and worked my way through the crowd to find Chapman, who was in the middle of the dance floor with one of the assistant DAs from my unit, Patti Rinaldi.

'You can have the next tango with him, I just need him for a few minutes.' I took Mike's hand and led him to the side of the room, explaining the news to him. 'You realize that means we're not going to have any kids there to interview by Monday afternoon, and possibly not any faculty members? They'll all scatter home over the weekend.'

'Relax, blondie. I'll pay Foote a visit first thing tomorrow morning and get some names and numbers. We'll do the best we can.' He shuffled back to the dance floor without missing a step, calling out to Patti, to the Motown beat: 'Rescue me! Take me in your arms

I fumed on the sidelines, annoyed that Chapman didn't seem as distressed as I was by Sylvia Foote's duplicity.

7

'Just once, I'd like to read an obituary of a murdered woman who hasn't been canonized overnight.' It was Chapman, my Saturday morning 6:45 wake-up call. 'Doesn't anybody wicked and ugly ever get blown away? I picked up the tabs on my way home.'

Home from where? Patti's apartment? I wondered.

''King's and Columbia Mourn Death of Beloved Professor.' Who beloved her? Mercer says she was a real ball breaker. 'Raven-haired Prof Slain After Spousal Sting.' The Post, of course. The broad is dead-what frigging difference does her hair color matter? D'you ever read a man's obit that says he was balding or blond? Someday I'm going to write the death notices for all of my victims. Truthfully. 'The despicable SOB, whose face could stop a clock, finally got what she deserved after years of being miserable to everyone who crossed her