we didn't release the Compu-Mate connection, the news media probably wouldn't link the two killings. Not that they weren't still pestering me. That very afternoon, a reporter, a photographer, and a grip from Channel 8 ambushed me outside the courthouse with camera rolling.
'Any new developments in the anchor-lady murder?' Rick Gomez yelled over the traffic.
I picked up my pace and cut toward the street, hoping to tangle Gomez's mike cord on a parking meter. 'Your fly's open, Rick.'
He looked down, cursed at his own gullibility, and tried again. 'Is it fair to say the investigation is stalled?'
'We'll have an indictment about the time your paternity case comes to trial.'
'C'mon, Jake! Gimme something I can use.'
'Have you tried condoms?'
'Jake, please.'
'See if they come in petite.'
The grip was getting a charge out of this, even if Rick Gomez wasn't. If nothing else, they could show it on the blooper reel at the station's Christmas party.
I jaywalked across Miami Avenue, cut close to a city cop on horseback, using him as a pick like in a basketball game. Gomez, a veteran street reporter, stayed on my heels. 'Critics have questioned your qualifications to head the investigation.'
'So has my granny.'
'How many homicides have you prosecuted?'
'Same number of Emmys you've won.'
I was within sight of my office building, but Gomez wouldn't give up. 'There's a rumor that the state attorney couldn't handle the Diamond case because of his personal involvement with the victim. Care to comment?'
'I heard a rumor that you got run out of the Atlanta market after an incident with a fifteen-year-old cheerleader.'
'Jake!'
I hit the revolving door and left Gomez and his crew in the heat of Flagler Street. I was halfway to the elevator when I heard his plaintive cry: 'She was seventeen, you second-string son of a bitch!'
With the TV still jabbering in the background, I prepared dinner in a kitchen so small the roaches walk in single file. I opened a can of tomato soup and a can of tuna. The Grolsch comes in a bottle, so I didn't open any more cans.
I heard the weather guy explain how it would be ninety-two with an eighty percent chance of afternoon thunderstorms. He could have mailed it in.
The anchorman was inviting me to stay up late and watch a comedian tell semi-dirty jokes when the glare of headlights swung through the front window, a set of brakes squealed, and rear tires kicked up gravel where my lawn is supposed to be. Cops like to make entrances.
Alejandro Rodriguez walked in, helped himself to a beer, and nearly said thank you. He ran a hand through his short black hair and removed his made-for-Hollywood reflecting sunglasses, which was a good idea, since it was close to midnight. He tossed his wrinkled sport coat over a chair and removed his rubber-soled oxfords. Then he turned off his portable two-way radio, crackling with police jargon, threw down a crumpled old briefcase, and dropped into the sofa to watch TV. At the first commercial he said, 'What's black and brown and looks good on a lawyer?'
'Dunno.'
'A Doberman.'
He had another beer, and at the second commercial he asked, 'What's the difference between a rooster and a lawyer?'
'Dunno.'
'The rooster clucks defiance.'
I was running out of beer, so I was happy when he stood up, turned off the tube, and simply said, 'Passion Prince is an English professor with a potbelly.'
Then he opened the briefcase, removed a file, and slid it across my sailboard, which, when propped between cinder blocks, makes a fine coffee table. I lifted the porcelain top on my last sixteen-ounce Grolsch, sat down, and started reading. Rodriguez had handled the old-fashioned gumshoe work himself, checking out the nighttime callers. Four to Marsha Diamond, nine to Mary Rosedahl the night each was killed. Two men chatted with both. Biggus Dickus never left his house either night, Rodriguez said. His wife corroborated the alibi. Wife?
They played the game together. Biggus bedded down the women, conversationally at least. They talked it right down to panting, penetration, and popping. The missus did the men. Made them both so hot, they'd get off together. For real.
Oh.
Of the other ten men, seven had alibis that also checked out. That left Passion Prince, Harry Hardwick, and Tom Cat. Passion Prince was Gerald Prince, fifty-one, an English professor at Miami-Dade Community College. Other than Biggus Dickus, the only man to talk to both women the night they died. Divorced, lives alone. No criminal record. Expressed shock at the deaths, Rodriguez said, but seemed to enjoy the attention. Was home alone at time of both killings. Or, in the words of Rodriguez's report, 'Subject allegedly asleep between 2300 hours and 0600 on dates of homicides, no corroborating witnesses.'
'Does Prince teach poetry, by any chance?' I asked.
'Nope. I checked. Specializes in theater.'
I turned to the next file. Harry Hardwick was Henry Travers, forty-six, retired postal worker on full disability. Ordinarily found at the horses, dogs, or jai alai, depending on the season. Never married, no criminal record. Willing interview subject. Admits computer connection with Mary Rosedahl early on evening she was killed. Claims to have been at jai alai, maybe on way home at time of homicide.
Tom Cat was Tom Carruthers, thirty-five, wilderness guide. Never married, one arrest for assault in a tavern brawl, case dismissed. Refused to be interviewed, or as Rodriguez wrote, 'Subject provided minimal assistance and informed undersigned officer to 'fuck off, asshole.''
'What do you think?' I asked Rodriguez.
He sighed and stretched out on the sofa, one tired cop. 'I don't know. Travers and Carruthers spoke only to Rosedahl, so you gotta start with the professor because of the double match. The retired guy walks with a limp and would have a hell of a time attacking anybody. The outdoorsman is a hardass, one of those survivalist freaks with about thirty guns, but…'
'Nobody got shot here.'
'Right.' Rodriguez grazed his chin with the back of his hand, scratching his five o'clock shadow plus seven hours. 'And another thing. You deal with enough homicides, you get a feeling. Like you can talk to a guy and you just know he's a killer. I don't get that feeling here, not with any of them.'
'I'm told that psychopaths can be very charming.'
'None of them's exactly a charmer either.' He paused, then said, 'One's a weirdo, though.'
'Which one?'
'Don't know, but look at this.'
Rodriguez shoved a sheet of computer paper in front of me. 'The crime-scene guys got this to print out of Mary Rosedahl's computer. According to the directory, it was her last Compu-Mate conversation. She saved it into hard memory about two hours before she was aced.'
HELLO, FLYING BIRD, CARE TO CHAT?
SURE. HAVEN'T SEEN YOU AROUND THE CLUB BEFORE, HAVE I?
NO.
WHAT DO YOU DO FOR FUN, OH SWEET BIRD OF YOUTH? JOG, WORK OUT, RIDE. RIDE? YOU KNOW, HORSES. AH, FLYING BIRD. EQUUS THE KIND…THE MERCIFUL!
WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?
EYES LIKE FLAMES. GOD SEEST! ARE YOU ONE OF THOSE BORN-AGAIN GUYS? 'CAUSE I GOTTA TELL YOU THAT SHIT DOESN'T EQUUS…NOBLE EQUUS. GOD-SLAVE…THOU GOD SEEST NOTHING!!!! OH FORGET IT. NICE
