'Waiting for time to tell is just what we can't do, danm it. Take it down, will you?' While Hackett was gone he called Gunn's office.
'Morgan? He just got in-'
' Bueno,' said Mendoza happuy. 'I want him. Now. Immediately. Sooner. Apologies to take him away from his job, but I need him.'
Gunn said resignedly all good citizens had a duty to aid the police when requested and he'd shoot him right over. Mendoza looked up another number and called it. 'Mrs. Demarest? Lieutenant Mendoza. I want to see you some time today. I think we've got the doll, and I want your identification-if it is. Also Mrs. – Breen's… I don't know one thing about it except that I've got it-it just came out of the blue. Look, I won't ask you to come all the way down here, suppose you see if you can get hold of Mrs. Breen for some time this afternoon, and I'll bring it to your house. I probably won't get it back from Prints until noon anyway… Right, then, you'll call me back.'
Waiting for Morgan, he called Callaghan in idle curiosity about Ramirez. They had found an ounce and a half of uncut heroin in a plastic bag taped to the underside of the bureau in his room at the Ramirez house, he had been taken into custody, and yes, Callaghan agreed that the rest of the family looked innocent enough but of course a check had to be made. And was what he heard in the background evidence of how they usually examined witnesses in Homicide because if so it ought to be reported to the Chief.
'I'm just about to find out,' said Mendoza, and hung up. Somebody out in the anteroom was shouting angrily; he could hear Hackett saying, 'Now take it easy,' and a woman saying something else. He opened the door in time to see a little dark fellow take a swing at Hackett which almost connected. Hackett, looking as surprised as a Great Dane attacked by a belligerent Peke, held the fellow off with a hand on the chest and went on saying, 'Take it easy now-'
The woman was Agnes Browne, and she was saying, 'Joel- Oh, you mustn't-please, Jo-'
'What's all this about?' Mendoza plucked Joe off Hackett and swung him around. 'Now calm down, all of you, come into my office and let's hear about it-Miss Browne, or it's Mrs. Browne, isn't it'
'No, it's n-not!' said Agnes desperately. 'That's just what I came to tell you, sir-only I went to tell Mr. Snyder I was quitting first, and Rita would go and call Joe, and he has to come after and start all this ruction-he doesn't mean any harm, sir, please-'
'The hell I don't! I'd like to know what the hell you guys are up to, persecuting an innocent citizen what it amounts to and by God I'll see it carried to the Supreme Court if-you got no reason-just because she happened-'
'Oh, Joel They have. I-I couldn't tell you, but now I got to-I came to confess and have it all done with, I know I've done awful wrong, sir, but please, Joe didn't know-'
Hackett said to nobody in particular, 'I better apologize to Dwyer, I see how he came to walk into it.' Joe stared at Agnes in astonishment and subsided, and Mendoza told them all to sit down.
'You want to confess what?' he asked Agnes.
She collapsed into a chair and began to cry. 'I'm black!' They all looked at her. Hackett said, 'Well, I'll be damned. You see, Luis, I told you-it was that sort of thing, nothing at all. Now we know… You don't look very black to me, Miss Browne.'
'I am-it's the law-I-I know I don't look so-my mother was half white, sir, and my dad more'n half, they didn't either, I'm about an eighth I guess or something like that, and everybody always said I could pass, and I thought I'd-but I've felt just awful about it, I've never done anything against the law before, sir, I swear I haven't! I-I don't know if that counts, makes any difference to how long I'd maybe have to go to jail-'
'Nobody's going' to put you in jail!' said Joe.
'It's the law!' sobbed Agnes. 'They know it's the law! And I gave a wrong address and all, I s'pose they found out and then of course they'd suspect something funny-'
'Well, now, I grant you we got some damn funny laws on the books,' said Hackett, 'but that's a new one to me, Miss Browne.'
'It is the law, most states and I guess here too. I know it was wrong, sir.' She emerged from her handkerchief to blow her nose. 'It says anybody with any black at all who pretend-'
'Oh, that one,' said Hackett. 'I forget now, does it say it's a misdemeanor or a felony?' He looked at Mendoza.
'I seem to remember it says misdemeanor,' said Mendoza, 'but offhand I wouldn't know whether the mandatory sentence is thirty or sixty days. A judge-'
'Now listen,' said Joe.
'A judge might have a little trouble finding the latest precedent, somewhere around 1900 I should think.'
'They leave all that stuff in to make life hard for law students,' said Hackett. 'There're some a lot funnier than that.'
'Don't ridicule the law,' said Mendoza severely. 'If you ask me some of those ought to be looked up and enforced. There's another one that says it's a misdemeanor for a female to wear male clothing in public, and if you've ever walked down Broadway and seen all the fat women in pants-'
Agnes stared at them a little wildly and asked weren't they going to arrest her?
'Agnes honey,' said Joe, as if the sense of it had just penetrated, 'you mean that's why you'd never go out with me, always acted so- Well, I'll be damned!' He leaned on Mendoza's desk and laughed. 'You want to know something, I-I been in kind of a sweat about it because I figured it was on account I'm Catholic and you wouldn't have nothing to do-''
'Why, Joe! However could you think such a thing of me, I'd never-why, that's unamerican, go judging people by what church-'
'Yes, I think there's a law about that too,' agreed Hackett thoughtfully.
'Honey, one-eighth isn't so awful black, you know. Matter o' fact, you're a lot lighter-complected than me, and far as I know I got nothing but Italian both sides back to Adam. Though I guess at that a lot of us'd get some surprises if we knew everything was in our family trees like they say. You stop crying now, Agnes, it's all right, you see it's all right-'
'But-you mean you don't care-and they aren't going to arrest-'
'Well, I tell you, Miss Browne,' said Mendoza, 'the court calendars are pretty full, and we don't want to overburden the judges. I think we'll just forget it, but maybe Mr. Carpaccio here-it is Mr. Carpacdo? -would care to take the-er-probationary responsibility for your future good conduct, in which case-'
'That's a dgmn good idea,' said Joe. 'Come on now, Agnes, stop crying and come with me, you see they're not going to do noffng to you, it's nobody's business but yours… Don't I care? Listen, honey, you're the nicest girl I ever knew and the prettiest one too, and I couldn't care less if you're all colors of the rainbow. And no, Rita won't care either, I'd like to see her try- Besides, I read some place about a thing called Mendelian law, it sa-'
'Take her away and explain that one thoroughly,' advised Mendoza, shooing them out to the anteroom. 'Yes, yes, Miss Browne, you're very welcome, thank you for coming in…. Morgan, good morning, what kept you? Come in here, I've got a job for you.'
Morgan wasn't enthusiastic about the job, took it on somewhat grudgingly, while taking Mendoza's point of view. 'I've got no real reason to ask questions about this boy, and the school people would undoubtedly raise an uproar, want to know all about it if a Homicide man walked in wanting to know all about one of their seventh- graders. There may be nothing in it anyway, and in any case not much to find out at the school, but it's obviously the first place to go for information about him. They may be a little surprised at your office wanting to know, but they won't be alarmed about it, and everybody's so used these days to being asked irrelevant questions by busybody government agencies, ten to one they won't think twice about it. Try to see his teacher-or all his teachers, if there are more than one-and his school records. I've jotted down some questions you might ask.'
All right.' Morgan took the memo ungraciously. 'I'll get what I can for you, but I do have a job of my own, you know things I've got to do today.'
'I realize that.' Mendoza also realized that some of the reluctance was due to the fact that Morgan didn't like him much personally; that was just one of those things. Morgan being a reasonably intelligent man, Mendoza didn't put it down to any irrational prejudice, though he wasn't much concerned with the reason if there was one. Probably not, just a matter of personal chemistries; and he never wasted time trying to ingratiate himself with people who felt that way. He'd had the same reasonless reaction himself often enough to know that it was a waste of time. He
