were killed? Every precinct in the city had to direct manpower to the scene, can you understand that?”
“So my case means nothing to them, right? I’m the bottom of the pecking order, aren’t I? You think the newspapers won’t be interested in that? You think I can’t get some reporter to do a story on how this has impacted me both emotionally and professionally?”
“Tell your story to anyone you think will help you, Carol,” I said, rising again, aware that I’d be losing points on the sensitivity scale today. “Threats don’t work very well with me, so now I’m going to suggest that you leave and let me get back to business. You got home safely, didn’t you?”
“I had to wait in that damn place until one of my neighbors came in and walked me home. I guess the police wouldn’t have cared if I had to stay there all night.” She got up from her chair and fumbled in her bag to find lipstick to apply.
“That’s a silly thing to say, Carol. They’ve been very concerned about this. I’ll give the cops a call, but I think you’ve got to cut them a break about last night. Where are you going now?”
“Back to work.”
“Would you be more comfortable if I had one of the detectives from the DA’s squad give you a ride?”
“Yeah. That would be great.”
“Then have a seat in the waiting area, okay?”
I led her out past Laura’s desk and returned to my office, closing the door behind me. I dialed Steve Marron in the squad, one flight above me. “Steve, have you got twenty minutes?”
“Every time I give you twenty you manage to turn it into an hour. Five hours. Ten.”
“Come on down. I need you to drive a witness to her office on Wall Street. Tell Joe Roman to stand outside our building entrance and get a good make on the young woman who’ll be coming out with you.”
“Be right there, Alex.”
When Steve Marron knocked on my door and came in, I explained the situation. “I need Joe to do surveillance on her. I don’t want to wait for her to call the next time the stalker shows up. I want Joe to follow her from her office when she leaves tonight, onto the subway, then to her house. And then he needs to take her in the reverse direction, from home to work, the next few mornings.”
“Aren’t there detectives assigned already?”
“Yes, but I don’t want her to know we’re doing this. She’s met those guys. I want to use a team she doesn’t recognize. If this is for real, then the perp also must have figured out who the cops are by now.”
“And if it’s not for real?” Steve asked. “Don’t roll your eyes at me.”
“We have to assume it is. Give it a try.”
Few investigations were more frustrating than stalking cases. Victims were rightly terrified by criminals or psychos who lurked outside their homes and offices, following them for months, often without making any overt gestures. Law enforcement agents and judges had traditionally responded to complaints with a cavalier and dismissive attitude that “nothing” had happened over time. But when the behavior might escalate was often unpredictable, and until resolved, every break had to go in favor of the victim. Threat assessment had burgeoned since stalking had been recognized as a crime category only a decade ago.
I introduced Carol to Steve Marron and saw them to the elevator, then returned to my office to grab my jeans and driving moccasins before heading to the ladies’ room to change.
Artie Tramm was sitting in Laura’s desk chair when I got back, flipping through the copy of Cosmo that sat on top of a pile of the unit’s latest indictments.
“What do you need?” I asked.
“I think you dropped something on your way out of the courtroom. Thought I’d bring it to you myself,” he said, giving me a small white business card with a handwritten notation on the blank side.
I hadn’t any cards with me when I went upstairs to Part 83 this morning, so I was puzzled as I reached for it.
The name that had been written on it was not familiar to me. It was in a bold script that I recognized from looking at hundreds of documents signed by Brendan Quillian and said simply Lawrence Pritchard.
I flipped the card, surprised to see the logo of Keating Properties.
I reddened as I handed it back. “C’mon, Artie. You know this isn’t mine. We’d better go back up to the judge and make a record. It could be Brendan Quillian’s.”
“It don’t belong to anybody. I told you I picked it off the floor. It’s garbage, wouldn’t you think? Just garbage.”
I shook my head at Artie.
“Besides, Gertz is gone until Monday, after the funeral. Meantime, Alex, the least you could do is find out who this guy is-the one whose name is written here. You never know, maybe he’s somebody who could be useful to you.” Artie pocketed the card and walked to the door. “And your case needs all the help you can get.”
11
I parked at the corner of Eleventh Avenue and walked east across Thirtieth Street to the front of the barbed- wire entrance to the construction site at three forty-five in the afternoon. I had called Mike on his cell phone and he was waiting for me at the gate.
“I can’t believe you told Lem about this Lawrence Pritchard business before you even found out who the guy is.”
“It’s a little thing called ethics, Mike. If it has anything to do with our case, Lem would be likely to move for a mistrial. This one won’t get any better the second time around.”
“He’s baiting you. That’s all it is.”
“What do you mean?”
“Lem Howell? Dropping a piece of paper on the floor by mistake? There’s a guy who never had a spit curl where he didn’t want it to be and he’s playing loose with a clue or a potential suspect’s name? Not his style, Coop. You know your players better than that. You know he wanted you to be misled by that business card. What’d he tell you?”
“He was very gracious about it. Said it had nothing to do with the trial. Thanked me for the call and said I could make a record of it when we resumed next week.”
“Sucker,” Mike said, and started to walk through the yard.
“I googled this guy Lawrence Pritchard,” I said, stepping over enormous pieces of mechanical equipment and walking between two tall cranes to keep up with Mike. The site was a beehive of activity. The sandhogs were in work clothes, the detectives had eschewed sports jackets for T-shirts, and the officials from a mix of city agencies were the only ones standing around in suits, kibitzing with each other. I hadn’t smelled this much cigarette smoke in any one place since my first midnight visit to a homicide squad.
No one seemed happy to see me, but that was hardly a new crime-scene experience.
“What’d you get on him?” Mike asked, calling to me over his shoulder.
“Former chief engineer on this project. Fired two years ago. Has his name come up?”
“Watch your step,” he said, waiting for me and holding out his hand. “It gets really sloppy over here from the fire hoses last night. Never heard of him.”
“There are a few articles about it. Max is going to pull them for me. Looks like he was involved with kickbacks. Pocketed more than a hundred thou, took lots of expensive gifts, went on a few gambling trips and boondoggles.”
“And Quillian knows him?” Mike was standing at the bottom step of a trailer, a dust-covered double-wide that seemed to be the headquarters of the operation. He climbed the four stairs and held open the door, which was draped with black bunting. “Welcome to hog house. No kidding, that’s what they call it.”
“Thanks,” I said, pausing at the threshold. “That’ll be your job to figure out, don’t you think? We’ll be looking for a link between Duke Quillian and Pritchard. Obviously, I think Brendan was trying to put Lem Howell on Pritchard’s trail for some reason. Lem said it has nothing to do with my murder case, but he must figure there’s a connection to Duke’s death.”
“We’ve got the main man from the Department of Environmental Protection here. The entire tunnel project-
