A kidnapping! The ultimate crime, the hardest to solve, the most satisfying yet frustrating case to run, thought Corey. He frowned. What was this about, he, a lieutenant, having to wait to be briefed by a lowly trainee? Still, he knew Carmine. If the boss said she knew the most, then she did. Unwilling to sit waiting for her like a patient for his doctor, Corey got up and went to the office of his two team members.
Buzz was filling in the despised time sheets, a task Corey had handed to his precise second-stringer when he realized that the guy actually enjoyed filling in forms. When told what was in the offing, Buzz swelled in satisfaction.
“Where’s Morty?” Corey asked.
Buzz Genovese shrugged. “Try Cells. Virgil Simms is in charge since Vasquez shifted everyone around, and Virgil’s an old pal of Morty’s. I’ll call if you like.”
“No,” Corey said quickly. “I need some exercise, I’ll go find him for myself. You can go to my office. We have to wait for the princess.”
The cells and the offices attached to brief incarceration were on the ground floor of the County Services annex, which had been due for demolition ten years ago but was still waiting-and still functioning. It contained all kinds of antique gear for long-abandoned police techniques, like two massive bathtubs wherein raving lunatics were once submerged until the men in white coats could come and remove them to the asylum. The record of every drunk held overnight was on a file card in a special room together with arrests on more serious charges of everything from arson to murder.
There were twelve terrifyingly white cells, each twenty by twenty feet, equipped with a toilet and inadequate bench-bunk-beds covered in stained mattress ticking down three of the walls. The whiteness, achieved by tiles, dated back to the turn of the nineteenth/twentieth century, and meant that the slightest hint of dirt showed up like neon signs in a black void. It was general practice to put the night’s takings in as few cells as possible; less mess to clean up later.
No place, however, for a woman. Of the weaker sex the Cell Sergeant saw few; when one did arrive, she was put in a proper room, albeit one easy to clean and not good enough for a lady. It had a toilet with a seat on it behind a screen, a wash basin, and three proper single beds, though the mattress ticking didn’t vary. She was issued with a towel and bed linen. No mirrors, of course. Usually these poor creatures were plunged into a despair so deep that a shard from a broken mirror would have spelled freedom in death. Few of Holloman’s whores were arrested; the female intake varied from wives who had killed their husbands or lovers to child abusers.
A man pushing forty, Sergeant Virgil Simms was sitting in his office wading through the mountains of paper this new Captain of Uniforms was generating. When Corey came in he sighed, and inclined his head toward the women’s cell.
“Sleeping it off?” Corey asked.
“I doubt that,” Simms said loyally; he and Morty had gone through the academy together, served on patrol as partners, kept up their friendship. “The new housekeeper’s giving him hell, so are his kids. The only place he seems to be able to sleep is down here. Sorry, Cor.”
“Not your fault. Thanks for helping. Our boss isn’t very sympathetic.”
Corey walked into the women’s cell to find Morty sprawled on one bed in an attitude that suggested either booze or bone-tiredness; he didn’t stink of Jack or Jim, so maybe Virgil was right, he couldn’t sleep in the hell of his home.
“Morty!” Corey called, shaking his shoulder. “Morty, it’s time to wake up. Have a shave and comb your hair- we’ve got a new case, and it’s a doozy. I need you alert! The Captain’s going to be watching us, and he’s put a spy with us-Princess Helen. She’ll be reporting everything to him. And go home later, find a clean shirt. You look like something the cat dragged in.”
He caught the elevator upstairs; he’d been gone twenty minutes. Buzz strolled in and sat; Morty, looking reasonable, entered on his heels. All three men were waiting when Helen, looking flustered, came in.
“You’re late,” said Corey: put her in her place, tell her that she wasn’t going to be the kingpin around here.
“My apologies,” she said, but offered no excuses. Then she proceeded to give them a description of the case that, Corey had to admit, could not be faulted. “I’m here with you because I know Kurt very well, and the kidnapper is using me as the go-between. Beyond that, I’m strictly a trainee,” she said, winding up her presentation.
“Thanks.” said Corey, “First, I want you to come with me to an interrogation room-yeah, yeah, I know the Powers That Be want them called interview rooms, but the old name suits me fine. Whatever you know about Kurt von Fahlendorf and his family is best put on tape and transcribed. We’re going to have the FBI all over us, and I want something to slap on my desk in front of their head honcho. It’ll save us a lot of time as well. Buzz and Morty, listen in and ask your own questions.”
Off they went, Helen’s head spinning; Corey’s detecting techniques were certainly different from Carmine’s!
Nor was Corey easy on her, either because she was one of their own, or because her father was the President of Chubb University and she had a trust fund five times bigger than the von Fahlendorf ransom. He grilled her mercilessly for two hours as to her relationship with Kurt-thank God she wasn’t sleeping with him! Who his other friends were, how much she knew about the people he worked with, why the son of an industrial chemist had gone into particle physics, what his habits were, his favorite colors, his favorite music, why he’d bought a pre- Revolutionary house-it went on and on. She answered calmly and lucidly, and was sufficiently intelligent to keep the threads separated in her mind-no contradictions or uncertainties in Helen MacIntosh’s testimony! To her surprise, she was asked to read the typed version and sign it as an affidavit. Smiling slightly, she obliged. Corey was loading both barrels for the advent of the FBI by giving them twenty tangents to fly off on.
“Shrewd, but it won’t answer,” she said. “By the way, Corey, has anyone told you recently what a prick you are?”
Looking taken aback, Corey took her affidavit and left; she was not surprised to find that he chose to go to lunch with Morty and Buzz. The word was getting around too. Soon the papers, radio and TV would be sniffing, and the kidnapping would go public.
Delia was eating alone; Helen slid in opposite her and ordered a burger and fries.
“I just told Corey Marshall he was a prick.”
“Accurate,” said Delia, enjoying Yankee pot roast.
“He grilled me for two hours, then brought in these people to rubber-stamp my statement as an affidavit.”
“You could have said no.”
“Wasn’t worth it.”
“Carmine had to break into Kurt’s house,” mumbled Delia through a mouthful of mashed potato. “The Porsche was locked in the garage, and his keys and wallet were on his hall table. That means he got home.” Her eyes followed Carmine as he entered Malvolio’s, sought out Corey. “Corey’s being told now.”
Helen put her pager on the table. “In case Munich calls.”
“I hope they don’t call you in the middle of the night.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Helen said cheerfully as she bit into her burger. “I go back to sleep in seconds.”
Carmine slid into the booth next to Helen. “Is it usual for Kurt to leave his keys and wallet on the hall table?” he asked, his body language telling those who watched that it was Delia he questioned, not Helen.
Who got the message and picked up a French fry. “Yes, sir, it’s usual. Just as he always locks up the Porsche.”
“You’d better come with me as soon as you’re finished eating, Helen. I want you to check Kurt’s house, including the guest quarters, with particular regard to foreign presences.”
“How do I explain my delinquency to Lieutenant Marshall?”
“I already have.”
“Then as soon as Delia is finished, I’m ready, sir.”
“No one has stayed here, Captain,” Helen said to Carmine after touring Kurt’s premises thoroughly. “Nothing is out of place. It also looks as if Kurt’s wearing the outfit he wore when we went to Buffo’s last night.”
“How long have the von Fahlendorfs been planning to set up this trust fund?” Carmine asked as he locked the front door.
“It’s a mystery to me. Kurt’s never mentioned it.”
“Would you have expected him to under normal circumstances?”
