'Were those his exact words?' Byrnes asked.
'No, he said the old man had something somebody
else wanted real bad and he wouldn't part with it. Some
thing worth a lot of money.'
'What'd he say about having him killed?'
'He said somebody was willing to pay five grand to
kill the old man and make it look like an accident.'
'But why?' Willis asked.
'What do you mean why?'
'You said the old man had something somebody else
wanted . . .'
'Right.'
'So how's this somebody gonna get it if he has the
old man killed?'
The detectives fell silent, thinking this over.
'Had to be the insurance money,' Hawes said at last.
'Only thing anyone could get by having him killed.'
'Which leads right back to the daughter and son-in-law.'
'Unless there's something else,' Carella said.
'Like what?'
'Was the guy tortured?' Hawes asked.
'No.'
'Cause maybe the killer was trying to get whatever
it was, and when he couldn't. . .'
'No, he wasn't tortured,' Meyer said. 'The killer doped him and hanged him. Period.'
'Smoked some pot with him, dropped roofers in his
drink . . .'
'Which is what the guy in the card game offered Harpo.'
'Did these two guys know each other?' Parker asked.
'They met in the card game.'
'Not them two. I'm talking about the old man and the guy who killed him.'
Again, the room went silent. They were all looking
at Parker now. Sometimes a great notion.
'I mean, were they buddies or something? Cause otherwise, how'd he get in the apartment? And how come they were smoking pot together and drinking together? They had to know each other, am I right?'
'I don't see how,' Carella said. 'Danny told me the
killer was a hit man from Houston. Going back there tomorrow.'
'Told you everything but what you wanted to know,
right?'
'Did the old man ever go to Houston?' Byrnes asked.
'Well, I don't know.'
'What do you know about him?'
'Not much. Not yet.'
'Find out. And soon.'
'Did he leave a will?' Hawes asked.
'Left everything he had to the kids.'
'Which was what?'
'Bupkes,'
Meyer said.
'What's that?' Parker asked.
'Rabbit shit.'
Ed McBam
'So then what's this something somebody wanted bad
enough to kill for?'
'The MacGuffin,' Hawes said.
'I told you,' Willis said. 'It's a fuckin movie.'
'Movie, my ass,' Byrnes said. 'Get some composites
made from the witnesses in that pizza joint. Let's at least
find two guys who came in blazing in broad daylight,
can we? And find out where that poker game took place.
There has to be . . .'
'On Lewiston,' Carella said. 'Up in the . . .'
'Where
on Lewiston? Our man's leaving town tomor
row.'
The room went silent.
'I want you to treat this like a single case with Danny
as the connecting link,' Byrnes said. 'One of the guys in
that poker game knew Danny, and another one may have
killed Hale. Let's find out who was in the damn game.
And find out who that old man really was. He didn't exist in a vacuum. Nobody does. If he had something somebody wanted, find out what the hell it was. If it was just the insurance policy, then stay with the Keatings till you nail them. I want the four of you who caught the squeals to work this as a team. Split the legwork however you like. But bring me something.'
Carella nodded.
'Meyer?'
'Yeah.'
'Artie? Bert?'
'We hear you.'
'Then do it,' Byrnes said.
'What about my dope bust?' Parker asked.
'Stay,' Byrnes said, as if he were talking to a pit bull.
There were several training exercises at the academy,
each designed to illustrate the unreliability of eye witnesses. Each of them involved a variation on the same
theme. During a class lecture, someone would come into
the room, interrupting the class, and then go out again.
The cops-in-training would later be asked to describe the
person who'd entered and departed. In one exercise, the
intruder was merely someone who went to one of the
windows, opened it, and walked out again. In another,
it was a woman who came in with a mop and a pail, quickly mopped a small patch of floor, and went out again just as quickly. In a more vivid exercise, a man came in firing a pistol, and then rushed out at once. In none of these exercises was the intruder accurately described afterward.
