Detective Wallace listened to Jake’s voice, trying to imagine the person on the other end—his age, his race, his education level. “She fell down fifty yards of escalator stairs. Broken neck. It was a violent fall.”
“So it was an accident?”
“Yes, as far as I know. Do you have something to tell me it wasn’t?”
“No, I was just wondering. We got the news at the church and we were looking for answers.”
“Well, could I get your number, just in case I need to speak with you.”
“That’s all right. I just wanted to know how she died. You have been helpful. Thanks for your time, detective.” Jake hung up the phone as he finished the sentence. He felt sweat run down the inside of his arm. He looked out at the altar and the hanging crucifix, and crossed himself one more time for luck before dancing around the toys on the floor on his way out.
Detective Wallace hung up the old black phone on his desk and stared at the receiver, the noise of the office and its activities silenced by concentration. He picked the phone back up and punched nine for the police operator. “I need a trace on the call that just came in.”
“Yes, detective. The phone is registered to St. Michael’s Catholic Church. 2300 Pennsylvania Avenue.”
Wallace jotted a quick sentence in his detective’s notebook. The phone call was unusual. He pulled the file for the case from the out-basket on his desk and went over the evidence again just to be thorough. The accident scene report and the medical examiner’s cursory exam results all pointed to a lady with a broken heel taking a spill down one mean-ass escalator. He held the folder in his hand and tried to put it back in his out-basket. His fingers wouldn’t let it go. Something about the phone call stuck in his craw. Cases had been made and killers sent to prison from investigations that started with clues far more benign than a random phone call.
Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was everything.
Detective Wallace placed a call to the morgue. His request for a full autopsy on the victim wasn’t well received. The medical examiner’s initial report was already on file. The body had been in the morgue since late Friday night and it was due to leave in a couple of hours. A full autopsy was time consuming and the current backlog of stiffs was long and growing. Two teenagers found beaten, stabbed, and shot in an alley on U Street. A three-car accident that claimed four lives including a mentally ill man who was trying to cross the street with a grocery cart full of junk. A young man dumped at the entrance to the hospital with no visible signs of illness or injury. And those were only the dead from Saturday afternoon. Two bodies had just been fished out of the Potomac and were on their way over.
Dr. Hahn handled the call. “I’ll get to her later today, detective. Looking for anything in particular?”
“Anything suspicious, no matter how minute. Double-check for forensic evidence that may have been missed in the initial exam. Anything that would contradict an accidental death by serious fall.”
The doctor read the clipboard. “Alcohol, Valium, and Zoloft followed by a fall down the stairs at the Metro station?”
“That’s what we know.”
“Ouch,” the doctor said. “I will get back to you by this afternoon.” ***
The unmarked cruiser stopped between two of the most confusing parking signs ever manufactured. By process of time slot elimination, it was legal to park between six p.m. and midnight, excluding holidays and snow emergencies. Detective Wallace shook his head at the sign, shut the door to his black unmarked cruiser and jogged, stomach bouncing, across two lanes of traffic.
In the pace of the big city, Marilyn Ford’s demise was ancient history. Fewer than twelve hours after her fall, the escalators were back in full motion, people trampling over microscopic blood stains left in the cracks of the tiles, beyond the vision of human eyes. Three days later and half the commuters using the station had forgotten the incident ever occurred.
Detective Wallace tried to recreate the scene. He walked to the top of the escalator, looked down and then turned around. He scanned the urban surroundings from street level and walked down the sidewalk half a block in each direction. With the mid-morning foot traffic passing him, he leaned against the blue mailbox and removed his left shoe. He stuffed his sock into his left Rockport and walked back to the escalator, shoe in hand. To his surprise, the one-shoe-shuffle created a nice limp, a solid simulation of a lost heel on a woman’s shoe. Lawyers and businessmen gawked at the detective as he limped down the sidewalk on one bare foot. The detective, deep in concentration, was oblivious.
He turned at the corner of the building toward the subway station, still dragging his bare foot and trying not to step on anything sharp. At the top of the escalator he measured his balance.
He slipped on his sock and shoe and approached the subway station attendant’s booth.
He flashed his badge and spoke into the pass-through in the thick security glass. “You guys got any surveillance cameras at the street level?”
“Not that I know of,” the attendant replied pointing at the monitors on the console in front of her. “We have one at each end of the platform, one right above your head for evidence against fare dodgers, and another near the ticket machines to prevent vandalism and theft.”
“Does the one near the ticket machine have a view of the escalators?”
“No, it is on the far wall facing the machines head-on. When you buy tickets, your back faces it.”
Detective Wallace bent over and tied his shoe.
“Does this have something to do with the accident Friday night?” the station attendant asked.
“Yes.”
“It happens you know.”
“What’s that?” Wallace asked.
“Falling down the stairs.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“I haven’t had anyone die on my shift, but there are plenty of sprained ankles.”
Detective Wallace was still thinking. “Thanks for your time,” he said.
“Sure, detective.”
Wallace stepped away from the station entrance and again looked down the street in both directions. He scratched his head and gave a dirty look to the delivery driver who pulled his truck a little too close to the pedestrians in the crosswalk. He stood on the corner, eyes darting, mind running through scenarios. As the world passed around him, he found what he was looking for. He was willing to put down his weekend horse track money that he was about to get his first real clue. ***
Detective Wallace fumbled with the VCR before putting his tail between his legs and asking the young detective for help.
“Detective Nguyen?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Could you lend me a hand for a minute?”
“Sure, sergeant.”
Detective Wallace led the younger, fitter man to the empty break-room.
“Do you know how to hook this thing up?” Wallace asked, pointing to the VCR and a TV on the table.
“Sir, there is a TV in the corner with a built-in VCR.”
“I need two,” Wallace answered flatly.
Detective Nguyen nodded and went to work. “Hooking these up are pretty basic—there are three cords: one red, one yellow, and one white. They go into the holes in the back of the TV with the same colors.”
Detective Nguyen finished the procedure that any twelve year-old could do with their eyes shut and turned the TV on. “What are we watching, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Surveillance tapes,” detective Wallace answered, popping the tape in the VCR.
“Want an extra set of eyes?”
“Grab a seat.”
Both men lit cigarettes and eased into the metal breakroom chairs.
