Bean took a look at the statement. She hadn’t given the car registration number, he mused, as Rooney deposited his overweight frame behind his desk in his precious old leather swivel chair.
‘I reckon that Summers woman was right — she was a whore, that’s why she doesn’t know how tall the guy is. Maybe he never got out of the vehicle, just picked her up on the sidewalk...’
Bean nodded agreement. ‘Unless both the Summerses and this caller got the wrong guy. Maybe he just drives a blue Sedan.’
Rooney leaned on his elbows. ‘Possibly, but it’s the hammer, a claw hammer. If you read Forensic on the type of weapon used to kill Norman Hastings, they say: “A blunt-edged hammer-type head, one inch in diameter, with a claw section one and a quarter inches long”.’ He sifted dirough his files until he found the Forensic photographs of the dead man, close-ups of the blows inflicted to his skull, cheeks, and chin. If the anonymous caller was right, they were looking for a killer with a big bite taken out of his neck.
Rooney looked at Bean and grinned. ‘This shouldn’t take long then, should it? We got Dracula out there now — but at least we can check all Hastings’s associates. No bite, we’ll eliminate them.’
Lieutenant Bean frowned, unsure if Rooney was joking. Suddenly he barked at Bean to get cracking.
‘I thought you were joking, for chrissakes!’
Rooney picked at his bulbous nose. ‘Fuck off. We got to take that call seriously, it’s too detailed not to. Go on, move it! And, by the way, the shoe we got could also be the whore’s. The Summerses sort of thought she only had one shoe on but they weren’t certain.’
‘Right. I’ll take the shoe with me — get everyone to try it on, maybe find the owner.’ Bean was joking but Rooney looked as amused as the Summerses had been by his Cinderella crack. He carried on, working through the file, yawning. Something was nagging at him — the description? Was it too pat? Some kind of hoax? But the fact that they had found bloodstains in the glove compartment where the anonymous caller claimed the man kept the hammer was just too close a coincidence. Rooney guessed the caller was the woman the Summers couple witnessed leaving the car — and that Mrs Summers had been correct. She probably was a whore.
Lorraine had the worst headache she had ever known. No hangover had been this painful. She was dizzy if she stood up, if she moved she felt sick — and she had vomited the first time she sat up. Thanks to the antibiotics and the aspirin, however, the splitting pain behind her eyes eased a fraction. She had made the phone call then, while Rosie was out getting ice from the grocery store. She had been brief intentionally as she didn’t want a trace made, and she was back in bed when Rosie returned.
The torn old sheet crammed with ice was soothing, but there was no way she could get up and go to the AA meeting. Rosie was uneasy at leaving her alone, but needed to go to the meeting herself. Lorraine just wanted to be left alone. Her whole body ached, but the pain across her eyes was torture, so bad she couldn’t even think of a drink, let alone getting up to pour one. All she wanted was for the pain to go away.
She remained in Rosie’s bed for more than a week, had to be helped to the toilet, for even that small amount of exercise exhausted her. She found any noise unbearable — no TV, no radio. She could eat, and Rosie waited on her hand and foot. She enjoyed being needed; it occupied her mind and, like Lorraine, she didn’t give a thought to booze.
Two weeks went by. Jake never got round to contacting his friend at the clinic to ask about Lorraine. In fact, like Rosie, he had grown quite fond of her because, sick as she was, she didn’t complain, and often made him laugh. Her pain was obvious, however, and he had told Rosie that if Lorraine’s condition did not improve she should be taken to hospital.
Almost half-way through the third week, the headache subsided and Lorraine was able to shower by herself. That afternoon, Jake took out the clamp stitches. The wound had healed well, but he was doubtful about his prowess as a hairdresser. Lorraine had almost a crew-cut at the back of her head and crown while the front was long and jagged. It gave her an almost boyish look, and she made them laugh when she tied a ribbon around the front strands to keep them from flopping in her eyes. She read a lot, magazines at first, because even flicking through the newspapers gave her a headache but gradually she began to plough her way through Rosie’s spartan collection of bodice-ripping blockbusters.
She kept the money stashed beneath the mattress. Sometimes she had qualms of guilt when Rosie paid for everything, but didn’t know how she could hand out money if Rosie believed she was broke. Afraid of being questioned too closely about its source, she decided against mentioning it. And Jake made no reference to it either.
Four days later, she saw a way round it. When Rosie returned from work, Lorraine presented her with fifty dollars. ‘You can be proud of me, Rosie. I went over to my friend, then to a pawnbroker’s. Here, this is for you. I sold off my things.’ Rosie had no idea that Lorraine had never left the apartment, but she did remark that it was time they discussed the sleeping arrangements. She assured Lorraine she didn’t want her to leave, it was just that Rosie needed a good night’s sleep in her own bed. That night, Lorraine moved back onto the sofa.
Months had passed since Lorraine had last touched alcohol, had been stone cold sober; it was six weeks since the attack. Curled up on the uncomfortable sofa, she began to plan what she should do next. On the positive side, she was sober. She had no craving, yet, but would it develop as she regained her strength?
Money she had, almost three hundred dollars. It seemed like a fortune, but she knew it wouldn’t last long. She wanted to move on, but the question was, where to? And what would she do? Two more days and it became obvious, not just to Rosie but to herself, that she could no longer hide out in the small apartment. Rosie was already hinting that the fifty dollars had been swallowed up in groceries.
Lorraine felt incapable of making major plans for her future; it was the immediate that occupied her. Marooned in the apartment she watched a lot of TV and could follow the murder inquiry. The news showed an artist’s impression of the woman seen in the blue Sedan, which she found almost amusing; it bore no resemblance to herself, and Lorraine felt no guilt in not making further contact. The police were making inquiries in all the cab ranks, trying to trace if anyone answering the blonde woman’s description had hired a cab that afternoon. They had drawn a blank at all the hospital emergency departments. It seemed no one had seen either the woman or the deceased’s blue Sedan on the day of his murder. Lorraine’s phone call was becoming more and more important to the investigation.
Jake, now a frequent visitor, was disturbed by her inertia. In an attempt to motivate her, he suggested that, if she was interested, his friend could do something for her teeth. They needed treatment badly, and the missing tooth didn’t help her looks. If she could find thirty dollars or so, he said, she could get it capped.
‘Know a laid-off dentist, too, do you, Jake?’
Jake laughed, but she was right — his friend was AA and only just starting to rebuild his practice.
Lorraine spent four days in agony, but the end result was two front teeth capped, all her cavities filled, her gums cleaned and the rest of her teeth bleached. Her mouth was swollen and sore, but the exercise had been a success. She used the lie about selling off her belongings again, and paid the thirty dollars. She also gave Rosie another twenty, adding that now she had nothing more to sell or pawn. Rosie believed her: Lorraine was a good liar.