Mike was seated at the bar, sipping on his vodka as he chatted up the bartender. Giuliano, the owner, greeted us more quickly than Mike did. “Signorina Cooper. Detectivo-buona sera.” He called out to the headwaiter, “Dominick, give Ms. Cooper table one, subito.”
The four of us made ourselves comfortable at the round table in the front window and ordered our drinks. Vickee and I decided to stay light with a glass of white wine.
“Tell us everything,” I said to Mike.
“It was a really frustrating day. I’m hoping we get a jump after the autopsy tomorrow. That’s set for two P.M., and I’ll be there. Not much to go on so far.”
“I’m glad you’ll stand in. I never got a chance to swing by the morgue today.”
“Did you catch Scully’s clip on the news?” Vickee asked.
“I heard it on the radio coming over.”
“Did the search turn up anything?” I said.
“Yeah. About ten minutes after you took off this morning, one of the rookies walked out of the bushes.” Mike pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and held it up with his knife centered inside it, the white cotton cloth draped around it. “He had his pen hoisted up and a pair of white panties-like maybe the biggest size they make-hanging off the pen so he didn’t mess them up. ‘These must have come off the dead girl,’ the kid says proudly.”
“But she’s so thin.”
“That’s only half the point. Within minutes, four other guys nosing into four other bushes come out with white panties in the air. Some with polka dots, one with glitter, one with lace-and a bright green thong, too. There was so much white cloth waving in the air, I thought the NYPD was surrendering to Hannibal.”
“What does that tell you?” I asked. “The underwear, I mean.”
“Springtime in Central Park, Coop. It tells me that all the young lovers with no place else to go try to find a sweet spot between there and Strawberry Fields to get it on late at night. It tells me that the lab will be up to its eyeballs in analyzing jism from intimate garments that have nothing to do with our homicide. But you can’t chance to ignore a single one of them.”
“Do you have any idea how big that Park is?” Mercer asked.
“Yeah, actually. We got some stats today,” Mike said. “843 acres, and we haven’t even done a thorough job on one of them so far. And they’re all being trampled by the press-hounds who are hoping to beat us to a solution. You’ve got entire countries-like Monaco-that are smaller than Central Park. It’s only 489 acres, the whole thing.”
“It’s not a country,” I said. “Monaco, I mean. It’s a principality.”
Mike rolled his eyes. “Another factoid from the vast archives of a Wellesley College scholar.”
“I wasn’t correcting you. I was just-”
“I know you weren’t, Coop. You were just being yourself. Hey, Dominick,” Mike called out. “What are the specials? We’ve got to get these broads to the airport.”
Vickee and I split a tricolore salad and an order of orecchietti con broccoli rabe, while Mike and Mercer both started with the penne pasta special followed by veal chops. Murder was never an inhibitor for Mike’s appetite.
“Obviously, you know you can call me if anything develops before we’re back,” I said. “Vickee will be getting constant info from DCPI. Are you working all weekend?”
“I was supposed to anyway. Today was my first day back on. I’ll start at the canvass in the morning both days, be at the ME’s office tomorrow afternoon.”
“Can I canvass with you on Monday?”
“Suit yourself.”
Mercer put his drink down. “Alex was really helpful to us on the Reservoir rapist case. People that didn’t want to be bothered breaking their jog for a tough old cop like me were willing to talk to her.”
“Didn’t I just say she could come along? By then, Scully will have announced the formation of a task force, right?”
Every major case that wasn’t solved immediately and might benefit from the collaboration of some of the special agencies within the NYPD wound up being run by a task force. Mike and his superb team of detectives who worked the Manhattan North Homicide squad would rather keep this case-like all their others-to themselves, taking it down methodically and strategically with the vast experience and knowledge that made them such pros.
“Undoubtedly,” Mercer said.
“So Peterson’s holding Monday afternoon for a crash course on the geography of the Park. Scully already has a promise from the parks commissioner, Gordon Davis, to lead the session himself.”
“Davis is a big deal,” I said. “He’s one of the mayor’s favorite players.”
“No kidding.”
Central Park seems so integral to the life and landscape of Manhattan that most people assumed it had existed in its present form naturally and forever. Instead, as the city grew from its commercial roots and settlements on the southern tip of the island in the 1600s, landowners and merchants became increasingly aware that the open land north of 59th Street was likely to be overrun and strangled by the growth of this nineteenth-century metropolis-which had spread without any thought for a public park in its master plan. At last, in 1857, legislation was finally passed to enable the creation of this glorious enterprise, known first as the Greensward.
“So what’s the deal with the Park?” Vickee asked. “I had to make a lot of notifications today, not just to Davis’s office. It’s a public-private joint enterprise, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. The Department of Parks and Recreation is responsible for setting all policy-that’s why Gordon Davis is in charge. He’s a mayoral appointment. But it’s a monster to maintain. The budget is almost fifty million dollars a year, just for the Park. So when the city was in financial trouble in the ’70s and the Park was deteriorating from neglect, some philanthropic New Yorkers created the Central Park Conservancy. That’s the private fund-raising piece, which does most of the heavy lifting now. They come up with eighty percent of the money to run the place. So we have to make nice with them, too.”
“You’re right, Mike. I feel that task force coming on strong,” Mercer said.
“I get the sense that if this poor girl had been dumped behind a bodega on the Lower East Side,” Vickee said, “there wouldn’t be quite this frenzy, no matter who she turns out to be.”
“Homicide rule number three,” Mike said. “Never kill anybody in a landmark location. It always ups the ante.”
“Amen to that,” Mercer said.
“Did you talk to Battaglia about keeping the case?” Mike asked me.
“Yes. Both he and McKinney are fine with it.”
“Then I’ve got a present for you. When you and Vickee take a break from gossiping this weekend,” he said, handing me a thick brochure, “you can get familiar with the Park. I realize we all think we know it, but I’m talking about the ball fields and waterfalls and streams and glacial rocks and all the other hideaways that we’ll have to look at. Study up.”
I started to unfold the map on the table in front of me.
“This whole thing is the vision of two men,” Mike went on, “who planned it down to the number of trees and rocks and footpaths, gates and promenades and terraces. Nothing between 59th Street and 110th Street is there naturally. Nothing. And none of it was left to chance. These two guys-Olmsted and Vaux-they were geniuses.”
Mike tapped his glass to tell the waiter he wanted a second drink.
“Who?” Mercer asked.
“Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, the two dudes who created Central Park.”