The uniformed cop nearing the end of his night shift loped down the front steps of the old house.
“But that association was retired,” Mercer said. “Too many boys with bad behavior.”
“Let’s talk it out over bacon and eggs,” Mike said. “I’m thinking, what if Kendall Reid took a page out of Leighton’s book. I mean, the old guy was his mentor. Taught him everything.”
“Like he re-created the gentlemen’s club?” I asked.
“Maybe they look like gents but they’re scoundrels instead. Sub rosa-the secrecy symbol of medieval councils.”
“And Reid’s in the council,” Mercer said. “It’s got possibilities.”
“Every one of these fabulous houses stands empty. Even Gracie Mansion,” Mike said. “The mayor doesn’t sleep there. No mayor has been in residence there since long before Bloomberg took office.”
“So you’re saying forget the dinner, and rent out the bedroom to the highest bidder. Pay for play.”
“Like a tontine, with scads of cash being raised from its members, going to import these young women from wherever the cargo is most readily available. Mexico, Asia, Eastern Europe.”
“History, politics, sexual intrigue,” Mercer said. “It’s a heady mix.”
The cop in the RMP was calling out to his partner. He started the engine and turned on the red emergency light.
The second officer picked up speed and hurried to get into the car.
“Where’s the fire?” Mike asked. “What’s your hurry?”
“High Bridge Park. Sector Charlie just called in. There’s a woman down.”
“What happened? Have they ID’d her?”
“Not yet. A couple of dog walkers found her beneath the bridge. Looks like she screwed up a suicide attempt. The bus is on the way to take her to the hospital.”
“She’s alive?” Mike asked.
“Barely. She’s still breathing,” the cop said. “Likely to die.”
FORTY-SEVEN
It took less than three minutes for Mike to race up Amsterdam Avenue to West 174th Street once he floored the Jaguar.
The bridge was at one of the widest points in the park. It was difficult to navigate the rocky terrain and scramble down to the area where EMTs and cops were trying to put the woman’s body on a stretcher.
Mercer had followed us. He and Mike were the first detectives to arrive on the scene.
There was little doubt in my mind that the woman, who appeared to have fractured her skull and both legs, was Anita Paz. She fit the vague physical description Leighton had given us, and she was wrapped in a cheap synthetic fur jacket.
“She don’t have time for you, Detective,” the head EMT said as Mike put his hand in her jacket pocket to look for identification. “We don’t get her to Columbia Pres in minutes, she’s goin’ out of the picture.”
There were four men on the team. Two lifted the stretcher with Anita Paz strapped into it while the other two tried to clear the brush for the steep climb back up to the roadway. The great hospital was mercifully close to our location.
Two men, each holding a leashed retriever, were talking to the pair of cops.
Mike and I approached them, while Mercer scoured the ground for things that might be related to the woman’s fall.
“You see any of this?” Mike asked, after displaying his badge to the men.
“No, sir. We meet every day, same time, to walk our dogs down here by the river. I never saw nothing like this. I thought for sure the girl was dead.”
“Who called it in?”
“Me,” the same guy answered. His walking buddy looked like he was going to be sick.
“A suicide?”
“I said it could be that. Could be just an accident. You know that bridge is very dangerous, Detective.”
“I know. It’s the oldest bridge in the city. It’s been closed for fifty years.”
“Bad way to go,” the cop said.
“Find a note?” Mike asked. “Anything to suggest a suicide?”
“You kidding? Not here. Paper would have been blown away by this arctic air.”
I guessed the temperature was in the teens, but the wind chill made it feel like single digits.
“There’s a guy who was up in the squad for a couple of hours, might be able to ID her. He ran out of there a little while ago. You know the congressman who got collared for DWI last week?”
“Seen that scumbag’s pictures in the papers,” the cop said. “Think he was messing with this broad too?”
Mike didn’t answer.
“You know who the jumper is? That would solve half my problems, if she don’t wake up too soon.”
“Run the name Anita Paz. Leighton knows her. She’s been missing for a couple of hours.”
“Did you see anyone else in the park before you got to this point?” I asked. “Or jogging away?”
The dog walkers looked at each other. The same one spoke for both. “Just the regulars. Maybe a few less runners and people out for exercise. A little chilly, no? We’re only out because the dogs have to be.”
“But you didn’t hear people fighting with each other? Shouting? Nobody running through the park?”
“Nothing. We didn’t see nothing unusual.”
“Crime Scene on the way?” Mike asked the cops.
“After the triple homicide in Brooklyn and a gang rape in the Bronx. They want us to cordon off the area and they’ll deal with it by afternoon.”
“Keep an eye open for that Leighton weasel, pal.”
“You think he’s dangerous?”
“I know he’s self-destructive and angry. Don’t know what he’s liable to do.”
“I’ll put it out on the radio.”
“Good man,” Mike said. “C’mon up top, Coop. Let’s see what it looks like.”
My driving moccasins and Mike’s loafers were not the best shoes for managing the rocky incline, which in places was coated with ice. It took us almost ten minutes to climb from the edge of the Harlem River up to the Manhattan end of the High Bridge, which connected the island to the Bronx.
Mike tried to distract me as we made our way up. He knew me well enough that my first thoughts were about the baby, who was probably this woman’s child. Mercer brought up the rear.
“What if she’s Ana’s mother?”
“Steady as she goes, Coop. Don’t go there yet. You hear that guy? This is the oldest bridge in town.”
“Older than the Brooklyn Bridge?” I asked.
“Way. It was built in the eighteen forties as part of the system bringing water to New York from upstate. From the Croton Reservoir. It’s the very first structure that linked Manhattan to the main-land. To the rest of America. Don’t you remember what that lady told us when we were in Poe Park?”