Like a sentry on either side of the front door was a topiary that looked like a lollipop with Christmas lights. Green letters on a white canopy importantly declared the building's name: PARK CENTURY. Race came back to mind again as April wondered how many other blacks lived in this building, how many Latinos, how many Asians. Cops were trained not to make assumptions. In the department they were supposed to be all one color, blue. On the street they were supposed to look at everybody the same. But they didn't. In confusing situations, black cops in plain clothes who ran with their guns unholstered in pursuit of bad guys risked getting shot in the back by their white colleagues.
At 4:12 A.M. Sergeants Sanchez and Woo entered the Park Century, where Liberty had shared the penthouse with his wife Merril. The doorman was a large sleepy-eyed man who smelled of cigarettes and didn't like the sight of them.
"You're sure Mr. Liberty is here?" Mike asked after identifying himself and April and hearing that the former football star was at home.
"Of course I'm sure. I got to write everything down, don't I? Mr. Liberty came in before midnight." A black pin on the doorman's jacket gave his name as Earl.
Earl checked the clipboard on his porter's desk under the intercom board. "But Mrs. Liberty is still out. Is that what you're here about?" He wore green and gold livery even this late on the graveyard shift. A gleaming black top hat sat on the credenza along the wall. "Is she all right?" Earl suddenly looked concerned.
"Would you ring the apartment for me?" Mike asked.
"Mr. Liberty won't like it."
No one ever did. Mike jerked his chin at the intercom. It wasn't his problem.
April pursed her lips. Instantly they'd fallen into their usual routine. Mike being the authority figure. The man. She would have been more conciliatory with the doorman because they would need his cooperation later. But hey, who was complaining? Mike always got the job done.
Three minutes later they got out of a gleaming, dark wood-paneled elevator on the twelfth floor. There was only one door on the floor, but they wouldn't have confused the apartment anyway. The famous quarterback who'd been known as Liberty (and whom April recognized now that she saw him) stood there bleary-eyed in his doorway. In spite of the lateness of the hour, he was dressed. He wore a pair of gray slacks and was pulling a gray cashmere sweater into place as he frowned at them.
"What's going on?" he demanded.
"I'm Sergeant Sanchez. This is Sergeant Woo." Mike pulled out his ID, but Liberty turned his head away without looking at it.
"Do you mind if we come in?" Mike asked.
The impression he gave was not one of alarm. Liberty looked wary, eyed them with distrust. "All right," he said evenly. "Come in here." He led the way across a tan marble floor, then hit the light switch in the living room, stunning the two detectives with its splendor.
For a second, Liberty seemed shocked by it also, for he gripped his forehead, shielding his eyes from the great expanse of room and windows heightened by lengths of soft white sofas, white throws, miles of textured white rugs on a white marble floor, and white gauzy curtains, all of which were offset by many pieces of striking African art. Chieftains' stools served as coffee tables. Masks hung on the walls and were suspended above ebony columns by long metal rods. Ceremonial objects, cups, tobacco boxes, brass figurines were arranged on shelves. Particularly arresting were several large wooden statues of women with out-sized breasts and men with outsized penises. Some were decorated with small shells, colored cloth, raffia, and many bits of mirror. April knew the contrast of primitive and ultrasophisticated decorating was done for a particular purpose. She didn't want to guess what it was.
Liberty waved his hand at one of the spans of sofa but didn't go so far as to invite the two detectives to sit. April noted his demeanor carefully. The man was clearly annoyed by their intrusion, but she couldn't attribute a meaning to the tension in his jaw. He looked as if he were about to, or just had, bitten off the end of his tongue. As men often did, Liberty concentrated on Sanchez, stared at him challengingly as if he did not want to lower himself by asking again what was the reason for their predawn visit.
As she watched the set of Liberty's powerful clenched jaw that was so photogenic and had daunted so many opponents on the playing field, April flashed back to the story she'd heard several years ago of the middle-class man who claimed his wife had thrown herself from the fifteenth-floor window in their bedroom. Simple case. The husband gave a great performance, weeping, telling the detectives how the tragedy occurred—what the distraught woman had said, how she stormed out of the living room where he had been sitting reading the evening paper. Everything. Problem was it didn't add up. For one thing, there had been no sign of an evening paper. For another, the woman's makeup was carefully laid out on the dressing table, and only one of her eyes had been completed. The picture was of a woman interrupted in the middle of an activity. In addition, one of her slippers had snagged on the claw foot at the end of a leg on her dressing table. The other slipper was on her foot when she was found. When confronted with the question of the unfinished makeup and the snagged slipper, the man calmly confessed that after thirty years of his wife's boring conversation he couldn't face another dinner with her and threw her out the window as she was getting ready to go out.
"I'm sorry to have to bring you bad news," Mike said now.
Liberty swallowed. "What kind of bad news?"
Mike glanced at April.
Liberty closed his eyes. "Is it my mother?"
"It's two people," Mike said slowly.
The man looked hostile. "Who?"
"Your wife. And the man who was with her."
"That's not possible. You're mistaken."
"I'm sorry, sir," April said. "Would you like to sit down?"
"No." Liberty spun around as if there were a sound at his front door. "My wife's fine. She's on her way."
He stared at the door, waiting for it to open. Nothing. The tan gallery was dark and silent.
Mike and April watched him watching for an elevator that wasn't going to come.
"I'm sure you've made a mistake. They're fine. I know they are," he said again, concentrating on the front door.
Mike shook his head. "I'm sorry, sir."
Suddenly Liberty's face contorted. He put his hands to his forehead and gripped it with both huge paws, shielding his eyes.
"Do you want me to get you something?" April murmured.
"I get migraines. My doctors say they come from an old football injury. But I've always had them."
Mike glanced at April.
Liberty's hands dropped to his sides. "I have to call the restaurant. My wife is there."
"It's four in the morning," Mike said. "There's no one there."
"Four?" Liberty lifted his arm to check his watch. He wasn't wearing it. He frowned. "I just spoke to her. Four in the mornings—? I must have fallen asleep." He stared at them. "What happened?"
"We're not sure yet. Mr. Petersen may have had a heart attack."
"A heart attack?" Liberty cocked the head he said was hurting him. "A heart attack? Where's Merrill? Did she go to the hospital with him?"
"No, she was assaulted in front of the restaurant."
"What?" Sweat glistened on his forehead. His two-hundred-pound physique still looked like solid muscle. He towered over them. April would not like to fight him in a dark alley.
"She was struck as she left the restaurant," April said, taking up the slack.
"Struck? That just can't be true—"' Finally Liberty sat down.
Mike and April remained standing. After a second the big man got up again. "Tor had a heart attack and my wife was attacked? How could such a thing happen? Where were they? I—"