“He got shot from the wings,” Monroe said. “They were setting up for the big rally tonight…”
“Who was setting up?”
“His people.”
“All these people here?”
“All these people.”
“Too many people,” Ollie said.
“Is right.”
“What rally?”
“Big fund raiser. Putting up lights, American flags, cameras, bunting, the whole shmear.”
“So?”
“So somebody fired half a dozen shots from the wings there.”
“Is that an accurate count, or are you guessing?”
“That’s what his aide told us. Five, six shots, something like that.”
“His aide? Who’s that?”
“Guy with all those reporters over there.”
“Who let them in?”
“They were already here when we responded,” Monroe said.
“Terrific security,” Ollie said. “What’s the aide’s name?”
“Alan Pierce.”
The corpse lay in angular disarray, surrounded now by the Mobile Lab techs and the Medical Examiner, who was kneeling beside the dead man and delicately lifting his pink cotton sweater. Not fifteen feet from this concerned knot of professionals, a man wearing blue jeans similar to the dead man’s, and a blue denim shirt, and black loafers with blue socks stood at the center of a moving mass of reporters wielding pencils and pads, microphones, and flash cameras. A tall, slender man, who looked as if he jogged and swam and lifted weights and watched his calories—all the things Ollie considered a waste of time—Pierce appeared pale and stunned but nonetheless in control of the situation. Like a bunch of third graders waving their hands for a bathroom pass, the reporters swarmed around him.
“Yes, Honey?” Pierce said, and a cute little blonde with a short skirt showing plenty of leg and thigh thrust a microphone in Pierce’s face. Ollie recognized her as Honey Blair, the roving reporter for the Eleven O’Clock News.
“Can you tell us if it’s true that Mr. Henderson had definitely decided to run for the Mayor’s office?” she asked.
“I did not have a chance to discuss that with him before…before this happened,” Pierce said. “I can say that he met with Governor Carson’s people this weekend, and that was the main reason we flew upstate.”
“We’ve heard rumors that you yourself have your eye on City Hall,” Honey said. “Is that so?”
“This is the first I’m hearing of it,” Pierce said.
Me, too, Ollie thought. But that’s very interesting, Mr. Pierce.
Honey would not let it go.
“Well, had you planned on running for Deputy Mayor? Assuming Mr. Henderson ran for Mayor?”
“He and I never discussed that. Yes, David?”
A man Ollie had seen a few times here and there around City Hall shoved a microphone at Pierce.
“Sir,” he said, “can you tell us where you were when Mr. Henderson…?”
“That’s it, thank you very much,” Ollie said, and strolled into the crowd. Flashing his shield like a proud father exhibiting a photograph of his firstborn, he said, “This is all under control here, let’s go home, okay?” and then signaled to one of the blues to get this mob out of here. Grumbling, the reporters allowed themselves to be herded offstage. Ollie stepped into Honey’s path just as she was turning to go, and said, “Hey, what’s your hurry? No hello?”
She looked at him, puzzled.
“Oliver Weeks,” he said. “The Eighty-eighth Precinct. Remember the zoo? The lady getting eaten by lions? Christ-mastime?”
“Oh yes,” Honey said without the slightest interest, and turned again to go.
“Stick around,” Ollie said. “We’ll have coffee later.”
“Thanks, I have a deadline,” she said, and followed her tits offstage.
Ollie showed Pierce his shield. “Detective Weeks,” he said, “Eighty-eighth Squad. Sorry to interrupt the conference, sir, but I’d rather you told us what you saw and heard.”
“Yes, of course,” Pierce said.
“You were here when Mr. Henderson got shot, is that it?”
“I was standing right alongside him.”
“Did you see the shooter?”
“No, I did not.”
“You told the other detectives the shots came from the wings.”
“That’s what it seemed like, yes.”
“Oh? Have you changed your mind about that?”
“No, no. I still think they came from the wings.”
“But you didn’t see the shooter.”
“No, I did not.”
“Guy fired five, six shots, you didn’t see him.”
“No.”
“How come?”
“I ducked when I heard the first shot.”
“I woulda done the same thing,” Ollie said understandingly. “How about the second shot?”
“Lester was falling. I tried to catch him. I wasn’t looking into the wings.”
“And all the other shots?”
“I was kneeling over Lester. I heard someone running off, but I didn’t see anything. There was a lot of confusion, you know.”
“Were you planning to run for Deputy Mayor?”
“I wasn’t asked to do so. I was only Lester’s aide.”
“What does that mean, anyway?” Ollie asked. “Being an aide?”
“Like his right hand man,” Pierce said.
“Sort of like a secretary?”
“More like an assistant.”
“So you don’t have any political aspirations, is that correct?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then you do?”
“I wouldn’t be in politics if I didn’t have political aspirations.”
“Excuse me, Alan,” a voice said.
Ollie turned to see a slight and narrow, precise little man wearing a blue blazer, a red tie, a white shirt, gray slacks, gray socks, and black loafers. Ever since the terrorist bombing at Clarendon Hall, everybody in this city dressed like an American flag. Ollie figured half of them were faking it.
“We’re having a conversation here,” he said.
“I’m sorry, sir, but I wanted to ask…”
“You know this man?” Ollie asked Pierce.
“Yes, he’s our press rep. Josh Coogan.”
“Excuse me, Alan,” Coogan said, “but I was wondering if I should get back to headquarters. I know there’ll be hundreds of calls…”
“No, this is a crime scene,” Ollie said. “Stick around.”
Coogan looked flustered for a moment. He was maybe twenty-four, twenty-five years old, but he suddenly looked like a high school kid who hadn’t done his assignment and had got called on while he was trying to catch a nap. Ollie didn’t have much sympathy for politicians, but all at once this seemed very sad here, two guys who all at once didn’t know what to do with themselves. He almost felt like taking them out for a beer. Instead, he said, “Were you here in the hall when all this happened, Mr. Coogan?”