Flannagan rose to full height and glared down at me suspiciously. Very suspiciously. Did he know more about my, er, situation than I thought he did? “Okay, then, get up,” he growled, stepping back and crossing his arms over his narrow chest. I’ve got a few questions to ask you. We’ll go sit in the car.”
I did
not want to go sit in the car with him. And I certainly didn’t want to answer any of his questions. But I didn’t want to stay plopped on the pavement either. So, taking the only path that seemed open to me (besides the hospital, I mean), I reached my hands up to Flannagan, asked for his assistance, and allowed him to pull me to my feet. Then I sucked in a chestful of air, squared my shoulders, surrendered my elbows to the two uniformed officers, and let them guide me-as they would a handcuffed criminal-to the flashing patrol car.
FORTY FIVE MINUTES LATER, I WAS STILL sitting in the back of that car. And Flannagan was still sitting next to me, asking one question after another, grilling me like a hamburger, giving me an even bigger headache than I’d had before. I had told him as much of the truth as I could without getting myself, or Willy, into too much trouble, and now we were going over everything again, for the third or fourth time, and I was on the verge of losing consciousness again.
As headaches and hamburgers go, I felt both raw and overcooked.
But at least the fireworks had stopped. The waterfront was dark and silent now. The ominous presence of the two police cars had put a damper on the frenzied fun, causing the fire-bugs to pack up all their bombs and rockets and move upriver. The area around the Keller Hotel was dead as a doornail, too. Having been alerted that the cops were in the vicinity, the partygoers had-very slowly and systematically-exited the bar in small groups and slunk away in the opposite direction, back toward the heart of the Village. (I know this for a fact because I sat there in the car and watched them go. Willy and Farley left together, by the way, looking quite animated and gay. And by that I mean
happy.)
“Getting tired yet, Mrs. Turner?” Flannagan prodded. “Had enough?” He was taking pleasure in interrogating me. You could tell by the way his thin lips kept curling up in the corners.
“I’ve had more than enough,” I said, “but apparently
you haven’t. How long do you plan to keep me here?”
“As long as it takes for you to tell me the truth.”
“And what makes you think I’m not?”
He let out a nasty chuckle. “And what makes you think I’m a stupid fool?” He loosened his tie (finally) and glared at me across the back seat. “Look, I know your game, Mrs. Turner. I know you’re a nosy reporter for
Daring Detective magazine, not just a secretary as you told me at our first meeting. Did you think I never learned how to read? I’ve seen your name in the papers on several occasions-in connection with one murder case or another-and it’s a damn easy name to remember.”
Aaaargh!
“But that doesn’t mean I was lying to you,” I insisted. “Ask my boss Brandon Pomeroy if you don’t believe me. He’ll tell you I’m a secretary, and nothing
but a secretary.”
“Then he’d be lying, too.”
Score one for the perceptive detective.
“Okay, okay! So I’m a nosy crime writer. I didn’t reveal myself before because I was afraid you might tell my boyfriend, Dan Street, about my connection to this case. I’m sure you know him. He’s in homicide in the Midtown South precinct, and he’s forbidden me to inquire into any more unsolved murder cases-ever! If he thought I was working on a story about the Gray Gordon murder, he’d kill me.”
“Oh, yeah?” Flannagan jeered. “At the rate you’re going, somebody else is gonna beat him to it.”
He had a point. I wouldn’t have believed it yesterday-even the Baldy and Blackie incidents hadn’t convinced me that I was in serious danger-but the Aunt Doobie incident tonight had made a deep and painful impression. Now I
knew I was at risk.
“If you know what’s good for you,” Flannagan went on, “you’ll tell me the truth-and I mean the
whole truth-about what’s been going on. You’ll tell me everything you’ve learned about the case so far, and you’ll stop meddling in the investigation right now. And here’s another tip: You’d better quit dressing like a dyke and hanging out with homosexuals. Willard Sinclair, in particular. He might do to you what he did to Gray Gordon.”
“Oh, come off it, Detective Flannagan!” I sputtered. “You don’t
really believe Willy killed Gray! You can’t! Willy is a kind, gentle, and very squeamish man. He’s as dainty and fastidious as your grandmother. He couldn’t bring himself to carve up a turkey, much less a human being!”
“Leave my grandmother out of this.” Flannagan fired up a Camel and blew the smoke in my direction. “You could be wrong about your homo pal, Mrs. Turner. Ever think of that?
Sinclair is our number one suspect. He’s the same blood type as the killer.”
“Yes, he told me that, but-”
“But what? The proven facts don’t mean anything to you? You’ve decided the fat little faggot is innocent, and that’s the end of it? I thought you were smarter than that, Mrs. Turner. You’re just begging for trouble. For all you know, Willard Sinclair was the one who knocked your block off tonight.”
By this point I wanted to knock off his. “Don’t be ridiculous! Willy didn’t even know when I left the bar. I shot out of there in a flash because…”
Take it easy, Paige. Slow down. Be cool. I fully intended to tell Flannagan about Aunt Doobie, but I wanted to choose my words carefully, make sure I didn’t reveal more than was good for me. Or Willy.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Flannagan scoffed. “I’ve heard it all before. You left the bar because you had too much to drink and you needed to get some air. But you might as well ditch that pack of lies right now. We know what really happened. We’ve known it all along.” The gloating smile on his face was so annoying I wanted to wipe it off with my fist. (When you think you
look manly, you kind of feel manly, too.)
Luckily for both of us, I took the passive (i.e., feminine) route instead. “I’m sorry, Detective Flannagan,” I cajoled. “I haven’t been totally honest with you. I’m so scared and confused I don’t know what I’m saying. But look, I have an idea. Why don’t you tell me what
you know, and then I’ll tell you what I know. That way, we can compare notes and work out the truth together.” I smiled sweetly at him and fluttered my lashes, hoping I could get him to go first.
To my great astonishment, he did. (Sometimes you really
can catch more flies with honey.)
“We learned by telephone at approximately ten thirty-five tonight,” he began, speaking in a lofty, official tone, “that a woman had been attacked at the corner of West and Barrow. The caller reported seeing a dark-haired man in dark clothing hit the victim on the back of the head-with a brick, or a rock, or a hunk of cement-and then run away on West toward Christopher. About halfway up the block, the assailant jumped into the back seat of a black Lincoln limousine, and the car took off for parts unknown.”
Black limousine? Baldy. Dark hair and dark clothing? Aunt Doobie. Or maybe Blackie. Cripes! It could have been anybody! Does Baldy have a wig?
“We arrived on the scene within minutes,” Flannagan went on, “and found you lying on the ground in the dark, unconscious and unprotected. There were no onlookers or eyewitnesses-even the man who called us was gone. You regained consciousness almost immediately, though, claiming to feel fine and showing no signs of serious injury. There was a big rock lying nearby which may or may not have been the assault weapon. We’re taking it into the lab for testing.”