The something back there was a knife.
He had found the murder weapon.
The defense attorney, a man named Oscar Loring, leaned in closer to Willis and said, "And what was this, exactly, Detective?”
He had a bristly mustache and the breath of a lion who'd just eaten a warthog. It was now a quarter to three. Willis had been on the stand for an hour and a laalf this morning, and had been on again since two o'clock, when court had reconvened. Trying to explain, first, why he'd requested a no-knock warrant, and next why he'd shot a man who'd tried to kill him with an AR-15. This had been in October of last year, during a raid on a stash pad. The case had just come to trial. Loring was attempting to show that Willis had lied on his affidavit making application for the search warrant, that he'd had no reasonable cause to believe there'd be either weapons or contraband material in the suspect apartment, and that in fact he'd planted both the weapons and the contraband after he'd kicked in the door!
He now wanted to know exactly what time it was that Willis and Bob O'Brien and four uniformed cops from CPEP had kicked in the door to the apartment.
"It was nine o'clock in the morning," Willis said.
"Exactly nine o'clock?" Loring asked.
"I don't know if it was exactly. We had the raid scheduled for nine o'clock, it's my belief we were assembled by nine and went in at nine.”
"But you don't know if it was exactly...”
“Excuse me," the judge said, "but where are you going with this?”
His name was Morris Weinberg, and he had a bald head fringed with sparse white sideburns, and he was fond of telling people that he'd lost all his hair the moment he'd been appointed to the bench.
"Your Honor," Loring said, "it's essential to client's case that we know at exactly what illegal entry was...”
"Objection!”
The prosecuting attorney. Bright young guy the D.A.'s office, hadn't let Loring get away with i much as an inch of bullshit.
"Sustained. What difference will it make, Loring, if the police went in at a minute before or a minute after nine? What possible... ?”
"If Your Honor will permit me...”
"No, I'm not sure I will. You've kept this on the stand for almost two and a half hours picking at every detail of a raid he and policemen made under protection of a warrant duly signed by a justice of the Court.
You've questioned his integrity, his his methods, and everything but the legitimacy birth, which I'm sure you'll get around to the. “
"Your Honor, there is a jury pres...”
"Yes, I'm aware of the jury. I'm also aware of fact that we're wasting a great deal of time here, that unless you can tell me why it's so important pinpoint the time of entry, then I will have to ask' to leave off this line of questioning.”
“Your Honor," Loring said, "my client awake and eating his breakfast at nine o'clock.”
"So?”
"Your Honor, this witness claims they kicked the door at nine o'clock and found my client in bed.
Asleep, Your Honor.”
"So?”
"I'm merely suggesting, Your Honor, that if the detective is willing to perjure himself on...”
"Objection!”
"Sustained. Now cut that out, Mr. Loring. You know better than that.”
"If the detective is mistaken about what actually happened on the morning of the raid, then perhaps he made a similar mistake regarding cause.”
"Are you referring to probable cause for the search warrant?”
"Yes, Your Honor.”
"Detective Willis," Weinberg said, "why did you believe there were weapons and contraband materials in that apartment?”
"An undercover police officer had made several buys there, Your Honor, in advance of the raid. Of a controlled substance, namely cocaine. And he reported seeing weapons there. Of a type, I might add, that was fired at us the moment we entered the apartment.”
"What's his name? This undercover officer?”
"Officer Charles Seaver, Your Honor.”
"His precinct?”
"Same as mine, Your Honor. The Eight-Seven.”
"Does that satisfy you as to probable cause, Mr. Loring?”
"I'm just hearing of this, Your Honor. This not stated on Detective Willis's petition for a...”
“I said information based on my person knowledge and be...”
"You didn't mention a police officer...”
"What difference does it make? The warrant granted, wasn't it? I went into that damn with a...”
"Just a minute now, just a minute," said.
"Sorry, Your Honor," Willis said.
"Can we get Officer Seaver here this afternoon Weinberg asked.
"I'd need time to prepare, Your Honor," Loft said.
"Tomorrow morning, then. Be ready to call him nine A.M.”
"Your Honor...”
"This court is adjourned until nine A.M. morning," Weinberg said, and banged his gavel, abruptly stood up.
"All rise!" the Clerk of the Court shouted, everyone in the courtroom stood up as swept out like a bald Batman, trailing his black behind him.
The clock on the wall read 2:55 P.M. They were due at three-thirty.
When they announced themselves over speaker at the front door, she would tell them the door was open. When they stepped into the entrance foyer, she would call, "I'm in here." And as they walked into the living room... The entire house was already in disarray.
She had spent the past hour yanking out dresser drawers and strewing their contents onto the floor, unplugging television sets and stereo equipment, gathering up silverware, jewelry and fur coats, carrying all of this down to the living room where it would appear they had assembled it after ransacking the house. Her story to the police would be that she had walked in on two armed men... She hoped they'd be armed. If not, she would change her story... two armed men whom she'd shot dead in self-defense. Two armed intruders shot to death while burglarizing a house they thought was empty.
Criminal records a mile long on both of them, Willis had shown her copies. Open and shut, don't cry for me, Argentina.
She did not have a permit for the gun she'd bought from Shad Russell, but she was willing to look that charge in the eye when the time came, even if it meant going to prison again. The important thing was to make certain none of this rubbed off on Willis. She did not see how it could.
The day watch was relieved at a quarter to four. He would not be home until four-fifteen, four-thirty. It would be over by then. All of it.
She looked at the mantel clock now.
Seven minutes to three.
She picked up the gun Russell had sold her.
A .38 caliber Colt Detective Special. Sixcapacity. Three for each of them. She had bel shoot fast and she had better shoot straight.
She rolled out the cylinder, checked that the was fully loaded, and then snapped it back into barrel.
The clock read five minutes to three.
The two girls came down the front steps of Graham School on Seventh and Culver, wearing pleated green skirts, white blouses, knee-high socks, brown walking shoes, and bh blazers with the school crest over the left pocket. They were both giggling at sc another girl had said. Books held against budding bosoms, girlish laughter spilling onto springtime air, sparkling and clear now that the had stopped. One of them was a killer.
"Hello, girls," Carella said.
"Hi, Mr. Carella," Gloria said. Blue eyes twinkling with laughter, long black hair dancing sunshine as she came down the steps.
"Hi," Alexis said. She wore the solemn look in the aftermath of laughter, her brown el thoughtful, her face serious. I'm nothing, she told him. Blonde hair falling to her shoulders bobbing as she came down the steps. They could have been twins, these two, except for their coloring.