by Philip Cox
ELEVEN
The General Manager of the Columbus Circle mall seemed to have a habit of clearing his throat every time before he spoke. An annoying habit, thought Detective Roberts; unless the guy just had a cough. She suspected he was not sick, and it was just a little habit as it was always a delicate little hem accompanied by an elaborate movement of his arm as he put a hand in front of his mouth. It was if he was announcing that he was about to speak.
‘Detective Roberts,’ he asked smugly, ‘are we in a position yet to open my restroom?’
Roberts’ eyes flashed over to Detective Alvarez; now he was clearing his throat and fidgeting, although she knew that this meant her partner was suppressing a snigger.
‘I want to thank you for your patience, sir,’ she replied, straight-faced. ‘I understand the forensic team is almost done.’
‘Do we have a timescale?’
‘I think we’re talking late morning to early afternoon. Remember, sir, this was a murder scene, and being a men’s room, there was a lot of evidence to take.’
The Manager frowned. ‘But I understood -’
Alvarez cut in. ‘A men’s room contains a lot of DNA. Everywhere. Think about it.’
The penny dropped. The Manager nodded. ‘Ah.’
‘We will need to review your CCTV footage for that time,’ Roberts continued. She indicated over to the flat screen on the desk. ‘Is it possible to check it here, or do you have somewhere else we could go?’
‘I have a team of security officers. They have facilities in their suite for you to view the footage.’
‘Where is that?’ asked Roberts.
The Manager stood up. ‘I’ll take you down there now.’
Roberts and Alvarez followed him to the room where they had originally spoken to Will Carter. The security guard they had encountered before was sitting at his desk watching his screen. He looked up when they entered the room.
The Manager said, ‘These officers need to see the camera footage from the other afternoon.’
‘Right,’ said the guard.
‘I’ll leave them with you, then.’ He turned to Roberts and Alvarez. ‘I’ll be in my office if you need me, officers.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ Roberts replied politely.
The guard waited for his boss to leave, then said, ‘You can see it on this screen here.’ He turned the screen round and the officers could see it was split into four separate images.
‘Is there somewhere else we could use?’ Roberts asked. ‘Your manager spoke of a suite for security officers.’
He looked puzzled. ‘No, this is pretty much it.’
‘How many of you are there?’ Alvarez asked.
‘Me. And the guy who works nights.’
‘Two of you,’ stated Roberts.
‘U-huh.’
‘Can you bring up the recordings for Sunday afternoon?’ Roberts asked.
‘Sure.’ He leaned over the keyboard and after some mouse movements and clicking, the images on the screen changed. Reluctantly, he pulled his chair out for Roberts; Alvarez lifted his chair over the desk. The guard stood watching while the officers sat down.
‘How many cameras are there on each floor?’ Roberts asked.
‘Six on each floor, all movable.’
She looked over at Alvarez. ‘That ties in with what we could see outside the restroom.’ Then up at the guard, who was still standing watching. ‘Don’t let us keep you. I’m sure you must have patrols to make.’
‘Okay. You’d better call me if you need any help with that.’
Alvarez smiled. ‘Thanks. These security systems are pretty standard, so I’m sure we’ll find our way round it. But, thanks - we’ll call if we need you.’
‘How is all this stored?’ Roberts asked.
‘It’s all kept on the mall mainframe,’ the guard explained. ‘Kept for six months, then wiped.’
‘But if we needed a copy, you could put it on a disk, or a memory stick?’
‘Or email as an attachment?’ added Alvarez.
‘Sure. All of those.’
Roberts nodded and smiled at the guard, who quickly got the message and left.
‘Team of security officers in their suite,’ Roberts muttered as he left. ‘Jesus Christ.’
‘He never patrols the mall,’ said Alvarez. ‘Just sits up here on his fat ass watching the screen.’
Roberts used the mouse to get to the top right image. The camera here was pointed directly at the men’s room door. ‘I’ll try to fast forward until we see Carter go in.’
‘That’s him,’ said Alvarez after a few minutes. ‘With the little girl.’
‘And that’s the vic.’ Roberts tapped on the screen. Just as the man entered the men’s room, he turned, looked behind him, and hurried in.
‘He knew he was being followed,’ Alvarez said.
‘Or at least suspected.’
‘But why go in there?’ There’d be no way out. He’d be safer somewhere in plain sight.’
‘There. Look.’
Two figures followed him into the restroom. They were both wearing sweatshirts, both with their hoods up.
‘From their shape and gait,’ Alvarez said, ‘I’d guess they’re men in their twenties.’
‘Or even late teens. Their faces would be good.’
A few minutes later, the figures came out. Roberts quickly fingered the mouse and froze the picture. The men still had their hoods up, their faces not showing.
Roberts sat back and slid the keyboard over to Alvarez. ‘See if you can enlarge the picture; get it enhanced.’
‘I’ll try.’ A couple of clicks later and Alvarez blew the image up full screen size, but it was out of focus, and the men’s faces were still hidden in the shadow of their hoods.
‘Shit,’ Roberts muttered. ‘Think if we got this back, we’d be able to get it enhanced? Use one of those facial recognition programs?’
‘Possibly. But look - they know they’re on CCTV: they’re deliberately keeping their faces concealed.’
‘So we’re not talking about rookies here. Let’s check out the other cameras, ones on the other floors, too. These guys must have entered and left the mall somewhere; maybe they dropped their guard on their way out.’
Roberts and Alvarez spent the next two and a half hours trawling through hours of CCTV, trying to track the two men’s movements from when they entered the mall to when they left. Eventually they found the victim hurrying in through the glass revolving door, nervously looking around, and heading directly up the escalator. His attackers were half a minute behind him, pausing in the entrance to see where he had gone. One of them spotted him on the escalator and pointed.
At this point Roberts said, ‘If we’re ever going to get them, this is the point.’ She froze the picture and enlarged it. Still the faces were obscured by the hoods.
‘They might as well be wearing burkhas,’ Alvarez complained.
‘They knew exactly what they were doing. Okay. Let’s check any images from outside the mall; then go back to when they left the restroom.’
Once they had done, Roberts sat back and cursed. ‘Eric,’ she said, ‘we’re definitely not dealing with amateurs here. These guys were experts in dealing with security cameras.’
Alvarez asked, ‘Do you know of anyone with these, er – skills?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ll ask around, but I don’t think so.’ She turned to her partner. ‘We need to focus on the vic himself; see what connections he had.’
‘What about street cameras? We might have more luck there.’
‘Possibly. But where did they come from? Where did they go when they were done here? Central Park’s over the road, for God’s sake.’ She reached for her bag, pulled out a memory stick, and passed it to Alvarez. ‘Save that for me, Eric. We’ll have one more try at enhancing.’
As Alvarez fumbled under the desk, Roberts stood up. ‘I’ll see if they’ve finished with the crime scene, then we’ll go. We’re done here.’
/> TWELVE
Mitchell Breed remembered coming here as a child. Leaning on the blue metal railing, he looked up at the Ferris wheel. Screams of delight and mock terror came from every seat, from guys as well as girls. He shook his head: in his day, which was not that long ago, dudes didn’t make a sound up there. It was just the chicks. You could well get beaten up if you showed any signs of being scared.
Unless you were a kid.
He could recall sitting up top of the Wonder Wheel with his mother. The wheel had come to a halt to allow riders to get off and on, and the seat gently swayed in the breeze. His mother was laughing loudly; he was silent, maybe feeling a little nauseous on account of the height and swaying.
Mitch’s family - he and his older brother and their parents – were frequent visitors here. Once a month or so, his father would announce on Saturday evening, ‘Let’s hit Coney Island in the morning,’ and first thing, after stopping off for bagels for breakfast, they would head for the subway and take the D Train to Brooklyn. They would spend the whole day there, going on the same rides every time, and leaving at five-thirty exactly every time.
Those days were long gone; in fact, Mitch could not remember the last time he came down here.
He was surprised that his meeting was going to be held here of all places. So public, so out in the open. Unless they were all going to share a booth in the ghost train. He looked around: was there still a ghost train? He could remember being on one somewhere. Once with his brother, and a couple of times with a girl. He couldn’t remember if it was the same girl. He remembered riding round in the dark, arm round her shoulders. They were being subjected to loud screams and manic laughter, passing through cobwebs and God knows what else. He could also remember trying to show her what his middle finger could do. She had other ideas, although he recollected it took her a while to object.
He threw his cigarette into the water; it might not have been here, anyway.
He sighed in frustration. On his way here he had a feeling the others would be late. Walt always was, but at least he expected the boss to be on time. After all, Mitch had taken the afternoon off to get down here.
His phone rang. It was Walt. Short for Walter. An old fashioned name - anachronistic, as their High School teacher had said - and given to him by his mother who said he was conceived on a Space Mountain car on a trip to Orlando. She then had to explain the relevance of that to his name.
‘Hey, man. Wassup? Where the fuck are you?’
‘Same as you - on the boardwalk, only I’m by the Cyclone.’
Mitch looked up the boardwalk. It was not exactly crowded, but there was a steady flow of people - couples, young families, kids who ought to have been at school – walking back and forth. Some were holding red or blue helium balloons, some of the kids had toffee apples or cotton candy, and further up, between a small group of beach huts on the sand and the giant Cyclone roller coaster, he could see Walt. He waited a few moments to see if Walt was going to walk down to meet him, then cursed and sauntered up to him. They touched fists as they met.
‘How long you been here, man?’ Mitch asked. ‘Thought you wasn’t coming.’
‘It’s cool, man. I’ve been here ages. Saw you down there playing with yourself a while back.’
‘Then why the -’ Mitch decided not to take the bait. Squinting in the bright sunshine he looked up at the rollercoaster as a car full of screaming day trippers sped by. ‘Looks like we’re not the only ones who are late,’ he said.
‘You mean our man?’ Walt asked. He pulled his hood tighter over his head.
‘Yeah,’ muttered Mitch. He looked down at a couple of kids who were walking past munching giant boxes of popcorn. ‘Come on,’ he said to Walt. ‘Let’s go down to Footprint’s. I’m hungry.’
They both headed down the boardwalk to the Surf Avenue café. Walt stood outside and stared at the menu in the window.
‘Man, you gotta be fuckin’ kiddin’,’ he exclaimed. ‘At these fuckin’ prices!’
Mitch read the menu. ‘See what you mean.’ He pointed to a kiosk at the corner of Surf and 16th. ‘Let’s get a hot dog.’
They both bought a $3 dog, Mitch’s covered in onions and ketchup, Walt’s in mustard.
‘Don’t understand,’ Mitch said through a mouthful of sausage. ‘We used to come down here regular when I was a kid; used to go there back then.’
‘Maybe your old man had more money than you do now.’
‘Maybe.’ Mitch grabbed a napkin from the little stainless steel table standing by the kiosk and wiped ketchup from his mouth.
‘You wanna know something?’ Walt mumbled, also with a mouthful of food. ‘He’s already here, watching us. I know it.’
‘Bullshit. He’s just late.’
‘Well, I ain’t going to be hanging -’ Walt stopped as Mitch’s phone rang.
The display on his phone read a number Mitch recognized. ‘It’s him,’ he said, stabbing a finger at the green button.
‘Yeah?’ he said into the phone. ‘Okay. See you there in ten.’ Hanging up he said to Walt, ‘He wants to meet us outside the MCU Park.’ He put the remainder of his hotdog in his mouth and tossed the napkin, aiming at the trashcan by the little table. He missed and it landed on the ground, but Mitch made no effort to pick it up.
‘Jesus, why over there?’
‘Quit complainin’, willya? Come on, let’s get it over with.’
MCU Park is the shared home of the Brooklyn Cyclones and Brooklyn Bolts, since it was constructed at the turn of the century. The Cyclones are a baseball team, the Bolts football. The site was originally home to an amusement park which closed in 1964 amid the deterioration of Coney Island and of the subway routes which lead there. Part of a regeneration of the area, the park broke ground on 22nd August 2000, and opened 25th June the following year. Such was its popularity one thousand extra seats were added three weeks after opening, the original 6,500 being nowhere near enough.
Mitch and Walt stopped by the grey metal gates at the entrance to the park. Neither had ever been inside, neither having any interest in baseball. Mitch was not a sporty guy, being more interested in computer games; Walt managed to drag himself away from his consul a couple of years back to watch a soccer game, and had since proclaimed himself to be a follower of New York City FC, although had never even ventured near the Yankee Stadium. ‘Showy mother,’ was Mitch’s assessment of Walt’s periodic pretensions. Above where they stood was a light blue circular sign, gate 4 printed in dark blue. A gardener was mowing the circle of grass separating them from the parking lot entrance.
‘Thanks for coming, guys,’ said a voice from behind them. They both whirled round. ‘Been here long?’
‘No, Mr Kelly,’ Walt lied. ‘Just got here.’
‘Me too. Let’s sit down.’ He led Mitch and Walt over to a bench. The rear of the bench was covered with an advertisement for the Cyclones. He sat down next to them, next to Walt. Mitch sat the other side.
‘I didn’t ask you to kill him,’ Kelly said.
They both looked at Kelly in shock. ‘No way,’ Mitch cried. ‘No fucking way. He was alive when we left him.’
‘Keep your voice down,’ Kelly said. ‘Get a grip. He might not have been dead when you left him, but he was when the police arrived.’
‘How – how do you know all this?’ stammered Walt.
Kelly sat back, head looking forward. ‘I read the newspapers. You could try that. Reading, I mean. Funny thing is, it didn’t make the TV news.’
‘Where does this leave us?’ Mitch asked, his calmness surprising both of them.
‘Where does it leave you? I just hope you made sure you didn’t get picked up by the mall security cameras. And there were no witnesses.’ He looked round at them. ‘There weren’t any? Nobody else using the john?’
‘No.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘I told you - no-one else.’
‘Nobody taking a dump?’
‘Nobody.’ Mitch looked at
Walt. ‘Nobody, right.’
Walt nodded. ‘That’s right. Nobody.’
Kelly said, ‘Let’s hope you’re right. For your sakes. Now, to business: did he have it? Did you get it?’
‘No.’
‘He didn’t have it, or you didn’t get it? Which?’
‘He didn’t have it.’
Kelly looked ahead. ‘Damn the son of a bitch.’
‘So where now, Mr Kelly?’ Walt asked.
‘I’ll have to see. I’ll be in touch.’ He stood up to go.
Mitch put his hand out.
‘What?’ Kelly asked.
Mitch said nothing; put his hand out further.
‘All right,’ Kelly said, pulling his wallet from a back pocket. He took out a small wad. ‘Here: a hundred each. Would have been two fifty had you gotten it.’
Mitch and Walt counted their five $20 bills.
‘I’ll be in touch.’ Kelly swirled round and strode off. He had gone about thirty feet when he stopped and turned round. ‘By the way, the prices at Footprint’s are way out of your league.’ Laughing, he turned round again and walked off.
‘Son of a bitch! I told you he was watching us.’
‘Chill out, man,’ said Mitch. ‘About that anyway.’
‘But the guy died! What’re we gonna do now?’
‘We’re going to stay calm. Neither of us has a rap sheet -’
‘You don’t.’
‘Say what?’
‘I got a record. Small one. Did a few months in juvy some years back.’
‘Shit, man. Why didn’t you say?’
‘Statute of Limitations, man.’
‘That’s a crock.’
‘Hey, we were careful, so careful, weren’t we?’
‘You’d better hope we were.’
‘But the guy died.’
‘All the more reason not to lose our wads. You gotta stay calm, Walt.’
‘Why didn’t you tell Kelly about the other guy in the john?’
‘For one thing, I don’t want him to think we fucked up in there. Second, what if he did have it on him, and we just didn’t get time to get it off him? That guy had plenty of time to search him.’
‘You think he has it?’
‘We need to find out. If he don’t got it, and we can’t find it, then we’re both fucked.’
