"What about it?" he asked.
"That's your size shoe, isn't it?"
"About."
She continued to stare at him, saying nothing. Rhyme sensed she was setting up a brilliant trap. He watched them both closely. . . .
"Thanks," Dance said to Sachs, who sat down again.
The agent eased forward, slightly more into the suspect's personal space. "Vincent, I'm curious. Where'd you get the groceries?"
A brief hesitation. "Well, at the Food Emporium."
Rhyme finally understood. She was going to draw him out about the groceries and then ask him why he'd bought them in Manhattan if he lived in New Jersey--since everything in the cart would be available closer to home and probably cheaper. She leaned forward, pulling off her glasses.
Now--she was going to snare him.
Kathryn Dance smiled and said, "Thank you, Vincent. I think that'll be it. Hey, you thirsty?" the agent added. "Want a soda?"
Vincent nodded. "Yeah. Thanks."
Dance glanced at Rhyme. "Could we get him something?"
Rhyme blinked and shot a perplexed look at Sachs, who was frowning. What the hell was Dance thinking? She hadn't gotten a single bit of information out of him. The criminalist was thinking, A waste of time. That's all she's going to ask him? And now she's playing hostess? Reluctantly Rhyme called Thom, who brought Dance a Coke.
Dance put a straw in and held it up for the handcuffed man to drink from. He drained the glass in seconds.
"Vincent, just give us a few minutes alone, if you don't mind, and I think we'll get this all straightened out."
"Okay. Sure."
The patrol officers escorted him out. Dance shut the door behind him.
Dennis Baker shook his head, staring unhappily at the agent. Sellitto muttered, "Worthless."
Dance frowned. "No, no, we're doing fine."
"We are?" Rhyme asked.
"Right on track . . . Now, here's the situation. I got his baseline readings and then asked him about the reverse order of events--it's a good way to catch up deceptive subjects who've been improvising. People can describe an actual series of past events in any order--from start to finish or backward--without a problem. But people fabricate events in only one direction, start to finish. When they try to reconstruct it backward, they don't have the cues that they used in creating the scenario and they trip up. So, I learned right up front that he's the Watchmaker's assistant."
"You did?" Sellitto laughed.
"Oh, that was obvious. His recognition responses were off the charts. And he's not afraid for his personal safety, like he claimed. No, he knows the Watchmaker and he's been involved in the crimes but in a way that I can't figure out. More than just a getaway driver."
"But you didn't ask him about any of that," Baker pointed out. "Shouldn't we be picking apart where he said he was at the times of the attacks at the florist shop and the apartment in Greenwich Village?"
Rhyme's observation, too.
"Oh, no. Worst thing to do. If I did, those are the subjects he'd stonewall on instantly." She continued. "He's a complicated person, there's a lot of conflict going on inside him, and my feeling is that he's in the second state of stress response, depression. That's essentially anger turned inward. And it's very difficult to break through. Given his personality type, I'd need to create a sympathetic bond between us and it would take days, maybe weeks, to get to the truth with traditional interrogation methods. But we don't have days. Our only chance is to try something radical."
"What?"
Dance nodded at the straw Vincent had used. "Can you order a DNA test?" she asked Rhyme.
"Yes. But it'll take some time."
"That's okay, as long as we can say truthfully it's been ordered." She smiled. "Never lie. But you don't have to tell a suspect everything."
Rhyme wheeled around to the main portion of the lab, where Mel Cooper and Pulaski were still working on the evidence. He explained what they needed and Cooper packaged the straw in plastic and filled out a DNA analysis request. "There. Technically it's been ordered. The lab just doesn't know it yet." He laughed.
Dance explained: "There's something big he's keeping from me. He's very nervous about it. His response to my question about being arrested was deceptive but it's also very rehearsed. I think he was collared but it was a while ago. There're no prints on file so he fell through the cracks--maybe a lab screwup, maybe he was a juvenile. But I know he's run into the law before. And I finally got a sense of what it might be. That's why I took my jacket off and had Amelia walk around in front of him. He's eating up the two of us with his eyes. Trying not to but he can't help it. That makes me think there's a sexual assault or two in his past. I want to bluff and use that against him.
"The problem is," she continued, "that he could call me on it. Then we lose our bargaining power and it'll take a long time to grind him down and get anything helpful."
Sellitto said to Rhyme, "I know where you come down on it."
Hell, yes, Rhyme thought. "Take the chance."
Sellitto asked, "And you, Dennis?"
"I oughta call downtown. But we'd be kicking ourselves if they say no. Go ahead and do it."
The agent said, "One other thing I need to do. I have to take myself out of the equation. Whatever he had planned with me in the alley, we have to let it go. If I bring it up it'll move the relationship to a different place and he's going to stop talking to me; we'll have to start over again."
"But you know what he was going to do to you?" Sachs asked.
"Oh, I know exactly what he had in mind. But we have to stay focused on our goal--finding the Watchmaker. Sometimes you just have to let other things slide."
Sellitto looked at Baker and nodded.
The agent walked to the closest computer and typed some commands, then a user name and pass code. She squinted when the website appeared and typed in some more commands. A page of some suspect's DNA rolled onto the screen.
Dance opened her purse and replaced the sheep glasses with the wolf ones. "Now it's time for the fun part." She walked to the door and opened it, asked that Vincent be brought back.
The big man, sweat stains under his arms, lumbered back into the room and sat down in the chair, which groaned under his weight. He was cautious.
Dance broke the silence with, "I'm afraid we've got a problem, Vincent."
His eyes narrowed.
Dance held up the plastic evidence bag containing the straw he'd drunk from. "You know about DNA, don't you?"
"What're you talking about?"
Rhyme wondered, Is it going to work? Will he fall for it?
Was Vincent going to end the interview, clam up and insist on an attorney? He had every right to do that. The bluff would end in disaster and they might never get any information from him until after the Watchmaker had killed his next victim.
Calmly Dance asked, "You ever seen your DNA analysis, Vincent?"
Dance turned the computer monitor toward Vincent. "I don't know if you're aware of the FBI's Combined DNA Index System. We call it CODIS. Whenever there's a rape or sexual assault and the perp isn't caught, his fluids, skin and hair are collected. Even with a condom, there's usually some material left on or near the victim with DNA in it. The profile is stored and when police get a suspect, his profile is matched against what's in the forensic index. Take a look."
Beneath the heading CODIS were dozens of lines of numbers, letters, grids and fuzzy bars virtually incomprehensible to anyone unfamiliar with the system.
The man was completely still, though his breathing was heavy. His eyes, to Rhyme, seemed defiant. "This's bullshit."
"You know, Vincent, that nobody ever beats a case built on solid DNA. And we've gotten convictions years after the assaults."
"You can't. . . . I didn't say it was okay to do that." He stared at the bagged straw.
"Vincent," Kathryn Dance said softly, "you're in trouble."
Technically true, Rhyme reflected. He was in possession of a d
eadly weapon.
Never lie . . .
"But you've got something we want." A pause, then Dance continued. "I don't know about New York procedures but in California our district attorneys have a lot of latitude to work with cooperative suspects."
She looked at Sellitto, who took over. "Yeah, Vincent, same thing here. The DA'll listen to our recommendations."
Lost in the bars on the computer screen, his teeth set, Vincent said nothing.
Baker continued. "Here's the deal: If you help us get the Watchmaker and if you confess to the prior sexual assaults, we'll get you immunity on the murder and assault counts for the two victims the other day. We'll make sure you have access to a treatment center. And you'll be isolated from the general population."
Dance said firmly, "But you have to help us. Right now, Vincent. What do you say?"
The man glanced at the screen that contained a DNA analysis that had nothing whatsoever to do with him. His leg was bouncing slightly--a sign that a debate was raging within him.
He turned his defiant eyes to Kathryn Dance.
Yes or no? What would it be?
A full minute passed. Rhyme heard only the ticking of the Watchmaker's clocks.
Vincent grimaced. He looked up at them with cold eyes. "He's a businessman from the Midwest. His name's Gerald Duncan. He's staying in a church in Manhattan. Can I have another Coke?"
Chapter 27
"Where is he now?" Dennis Baker barked.
"There was somebody else he was going to . . ." Vincent's voice faded.
"Kill?"
The suspect nodded.
"Where?"
"I don't know exactly. He said Midtown, I think. He didn't tell me. Really."
They glanced at Kathryn Dance, who apparently sensed no deception and nodded.
"I don't know whether he's there now or the church."
He gave the address.
Sachs said, "I know it. Closed a while ago."
Sellitto called ESU and had Haumann put together some tactical teams.
"He was going to meet me back in the Village in an hour or so. Near that building in the alley."
Where, Rhyme reflected, Vincent had been going to kill and rape Kathryn Dance. Sellitto ordered unmarked cars stationed near the building.
"Who's the next victim?" Baker asked.
"I don't know. I really don't. He didn't tell me anything about her because . . ."
"Why?" Dance asked.
"I wasn't going to have anything to do with her."
Do with her . . .
Rhyme understood. "So you were helping him out and in exchange he'd let you have the victims."
"Only the women," Vincent said quickly, shaking his head in disgust. "Not men. I'm not weird or anything. . . . And only after they were dead, so it wasn't really rape. It's not. Gerald told me that. He looked it up."
Dance and Sellitto seemed unmoved by this but Baker blinked. Sachs was trying to control her temper.
Baker asked, "Why weren't you going to do anything with the next one?"
"Because . . . he was going to burn her to death."
"Jesus," Baker muttered.
"Is he armed?" Rhyme asked.
Vincent nodded. "He's got a gun. A pistol."
"A thirty-two?"
"I don't know."
"What's he driving?" Sellitto asked.
"It's a dark blue Buiek. It's stolen. A couple years old."
"License plates?"
"I don't know. Really. He just stole it."
"Put out an EVL," Rhyme ordered. Sellitto called it in.
Dance leapt in with, "And what else?" She sensed something.
"What do you mean?"
"What about the car upsets you?"
He looked down. "I think he killed the owner. I didn't know he was going to. I really didn't."
"Where?"
"He didn't tell me."
Cooper sent out a request for any reports of recent carjackings, homicides or missing persons.
"And . . ." Vincent swallowed. His leg was bouncing faintly again.
"What?" Baker asked.
"He killed somebody else too. This college student, I think, a kid. In an alley around the corner from the church, near Tenth Avenue."
"Why?"
"He saw us coming out of the church. Duncan stabbed him and put the body in a Dumpster."
Cooper phoned the local precinct house to check this out.
"Let's have him call Duncan," Sellitto said, nodding at Vincent. "We could trace his mobile."
"His phone won't work. He takes the battery and SIM chip out when we're not actually . . . you know, working."
Working . . .
"He said you can't trace it that way."
"Is the phone in his name?"
"No. It's one of those prepaid ones. He buys a new one every few days and throws out the old one."
"Get the number," Rhyme ordered. "Run it with the service providers."
Mel Cooper called the major mobile companies in the area and had several brief conversations. He hung up and reported, "East Coast Communications. Prepaid, like he said. Cash purchase. No way to trace it if the battery's out."
"Hell," Rhyme muttered.
Sellitto's phone rang. Bo Haumann's Emergency Service Unit teams were on their way. They'd be at the church in a few minutes.
"Sounds like that's our only hope," Baker said.
He, Sachs and Pulaski hurried out the door to join the tactical operation.
Rhyme, Dance and Sellitto remained in his lab, to try to learn more about Gerald Duncan from Vincent, while Cooper searched databases for any information on him.
"What's his interest in clocks and time and the lunar calendar?" Rhyme asked.
"He collects old clocks and watches. He really was a watchmaker--a hobby, you know. It's not like he has a shop or anything."
Rhyme said, "But he might've worked for one at some point. Find out the professional organization of watchmakers. Collectors too."
Cooper typed on his keyboard. He asked, "America only?"
Dance asked Vincent, "What's his nationality?"
"He's American, I guess. He doesn't have an accent or anything."
After browsing a number of websites Cooper shook his head. "It's a popular business. The big groups seem to be the Geneva Association of Watchmakers, Jewelers and Goldsmiths, the Association Interprofessionnelle de la Haute Horlogerie in Switzerland; the American Watchmakers Institute; the Swiss Association of Watch and Jewelry Retailers, also in Switzerland; the British Association of Watch and Clock Collectors; the British Horological Institute; the Employers' Association of the Swiss Watch Industry; and the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industries . . . but there're dozens more."
"Send them emails," Sellitto said. "Ask about Duncan. As a watchmaker or collector."
"And Interpol," Rhyme said. Then to Vincent: "How did you meet?"
The man gave a rambling account about a coincidental, innocent meeting. Kathryn Dance listened and in her calm voice asked a few questions and announced that he was being deceptive. "The deal is you play straight with us," she said, leaning forward. Her gaze was cool through her predator glasses.
"Okay, I was just, like, summarizing, you know."
"We don't want summaries," Rhyme growled. "We want to know how the fuck you met him."
The rapist admitted while it was a coincidence, the meeting wasn't so innocent. He gave the details of their initial contact at a restaurant near where Vincent worked. Duncan was checking out one of the men who'd been killed the previous day and Vincent had his eye on a waitress.
What a pair, these two, Rhyme reflected.
Mel Cooper looked up from the computer screen. "Getting some hits here . . . We've got sixty-eight Gerald Duncans in fifteen midwestern states. I'm running warrants and VICAP first then cross-referencing approximate ages and professions. You can't narrow down the location any more?"
"I would if I could. He never talked about himself."
&nb
sp; Dance nodded. She believed him.
Lon Sellitto asked the question that Rhyme had been about to. "We know he's targeting specific victims, checking 'em out ahead of time. Why? What's he up to?"
The rapist answered, "His wife."
"He's married?"
"Was."
"Tell us."
"His wife and him came to New York on vacation a couple years ago. He was at a business dinner somewhere and his wife went to a concert by herself. She was walking back to the hotel on this deserted street and she got hit by a car or truck. The driver took off. She screamed for help but nobody came to save her, nobody even called the police or fire department. The doctor said that she probably lived for ten, fifteen minutes after she was hit. And even somebody who wasn't a doctor could've stopped the bleeding, he said. Just a pressure point or something like that. But nobody helped."
"Run all the hospitals for admissions under the name Duncan, eighteen to thirty-six months ago," Rhyme ordered.
But Vincent said, "Don't bother. Last year he broke into the hospital and stole her chart. The police report too. Bribed a clerk or something. He's been planning this ever since."
"But why's he picking these victims?"
"When the police investigated they got the names of ten people who were nearby when she died. Whether they could have saved her or not, I don't know. But Gerald, he convinced himself they could have. He's spent the past year finding out where they live and what their schedules are. He needed to get them alone so they could die slowly. That's the important thing to him. Like his wife died slowly."
"The man on the pier Tuesday? Is he dead?"
"He's gotta be. Duncan made him hold on and then cut his arms and just stood there watching him until he fell into the river. He said he tried to swim for a while but then he just stopped moving and floated under the pier."
"What was his name?"
"I don't remember. Walter somebody. I didn't help him with the first two. I didn't, really." He glanced at Dance with fear in his eyes.
"What else do you know about Duncan?" she asked.
"That's about it. The only thing he really liked to talk about was time."
"Time? What about it?"
"Anything, everything. The history of time, how clocks work, about calendars, how people sense time differently. He'd tell me, like, the term 'speed up' comes from pendulum clocks. You'd move the weight up on the pendulum to make the clock run faster. 'Slow down'--you moved the weight down to slow it. . . . With anybody else it would've been just boring. But the way he talked about it, well, you kind of got caught up in what he was saying."
The Cold Moon Page 28
