The Killing Room

by Richard Montanari

  ‘Wait a minute,’ Jessica said. ‘He was only on the job for eighteen months? He was just a kid.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Why’d he retire?’

  ‘No idea,’ Byrne said. ‘But I’m really interested in finding that out. Aren’t you?’

  ‘Oh yeah.’

  Jessica and Byrne returned to the homicide duty room. Once there, Jessica sat down, rolled her chair over to a computer terminal, and entered the name in the database. In seconds she got a hit. She compared the photo on the computer monitor to the one she had taken of the victim at the scene. In her photograph the victim’s face was so covered in blood and cuts, it hardly looked human. Still, prints never lie, and according to Judy’s expert work, the prints were an eight-point match.

  Daniel Palumbo had been twenty-three years old. He grew up in South Philadelphia, and became a police officer three years ago.

  Jessica looked again at the two photographs. The man they found bleeding out in a church basement now had a name: Daniel Elias Palumbo. Patrol Officer Daniel Elias Palumbo. They had a minimum amount of information about him.

  He had been arrested and convicted of possession of a controlled substance a few months after quitting the force, but had gotten off with time served and community service.

  They had a date of birth. They had a brief life story. Now they had a date of death.

  ‘We have a last known?’ Byrne asked.

  ‘Yeah, we do.’ Jessica grabbed her coat and keys. ‘His mother’s house. She still lives on Latona Street.’

  NINE

  As they rode to South Philly Jessica scrolled through the pictures on her iPhone. She looked at the photos taken at the St Adelaide’s crime scene.

  The first three were of the basement room in which the victim was found. The condition of the room was horrific, but nothing compared to the condition of the body. She knew that there were all manner of religious sects that practiced self-flagellation and self-mutilation as part of their ceremony, but she had a hard time believing their victim had wrapped himself in barb wire. Even if he had, he definitely had help tying his hands behind his back.

  My Missal. Had the book belonged to the victim? It looked like a child’s edition. If it was, why was this grown man carrying it? Did it belong to him? Did it belong to the killer?

  Jessica also considered the X on the lamppost. If it was rendered in the blood of the victim they might be able to pull prints off the post, although the rusted surface of the metal might make that difficult.

  They stopped for a light. ‘What do you think?’ Jessica asked.

  ‘I think I need another day off already.’

  ‘Do you think this was a ritual killing?’

  ‘Well, the ritual killings we’ve investigated in the past have been just that, right? Killings. This guy was alive when we got there. I think he was left that way on purpose. For ten days.’

  ‘But why that place?’

  Byrne turned onto Latona Street. ‘Good question. Maybe he used the place to shoot up. There was plenty of paraphernalia on the first floor.’

  ‘You’re not thinking this was a drug hit, are you?’

  Byrne shook his head. ‘I doubt it.’

  Jessica agreed. This wasn’t really a drug dealer’s style. They usually went for an efficient, cost-effective double tap to the back of the head. Although there were serious sadists in that business. Both Jessica and Byrne had investigated drug-related homicides that had been committed with hatchets, shovels, machetes, and sundry other weapons.

  While the murder did not seem like a drug killing at the moment, if Jessica had learned anything in her time in the unit, it was that you couldn’t rule anything out in the first few hours of an investigation.

  ‘What about the cop angle?’ she asked. ‘I’m wondering if this could be a holdover from his days on the street.’

  ‘Could be that,’ Byrne said. ‘Could very well be that.’

  The Palumbo address was a well-kept, white-washed two-story rowhouse on Latona Street, between Eighteenth and Nineteenth. Entrance was via a black-wrought iron security door, flanked by a mailbox to the right, address above. Under the front window was an empty flower box, painted brown, partially wrapped in blue plastic sheeting. Two basement windows were clad in vented glass block.

  Byrne rang the doorbell. After a few moments the door opened.

  The woman standing before them was in her late fifties or early sixties. She had moist blue eyes that drooped slightly at the corners, and wore a light green waitress uniform with the name LORRIE stitched on the left side. She had the weary countenance of someone who had worked on her feet her entire adult life. In her hands was a well-laundered pink dishtowel.

  Jessica and Byrne produced their badges and ID.

  ‘Are you Loretta Palumbo?’ Jessica asked.

  ‘Yes,’ the woman said, a bit cautiously, as if she had done this many times before. She squinted against the sudden blast of cold air. ‘I am.’

  ‘Ma’am, my name is Detective Balzano, this is my partner, Detective Byrne. We’re with the Philadelphia Police Department.’

  The look on the woman’s face said that she knew. Not that she was aware that her son was dead, or any of the circumstances surrounding his murder, but just that she knew. It was a look that all but proclaimed that she had been waiting for this visit every day for a very long time.

  ‘You’re not with the Drug Unit,’ she said.

  ‘No, ma’am,’ Byrne said. ‘May we come in?’

  The woman hesitated, then stepped to the side. ‘I’m sorry. Please.’

  The front room was very tidy and well-kept. The floral brocade sofa and chair against the sidewall were old, but covered in clear plastic. There were crystal ashtrays on every table, all brightly polished. On the walls were a half-dozen framed renderings of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. On the mantel over the bricked-in fireplace was a picture of Danny Palumbo in uniform, wearing his patrolman’s cap, dress blues. It was hard for Jessica to reconcile this handsome young man with the person she had seen bleed out in that frigid basement.

  What had happened to him?

  ‘Is there anyone else here right now?’ Byrne asked.

  ‘No. I’m here all by myself.’

  ‘Ma’am, do you have a son named Daniel?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Danny is my son.’

  ‘When was the last –’

  ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’

  The question floated in the dry, overheated air for a moment. ‘Yes, ma’am,’ Byrne said. ‘I’m afraid so.’

  The woman’s gaze slowly moved from Byrne to Jessica, as if Jessica might have a different opinion, as if Jessica might disagree with Byrne and tell her that there might have been some kind of a mistake. Jessica had seen the look before, many times. Unlike the incidence of disease, there were no second opinions in homicide.

  ‘We’re very sorry for your loss,’ Byrne said.

  The woman crossed the kitchen, reached into a cupboard, pulled out a cup. It was not a coffee mug, but rather a child’s brightly colored plastic tumbler. Jessica noticed that it was decorated with characters from the Flintstones. The woman didn’t pour anything into it – no coffee, no soda, no juice. She just held it. Jessica wanted desperately to look at her partner, but stopped herself.

  ‘What … what happened?’ the woman asked. ‘Was it the drugs?’

  Jessica knew the convenient answer would be to say yes. Yes, he died of an overdose. It would make the job so much easier if they could blame all of this on a weakness, not the cracked mind of a killer.

  ‘No,’ Byrne said. ‘We think he was murdered.’

  The woman steadied herself with the arm of the sofa. ‘Why?’

  ‘We’re not sure yet, ma’am,’ Byrne said. ‘We’re just beginning our investigation. And we could use your help. I know this is a terrible shock. Do you feel up to answering a few of our questions?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I think so.’

  Byrne too
k out his notebook and pen. ‘When did you last see Danny?’

  The woman thought for a few moments. ‘I saw him two weeks ago. Maybe longer than that.’

  ‘Do you remember the day of the week?’

  The woman’s stare was blank. Jessica had seen this many times also, the way sudden grief could steal even the smallest details from your memory. It was a form of shock.

  ‘It’s okay if you can’t remember right now,’ Byrne said. ‘We can get to it later.’

  Loretta Palumbo nodded.

  ‘Did Danny live here?’

  ‘No, not for years,’ she said. ‘It’s just that sometimes he would stay here when he …’

  When he got sick, Jessica thought. When he needed money. She looked around the room. There was no television, no DVD player, no stereo. Jessica wondered if those things had gone up Danny Palumbo’s arm.

  ‘I wouldn’t let him do his drugs in this house,’ Loretta said. ‘I just couldn’t.’

  The woman’s legs got a little shaky. Byrne crossed the room, eased her into a chair. He pointed to the plastic cup in her hands. ‘Can we get you some water, ma’am?’

  Loretta Palumbo pulled a tissue from a square box on the coffee table, dabbed her eyes. ‘No, thank you.’

  Byrne nodded to Jessica, who took out her notebook. Byrne put his away, sat on the couch. ‘When Danny was here, the last time you saw him, how did he seem? Did he seem particularly troubled?’

  Loretta stared at the framed photographs on the end table. One of them showed a much younger Loretta Palumbo leaning against the trunk of a 1980s compact car, a baby in her arms. ‘He was always troubled,’ she said. ‘Even as a baby. Always restless, never could stay in one spot too long. One time he got out of his playpen and crawled almost to the corner.’

  Byrne let the woman talk.

  ‘When his father died, Danny was only ten years old. He came to me after the funeral holding my husband’s toolbox. His father was quite handy around the house, you know.’

  ‘When Danny stayed here, did he have his own room?’ Byrne asked.

  ‘Of course,’ she said.

  ‘May we take a look at it? There may be something in there that might help us.’

  ‘It’s upstairs,’ Loretta said. ‘On the left.’

  Byrne nodded to Jessica, telling her that he would sit with the woman while she searched the victim’s room.

  Jessica took the stairs two treads at a time, suddenly feeling claustrophobic in this cramped rowhouse, suddenly wanting to move on. Notification was never an easy thing – indeed, it was the worst part of her job – but for some reason she was having a harder than usual time with this one. It was all such a waste.

  She opened the door to the bedroom on the left. The first thing that struck her was how spartan the room was. Against the wall with the window that looked out the front of the rowhouse there was a single bed, tightly made up with a light blue blanket, hospital corners. Next to the bed was a worn night-stand and lamp. At the foot of the bed was a dresser; next to it a low bookcase with what looked like five years’ worth of crossword magazines, the kind that feature number-seek puzzles. That was it. No paintings or photographs on the walls, no throw rugs, no decorations of any kind. Jessica had enough experience with drug-related homicides to know that Danny Palumbo did not maintain a space this clean and spare.

  She crossed the room, opened the drawers on the dresser. Inside she found a few old T-shirts, a pair of jeans. She checked the pockets. All empty. In the bottom drawer she found Danny Palumbo’s certificate from the police academy. It was unframed. Beyond this, there was no other clothing or accessories that indicated a police officer had ever occupied this room.

  Jessica crossed the room to the sole closet, opened the door. The space was empty. There weren’t even hangers on the rod, or anything stacked on the pair of shelves. Mounted on the inside of the closet door was an inexpensive full-length mirror. Jessica looked at her own warped reflection for a moment, thinking back to the day she had graduated from the academy, how proud her father had been. She wondered if Loretta Palumbo had felt the same way. She was sure of it. She wanted to be sure of it.

  Jessica closed the door and, just to be thorough, got down on her knees and looked under the bed and the dresser. The only thing she found was a pair of worn green corduroy slippers under the bed. She looked inside, found nothing. She arranged them precisely as she had found them, matching their position to the dust-formed silhouettes.

  She got up, walked back to the door, stepped into the hall. She was just about to close the door when something on the ceiling caught her eye. She glanced up.

  There, in front of the doors and the windows, burned into the plastered ceiling, were marks in the shape of a cross.

  When Jessica returned to the front room she found Byrne and the woman standing near the door.

  ‘Do you know any of Danny’s acquaintances?’ Byrne asked. ‘Someone we might talk to regarding his whereabouts for the past few weeks?’

  Loretta Palumbo thought about this. Whatever crossed her mind brought a look of distaste to her face. ‘He did bring a friend over a few times.’

  ‘Do you remember this friend’s name?’

  ‘He was dirty. I didn’t like him,’ she said. ‘I think Danny called him Boise, or something like that.’

  ‘Boise? Like the city in Idaho?’ Jessica asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Jessica made the note.

  ‘He had the HIV, you know,’ Loretta Palumbo added. ‘They said he had the full AIDS a year ago, that maybe he didn’t have too long to live, but then he got better.’

  Jessica looked at Byrne. This meant two things, at least in the immediate sense. One, it opened up the possibility of this being some sort of hate crime, in addition to the motive having something to do with the time Danny Palumbo had been in uniform. Second, and more importantly, was that Jessica and Byrne had both been exposed to Danny Palumbo’s blood. They had been wearing gloves when they touched him, and they both disinfected at the scene, so they were 99% safe. Still, you never knew.

  ‘Your son was HIV-positive?’ Byrne asked.

  Loretta Palumbo nodded.

  ‘I know this next question is going to seem very personal, but it is something we have to ask,’ Byrne said. ‘Was Danny gay?’

  ‘No. He got it from the … you know …’

  ‘He got it from sharing a needle.’

  She didn’t answer. She didn’t need to.

  ‘Mrs Palumbo, do you have a cell phone?’ Byrne asked.

  ‘A cell phone?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘No. I just have the regular.’ She pointed to the cordless phone on the wall near the kitchen door.

  ‘I left my phone in the car,’ Byrne said. ‘Would you mind if I used your phone? It’s a local call, and I won’t be on long.’

  ‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘Please.’

  Byrne crossed the room, picked up the phone, dialed. After a few seconds he hung up. ‘No answer.’

  As Byrne buttoned his coat, preparing to leave, he gestured to the walls, to the framed renderings of Christ. ‘I see you’re a God-fearing woman.’

  Loretta Palumbo stood a little straighter. ‘The Lord is my salvation.’

  ‘Was Danny a religious young man?’

  ‘He was. He was baptized, he was confirmed. He went to Catechism.’

  ‘Did he also make his first Holy Communion?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Loretta walked over to one of the end tables, populated with a dozen framed photographs. She lifted one from the back. In it an eight-year-old Daniel Palumbo sat posed for a professional photographer, wearing a long-sleeved shirt and thin white tie. ‘He was a very devout boy.’

  ‘Do you know if Danny owned a little white prayer book?’

  ‘A prayer book?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am. A book called My Missal?’

  They had considered showing the woman the photograph they had of the book, the picture taken at t
he crime scene. Considering that it was covered in blood, they had decided it was not a good idea.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘He read the Bible all the time when he was small. I don’t know about now.’

  Byrne took out his card case, thumbed a business card. ‘Ma’am, once again, on behalf of the city of Philadelphia, we’re very sorry for your loss. We may have some more questions for you.’ He handed the card to the woman. ‘And we’re going to need a member of the immediate family to make a positive identification.’

  Loretta nodded. ‘There’s just me now. No one else.’

  Byrne took her hand, held it for a moment. ‘I’ll let you know when we need you to be there. I’ll come and get you. You won’t be alone. And rest assured that the entire police department feels this loss. Danny was, and will always be, one of us.’

  The woman stepped forward, put her arms around Byrne. From where Jessica stood, it didn’t look like something this woman did often. It appeared that now that her son and husband were dead, it might be the last time she would have someone to embrace.

  Byrne seemed to sense this too, and gently put his big hands on the woman’s back. He let her break away first.

  When she did, Byrne squared himself in front of her. ‘You call me if you need anything. Anything at all.’

  ‘God bless you,’ she said.

  ‘Thank you, ma’am,’ Byrne said. ‘Thank you.’

  They walked back to the car in silence. It was still bitterly cold, but at least the wind had died down. As they reached the curb, waiting for traffic to pass, a cloud sifted by the sun, bathing the street in a watery winter light.

  ‘So, that was his baby cup that she took out of the cupboard, wasn’t it?’ Jessica asked.

  ‘Yeah. It probably was.’

  ‘He was twenty-three years old. She still has his little sippy cup. His Flintstones cup. It was the first thing she thought of.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Jesus, Kevin.’

  There was no longer any traffic, but they didn’t cross. Neither of them wanted to get back into a police car at the moment.

  ‘You know, when I first came to the unit, I thought notifications were going to get easier over time,’ Jessica said. ‘They don’t, do they?’