Death Angel (9 page)

At the time, it was easy to agree, but
now Bea was forty-nine and Carl wondered if he or the department could do
without her.

He leaned back in his desk chair and
stared through the glass partition at the activity in the outer offices of the
police station. It was barely seven. People were beginning to drift in for the
seven-thirty briefing. Noise and conversation mingled in a low, unintelligible
murmur.

One of the first things Carl had done as
police chief was to establish procedures to handle violent crime. Pickard had
36,000 residents and a fifty-person police force. In normal circumstances, the
town was adequately manned. With so many people involved in the Warner case,
their resources would be strained. He and Bea had been working since six
o’clock, reviewing the progress and adding to the assignments of the
five-member crisis team.
 

Deputy Lieutenant Bob Jackson, a
soft-spoken, humorless African-American, was the most senior of the team. When
Carl had been brought to Pickard over Bob’s head, the man had held no
resentment. He’d acknowledged that the town wasn’t ready for a black police
chief, and he was too old to fight the system. Bob had proven to be an
indefatigable worker.
 

Detective Diego Garcia was on the team
because he had an eye for out-of-place details which sometimes made the
difference in solving a crime.
 

After some consideration, Detective
Anthony Torrentino had been added. Tony dressed and acted like a Chicago
mobster, but he had the tenacity of a rat terrier when he was involved in a
case.
 

The fourth member of the team was
Sergeant Jas Walker. Working as a Chicago police photographer, he’d earned the
nickname “Squint” and had been lured to Pickard when Carl became chief. After
looking over the facilities, Squint had set up a first-rate photo lab, and had
trained a group of officers in photography procedures.
 

Owing to the nature of this crime, Ellen
Fredricks, the youth officer, had been added to the team. Although she was
younger than the others, she was tough enough and intelligent enough not to be
intimidated.

When Bea returned, Carl eagerly accepted
the mug of coffee, took a careful sip of the steaming contents and sighed in
appreciation.
 

“Where were we?” she asked as she pulled
her chair up to the desk and looked back over her notes.

“I want Diego to coordinate all the
door-to-door interviews. Tell him to go over them to see if he can pick up
anything that might be useful.”

“He’ll bellyache. He prefers to be out
on the street.”

“Don’t we all. Sweet talk him. Once this
phase is over, I’ll get him on something else.”

She grimaced but nodded in agreement.
She handed him several typed sheets. “This is Ellen’s interview with the
victim’s teacher.”

“Good. Tell her I talked to Father
Blaney at St. Madelaine’s. He and the principal, Miss —” Carl leafed through
the stack of papers on his left until he found the note he wanted. “Aha. Miss
McGough will talk to the children at a special assembly this morning. Both the
school psychologist and the social worker suggested that normal routine be
followed for the remainder of the day. They’ll treat individual problems as
they come up.”

“Okay. Ellen’s going back to the school
today to interview some of the children in the victim’s class.”

“Make sure we get a list of all the
pupils and all the staff. Anyone who would have a reason to be at the school.
Nurse, janitors, coaches, bus drivers, deliveries. You know the drill.”
 

“Got it,” she said. “Bob Jackson’s in
charge of the interviews at Mr. Warner’s office and at the hospital.”

“How about Tony for priors?”

“Just seeing his ugly mug should make
any previous offender confess to jay walking. Do you think it’s a repeater?”

“I don’t know. I talked to the crime lab
boys in Chicago last night. They’re going to run it to see if the MO fits. Same
with the suburbs on the north side of Chicago.” His expression hardened. “I’ve
a gut feeling that it was a one-shot deal. If it had been planned, there would
have been more of an attempt to hide the body. My guess is it was someone the
kid knew. Once he’d raped her, he panicked, and killed her.”

He took a sip of the coffee then
continued. “While Ellen’s at the school, have her check to see if the Warner
kid ever showed any signs of abuse.” Bea looked up, her face a question. “We
don’t want to overlook the possibility that it’s an escalation of an ongoing
situation.”

“All right.” Bea wrote a note in the
margin of the paper, underlining it twice. “I notice you’re running a pretty
heavy check on Richard Warner. It’s early days yet to zero in on anyone. Once
that happens, everyone gets a blind spot and we could miss something major.”

Carl’s voice was cold. “If you’re
suggesting that my own personal agenda is clouding my judgment, forget it. I’m
open at this point. However just because Warner is the victim’s father doesn’t
automatically keep him off the list of suspects. He lied about where he was on
the day of the murder and I want to know why.”

Bea held up both hands in surrender.
“I’m not criticizing.”

“Like hell.” There was a moment of tense
silence as their eyes met. Carl jerked his head in an abrupt nod. “I’ll keep
your concerns in mind.”

“Good.” She ran a finger down the list
on the top of her papers, pausing at the last item. “I talked to Squint last
night. He’ll have individual photos in the computer today after two.”

“He’ll have pictures from the funeral
home, church, and the cemetery?”

“Yes. And he’s trying to get footage
from the other media. Those he won’t have right away.”

“That’s all right. The shrinks say
there’s always a chance, even if he’s a stranger, that he’ll show up at the
funeral or cemetery.” Carl pushed his chair away from the desk. “Once we
identify the majority of the people we’ll have a preliminary list to work
from.”

“For the unknowns, we’ll have everyone
in the department take a look. If one of us can’t ID them, they’re probably not
local.” She gathered her papers together into a neat pile then sat back in her chair.
“Anything else?”

“The crisis team will meet after lunch.
Say one-thirty. Until further notice, we’ll use the conference room as our
command post. We can add personnel as we need it.”

“We’ve had to double the personnel on
phones due to the number of tips, sightings, and assorted bizarre calls.”

“The whole town’s jumpy. I talked to
Mayor Etzel last night and we’re going to schedule a press conference for later
today.” He ran a finger down the scribbled notes on his daily agenda then shook
his head. “I don’t have a time listed. Late afternoon I’d guess. He wants to
catch the commuter news at six.”

“Good. The reporters have been bugging
us for another statement.”

“Any questions from the outside, refer
to Hayden in PR. At briefing this morning remind the troops if there’s a leak
I’ll have their balls. In the case of the ladies, you think of something
creative. No talking at home about the details.”

“Got it.” Bea stood up, stretched,
turning as the door of the office opened and Dana Adams, the watch commander,
stepped inside and closed the door.
  

“Sorry to interrupt, Chief, but I think
you better hear this. We just got a call from a woman who says she saw the guy
that killed the Warner kid.”

Six

“S
omeone saw the killer
?”
 

“Maybe.” Dana’s breathing was ragged as
if she’d run from the communications room. “Lady called in. Said she just read
the story in the paper, and she might’ve seen the kidnapping.”

“A kook?” Carl asked.

“I’ve logged in at least eight of
those,” Dana said. “This one might be the goods. She was pretty hesitant. Kept
apologizing for not calling sooner. At any rate, I told her that I’d send
someone right over to talk to her. Thought you might like to go yourself.”

“Damn straight,” Carl said, pushing
himself to his feet. “Got the name and address?”

Dana held out a small piece of paper. “A
Mrs. Nell Doutt. Sounds like a little old lady.”

Bea took the paper. “It’s on Corydon.
The street where Mrs. Warner found the watercolor.”

Carl took the paper, eyeballed it, and
then stood up. “Make sure not a word of this gets out until after I’ve talked
to her.”

“No problem.” Dana touched her temple in
a two fingered salute as she left.

Carl grabbed his uniform jacket, picked
up his leather notebook, and started out the door. He straight-armed the door
to the parking lot, car keys already in his hand.

He cursed as the light in the center of
town turned red. He resisted the urge to flip on the siren, settling back
against the seat and trying to relax the muscles in his jaw.
 

It only took five minutes to get to the
address, an old, but well-kept, two-and-a-half-story clapboard house. Stately
elms lined the sidewalks, and there were four or five cars parked along the
street. He pulled against the curb, walked up the front walk, and rang the bell.
Nothing happened. Carl was just reaching for the bell to ring again when the
door slowly opened. Standing inside, leaning heavily on a metal walker, was a
tall, white-haired woman.

“Mrs. Doutt? I’m Chief Leidecker.”

“Yes. Come in please.”

She led him toward the living room.
Although the room was tastefully furnished, it appeared crowded because of the
profusion of photographs and small ceramic animals scattered on every surface.
She stopped in front of a wing chair and Carl waited as she jockeyed her walker
into position so that she could sit down. Once seated, she smiled warmly.

“Men in uniform always seem to have
impeccable manners,” she said, waving Carl to a chair.
 

“I gather you might have seen something
that could be helpful in our investigation of the Warner child’s death,” Carl
said.

“I am so sorry that I didn’t call
sooner. It was my grandson’s birthday on Tuesday. My son-in-law picked me up
after work, and I stayed at my daughter’s in Rockford until last night. It
wasn’t until I saw the paper this morning that I thought I might have seen the
child who was killed.”

Restraining his impatience, Carl spoke
quietly. “What were you doing when you first saw her?”

“I was washing the windows.” She
chuckled at Carl’s raised eyebrow. “Since I broke my hip I’ve been confined to
the house and bored to boot. I have a girl who comes in and cleans but she’s
just good for the surface of things. The windows were thick with winter grit
and Tuesday was the most glorious day. I thought if I just washed these.” She
pointed to the windows in the alcove. “I had just finished the first one when I
saw the child.”

“Could you describe her for me?”

“She had black hair, shoulder length. A
sweet face, although I couldn’t see it very clearly. She was wearing a school
uniform. St. Madelaine’s. White knee socks and white tennis shoes.”

“Anything else?”

“A bright yellow jacket. That’s what
made her so noticeable.”

She paused, leaning her head against the
back of the chair. Her eyes were open but focused out the window as if she were
seeing it again.

“She was chasing a piece of paper down
the street. The wind had caught it, and each time she reached for it a gust
would carry it further. She was laughing. She made such a joyful picture that I
couldn’t help but smile as I watched her. She grabbed for it several times and
on the last attempt she tripped and fell on her knee.”

“Can you remember which knee?”

Her eyes narrowed in concentration, but
the answer was definite when she spoke. “Her right.”

When Carl had examined the child’s body
with the coroner, he had noted the scrape on the girl’s right knee and assumed
it had happened during the attack. Physical details like this had been withheld
from the media. This information plus the yellow windbreaker made it almost a
certainty that Mrs. Doutt had seen Jennifer Warner.

“It was right in front of the window and
I could see that she’d skinned her knee and was crying. I put down my things
and went to the door. Because of my walker, it took a minute or two before I
could get to the front door. By that time the child was standing beside a car
parked at the curb. The door on the passenger side was open and she got in. A
man’s hand reached across her and closed the car door. Through the rear window
I could see them talking. Then the car pulled away.”

Silence filled the room when the woman
finished. Carl shifted in his chair, letting Mrs. Doutt relax now that the
initial portion of the interview was completed.
 

“Where exactly was the car?”
 

She looked out the window. “Right where
that red car is now.”