Detective First Grade

1

July 9 3:30 p.m.

Yogi was no dope, Detective Brian McKenna thought as he drove along Empire Boulevard. This is déjà vu all over again.

McKenna looked at his partner, Richie White. Stuck in deepest, darkest Brooklyn again and working with another hoople. No more bright lights for me for a while, no fine restaurants, no high-fashion good-looking women. How many times have I been sent down? Four? Five? How many times have I been caught breaking their rules?

McKenna was bored and began feeling sorry for himself again. Seven-one Detective Squad. Certainly not very glamorous, the main mission being to keep the Hasidic Jews and the Blacks from killing each other or burning each other out. Angelita disgusted with both me and the police department and threatening to leave. Not much to smile about. And nobody to blame except myself for this current state of affairs. Myself, and those jerks in the FBI. They don’t appreciate anybody doing the right thing when it conflicts with their plans.

But the worst thing about banishment to Brooklyn is the boredom: there isn’t enough worth doing. Nothing important anyway. After all, it’s only Brooklyn. Who cares what happens here? Nobody I know.

McKenna drove what the New York City Police Department called an unmarked car. The car fooled no one in this neighborhood. Everyone knew that two white guys wearing ties in a four-door Plymouth were the DTs, the detectives, the Man. They might as well have been in full police uniform driving an ice cream truck.

It was a hot and muggy July afternoon and the streets were packed with the darker and poorer shades of humanity. McKenna and White were stuck in one of those Brooklyn traffic jams that occur for no good reason and only end by Divine Intervention. McKenna observed the difference between this particular jam and typical midtown Manhattan gridlock. Nobody was blowing their horn here, probably realizing that a show of annoyance could upset the crowded and delicate balance and could lead to a serious confrontation with fellow motorists. Confrontation was more dangerous here than in the Bright Lights. This was a notoriously well-armed neighborhood.

But the healthy fear evaporated as soon as anyone noticed that the police were around. The middle-aged, well-built black man in the car on McKenna’s left started blowing his horn and gesturing in an attempt to get McKenna’s attention.

McKenna smiled and stole a quick glance at his fellow motorist. Everything about the man was big and solid, including the chunky Buick he was driving. Their eyes met while the big man simultaneously leaned on his horn and shouted in McKenna’s direction. McKenna couldn’t understand because the big man’s windows were closed.

Perfect! McKenna thought. A way to break the boredom. He faced forward and made a pretense of studiously ignoring the big man. This implied insult enraged the man and he continued blowing his horn and shouting at McKenna through his closed window. McKenna continued to ignore him. Finally the man leaned over, rolled down his passenger window, and yelled, Hey, Officer, why don’t you get out of your car and do something about this traffic?

Rising to the occasion, McKenna answered in his best LAPD-Adam 12 voice, Excuse me, sir, but I just happened to notice that you aren’t wearing your seat belt. Do you realize that, in the event of an accident, you could be seriously injured if you were ejected from your auto? Not to mention the fact that you are currently risking being cited for a fifty-dollar fine and two points on your license, if any. I remind you that a conviction for this violation would automatically entail an increase in the amount of automobile insurance that I am sure you know you are required to pay by Section sixeleven of the New York State Vehicle and Traffic Law.

Say what?

If, by your present conduct, you are going to force me to start doing my sworn duty of enforcing the law, I feel that I must start on the first violation I encounter, which is the violation that I have just finished discussing with you, sir.

Huuhh? Confusion was engraved all over the big man’s face. McKenna watched as this confusion was slowly replaced by resentment.

McKenna smiled, leaned out of his window, and said in a stage whisper, I sure hope this bullshit works on you, pal, because, just between us, I don’t have any summonses and I think I forgot how to write one anyway. So, please let me slide on this one so this knucklehead sitting next to me doesn’t call me a pussy and break my balls for the rest of the day. How about it?

Finally he got it. The big man smiled and said, Ain’t this a bitch, Officer!

Thanks, pal. By the way, would you mind saying that once more, but a little louder so the knucklehead can hear you?

The big man leaned forward in his seat, looked at Richie White, and agreed with McKenna’s assessment of his partner.

Sure, Officer. AIN’T THIS A BITCH!

Thank you, sir, and happy motoring.

One second, Officer! I just got to know your name.

Brian McKenna, expert detective at your service, sir, answered McKenna with a salute and a smile.

Pleasure to meet you, Detective McKenna. I’ve got to catch you at a party sometime, the big man said as he returned the salute and rolled up his window.

I just love that seat-belt law, McKenna said to White.

White didn’t look the slightest bit disturbed about McKenna’s disparaging characterization of him. Let’s keep this straight, McKenna. You have to play by the rules and be consistent. Call me either a knucklehead or an asshole in your stories to these guys. One or the other. Otherwise, the bet’s off.

"OK, knucklehead. Let’s add it up. Correct me if I’m wrong, but so far today I’ve got three Ain’t that a bitch’s, eight Say what’s, and three Damn’s. Subtracting that ‘Officer, you ain’t nothing but a nogood motherfucker,’ I figure you owe me thirteen dollars."

Settle for five bucks?

For you, anything, McKenna replied. Sucker, he thought. This guy belongs in Brooklyn. He even likes it here. He’s just like the Eskimos. They think they’ve got a great place, too. Richie White and the Eskimos just don’t know any better.

McKenna’s eyes were drawn to the pulled, frayed thread hanging from the elbow of White’s jacket. He couldn’t help himself.

He doesn’t even know it’s there, McKenna thought. A 100 percent no-wrinkle, no-iron polyester sports jacket. What a buy! Looks like one-size-fits-all. I can’t even tell what color it is. How can we possibly get any respect for this police department when it looks like our detectives get dressed in the dark? These Brooklyn detectives don’t know that this job is 50 percent appearance. If you look good, people want to talk to you. If people want to talk to you, the rest of the job is easy. Now, who would want to talk to this guy? It’s not that he’s a bad guy. It’s just that he hasn’t learned the tricks to make it easy.

White caught McKenna staring at the jacket and said, Like it? My wife got it for me for my birthday. She’s a great shopper. Most comfortable jacket I’ve ever had. And it never wrinkles. I took it right out of the dryer before work today.

Yeah, it’s nice. I’d like to get something like that for myself. It looks like it goes with anything. You can wear it anywhere, McKenna said.

The great thing about it is that I can wear any tie I want with it.

That’s great, answered McKenna. Any tie but that one, he thought.

I’ll bring you in the catalog tomorrow, if you like. Then I can have my wife put you on the mailing list.

Great, thanks, McKenna said. If my mailman sees that catalog, I’ll have to move.

The auto air-conditioner was going full blast. McKenna looked at White, who was rolling up his window to keep the July heat out. He disapproved, but didn’t say anything.

McKenna, asked White, How about rolling up your window before we roast in here?

Sorry pal, but I prefer to hear all the good things that our citizens are saying about us. I never miss an opportunity to make sure that we’re still winning their hearts and minds.

They were headed eastbound in the stop-and-go traffic, slowly approaching the intersection of Bedford Avenue.

McKenna had never been able to suppress the warm feeling of nostalgia that swelled inside him every time he had to pass this place, now the site of the Ebbets Field Houses. He thought back to his childhood, when the city had been different. Many times his father had brought him here to watch Duke Snyder, Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella, and those other Boys of Summer. Dem Bums, he remembered his father saying. Won the National League Pennant in ’52 and ‘53 and did it again in ’55 and ‘56. They even finally beat the Yankees and won the World Series in ’55, and suddenly Brooklyn wasn’t good enough for them. They started looking around and after the 1957 season they took the money, packed up, and went off to the sunshine. They were the first to leave the neighborhood.

McKenna took another look at his surroundings. Of course, he thought, anyone with sense and enough money took the hint and soon followed them out.

Look what they did to this place, McKenna thought. The site of the famous ballpark, once the home of the Brooklyn Dodgers, was now occupied by six separate twenty-three-story buildings that comprised the Ebbets Field Houses, a low-to-moderate-income New York City housing complex famous only to the cops who spent a lot of time trying to catch the assortment of robbers, drug dealers, rapists, and murderers who lived in these high-rises among their victims and customers.

Four cars in front of the detectives a man exited the rear seat of a taxi. He walked to the sidewalk, looked around, and started strolling in their direction. McKenna’s instincts startled him out of his daydreams. He sized up the man instantly. Male, probably Hispanic, about forty years old, five feet nine inches tall, medium build, one hundred and sixty pounds, mustache and goatee, swarthy complexion, well dressed, wearing green snakeskin shoes, green pants, a white shirt, and an open green nylon Windbreaker.

It was the shoes and the Windbreaker that caught McKenna’s attention. The shoes were out of place in this neighborhood. Too expensive. And it was too hot to be wearing a Windbreaker. As the man approached, McKenna saw that as he walked his left shoulder was slightly lower than his right shoulder and that he also swung his left arm slightly away from his body.

Without moving his lips, McKenna said to his partner, Don’t look now, but get ready! This guy’s got a gun in a shoulder holster. The man was now about ten feet from the front of their car.

Naturally, White turned his head and looked right at the man as he approached. Why do I bother talking to this guy? McKenna wondered.

So McKenna also turned and his eyes locked with the man’s as he passed their car. He was right; the guy was definitely one of the piranhas. In that instant McKenna saw recognition, fear, and apprehension in the man’s eyes. Although McKenna and this man had never seen each other before, they recognized each other. The hunter was about to become the hunted. They both knew their roles and began formulating their plans. The game had begun.

The man turned his head forward and continued walking. McKenna saw that his gait had picked up almost imperceptibly as he continued down Empire Boulevard.

Are you sure? White asked. I didn’t see it.

McKenna ignored the question. Let’s get him, he said as he slipped his 9-mm Glock semiautomatic from the holster on his belt, turned off the car, removed the keys from the ignition, and handed them to White. He was relieved to see that White had finally caught on and was removing his own pistol from its holster.

Don’t forget the radio, McKenna said, meaning the police walkietalkie. They both took a deep breath and opened their doors.

Their quarry was sharp. He was thirty feet behind the detectives when they got out of the car. As soon as he heard the sound of the doors opening, he took off. He was fast and he wasn’t looking back. Leaving their car right in the middle of traffic, the detectives gave chase. The race was on.

The piranha ran across Empire Boulevard through the lanes of stopped cars and headed toward the Ebbets Field Houses.

McKenna was delighted. Now there would be no need to tell any little lies in court about this upcoming arrest. Flight of a suspect was one of the mitigating circumstances that, in the eyes of the courts, justify an officer’s action when he stops and frisks a person before he arrests him for unlawful possession of a firearm.

It never even crossed McKenna’s mind that this man might get away. For the past ten years he had run in three marathons a year. He was fond of saying, They might be faster for the first block, but to get away from me they have to run twenty-six miles in under three hours fifteen minutes. They never could.

The detectives were fifty feet behind the man by the time he reached the first building in the housing complex. He hadn’t slowed down a bit. McKenna judged the man’s pace and started to pull a little ahead of White.

Should I put it over? White yelled, meaning, Should he transmit this foot pursuit over the police radio he was carrying?

McKenna looked over his shoulder at White and saw that he was red. Looks like I’m going to be on my own in this one in a little while, he thought.

Not yet, McKenna answered. He figured that he might want to have a little private chat with their man when they caught him, and he wouldn’t want to have any other officers present during this interview who could be called to testify against him later.

The chase continued through the sidewalks of the complex of buildings. McKenna slowly narrowed the gap while White fell farther and farther behind. The suspect made a series of right or left turns at the corner of each building, so that by the time McKenna was twenty feet behind him, they were at about the same point as when they’d first entered the housing complex.

By now, this foot pursuit had attracted quite a bit of attention in the crowded neighborhood. McKenna felt as though they were running across the infield of Ebbets Field on opening day. People were everywhere and they all stopped whatever they were doing to watch the game. Both officers knew that the police weren’t considered the home team here.

The man now heard McKenna’s footsteps behind him and he pulled a large, ugly-looking automatic pistol from his shoulder holster. McKenna saw the weapon and slowed down a bit.

Not just yet, McKenna thought. He didn’t want to risk a gunfight on these crowded streets.

The suspect ran toward a group of tough-looking Spanish punks wearing gang colors and yelled to them, ¡Ayúdenme, hermanos! imploring them for help.

The group gave the man a cheer as he passed through them. McKenna followed and one of the aspiring gangsters stuck his foot out as McKenna was passing, catching the instep of McKenna’s left foot while he was in midstride. The result was spectacular. McKenna sprawled face forward on the concrete and slid into second base.

McKenna got up as quickly as he could and turned in time to see White grab the owner of the offending foot. The rest of the pack was giving a demonstration of the Big Bang Theory, scattering to all corners of the universe at close to the speed of light.

McKenna shouted to his partner, Let him go and put it over! The suspect was now about one hundred feet in front of him.

He heard White shout into the police radio the New York City Police Department code call for Officer needs assistance. Tenthirteen. Ebbets Field Houses. Officers in civilian clothes chasing male Hispanic armed with a gun.

In the nine radio cars then on patrol in the 71st Precinct, eighteen hearts skipped a beat and the adrenaline started flowing. In one instant, nine hands reached for the dashboard and turned on roof lights and sirens. All assignments were put on hold. Nothing else mattered. A fellow officer was in trouble and requesting assistance. Within five seconds the front of every police car on patrol in the 71st Precinct was pointed toward the Ebbets Field Houses.

McKenna heard the wail of the sirens and wondered, How many collisions did I just cause?

He poured on the speed and as he ran he heard the sound of White’s footsteps behind him. He felt pain in his right knee, looked down, and saw that he had torn the pants knee of his Botany 500 suit. For the first time McKenna felt anger. Man, do I want to talk to this guy!

The gap was quickly beginning to narrow. He’s finally getting tired, McKenna thought. Thank God!

The man made a left when McKenna was once again fifty feet behind him and, gun in hand, ran into the lobby of 277 McKeever Place in the heart of the housing complex. In the lobby were three middle-aged black women from the building Tenants’ Safety Committee, sitting behind a desk placed near the front of the inner lobby door. Their mission was to screen all nonresidents entering the building, an attempt to keep criminals from using their building as a place of business. The gunman rushed past them and tried the inner glass door of the lobby. It was locked. He was cornered.

In unison, the three ladies resigned their position of trust, got up from their chairs, and headed for the front door.

The gunman turned. Stop! he yelled, and the three ladies froze in the doorway. They were between McKenna and the gunman. The gunman raised his weapon and placed the short barrel on top of the shoulder of the closest woman. McKenna dove behind one of the thick, old, pollution-scarred sycamore trees that dotted every New York City housing complex in the city.

The gunman fired a four- or five-round burst. McKenna heard the outer glass doors shatter as the rounds slammed into his tree. The volley of rounds hit the tree with repetitive thumps.

Christ, full automatic! McKenna thought. Thank you, God, for this tree.

McKenna peered around the tree and saw that the three ladies in the lobby were frozen in terror. He couldn’t shoot.

Get down! McKenna yelled. Everyone in the lobby, including the gunman, instantly dropped to the ground. From the prone position he fired another burst at McKenna’s lucky tree. Each round hit the tree, but this time the rounds struck closer to the ground, very near where McKenna had just shown his face.

McKenna looked behind and saw that White had also dropped to the ground about one hundred feet behind him. He was yelling excitedly into his radio.

The sound of approaching sirens promised that help was very close.

McKenna heard another burst of fire from the lobby and dug himself deeper into the pavement. This time the bullets weren’t meant for him. He peered around the tree and saw that the gunman had fired into the heavy inner glass door, shattering it. He was gone.

McKenna ran in a crouch into the lobby of the building. The three ladies still lay frozen on the ground.

Which way? he asked, and three index fingers pointed up.

McKenna stepped through the blasted door and ran toward the two elevators in the inner lobby. The floor-indicator lights showed one elevator on the tenth floor and the other on the seventeenth.

No way he’s in the elevators, thought McKenna. These elevators were notoriously slow, when they worked at all. He couldn’t have gotten so high so fast in these elevators.

McKenna ran to the stairwell, opened the door, and heard the sounds of his man running up about three floors above him. The stairs were made of steel, and in the enclosed stairwell the footsteps rang like coins dropping into a tin cup.

McKenna started up and noted with alarm that he was making as much noise as the gunman. He counted twenty-four stairs between each floor. There was a small landing after every twelfth step where the stairs performed a U-turn on their way up to the next floor. He took the steps three at a time. When he got to the fifth floor the gunman’s footsteps sounded louder, maybe just two floors above.

This guy’s good, McKenna thought, but he’s getting tired now. I’ve got him.

Suddenly the footsteps above him stopped. McKenna heard the sound of metal hitting metal and it echoed down the stairwell. He recognized the sound. The gunman was reloading. He had just dropped his used magazine from his weapon and was inserting a loaded clip of ammunition. McKenna heard the distinctive sound of the bolt snapping closed on a fresh cartridge.

He kept climbing until he estimated that he was one story below the gunman, who, he knew, was waiting for him. The sounds of many footsteps from the floors far below him meant his reinforcements were arriving.

Let me try this one, McKenna thought. He yelled up the stairwell, "Give it up, hombre, so we can both walk out of here."

The gunman’s answer was swift and unexpected. McKenna heard the sound of rapid gunfire, saw the sparks of ricochets striking the steel and concrete of the stairwell, and staggered from the force of one of these rounds hitting his bulletproof vest.

McKenna cried out, more from surprise than from pain.

The gunman yelled down the stairwell, "How do you like that, maricon? Did I get you?"

McKenna resented the gunman’s Spanish insult, which implied that McKenna’s sexual orientation was a little off. He could also hear in the man’s voice that he was tired and breathing heavily. Making his voice sound like he was in pain, McKenna shouted up, Just a scratch, partner! using his best patent-pending John Wayne imitation. Regretfully, he ripped open his white-on-white custom-made shirt, popping all the buttons, and with his left hand felt his chest under his vest. No blood. Much of the force of the bullet had been spent during its course of flight when it had ricocheted off the stairs and walls of the confined stairwell.

Thank you, John and Yoko, he thought. McKenna had received one of the one hundred vests that John Lennon and Yoko Ono had donated to the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association in 1977, in the time before the Police Department gave free vests to its officers.

McKenna realized that he was up against the best he had ever seen. Skip shooting was something one learned only during intensive military training in house-to-house combat.

The way this guy banked his bullets in the stairwell, I’m glad that I’m not playing billiards against him, McKenna said to himself.

For the first time the thought crossed his mind that he might not win this one.

At the sound of the gunshots the footsteps below him had stopped. McKenna breathed a sigh of relief when he heard their noise resume. At the same time he heard the sounds of the gunman’s footsteps as he continued his climb.

McKenna took off his shoes and placed them on the stairs. I should have done this before, he thought. He noticed with some satisfaction that the sound of his footsteps was now indistinguishable from the racket that his fellow officers were making about three floors below him.

McKenna kept himself two floors below the gunman as he continued his now silent pursuit. When he reached the tenth floor he heard the squeal of the stairwell door opening on the twelfth. He could tell by the sound that the gunman’s footsteps made on the concrete of the building hallway that he had finally left the steel stairwell.

McKenna climbed until he reached the access door on twelve. He could hear the gunman banging on one of the apartment doors and yelling, Open up, Paco. It’s Rico.

The stairwell door was half open. McKenna hesitated a second and then slipped quickly and silently into the hall.

The gunman was twenty feet away. His back was toward McKenna. He pounded on the door of the end apartment in the hallway with the butt of his gun.

McKenna raised his pistol and lined up his sights on the middle of the gunman’s back. He savored the moment of victory and said, Surprise, partner! As the gunman started to turn with his gun hand raised, McKenna fired three quick shots. The force slammed the gunman flat against the apartment door. He dropped his gun and his feet slipped from under him as he slid slowly to the floor. He moved slightly as McKenna cautiously approached him. When McKenna was standing over him, the dying man tried to push himself up off the floor. He managed to turn his head and face McKenna.

McKenna looked into the man’s eyes for the second time and saw that he was right. It was a surprise. He died just as the first uniformed officers, led by Detective White, reached the twelfth-floor stairway door.

Police officer! McKenna yelled to them. It’s all over!

It was then that he saw the hole in the apartment door that one of his bullets had made after it had passed through the body of the dead man. And it was then that he heard the moaning coming from the other side of the door. McKenna knew he was wrong. It wasn’t all over.

Detective Second Grade Brian McKenna had just fired his weapon in the line of duty for the second time in his twenty-three-year police career, a career during which he had effected more than eighteen hundred arrests.

McKenna took quick stock of his situation as he was surrounded by a sea of his fellow police officers. He smiled slightly as it dawned on him that he was barefoot and without a glove in left field of the Ebbets Field Houses.

2

July 9 3:45 p.m.

Detective Richie White pounded on the apartment door and rang the bell. No answer.

Images of doom flashed through McKenna’s mind. His doom. Every second the hallway grew noisier and more crowded with uniformed police officers, breathing heavily. They sounded like a porno movie. The twelve-flight journey up was grabbing everybody’s lungs, including McKenna’s. The constant crackle of voices from each cop’s radio made it worse: We need the sergeant. We need Emergency Service. We need an ambulance. Everyone was needed at 277 McKeever Place, twelfth-floor hallway, and everyone was coming. The circus had begun and the spotlight was fixed on McKenna, center ring. The other officers were asking him questions and he couldn’t focus. All he could see was the small hole in the door and all he could concentrate on was the moaning on the other side.

How could this be? McKenna knew that he had hit the gunman with every shot. How could a bullet go through his body, go through a steel door, and hit somebody on the other side of the door? And who was the injured person, moaning with the pain caused by his bullet and unable to answer the door? He imagined the worst. A grandmother on her way to church. A small girl on her way to buy ice cream. The police commissioner sneaking out of his girlfriend’s apartment. He concentrated on that one and started to feel better.

Then things actually got better. White stood over the gunman’s body with his ear to the door. I hear lots of movement inside, he said. Somebody’s running around in there. Good. Next came a radio transmission from a cop outside the building. There’s a male Hispanic throwing guns from the window of the twelfth floor at 277 McKeever Place. We’ve got two automatics and a revolver so far. We need more units outside for crowd control. Better. Whoever was in apartment 12G was with the bad guys.

White stood up and called McKenna over to the door. This guy really stinks, he said, pointing down at the dead gunman.

McKenna smelled it then. The gunman had defecated in his pants as he died. But White also had some good news.

Look at this, Brian. There’s just a trace of sheet metal welded to the door where your bullet went through. It’s painted over, the same color as the door. Knock on it. McKenna tapped the door around the edges. Solid steel. Then he knocked in the center where his bullet had gone through. Just a thin sheet of metal.

All right! McKenna exclaimed. Drug dealers. Everyone in these housing projects knew the setup. Drug dealers cut illegal mail slots into their doors. You want drugs, you knock. Put your money in the mail slot and the drugs come out the same way. Very clean arrangement. No face-to-face deals. No chance of the dealer getting robbed during the transaction. Except the building management doesn’t permit mail slots for that very reason. The mailboxes for each apartment are located in the building lobby. After a while, the other people who live on the drug dealer’s floor start to complain, anonymously of course, about the steady stream of visitors to their neighbor’s apartment. So every once in a while the building maintenance crews pull out the mail slots, weld on a piece of sheet metal to close the opening, and paint the door. But the drug dealers are still there, inside.

Lucky shot, McKenna thought. I managed to send a dealer a Special Delivery through his old mailbox.

The elevator doors opened and the 71st Precinct patrol sergeant, an Emergency Service sergeant, and two Emergency Service police officers came out.

Short and young, the patrol sergeant looked annoyed by the scene that greeted him. His name tag said Rocco Diluvio. That grabbed McKenna’s attention. Nobody but a pompous ass would put his first name on his name tag, McKenna thought. Especially if it was Rocco.

The Emergency Service sergeant was the exact opposite. He was big, gray, with a heavy flak vest, and he looked delighted to be there doing the job he was trained to do. Everyone knew Sergeant Leo Smart. He was a legendary character. This job was going to get done right.

The two Emergency Service cops with him wore the same vests and helmets and were loaded with equipment. One carried a large machine that looked like a combination portable generator and vacuum cleaner. The other dragged what looked like a do-it-yourself swimming-pool kit, boxes of heavy rubber lining and steel braces. Both of them had shotguns slung on their shoulders.

Emergency Service went right to work. They tied a taut rope from the doorknob of apartment 12G to the doorknob of apartment 12H, the adjacent apartment, so that neither door could be opened. Then the two cops began setting up the mysterious apparatus.

Rocco Diluvio watched them for a moment, then turned to the gunman’s body. Who’s the shooter? he asked.

I am, said McKenna.

Then I don’t want to talk to you yet. He turned to White and asked, You his partner?

The honor is mine for today, Sarge.

Did you fire any shots?

Not.

Good. You I can talk to. Tell me what you’ve got inside and why we’re all here.

White very briefly described the chase. When he was finished, Sergeant Diluvio said, Tell me where there might be any evidence.

Spent shells in building hallway. Spent shells and empty magazine on seventh-floor stairwell landing. Oh yeah, McKenna’s shoes down on sixth-floor landing. And over here … White took him over to the twelfth-floor stairwell entrance and pointed out McKenna’s three expended shells.

The young patrol sergeant looked McKenna over. He took in the torn pants, the ripped shirt, and then he focused on McKenna’s left hand. McKenna looked at his hand and saw that it was bleeding from a scrape across his knuckles. He didn’t feel any pain and figured that he got the injury when he was tripped outside.

You want to go to the hospital, Detective McKenna? Rocco Diluvio asked. You look like you could use some kind of treatment.

Maybe later, Sarge. I don’t feel a thing yet.

There were now about fifteen uniformed cops in the hallway. As their patrol sergeant took careful note of them, they started slowly drifting toward the freedom offered by the stairwell door.

Rocco Diluvio stopped the drift with the magic words: Everybody’s on overtime. He sent two cops to the sixth- and seventh-floor stairwell landings to establish a crime scene. Three cops went to the lobby and another one to the tree outside the building where McKenna had taken cover from the gunman’s bullets.

Nobody touches anything, he told them. And nobody up or down the stairs through the crime scene.

Diluvio posted a cop at the stairwell and another at the elevator, with orders to permit no civilians or any more cops on the floor unless they were accompanied by a boss or acting on higher orders. And no press, he said.

He turned to McKenna. Where’s your car?

We left it in the middle of Empire Boulevard, White interjected. Want me to move it?

Not you, the sergeant said. Give me the keys. He tossed them to one of the uniformed cops. You take care of this.

He took the radio off his belt and gave a rapid series of requests to the dispatcher. Seven-one Sergeant to Central, K. I need the Crime Scene Unit, the Hostage Negotiating Team, the Brooklyn Homicide Squad, the Medical Examiner, and a supervisor from the Seven-one Detective Squad to respond to the twelfth-floor hallway of 277 McKeever Place. And the Duty Captain.

The dispatcher confirmed that everybody was already on the way. Then Rocco Diluvio turned to McKenna and asked, Anything else?

With a smile that hid his growing respect for the young sergeant, McKenna pointed to his feet and Diluvio sent a cop down to the sixth-floor landing to get McKenna’s shoes.

He next directed his attention to Sergeant Smart. Can I do anything for you, Leo?

Yeah, kid. This skell’s body’s in my way, and he’s smelling up the hallway. I also need a layout of this apartment, he said, pointing to the doorway of 12G.

Diluvio thought this over for a moment. Then he had two uniformed cops pick up the dead man and carry him down the hall to just beyond the stairwell. Nobody touches that body, he ordered.

A cop went off to the building management office for a diagram of 12G. Diluvio stepped to the doorway of the apartment and picked up the dead man’s weapon, a TEC-9 automatic pistol. It resembled a rectangular box, with a two-inch barrel protruding from one end and a pistol grip and trigger attached to the bottom.

Looks nasty, Rocco Diluvio said. He gave the pistol to White. Your partner’s going to be spending a lot of time talking to the chiefs and the DA, so it looks like these are going to be your collars, right?

Sounds OK to me, as long as my boss agrees.

White took a pad from his pocket, handed it to McKenna, then crouched in the hallway and unloaded the weapon.

One live round in the chamber, a magazine loaded with fourteen rounds of live nine-millimeter ammunition. Weapon defaced, serial number filed off. McKenna wrote as White was talking. White smelled the muzzle and chamber of the weapon. Evidence of recent discharge present, he said as he stood up.

White gave the weapon back to the sergeant, who handed it to a nearby officer.

Welcome to the case, Rogers, Diluvio said. You’re now the official property officer. Keep track of everything recovered and write it all down.

There were still a few happy uniformed cops without assignments left in the hallway. Diluvio took care of that, telling them, Go downstairs to help the units outside with crowd control.

Sergeant Rocco Diluvio, Mister Personality himself, had made everybody less happy but more productive in the shortest time possible.

An Emergency Medical Service ambulance crew arrived on the floor to officially pronounce the gunman dead. The attendant leaned over the body and felt for a heartbeat, then stood up and said, Yup, he’s dead. He looked at his watch. Officially pronounced dead at four-o-six P.M.

McKenna took the attendant’s name and wrote it down on his pad. Diluvio told the ambulance crew to stand by until they had cleared out apartment 12G.

Meanwhile the Emergency Service crew had been busy working on the door. They took the rubber lining and placed it all around the doorframe of apartment 12G. The steel braces held the rubber lining in place. It looked like they were building another rubber door in front of the apartment door. Two more Emergency Service cops came up with shotguns and additional tools. Leo Smart took a crowbar and hammer and used them to widen the bullet hole in the door by ripping away the sheet metal that covered the former mail slot.

Smart bent over and peeked through the opening. There’s a male Hispanic lying right in front of the door. He’s breathing, but it looks like he took the bullet in the chest. There’s another male Hispanic at the far end of the apartment. He appears to be unarmed right now. He’s looking at me and giving me the finger. The Emergency Service cops finished their work at the door.

While McKenna tied his recently returned shoes, he stared at the contraption. Nice job. How does it work?

He got a quick lesson on the Rabbit Tool from one of the Emergency Service cops. Start the generator and a pump fills the rubber bladder that’s forced into the doorframe with air. Eventually, the pressure becomes too much for the door. It starts to bend a little and pulls the hinges and the lock from the doorframe. Door goes down. It’s the only thing short of dynamite that works on these steel-frame doors.

Rocco Diluvio knocked a few times next door on 12F. After a few moments it opened just a crack. All McKenna could see of the occupant was a black hand holding the edge of the door slightly open.

Diluvio said, Sorry to bother you, but we’re going to blast your neighbors out in a couple of minutes. You got a phone?

Uh-huh.

We’d like to use your apartment as a temporary headquarters. I hope you don’t mind. As a matter of fact, you might want to go to the store or something, because there might be some more shooting around here.

Enough said. The circus continued. McKenna was reminded of the clown car when eight children and five adults left the apartment and headed for the elevator. Then came a large black woman pushing an old man in a wheelchair. It’s all yours, Officer, she said, and joined the rest of the displaced occupants.

The elevator door opened. Out stepped Deputy Inspector Jerimiah O’Shaughnessy, the recently promoted commanding officer of the 71st Precinct. Not the duty captain, as everyone expected, but something worse.

O‘Shaughnessy was known far and wide as Deputy Dog Dick. Rumor had it that he had gotten that name while working as a desk officer in a Harlem precinct. One day he had been busy berating a prisoner who had a sense of humor, something O’Shaughnessy lacked. What he did have was bright red hair and a tendency to blush violently whenever he was angry, embarrassed, or under pressure. The more O‘Shaughnessy yelled at the prisoner, the redder he’d gotten, and the more the prisoner had convulsed with laughter. Finally, while the entire four-to-twelve platoon of that Harlem precinct stood in front of the Desk waiting to be inspected before they went on patrol, the prisoner had said to O’Shaughnessy, You know, Lieutenant, you’re red in the head like a dick on a dog.

That was it. From then on he had been Lieutenant Dog Dick, until it was Captain Dog Dick; now it was Deputy Dog Dick, which the cops in the Seven-one Precinct agreed had a nice ring to it. They were all looking forward to the day when he would get promoted to full inspector and finally be transferred. Then he would be the Dog Dick Inspector. And he had the perfect personality to eventually become the Chief Dog Dick. O’Shaughnessy’s arrival was good news for no one. He was the perfect act to follow Sergeant Rocco Diluvio.

Diluvio saluted O’Shaughnessy and brought him into the new temporary headquarters to fill him in. The assembled officers felt it was a good idea to wait in the hall. After five minutes Diluvio came to the door and told McKenna that the inspector wanted to see him. McKenna found O‘Shaughnessy standing in the living room of the small apartment. He was on the phone, and by his deferential manner, McKenna guessed that he was talking to the borough commander, who probably wanted to know what the hell was going on. McKenna saluted and O’Shaughnessy asked, How long have you been in Brooklyn this time, McKenna?

Two weeks, Inspector.

Why you here?

A little incident in Manhattan with a diplomat. I haven’t gone to Department Trial yet. McKenna mentioned the Department Trial for a reason. Under the rules of the game, O’Shaughnessy couldn’t ask McKenna specifics about the incident until the trial was over.

So we’re stuck again. Two weeks and you’ve already managed to get bullets spread all over the borough, shoot somebody in the back, and maybe get some innocent people shot. Not to mention you caused a radio-car accident when one of my cars was rushing here to help you out. You’re lucky no one was hurt. But I’m still short a car now, thanks to you. Tell me, McKenna, did this whole mess have anything to do with your assignment today?

No, sir. Just a crime in progress that we observed on our way back to the station house.

And what was that crime in progress, McKenna?

Illegal Possession of a Loaded Firearm, sir.

There it was, a little red, starting at the neck. Care to tell me more, McKenna?

I’d rather wait until I speak to my delegate, Inspector. You understand. Just in case there are any criminal charges against me later. I would hate to have you testifying against me for something I might tell you now.

The red had reached his cheeks and was still climbing. I’m talking man to man, McKenna. Just so I have something to tell the chief when he asks me. I’ve got a large, disorderly crowd outside and there’s going to be a lot of press. You’ve got to give me more.

No offense, Inspector. But I think I’d rather talk to my delegate first. Then he can talk to the union lawyer, and our lawyer can whisper to the chief and tell him what he needs to know.

O’Shaughnessy was red right to the top of his head, Ready for Blastoff.

Just then Diluvio came in and said, Inspector, they’ve got a lot of drugs in the apartment and they’re flushing them down the toilet. The Emergency Service sergeant wants permission to blow the door and go in before they flush it all.

Countdown delayed. O’Shaughnessy snarled, I’ll talk to you later about this, Detective McKenna. All I can say is that you’d better have your story straight.

The men went back into the hall to see what was going on and to await the inspector’s decision.

Smart was still looking through the hole in the door. Out of the corner of his eye he saw O’Shaughnessy, stood up, and saluted. They just started flushing drugs down the toilet, Inspector.

How do you know, Sergeant?

A minute ago I saw one of the guys inside bring about ten one-kilo bags of dope into the bathroom. Then I heard the toilet flush. What do you think, Inspector?

The toilet in Apartment 12G was flushed again and the sound was clearly heard by everyone standing in the hallway.

Don’t worry about it too much, Inspector, Smart said. I called our dispatcher and ordered a couple of Emergency men who were on their way up to cut the water off into the building. That’ll stop our pal inside from flushing his dope, but it’s gonna take a few minutes.

O‘Shaughnessy didn’t look happy. He was thinking the situation over when the toilet flushed again. Smart decided that it was time to have some fun with O’Shaughnessy. Fun for Smart consisted of forcing the big Bosses to make a decision. They hated that.

It flushes every couple of minutes, as soon as the tank fills up, said the old sergeant. We’re losing a lot of evidence. I’ve got another two men coming up with a bulletproof shield. We’re ready to blow the door and go in now. It only takes about a minute to get this generator going. As soon as you give the word, Inspector.

Without answering, O’Shaughnessy went back into the temporary headquarters apartment and turned on the water faucet in the kitchen.

Smart winked at McKenna and McKenna replied with a smile.

After two minutes and a few more flushes the water stopped. O’Shaughnessy came back out and told Smart that the water was off.

I already knew that, Inspector, replied the sergeant. The guy inside just asked me what happened to the water.

The people inside may still be armed and just waiting for us, O’Shaughnessy said. There might be ten people in there. We’ll wait for the Hostage Negotiating Team to try and talk them out.

Smart took these instructions in stride. He didn’t look surprised. O’Shaughnessy had just given him the Official Department Line.

Two more Emergency Service cops came up carrying a large Plexiglas bulletproof shield. With them was the cop who had been sent to the building management office for the apartment plans, which he gave to Smart. Four rooms: two bedrooms, a living room, and a kitchen. With O’Shaughnessy listening, Smart and Rocco Diluvio made their own plan to deal with the people inside