Cemetery Dance

Chapter 2

Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta stood in the crowded hallway outside the door to the two — bedroom apartment. He moved his shoulders inside the brown suit, trying to unstick his damp arms from his polyester shirt. He was very angry, and angry wasn't good. It would affect everything he did, detract from his powers of observation.

He took a long breath and released it, trying to let the anger flow out with the air.

The apartment door opened and a thin, stooped man with a tuft of hair on his pate emerged, lugging a bundle of equipment behind and pushing ahead an aluminum case strapped to a luggage roller. "We're done, Lieutenant." The man took a clipboard from another officer and logged out, followed by his assistant.

D'Agosta glanced at his watch. Three A.M. The scene — of — crime team had taken a long time. They were being extra careful. They knew he and Smithback went back a long ways. It irritated him the way they went head — ducking past him, eyeing him sideways, wondering how he was taking it. Wondering if he'd recuse himself from the case. A lot of homicide detectives would — if only because it raised issues at the trial. It didn't look good when the defense put you on the witness stand. "The deceased was a friend of yours? Well now, isn't that a ratherinteresting coincidence?" It was a complication a trial didn't need, and the DA hated when it happened.

But D'Agosta had no intention of letting this one go. Never. Besides, it was an open — and — shut case. The perp was as good as convicted, they had him cold. All that was left was to find the bastard.

The last of the SOC team came out of the apartment and logged out, leaving D'Agosta alone with his thoughts. He stood for a minute in the empty hallway, trying to settle his frayed nerves. Then he snapped on a pair of latex gloves, pulled the hairnet close around his balding pate, and moved toward the open door. He felt faintly sick. The body had been removed, of course, but nothing else had been touched. He could see, where the entryway took a dogleg, just a sliver of the room beyond and a lake of blood on the floor; bloody footprints; a handprint streaked across a cream — colored wall.

He stepped carefully over the blood, pausing before the living room. Leather sofa, pair of chairs, overturned coffee table, more clots of blood on the Persian rug. He slowly walked into the center of the room, rolling his crepe — soled feet down, one after the other, stopped, turned, trying to reconstruct the scene in his mind.

D'Agosta had asked the team to take extensive samples of the bloodstains; there were complex overlapping splatter patterns that he wished to untangle, footsteps tracked through the blood, hand — prints layered on handprints. Smithback had fought like hell; there was no way the perp escaped without leaving DNA at this scene.

The crime, on the surface, was simple. It was a disorganized, messy killing. The perp had let himself in with a master key. Smithback was in the living room. The killer got in a good blow with his knife, right away putting Smithback at a severe disadvantage, and then they fought. The fight carried them into the kitchen — Smith — back had tried to arm himself: the knife drawer was halfway open, bloody handprints on the knob and counter. Didn't get a knife, though; too damn bad. Got stabbed again from behind while at it. They fought a second time. He had been cut pretty bad by then, blood all over the floor, skid marks of bare feet. But D'Agosta was pretty sure the perp was also bleeding by this time. Bleeding, shedding hair and fibers, blowing and snorting with the effort, perhaps scattering saliva and phlegm. It was all there, and he had confidence that the SOC team had found it. They'd even cut out and taken away some floorboards, including several with knife marks; they'd cut pieces of drywall, lifted prints from every surface, collected every fiber they could find, every lint ball and piece of grit.

D'Agosta's eyes continued to roam, his mind continuing an interior film of the crime. Eventually, Smithback lost so much blood that he weakened sufficiently for the killer to deliver the coup de grâce: according to the M.E., a knife through the heart that went half an inch into the floor. The perp had twisted it violently to get it out, splintering the wood. At the thought, D'Agosta felt himself flushing with a fresh mixture of anger and grief. That board had been cut out, too.

Not that all this attention to detail would make much difference — they already knew who the perp was. Still, it was always good to pile on the evidence. You never knew what kind of jury you might draw in this crazy town.

Then there was the bizarre shit the killer left behind. A mashed — up bundle of feathers, tied with green twine. A piece of a garment covered with gaudy sequins. A tiny parchment bag of dust with a weird design on the outside. The killer had floated them in the lake of blood, like offerings. The SOC boys had taken them all away, of course, but they were still fixed in his mind.

Still, there was the one thing the SOC boys couldn't take away: the hurriedly drawn image on the wall, two snakes curled around some strange, spiky, plant — like thing, with stars and arrows and complex lines and a word that looked like dambalah. It had clearly been drawn with Smithback's blood. D'Agosta walked into the main bedroom, taking in the bed, bureau, mirror, window looking southeast onto West End Avenue, rug, walls, ceiling. There was a second bathroom at the far end of the bedroom and the door was shut. Funny, last time he was in here the door was open.

He heard a sound from the bathroom. The water turned on and off. Somebody from the forensic team was still in the apartment. D'Agosta strode over, grasped the door handle, found it locked.

"Hey, you in there! What the hell you think you're doing?"

"Just a moment," came the muffled voice.

D'Agosta's surprise turned to outrage. The idiot was using the bathroom. In a sealed crime scene. Un — frigging — believable.

"Open the door, pal. Now."

The door popped open — and there stood Special Agent A.X.L. Pendergast, rack of test tubes in one hand, tweezers in the other, a jeweler's loupe on a headband.

"Vincent," came the familiar buttery voice. "I'm so sorry we have to meet again under such unhappy circumstances."

D'Agosta stared. "Pendergast — I had no idea you were back in town."

Pendergast deftly pocketed the tweezers, slid the rack of tubes into a Gladstone doctor's bag, followed by the loupe. "The killer wasn't in here, or the bedroom. A rather obvious deduction, but I wanted to make sure."

"Is this now an FBI matter?" D'Agosta asked, following Pendergast as the agent moved through the bedroom into the living room.

"Not exactly."

"So you're freelancing again?"

"You might say that. I would appreciate it if we kept my involvement to yourself for the moment." He turned. "Your take, Vincent?"

D'Agosta went through his reconstruction of the crime while Pendergast nodded in approval. "Not that it makes much difference," D'Agosta summed up. "We already know who the dirtbag is. We just have to find him."

Pendergast gave a quizzical rise to his eyebrows.

"He lives in the building. We got two eyewitnesses who saw the killer enter, and two who saw him leave, all covered with blood, clutching the knife. He attacked Nora Kelly on the way out of the apartment — tried to attack, I should say, but the fight had attracted neighbors and he ran away. They got a good look at him, the neighbors I mean. Nora's in the hospital now — minor concussion, but should be all right. Considering."

Another faint incline of the head.

"He's a creep named Fearing. Colin Fearing. Out — of — work British actor. Apartment two fourteen. He'd hassled Nora once or twice in the lobby. Looks to me like a rape gone bad. He probably hoped he'd find Nora home alone, got Smithback instead. Chances are he lifted the key from the super's key locker. I've got a man checking on that."

This time there was no confirming nod. Just the usual inscrutable look in those deep, silvery eyes.

"Anyway, it's an open — and — shut case," D'Agosta said, starting to feel defensive for some unknown reason. "Wasn't just Nora's ID. We got him on the building's security tapes, too, an Oscar performance. Coming in and going out. On the way out we got a full — frontal shot, knife in hand, covered with blood, dragging his sorry ass through the lobby, threatening the doorman before splitting. Gonna look beautiful in front of a jury. This is one bastard who is goingdown. "

"Open and shut, you say?"

D'Agosta felt another twinge at the doubtful note in Pendergast's voice. "Yeah," he said firmly. "Open and shut." He checked his watch. "They're holding the doorman downstairs, waiting for me. He's going to be a star witness, a reliable, solid family man — knew the perp for years. Want to ask him any questions before we send him home?"

"Delighted to. But before we go downstairs…" The agent's voice trailed off. A pair of spidery white fingers reached into the breast pocket of his black suit and withdrew a folded document. With a flourish of his wrist, he proffered it to D'Agosta.

"What's this?" D'Agosta took it and unfolded it, taking in the red notary stamp, the Great Seal of New York, the elegant engraving, the signatures.

"It is Colin Fearing's death certificate. Signed and dated ten days ago."