Judging Time

40

April and Mike drove uptown to check in with the detective squads in the 33rd and the 30th precincts. It had started to snow, and both of them were deep in their own thoughts. Mike had moved into action mode. April was still distracted by his kiss.

The 33rd Precinct was pretty quiet for a Friday night. But the 30th had a number of special operations . going on and was a zoo. In spite of the weather, the number of arrests made that night was already so high there was no more room in the holding cells for prisoners. Opposite the front desk in the lobby area where roll was called, the folding screen had been pulled for privacy. Barely out of sight, seven bedraggled, angry-looking men were cuffed to chairs, to the wall, even the radiator pipe. Several were carrying on arguments with officers who were no longer in the room with them.

Upstairs in the squad room, only one detective was in. A tired-looking female African-American called Yolanda Brick was typing up a report. She told Mike and April she'd just gotten a call that a man fitting Liberty's general description had been spotted on 108th Street, accompanied by a firefighter.

"Anybody follow it up?" Mike asked.

The detective gave him a cold stare. "We had a couple dozen calls on this today. After the first twenty amounted to nothing, it got kind of busy around here."

"Well, thanks," April told her. This was a high priority. She was sure the commissioner would be pleased.

As Mike and April came down the stairs from the squad room, five uniforms were being pulled together for another operation. In the makeshift holding pen, a prisoner threatened to defecate in his pants if he wasn't immediately taken to the bathroom.

Snow was falling even more heavily as they came out of the building. "Great," April muttered. Now they wouldn't be able to see Liberty if he danced naked in front of the car. "I just hope I don't have to chase anybody. I've got my best boots on, and I'm really stuffed." She wanted him to kiss her again, but he didn't.

He switched on the wipers and pulled out into 151st Street. "I'd bet your chances for that are about nil."

For what? She'd forgotten what she said.

He drove west, plowing through the snow. At Broadway he turned downtown, heading to the location where the unidentified caller to the 30th claimed to have seen a man who looked like Liberty. Accompanied by a firefighter. Now that was a description. He drove slowly down the treacherous street. April scanned the sidewalks. People were heading home. It looked as if the Friday-night dealing game had been called for weather.

Mike switched on the police scanner, where several excited voices were cutting in over each other, calling in a shooting—man with a gun. Man with a knife. Shooting wasn't confirmed. It was confirmed. The victim was dead. He was alive, but seriously injured. Shooting was in the lobby of a three hundred building, in the basement. Request for backup at B-way and 138th Street.

"That's our location," Mike said excitedly.

He didn't have a gumball for the roof, but the Camaro was rigged with a siren. When he heard the address of the shooting, Mike hit the hammer. The Camaro's siren shot out a warning as he accelerated into traffic. The traffic around them had been moving cautiously through the snow. The two cars ahead parted for them at the first red light. The Camaro's tires spun for a moment at an incline in the middle of the cross street. April turned away from the headlights of the cars coming at her from the side street. The first car would slam into them at the passenger seat where she was sitting. And her mother always said she'd die before giving birth.

"Hang on," Mike ordered.

As if she had a choice. April braced her hands against the dashboard. The tires caught, the car shot forward, skidding sideways on the other side. Mike slammed the Camaro into low and regained control, then accelerated exactly the same way into the next changing light.

Take it easy, pal. 1 want to make it through the weekend, April didn't say. She knew enough not to tell Mike how to drive, particularly in bad weather. She also knew enough not to tell him this wasn't their party. He'd only say they were on duty. On duty, everything was their party. And most cops felt the same way, loved getting in on any operation—as long as they didn't have to make the actual arrest, fill out the damn arrest forms, follow the prisoner downtown. Lose days in the process.

Excited voices on the radio continued. Sirens sounded to the south of them, to the east. Even behind them in the north. Everybody was hot to join. The voice on the radio gave only one item of identification on the shooter. His head was covered with some kind of scarf. April snorted. It was snowing. Everybody's head was covered.

At 145th Street, Mike slowed the car to a crawl. He let the hammer have two final spurts of whine, then shut it off.

"What do you say, east, west?"

"Is it my call?" April asked, scanning the street.

"Yes. Yours."

"You want me to flip a coin?"

"No, I want you to make a call."

April shrugged. "Okay, he'd go west. Hang out under a stoop for a while. Too much activity east of B-way."

"Fine. Remember, you called it."

"Oh, give me a break."

"You called it." Mike turned west, headed down a quiet street of brownstones. A few people were hurrying along. Not many. The snow was thicker now, was beginning to stick. They needed a spotlight to see through the storm.

Mike kept going, through the next light. Two blocks from Broadway at 141st Street everything was nice and quiet. No one out on the street here—except one guy halfway down the block, fiddling with the top of a garbage can. He had a scarf on his head.

"Let's check him out," Mike said. He accelerated the car to where the man was standing, then stopped a few feet in front of the garbage

Startled, the man whipped around to look at them. Just as quickly, he gave them his back, let go of the garbage can top, and walked quickly down the street in the opposite direction. April was out of the car before Mike cut the engine.

"Oh, come on, April, no."

In her haste, April planted the heel of one of her new boots in an ice slick in the gutter. She slid into a freezing puddle between two managed to grab the back of one of them before falling to her knees in the wet. She righted herself, splashed out onto the sidewalk, and charged down the street. The guy limped away through the snow, didn't look back at the car with one door gaping open and two people running after him.

"Hey, you. Stop. You dropped something." April ran, slipping with every other step. Mike caught up and passed her.

"Pare alli," he shouted. "Policia."

The guy stopped suddenly at the word "Policia" and turned around. He put his hands up."No tire. No tire."

April caught up, unholstered her gun. She didn't like the look of this guy. He was whining at Mike not to shoot him, but one hand dropped almost immediately. Bad sign. A big mocking grin on his face revealed an impressive ridge of gold where he should have had top teeth. He was not really frightened.

"?Ouien es la chica?" he said, dipping his head at April.

Good, she got that. Who's the girl? April raised her gun, covering Mike.

"Policia," she snapped back. It worked for Mike. But the guy didn't seem worried enough about her gun.

"Hey, hey, hey." Mike growled at the hand slipping into the right-hand jacket pocket. "Arriba los manos." Mike jerked his head at April.

April got that, too. Raise your hands. He wanted her to cover him as he patted the guy down.

"Ayiie, por que?"

"Porque digo lo." Mike wasn't playing around. He jockeyed the guy against a car, arranged his hands over his head, kicked his legs apart. Very efficient.

April saw a smear on the man's hand. Blood was leaking from a cut on his hand, or maybe his wrist. "Blood," she barked. "He's injured."

The man wiped his hands in a puddle on the windshield.

"Hey, hey, hey. Don't you move. I tell you not to move, you don't move."

"lOue hice?" the man whined. He whirled around.

"Get back there." Mike pushed him back against the car.

"No hice nada."

"Then why's your hand bleeding?"

"No hablo ingles."

"The fuck you don't, buddy."

"No hablo ingles," he insisted.

Mike patted down skinny legs. The man's hand held above his head caused the blood to drip down his right

sleeve. "Ayiie," he cried. "Estoy enfermo. No hice nada. No hablo ingles."

"Did you hear that, Sergeant? This man is sick, he didn't do anything, and he doesn't speak English."

"No hablo ingles."

"We heard you the first time, around we go. Real slow here, keep those hands up. No fast moves." Mike turned the guy around and unzipped his jacket. After a quick forage, he pulled out a mean-looking switchblade. "Well, look at what we have here. A guy doesn't speak English. My partner here loves to shoot people who don't speak English, don't you, Sergeant?"

"Yes sir, my favorite. You want me to put him out of his misery?"

"Aw, come on, I'm hurt here. Don make a big thing. I have cut, gotta go to doctor."

"Oh, I see we do speka de ingles. Didn't anybody tell you you could get hurt playing with knives." Snow whipped Mike's face as he patted the guy some more. "Oh, look at this, another one." Mike sounded peeved as he pulled out another knife, this one sheathed in well-used leather. He gave both knives to April, yanked the man's arms behind his back. "I'm getting cold. How about you, Sergeant?"

Tears stung in April's eyes. "My feet are killing me," she said. "Let's take him in and warm up."

"Oh, no, man, hey. I ain't done nothin'."

"Looks like you were into something. We got a report someone looks just like you shot somebody. We'll take a little visit to the station, warm up a little. See what's up with you." Mike cuffed him with a set of handcuffs he'd stuffed in his pocket before leaving the car. April holstered her gun. One on each side, they marched him back to the car. "What a night," she muttered, shaking out her boots.

"What's your name, hombre?"

The hombre whimpered. "Oh man, no gun. I got no gun. You see a gun, huh? Come on. Some guy with a gun hit me. Looka this. Guy hit me. It was that football guy mato su mujer. He shoot a guy."

"We'll come back for him." April pushed the guy's snow-covered head down, guiding him into the backseat. "Move over." Damn, there was no guard between the front and backseat. She had to sit next to him. "Gun's probably in the garbage can," she told Mike.

"We'll take him in, send someone out to take a look." Mike slammed the car door. The car was warm. He'd left it running.

The hombre whined. "I didn't have to tell you nothing. I was nice, tole you who made the hit."

"Okay, if the football guy made the hit, then you have nothing to worry about, right?"

"I don't need no trouble."

"Tell it to the detectives."

"Oh, man, I'm bleeding," he complained.

"You bleed on my car, you're a dead man," Mike snapped. He called into the 30th to say they were coming in, then hit the hammer and the accelerator at the same time. The car's tires spun, then lurched forward. Six minutes later they unloaded their cargo at the 30th.

"Oh, yeah, Sanchez. You're the one that called." The name plate on the desk officer's chest read LIEUTENANT TIMOTHY BRAMWELL.

"We need someone who speaks Spanish for this honey," Mike told him.

Bramwell took a look at him. "Oh, it's Julio Don't-Speak-Ingles. Julio, don't you know it's not healthy for you to come back here?"

"Good, you know him, we're out of here." Mike turned to April, who was swabbing blood off her sleeve with some tissues from her bag.

"He bled all over the car, too," she muttered. "Hope he's not HIV."

"I was just visiting a friend," Julio whined. "I got out of my car. This football guy shot someone. I just happened to see it, that's all. Then he run over and smash me with the gun. Jeeeeze."

"What the hell you talkin' about?" The desk sergeant rolled blue eyes, beckoned to a uniform to come and take the guy.

"Better send someone out to look for the gun." April gave the location of the garbage cans.

"Got anything on the shooting?" Mike asked.

"Yeah, the victim's still alive. We don't have an ID on him yet. Any chance this guy is on the level and Liberty was involved?"

"We'll go check it out."

"Hey," Bramwell barked. "Sanchez, you can't just come in here, dump your garbage, and walk out without making a report. You picked him up. You make a report. Forms are right here."

"Oh, yeah, and here's the arsenal he was carrying." April deposited the knives on the desk.

Bramwell looked them over, asking. Then the phone rang, and they lost his attention. It was forty-five minutes before April and Mike were on the road again. By then April's boots had dried and stiffened with the salt the city used all over the streets, the snow had stopped, and any chance they might have had of catching Liberty anywhere near the scene of the shooting was long gone.