Rosary girls

12

If J. Alfred Prufrock measured his life in coffee spoons, Simon Edward Close measured his in deadlines. He had less than five hours to make the deadline for the next day's print edition of The Report. And as of the opening credits of the evening local news, he had nothing to report.

When he moved among the reporters from the so-called legitimate press he was an exile. They regarded him the way you might a Mongoloid child, with looks of spurious compassion and ersatz sympathy, but also with an expression that said: We can't kick you out of the party, but please don't touch the Hummels.

The half a dozen reporters lingering near the cordoned-off crime scene on Eighth Street barely gave him a glance as he arrived in his ten- year-old Honda Accord. Simon would have liked to be a little more discreet in his arrivals, but his muffler-which was attached to the manifold pipe by a recently performed Pepsi-canectomy-insisted on announcing him first. He could almost hear the smirks from half a block away.

The block was cordoned off with yellow crime scene tape. Simon turned the car around, drove down to Jefferson, left to Ninth. Ghost town.

Simon got out, checked the batteries in his recorder. He smoothed his tie, the creases in his trousers. He had often thought that, if he didn't spend all his money on clothes, he might be able to upgrade his car or his flat. But he always rationalized that he spent most of his time on the street so, if no one saw his car or apartment, they would think him in the chips.

After all, in this business of show, image was everything, yes?

He found the access path he needed, cut through. When he saw the uniformed officer standing, behind the crime scene house-but not a solitary reporter, not yet, anyway-he made his way back to his car, and tried a trick he had learned from a wizened old paparazzo he knew from years ago.

Ten minutes later, he approached the officer behind the house. The officer, a huge black linebacker with enormous hands, held up one of those hands stopping him.

"How ya doing?" Simon asked.

"This is a crime scene, sir."

Simon nodded. He held up his press ID. "Simon Close with The Report"

No reaction. He could have just as well said, Captain Nemo with the Nautilus.

"You'll have to speak to the detective in charge of the case," the cop said.

"Of course," Simon said. "Who would that be?"

"That would be Detective Byrne."

Simon made a note, as if this information was new to him. "What is her first name?"

The uniform screwed up his face. "Who?"

"Detective Byrne."

"Her first name is Kevin."

Simon tried to look appropriately confused. Two years of high school drama, including the part of Algernon in The Importance of Being Earnest, helped somewhat. "Oh, I'm sorry," he said. "I heard a female detective was working on this case."

"That would be Detective Jessica Balzano," the officer said, with punctuation and a narrowing of brow that told Simon that this conversation was over.

"Thanks so much," Simon said, heading back down the alley. He turned, snapped a quick photograph of the cop. The cop got immediately on his radio, which meant that within a minute or two the area behind the row houses would be officially sealed.

By the time Simon got back to Ninth Street, there were already two reporters lingering behind the yellow tape across the access passageway-yellow tape Simon himself put there a few minutes earlier.

When he came strolling out, he could see the look on their faces. Simon ducked under the tape, tore it from the wall, handed it to Benny Lozado, a staffer from the Inquirer.

The yellow tape read: DEL-CO ASPHALT.

"Fuck you, Close," Lozado said.

"Dinner first, love."

Back in his car, Simon rummaged his memory.

Jessica Balzano.

Where did he know that name from?

He picked up a copy of last week's Report, thumbed through it. When he got to the meager sports page, he saw it. A small quarter-column ad for prizefights at the Blue Horizon. An all-female fight card.

At the bottom:

Jessica Balzano v. Mariella Munoz.