The knuck cop laughed. “Strike a nerve, Sonny?”
“Fuck you!”
The weightlifter cop backhanded him; Danny spat in his face. Green yelled, “No!”
The knuck man put his arms around weightlifter and held him back; Green chained another cigarette, butt to tip. Danny gasped, “Tell me what this is all about.”
Green waved the strongarms to the back of the cubicle, dragged on his smoke and stubbed it out. “Where were you night before last between 2:00 and 7:00 A.M.?”
“I was at home in bed. Asleep.”
“Alone, Deputy?”
“Yes.”
“Deputy, during that time Sergeant Gene Niles was shot and killed, then buried in the Hollywood Hills. Did you do it?”
“No!”
“Tell us who did.”
“Jack! Mickey! Niles was fucking rogue!”
The knuck cop stepped forward; the weightlifter cop grabbed him, mumbling, “Spit on my Hathaway shirt you queer-loving hump. Gene Niles was my pal, my good buddy from the army, you queer lover.”
Danny dug his feet in and pushed his chair against the wall. “Gene Niles was an incompetent bagman son of a bitch.”
Weightlifter charged, straight for Danny’s throat. The cubicle door opened and Mal Considine rushed in; Thad Green shouted commands impossible to hear. Danny brought his knees up, toppling the chair; the monster cop’s hands closed on air. Mal crashed into him, winging rabbit punches; the knuck cop pulled him off and wrestled him out to the corridor. Shouts of “Danny!” echoed; Green stationed himself between the chair and the monster, going, “No, Harry, no,” like he was reprimanding an unruly monster dog. Danny ate linoleum and cigarette butts, heard, “Get Considine to a holding tank”, was lifted, chair and all, to an upright position. The knuck man went behind him and unlocked his cuffs; Thad Green reached for his .45 on the table.
Danny stood up, swaying; Green handed him his gun. “I don’t know if you did it or not, but there’s one way to find out. Report back here to City Hall, room 1003, tomorrow at noon. You’ll be given a polygraph test and sodium pentothal, and you’ll be asked extensive questions about these homicides you’re working and your relationships with Felix Gordean and Gene Niles. Good night, Deputy.”
Danny weaved to the elevator, rode to the ground floor and walked outside, his legs slowly coming back. He cut across the lawn toward the Temple Street cabstand, stopping for a soft voice.
“Lad.”
Danny froze; Dudley Smith stepped out of a shadow. He said, “It’s a grand night, is it not?”
Small talk with a murderer. Danny said, “You killed José Diaz. You and Breuning killed Charles Hartshorn. And I’m going to prove it.”
Dudley Smith smiled. “I never doubted your intelligence, lad. Your courage, yes. Your intelligence, never. And I’ll admit I underestimated your persistence. I’m only human, you know.”
“Oh, no you’re not.”
“I’m skin and bone, lad. Eros and dust like all us frail mortals. Like you, lad. Crawling in sewers for answers you’d be better off without.”
“You’re finished.”
“No, lad. You are. I’ve been talking to my old friend Felix Gordean, and he painted me a vivid picture of your emergence. Lad, next to myself Felix has the finest eye for weakness I’ve ever encountered. He knows, and when you take that lie detector test tomorrow, the whole world will know.”
Danny said, “No.”
Dudley Smith said, “Yes,” kissed him full on the lips and walked away whistling a love song.
o o o
Machines that know.
Drugs that don’t let you lie.
Danny took a cab home. He unlocked the door and went straight for his files: facts you could put together for the truth, Dudley and Breuning and HIM nailed by 11:59, a last-minute reprieve like in the movies. He hit the hall light, opened the closet door. No file boxes, the rugs that covered them neatly folded on the floor.
Danny tore up the hall carpet and looked under it, dumped the bedroom cabinet and emptied the drawers, stripped the bed and yanked the medicine chest off the bathroom wall. He upended the living room furniture, looked under the cushions and tossed the kitchen drawers until the floor was all cutlery and broken dishes. He saw a half-full bottle by the radio, opened it, found his throat muscles too constricted and hurled it, knocking down the venetian blinds. He walked to the window, looked out and saw Dudley Smith haloed by a streetlight.