There was yellow crime scene tape strung across the mouth of the alley. Lewellyn lifted it high so Quinn could stoop and move beneath it, like a corner man helping a boxer into the ring.
A late-model red Buick was parked in the alley. Beyond it, Quinn saw three kids peering down the alley from the block at the opposite end. There was no crime scene tape, but there was at least one uniform posted there, keeping anyone from cutting through. He came into view and talked to the kids, and they all looked down the alley toward Quinn and hurriedly moved along.
As Quinn got closer to the car he saw a figure hunched over the steering wheel. “CSU been here?”
“Nobody,” Lewellyn said. “We were keeping it fresh for you.”
Quinn set his coffee cup on the ground out of the way, then got some crime scene gloves from a pocket and worked them onto his hands. He moved in closer to the Buick. All of the car’s windows were up. The doors appeared to be unlocked.
“The engine and air conditioner were off,” Lewellyn said.
“Ignition key in the off position?”
“Yes, sir. It wasn’t all that hot last night. The victim might have sat a while with the windows up and still not gotten warm enough to lower them or turn the engine and AC back on.”
“Or he might have just arrived and been about to get out of the car,” Quinn said.
Lewellyn nodded.
“I like it your way, though,” Quinn said, making friends. “He didn’t park here in an alley for nothing.”
Lewellyn nodded again, same way, same expression, not giving away much or taking much. Quinn liked that about him.
Quinn leaned closer and peered into the lightly tinted front-side window, across the wide seat, at the dead man behind the steering wheel. He saw no sign of a bullet hole. The heavyset man with the wavy gray hair might have been taking a nap.
Not touching the car, Quinn moved around to the driver’s side. Through the window he could see the dark bullet hole in Galin’s temple.
Making as little contact with the handle as possible, he opened the door.
The wound looked nastier up close and without tinted glass filtering out the details.
“He wasn’t wearing his seat belt,” Lewellyn said. He’d moved in so he was standing just behind Quinn.
Quinn saw that that was true.
There was no sign of a gun, but they might still be looking at suicide. Then Quinn noticed the butt of what looked like a nine-millimeter handgun protruding from a belt holster beneath the victim’s suit coat. The position of the holster, the way the gun butt was turned, indicated Galin was right handed.
Left temple wound. Small-caliber bullet. Not likely a suicide, even if the gun that fired the bullet was around, under the seat or something. And why would somebody serious about suicide favor a small-caliber weapon when he had a large-caliber one in his holster? If you really do go through with it and shoot yourself, you want to make sure.
Quinn noticed the right-hand jacket pocket in Galin’s gray suit coat was turned inside out.
“No sign of a note,” Lewellyn said.
“Sometimes they put them in the mail beforehand,” Quinn said.
Lewellyn sipped his coffee, holding the cup with both hands as if it were a cold morning instead of seventy degrees.
“You know him personally?” Quinn asked.
Lewellyn shook his head no. “He worked out of Manhattan. You?”
“Didn’t exactly know him. I recall seeing him around. He was Narcotics. Worked undercover sometimes.”
“Think that might have anything to do with him being shot?”
“It usually does,” Quinn said. “But probably not this time.”
“Guy walks some mean streets for years, then doesn’t bother wearing his seat belt and something like this happens to him.”
“Goes to show you,” Quinn said, “but I’m not sure what.”
Lewellyn silently sipped some more coffee, not knowing what, either.
Quinn wished he could help him, but couldn’t.
10
Quinn wished he could take his eyes off Pearl.
He was behind his big cherrywood desk in his combination office and den. Pearl was slouched in the small armchair on the left, angled toward the desk. She was wearing a white blouse, black slacks, a gray blazer, and comfortable-looking black shoes with thick, slightly built-up heels. Not a sexy outfit, but she turned it into one. Her black hair was slightly mussed this morning, her full lips glossed a red that wasn’t brilliant but looked so on her. Her dark eyes with the long dark lashes…
“Quinn, you concentrating?”
Fedderman’s voice. Feds was seated in the large brown leather chair where Quinn often sat when he was alone and wanted to read.
“Concentrating,” Quinn said.
Fedderman looked at him and shook his head slightly. He had antennae, did Feds.
“Something I’m missing?” Pearl asked.
“Not a chance,” Fedderman said.
Pearl didn’t answer. Gave him a look. Quinn could feel the old chemistry returning to the team of detectives. There was tension here, almost all the time, but it tended to lead to results.
“What we have is a dead ex-cop,” Quinn said.
“There’s no such thing as an ex-cop,” Fedderman said.
“Me,” Pearl said. “From time to time.”
“We still have a dead ex-cop,” Quinn said. “For him, time’s over.” He looked at Fedderman. “You know Galin when he was on the job?”
“Knew of him,” Fedderman said. He was wearing a gray suit like Galin’s, only Galin’s fit him better, even dead.
Gangly, paunchy Fedderman was one of those people who mystified tailors. Not that Fedderman ever went to one. He always looked as if he’d just shaken straw out of his sleeves and come from scaring away crows in a cornfield. His body parts didn’t quite match, and nothing fit him well. Often one of his shirt cuffs was unbuttoned and flapping as he walked. Quinn wondered how that happened. It was usually after Fedderman had written something down. Quinn thought it might be because he dragged his hand a certain way when he used a pen or pencil and it worked the cuff button loose.
Fedderman ran his long, pianist’s fingers through what was left of his light-colored hair. That seemed to remind him he was getting balder by the day. He lowered his hand and glanced at it as if he might find errant hair. “Galin was a guy kinda kept to himself,” he said. “Seemed friendly enough, just…I dunno, private.”
“I was in the two-oh doing a report a long time ago,” Pearl said. “Galin walked past and pretended he’d pinched me on the ass. Made a big thing of it. It got him some laughs.”
“Sure,” Fedderman said.
“But he didn’t really pinch you?” Quinn asked.
“I