“Yeah, that’s right.” Novack nodded.

Decker stared at the photo. “She was older than twelve in this picture. Still fresh-faced. God, what a terrible thing! Can I keep this?”

“I’m bending rules.”

“That’s why I’m asking.”

“Yeah, go ahead.”

Decker pocketed the picture. Again he scanned the room. A fourteen-inch TV sat on several cinder blocks at the foot of the bed. Novack told them that he had found the two boxes underneath the bed—one held dog-eared paperback fiction, the other held standard porno magazines.

Decker bent down and sniffed the sheets.

Novack said, “I didn’t smell any jizz, if that’s what you’re doing. But I don’t need to bag the sheets. If we find the girl and she’s”—he made circles with his hand—“if she’s got stuff in her, I got plenty of tubes of humors from the stiff to do DNA testing.”

Gindi was scanning the adult magazines. “Nothing out of the ordinary. Except that this guy was supposedly a holy roller. But even them having stuff like this isn’t out of the ordinary. You go talk to anyone in the nine-oh. Right as the Chasids cross the bridge from the city into Williamsburg, they’ve got these hookers lined up, waiting to ream out their pipes. Okay, so no one’s perfect. But if that ain’t bad enough, they have a real elitist attitude. If you’re not one of them, you don’t count. That’s why it’s okay to skirt the law, because anything but their laws don’t apply to them.”

Novack held up his hands and dropped them to his sides. “It’s hard to believe that these are my people. Grandpa sacrificed everything just to make it over here, and these yutzes are too blind to notice what real freedom is.”

“Did you find anything to suggest that the vic was molesting the girl?” Decker asked.

“Not so far,” Novack said. “No dirty pictures of the kid, if that’s what you mean.”

Decker nodded. “Any camera equipment or videos?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you have a look in her room yesterday?”

“No, I haven’t been out to the house,” Novack said. “I only talked to the parents at the precinct. Like I told you before, I’m not saying they’re hiding something. Maybe they just find it hard to relate to anyone outside their chevrah.”

Decker knew that chevrah meant their circle of friends. “Could be.”

“That’s why, you being here, it’s a good thing for me if you’re legit. You probably could get insider’s info.”

“I’m probably closer than you are, but I’m far from one of them.” Again Decker regarded the picture. Just an uncle trying to do a good deed for a niece? Or a man obsessed with a young girl? “Do you think he brought her here?”

Gindi broke in. “You gotta know where you are, Lieutenant. This is a very religious neighborhood. People talk. How long before it would get around that a religious man is bringing a girl up to his apartment—let alone a girl child. Besides statutory rape being illegal, it’s not tzneosdik.”