“Yes, sir.” She backed away before she turned, as unhappy as he could remember. He wanted to think that she was getting the opportunity to learn something, but he didn’t really believe it himself. He was doing terribly and the flight to Port Smith was coming just in time—maybe.

Chapter Eighteen

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

From Phillips Airport Leland drove into downtown Port Smith to the Eleventh Precinct. He parked the Cadillac a block away and walked through the deserted barricades to the station house. The desk was manned by a sergeant he did not know.

“Does the Captain expect you?”

“No, he doesn’t.”

The sergeant pursed his lips and sucked his teeth. “Just a minute.” He picked up the telephone. “Captain Leland? Sorry to bother you, sir, but your son is down here.… No, not so far.… Yes, sir.” He passed the handset over the rail.

“Joe? What’s on your mind?”

“You’re making me feel like a jerk. I wanted to see that you had a good dinner.”

“Oh. Wait a minute.” His voice sounded again, muffled. He was talking to someone else. “Joe? Stay there. A man will come down for you.”

“What’s up?”

“Has anybody come in since I asked the sergeant?”

Leland looked to the door. “No.”

“I just wanted you to get on your guard. We have Scanlon, the Shoftel suspect.”

Scanlon had been picked up an hour before in a basement of a public school in Westlake. Unwashed, unshaven, and so badly frightened he had not been able to walk without assistance, he had thrown up twice in the unmarked car that had brought him in.

He had not been booked, in accordance with a plan that had been handed down from some obscure quarter above. The police were to work for an admission that would let them issue a statement announcing that their work was done. That statement had already been dictated over the telephone. The object, they had been told, was a quick, clean finish to the case. It did not seem as if they could fall short: a search of the suspect had turned up a religious medal that the girl had been wearing. That was dramatic. The information that a medal had been missing had not been released.

Drama was the real object. For reasons that eluded the police, the politicians in and above the Department were choosing to make the case an opportunity to bathe themselves in publicity. Television made that possible to a degree that had been unimaginable in the years after the war. If the case broke along the lines the politicians had set down, the newscasts tomorrow evening would showcase one of their own, who would have some good words to say about the effectiveness of the police. No one watching would pay much attention to the words. The presence would all but speak for itself.