Soul Murder. Daniel Blake

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СКАЧАТЬ waited for a resident to come down before leaving the building, you didn’t need to sign in; but Redwine’s killer couldn’t have done that, as Redwine had been found in his apartment. Anyway, he’d had no visitors at all today, said Foxworth; none, full stop.

      There were, he added, no other ways into the building unless you knew enough about The Pennsylvanian’s layout to sneak in through the underground parking lot or up the fire escape; but even then you’d have to rely on doors being open that shouldn’t have been, and risk being spotted by someone who might ask you what you were doing. Hazardous, to say the least, but not out of the question.

      Whichever way Redwine’s killer had entered the building, he – of course it could be a ‘she’ too, Beradino said, but since the majority of murderers were male, they would for simplicity’s sake refer to the killer as a ‘he’, all the while maintaining an open mind – had not had to force the door of the apartment itself. The firefighters had broken down the door when they’d arrived on scene, and they were adamant both door and lock had been intact.

      Which in turn suggested two possibilities.

      Firstly, that the killer had a key with which he’d let himself in. This might have been a surprise to Redwine, or he might have been expecting it. Perhaps the killer had thought Redwine would be out, and the surprise at finding him in the apartment had been mutual.

      Secondly, that Redwine had known the killer, and opened the door to him.

      There were two sets of crowds out front. First, the building’s residents, who’d been evacuated and were massed under the canopy waiting to be questioned. Second, the rubberneckers who’d heard that there’d been not just a fire but a death too, which was for a dispiriting number of people more than reason enough to drop everything and stand behind police barriers for hours on end.

      One of the uniforms was subtly filming the latter group. Murderers sometimes returned to the scene of their crime; arsonists often did. The detectives would study the footage later, looking for known troublemakers or simply those who looked shifty.

      A film crew from KDKA, Pittsburgh’s local TV station, were also on site. The event was newsworthy because of The Pennsylvanian’s prestige as a place to live, and the fact that the victim had been a surgeon, but the body language of the reporter and cameraman betrayed their instinct that this was not a major story.

      Man dies in fire. Tragic, but happens every day. The TV crew would go through the motions and hope for something bigger, more exciting, or quirkier next time.

      Beradino and Patrese introduced themselves to the residents and asked if a Magda Nagorska was among them as, according to their records, she lived directly beneath Redwine’s apartment.

      She was indeed there, and she looked as old as God, possibly older.

      If the way they had to shout every question two or three times was anything to go by, Redwine could have been murdered in her apartment, perhaps right next to her, without her having heard a damn thing.

      ‘Did you see or hear anyone go into his apartment?’ Patrese asked.

      ‘He was a charming man,’ she shouted.

      ‘No commotion? An argument? Your apartment didn’t shake?’

      ‘It’s dreadful, that it happens somewhere like here. Dreadful.’

      One of the uniforms bit on his hand to stop himself from laughing. It was like giggling in church; the more taboo it was, the more tempting it became.

      Patrese didn’t think it would do much for the reputation of the Pittsburgh homicide department if he fell to his knees weeping with laughter in front of a potential witness.

      They continued in mutual incomprehension for several minutes, before Beradino asked in exasperation: ‘Do you have a hearing aid?’

      ‘Lemonade?’

      ‘HEA-RING-AID?’

      ‘Oh yes, but I don’t wear it too often. I’m not deaf. Just a little hard of hearing in one ear, you know.’

       11:17 p.m.

      ‘How did the killer get in?’ Patrese asked, when he and Beradino were in the car.

      ‘That’s the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it? Well, one of them, anyway.’

      That the fire escape and underground parking lot were risky methods of entry didn’t mean they were impossible. The parking lot had closed-circuit TV; the fire escape didn’t. The cops would trawl through the footage and see what they could find.

      Failing either of those, could the killer have been a resident?

      It seemed unlikely, to say the least. They’d spoken to all the residents, albeit briefly. None of them looked as though they could harm a fly, and none had an obvious motive to do away with Redwine.

      The uniforms would follow up, of course, interviewing every resident properly.

      What about one of the doormen? Probably not Foxworth himself – it would be hard to do it on one’s own shift, because it would have meant leaving the front desk unattended for too long – but one of the others, who was off shift? A doorman would know all the shortcuts and hidden entrances, and his presence wouldn’t be suspicious.

      But again, it came back to the same stumbling block: why?

      Why had Redwine been killed, and why – the second sixty-four-thousand-dollar question – why in that way? Why burned, rather than, say, shot, or stabbed?

      To hide something? If not Redwine’s identity, then something else?

      To destroy something? Forensic evidence, or something less directly connected to the corpse, such as documentation or other items?

      As punishment; a cruel and unusual way of murdering someone?

      Or were all these delving too deep into something very simple? Had Michael Redwine been burnt to death simply because the killer had felt that was the easiest way of doing it?

      Redwine had been a surgeon at Mercy, Pittsburgh’s largest and most famous hospital. Mercy was located uptown, a few blocks from The Pennsylvanian.

      ‘We’re going to Mercy?’ Patrese asked.

      ‘You got any better ideas?’

      ‘Matter of fact, I do.’

      Patrese flipped open his cellphone and hit one of the speed dials. A woman answered on the second ring.

      ‘Hey, Cicillo.’

      ‘Hey, sis. Are you on shift?’

      ‘No, at home, all alone; Sandro’s taken the kids to his mom’s for a few days. Why?’

      ‘Can we come by?’

      ‘Who’s we?’

      ‘Me and СКАЧАТЬ