Tuesday 10:47 A.M.
Turner wanted to get back to the station early to continue getting their mass of data organized onto his spreadsheet. He spent an hour and a half collating work on it as well as organizing who they were going to interview for the day. When Fenwick appeared at the top of the stairs, he lumbered his bulk over to their desks.
Fenwick asked, “Did you see the morning news shows, the newspapers, and the Internet?”
“I haven’t seen the TV, and I’ve only checked email on the Net. I didn’t go to the news.”
Barb Dams appeared at the top of the stairs and hurried over to their desks. She carried a laptop computer open to the Internet.
She showed Turner the headlines. “Drag Queen Cardinal.”
“What the hell?” Turner asked.
Fenwick said, “Do not piss off Mrs. Talucci.”
Dams set up the computer so all of them could see the screen. She called up a YouTube site. They watched a drag show. From the look of the audience members and the quality of the video, it looked like it might have come from the early seventies.
Dams pointed to an overweight dancer wearing a very short skirt and belting out Where Did Our Love Go. Dams said, “That’s the Cardinal.”
Fenwick said, “I don’t recognize him without his red robe. How could anyone prove it was him?”
Dams said, “Look closely.” She waited for several seconds, hit pause, then enlarged the portion of the screen that showed the dancer’s legs. “See the tattoo on the singer’s left ankle. It’s reasonably unique, a silhouette of Diana Ross. The Cardinal has one just like it in exactly the same spot.”
“How do we know that?” Fenwick asked.
“Pop culture,” Dams said. “The Internet. During some innocuous interview he gave seven years ago, he mentioned he had a tattoo. In the interview he was trying to ‘reach out’ to young people. He thought revealing he had a tattoo would mean he could relate to them.”
“You’re joking?” Fenwick said.
“When I try to be funny,” Dams said, “people actually laugh.”
“I am wounded,” Fenwick said.
Dams chortled. “I wish.”
“It’s really him?” Fenwick asked. “I’m not doubting,” he rushed to add seeing D’Amato’s sardonic look, “I’m just awed.” He looked at Turner. “Did you know Mrs. Talucci had this?”
Turner smiled.
“Did she tell you she was going to do this?”
“Mrs. Talucci has never asked me for permission to do anything. She wouldn’t telegraph this to me. She knows it’s connected to my job.”
“The Cardinal thought we were stupid,” Fenwick said, “and he thought Mrs. Talucci was bluffing.”
“She did say that,” Turner admitted.
“That what?” Dams asked.
Turner smiled. “That she never bluffed.”
Molton arrived at their desks. He and Dams walked over to the huge screen and the rows and columns of names, dates, numbers, explanations, and details.
Molton whistled, “Damn.”
Fenwick said, “This is not going to be an excuse to add another layer of paperwork to each case.”
Molton whistled again. He and Dams read and looked for a few minutes. Molton turned to Turner. “I’m impressed.”
Turner said, “I’d be more impressed if it led to an arrest and conviction.”
Molton asked, “Where the hell did Fong get such a huge screen?”
Dams spoke another CPD truism. “Do we really want to know?”
Fenwick asked Molton, “Did you learn anything from Drake and Pelagius last night?”
“They were quite miffed. Which one of you is the pawn of Satan?”
Turner and Fenwick pointed at each other and said, “He is.”
Molton and Dams laughed.
Molton said, “Drake was a fulminating fool, but that Pelagius, I don’t trust him. He just kept that superior smirk on his face. As if he knew something or knows something.”
Fenwick said, “They were threatening Dere last night.”
After the detectives summed up what they’d learned the night before, Molton said, “I don’t know if there’s any truth to be had from any of them.” The Commander chuckled. “I’m afraid Bishop Pelagius is not ever going to be your friend.”
“How long did you talk?” Turner asked.
“I invited them to stay as long as they wanted, but they were quite angry. The main problem is, they have no one to listen to them. The head of the County Board has no real power in the city, at least not over the police. And no one likes Vern Drake in the mayor’s office so he can’t cause as many problems as he would like.”
Turner said, “But they weren’t confessing or adding any actual facts to the case.”
Molton gave him a grim smile and held out his empty palm. “Here’s all the real help they gave.”
Turner said, “But they must know something. People this concerned have got something to lose.”
Fenwick said, “Gotta be covering up for the killer.”
“But why?” Turner asked. “All these people are going to lie for each other? They don’t seem to be close friends or lovers. Why lie? Why protect each other? For some esoteric notion of ‘church’? None of them seems to really care. Who is so worth all this lying? They really think they’re ‘saving’ the Catholic church by all this?”
Fenwick tapped the top of his desk. “They’re saving their own asses. They’ve got it easy. They’ve had it easy for a very long time, and they’re frightened. That much money is that scared?”
Molton said, “That much money is usually the most scared.”
The four of them were silent and mulled this for a few moments.
Fenwick broke the silence. “He told you he called us pawns of Satan?”
“He is very not happy with you. Did you try to tell him the wrist joke?” The whole wrist joke shtick was known and feared throughout the station.
“No. You know that joke is on a “you asked, I told basis”.”
Molton and Dams laughed and left.