Night Extra

The silence in the room suddenly became oppressive and ominous; Terrell felt a little chill go through his body. Would they really try to get away with this? he wondered. Would they try anything so raw? “You know what l mean, Paddy,” he said, watching the little man’s shifting eyes. “You told me fifteen minutes ago that you saw a man run out of this house — after Eden Myles screamed. You chased him and lost him. But you got a good look at him. Are you changing your story now?”

Coglan’s eyes slid past Terrell and focused on a spot just beside his shoulder. “I told you you’d better talk to the detectives. It’s their job to pass on stories to you guys. I remember telling you that, Sam. I was pretty jolted, finding her dead. Maybe you misunderstood me or got it mixed up.”

“Sure, you got it mixed up,” Stanko said, in a hard, derisive voice. “You were trying to work ahead of us. That’s how rumors get started and stories get twisted out of shape.”

Terrell didn’t take his eyes from Coglan’s flushed and unhappy face. “Once more, Paddy; you didn’t see a man run out of here?”

Stanko said, “He told you ‘no’ once.”

Terrell hesitated, not sure of his next move. He knew Stanko by reputation, a cold, unemotional man with a blind and compulsive loyalty to the administration. What were his orders? To make certain that Caldwell was tagged with the girl’s murder? To eliminate other suspects?

Terrell made up his mind. He said, “Captain, I’m using what Coglan told me. I don’t know what he saw; but I know damn well what he told me he saw. And that’s going into the paper.”

“And your paper is heading for trouble,” Stanko said. “Paddy’s tried to set you straight. He may have been confused, or you may have misunderstood him.”

“We’ll print all of that, too,” Terrell said, in a tone heavy with sarcasm. “He’s been a cop for twenty years but the sight of a body sends him into a state of incoherent shock. Readers will find that intriguing.”

“Sam,” Coglan said plaintively, “there’s no reason—”

“Shut up!” Stanko yelled at him. “Print what you want, snoop. Now get out of here.”

“We’ll print all the versions,” Terrell said. “Coglan’s first account and Coglan’s second account. Something for every edition. And when do we get the definitive official report? When the Mayor and Ike Cellars decide just how it should be shaded and tinted for public consumption?”

“Get out of here. Get out of here before I throw you out. You’re a troublemaker, that’s all. And, by God, I’d like to beat some manners and sense into you.”

Terrell said, “I don’t want trouble, Captain, I just want the truth. But those words mean the same thing tonight.” He tossed him a little salute and walked out of the room.

From Caldwell’s house Terrell went looking for a telephone. He found an all-night drugstore six blocks away, and called the paper. Wheeler was writing the first running story, and Terrell gave him everything he had learned from Coglan.

When he finished Wheeler said cheerfully, “Well, Caldwell’s got a loophole now. It’s not open-and-shut until they chase down the prowler. Meanwhile chaos reigns supreme here, Karsh is tearing into this big. Everybody but the janitor and the publisher’s wife is out working on it. Where are you going now?”

“To the Sixteenth. I’ll call you after he’s slated.”

“That’s the stuff, son. Atmosphere, color. We relish all tawdry details.”

There was an air of pressure and excitement in the old mid-town station house. The shift reporting for the midnight-to-eight trick was buzzing with the story. In a few hours the whole city would be buzzing, Terrell knew. He walked down the dusty, brightly lighted hallway to the House Sergeant’s office. The new shift was on duty; Sergeant McManus, who had taken Coglan’s first call, wasn’t around. Probably in the locker room, the clerk said. Terrell found him there sitting in front of his locker.

Two young patrolmen stood near him changing out of their uniforms. “My wife doesn’t want me to come home in the monkey suit,” one of them said. “Even when it’s after midnight. Sheer snobbery, I tell her. But it cuts no ice.”

Terrell sat down on the wooden bench beside Sergeant McManus, an erect, gray-haired man with surprisingly gentle blue eyes. “Big night, eh?” he said.

“Big is right. I can’t figure it, Sam.”

“I don’t blame her,” the second patrolman said, knotting his tie. “Who wants to be taken for a doorman or a zoo attendant?”

Sergeant McManus looked up at them and said irritably, “If you think the uniform is such a lousy thing, why did you bother taking the police exams? Did you think they’d deck you out in top hats and canes?”

“Good working conditions got me,” the first patrolman said, winking at his companion. “That and the stimulating friendships I’ve formed among my buddy cops.”

McManus said, “Spend as much time on the manual as you do dressing and undressing every day and you’ll be Inspectors in ten years.”

When the two men had gone, Terrell said, “How do you mean you can’t figure it out, Mac?”

“I never figured Caldwell that way.”