The City When It Rains Read Free

Santana told Corman. “One from the News. One from the Post. Some video cams, too. But nobody looked that excited.”
    Corman looked at the woman, then the mound of blue blanket her naked arm seemed to be reaching for. “What happened?” he asked.
    Fogarty’s head drooped forward as he scratched his face. A line of moisture spread out from the brim of his hat. “Same old shit,” he said to Corman. “You been following the cop house long enough to know that.”
    Corman’s eyes returned to Shepherd. He was loading everything into the back of the CSU wagon. Two men lounged in its front seat, both of them smoking cigarettes. They had cracked the window slightly on the driver’s side and a steady cloud of white smoke curled out of it.
    â€œYou got the field now,” Santana said to Corman, “but you’d better make it fast. The EMS boys’ll scoop it up pretty soon.”
    Corman looked at Fogarty.“Did you get an ID?”
    Fogarty shook his head. “It’s not my beat, Hell’s Kitchen.”
    Santana laughed. “He just came over because the wife’s riding the pink pony, right, Artie?”
    Fogarty glanced at Santana, winked. The two men laughed together, old comrades in the wars of love.
    â€œListen, Corman,” Santana said after the laughter had trailed off. “I hear Lazar died.”
    â€œNot exactly.”
    â€œWent to Florida, something like that?”
    â€œHe had a stroke,” Corman told him. “He’s in a home up on 106th Street.”
    â€œYou two were real close, right?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œYour rabbi. Taught you everything.”
    Corman nodded quickly. “I’m going to take a few shots,” he said as he stepped out from under the awning, into the rain again.
    The woman’s body was sprawled across the smooth wet street. She wore a long white dress, but as the rotating lights of the EMS ambulance rhythmically pulsed over it, they turned it faintly orange. She lay face down, her body bent slightly at the waist. One of her arms pressed against her side. The other stretched out over her head, nearly perpendicular to her tangled hair, the fingers thrust out rigidly, so that they nearly touched a torn strand of the blue blanket. Her head was lifted, as if balanced on the tip of the chin, her face raised, despite the fact that her nose was crushed nearly flat. A trickle of blood ran from her ear, then moved in a gently curving line along her throat. In a standard black-and-white, it would look like a piece of soft black cord.
    For a few seconds, Corman merely circled the body, looking for the best shot. Finally, he stopped just to the left of the woman’s face and bent down to bring the top of her body into the frame. As he snapped the picture, the bright light of his flash swept over her like the tail of a comet, throwing her shadow across the slick gray pavement.
    â€œYou’re wasting your time, Corman,” Santana said dryly as he passed by, heading for his car. “Even the locals’ll pass on this.”
    â€œMaybe.”
    Santana nodded toward the blue blanket. “That’s the only angle. And you ask me, it’s not much.”
    Corman glanced up at him. “Do they have any witnesses?”
    Santana nodded in the opposite direction. “The Incorruptible Detective Lang dug one up,” he said facetiously. “He’s still at him.”
    Corman turned slowly to see the witness, a tall man in a New York Mets sweatshirt, as he talked to Lang just inside the doorway of a neighboring building.
    Santana tapped Corman’s shoulder. “Listen, could you spare me a sawbuck for a couple days?”
    Corman stared him dead in the eye. “No.”
    For an instant Santana looked offended, then his face relaxed into a light chuckle. “Well, at least you didn’t give me some bullshit song and dance.” He laughed again, waved his hand. “Catch