LITMIR.BIZ

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for weddings, birthdays and bar mitzvahs’?

      By the third landing, he was poised to call Freilich and press him for more information. Anything else they had which might narrow it down. But the last apartment on the third floor stopped him dead.

      The door was open.

      Will crept towards it, lightly tapping it with his knuckles as he moved past and inside. ‘Hello,’ he called out, almost in a whisper. No lights were on, just the silver shadow of the moon, coming through the window that faced the street.

      He looked to his left. A galley kitchen, small and made up of 1950s units. Not as some retro fashion statement, but the real thing: a bulky, curved fridge; a stove with oversized knobs. This was the home, Will concluded, of an old person.

      Then he looked to his right. He could see a big radio on a table; a couple of wooden chairs, whose seats were cushioned in thin, fake leather; one was spilling out its stuffing. Then a couch—

      Will gasped, jumping back. There was a man lying on it, flat on his back. Silhouetted in the light were the bristles on his chin. He had a small, squirrel-like face framed by clunky, chunky spectacles. The rest of him looked shrunken with age, in a too-big cardigan. He seemed to be sleeping.

      Will took a step forward, then another one, until he was crouched over him. He placed his hand in front of the man’s mouth and waited to feel a breath.

      Nothing.

      Then Will touched him, placing a hand on his forehead. Cold. He put a finger on his neck, searching for a pulse. He knew there would be none.

      Will moved backwards, as if to take in the enormity of what he could see. As he did, he felt a crunch of glass. He looked down to see that he had just stepped on a syringe.

      He was bending down to get a closer look when the room flooded with light.

      ‘Put your hands in the air and turn around. NOW!’

      Will did as he was told. He could barely see; he was dazzled by the three or four torches aimed directly at his eyes.

      ‘Step away from the body. That’s good. Now walk towards me. SLOWLY!’

      His eyes were not yet adjusted but he could make out the small circle dancing before him, right next to the ring of torch light. It was the barrel of a gun – and it was aimed at him.

FIFTY-THREE

       Monday, 12.51am, Manhattan

      In a way, it helped that he was so exhausted. In normal circumstances, his heart would have been banging loud enough to wake the neighbourhood. Instead, his fatigue acted as a kind of defensive shield, slowing down his reactions and even his emotions. His default mental state had become weary resignation.

      He was now in handcuffs in the back of a squad car, jammed up against an officer of the New York Police Department. In front, the radio traffic was constant – and all about him. He was, it was clear, a murder suspect.

      The men in the car were giving off an odour that Will recalled from his adolescence: testosterone and adrenalin, the smell of a locker room after a big win. These men were high on success, and he was the prize. They had caught him all but red-handed, looming over his victim, his fingerprints on his neck. The officers in this unit could almost touch the police medals they were bound to receive.

      ‘I did not kill that man,’ Will heard himself say. The scene was so absurd, so remote from the rest of his life experience, that the voice sounded disembodied, unconnected. It was like listening to the radio, one of the BBC afternoon dramas his mother was hooked on.

      ‘I know what it looks like, but I assure you that’s not what happened.’ Suddenly a bolt of inspiration. ‘But I could lead you to the man who did do it! I followed him out of that building less than an hour ago. I know where he’s hiding! I can even give you a description.’

      The officer in the front passenger seat turned around to give Will an ironic smile. Sure you can, son. And I’m gonna pitch for the Yankees next Tuesday.

      At the seventh precinct station, Will maintained his defiance. ‘I just found that body!’ he said, as they led him upstairs. ‘I’d seen the man leave the building, I followed him and then I went back. I thought he had killed someone and I was right!’

      Even as the words came out of his mouth, he knew they sounded ridiculous. The cop who had been guarding Will from the start stared at him contemptuously. ‘Will you shut the fuck up?’

      For the first time since the police had picked him up, Will began to panic. What the hell was he doing here? He needed to get to Beth. He needed to be out on the streets, in Crown Heights or wherever else, searching for his wife – not chained up as a prisoner of the New York Police Department. He was not even thinking about the prospect of being charged with murder; merely losing vital hours battling the bureaucracy of the New York criminal justice system was nightmarish enough. Every minute spent here was another minute not finding Beth. Besides, the Hassidim had been emphatic: there was no time to lose; the fate of the world was to be decided in the coming hours and minutes. Yet here he was, doing nothing; his hands literally tied.

      They took him to the sergeant’s desk, where someone was waiting for him: the detective he had seen at the apartment building. He had inspected the scene while they kept Will in the car. ‘I got a prisoner to log in,’ he said, addressing the clerk and ignoring Will. Whippet-faced and in his late thirties, the rising star of the homicide department, Will guessed.

      ‘OK, let’s empty his pockets.’ The cop who had played bodyguard stepped forward. He had already frisked Will hard at the apartment: after the police had seen the syringe, they were taking no chances. They also took his cell phone and BlackBerry: no calling of accomplices. Now they took the rest: coins, keys, notebook.

      ‘Let’s get all this stuff vouchered,’ the detective said. Each item was put in a clear, plastic zip-loc bag and sealed. The detective made a note, witnessed by the desk sergeant.

      As they opened his wallet, Will was prompted to make one of his biggest mistakes of the night. In among the plastic was his press card: Will Monroe, New York Times.

      ‘OK, I’ll admit it. The real reason I was in that building was that I was on assignment for the Times. It was undercover. I’ve been writing a series on crime in the city and that’s what I was doing.’

      The detective looked at him for the first time.

      ‘You work for the New York Times?’

      ‘Yes. Yes, I do,’ said Will, glad just to have got a response. The detective looked away and the clerk went back to her work.

      Will was led to another desk, where he was asked to place his right index finger on the electronic device in front of him, hold still, and then do the same with his left. Then the rest of his fingers and his thumbs. It beeped, as if he was a package at a supermarket.

      Next, Will was taken towards a room marked ‘interview suite’. On the way the detective handed a copy of Will’s details to a colleague: ‘Jeannie, can you do a name-search on this for me?’

      Now they were inside. Just a table, with a chair on either side and a phone in the corner. Nothing on the walls but a calendar: New York, the Empire State.

      ‘OK, my name is Larry Fitzwalter and I’m going to be your detective for the evening. We’re going to begin like this.’ He produced another form. ‘You have the right to remain silent. Do you understand?’

      ‘I do understand, but I would really like to explain—’

      ‘OK, you understand. Can you initial here, please?’

      ‘Look, I was in there because I followed a man in there—’

      ‘Can you initial here, please? That means you understand that you have the right to remain silent. OK. Anything you say can and will be used against

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