Faye Kellerman [Decker & Lazarus 01] The Ritual Bath (pdf)

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Jewtown.
Decker didn t even bother to unwrap the contents.
He picked up the phone and called the crime lab.
He had a steak, fries, salad, and a beer with
Fordebrand, then went home and slept for a couple of
hours with Ginger curled at his feet. When he woke
up it was nearly six P.M. He d made an appointment
earlier to speak with Stein and Mendelsohn. It was
getting late, and he d have to move it. Before he left
the ranch he fed the animals and phoned the station.
The bag had contained a bloody, unwashed buck
knife. The handle was bone with a metal ID tag insert.
The name on the tag was Cory Schmidt. Preliminary
blood typing and fiber analysis showed Marley s blood
on the knife and beige threads from her uniform. Marge
had already requested a search warrant for Schmidt s
house and an arrest warrant for Schmidt, but so far
they d been unable to locate Cory or his friends. They
were still looking. Decker left a message that he was
going to do his interviews and to beep him if he was
needed.
Well, golly! How convenient! Who the hell
THE RITUAL BATH / 235
would want to set up Cory? His friends? The real
murderer? But how would the real murderer know
about Cory as a suspect? Unless he was an insider in
the yeshiva and knew that Cory had pulled a knife on
Rina. The interviews suddenly seemed more pressing.
Shlomo Stein sat hunched over a volume of Talmud.
He d been sitting that way since Decker started the
interview a half hour before. His eyes remained fixed
on the text in front of him, but the fidgeting of his
hands and the shaking of his leg were giveaways; his
mind was decidedly elsewhere. His beard was black
and heavy and trimmed to a Van Dyke point a couple
of inches below his chin. He wore a white shirt with
sleeves rolled up to the elbows, a pair of black slacks,
and a large black velvet yarmulke.
Why the hell was he being so uncooperative, Decker
wondered? What did he have to gain by being so
outwardly contemptuous? Decker looked over the
notes he d taken, then said:
I want to go over this again with you.
What s the point?
Why don t you let me be the judge of that?
You re not a judge. You re a cop. I have only one
judge, and He s the one I ll ultimately answer to.
Well, right now why don t you bear with me and
answer my questions?
Stein said nothing.
236 / Faye Kellerman
You were studying the entire time with your partner
when Florence Marley was killed?
Yes.
The entire night?
Yes.
And you didn t leave the classroom?
No.
To get a breath of fresh air?
No.
To get something to eat? To go to the bathroom?
No.
You put all your body functions on hold for twelve
hours, Mr. Stein?
The learning of Torah liberates one to the point
that one forgets such banalities as body functions. The
words of Hashem envelop and whisk one out of the
corporeal and into the spiritual. I was trying to soar
above my meager earthly existence and grow close to
Hakodosh Boruch Hu. Of course, you couldn t under-
stand that.
What I do understand, Mr. Stein, is that while you
were spreading your heavenly wings in holy ascent,
Florence Marley was hacked up by some psycho. It
caused quite a commotion out there all the people
and noise. You didn t hear a thing?
I was learning.
That was supposed to explain it all.
Decker tapped his pencil against his note pad. He
ached to break through the man s holier-than-thou at-
titude. The hell with it.
THE RITUAL BATH / 237
How d you go from pimping to praying, Scotty
Stevens?
Stein burned with a rage that glowed on his face.
Why don t you crawl back into your anti-Semitic
sewer, Detective, instead of raking innocent Jews over
the coals? I know what you re doing. You re trying to
be a big sheygets hero to impress a woman who is
unattainable to you. You re a goy, Decker. She d rather
be raped by a scum-of-the-earth Jew than let you touch
her. Ask her. Ask her what s halachically correct.
Why? Are you the scum-of-the-earth Jew who tried
to rape her?
Crawl back into your gutter, Stein mumbled, then
returned his eyes to his book.
So no one can attest to your whereabouts except
Shraga Mendelsohn your partner.
Yes.
Did Mr. Mendelsohn ever leave you alone to attend
to his bodily needs, or was he also imbued with the
holy spirit?
I don t remember. Why don t you ask him?
I will, Mr. Stein. And if there are any inconsisten-
cies, you ll hear from me again.
I don t doubt it, Stein growled. Amalek always
has a way of rearing its ugly head.
Decker scribbled down Amalek in his note pad,
then stuffed it in his breast pocket. He d ask Rina what
the word meant. He hated insults he didn t understand.
238 / Faye Kellerman
I don t know what I can tell you that Shlomi hasn t [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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