Thomas O`Callaghan - The Screaming Room

“That exerciser-on-wheels retails for about twenty-one hundred dollars plus,” said Haverstraw. “But now it’s fit for the junkyard. Not only was the front wheel damaged but also the frame was bent in the collision. Whoever left it behind knew it was a total.”

“What’d it hit?”

“Something made of brick. My guess would be one of the columns on the bridge.”

“Come up with any prints?” asked Thomlinson.

“A few. But none that matched any in our databases.”

“Figures,” said Driscoll.

“Found something, though.” The technician held up a clear plastic envelope about the size of a pack of cigarettes. Driscoll squinted to see what was trapped inside. “We found it wedged into the brake assembly on the bike’s handlebars. We know it doesn’t belong to your victim.”

Driscoll brought the bag to within inches of his nose. He was able to identify the find: the jagged edge of a bloodstained fingernail. He handed the pouch to Thomlinson.

“Now if we could only get hold of the guy that belongs to this nail…” Thomlinson said.

“That won’t be easy,” said Haverstraw. “We tested the blood. Another no-hit. We’re still waiting for the chromosomal scanning results on the blood’s white cells. That’ll give us the likely race and gender.”

“Tell me more about the bike,” said Driscoll.

“It’s imported from Italy by Stranier and Sons. You’ll find it available in only three stores in the Northeast. One’s in Darien, Connecticut. Another in Manhattan. And one more in Southampton. But you see that emblem? That bike ran the Tour de France. And your rider is a professional who bought it right here in Manhattan.”

“I’ll be damned,” said Thomlinson. “All that from a bike?”

“Well, the serial number helped.” Haverstraw grinned like the Cheshire cat.

“So we’ve got a name,” said Driscoll.

“That we do. The bike’s owner is one Kyle Ramsey. He lives at Two-Thirty-one Pineapple Street. Downtown Brooklyn. That makes him a Brooklyn Heights resident, Lieutenant. Right in your own backyard.”

The club was called the Wet Spot, and it was ladies’ night. k. d. lang’s sultry voice flooded the dance floor as a crowd of drag queen revelers responded rapturously to the balladeer. Sweat glistened. Tongues explored. Limbs intertwined. Flesh clung.

At the bar, a ponytailed lass dipped her pinkie in her mimosa and tickled the cherry. Her pristine white blouse, her parochial-school jumper, and her bleached cotton knee-highs made her look like a Catholic schoolgirl.

“I could drink Veuve Clicquot all night,” her bar companion singsonged as she ran a teasing finger under the small of the schoolgirl’s foot. “They call me Gretchen,” she added with a wry little smile that accented a Betty Boop face.

“Dance! Dance! Dance to the music! Grind! Grind! Grind to the beat!” The DJ’s rhythmic incantations exhorted the excitement seekers to heightened realms of rapture spurred now by Janet’s Jackson’s “Nasty.”

Circumnavigating the bar, waiters, costumed as mermaids, scurried in stiletto heels to deliver drinks.

“I just love ladies’ night. Don’t you?” Gretchen crooned.

“That I do,” said the schoolgirl. “But I’m inhaling enough noxious perfume to hatch a pulmonary tumor.”

“Oooooo, pulmonary! Sounds raunchy. Sure like the sound of that. You a nurse or an obstetrician?”

“Silly,” the girl giggled.

“Why don’t you lead me to your examination table? I just love stirrups.”

“All right, then. Hi-ho, Silver!”

Gretchen signaled the bar’s mermaid for the check.

The Catholic schoolgirl rummaged through her over-stuffed bra and produced a crisp $50 bill.

“The libations are on me,” she said, grabbing hold of Gretchen’s hand, before heading for the exit.

“You Kyle Ramsey?” The voice cropped up out of nowhere. It stopped the Catholic schoolgirl dead in her tracks. When she turned around, the glow of a woman’s face stared back at her.

“Sorry, honey. The name’s Celeste. And who might I ask are you?”

“We’ve got your bike,” Sergeant Aligante said flatly, producing her shield.

Gretchen quickly disappeared, swallowed up by the throng of gyrating dancers.

“Do I look like I’d be riding a bike in this getup, darling?”

“Your bike. The Brooklyn Bridge. Am I ringing any bells?”

The etchings of fear began to form on Ramsey’s face. He climbed back onto his barstool and invited Margaret to join him.

“It was just supposed to be an early-morning jaunt. That’s all. The guy’s dead. Right?”

“What guy is that?”

“The guy whose head was bleeding.”

“The man’s dead, all right. What can you tell me about him?”

“What’s to tell? He was lying there when I found him. I’m the one who called 911.”

“Been to Coney Island recently, Mr. Ramsey? Or to the Museum of Natural History?”

A look of panic seized Kyle Ramsey.

“Wait a minute. Does this have something to do with those two tourists who were killed?”

“This’ll go a lot easier if I ask the questions.”

“I’m sorry. But that’s gotta be it. Why else would you be here asking questions?”

“Which you haven’t answered.”

“I’ve never been to Coney Island. It’s a dreadful place. And the last time I was to a museum I was six years old. Honest!”

It appeared to Margaret that the man was about to cry.

“We think there may have been someone else on that bridge, Mr. Ramsey.”

“You’re damn right there was. There was this guy. At least I think it was a guy. Anyway, he darted out in front of me. I swerved the bike to avoid him and hit the goddamn bridge.” Ramsey leaned in conspiratorially. “I think I may have hit the bastard.”

“We do too.”

Margaret eyed the man dressed in Catholic schoolgirl attire. Could she have found her serial killer hiding behind lipstick, mascara, and a padded bra? Every instinct said no. His story too closely paralleled the evidence. And why would a killer leave a traceable ten-speed racer at the scene of a murder?

“Let me buy you a drink,” said Margaret. “What’ll it be?”

“I’ll have another mimosa.”

“Make that two,” said Margaret to the bar’s mermaid.

“You look more like the Cosmopolitan type, if you don’t mind me saying,” said Ramsey. “And don’t you feel just a tad out of place in this meat emporium?”

“What? You don’t like my Versace blouse?”

“On the contrary, I like it too much.”

Whoa! Was this guy a switch-hitter? Margaret couldn’t remember ever being hit on by a man dressed in drag. Oddly enough, she found it amusing. Life’s just full of surprises, she thought.

“Kyle, tell me about the guy you think you hit.”

“From the top?”

“From the top.”

“Okay. I’m racing across the bridge. I do it every morning. That particular morning I was trying to better my time from the day before. As I’m closing in on the second piling, I check my stopwatch. I’m doing okay. Then out of nowhere this guy…or girl. Whatever! Let’s call him a guy. This guy pops out in front of me. Smack! I hit him. At least I think I did. It all happened so fast. Anyway, the guy does a cartwheel and I hit the floorboards. Man, did that hurt! When I get to my feet the guy is bolting and my bike looks like an accordion. That’s when I spotted the man with the head wound. I checked for a heartbeat. There didn’t appear to be any. So I called 911.”

“Why didn’t you identify yourself?”

“I should have. I know. The whole thing was just too scary. I just wanted to get the hell out of there.”