Time Frame: May Day occuns on Friday, May 1, 1998, “before” Finnegan’s Wake and Fallen Heroes (1) •* Because the first broadcasts of episodes of “Homicide: Life on the Street” typically were aired once a week, at one-week intervals, it is difficult to absolutely establish a link between the “when” of an episode to a “when” in real time; for example, the first air dates for Fallen Heroes (1) and (2) can’t be definitively linked to “when” they happened, as they were broadcast a week apart, but the events of the two episodes occurred in a few days. As this is the case, the author asks the reader to “cut me some poetic slack,” and allow May Day to occur on May 1, 1998, “before” Finnegan’s Wake, first broadcast April 24, 1998.

***
The raw egg of a sun begins to sizzle as it hits the Baltimore horizon; two minutes: over easy. With no pnion warning, Fniday, May 1, 1998, dawns hot and damp in Baltimore, and the population wakes up in its own sweat. Spring doesn’t last long in Baltimore; the punishment starts early.

By noon, detectives in the Baltimore Police CID have resigned themselves to the fact that they will spend the nest of the day sitting, walking, and running in their own sweat: the office windows, repaired in the fall, are painted shut, and the ancient central air, inadequate at its installation, does not attempt to rise to the challenge.

Lt. Giandello and his flock have the 8 to 5 shift for the next 3 weeks--luck of the draw. The first call hits at 8:20 and Lewis, Falsone are gone, with little to no pretense: get in the can, roll down the windows, cruise to the scene. Lucky, in the heat, it’s a fairly new body, in the north end, where the gently rolling hills and money nearly as old don’t stave off violent death.

Munch returns with the mail, scanning as he delivers. “Interesting mail, Bayliss,” smacking him in the back of the head with the packet.

“That’s my mail, John.” Bayliss grabs for it while he attempts to flatten his hair to his head, with little success at either.

Deploying his favorite b-ball technique, Munch feints while keeping the mail: “No, I mean, look, Bayliss, this is a hand-made postcard. Look, it’s got a drawing of what, flora and fauna?” Bayliss surrenders to the damp and heat, sits down and waits. “I don’t know what it is John. I’m busy. I’m busy, I work here, right, I work here? We work here, right? Gimme my mail?”

Munch shows no mercy. “This feminine, perfumed card is evidence of--of something, Timmy; who knows, maybe a latent heterosexual impulse?” Munch flashes the card at Pembleton, who is intently jabbing the keys of the manual typewriter with his index fingers. “Look at this, Frank, it’s got handwritten verse.”

Without moving his eyes from the keys, Frank suggests, “Having trouble working in the heat, John?”

The sarcasm glances off Munch’s flinty hide: “Frank, this may be an important clue. It reads, and I quote, ‘Hooray, hooray, the first of May. Outdoor screwing begins today.’ Succinct, yet with its own erotic flow.”

Bayliss stands behind Munch, feints to Munch’s left, then grabs the packet from his right.

“Hey! Bayliss!”

“Can I work now, John!”

Munch attempts to retrieve the packet, with no success. “I need that Bayliss, hey!” He calls at Bayliss’s back, now retreating down the hall. “Hey, I need that! Let me at least xerox it. Hey. Hey! Don’t go away mad, or at least go away and let me have the card. Damn. Why wasn’t that card mailed to me? Me, me: one who knows, understands the vernal impulse. Damn.”

Giardello, drawn by the noise, exits his room with a wash of fan-cooled air. “It would seem to be too hot for shouting.” Looks at Munch, the still-pecking Pembleton. “Don’t tell me, it’s the general rejoicing of the populace. You have closed not only all your open cases, but the cases of your fellow detectives. Congratulations, I embrace you, Detective Munch. What else could possibly be the cause of this . . . merriment?”

Munch smirks. “It’s May Day.”

“May Day? May Day, as in ‘SOS, lost at sea’?”

Frank looks up, offers, “No he’s found a May Pole,” and resumes his review of the keys still available for use.

“Someone’s looking for somebody’s May Pole,” Munch continues. “Bayliss just got an anonymous invite via office mail for sexual congress a la fresco.”

Gee snorts; “Bayliss? He doesn’t need the distraction. And outdoors? Too hot outdoors. Hell, too hot in here.”

“Lieutenant, where is your youthful elan? I remember one particular vixen from my youth, who . . .“

Pembleton, angry that the distraction makes it harder to hit the typewriter keys squarely, snaps, “I don’t really want to know, John.”

This hits the mark. “Oh, right, Frank, the private school boys just don’t do that in Manhattan; too dirty, I guess? Even zoo animals don’t copulate out of doors in Manhattan if they can help it.”

He’s interrupted by the demanding peal of the phone; the second call on day shift. Munch defers to Pembleton, who lifts the receiver of his desk phone: “Homicide.”

Pembleton is thus the primary; he collects Bayliss with his mail from the mens’ toilet, and pilots the white Cavalier to Southwest Baltimore. The luck of the draw: a two-fer.
***
“My name is Detective Frank Pembleton. What can you tell me, Mr., ah. ..?“

“Kestenbaum. Chaz Kestenbaum. I own the building.” Older white male, dressed for golf. Those New England-style slacks, made of deliberately mismatched fabric swatches sewn together, like a small patchwork quilt. A lot of work for no good reason.

“Your building, OK. What can you tell us about Ms, ah. . . .“

“Susie Coblentz. Nice girl. Ah, well . . . day well, she had the little girl, anyway.”

“And her daughter’s name was?”

“Don’t know.”

“You don’ t know the little girl ‘ s name.”

“No, no I don’t. You know, officer, my god, the smell of that blood. Made me puke, I walked in and I puked on the carpet.”

“Rough smell, hot day. Rough. A lot of bullets in Ms Coblentz, a lot of bullets in the bathtub, the walls, the floor. Not a lot of bullets in the little girl though. Somebody mad at Mizz Susie Coblentz? She pay her bills OK?”

“What, to me? I call her daddy, and he pays when she forgets.”

“Now, she’s a little old for Daddy to be paying the bills. Ah, she had a, had a problem?”

“That, I don’ t know. I can’ t say.”

 “It’s obvious, Mr. ah Kestenbaum, it’s obvious looking in the other room that she had a rough . . . she had a rough . . . life style.”

“You know, officer, that’s not my business. I own the building. I come here because there’s complaints of noise last night. From the other tenants. I call last night, this morning, I get no answer. I stop by, there’s her green Celica, so she’s home, but there’s no answer at the door. I knock and I knock. So I open the door, I got the key. And I find this. . . . I don’t mean to be disrespectful of you, officer, I don’t mean disrespect, but I don’t know about this. This is not my problem.”

“This is your building, Mr. Kestenbaum.”

“This is not my problem, officer. Not my problem.”

Bayliss walks in from the bathroom. “Frank. The ME’s office has signed off. You want to come in here.”

Pembleton signals to a uniform, touches Kestenbaum’s arm. “Officer Phatt has a few further questions. After you answer, you can leave, Mr. Kestenbaum. Thank you.” He turns on his heel and joins his partner in the bathroom.

There Bayliss stands motionless, staring at the bodies: a small child, her white-blond hair thick with jelled blood, sits in the clotted water of the tub; the still-kneeling body of her mother, pocked with bullets, covers the child’s naked torso. Pembleton watches Bayliss, and he straightens his already straight back; he needs a partner who can look this in the face, do the job. He clears his throat.

Bayliss, grim-faced, turns to face him.

Pembleton takes in the shot-up walls of the bathroom of the apartment, and suggests, quietly, “Think there’s enough ordnance here, Tim?”

Bayliss grabs the lifeline, grateful to focus on procedure. He returns, as quietly: “The department may have a problem, Frank. This is our ordnance. Shooter left an empty magazine: a 17, Glock.”

Pembleton, quieter still: “Son of a bitch.” Pulls rubber gloves from his pocket, pulls them on, stoops to finger the magazine Bayliss has found: 17 shells, special issue, sold to police only. “Son of a bitch, Tim, we can’t know for sure. Not without a doubt, not at this point, we can’t. Look--there are no shell casings left.”

“Frank, the shooter was nuts. Look what he left us in the wall tile, the ceiling, the tub. The bodies.”

“Y’know, Tim, this is very fine. We got us a slam dunk, and it’s for the wrong team.” A breath. “Son of a bitch!” Quiet again. “OK, OK, OK, fine. Fine.” Pembleton quiets again. “Who we got on tap, Tim. Who we got in the department who is literally a loose cannon? We got a slam dunk, we go with it: it’s easy, so let’s go easy. Who’s easy in the department, Tim, let’s start with easy. Who has a little . . . problem? A little . . . substance problem?”

“Well, Frank, you want we should start easy? OK, so we go to Internal Affairs.”

The muscles in Pembleton’s taut neck tighten. “No, we do not go to IA. We go to IA, then we got a problem, Pembleton and Bayliss got a problem. No, let’s find our inside problem ourselves, before we go to IA; if we don’t find our shooter inside, then we got that. ruled out, and there’s no reason to flag IA. But if we can find our inside man, then we give him to IA, nice and clean. Look Tim, I already had those IA dogs at my heals. No thank you. We finish up here, then we go back downtown, look at the ballistics. If it’s what we think it is, we start looking at our fellow police, looking for a nutcase. Fine. Welcome to the summer, Tim. Welcome to our little problem. Happy May Day. We get screwed, no muss, no fuss.”
***
Pembleton and Bayliss welcome the decomp-free air outdoors. They fill their lungs with the cleaner, sultry air. Pembleton watches Bayliss wince as he gingerly cantilevers himself into the Cavalier.

“You OK?”

“Yeah. I mean no, no, I’m not. My back, it’s acting up.”

Pembleton starts the engine. “I thought you took care of that. You haven’t mentioned it for a long time.”

“Maybe I twisted it, going after the empty magazine under the sink.” He grimaces. “You know, I stopped taking the painkillers ‘cause I was getting loopy on them.”

“Getting loopy, huh.” Pembleton glances at Bayliss as he waits to enter traffic.

“The doctors, they think I should have surgery. But there’s no guarantee it’ll work.” His voice trails off as he searches for a less-uncomfortable position.

“Why us, Frank?” It’s going to be a long drive to the ME’s office;  they’re just leaving the curb, and already Bayliss is agonizing out loud.

Gripping the top of the wheel, Frank grunts, “Why us, what? Dead little girl, call Pembleton and Bayliss?”

“Yeah, for starters.”

“You could just as easily wonder, Why another cop-involved shooting?”

They ride in silence, considering the odds they would each get another case like this.

Unable to maintain the silence, Bayliss blurts out, “Looking around that apartment, my heart freezes, Frank. I mean, what kind of chance did that little girl have? Even if, even if she wasn’t being abused. Even if no one was raising a hand to her . . . you saw what that place looked like. What’re the odds she was neglected, at the very least, and nobody’s helping her, nobody’s hearing she’s in deep trouble?”

Frank emits a bitter chuckle. “Parents. Cops. In the gods of our own devising we trust! How can we be surprised when they betray that trust?”

“But children, they don’t know any better, Frank. Whatever they see, that’s all they know.”

“Yeah. But rational adults should know better! And we should know better, ‘cause we’re the ‘good guys’, we’re the Murder Police. . . .“ He interrupts himself to honk furiously at the driver trying to merge into his lane. “Murder Police, and this is all in a day’s work, right? Except when it’s not. When it involves a fellow police officer. We speak for the dead, except--oops!--when we don’t!” He blasts the horn once more, for good measure, and guns the engine.

Tim’s anger fizzles into sadness. “It doesn’t end, does it? Seeing this . . . this waste; how come it never gets any easier?”

“There’s not much to it, my friend. Children are the innocent victims of adults’ selfishness.” Without moving his gaze from the road, Frank hesitates a beat, then adds, “You know that.”

Tim’s eyes tic toward him. “Yeah.”

Frank focuses ahead. Tim looks to the distance, then says, “Why do people like that have kids?”

“For all the wrong reasons.”
***
Welcome to the ME’s office; on the bright side, it’s cold: things may be looking up. “Gentlemen. You’re early. Welcome to life in the cold, slow lane. Very slow, actually.”

“Dr. Griscom. Yeah, we’re a little early, we’re a little anxious to collect any slugs from the mother-daughter shooting and bring them to ballistics.” Pembleton smiles with all his teeth.

Griscom is working on the larger of the two female bodies on autopsy tables. “Detective Pembleton, Detective Bayliss; in the case of Miss Coblentz, what you have brought me is not so much a cadaver as it is a Swiss cheese. And this is a Swiss cheese carrying payload: the baby would have been due around the New Year. Other than that. . . Ahm, what can I report, add, to your information? Well, it appears the mother-to-be was bathing her daughter, Tiffani, between 4 and 10 p.m., shortly after they had dinner. My guess: McDonald’s. The assailant appears to have entered the apartment unknown, or was known to Miss Coblentz and her daughter, as the assailant found them still at the bath. Miss Coblentz had numerous bullets enter her palms, and some are embedded as deep as the shaft of her lower arm. From her posture, I believe she was holding her palms above her head, attempting to shield herself and the child. With the first shots, she fell over her daughter, again shielding her from the, ahm,” checks note pad, “35 bullets recovered at the scene. One bullet entered the child’s abdomen, another entered the chest wall.”

“So now we got a triple, Frank.”

“Right. So. . . . Any luck on any slugs we can take to ballistics?” Frank wheedles.

“Well, I have some . . . substances I need to ID still, on Miss Coblentz. It really is incredible: the body of a 32 year old, with the liver and circulatory system of a 70 year old life-time drunk . . . I may be a few hours more, and I may need a new notebook.”

He grins; waits. “That’s a witticism, gentlemen.”

“And the slugs?”

“Well, I must say, you appear to be intent, intent on this case. Well, the good news is, there were four slugs in excellent condition, really rather surprisingly excellent condition, just wild good luck, is all. Sent to ballistics 45 minutes ago. With just a cursory examination--of course it’s not my area, just a cursory exam--I’d say a standard-issue service 9mm Glock, service weapon?”

Pembleton cuts him off. “So now you’re moonlighting in Ballistics? How can you possibly ID it as a service weapon?”

“Might that be a problem, ahm, internally?” Griscom grins at Pembleton’s discomfort. “It seems that Officer Pratt at the scene noticed some tell-tale evidence. My people overheard the discussion--not, you understand, that they are in the habit of eavesdropping.”

“No, of course not.” Again with the smile. Frank’s politesse covers his annoyance, barely.

“Furthermore, the bullets recovered from these two, ahm, two and one-half unfortunates do, indeed, in my admittedly uninformed opinion, resemble 9mm ammunition.”

“Thank you for your uninformed opinion, Dr. Griscom. I appreciate the advice, I really do.” Pembleton again flashes the pearly whites. “But may I ask you--as a personal favor--to keep this bit of personal opinion entirely, ah, personal?” Still smiling.
Griscom flashes his own teeth. “Fine. Yes fine, but may I offer--unsolicited--offer unsolicited advice that I think your problem may be, shall we say, extended beyond your primitive protective response at this time?”

“Look. Dr. Griscom, I’m the primary, but please do not refer to this as ‘my problem.’ It is not ‘my problem.’ But thank you for the advice.” End of smile. “I think we’ll head over to Ballistics.”

“Right. Oh, Detective Bayliss? Heard about the great postcard. As Lenin would have said, ‘Happy May Day. Eat the rich.’ And, may I add: Whomever and wherever they might be.”
***
Munch, watching the crappy TV in the lunchroom, sees it tirst and calls “Hey, hey Frank!” and cranks up the volume. “. . . WBAL live, from SoWeBo, at the scene of a particularly grisly mother-daughter killing. Ms Baumgardner, tell us what you know.”

“Lee said he was going to kill her, and I guess he did, like he said. Her place is roped off, and they say an amb’lance left just past noon and Susie and Tiffi were in it.”

Munch, with commentary: “Brilliant guess, bimbo! Hey, Bayliss, maybe the May Day postcard was from her! And what a beauty she is, too. Look at the hair, she looks like a blonde poodle.”

Bayliss grabs a note pad, starts taking notes. Hisses, “Shut up, John.”

But Munch can’t stop: “She does look like a poodle--look at that ratted-up pompom of hair at the forehead, with the long, frizzy sides, like ears. . . .“

The camera woman prompts Baumgardner, “This is Lee ----?“

“Lee Ambush. He’s a narcotics cop.” Poodlehead says, and smiles witlessly into the camera.

Pembleton twitches like he’s taken quick jab in the gut. “Son of a bitch!” He doesn’t look at Bayliss who’s scribbling as fast as he can.

“Shut up!” It’s Munch’s turn to shout at Pembleton, as the news goes from merely awful to catastrophic.

But Poodlehead is only warming up. She may not get her full 15 minutes of fame, but it may be the most she gets. “They smoked rocks 24/7. Lee smacked Susie around, she told him to [bleep] off, threw him out. Lee calls me, says he’s going to [bleep] her up good. Kill her, he meant. Susie was stupid that way. I mean, I love her like my own sister, but I got to say, she was a whore. She collected men like baseball cards. Lee didn’t like that, and smacked he around so she’d stop. She didn’t stop. He stopped her. It seems like he stopped her for good, now.”

Munch is entranced: “Now this, this is a friend: ‘I love her like my own sister.’ Hah!”

“Shut up. Shut up!” Pembleton is shouting into the phone: “Yeah, this is Pembleton, Homicide; get a uniform at the Coblentz scene in Southwest to look out of the window, go outside, grab the woman talking into the camera, and bring her in now. Now! Thank you.”

On the TV they see a uniform barreling out the front door and down the stoop, ending the interview by hustling Ms Baumgardner into a cruiser. Munch continues to watch the screen, riveted. “ ‘I love her like my own sister’,” he cackles.

“You are one sick bastard, John.”

Giardello has been on the phone. Now he fills the doorway, magisterial, beckoning. “Pembleton, Bayliss. We don’t spend enough quality time together. In my office, please.”

The two men don’t bother to exchange looks. They both know it won’t be good.

Their lieutenant cuts to the chase. “I understand WBAL has just broadcast their own, fairly fruitful investigation of your mother-daughter. Killer might be a cop. Comments?”

Pembleton, with notes, plunges in. “The initial report was phoned in by the landlord, a Charles Scott Kestenbaum the third. He had no info; said he would look for a phone number for Coblentz’s father and get back to us; this was at 11:15--two hours ago. OK,” he anticipates Gee’s comments, “time for a call back. Uniforms canvassing available tenants and neighbors: nothing. The girlfriend must have shown up just as the news crew from WBAL did. We’ve been with the ME and Ballistics: 35 bullets from a 17-magazine, 9mm Glock.”

Giardello rumbles, “That was the brass upstairs on my phone just now, confirming that Ambush had an 8 a.m. shift this morning, but no show, and no call.”

Pembleton continues, grimly. “Gee, we don’t have squat on Ambush. There was no hint of a boyfriend, never mind a name.”
Giardello gives voice to the inevitable question, “You’ve been in communication with IA about this?”

Pembleton begins the spin: “Gee, our esteemed lieutenant. . . .“

“Wait right there, Frank. Am I right? The answer to my question is ‘no’ ?“

Frank dodges. “There is no mystery here, no larger force at work. We think it would be easier all around if we get our end together, get the Ballistics report in hand. Even better, find this guy Ambush. Tie it all up nice and neat before turning it over to IA.”

“Let me get this, Frank: ‘easier all around, ‘ and ‘get our end together.’ I’ll tell you this, you get our end together, because I don’t want to find our end out, cold, hanging in the wind. Capisce?”

Without a knock, Munch opens the door: “Pembleton, line 3; it’s a guy who says he’s the father of Tiffani Suzanne Firey, saw the broadcast in Frederick County. Name is Jack Firey.”

Stivers is behind Munch: “Line 2; Eugene Coblentz, father of Suzanne Coblentz--his wife saw the live TV spot.”

Bayliss:  “I’ll take line 2, the little girl’s father?”

 Pembleton: “Then I’m line 3.”
***
Stivers is dispatched to interview her old bunkies in Narcotics, and Munch is in the right place at the right time: Detective to Poodlehead, in the Aquarium.

They learn that Pembleton made the right call: a slam-dunk it is, but one with some nasty action on the sidelines. The reconvene at 2:25 p.m. in Giardello’s office.

“What do we know?” Giardello begins. “Frank?”

“Ms Coblentz’s father is on his way from Frederick County to ID the body; he’ll drive in with the child’s father; they’re acquainted. Mr. Coblentz says that his daughter told him Monday that she had ended her live-in relationship with Robert E. Lee Ambush, Detective, Narcotics, Baltimore Police Department. Because Ambush had repeatedly beaten her. Mr. Coblentz reports that his daughter, to his knowledge, has used crack and alcohol for years. He’s met Ambush and can ID him.”

“Didn’t the father find it odd that her use wasn’t curtailed when she was living with a Narcotics detective?”

“He said that, at first, he hoped it meant that she had quit using. But in fact, she appeared to increase her use.”

Gee turns his attention to Stivers. “Tern? What have you got.”

She ducks her head. “Not much.”

“Not much? Why am I not surprised? I suppose they all told you that he’s a regular Boy Scout, helps little old ladies across the street. Do you know Ambush, Stivers?”

“We worked together, yeah, socialized some.”

Munch leers over his glasses, “Lewis told me you were an item, Stivers.”

“Hey, not an item. We went out socially a few times.”

“And?”

“It ended. It’s not news anywhere that Lee Ambush was--is--a major party boy. And he’s a mama’s boy: 35 years old, living with his retired father and mother to save on rent money, spends it on his car.”

Munch again interrupts: “Yeah, Lewis told me. ‘57 ‘Vette convertible. All stock.”

Bayliss perks up at this information. “Yeah? My motorhead cousin Kurt had one. Really pretty car. Red on white?”
Stivers confirms, “Yeah, red on white, red on white.” Shakes her head. “Hey, but I don’t move that fast, and we ended friends.”

Giardello is back on topic. “Was he using then?”

“He was in this fast group, driving to the shore on days off, chartering deep-sea boats, drinking it up. He was wild, but a good guy. A stand-up guy. That’s what I have from Narcotics: ‘Good guy, stand-up guy. A little wild, but would do anything for you.’ Blah blah blah. I got nothing, Gee.”

“But no one knows where he is.”

“Nothing.”

 “You met his parents?” Gee asks, and Stivers nods. “So go and see them. Ask them if they’ve heard from him.” She’s dismissed, and the focus moves. “Munch?”

“Welcome to Life with Poodlehead: Kellie Janine Baumgardner, 28, White, single, stupid, unemployed bar waitress, recently moved here from Purcelleville, West Virginia. Bad hair, bad brains. States that she witnessed Detective Ambush deliver, use, sell controlled substances over a period of months. Aided and abetted him in same. States she saw Detective Ambush viciously and repeatedly beat Suzanne Pauline Coblentz, 32, also White, single, stupid, and marginally employed as a freelance manicurist. States that she received a phone call from Detective Ambush on Wednesday, threatening to, quote, shoot Ms Coblentz to pieces, unquote, if she didn’t let him back in the apartment. At that time, Detective Ambush said that he would wait until Thursday, when the little girl would be away with her dad for her sixth birthday. Ms Baumgardner states that she took him seriously enough to stay away from her main sources of supply until today. She photo-IDed Detective Ambush with no hesitation.”

“Bayliss?”

“I got Jack Firey, the little girl’s father. Electronics repairman, lives in Point of Rocks, Maryland. As Frank said, on his way here with Coblentz’s father. Says he only dealt with the girl’s mother to be with the little girl. He confirms that he was supposed to pick up his daughter on Thursday, for her sixth birthday. But the mother screws up, as usual--she wasn’t home at the arranged time. He waits around for a while, finally gives up and leaves. Spends the afternoon and early evening at Mitzi’s Gentlemen’s Lounge in Funkstown, Maryland. Today, he learns from the TV that both mother and daughter are dead.” Bayliss pauses in his recitation. “He sounds pretty broken up over the girl.”

“Does he know the boyfriend?”

“He knows his name, that he’s a Narcotics cop. That he supplied the victim. That both cop and girlfriend’s habits got much worse after they got together.”

“Charming,” Giardello booms. “Alright, Munch, go down the hall and see if you can’t jog the memories of our friends in Narcotics. Someone must know the boyfriend’s habits, his hang-outs. Pembleton, Bayliss, wait for the father and grandfather. If they’ve bailed Coblentz out of her scrapes in the past, they might know where boyfriend is hiding. Drive them around if you have to.”

Gee’s troops quickly disperse.
***
3:06 p.m., Stivers knocks on the Ambush family’s door. The gray-white marble stoop of the three-bay brick row house is immaculate. Lee’s mother answers the door.

“Hi, Mrs. Ambush, it’s Tern Stivers, from the Department, remember me?” Pretty, sweet. “I was wondering, have you heard from Lee lately?”

“Yes.” Mrs. Ambush frowns--which had always been her greeting.

“Mrs. Ambush, do you or Mr. Ambush know where Lee is?”

“In his room, with the flu.”

Stivers finds that her mouth is hanging open, and closes it. “You say that Lee is here?

“He’s been vomiting since yesterday, shaking with fever chills.” As the mother speaks, the muscles in her face sag. “He’s very sick. He came home.”

Stivers lifts her left foot up to the next step, closer to the door.

“His father and I know what he did. You’re here to arrest him. He can’t walk.” The door opens and the mother steps out of the way.

Stivers enters and steps beyond Mrs. Ambush, who motions her forward, to go on her own. Through the living room to the stairs at the far right. Up the narrow stairs to the landing, left across the landing, left and up a short flight. Second floor, first door on the right. She can hear a television through the doorway. The door opens into the room. She takes her duty weapon from its holster under her light jacket--force of habit--and walks just short of the doorway and says, loudly, “Lee, it’s Tern Stivers.”

No answer. Waiting, in the quiet, she can smell the vomit from the doorway. “Lee, it’s Tern Stivers.” Quiet.

Her eyes wide in concentration, steadying the nervous twitch in her thigh, she approaches the open doorway, her back to the wall, her head up and turned slightly to the left to see beyond the opening. She sees Ambush asleep on a single bed, his bare skin ashy and slick with sweat. There is no weapon in sight; he is nearly naked, barely covered by a sheet. “Lee.” She approaches more closely. “Lee!” Touches his shoulder; shakes his shoulder. He opens his eyes.

“Lee, it’s Tern Stivers.” Ambush turns his head slightly, focusses on her face.

“Tern. Hey.” His words are indistinct, his tongue swollen.

Stivers holsters her handgun.

“Lee.” She sees that he is barely able to move. “I’m here to ask you about Susie Coblentz.”

“I ‘m screwed, Tern,” he croaks. “I know I ‘m screwed.”

Stivers waits for more words, but they don’t come. “She’s shot, Lee. The girl is dead too.”

“I saw Kellie on TV, Tern.” Closes his eyes. “It’s out of control. That bitch got me . . . out of control. I can’t run. I can’t even walk. Honey, I got a real serious problem.”

Ambush looks down at Stivers’s knees and doesn’t raise his eyes. “I know what happens next,” he says, “just do it.”

***
Munch knocks before entering. “Gee, Stivers is on line 2 for you.”

Giardello stands as he takes the call. “Tern, any information?”

“Ambush went home to be with his mother. I’m calling from outside the house.”

“No! He took this back to his parents? What is this guy?”

“He’s in real bad shape, Gee. His mother says the flu--flu my ass. Worst case of withdrawal I’ve seen. I just called an ambo to get him to the U Maryland ER. Can I have a uniform meet me there so I can get back and do the paperwork?”

“Tern, you got a confession from Ambush?”

“Yeah.”

***

3:15 p.m., Firey and. Coblentz enter the squad. room, and. tind Bayliss. Firey does the talking. “Detective Bayliss? Jack Firey. Tiffani Suzanne’s. . . .“ and stops. “We spoke on the phone.”

Bayliss unfolds his bulk from behind his desk and then stands, towering oven both. Height as a weapon. Decides to offer his hand to first to Coblentz, then to Firey.

“Please accept the condolences of the Department for your losses,” he says, his voice as cold as the air in Gniscom’s office.

“An officer will escort you to the Medical Examiner’s. But first, we need you to review and sign off on the statements that you gave earlier oven the phone.”

Finey and Coblentz comply, docile. Obviously not from the city.

“You spoke with Detective Pembleton earlier, Mr. Coblentz,” Bayliss says, as he leads the older man to Frank’s desk. Coblentz is startled to be confnonted with this articulate, Black, alpha male. Definitely from the county.

The Aquarium is at capacity with 2 plainclothes, with 2 scowling charges each. So Bayliss sits Firey in the Box--one on one, but this will be no contest. This guy is already beat. Middle 30s, black Irish, slight but well-built. Good guy to have behind you in a fight, maybe, but a guy who left his kid behind unprotected.

“Can I get you anything to dnink while we do this, Mn. Firey? Soda, or coffee?”

“No. But wouldn’t mind a smoke.” Bayliss shrugs, and he lights up.

   “Thanks.”

Bayliss checks his note pact. Atter Stivens’s call, the investigation is done. But the mystery remains: how does a god-awful mess like this start? What kind of guy abandons his kid? Bayliss tries to hear Frank’s voice in his head: This is not our problem. “Mr. Finey, 15 minutes ago Lee Ambush confessed; he’s in custody now.”

Firey lowers the cigarette from his mouth and crushes the end with his index finger on an ashtray, exhales, his face still. When his mouth opens again, a scream of rage and grief escapes, frightening them both. Bayliss sits still, watching, as Firey rolls forward, drops his chin to his chest, wraps his arms around his head, and sobs. Bayliss sits still.

The horrible, unexpected keening noise stops. Firey wipes his face on the sleeve of his plaid shirt and looks up. “Sonny.”
Breathes. “I guess it’s all done.”

Bayliss says, “I just hoped you’d be able confirm the information you gave on the phone.” Backing off.

Finey looks at Bayliss and his note pad. “I met Susie at a Labor Day barbecue. What are the odds she gets pregnant, night? I got a good job, I move her in with me and my boy, Jack Jr., and I pay all the bills. But after Tiffani Suzanne is born, Susie gets boned staying home while I work, and it hits the fan. I can’t have her with drugs in my house--my boy is 13, and I send him to a private Adventist school. So Susie leaves, and takes Tiffani Suzanne with her. Me and hen mom and dad, we go to Social Services, and say, she’s an unfit mother, give the baby to us. No dice--Susie’s got no arrests, they say, can’t do it. We try and try. Frankly, I been saving up, I’ve been arranging to take Tiffani Suzanne and Jack Jr. to Mexico.”

Bayliss stares, incnedulous. “Kidnapping is a felony, Mr. Finey.”

“Yeah, but if I had--but, if I had--” Tears, but no more gasping howls; Bayliss is surprised to leann how grateful he is for that.
Firey again wipes his face, looks at Bayliss. “Susie’s dad asked me on the way here if Susie could be buried with Tiffani Suzanne, in our family graveyard on my granddad’s farm. Mother and daughter together. I hope you understand that we’ve got to go make some plans.” He starts to push his chain back fnom the table.

Bayliss stands and gives Finey a hand up, and moves him, not ungently, to the door.
***
Bayliss stands alone on the rooftop, his fingens threaded through the chain-link, staring across the water at the orange Domino Sugar sign. He turns at the approaching footsteps, then nods. “Frank.”

Pembleton steps up to the fence. “Nasty case, but easy. Just about closed itself.”

“Be grateful for small favons, huh, Fnank?,” Tim says, still dazed. His partner nods. The two stand a while in silence, until Tim says, so quietly his words are almost lost in the lap of water, “He tnied to protect her, but he couldn’t.”

“Who protects who?”

“The father of the little ginl. Firey. He said that he tried and tried to protect her, but he didn’t protect hen. He couldn’t.”

Frank suggests, “Maybe nobody could.”

“He couldn’t because everyone else was covering their asses. Our thin blue line, the thin gnay line of bureaucrats; they all just circled the wagons. Not one person would listen to that cry for help.”

Frank sighs, “Yeah. May Day, May Day.”

***
5 p.m. Bayliss, on the way out, greets Lewis, on the way in. “So hey, Meldrick, what’s your progress with the north-end bludgeoning?”

“Slam dunk, Bayliss. The butler did it.”

“Yeah, ha ha. Really. What?”

“Yeah, ha ha, really. Slam dunk. Chalk another one up for the Lewis/Falsone machine. Read my lips. Confession. Crime of passion. Butler. Did it. So howz your day?”

“Yeah, well. Even heard of the poet named T.S. Eliot?”

“Yeah. So?”

“He wrote, ‘this is how the world ends, not with a bang, but a whimper’ .“

“Hey, that’s deep, Timmy. Listen, I got some poetry for you: ‘Hooray, hooray, the first of May, . .

“Screw you, Meldnick.”

And this is how it ends in Charm City CID: not with a bang, but a snicker.

***
In memory of little “Tiffani Suzanne Firey,” safe with, and from, her mother at last. God forgive us for what we do, and don’t do.