"Bernie Himmel. Your bookie. Bernie the B You're a gambler, aren't you, Lorenzo?"

"Sometimes I bet on horse races. At the OTB. B don't know this man you're talking about."

"Then you don't remember him telling you to get money or you'd be swimming with your little fishie

"I don't know him. How could he tell me this?"

"After which you went directly to the wall

telephone..."

"No."

"... and called Svetlana Dyalovich. Why,

Did you want to make sure she'd be out of her apartment when you went there to burglarize it?" "Cosa?" he said again.

The stenographer repeated the question. M translated it. Moscowitz cleared his throat.

"Detective," he said, "my client has told you repeatedly that he did not know Svetlana D) did not know her granddaughter, and never went to her apartment on Lincoln Street. Nor does he know a bookmaker named Bernie Himmel or a guy named Jose Santiago. Now, if..."

"He's not a gun dealer."

"Excuse me, I thought he's supposed to have my client a gun."

"He did sell him a gun. But he's not a dealer. He pumps gas at a Texaco station."

"Whatever he does, my client doesn't know him."

Carella figured he kept calling him "my client" only because he couldn't pronounce his last name.

"So unless you have something new to..." "How about a clear chain on the gun, Counselor?" "You!" Moscowitz shouted, and pointed his finger at the stenographer. "Hold it right there." He turned to

Carella. "Is this off the record?" he asked.

"Sure."

The stenographer waited. Carella nodded.

"Then let me hear it," Moscowitz said.

"We've traced the gun from its registered owner..." "Named" "Rodney Pratt."

"TOT".

"Jose Santiago, who stole it from the glove compartment of Pratt's car..." "He's admitted this" "He has."

"And from there... ?"

"To Mr. Schiavinato here, who bought it from him for two hundred and fifty dollars."

"Well, this is where it begins to get speculative, Detective. But let's assume for the moment, arguendo, that my client did buy a gun from this man. How does that make it the murder weaponT"

"The bullets that killed Mrs. Helder and her cat were fired from it.

We found them embedded in the door behind her body and the baseboard behind the cat. We recovered the gun itself in a sewer outside her building. The only thing we don't have is Mr. Schiavinato's fingerprints on the gun, and frankly..."

"Well, that's a very big negative, Detective.

could have fired the gun."

"Perhaps your client..." Byrnes said.

He couldn't pronounce the name, either.

"can explain why he telephoned the minutes before he bought the gun that killed her." "Why exactly did he call her, Lieutenant?" The weak spot.

Byrnes knew it, Carella knew it, Hawes knew it now Moscowitz had zeroed in on it: Why had he called Svetlana before buying the gun he later used to kill her?

"We think he was planning to burglarize her apartment," Carella said. "He called to find out would she be safe. When she'd be home."

It still sounded weak.

"Are you saying he called to ask her when she'd be home? So he could run right over to burglarize..." "Well, no, he didn't ask her flat out."

"Then how did he ask her?"

"I don't know the actual conversation that took

"But you think he was trying to determine she'd be out of the apartment..."

"Yes."

"So he'd know when it would be safe to go into burglarize it."

"Exactly." "In Italian" "What"

"This conversation. Was it in Italian" "Yes, it was. According to a witness." "Because he doesn't speak English, you see."

"I suspect he speaks some English."

"Oh. And why is that?"

"He sells fish to English-speaking people, I'm sure he must speak at least a little English."

"We'll have to ask him, won't we?" Moscowitz said, and smiled sweetly.

"In Italian."

Hawes wanted to smack him, too.

"How long was this phone conversation, do you know?"