She ignored the reply.

"Finally, on what grounds are you asking me to reverse the magistrate's decision to grant bail?"

"That these people pose a threat to society," Callis replied. "That there is a strong possibility they will jump bail, that they are continuing to engage in criminal activity . . ."

"How can you possibly know these things, Mr. District Attorney, if you can't even give me the names of the people we're talking about?"

"By now, Your Honor," Coughlin said, "Mike Weisbach should have the names."

"You don't know know that, Dennis," she said. that, Dennis," she said.

"May I use your phone, Your Honor?"

She waved at the telephone on an end table.

Coughlin went to it and dialed a number from memory.

"Malone, have we got a location on Inspector Weisbach?" he asked.

There was a reply.

Coughlin smiled and hung up.

"Well?" Judge McCandless asked.

"Your Honor, I was just informed that Staff Inspector Weisbach has for the past ten minutes been parked outside."

Judge McCandless nodded.

"Well, Dennis, why don't you go out and ask him to come in?" she said. "The more the merrier, so to speak."

"Thank you, Your Honor."

Weisbach came into the comfortably furnished living room two minutes later, carrying a large manila envelope stuffed with Xerox copies of the records from Central Lockup.

"Good morning, Your Honor," he said.

"If I knew you were coming, Inspector Weisbach, I would have baked a cake," Judge McCandless replied. "What have you got?"

"The names of all prisoners transported to Central Lockup after their arrest by the Narcotics Five Squad in the last ten days, Your Honor."

Judge McCandless put out her hand for the envelope. Weisbach gave it to her.

She went through each record carefully. From time to time, her eyebrow rose, or her mouth pursed, or she shook her head from side to side in what could have been contempt or resignation.

Then she handed the stack of paper back to Weisbach.

"You've got twenty-two-give or take a couple-names in there-"

"Twenty-two, Your Honor," Weisbach said.

"In my opinion, the magistrates erred in granting bail in eleven cases, on various grounds, such as the individual has in the past violated the bail privilege; and/or in my judgment poses a threat to society; and/or based on past criminal behavior with which I am personally familiar is probably continuing to engage in criminal activity."

"Just eleven of them, Your Honor?"

She ignored the question. "If presented by an appeal to override the magistrates' decision to grant bail by competent authority-such as the district attorney-I would be inclined to override."

"Just half of them, Your Honor?" Coughlin pursued.

"How clever of you, Dennis. Despite allegations to the contrary, you can can divide by two, can't you? Don't push your luck. Just pick your eleven." divide by two, can't you? Don't push your luck. Just pick your eleven."

"I'll have the appeals in your chambers by ten o'clock," Callis said. "I presume we may act now on Your Honor's verbal authority?"

"You may not," Judge McCandless said. "You put a duly executed appeal in my hands, and I'll sign it. You don't move until then."

"That'll take hours!" Coughlin thought aloud.

"Unless you type them yourself," the judge said. "I have a typewriter. Can anybody type?"

"I can, Your Honor," Weisbach said.

"And I wouldn't be at all surprised if Tony remembers what to say in an appeal," she said. "May I suggest you pick your eleven and get started?"

Detective Kenneth J. Summers, a portly forty-year-old, looked around the Homicide Unit and saw there was no one else immediately available to answer the telephone, muttered an obscenity, and punched the flashing b.u.t.ton on his telephone.

"Homicide, Detective Summers."

"This is Chief Coughlin," his caller announced. "Who's the lieutenant?"

"Lieutenant Natali, sir."

"No one answers that phone."

"The lieutenant must have stepped out for a minute, sir."

What the h.e.l.l does Coughlin want this time of the morning?

"Who's the sergeant?"

"Sergeant Hobbs, sir."

"Get him on the horn, will you?"

"He's with Lieutenant Natali, sir. Is there anything I can do?"

"What I'm trying to do, Summers, is avoid having to wake up Captain Quaire. Or, for that matter, Chief Lowenstein."

Captain Henry C. Quaire was the commanding officer of the Homicide Unit. Chief Inspector Matt Lowenstein was commanding officer of the detective division, which includes the Homicide Unit.

"What do you need, Chief?"

"I need-specifically, Sergeant Washington needs-the use of your interview room."

"I'm sure there'll be no problem about that, sir."

"I don't want anybody asking questions about it, or talking about it."

"No problem there, either, sir. When does Jason want to use it?"

"Right now. As soon as he can get there."

"It's his, sir."

"Highway is about to bring you the man he wants to interview. What I want you to do, Summers, is handcuff him to the chair and leave him there until Washington shows up."

"Yes, sir."

"When Lieutenant Natali returns, you tell him I'll explain this to him later, and in the meantime, I want him to sit on it. Same thing if Captain Quaire shows up there. If Chief Lowenstein does, ask him to call me."

"Yes, sir."

The line went dead in Detective Summers's ear.

Five minutes later, a Highway Patrol sergeant and a Highway Patrol officer appeared in the anteroom of the Homicide Unit, which is on the second floor of the Roundhouse. With them they had a very large, angry-appearing black man wearing a gray sweatshirt, baggy blue athletic trousers, bedroom slippers, a golden chain with a three-inch gold medallion, and handcuffs.

"What the f.u.c.k am I doing in here?" Mr. Marcus C. (aka Baby) Brownlee inquired.

"Put him in there," Detective Summers said, pointing to the interview room.

"I want my f.u.c.king lawyer!" Brownlee announced.

The Highway Patrol sergeant, a slight, very intense black man, guided Mr. Brownlee into the interview room, indicated that he should take a seat in a metal captain's chair bolted to the floor, and turned to Detective Summers.

"One wrist, or both?"

"Did you hear what I said?" Brownlee indignantly demanded.

The Highway Patrol sergeant put his index finger before his mouth and said, "Sssshhh!"

"He's big, but one should hold him," Detective Summers decided and announced.

Brownlee's right wrist was placed in a handcuff, the other end of which pa.s.sed through a hole in the seat of the steel captain's chair.

The Highway Patrol sergeant left the interview room and closed the door after him.

"I don't suppose you can tell me what the h.e.l.l this is all about?" Detective Summers said.

"I can, if I want to go back to Traffic on the Last Out," the Highway Patrol sergeant said. "The Black Buddha's on his way. Maybe he'll tell you."

"You just going to take off?"

"We got three more to pick up," the Highway Patrol sergeant announced, gestured to his partner-a Highway patrolman of Polish extraction even larger than Brownlee-to follow him, and walked out of the Homicide Unit.

Detective Summers went into the room adjacent to the interview room and looked through the one-way mirror at Brownlee.

Brownlee was testing the security of the handcuffs restraining him to the chair. Detective Summers wondered if he should have suggested to the Highway sergeant that both Brownlee's wrists be manacled.

Five minutes later, Sergeant Jason Washington walked into the Homicide Unit. Despite the hour, he was the picture of sartorial elegance. He was wearing a double-breasted dark blue silk suit, a crisp white shirt with a flower-pattern silk necktie that matched the handkerchief in his breast pocket, and a gleaming pair of black Amos Archer wing-tip shoes.

"Welcome home, Jason," Summers said.

"You would be ill-advised, Kenneth, to rub salt in my open wound at this hour of the morning."

The open wound to which Washington referred was his involuntary transfer from Homicide to Special Operations.

"He's in there," Summers said, chuckling. "You want to tell me what's going on?"

Washington considered that a full thirty seconds.

"Solely because a witness might be useful, you have my permission to watch me interview Brownlee. With the clear caveat that I am not furnishing you with something interesting with which to amuse, or edify, others. Do you understand?"

Washington was dead serious, Summers saw.

He nodded his acceptance.

"If anyone else comes in, you will pa.s.s on to them Chief Coughlin's admonition that if anyone lets this cat out of the bag, they may look forward to spending a good deal of time on Last Out."

"You got it, Jason," Summers said.

"The question, Kenneth, is whether or not you do."

"I've got it, Jason," Summers said. got it, Jason," Summers said.

"In that case, into the breach," Washington said, and walked into the interview room.

Summers went into the room adjacent to the interview room and took a chair.

"Who the f.u.c.k are you?" Brownlee inquired of Sergeant Washington.

"My name is Washington, Mr. Brownlee. I'm a police officer."