us.
“No,” I said. “Maybe someday, I’ll look at the cards for you, but not in a public place, okay?”
He rubbed his hands together. “Lovely! I can’t wait. But now I really have to get going,” he said. “Don’t worry, kiddo, your secrets are always safe with me. I’ll catch up with you tomorrow, all right? Try to stay out of jail in the meantime.”
We hugged and I headed via the back entrance to my building to the basement garage where I retrieved my Mini Cooper and slowly made my way through the crowded Greenwich Village streets towards the Holland Tunnel. When I was sitting in line on Seventh Avenue waiting for the traffic light to change and cars to move into the tunnel entrance, I saw a flashing red light coming up in my rear view mirror. There were cars on all four sides of me, and so I had nowhere to move out of the way.
“Pull over, Miss,” a voice instructed. “You, in the red Mini, pull to the right. Yes, you.”
At the green, the car next to me moved ahead and I signaled right. I stopped at the curb and the cruiser pulled in behind me. In short order, two officers approached, one on either side of the little car. I turned down the radio and pulled out my license, holding it out the window for the large policeman to read.
“Registration, Miss,” he said. I pulled the plastic envelope out of the glove compartment and handed it to him, noting that the other cop was walking around, looking in all the windows and assessing my belongings.
“Turn off the car and put the keys on the passenger seat, please,” he said. “I’ll be right back.” He walked away but the other officer, whom I now identified as female, stayed next to the car, her hand resting on her weapon. I reached for my cell phone.
She tapped on the window. “No calls right now. Just sit tight,” she said.
I dropped the phone back in my bag and moved the rear view mirror until I could see the other cop talking on the phone in his black and white. He was nodding; then he got out, motioned to his partner and filled her in. I took the opportunity to dial my own home phone number and waited for the answering machine to engage, then activated the speaker phone.
“Miss.”
The officer surprised me by appearing at my window suddenly. I secured the phone close to my thigh.
“Yes?”
“Detective Friday has instructed me to ask you to kindly remain in Manhattan until the investigation into Mr. Carstairs’ murder has been concluded.”
“Excuse me? Am I under arrest or something?” I asked.
“No, ma’am, it’s just a request.”
“So you aren’t going to take me in or anything?” I waited while he shook his head and handed my documents back. “And you can’t stop me from taking the tunnel to New Jersey to visit my father, can you?”
“Technically, no, we have no power to prevent you from leaving the jurisdiction, Miss, but Detective Friday is requesting that you remain in Manhattan for the time being, if you would be so kind.”
“Tell me, officer, am I a suspect? A ‘person of interest’ in this crime?”
“I have no idea, ma’am, I was just told to keep eyes on you and detain you if you made any attempt to leave the city.”
“Can I have the phone number of this Detective Friday, so I can speak with him directly?” I asked.
He turned away, spoke into his phone, and then jotted a number onto a card and handed it to me.
“Here you are. You can reach him at this number any time.”
“Thank you.” I reached for the keys and started the car. Both officers were still crowding my windows. “Can I do anything else for you?”
“I, um, aren’t you going to call him?” he asked.
“Not right now,” I said. “Please step away.”
“One moment.” He turned away again, but now I could hear him clearly speaking to the detective. “Do you want us to search the vehicle? Uh-huh… I don’t know...I gave her the number. ..Uh-huh…Should we follow her? Yes, sir. Roger that.”
He signaled the other cop. “Okay, thanks for your time, Miss.” They walked back to the cruiser.
Damn, I thought. Are they going to follow me to Princeton? This is ludicrous. Besides, that guy should decide if I’m a Ma’am or a Miss. Talk about bad form.
I hung up the phone and speed-dialed my father, then quickly filled him in on the situation. “So, should I still come down, or do you think you should come up here?”
“I’ll get the train,” he said. “When I know what time I’ll be in the City, I’ll send you a text. We can go somewhere extravagant for dinner. Don’t worry, we’ll get this all straightened out.”
“Okay, Dad,” I said.
“And I called your Uncle Phil for legal advice,” he said. “I’ll see you soon.”
He hung up before I could object to the Uncle Phil call. Oh boy.
It was almost 4:30, and I had no idea how I was going to get out of this lane of traffic without going through the Holland Tunnel and coming back. If it weren’t for the fact that it would cost me twelve bucks, I’d do it just to tick off the cops. Hmmm. Instead, I got out of the car and approached the officers sitting in the cruiser behind me. I knocked on the window.
“Excuse me, but could you possibly create a path for me to get out of here without going in the tunnel? I don’t feel like sitting here for the three hours it will take for there to be a break in the traffic,” I said.
They looked at each other. “Fine,” he said. “Move to the left when I tell you to go.”
It was kind of fun to be the subject of this maneuver, but I accumulated quite a bit of bad traffic karma during the painful exercise that involved one cruiser stopping traffic across four lanes of traffic to enable me to make a left onto Canal Street and get off Seventh Avenue.
Since I had an entourage and some time to kill, I decided to do some shopping in Chinatown. I found a questionable parking lot and paid ten dollars to a boy who was probably not much older, promising him a large almond cookie if I found the car in the same condition that I left it.
“No cookie. Big Mac,” he said, smiling.
We shook on it. I resisted the urge to ask if he wanted fries with that, certain of the affirmative response.
I was determined to inject my own personality into the vanilla apartment that Michael was helping me decorate. First stop, Mrs. Wong’s Emporium. Okay, it was a tourist trap, but I knew what I wanted from my virgin trip below Canal just a couple of months before, and I knew exactly where to find it: a giant golden cat with one perpetually waving paw, symbol of welcome and good luck. Its ornate floral designs and smiling face would add just the right touch of whimsy to Michael’s sophisticated choices for the living room. Fortunately, the large item was extremely lightweight and fit snugly into my front seat.
When
