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But I’m a cop, and Holland is a thief, and what cops are supposed to do is lock up thieves.

Maybe Wohl, if I went to him, would understand. He understands that some thieves are fucking pillars of the community. Christ, he locked up Judge Findermann, didn’t he?

You’re dreaming, Poor Jack Malone. You don’t have anything to go on except a gut feeling, and if you said that to Wohl, you’d soon be commanding officer of the rubber-gun squad.

Inside the outer doors was a small flight of stairs. Malone went up that, and then through a second set of doors. He heard scurrying noises that experience told him was the sound of rats.

I wonder what the hell they eat in here? It doesn’t look like anybody has been in here in years.

He waited for a moment, to let his eyes adjust to the dim light, and then went left down a corridor. The ancient hardwood floor squealed and creaked under his weight. There was a sign with PRINCIPAL still lettered on a door. He pushed that open and looked inside.

There was a counter inside, and several open doors, through which he could see rooms that could be used as Wohl’s and Sabara’s office.

“We could put the boss in there, I suppose,” he said.

“Jesus!”

“And you, Officer Payne,” Malone said. “I can see your desk right there by the hole in the wall.”

“Do they really think we can use this place?” Payne asked.

“I think the inspector is desperate,” Malone said. “We’re sitting in each other’s laps at Bustleton and Bowler.”

“Well, there’s a big enough parking lot. Already fenced in. We could start with that, I suppose, and build on it.”

“Where?” Malone asked, and then went to a window and looked out where Payne pointed.

“I was reading the grant, and there’s—”

“What?”

“The Justice Department Grant,” Payne said. “That’s where we got the money for Special Operations. A.C.T. It stands for Augmented Crime Teams.”

Interesting. He’s probably the only guy in Special Operations besides Wohl and Sabara who ever heard of the grant, much less read it.

“You were saying?”

“There’s money in there, available on application, for capital improvement. About a hundred grand, if I remember correctly. The question is, would fixing this dump up be considered a ‘capital improvement’?”

“I don’t know,” Malone said. “It’s a thought.”

“I’ll mention it to the inspector,” Payne said.

Malone went back in the corridor and down it and into another room. It was a boys’ room.

“Well, there’s something else we could start with and build on,” Malone said. “I saw a Highway guy this morning who’s small enough to use one of those urinals.”

“Hay-zus,” Payne chuckled.

“What?”

“Hay-zus—Jesus—Martinez. He’s a quarter of an inch and maybe two pounds over Department minimums.”

“How did he get in Highway? Most of those guys are six feet something?”

&nb

sp; “He was one of the two of the inspector’s first probationary Highway Patrolmen. He was a Narc. He and his partner were the ones who caught the guy who killed Dutch Moffitt. The inspector gave him a chance to see if he could make Highway, and he did.”