PART 35 by John Nicholas Iannuzzi Page A

Luis?”
    â€œI told you they can’t be mine cause I wasn’t there.”
    â€œI know I repeat a lot of these questions, and I know you give me the answers, but I want you to understand that I must have the absolute truth. Do you understand? If your fingerprints are there, we’re in tough shape, and I want to know what shape we’re in before we walk into court.”
    â€œI know that. But you can believe me. Those are not my fingerprints there.”
    â€œAll right.”
    â€œListen, did you check who was the womans who look at me through the glass at the police station?”
    â€œI told you we got some information, but no names yet. I have the fellow whose apartment was burglarized finding out for us. You have no idea what any of the women looked like? Or if they identified you?”
    â€œNo. I know some witnesses came, cause they had me standing in this room, you know. And there was two police, and there was a door between them with a mirror like. And they made me stand on one side, and I had to bend down and twist around this way and up and down. I know it was womans. I could hear. I think they was Puerto Rican, on the other side, but I don’t know who.”
    â€œCan you describe any of them?” Sandro pressed.
    â€œI don’t know cause I couldn’t see through the mirror. But Hernandez’s wife was downstairs. I saw her downstairs. Maybe she saw this woman come in, and then you could find out from her.”
    Sandro made a note. “Did you know Hernandez before this?”
    â€œWell, I use to see him around Delancey around Essex Street, Rivington Street. He use to hang around there. And I would see him from time to time, you know, with a bag or something, but I never hang around with him.”
    â€œWhere does Jorge, this superintendent, live?”
    â€œIn the same building where I live. Sixty-four South Ninth Street.”
    â€œHave any visitors come to see you here?”
    â€œNo, nobody. Not yet.”
    â€œDo you have any relatives in New York?”
    â€œI have a brother. But he don’t come. I have a mother, too, in Puerto Rico, but she’s very sick. I have my wife and kids.”
    â€œIs this the woman you married in church?”
    Alvarado looked at Sandro and shrugged slightly. “No, this is another one. This is the woman I really love, Tina. But she’s away now.”
    â€œAway?”
    â€œYeah, she’s with the authorities for a while, but I wrote to her, and she is going to write to me.”
    Sandro shrugged slightly.
    â€œThis is a very tough case, Luis. I don’t want you to think any other thing while you’re here. I don’t know what’s going to happen, and I can’t promise anything. I’ll fight to the last drop of blood, if necessary, if you’re right. But remember, if you are lying, it is you and not me who is going to suffer. You understand?”
    â€œI understand, believe me. And believe me, I didn’t do this thing.”
    â€œOkay. Keep thinking, and write down anything new you remember.”

CHAPTER VIII
    Sandro walked up the stone steps and entered the Seventh Precinct station house. Just inside, to the left, was a long counter and desk. A sergeant sat behind it, writing. A shortwave radio squawked somewhere. A patrolman, routing calls, manned a switchboard to the side of the sergeant. The noises of a typewriter clacking and a large fan moving the warm air around filled the background. Everything was painted light green—old, dusty, light green. Paint peels clung to the walls. There were many posters and announcements. The wooden floor was similar to hundreds of wooden floors in New York’s old public schools, the cracks between the old boards routed with age, the nails shiny from being polished by generations of feet. The only difference was that in the schools you could always dig your pencil into the cracks and come up with some old lead points, broken