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"Now?"
"To took place, and that was the one that's supposed to have spooked Barbara Ettinger"
"You think the same person-"
"Louis Pinell admits to the Sheepshead Bay , either I'uess I want to talk to somebody as on the scene, someone who saw the body There were sos that were held back froe, and they were duplicated in Barbara's murder Imperfectly duplicated, and I want to know if there was any parallel in the other Brooklyn homicide"
"And if there ould it prove? That there was a second killer, a maniac who confined himself to Brooklyn?"
"And who conveniently stopped at two killings It's possible It wouldn't even rule out so Barbara Say her husband decided to kill her, but he realized the Icepick Prowler hadn't been to Brooklyn yet, so he killed soer in Sheepshead Bay first to establish a pattern"
"Do people do things like that?"
"There's nothing you can iine that somebody hasn't done at one ti the woman in Sheepshead Bay Then he orried that the murder would stand out as the only one of its kind in Brooklyn, so he went after Barbara Or maybe that was just his excuse Maybe he killed a second time because he'd found out that he enjoyed it"
"God" She drank vodka "What was the physical detail?"
"You don't want to know about it"
"You protecting the little woh the eyes An icepick, right through the eyeballs"
"Jesus And theā¦ what did you call it? Iot it in one eye"
"Like a wink" She sat for a long lass and noticed that it was empty She went to the bar and calasses she left the bottles on the slate-topped table
"I wonder why he would do a thing like that," she said
"That's another reason I'd like to see Pinell," I said "To ask him"
THE conversation turned this way and that At one point she asked whether she should call me Matt or Matthew I told her it didn't matter to me She said it mattered to her that I call her not Janice but Jan
"Unless you're unco murder suspects by their first names"
When I was a cop I learned always to call suspects by their first nae I told her she wasn't a suspect
"I was at the Happy Hours all that afternoon," she said "Of course it would be hard to prove after all these years At the time it would have been easy Alibis must be harder to come by for people who live alone"
"You live alone here?"
"Unless you count the cats They're hiding so them your ID wouldn't impress them much"
"Real hard-liners"
"Uh-huh I've always lived alone Since I left Eddie, that is I've been in relationships but I always lived alone"
"Unless we count the cats"
"Unless we count the cats I never thought at the tiht years I thought a relationship with a woht be different in so time I decided the problem was men"
"And it wasn't?"
"Well, it may have been one of the problems Women turned out to be another problem For a while I decided I was one of those fortunate people who are capable of relationships with both sexes"
"Just for a while?"
"Uh-huh Because what I discovered next was that I may be capable of relationships with ood at relationships"
"Well, I can relate to that"
"I figured you probably could You live alone, don't you, Matthew?"
"For a while now"
"Your sons are with your wife? I'm not psychic There's a picture of them in your wallet"
"Oh, that It's an old picture"
"They're handsoood kids, too" I added a little Scotch to lass "They live out in Syosset They'll take the train in now and then and we catch a ball gaht at the Garden"
"They must enjoy that"
"I know I enjoy it"
"You o"