Buried on Avenue B by Peter de Jonge Page A

me.”
    â€œEighty percent of the kids in New York do that. Why’d you wait three years to file a missing person report?”
    â€œI thought that if I was patient, she would just walk in the door one day. I still hope that will happen.”

 
    CHAPTER 21
    AT 3:05 A.M. O’Hara and Jandorek visit Malmströmer again, this time in his home at 538 East Sixth Street. The rooster on the roof crows like a Doberman and Malmströmer, a tired man in a bathrobe, is shown the freshly signed warrant.
    â€œYou have a permit for livestock?” says Jandorek.
    â€œYou came in the middle of the night for that?”
    â€œNo. We came to search your apartment and basement. The warrant is good for both. Let’s start at the bottom.” They drag him down seven flights and wait for him to open the steel padlock below a large KEEP OUT sign. Inside is a well-appointed workshop, lined with band- and jigsaws, a planer and a lathe.
    â€œWe hear you spend a lot of time down here, Mr. Malmströmer. What do you do?”
    â€œMake things.”
    â€œWhat sort of things?”
    â€œAnything I want to.”
    With a tip of his finger, Jandorek nudges an expensive drill just far enough over the edge of his worktable so that it falls onto the cement floor. They step over it and walk to the far end of the shop, where a small dresser, recently stained, is drying. Although the scale is Lilliputian, the detail and design are exquisite. “Why so small?” asks O’Hara.
    â€œIt takes up less space.”
    â€œAnd you’ll give it away, like your tomatoes?”
    Malmströmer doesn’t reply.
    â€œWho’d you make it for, Mr. Malmströmer?”
    â€œI made it for myself.”
    â€œI thought you were going to say it’s for your grandchild,” says Jandorek. “But you don’t have any, do you? Because you threw your own daughter into the street for smoking a joint or holding hands. And your other daughter hates you because you spy on her with binoculars.”
    â€œShe doesn’t hate me.”
    In the corner of the room is a half door, also steel, fortified and padlocked.
    â€œWhat’s back there?”
    â€œNothing much.”
    â€œOpen it,” says Jandorek, and it occurs to O’Hara that her partner’s hard-on for Malmströmer may be related to his hard-on for Fagerland. Malmströmer takes out his keys. With his hands shaking, he struggles to separate the right one from the ring and slide it into the lock. Finally he undoes the bolt and pushes open the door. It takes several seconds for a flickering light to come all the way on. When it does, they see a low-ceilinged room crammed with wooden miniatures as beautifully crafted as the dresser. Among the furnishings are a bunk bed, a desk, and a rocking chair. There’s also a pair of hand-crafted hockey sticks, a scooter, and a small perfectly proportioned dark green canoe with a white pinstripe.
    â€œI thought you said you didn’t have grandchildren.”
    â€œI don’t.”
    â€œSo why all this?” asks Jandorek.
    â€œI drove Inga away, but it’s not too late for Christina. She could still have a family.”
    O’Hara stares back into the crawl space. The old world pieces seem too small to contain all the anguish and love that has been instilled in them.

 
    CHAPTER 22
    O’HARA SITS AT her desk and tries not to flinch every time Kelso walks by. If their roles were reversed, O’Hara would be just as pissed. A week after they brought the kid out of the ground, they still don’t even have an ID, and her only suspect, Henderson, is both incompetent and incontinent. Even though Gus got the body wrong, he got the burial spot right, so there has to be a connection, but the thought of returning to his malodorous apartment is no more appealing than sparking up another adult chat with Kelso.
    â€œAny ideas?” O’Hara asks Jandorek.
    â€œI was