innocent. The woman wasn’t completely
convinced, so Mrs. Franklin agreed to go with her to Mr. Cozen’s house to drop
off the child, and she talked to him there.
She noted in her records that Mr. Cozen seemed rather confused and more than a
little embarrassed by the whole thing, but that he was cooperative and assured
Mrs. Franklin to her satisfaction that nothing illicit or untoward had taken
place between him and his daughter. The child was returned and no follow-up was
ever done.”
Titus scribbled down all the information in his notepad,
steering the Mercedes with his knees and with an occasional quick turn of his
left hand before returning to scribble something else.
“Would it be possible to interview Mrs.
Franklin?”
“Um . . . unfortunately she is no longer with
us.”
“Would you happen to know where she’s employed
now?”
“Detective . . . Rita Franklin died two months
ago. She was very old, almost seventy, and she just went in her sleep. She was
at work all day the day before she died. She could never stand the thought of
retirement. Such a sweet old lady.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Listen, thank you very
much for the help, Mrs. Hamilton.”
“That’s Ms. Hamilton, Detective, and you can call
me Judy.”
“Well . . . uh . . . thanks Judy. You have been a
tremendous help.”
Now there was an accusation of sexual misconduct
between Reed and his daughter. What if Reed really was molesting his daughter?
If the mother found out and threatened to leave him and take the kids, or call
the police, that would be a hell of a convincing motive for murder. It would
definitely convince a jury. Juries don’t have much tolerance for crimes against
kids. Baltimore wondered what had made the vice principal so certain the little
girl had been molested. He turned off Frankford Avenue onto Tarsdale. He was only
a mile or two away from Frankford Elementary. He would ask her himself.
Frankford Elementary was one of the older schools
in Philadelphia. It was right next to Frankford’s low-income housing project,
which was right next to an upper-middle class white neighborhood. The fifty-year
old three-story red brick building covered in creeping ivy was a racial
battleground. It was filled with over-privileged white kids and
under-privileged black and Latino kids.
The poor kids saw, in the clothes the
white kids wore and the expensive cars that dropped them off in the morning,
exactly what they would probably never have. The city planner who zoned the
housing projects and the school for that area seemed to have been some kind of
racist out to turn every white kid in that neighborhood into Philadelphia’s
version of Hitler Youth. Their whole perception of the black and Latino
community was of down-trodden, angry, rebellious black and brown faces that
stared out at the white kids from their hellish projects and extorted lunch
money, sneakers, jackets, jewelry and anything else of value the white kids
were stupid enough to bring into this war-zone. Every one of those white kids
would grow up to hate and fear blacks and Latinos, except the ones who idolized
and emulated them, the so-called whiggers who would eventually join the same
gangs and wind up on the same nowhere path the projects condemned the minority
kids to.
Reed actually lived a little further east in the
homogeneous, all white, northeast section of Philadelphia. Why he sent his kids
to a school way down here in this combat zone instead of a nice, safe school in
his own neighborhood, Baltimore could only guess. This was the first school
that Reed and Malcolm attended together. It seemed that Reed was a little sentimental
after all. If he remembered the school so fondly that he would risk his kids’
lives and their social objectivity to send them there, Baltimore found it hard
to believe that he hadn’t thought of Malcolm in over a decade as he had
claimed. Every time he dropped his kids off at school, he most certainly
thought about him. Baltimore
convinced, so Mrs. Franklin agreed to go with her to Mr. Cozen’s house to drop
off the child, and she talked to him there.
She noted in her records that Mr. Cozen seemed rather confused and more than a
little embarrassed by the whole thing, but that he was cooperative and assured
Mrs. Franklin to her satisfaction that nothing illicit or untoward had taken
place between him and his daughter. The child was returned and no follow-up was
ever done.”
Titus scribbled down all the information in his notepad,
steering the Mercedes with his knees and with an occasional quick turn of his
left hand before returning to scribble something else.
“Would it be possible to interview Mrs.
Franklin?”
“Um . . . unfortunately she is no longer with
us.”
“Would you happen to know where she’s employed
now?”
“Detective . . . Rita Franklin died two months
ago. She was very old, almost seventy, and she just went in her sleep. She was
at work all day the day before she died. She could never stand the thought of
retirement. Such a sweet old lady.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Listen, thank you very
much for the help, Mrs. Hamilton.”
“That’s Ms. Hamilton, Detective, and you can call
me Judy.”
“Well . . . uh . . . thanks Judy. You have been a
tremendous help.”
Now there was an accusation of sexual misconduct
between Reed and his daughter. What if Reed really was molesting his daughter?
If the mother found out and threatened to leave him and take the kids, or call
the police, that would be a hell of a convincing motive for murder. It would
definitely convince a jury. Juries don’t have much tolerance for crimes against
kids. Baltimore wondered what had made the vice principal so certain the little
girl had been molested. He turned off Frankford Avenue onto Tarsdale. He was only
a mile or two away from Frankford Elementary. He would ask her himself.
Frankford Elementary was one of the older schools
in Philadelphia. It was right next to Frankford’s low-income housing project,
which was right next to an upper-middle class white neighborhood. The fifty-year
old three-story red brick building covered in creeping ivy was a racial
battleground. It was filled with over-privileged white kids and
under-privileged black and Latino kids.
The poor kids saw, in the clothes the
white kids wore and the expensive cars that dropped them off in the morning,
exactly what they would probably never have. The city planner who zoned the
housing projects and the school for that area seemed to have been some kind of
racist out to turn every white kid in that neighborhood into Philadelphia’s
version of Hitler Youth. Their whole perception of the black and Latino
community was of down-trodden, angry, rebellious black and brown faces that
stared out at the white kids from their hellish projects and extorted lunch
money, sneakers, jackets, jewelry and anything else of value the white kids
were stupid enough to bring into this war-zone. Every one of those white kids
would grow up to hate and fear blacks and Latinos, except the ones who idolized
and emulated them, the so-called whiggers who would eventually join the same
gangs and wind up on the same nowhere path the projects condemned the minority
kids to.
Reed actually lived a little further east in the
homogeneous, all white, northeast section of Philadelphia. Why he sent his kids
to a school way down here in this combat zone instead of a nice, safe school in
his own neighborhood, Baltimore could only guess. This was the first school
that Reed and Malcolm attended together. It seemed that Reed was a little sentimental
after all. If he remembered the school so fondly that he would risk his kids’
lives and their social objectivity to send them there, Baltimore found it hard
to believe that he hadn’t thought of Malcolm in over a decade as he had
claimed. Every time he dropped his kids off at school, he most certainly
thought about him. Baltimore
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