“Very well.” The judge looked at his clerk, and she barked out a date for a pretrial hearing and trial. The judge repeated it, and I wrote the date down on the file. “Hearing is set,” the judge said. “Next case.”
I patted Mr. Bates on the back, gave him my card, and pointed him toward the judge’s law clerk, who was waiting with a written notice of the date and time of his next hearing. Then I turned to Sammy to retrieve the next file, continuing to work through the remainder of the cases.
We finished the morning arraignment calendar at eleven thirty. In just an hour and a half, the court had processed sixty-three cases. Ten were set for pretrial and trial. Twenty warrants were issued, and the remainder of the defendants pled guilty.
“That was fun.” Sammy pressed the elevator button in the hallway, smiling. “Where are we going now?”
I put my arm around her. I was glad that she was happy, and for a second I allowed myself to believe I was actually a competent parent. “We’re gonna take those files back to where we got them this morning and then go over to the police station for a few minutes.”
“Then get a milk shake?”
“How about we get lunch first, something super healthy like a chili dog. Then we can get a milk shake.”
Sammy nodded. “Deal.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The main government buildings for the City of Saint Louis were all clustered together on the southern edge of the Gateway Mall. The mall was a long park that stretched from one end of downtown to the iconic Gateway Arch on the Mississippi River. As we walked past city hall toward the public defender’s office and police headquarters, Sammy asked whether we could stop and visit Annie.
Annie was Angela Montgomery. She and I had grown up together, the two oldest children in two famous political families. Annie was also the first female mayor of Saint Louis and one of the only African American female mayors in the country.
I played it cool as we continued down the street, glancing over my shoulder to ensure that nobody was around to overhear the conversation. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“But I love the castle.” Sammy referred to city hall as “the castle” because of its ornamental towers and columns. The four-story structure even had a grand imperial staircase like in the movie Cinderella. Sammy liked to spin around on the marble floor and then pretend to lose her shoe going up the steps.
“I’ll call Annie and see if she wants to have dinner sometime. How about that?”
Sammy nodded, agreeing, although she was disappointed and a little confused. She wasn’t sure why we couldn’t just surprise the mayor of Saint Louis—with whom I was currently having an on-again, off-again extramarital affair—and hang out in the middle of the day.
I let it go. It was complicated.
After chatting with some colleagues at the public defender’s office and handing off the majority of the files, we walked farther down Tucker to a large structure at the corner of Tucker and Clark. It was the city’s main police headquarters and connected to the police academy. Built a few decades after city hall, the building was quite plain in comparison.
Inside headquarters, there was calm. Most of the excitement was now dispersed among the various neighborhood precincts and the new jail down the street.
This building was where the police chief had his office, as well as his more senior officers, human resources personnel, and the geeks. The geeks were computer nerds who analyzed the city’s crime data and generated a myriad of reports that advised commanders where the city’s beat cops should patrol. Twenty years ago patrols were doled out by instinct. Now there was an algorithm.
Sammy and I walked into the empty lobby. At the far end, there was a reception desk. We went up to the desk and were ignored.
Every time I tried to speak, the heavyset blonde with the painted face raised a finger and quieted me. It didn’t matter that I was wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase. To her, I was just another boy who needed to be taught that his hurry wasn’t hers. She would not be interrupted. She was in the middle of reading an important article about Hollywood’s best and worst beach bodies.
Two minutes passed. The woman still had not looked up from her magazine. Then she nodded, laughed, and stood. Her point had been made, and I, hopefully, understood who was really in charge. “Who are you coming to see?”
“Sergeant David Schmidt.”
She nodded. The woman looked down at Sammy and then back up at me. “And you are?”
“Justin Glass.” I looked her in the eye and I held it.
The last name clicked somewhere in the deep recesses of her bureaucratic brain, and her attitude softened. “Just a second.” If she wasn’t careful, she was going to seem almost friendly.
The woman looked at an office directory, then picked up her phone and punched in a number. “Sergeant,” she said. “This is your angel at the front desk.” The woman looked me over again. “I got a Justin Glass and a little girl up front wanting to see you.”
She listened, then nodded and hung up the phone. She pointed at the sign-in sheet. “Gotta sign in here.” She handed me a pen and then reached into her desk drawer. “And wear one of these at all times.” She removed two visitor badges and handed them to me. “Sergeant Schmidt is on the sixth floor.” She gestured toward the elevator. “Welcome to paradise.”
Schmitty’s office was small, but the fact that he had an office at all was a testament to his seniority and savvy. Despite a steady rotation of new police chiefs every three to four years, Schmitty remained. He was promoted off the streets and got that office because he had the unique ability to keep a low profile but always be present when big decisions were made. Schmitty was valued for his advice, but rarely blamed if things went badly.
“Sit.” Schmitty closed the door and pointed to a chair across from his desk. “Is this your girl?”
I nodded, looking at Sammy. “She’s helping me out today.”
Schmitty sat back down behind his desk. “No school?”
“Something like that.” I put my hand on Sammy’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze.
Schmitty knew that I was being deliberately vague, but he didn’t press for details. It was none of his business.
“Your missing boy is something else,” he said.
“Doesn’t surprise me.”
Schmitty looked at Sammy and then back at me. “Let’s just say that Devon Walker is very well known to the police working that area. Young as he is, he’s already been in and out of juvie about a dozen times.”
“Any idea where he went?”
Schmitty shrugged. “He’s got a warrant out for his arrest. Serious case. He’s also a person of interest in a couple of other ones, aggravated robberies. I think the prosecutors were about ready to bring additional charges, maybe even a certification to adult court, but then he disappeared.”