Killer's Payoff Read online
Page 19
“That’s what he was doing when he got shot. He was crossing the stage to the podium, making sure the spot was following him.”
“Where were you?”
“At the podium, I told you. Looking up at the guy in the booth, waiting for the councilman to…”
“What guy in the booth?”
“The guy on the follow spot.”
“One of your people?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“I have no idea. My guess is he works here at the Hall.”
“Who would know?”
“You got me.”
“I thought you supplied everything. The sound, the lighting…”
“The onstage lighting. Usually, when we do an auditorium like this one, they have their own lighting facilities and their own lighting technician or engineer, they’re sometimes called, a lighting engineer.”
“Did you talk to this guy in the booth? This technician or engineer or whatever he was?”
“No, I did not.”
“Who talked to him?”
“Mr. Pierce was yelling up to him—Henderson’s aide—and so was the councilman himself. I think the college kid was giving him instructions, too. From up in the balcony.”
“Was the kid up there when the shooting started?”
“I think so.”
“Well, didn’t you look up there? You told me that’s where the shots came from, didn’t you look up there to see who was shooting?”
“Yes, but I was blinded by the spot. The spot had followed the councilman to the podium, and that was when he got shot, just as he reached the podium.”
“So the guy working the spot was still up there, is that right?”
“He would’ve had to be up there, yes, sir.”
“So let’s find out who he was,” Ollie said.
A uniformed inspector with braid all over him was walking over. Ollie deemed it necessary to perhaps introduce himself.
“Detective Weeks, sir,” he said. “The Eight-Eight. First man up.”
“Like hell you are,” the inspector said, and walked off.

Alice in Jeopardy: A Novel
The Frumious Bandersnatch
The McBain Brief
He Who Hesitates
Mischief
Fat Ollie's Book: A Novel of the 87th Precinct
A Matter of Conviction
Ice
Even the Wicked
Hark!
Long Time No See
Killer's Payoff
Murder in the Navy
A Horse’s Head
So Nude, So Dead
Nobody Knew They Were There
Alice in Jeopardy
87P14-Lady, Lady, I Did It!
Fuzz
Jack and the Beanstalk (Matthew Hope)
Ghosts
Like Love
Cut Me In (Hard Case Crime)
The Heckler
Give the Boys a Great Big Hand
The Con Man
Masters of Noir: Volume One
Money, Money, Money
Lightning
Ax
The Spiked Heel
Scimitar
Every Little Crook and Nanny
Criminal Conversation
Doors
The Jungle Kids
Hail to the Chief
Pusher
Killer's Choice
Transgressions Volume 2
King's Ransom
The Last Dance
Fiddlers
Don’t Crowd Me
Cinderella
Eight Black Horses
Big Man
Vanishing Ladies
Lullaby
Privileged Conversation
Transgressions, Volume 4
The Mugger
Tricks
Shotgun (87th Precinct)
Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here!
Ten Plus One
Fat Ollie's Book
See Them Die
Sadie When She Died
Til Death
Transgressions Vol. 3: Merely Hate/Walking the Line/Walking Around Money
And All Through the House
Widows
Cop Hater
Transgressions