"He could be right about that," Fenton said, sighing. "Up to a point anyway. I've known two or three big-name mystery writers in my time, and my wife sort of—well, collects them. Writers in general, I mean, along with painters and musicians. It's an odd hobby for the wife of an old police warhorse, but show me just one thing I can really understand about women and I'll get you a lieutenancy tomorrow, if I have to go down to Center Street myself and beg for it. You'd be the biggest asset the Homicide Squad could possibly have."
It was Gallison's turn to sigh. "I guess I'm the way Willard is about contracts when it comes to understanding women," he said. "You seem to forget I've been married myself for fifteen years. Every day my wife is a different kind of woman. But the big difference came between the day before and the day after I married her."
"It's usually that way," Fenton said. "You wake up and discover your wife is a human being."
His expression sobered abruptly. "Where is Willard now? In a cell or still under the lights. If you've got a signed confession—"
"We've got it, all right—signed, sealed and delivered."
"So you just went ahead without even consulting me, is that it? What am I supposed to be around here—a rookie fresh from the asphalt?"
"It couldn't be helped, Lieutenant.... It all happened so fast."
"John! You're asking for trouble, boy!"
"All right then, Joe. I swear it really couldn't be helped. It all just poured out of him, so fast we had trouble in taking it down and had to ask him to read it over three times. We wouldn't have laid a finger on him, anyway. You know that as well as I do."
"Sometimes I wonder. A cop can get terribly angry at times and once, about four years ago, I saw something I deliberately shut my eyes to, and I've never regretted it. They had this ... human animal ... stripped to the waist in the tank room and were ... well, never mind. He committed a brutal sex crime and when they were through with him ... they had a full confession. I just turned on my heels and walked out."