:39:00
This isn´t a game.
:39:05
Did you see him?
:39:07
The nerve! The absolute nerve!
:39:11
- Forget it. lt´s not important.
- This isn´t a game?
:39:14
- Who does he think he is?
- Forget it now.
:39:18
Any idea how long it takes an el train
at medium speed to pass a given point?
:39:23
- What has that to do with it?
- Guess.
:39:25
- l wouldn´t have any idea.
- What do you think?
:39:27
- l don´t know. Ten, twelve seconds?
- A pretty good guess. Anyone else?
:39:32
- Sounds right to me.
- What´s the guessing game for?
:39:34
- What do you say?
- Ten seconds.
:39:36
- All right. What are you getting at?
- This.
:39:40
lt takes a six-car el train
ten seconds to pass a given point.
:39:43
Say the given point is the open window
of the room where the killing took place.
:39:47
You can reach out
and almost touch the el tracks, right?
:39:50
Now let me ask you this. Has anyone
here ever lived near the el tracks?
:39:54
l just finished painting an apartment that
overlooked an el line. lt took three days.
:39:59
- What was it like? Noisy?
- Oh, brother! No matter. We were punchy.
:40:03
l lived in an apartment
near the el line once.
:40:06
When the window´s open,
the train noise is almost unbearable.
:40:09
- You can hardly hear yourself think.
- Will you get to the point?
:40:13
l will. Now, let´s take two pieces of
testimony and try to put them together.
:40:18
First: the old man
in the apartment downstairs.
:40:22
He says he heard the boy say
´´l´m gonna kill you´´,
:40:24
and a split second later
heard a body hit the floor.
:40:27
- One second later.
- Right.
:40:29
Second: the woman across the street
:40:31
swore positively she looked
out of the window and saw the killing
:40:35
through the last two cars
of a passing el train - the last two cars.
:40:39
- What are you givin´ us here?
- Now, just a minute.
:40:41
We´ve agreed that it takes ten seconds
for a train to pass a given point.
:40:46
Since the woman saw the killing
through the last two cars,
:40:50
we can assume that the body hit
the floor just as the train went by.
:40:55
Therefore, the train had been
roaring by the old man´s window
:40:59
a full ten seconds
before the body hit the floor.