And a Puzzle to Die On (23 page)

They hadn’t.

That was the good news.

The bad news was, they’d kept her keys.

Of course, there was no help for that. She’d had to surrender the keys. If she’d made a fuss, the cops would have figured she planned to use them. They’d have posted a guard. Assuming they hadn’t already. But that was a good assumption. She’d already broken into the office. No one would suspect she’d do it again.

If she just had her damn keys.

There was always a chance the office door was open. Cora figured the odds were about a million to one. It was a good thing she didn’t bet, because the door was locked.

Cora could have broken the frosted glass, like Sherry was afraid she was going to do earlier that evening. Cora smiled at the thought of considering two in the morning earlier that evening. She also smiled at the thought of breaking the frosted glass. She couldn’t recall breaking a frosted-glass window before. Regular
panes, sure, but frosted glass was another matter. It had all those little veins in it. Those little hexagons, or octagons, or however many gons it was. Cora wasn’t about to count them. Instead she was striding down the hallway to the window at the end.

It opened onto nothing, which was strange. Cora would have expected a fire escape, but there was none. Just an air shaft between this and the next building.

That was interesting. If there was no fire escape there, surely there must be one somewhere else.

Cora made her way back to the elevator, took it up to the sixth floor, and found the stairway to the roof. She pushed the door open and stepped out.

It was a cloudless night. Stars were out. There was a three-quarter moon. Cora knew the Big Dipper. Her fourth husband, Henry, had pointed it out on their honeymoon. At the time Cora had thought of Henry as the big dipper. It was only later when she thought of him as the big dip.

Cora went to the side of the roof where Burnside’s office was, looked over the edge. Sure enough, a fire escape ran down the side of the building. Of course, it didn’t go to the roof, but it went to the sixth floor. And the sixth floor was close below.

Relatively close.

Somewhere between twisted-ankle and broken-neck close.

Cora looked around the roof. Oddly enough, there was no twelve-foot ladder one could lower over the side. Cora couldn’t understand the shortsightedness of the building’s maintenance staff. She made a mental note to speak to the super.

The stairwell wasn’t that far from the edge of the roof. Cora went back, looked down the stairs.

On the wall of the sixth-floor hallway was a fire hose on a metal wheel.

Cora went down the stairs, grabbed the hose just below the nozzle, and pulled.

The hose obviously hadn’t been uncoiled in years. The metal wheel proved mightily reluctant to turn. It squeaked in protest. Yielded each inch of hose grudgingly.

Cora pulled it all out, and made sure the end was securely attached. How the hell they got water in it was beyond her, but that wasn’t Cora’s problem.

The length of the hose was.

Cora wrestled the hose up the stairs, pulling it tight behind her. Was gratified to see she still had plenty left when she reached the roof. She dragged it to the edge, dropped it onto the fire escape.

Or at least tried to.

The hose was long, but not that long. The nozzle stopped halfway down. A good six or eight feet from the fire escape. It was hard to tell in the dark. Cora told herself it might be closer than that. Hell, holding on to it, her feet might reach the bottom.

Only one way to find out.

Cora looped her drawstring purse over her neck, so that it slung down her back and wouldn’t get in her way. She pulled herself up over the parapet, and, holding on to the hose, lowered herself over the side.

The fire escape was a lot farther below than she figured. Or maybe it just seemed a lot farther because she was crawling down the side of the building holding on to the hose. The rough bricks were scraping her knees, the fire hose was rubbing her fingers raw, and the purse was strangling her.

And it was windy. Why hadn’t she noticed it was
windy before? All she’d noticed was what a nice night it was. Not that a cold north wind was chilling the hands of anyone attempting to defy gravity by clinging on to a—

Cora lost her grip and fell.

She was high enough that the fire escape rattled as if a subway car had just jumped the rail into a swimming pool of cookie tins.

She was low enough that neither bones nor metal broke.

Her glasses fell off, however. Cora groped around for them on the fire escape. Had a moment of panic that they had fallen through.

Her purse was weighing her down like an anchor. She extracted her head, got to her hands and knees.

Cora couldn’t see a thing. Hell, how could she find her glasses without her glasses?

Her left hand hit them, almost knocked them off the fire escape. Cora grabbed the glasses, jammed them on her face. Found she couldn’t see with them, either. It was too dark. No matter. She could hold on to the rail, feel her way.

Cora retrieved her purse, slung it over her shoulder, and worked her way down the fire escape to the second floor.

There. This was Burnside’s window. Assuming she’d calculated correctly. Assuming it wasn’t the window of someone else.

Someone alive.

Cora put her hands on the bottom of the window, pushed up.

It opened.

Cora raised the window, scrambled through.

She emerged on the top of a desk. There was a loud clatter as pencils and pens went flying.

Cora expressed her opinion of the situation in a brief exclamation that would have made Ozzy Osbourne blush. She fumbled in her purse for her cigarette lighter, jerked it out, and fired it up.

Yes. The desk she had just decimated was indeed the property of the late detective.

Cora dropped to the floor and began gathering up the pens, pencils, ruler, stapler, paper clips—what the hell had they been in? Ah, an unused ceramic ashtray? Could that be it?

It was a moment before she remembered the detective whose office it was wouldn’t be around to notice if anything was out of place. It didn’t matter if everything was exactly as it was, just so long as it was neat.

Cora finished tidying up the desk, turned to the bulletin board on the wall.

And the lighter went out.

Cora spun the wheel, encouraging the flint to produce the spark to light the gas.

There was no gas. The damn thing was empty. It wouldn’t light.

Cora rummaged in her purse for another lighter. Or a book of matches. Or two Boy Scouts to rub together. But it was no use. The only thing she found capable of producing a spark was the gun. Cora could imagine herself firing several bullets for illumination as she worked her way across the room.

She shoved the gun back in her bag, along with the useless lighter, and groped her way toward the bulletin board on the wall.

Cora knew she needed something to stand on. She seemed to remember folding chairs somewhere in the room. But way over on the other side. A million miles away.

And here she was, bumping into the desk.

The desk over which the bulletin board hung.

If this was the right desk.

Cora leaned out, groped the wall.

Yes. There was the edge of the frame. Now, if there was just something to stand on.

Just beyond the desk was the computer stand. In front of it was a typing chair, the kind that revolves on wheels, has no arms, and has a back that tilts down.

The least steady chair imaginable.

Cora grabbed it, jammed it into the corner between the desk and the wall. She climbed up on the seat, reached out, and grabbed the edge of the bulletin board.

The bulletin board went one way, the chair went the other.

Cora wound up on the floor in a heap. At least this time she didn’t lose her glasses. Merely bruised a few more bones.

Cora struggled to her feet, gained her bearings, headed off in the direction she imagined the chair had gone.

She made out a curve that might have been the back of the chair. It was. She realized her eyes were becoming accustomed to the dark. She grabbed the chair with both hands, marched it back to the desk, and jammed it into place.

This time, when she climbed up on the seat, she could make out the edge of the desk. She put one foot up on it, and tried transferring her weight. Evidently the legs were closer to the middle, because she could feel the desk tip down.

Cora cursed her luck and moved her foot. With a lunge that sent the desk chair rolling across the room,
she stepped up onto the center of the desk. She flailed her arms, gained her balance.

Cora lifted the wire off the hook, slid the bulletin board down the wall, and rested it on the desk.

Okay. There was the safe. Now, what was the combination?

Cora glanced across the room at the computer. It was off. It was also across the room. It was also a computer. The odds of Cora getting a combination out of it were infinitesimal.

On the other hand …

It was left, right, left. Cora remembered that because her fourth husband, Henry, had gone to West Point, and that was the way the soldiers marched, left, right, left.

And the numbers were …

Twenty-four. Hours in a day.

Forty-eight. If you double it.

Fifteen. Minutes of fame.

Cora hoped like hell that was right. She reached up, spun the dial.

Couldn’t see the numbers.

Of course she couldn’t. Idiot. And here she was, balancing on the top of a desk.

Cora eased herself to her knees and groped around the desk, but there was nothing useful. She jerked open the top drawer and pawed through pencils, pens, and assorted office junk. She had no idea what most of it was, she just hoped it wouldn’t stab her.

Her hand encountered thin cardboard. She grabbed it, pulled it out.

A book of matches.

Cora’s biggest problem now was not to tip over the
desk in her excitement. She stood up carefully, struck a match, spun the dial.

Left twenty-four.

Right forty-eight.

Left fifteen.

The safe clicked open.

The match went out.

Cora struck another, held it up to the open safe.

It was empty.

Cora rolled her eyes in disbelief. That goddamned gumshoe. Who the hell has a hidden wall safe with nothing in it? No one. No one but what’s-his-face dead P.I. No wonder someone offed him. Cora felt like offing him herself.

Cora closed and locked the safe. She bent down, picked up the bulletin board, hung it from the hook. In the dark, she couldn’t tell if it was straight. She lit a match, saw the bulletin board was tilting a bit to the right, and evened it up.

Just before the match went out, however, a folded piece of paper caught her eye. Cora had a feeling she’d passed over it the first time around. She lit another match and took a look.

The paper was blank. It was pinned to the bulletin board with a pushpin. Cora pulled out the pin, unfolded the paper.

It was a check made out to Peter Burnside for five hundred dollars. Evidently checks were infrequent enough, Burnside had to pin them to his bulletin board to make sure he didn’t lose them until he got to the bank.

The check was signed
Valerie Thompkins
.

It took a moment for Cora to remember who that was.

The woman with the teased hair and the toy poodle.

It was easy to find Valerie Thompkins’s house. It was the only one on the street with its lights on. Cora could see it two blocks away. There was a light on the two-car garage, and a light over the front door. And there were lights in the upstairs and downstairs windows.

The toy poodle was barking when Cora came up on the front step, a high-pitched
yip, yip, yip
. She wondered if it had heard her car. The house was fairly far back from the road. She’d been quiet coming up the walk. But the dog was yapping to beat the band.

Cora rang the bell. That spurred the poodle to new heights. It managed to hit high F above C. But no one came to the door. That was odd. Cora could imagine someone not hearing the doorbell. She couldn’t imagine them not hearing the dog.

It occurred to her Valerie Thompkins might be out. Cora hoped she was.

Cora tried to peer through the living room window, but the drapes were closed. So were those on the next window.

Cora worked her way around the house. All the drapes were closed, and all the doors were locked. The only window not curtained was in the kitchen. All Cora learned there was Valerie Thompkins had a gas stove instead of an electric one. Sherry would have approved.

Cora completed a circuit of the house, rang the doorbell again. No one answered but the dog.

Cora stepped back, looked at the upstairs windows. One was open. And not that far from an elm tree branch.

No way. Cora’d had quite enough climbing for one night.

Were there basement windows? The lights would have been out, so she wouldn’t have noticed. She didn’t see anything in front of the house. Perhaps she should check around back.

Cora jabbed at the bell one more time. Of course, there was no response.