Badge of Honour 06 - The Murderers (6 page)

“Spell my name right, please.”

“‘Observing’? Or ‘supervising’?”

“Observing.”

“Exactly what does that mean?”

“Why don’t you ask Chief Lowenstein? I’m not sure, myself.”

“OK. I get the picture. But—this is for both of you, off the record, if you want—do you have any idea who shot Kellog?”

“No,” Natali said quickly.

“I just got here, Mike.”

“Is there anything to the story that the Widow Kellog is—how do I phrase this delicately?—
personally involved
with Wally Milham?”

“I don’t know how to answer that delicately,” Natali said.

“Mike?”

“I heard that gossip for the first time about fifteen minutes ago,” Weisbach said. “I don’t know if it’s true or not.”

His eye fell on something in the open cabinet behind Natali’s head.

“What’s that?” he asked, and pushed by Natali for a closer look.

“It’s a tape recorder. With a gadget that turns it on whenever the phone is used,” Weisbach said. “Has that been dusted for prints, Lou?”

“Yes, sir.”

Weisbach pulled the recorder out of the cabinet and saw that there was no cassette inside.

“Anything on the tape?” he asked.

“There was no tape in it when D’Amata found it,” Natali said. “And no tape anywhere around it. There was an empty box for tapes, but no tapes.”

“That’s strange,” Weisbach thought out loud. “The thing is turned on.” He held it up to show the red On light. “Did the lab guys turn it on?”

“D’Amata said you can’t turn it off, it’s wired to the light socket.”

“Strange,” Weisbach said.

“Yeah,” Mickey O’Hara agreed. “Very strange.”

A uniformed officer came into the kitchen.

“Lieutenant, the Captain said that Detective Milham is on his way to the Roundhouse.”

“Thank you,” Natali said.

“I want to sit in on the interview,” Weisbach said.

“You’re going to question Milham?” Mickey O’Hara asked.

“Yes, sir,” Natali said, not quite succeeding in concealing his displeasure.

“Routinely, Mick,” Weisbach said. “If there’s anything, I’ll call you. All right?”

O’Hara thought that over for a second.

“You have an honest face, Mike, and I am a trusting soul. OK. And in the meantime, I will write that at this point the police have no idea who shot Kellog.”

“We don’t,” Weisbach said.

Quaire wasn’t in his office. But Lieutenant Louis Natali was, and when he saw Milham, waved at him to come in.

Milham regarded Natali, one of five lieutenants assigned to Homicide, as the one closest to Captain Quaire, and in effect, if not officially, his deputy. He liked him.

“I got the word the Captain wanted to see me,” Milham said as he pushed open the door.

“Where were you, Wally? We’ve been looking for you for an hour.”

“At the insurance bureau in the First Philadelphia Building,” Milham replied, then when he sensed Natali wanted more information, went on: “On the Grover job.”

A week before, Mrs. Katherine Grover had hysterically reported to Police Radio that there had been a terrible accident at her home in Mt. Airy. When a radio patrol car of the Fourteenth District had responded, Officer John Sarabello had found Mr. Arthur Grover, her husband, dead against the wall of their garage. Mrs. Grover told Officer Sarabello that her foot had slipped off the brake onto the accelerator, causing their Plymouth station wagon to jump forward.

Neither Officer Sarabello, his sergeant, or the Northwest Detective Division detective who further investigated the incident were completely satisfied with Mrs. Grover’s explanation of what had transpired, and the job was referred to the Homicide Unit. Detective Milham got the job, as he was next up on the wheel.

“I know she did it,” Detective Milham went on. “And she knows I know she did it. But she is one tough little cookie.”

“The insurance turn up anything?”

“Nothing here in the last eighteen months. They’re going to check Hartford for me.”

While it might be argued that the interest of the insurance industry in a homicide involving someone whose life they have insured may be more financial than moral—if it turned out, for example, that Mrs. Grover had feloniously taken the life of her husband, they would be relieved of paying her off as the beneficiary of his life insurance policy—the industry for whatever reasons cooperates wholeheartedly with police conducting a homicide investigation.

“You weren’t listening to the radio?”

Milham shook his head.

“You know a cop named Kellog?”

Milham nodded.

“They found him, this morning, in the kitchen of his house,” Natali said. “Somebody shot him, twice, in the back of his head.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“He’d probably been dead about six hours.”

“Who did it?”

“They had trouble finding his wife. She apparently didn’t live with him. So the neighbors say. They just found her a half an hour ago.”

“She works for the City,” Milham said. “The neighbors should have known that.”

“I think that’s where they finally got it, from the neighbors,” Natali said. “Where were you last night, Wally, from, say, midnight to six in the morning?”

“So that’s what this is all about.”

“Where were you, Wally?”

“He was an asshole, Lieutenant. I think he was also dirty. But I didn’t shoot the sonofabitch.”

“So tell me where you were last night from midnight on.”

“Jesus Christ, Lieutenant! I was home.”

“Were you alone?”

“No.”

“Was she with you?”

Milham looked at Natali for a moment before replying.

“Yeah, she was.”

“She wouldn’t make a very credible alibi, Wally.”

“I told you I didn’t do it.”

“I didn’t think
you
did,” Natali said.

“She was with me, I told you that.”

“You wouldn’t make a very credible witness either, Wally, under the circumstances.”

“So we’re both suspects? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“Of course you are,” Natali said. “Think about it, Wally.”

“So what are you telling me?”

“You’re going to have to give a formal statement. Joe D’Amata was up on the wheel for the job. I’ll do the interview. You know Mike Weisbach?”

“Sure.”

“He’ll sit in on it. Chief Lowenstein has assigned him to ‘observe’ the investigation. He’s upstairs with the Captain and Chief Coughlin. They ought to be here in a minute.”

“OK.”

“Unless you want to claim the Fifth.”

“If I do?”

“You know how it works, Wally.”

“I’m not claiming the Fifth. I didn’t do it.”

“I don’t think you did, either.”

“What’s with Weisbach?”

“I guess they want to make sure we do our job. I don’t like that any more than you like being interviewed. You want a little advice?”

“Sure.”

“Go through the motions. Don’t lose your temper in there. And then go back to work and forget about it.”

Milham met Natali’s eyes.

“I start midnights tonight,” he said absently.

“I don’t think that anybody thinks you had anything to do with it. We’re just doing this strictly by the book.”

“A staff inspector ‘observing’ is by the book?”

Staff Inspector Michael Weisbach

C. You have a right to talk to a lawyer of your own choice before we ask you any questions, and also to have a lawyer here with you while we ask questions.

8. Q. State your name, city of residence, and employment?

18. Q. Was Officer Kellog aware of your relationship with his wife?