High Heels and Holidays (24 page)

“You're a real piece of work, Blakely. I don't know what in hell Maggie sees in you. For that matter, I don't know why I'm here with you, watching as you break every rule in the book.”

“It's my engaging personality, plus, perhaps of more importance to you, the liberating feeling derived from working
outside
some of those pesky rules every now and again,” Saint Just said, swinging up his cane and resting it jauntily against his shoulder. “All in all, you really can't help yourself. Besides, thus far, we've made a fairly successful pair of crime solvers, don't you think?”

“Yeah, I do. But I'll deny it if you ever repeat that to anybody.”

Perhaps because of the way Saint Just had taken charge downstairs, once they'd reached the sixth floor, Wendell was quick to step in front of Jonathan West's door and pound on it three times with the side of his fist. “Jonathan West! Police! Open up, Mr. West!”

“Ah, your usual subtle self. I believe I would have declared myself to be the plumber, warning Mr. West of a broken water pipe in the apartment above his. But, to each his own,” Saint Just said as they waited for Jonathan West to open the door.

And waited.

“He's not in there,” Wendell said. “It figures. My day's been going just great so far—why would anything change now?”

“Now, now, let's not go into a sad decline,
left
-tenant. The man is a recluse, and possibly quite shy. You may have frightened him with your so-gentle approach. Then again, all things considered, we could be standing out here while Jonathan West's body molders on the other side of this door.”

“Molders? Oh, right. You're thinking I can justify breaking down this door, aren't you? You know, you watch too much television, Blakely, you really do. Especially the Patrolman Swidecky bit. But I'll tell you what—I'll go find the super, flash my shield, and have him let us in. You stay here.
And don't do anything
.”

“Certainly not, and may I say, I do not appreciate the insult,” Saint Just said, and then waited until the elevator doors had closed behind Wendell before he reached into the inside pocket of his sports coat and took out the lovely new set of lock picks Mary Louise had gifted him with as thanks for arranging her modeling job with
Fragrances By Pierre
. The picks were in a velvet-lined case. Very attractive, in a larcenous sort of way.

It was a matter of less than two minutes before Saint Just was rewarded with the sound of the last tumbler turning over, and just in time, as the elevator doors opened once more and Wendell stepped out. Alone.

“The super wasn't there,” he said, standing half in and half out of the elevator, holding open the door. “Let's go, come back later for another shot at finding him. Ms. Myers is on three, you can stop there on our way down, Patrolman Swidecky.”

“Very well,” Saint Just said, “although I'm becoming more and more concerned. This reclusive business, you understand. Jeremy informed me that Francis Oakes hadn't left his apartment in over two years. Can we but wonder if Jonathan West is cut from the same sort of cloth? Both writers, you understand. Perhaps I could just try the door?”

“You think it's open? That never happens.”

“Oh,
left
-tenant, everything happens, sooner or later, if we're only patient. Ah, and it has happened now,” he said, pushing open the door. “Mr. West, are you in there? New York City police department, Mr. West. Don't be alarmed.”

“Will you freaking cut that out?” Wendell complained, pushing past Saint Just and into the apartment. “Jonathan West! Police! Show yourself!”

“As subtle as a red brick to the brain box,” Saint Just said, shaking his head as he followed after the lieutenant, only to be brought up short directly behind him as the air inside the apartment all but slammed into his nostrils. Reaching into his pocket after using his elbow to nudge shut the door behind them, he withdrew his handkerchief and put it to his nose. “
Left
-tenant?”

“Over there,” Wendell said, pointing to what at first glance appeared to be a large gray lump on the carpet. He had already taken out his revolver and held it straight out in front of him with both hands as he visually swept the large room. “And he's pretty ripe. Don't touch anything, I've got to call this in.”

“I wouldn't dream of it,” Saint Just said as he measured the apartment with his eyes. “He lived rather simply, didn't he? Is this what is called a studio apartment?”

Wendell slipped his cell phone back into his pocket but kept the revolver unholstered. “Yeah, that's what it's called. Everything in one room, except the bathroom, which I have to check out now. Stay here. And don't—”

“Touch anything. Yes,
left
-tenant, I believe I understand crime-scene protocol. However, we could do with a little light, couldn't we?”

“Better than tripping over evidence, I suppose, and I've got to check that bathroom. All right, a light,” Wendell said, pulling on thin latex gloves he'd gotten out of his pocket and reaching past Saint Just to turn on the overhead light. “Damn, another body.”

“Four-legged, happily,” Saint Just said, also seeing the open shoe box on a low table in front of a rather flamboyantly carved lime green on green satin couch. “I suppose, as you would say, Maggie's and my theory is back in the game?”

“Yeah, it sure looks that way. Where's Maggie?”

“Safely ensconced in her condo with Socks on guard duty downstairs, thankfully,” Saint Just told him, keeping his sword cane balanced lightly in his right hand, although he believed there was no one hiding in Jonathan West's bathroom. At least no one with a working sense of smell.

While Wendell went off to do his pull open the door, point the pistol, check out the area routine on the bathroom and closets, Saint Just did his own visual inspection of the apartment from where he stood. It was all rather pathetic, actually. The furnishings were extraordinarily good, if showing signs of wear, as if West had purchased them years earlier with a much larger living space in mind, so that the pieces were out of scale for this smaller room.

What was it called? The polite term? Oh yes, downsizing. Mr. Jonathan West had downsized, most probably because finances had forced such an economy on him. A sad man, living in a sad little apartment, living a sad little life. It was Francis Oakes's life all over again—merely with a better address and more comfortable furniture.

Saint Just was happy that Maggie had chosen not to come with him. Not only did he not wish her to see yet another dead body, but a room such as this would only reinforce her belief that wealth and fame could be fleeting, affirm her lack of confidence in herself and her abilities—not to mention how much tighter she would begin to squeeze every penny.

With Wendell once more back in the main living area, his weapon now holstered, Saint Just approached the body with him. “That's quite a copious amount of blood around the body, isn't it? And arterial spray, I believe is the term,” he added, pointing his cane in the direction of the bizarre stripes of dried blood on the nearest wall.

“That's what happens when somebody slices open his wrists. Hey, stay back over next to the—oh, never mind. I don't know if it's the blood smell or the decomp, but I've got to open a window.”

Saint Just was more than happy to shift his gaze from Jonathan West's bloated, eyes-open body and move away from that body—and the flies that appeared to be feasting on it and the blood that had soaked into the carpet. The sound of those flies, the buzzing, was most unnerving, not that Saint Just would allow himself to react in any way.

He stepped carefully to the coffee table, where the rat, similarly decomposing, could be seen inside the shoe box, although he could not see any evidence of the poem that had been included in with Maggie's rat, and the others.

“I don't see a poem,” he told Wendell, who had opened not one, but two windows, allowing some much needed cool, fresh air into the apartment.

“And I suppose you want me to look for it?”

“The thought had occurred, yes,” Saint Just said, refolding his handkerchief and replacing it in his pocket. “Ah, wait, I think that could be it—I see a corner of rather stained paper sticking out from beneath the animal's body. Strange. West never read the note? It's as if he merely opened the box, then abandoned it here on the table. One would think if one were to commit suicide out of fright after receiving a threat, one would first have had to
read
that threat. Although,” he continued, thinking out loud, “West could have
lifted
the rat out of the box, read the poem, and then replaced the—no, nobody would do anything like that. I know I most certainly wouldn't.”

“You enjoy talking to yourself, Blakely? And we both know this wasn't a suicide. The rats are just a prop the killer understands and we don't. Not when we've already got one body that looked like a suicide,” Wendell said as he stepped carefully around the room. He opened the cabinet under the sink with his gloved hand. “Wow, look at this. Good old Jonathan liked his Jim Beam, didn't he?”

Not understanding the reference, Saint Just approached the small kitchen area that at least boasted a breakfast bar to somewhat separate it from the living area, and looked into the plastic trash bin. “Oh,” he said, seeing the empty bottles. “Mr. West enjoyed his liquor. Open that cabinet, if you will,
left
-tenant.”

“More bottles, about ten of them,” Wendell said, closing the cabinet door once more and opening another. “More bottles. That's some serious drinking he had going on. All right, no more of this, okay? The crime-scene guys will be here any minute now, and I want to make some notes.”

“Certainly,
left
-tenant,” Saint Just said, his attention now on the length of counter that was crowded with several small kitchen appliances. Saint Just had quite an appreciation for small kitchen appliances, an interest he would rather not dissect as to exactly
why
he liked them so much.

The appliances put him in mind of something that appeared to be missing from the room. A computer. Surely a writer, even one who had, as Bernie had told them, not written in years, would have a computer. A writer would sell his couch, his television machine, his soul, before he would sell his computer. There was a rather lovely kidney-shaped cherrywood desk in the room, positioned in front of the bank of three tall windows. But no computer. In fact, the desktop was completely clear save for a photograph of—well, goodness. Bernice Toland-James certainly was a popular lady, with a romantic past probably best left unexamined.

Still, no computer? Odd. Very odd.

As was one of those small kitchen appliances behind him, now that he thought about the thing. Careful to keep his hands locked behind his back, Saint Just turned back to the long counter to lean over and peer at the out-of-place appliance, noting the cobwebs that had been woven just inside its openings, which were odd in themselves, for Jonathan West may have been reduced to the Manhattan idea of genteel poverty—and most anyone's idea of devoted tippler—but he seemed to have taken great care in keeping his surroundings neat and clean.

But this appliance wasn't even plugged into the outlet. It was just there, complete with cobwebs, one appliance out of many—while all the others were plugged into a plainly visible six-outlet power cord.

And then he saw it—something where it should not be. He then glanced over his shoulder at Wendell, who was busily writing in his spiral notepad—most probably detailing how he had found the door to West's apartment slightly ajar and had entered only because he'd believed he'd had reason to suspect imminent danger to the occupant.

With the man fairly well occupied with his inventive fiction, Saint Just began speaking out loud, because he needed a bit of noise, didn't he? The sort of noise the lieutenant would dismiss as inane background chatter as he continued to scribble on his notepad. It wasn't the best of plans, but he was laboring under the knowledge that they would soon not be alone in the apartment, and really didn't have time to formulate a better one.

“Quite a devotee of small kitchen appliances, wasn't he, Wendell? Perhaps the late Mr. West was an Internet shopper? This Foreman grill is very much like mine, only a smaller size—the two-hamburger, chicken breast, or chop size, I'd say. An interesting can opener—I believe it also might serve as a knife sharpener, which is quite handy. Microwave, toaster oven—ah, and that's a rotisserie turkey cooker, unless I miss my guess. Food processor, a very simple toaster. Now, I cannot help but wonder, why would a man with limited space feel the need for both a toaster oven
and
a toaster? The toast from toaster ovens is far superior to that of simple toasters, don't you think? I do. Do you suppose one of them is broken? Maybe this one?”

As he said the last words, holding his handkerchief to cover his fingers, Saint Just nudged the control lever on the toaster, at which time the mechanical workings inside were released to spring upward with a short, metal-on-metal grating sound.

“Hey, what was that? Damn it, Blakely, I told you not to touch anything!”

“My most profound apologies,
left
-tenant. I have such an insatiable curiosity about kitchen appliances. It's a failing, I know,” Saint Just said, the computer disk that had been inside one of the toaster slots already neatly secured in his sports coat pocket. He left the kitchen area and then suggested that it might be best for the good lieutenant if he was not on the premises with him when the crime-scene investigators arrived.