Irish Alibi (10 page)

She did, of course. She was like a kid when it came to sirens. He listened to the plaintive wail fade away down the campus road. Then he turned to the crime scene.

He had already marked it off, with stakes and yellow tape. Little bands of students came to see what had happened, but that yellow border might have been an electric fence. They stayed clear. Larry stepped over it and made a bit of a show of walking around the truck, bending over and checking the tires, and then going to the fallen statue. When he crouched beside it, Father Corby seemed to be aiming that blessing right between Larry's eyes. Larry stood abruptly, reminded of the agony confession had become since he and Laura had gotten back together. She said everything was all right, since they were going to be married and all, but she knew better than that. So did he. But it didn't matter. A woman has an unfair advantage over a man in that department. It didn't help that he felt that Laura was lowering huge coils of rope over his shoulders, pulling it tight, pinning his arms to his sides … No, she would want to leave his arms free.

“Hey, you in charge?”

Larry turned to face a tall, bright-eyed boy with a big smile. Red hair appeared when he pushed back his baseball cap.

“You have to keep on the other side of that yellow tape.”

“I did it. I want to confess.”

“What do you mean?”

“I stole the truck, I pulled down the statue, I'm your man.”

With students you had to be careful. Larry didn't want to run the risk of what had happened to Jackson, but the kid seemed serious—a little drunk, maybe, but serious.

“See that squad car on the road? Wait for me there.”

That would be the test. But the kid went dutifully to the car and stood there, loudly proclaiming that he had done it all. Larry went to shut him up, put him in the backseat, and drove to the headquarters of campus security. On the way, he called Laura.

“You done yet, honey?”

“I wish I were. Laura, I want you to get back to Corby Hall and make sure people keep away from things until we can make a thorough investigation.”

“Larry, I told you before. I'm not on duty.”

“Who's honey?” the kid asked from the back.

“Be quiet. You're in trouble.”

He called Henry Grabowski and explained the situation to him. Henry seemed delighted by what had been done on campus.

“Look, I need help.”

“I'm with Kimberley.”

“Bring her along.”

“I'll come by the office first.”

That done, Larry sat the kid down, pulled out a pad of paper, and said he wanted to hear all about it.

“First. What's your name?”

“Malcolm Kincade.”

This was more like it. Larry felt that he was at last putting order into a messy night.

*   *   *

That had been Saturday and early Sunday. Before he got the full statement from Kincade, Henry and Kimberley showed up, and then came Laura, looking daggers at Kimberley. Once, for a brief bright shining moment, Kimberley had gone with Larry, but then Henry had come along and Larry was back with the more ample and amorous Laura. He shagged the three of them off to Corby Hall and completed Kincade's statement.

He turned it in to Iglesias, the guy in charge of discipline, and if he had expected to be congratulated, he would have been disappointed. It was as if he were trying to create trouble for the university rather than control it.

“Good work,” Iglesias said, scarcely looking at the report.

“Jackson wants his truck.”

Iglesias stared at him. “Is that still on the lawn? Get it out of here.”

When Larry called Jackson to say that he was releasing his truck, his heart wasn't in it. A lot of good an all but sleepless night had done him. Well, at least it had kept Laura at bay.

*   *   *

On Monday, when the body was discovered in the Tranquil Motel out on 31, all the commotion on campus seemed a farce. Larry called Jimmy Stewart, hoping the detective would want to exchange information with a colleague. Geez, he wished he were a real cop.

6

When Father Carmody heard of the body found in the Tranquil Motel and of possible connections to the university, he asked Philip Knight to keep an eye on the investigation, on their usual terms. That was fine with Phil. He and Jimmy Stewart were old friends. When he got hold of him, Jimmy said he was heading out to the Tranquil Motel.

“I'll see you there.”

“I'll have a rose in my lapel.”

There was still talk of Notre Dame going to the Rose Bowl that year.

Phil got to the motel before Jimmy, but then he was closer; Jimmy had to come from downtown. He looked into the bar and got a pretty smile from the woman with
PHYLLIS
on her name tag.

“I'm looking for Jimmy Stewart.”

“The detective.”

“So you know him.”

“Are you from Immigration?”

He had her explain that and then wished he hadn't. In the middle of her rant, she fell silent. Michael Beatty, the manager, entered. He looked at Phil and then the barmaid.

“He's from Immigration,” Phyllis said.

Beatty grew alarmed. “What is it? What's wrong?”

Phil took his arm and led him out of the bar. “We think she's a foreign spy.”

“Phyllis?”

“If she looked like one, what good would she be?” He punched Beatty's arm. “I'm working with Jimmy Stewart.”

“What a terrible thing.”

He meant for business, but who could blame him?

Phil saw Jimmy's car pull up out front and went to meet him. “I've been talking to the barmaid. I think she's a wetback.”

“It's a wet bar.”

They went through the lobby and down a long corridor to 302. There was a plump officer on duty watching the soaps. Jimmy introduced her as Lois Lane, then told her to take a break. From what?

Jimmy shut the door and then showed Phil around the bedroom and the bathroom, bringing him up to speed. When they came back to the sitting room, they sat.

“Okay. She checked in with Mr. Kelly. Only she isn't Mrs. Kelly. Her name is O'Toole, and her husband was in town to sign a book on campus.”

“The visitors' book?” Then Phil remembered. “I met him.”

“When?”

“Saturday.”

“Where?”

“He came by to see Roger.”

“He's still here, according to the paper he works for in Atlanta. He stayed in a condo owned by a bunch of newspapers for their reporters to stay in while they're here. You and I are going to give him the bad news.”

“Doesn't he know?”

“If he does, I'll want to know how.”

“But it's in the morning paper.”

“What? That the body of a Mrs. Kelly was found here?”

“Where's Mr. Kelly?”

“Good question. He's a publisher located in Athens, Georgia. His company, that is. He isn't there. He was here for the game Saturday.”

There was more. Jimmy had spoken with the guests who had complained about 302. “Some bearded guy spent hours in the bar with the victim. She brought him back here. Kelly doesn't have a beard. At least he didn't have one when he left Athens.”

“A busy lady.”

“That was the complaint. There's also a student mixed up with it.”

“Oh-oh.”

“Funny thing. Phyllis in the bar saw the picture of the kid that tipped over the statue on campus and says he's the one.”

“Kincade. Maybe I should talk to him.”

“We both will. But first O'Toole.”

On the way to the condo, Jimmy told him Jankowski's theory of how Madeline O'Toole had died. Smothered. Probably with a pillow. It sounded easy, like drowning, but Phil had never had the experience.

“And you have your choice of interested men.”

*   *   *

The condo was east of campus in the town of Mishawaka, a large building whose units were owned or rented by affluent alumni who wanted comfort when they came for Notre Dame games. Some were owned by parents of students, again to make visits more comfortable. Conspicuous consumption.

Jimmy had the manager take them upstairs. His name was Scott Moore, and the request puzzled him.

“No point in causing a fuss.”

“What kind of a fuss?”

“We are bearers of bad news.”

“You said you were police.”

“That's right.”

“Is this an arrest?”

“We'll see.”

They stood back while Moore knocked on the door. A minute went by. He knocked again. The door opened.

“Someone to see you,” Moore said. He looked as if he'd like to hang around.

“I've got to catch a plane,” the little man in the doorway said, looking impatiently at Moore and then, beyond him, at Jimmy and Phil.

Jimmy stepped forward. “Are you Magnus O'Toole?”

“Who are you?”

Jimmy showed him his ID. O'Toole backed up as he looked at it, and Jimmy and Phil went in. Phil shut the door, thanking Scott Moore for all his help. Whatever possibility had led Jimmy to think it would be good to have the manager run interference for them had not been realized. Moore made a wet disgusted sound as the door closed on him.

“You're Phil Knight,” O'Toole said.

“You better sit down, Mr. O'Toole,” Jimmy said.

“I told you, I've got a plane to catch.”

“Is your wife named Madeline?”

O'Toole sat down. “I didn't even know she was in town.”

“Someone tell you that?”

“Quintin. Quintin Kelly.”

“You know him?”

“He's my wife's publisher. She writes novels. Under a pen name.”

“I'm afraid something's happened to your wife.”

“Happened to her?”

“Her body was found in her motel this morning.”

O'Toole rose from his chair like a marionette on strings. His mouth opened. “Quintin,” he said.

“Quintin what?”

“I told you. Kelly. They came to South Bend together. He wants to marry her.”

“Then he wouldn't want to harm her.”

O'Toole began to babble, telling them what a lousy marriage he had, of his wife's stupid novels, of the affair she had apparently been having with Kelly. Kelly had come to tell O'Toole this and get his okay to marry his wife. “He spent Saturday night here.”

“I thought he was with your wife.”

“He forgot. We were drinking.” O'Toole gave his face a dry wash with his hands. “Sunday morning he remembered. He stole my car and went to the Tranquil Motel.”

“Where is he now?”

“In the bedroom.”

“He came back?”

“They had a fight.”

“Let's talk to Quintin Kelly.”

When Kelly awoke he looked at O'Toole. “I thought you left.”

“These are police.”

Kelly looked at Jimmy, then at Phil. “I know you. What's going on?”

“Something's happened to Madeline,” O'Toole said.

“She's dead,” Jimmy said.

“I told them about your fight with her.”

“What fight?”

Jimmy said, “Okay, that's enough. We're all going downtown, and you're both going to tell me what you've been up to these past few days.”

“I've got to catch a plane!”

Kelly got his feet onto the floor and rocked himself upright. “What are you suggesting?”

“Downtown.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Let's put it this way: You have no choice.”

Obviously Jimmy wanted to talk to the two of them one at a time. He advised them to say nothing until they had a chance to talk to their lawyers.

“I don't believe this,” Kelly said.

O'Toole just looked at him and shook his head. “Quintin, Madeline is dead.”

7

Professors who pontificate in class on the events of the day, cloaking their dubious remarks in the mantle of academic authority, might not be the lowest form of university life, but they were, in Roger Knight's estimation, certainly near the nadir. It had become a mark of his own teaching at Notre Dame to bring to the attention of students relevant items of the institution's past history of which they might otherwise remain in ignorance even after four years on campus. Thus he had given courses on G. K. Chesterton and the great writer's lectures at Notre Dame on Victorian literature; he had rescued from undeserved oblivion F. Marion Crawford, also a onetime visitor to the South Bend campus; the nineteenth-century controversialist Orestes Brownson, who was buried in the lower church in Sacred Heart Basilica, had formed the basis of a semester's seminar. As for Henry James and William Butler Yeats, hardly more than allusions to their campus visits were justified, but in all cases, Roger hoped to instill knowledge of and reverence for Notre Dame's past. When he embarked on his current course dealing with Notre Dame's involvement in the Civil War, he had felt safely lodged in the relevant past. Now the toppling of the statue of Father Corby after the Georgia Tech game presented Roger with a problem.

The prank, if that was the right word for it, suggested that the bloody and bitter battles of a century and a half ago were no longer sufficiently remote to admit of serene and balanced discussion. The heroic action of Father Corby, at least as enduring as bronze, if not more, had improbably been transformed into an event of current controversy. Chatting with Father Carmody about recent events did little to ease his mind.

“The boy's father tried something similar. Unsuccessfully.” The old priest's smile was benevolent.

“Just youthful high spirits?”

“Oh, they're from Memphis, you know. Never forget that.”

“The Civil War.”

“They would say the second war of independence. When I think of the growth of the government since those days, I sometimes wonder if we won.”

Roger's solution was to turn to the priest-poet John Bannister Tabb and make a greater fuss over his verse than it perhaps deserved. After class Caleb Lanier said he wished he'd known what Roger was going to speak of today. “I would have brought Sarah Kincade.”