The Killing Edge (4 page)

“I'm really not up to going over all this.”

“It might help a great deal,” Will replied and allowed an edge of firmness in his voice.

“I came in the front door, as I usually do. I used my key. It must have been locked. I called out for Mauve and then saw her when I passed the living room.”

“Did you touch anything?”

Raleigh turned over his hands to reveal blood streaked palms. “Yes. Her.”

“To see if she were alive?”

“Yes.”

“There's blood along the side of your face and along your shirt.”

“What's on my face must be from my hands. The other's probably from a nose bleed I had on the way home.”

“Nose bleed?”

“I had a silly accident, that's all. It didn't amount to anything.”

“What sort of accident?”

“Hardly worth mentioning.”

“I'd like to hear it.”

“As I said earlier, the driving was slippery. When I passed by the Silo Liquor Store on Forum Street this bum steps off the sidewalk right in front of the car. I braked into a skid and luckily missed him.”

“Hit your nose on the dash?”

“No. Seems that the bum dropped his bottle, and when I got out to see if he was O.K., he was so mad he took a swing at me. I gave him a couple of bucks for a new bottle and that was it.”

“Let's go back to when you found your wife. You determined that she was dead, and then you called us.”

“Not right away. I called Noah Washington first.”

“You called a lawyer? You telephoned an attorney before an ambulance or the police?” Will purposely forced an incredulous quality into his voice.

“I was shook, Will. You've got to understand that I didn't know which way to turn.”

“What did Noah say?”

“Told me to call the police at once and that he'd be over later.”

“Which you did at exactly 9:05. By the way, what time did you get home?”

“After finding Mauve I didn't think to look, but if I called the police at five after, it must have been a few minutes before that.”

“How many is a few?”

“How the hell should I know?”

“Take a guess.”

“I came in the house, found her, called Noah and then the police emergency number. All told it couldn't have been more than five or ten minutes.”

“You didn't talk to your lawyer long.”

“No, two minutes maybe, and I don't think I even put the receiver down before I dialed the police. The first car was here in five or six minutes.”

“About 9:10?”

“Yes, about.”

“Then you got home around 8:45 at the earliest?”

“I guess.”

“The silly accident and the bloody nose. You say the man you almost hit stepped out of the liquor store on Forum Street?”

“Yes.”

“Connecticut state law says that liquor stores must close at eight sharp, Raleigh. If he came out of the liquor store with a purchase, that put you on Forum Street a few minutes before eight. And Forum Street is only a short drive from here.”

“I don't know where he came out of. All I know is that he dropped his bottle and took a drunken swing at me,” Raleigh's voice began to drop.

“Hey, Chief,” Dave August said from the doorway. “There's a guy downstairs wants to see Mr. Bridger, and Henry's found something in the cellar.”

Will waved him away. “I'll be right there. I'll need to talk to you further, Raleigh.”

“If you insist.”

“By the way,” Will said from the doorway. “How much have you had to drink?”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“I think you've had a couple.”

“I did, waiting for the police to arrive.”

“You told me when I arrived that you were ill.”

For the first time Raleigh stood. “Now wait a minute. Is this some sort of inquisition?”

“I'll be right back.” As Will went down the steps he calculated the driving time from the liquor store on Forum Street to the house on the point. Raleigh seemed to have lost track of forty-five minutes. He shook his head. It was going to be a long night.

Noah Washington, in a suede car coat, stood by the front entrance. The diminutive lawyer craned his neck forward to watch Will descend the stairs.

“Hello, Noah.” They shook hands. The small attorney's palms were damp.

“What in hell's going on, Will?”

“Raleigh told me he called you and that you could verify the time.” He cringed slightly at the small deception.

“Yes, when he told me something had happened to Mauve I immediately checked my watch. Exactly 8:58. I came over as soon as I could.”

“Your client's upstairs.”

“Thank you,” Noah said abruptly and started for the stairs. He passed the living room, glanced in and turned, ashen, back to Will. “My, God …”

“Raleigh's in the bedroom, Noah.”

“Is she …?”

“Yes.”

The tiny lawyer began to hurry up the stairs, stopped at the halfway point and turned to face Will. “The exact time he called me was important, wasn't it?”

“It could be.”

“I think I've been had.”

“You're a real estate lawyer, Noah. We aren't going to report you to the bar association.”

“Damn you!” He turned and ran up the stairs.

Will walked through the dining room toward the kitchen. The long formal table had settings for two at one end. The meal had never been served. In the kitchen a green salad in a wooden bowl sat on the drainboard. Through the transparent oven door he saw a small burned roast.

“Down here, Chief,” Dave August's voice called from the cellar. The cellar and rear outside doors were off the small mudroom past the kitchen. He stopped at the rear door and looked down at the handle. It had a twist lock set in the end of the knob and it was at the unlocked position. He hoped to God no one had touched the handle.

“Hey, Chief,” the voice called again from the cellar. “The back door's unlocked.”

Will put a hand to his face. “You tried it, right?”

“Right,” the voice from the cellar returned.

“Jesus, there go the prints.”

“What did you say? I couldn't hear you,” Dave said as Will descended the cellar steps.

“What do you have?”

“In the laundry room. There's a woman's clothes in the dryer.”

The dryer door stood open. “You opened the door?”

“Well, yeah. How else could I see the stuff inside?”

“Did you ever think about prints?”

“Hell, Chief. I'm sorry.”

“Try and keep it in mind, Dave,” Will said as he squatted in front of the dryer to peer inside. He heard and felt the rear seam of his pants split. L.C. was right, he should be getting more exercise.

“Hey, Chief, your pants are …”

“Never mind.” It was someone's principle that everything that could go wrong—would. It had been off from the start. He should have just sealed the house and let the state police handle the whole investigation. The small force he commanded in Lantern City was trained for traffic work, domestic squabbles and occasionally a robbery. Nothing of this nature.

He reached into the dryer and felt along the edges of the warm clothing. He glanced at his watch, saw that it was 10:12, and then looked at the timing device of the dryer and saw that it had a maximum setting of ninety minutes. Since the clothes were still warm, the dryer had to have clicked off only minutes ago, which meant that it was started at around eight. The whole time sequence was becoming more and more interesting.

“Dave, I want you to go out to the car and radio a patch through to the Burns Security people. Ask them what time tonight the alarm at the savings bank was activated. Also, ask them if anyone from the bank called in, and if they did, what pass number did they give. It'll all be in their log.”

“Right, Chief,” Dave strode out of the laundry room, through the recreation room, and was halfway up the cellar steps before he stopped. “Chief, I don't know what in hell you're talking about.”

Will crooked his finger and motioned to the young patrolman. “Come here, David. We shall have a brief lesson in security procedures at the bank.”

“Right, Chief.”

Will winced as the officer trotted dutifully back to the laundry room. “The Lantern City Savings Bank employs Mr. Raleigh Bridger, and it is where he claims to have been this evening. The bank is protected by an alarm system that is activated when the last employee leaves the building or at six P.M., whichever is earlier—unless someone with an authorized pass number calls the security office. In other words, if someone were to work late, they would have to call Burns and tell them not to activate at six, and call them again when they left the bank. All of those calls are recorded in a log.”

“Now, I'm with you.”

Will stooped before the dryer again and with a pencil began to fish the clothing from its interior: green bikini panties with a matching bra, blouse, ski pants, jacket and a cap. He aligned the items on the top of the appliance and stood looking at them trying to reconstruct events. If she'd been skating when the snow began, the clothes might be damp, and it would be logical that she'd place them in the dryer; however, that left the question as to what she was wearing when she put them in there. It seemed illogical that she'd enter the house, place her clothes in the dryer and then wander nude to the living room.

“Negative, Chief,” Dave August called down the stairs. “The people at Burns say the log shows that the alarm was activated at 5:45 tonight, and there is no record of it being turned off.”

“Which means that no one was in the building after 5:45,” Will said half to himself. “Dave, I want you to check outside, make a note of anything you see.”

From upstairs he heard a heavy tromp of feet and deep voices. Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee were here. He sighed and went up to meet them.

The two state police detectives stood at the archway to the living room. They were bulky men with crew cuts and stood with their feet apart as if bolted to the floor. They turned in unison as Will came down the hall.

“You really got one, Chief,” the first one said.

“The reporters and TV people are going to eat it up,” the second added. “Lab people will be here as soon as they get through the snow.”

“Farley's on duty at the medical examiner's office and he should be here first cuz he flies,” the first one said and they both laughed.

“Flies?”

They shook limp wrists at Will and laughed again. “Mind if we look around?”

“Go ahead. I'm in the midst of interrogating the husband.”

“We can handle that.”

“I'll do it,” Will said in a low voice. “It's my town, boys.”

“'Course, Chief. We're only here to help out.”

Will nodded and turned to Dave August. “They still upstairs?”

“Bridger and Mr. Washington?”

“Jesus, Dave, not Tinkerbell.”

“They left.”

“They what?”

“They left just a minute before the state boys arrived.”

“No, Dave. They didn't leave. Tell me they didn't leave, not without an escort. Tell me you didn't let a suspect walk away from a murder scene.”

“He was with the lawyer, Chief. They wanted to use the telephone and when I told them they couldn't—they left.”

I'm too old to cry, Will thought as he started for the door.

Chapter Three

L.C. thought that if he showed her another piggy bank she'd scream.

After making a strong second drink, Herb Strickland had insisted that she follow him into the sunroom to view his collection.

“I wouldn't be surprised if it's the largest in the world,” he said. “Once I had my basic pigs I began to specialize. This year I've been emphasizing porcelain. Would you believe that I have people all over the country on the lookout for me? If they come across an unusual specimen they immediately drop me a line.”

“They'd made a nice display in the bank lobby.”

“I've thought of that,” Herb said wistfully as he held a delicately flowered pig in his ham-like hands. “But I'm afraid of the children. You know how they like to pick up things and then drop them … poof … an irreplaceable loss.”

Simultaneous with the front door chime there was a loud knock at the door. Herb put the pig back on a glass shelf with its mates and moved ponderously to answer the door.

L.C. left the world's largest collection of piggy banks without regret to see Raleigh Bridger and Noah Washington talking with Herb in the front hall. Herb nodded and led them to the study down the hall, then returned to L.C. with a puzzled look.

“What's all that about?” she asked.

“They wanted to use the phone.”

“That's strange.”

“Would you like to see the rest of the collection?”

“Not right now, Herb. It's hard to give it the attention it deserves under these circumstances.”

“When Toby comes back from Florida, you must come over for dinner some night. We can spend the whole evening with the pigs.”

“That would be lovely,” she said while telling herself that when the invitation arrived it would be a propitious time to take that trip to Bermuda she'd always wanted.

There was another knock at the door and Herb lumbered from his chair.

“Is Bridger here?” Will snapped as he stomped snow from his shoes on the stoop.

“Yes, in the study using the phone.”

“Is there an extension?”

“In the kitchen or the living room.”

L.C. followed Will into the kitchen and watched him unscrew the mouthpiece of the wall phone before removing the receiver from its cradle.

“I know you're glad I didn't freeze to death in the car,” she said.

He gave her a smile as he pressed the receiver to his ear. “You're self-reliant, L.C. I figured you'd build an igloo if you had to.” He listened to the phone for a few moments. “Raleigh is sleeping with Sandy Devonshire.”