Too Old a Cat (Trace 6) (20 page)

They were told by Captain Mannion to wait for him out in their car, but Razoni decided that if he had owned a hat, he might just have left it in Longworth’s hallway so he had better look for it and so he just happened to overhear Mannion and the commissioner speaking.

COMMISSIONER: Marvin, you’ve got blood in your eye.

 

MANNION: I’ll do what you say.

 

COMMISSIONER: Fine.

 

MANNION: But you’re wrong and you’re downgrading two fine detectives.

 

COMMISSIONER: I don’t know. That one looks unstable to me. It seems as if Razoni has a grudge against Miss Longworth.

 

MANNION: Can I speak?

 

COMMISSIONER: Go ahead.

 

MANNION: Grudge, my ass. If he says there’s a reason to suspect her in a case, you’d better believe there’s a reason to suspect her.

 

COMMISSIONER: And you don’t think it’s just hatred at first sight?

 

MANNION: Those two don’t hate. They’re cops. They’d book you if they thought you killed Salamanda.

 

COMMISSIONER: You seem to be taking this kind of personally, Marvin.

 

MANNION: Commissioner, I’ve been a cop for thirty-five years. In all that time, I’ve met five, maybe six people I’d trust to walk down a dark alley with. Two of them are out there in that car. Or, knowing that insane Italian bastard, out in the hall trying to hear what we’re saying.

 

 

Razoni decided his hat was nowhere to be found and he was sitting next to Jackson five minutes later when Captain Mannion came out of the house.

“I don’t want any arguments. I want you two to go downtown and let the Marichal brat go. Tell her not to leave town without letting us know.”

“And then what?” Razoni said.

“Then tomorrow I’ll find something new for you to do before you both get me thrown off the force.”

“I guess you don’t want us to solve the Salamanda case for you,” Razoni said.

“Look. It’s been nothing but headache. That asshole Gildersleeve says if we don’t solve it by the weekend, we’ll have rioting in the streets outside headquarters. Okay, let there be. Let the precinct bulls handle the murder. It’s been nothing but a headache for you two.”

“You’re telling us to get off that case?” Jackson said.

“No. I am specifically not telling you to get off that case. However, you will have another assignment for which you will be responsible. Of course, I can’t tell you men what to do in your off-duty hours. I’ll see you in the morning.”

He walked off to his car, parked directly in front of theirs.

“All right,” Razoni asked Jackson. “What the hell does that mean?”

“That means the captain thinks we may be right. That means he’s been ordered to take us off the case and he doesn’t want to.”

“Why not?” asked Razoni.

“Because he trusts us more than any other detectives he’s got.”

Razoni nodded slightly as Jackson started the car’s engine. “I can understand him trusting me. But why you?”

“Because I’m charming and bright and lovable,” Jackson said.

“I’m drunk,” Chico said.

“I’m getting tired of you being plastered all the time,” Trace said.

“All I had was a little sip of a little glass of wine,” Chico said apologetically.

“You’ve done this every year since I’ve met you,” Trace said. “You take a little sip of wine and then you faint on me.”

“Japanese cran’t dink,” Chico said. “Whooops.” She giggled. “Can’t drink, I mean.”

“I know what you mean,” Trace said.

Chico tried to count the number of cocktail stirrers on the bar in front of Trace, evidence of the number of drinks he had. She kept getting confused at five.

“How many drinks you have?” she said. “You never get drunk.”

“I’ve had
on dorduncu
drinks,” Trace said. “Fourteen. And I don’t get drunk because I’m big and experienced and Irish. And you get drunk because you’re little and you’re Japanese and alcohol is poison to you.”

“That’s why I never be a businessman,” Chico said.

“Why?”

“Two-martini lunch would kill me.”

“
Ikinci
martinis,” Trace said. “Very tough.”

“Stop turking talkish,” Chico said. “Whooops.” She giggled again.

Trace had another drink and had the bartender bring Chico a cup of black coffee, which she dutifully sipped, and five minutes later the drunk attack was over.

“Feel better now?” he asked.

She nodded. “Stupid, isn’t it? A half a sip of wine and blotto. And what’s worse is I have a hangover the next day.”

“That’s why I drink so much,” Trace said.

“Why?”

“I’m drinking for two.”

Later, Trace said, “I feel stupid doing this alleged checking up on Gloria Alcetta.”

“Why?”

“Because there’s nothing to find out. She’s a religious zoonie and her husband’s a nut and I’m wasting his money. I don’t mind wasting his money, I just don’t like wasting my time.”

Still later, Trace said, “I’m going to make a phone call.”

He did, and when he came back to the bar, he said, “Sister Glorious must be home. She’s not at the mosque and she’s not at the granary.”

“Granary?” Chico said.

“The food store next to the headquarters. Listen. Let’s stop by her apartment on the way home.”

“What for?”

“’Cause I want to look in her eyes and tell her that we’re snooping after her for her husband and see what she’s got to say to that,” Trace said.

“There’s a couple of problems with that,” Chico said.

“Name two.”

“One, doesn’t that destroy your ability to find out anything bad about her? I mean, if she knows what you’re up to? And two, isn’t that betraying your client’s confidence?”

“Answers.
Birinci
. One. Probably, but I’m not finding out anything anyway, and if I’m going to fail, this will at least save time and let me spend more time out drinking with you.
Ikinci
. Two. About betraying our client’s confidence. Who cares?”

“Good thinking,” Chico said. “Let’s go.”

When they saw what was outside police headquarters, Razoni and Jackson almost wished for the return of the pickets from Salamanda’s movement.

Standing in a straggly line before the building were a man wearing leotards, ballet slippers, and a shiny knee-length leather coat; a woman in an artist’s smock with Harpo Marx blond curls peeking out from under a railroad cap; a man over six and a half feet tall with long blond hair and a formal suit; an elderly woman in a satin dress and white fur stole who paused every so often in marching past the front door to take a sip from a Thermos bottle she had around her neck on a lanyard.

“Oh, oh,” Razoni said. “The Addams family’s here. I’ll still take the old lady.”

The picketers were carrying signs. Ferenc Marichal’s read: END POLICE BRUTALITY. Charmaine Marichal carried one with the legend: NEVER AGAIN. The butler’s sign read: FREEDOM NOW.

And Mother Marichal carried a sign that Razoni and Jackson had to cross the street to read. It was hand-lettered and said: “‘The law has no claim to human respect. It has no civilizing mission; its only purpose is to protect exploitation.’—Kropotkin.”

“What do you think, Tough?” asked Razoni as they approached the Marichal menagerie.

“I kind of think that that Kropotkin may have something.”

Mother Marichal saw them first. The Thermos bottle was at her lips and she sputtered in surprise, spattering the front of her white gown with drops of red wine.

“There they are,” she cried. “There are the despoilers.”

“Calm down, Mama,” said Razoni.

She raised her sign to strike Razoni on the head. He danced back nimbly and the sign missed by three feet.

“Listen, you can all go home,” Razoni said. “We’re releasing Karen now.”

“We don’t want to go home,” Mr. Marichal said.

“What?”

“We’re going to stay. We want to draw the spotlight of world opinion to the abuses of our outmoded law-enforcement system.”

Razoni turned in disgust. “Just hang on a few minutes and you can have another recruit. We’re sending Karen out.”

On the steps, Jackson consoled his partner. “They won’t stay long,” he said.

“No?”

“No. Mama is almost out of wine,” Jackson said.

Inside a holding cell, Razoni told the young woman, “We’re letting you go, sweetie.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I still think you did it, but everybody else wants to let you go.”

“What about Abigail?”

“She’s home, honey. We found her where you had her hid,” said Razoni.

“Is she all right?”

“She’s fine,” Jackson said. “Your family’s outside.”

“I think they’re picketing.” said Jackson.

“Or having a picnic,” Razoni said. “It’s hard to tell. Try to get them out of here, will you? And you’re not allowed to leave town.”

“Why not?”

“Because the investigation is still going on. And unless somebody finds somebody else killed the lizard, you and your sweetie there are still suspects one and two.”

“You’re hateful.”

“I’m lovable,” Razoni said. “Too bad, you’ll never find out.”

After Karen Marichal left, the two detectives sat quietly in the room for a few minutes before the silence exceeded Razoni’s attention span and he said, “Tough, I’m going to let you do something I never thought I would.”

“What?”

“Buy me a drink.”

At the Red Horse Tavern, Razoni said, “I don’t think that fag really had Jack Daniels in his house. I bet that was some cheap crap poured into a Jack Daniels bottle.”

“You think the head of the biggest television network in the world pours cheap mash into expensive bottles?” Jackson said.

“Sure. Then he bills his company for Jack Daniels.”

“You know, Ed. You’re probably right. I bet he could knock down fifty or sixty dollars a year that way.”

“Damn right I’m right.”

On the next drink, Jackson said, “You know what’s wrong with those girls as suspects?”

“What?”

“They don’t have any motive,” Jackson said.

Razoni said, “That’s not so. They just don’t have any motive that we know about.”

Jackson said, “That’s true.”

During the next drink, Jackson said, “Who does have a motive?”

“I’ll play your silly game,” Razoni said. “Who does have a motive?”

“Nobody that I know of.” Jackson said.

“Me neither,” Razoni said.

Fourth drink, Razoni said, “One thing puzzles me.”

Jackson said, “Add it to the list of the many things that puzzle me. What?”

Razoni said, “The flowers. In the refrigerator.”

“What are you talking about?”

“If the lizard ate the roses, why was there another dozen roses in the refrigerator? I saw them when I was looking for a beer.”

“Yeah. I saw them,” Jackson said. “Maybe somebody just likes roses.”

“Sure,” Razoni said. “Why not? Even Marvin likes roses. Marvin. Our captain’s name is Marvin.” His laughter was interrupted by the telephone ringing.

There was no doorman in sight inside the elegant marble-walled lobby of Gloria Alcetta’s apartment building. A directory over the doorman’s desk showed that G. CHARTER-MAN lived in Apartment 317.

“Charterman?” Chico said as they walked to the elevator.

“Her maiden name,” Trace said. “Let’s surprise her. Maybe we’ll find her in bed with the Italian national soccer team.”

Gloria’s apartment was at the end of the hall, its front door hidden from view in a small alcove. The door was ajar.

Trace rang the buzzer set into the frame alongside the doorway, then rang it again and again. No answer.

“Not home,” Chico said.

“A true detective is persevering above all things,” Trace said. “And also a snoop.”

He pushed open the door and called out, “Mrs. Alcetta?”

No answer, and he and Chico stepped inside, leaving the hallway door open.

“Mrs. Alcetta?” Trace called again. The living room they were standing in was furnished in that elegant way that only underfurnished apartments managed. There were two small sofas in the center of the floor, facing each other across a marble-topped coffee table. There was a small dining table in a far corner and a stereo set against the other wall. Dried flowers sat in tall vases on the floor. There was a fireplace in the long wall and above it was a painting of Salamanda, seated majestically, wearing white robes. Trace recognized him from all the newspaper photos he had seen in the past two days.

“Mrs. Alcetta?” Trace called out again.

Chico looked around the apartment. “We should send your mother up here,” she said. “Can you imagine how a few plaster knickknacks would look in here?” She looked at the stereo rack of tapes and said, “Sitar music. I didn’t think anybody really listened to that anymore.”

Trace walked to the back of the apartment. The small kitchenette was empty. He pushed open the door to another room, started to call out, “Mrs….” then stopped and Chico saw him run inside.

When she followed him, Trace was in the center of the floor, kneeling alongside the body of a woman.

“Is that Gloria?”

Trace nodded. “Somebody bashed in her head.”

“Is she…?”

“Yes. And a while too. She’s cold.”

He stood up and looked around the bedroom. The living room had been sparsely furnished and elegant; the bedroom made up for it. It was crammed with furniture—dressers, a desk, cardboard boxes—and the room gave signs of having been ransacked. Papers from the desk were strewn on the floor. Contents of some cardboard storage boxes had been emptied out.

“Looks like somebody tossed the place,” Trace said.

“What do we do now?” Chico said. She tried, but was unable to keep her eyes off the face of the beautiful dead redhead.