Final Notice (11 page)

I'd run my errands and it was time to return home. Past time, really. It was almost three-thirty by my watch. Which meant that Kate Davis was probably wondering if I'd decided to renege on our partnership again. She didn't have a slow fuse, Kate. Or a constant faith in male detectives with ingrown parental tapes or whatever-the-hell it was I was supposed to be suffering from. She might just have taken it upon herself to investigate that list on her own. Not a good idea, if she happened on the right name. What I should have done, I thought, was call. And then I laughed at myself for turning so domestic on the basis of a single kiss. Only when I started thinking about that kiss and about her pert face and lush figure and that mop of curls that felt like crushed velvet to the touch, I began to wonder why I'd stopped at one.

Ingrown parental tapes, Harry? Or just a bit of old-fashioned anxiety. A touch of fear before the plunge. Before committing yourself one more time, steadfast as the good soldier, to love. The enormous exercise of love. The obligation, the duty of love. Fairly pleasant duty, though. I thought again about Kate Davis's pretty, sportive face, about the slender curve of her neck and the swell of her breasts, and pushed down on the accelerator.

She was a little peeved, all right, when I walked through the library doors at four. But when I told her all I'd learned about Twyla and the Ripper, patiently and in complete detail so she'd get the point that I was still her faithful partner, she seemed pleased. She seemed pleased with the way I was looking at her, too. Pleased and a little flustered, like a teenage girl before her first date. That afternoon, as we sat across from one another at one of the varnished oak library tables, was a fresh start. And both of us knew what we were starting. She ducked her head and straightened her glasses on her nose and grinned at me, with her hand to her forehead and those blue eyes wide with excitement. And I grinned back at her with the sort of wonder that I always feel when I realize that the girl sitting across from me, the girl with whom I'm about to share not only a bed but a history -a portion of my life and my past- has a life and a past of her own. I imagine that people who have lived together for decades must feel it, too. Must look up, now and then, and see a stranger sitting across from them-another person who will never quite fit the history that the two of them have created together. I suppose if you ever lose that sense of mystery -because that's what it is, folks the relationship dies. I didn't know how long she'd stay interested in me, but I had the feeling that even a detective could spend a long while finding Kate Davis out.

I think we might have held hands across the tabletop, if Ringold hadn't ambled up with his famous list.

"Here it is," he said, eyeing us suspiciously. "Kate and Jessie have culled it thoroughly and they've come up with four possible male suspects and six female ... what shall I say? Victims?" He slapped the list on the table between us like a gavel. "I did what you asked and called the police. I've also contacted the other branches about the possible mutilation of their art books. Now what have you got to report to me?"

"Good news," I said. "I think we've got a description of the Ripper."

I thought he might swoon. He rocked on his heels and his eyes got very large; then he broke into a big, sheepish grin.

"That is good news," he said with genuine cheer. "My gosh, how did you do it?"

"A little detective work," I said and winked at Kate. "And some very good luck. Twyla Belton was not only an art student, she was a very good artist. And she may have left one sketch of the Ripper behind her."

"What does he look like?" he said curiously.

"I don't know."

Ringold made a confused face, as if he weren't quite sure I wasn't twitting him again.

"What I've got, Leon," I said. "Is a sketch of a tattoo on the Ripper's forearm. But if it is him, it's distinctive enough to be used to make a positive I.D. All we have to do is find which one of the four people on our list has that tattoo on his arm and we'll have our killer."

"Wonderful!" Ringold said and clapped his hands. Then he looked confused again. "What if he's not on our list?"

"According to Dr. Howell, the man we want is likely to have a history of violent behavior. I've already contacted Al Foster at Central Station, and he's going to run our description through C.I.D. They'll cross-check their records and come up with a tidy list of felons who have this kind of tattoo on their forearms. There won't be a lot of them I guarantee you, because it's a distinctive design."

"Spare me," Ringold said.

He turned to go, whirled back around on his heels, cleared his throat, pinched the knot in his tie as if it were a tiny microphone, and said, "You've done a very good job." He nodded to Kate and added, "Both of you."

He walked briskly away, back to his office, leaving Kate staring after him with her mouth ajar.

"You'll catch flies," I said to her.

She shook her head and said, "I just never expected to hear that." She beamed at me. "Thanks. I'll pay you back sometime."

"How 'bout tonight?"

She pulled at her frilly white blouse and said, "How 'bout right now?"

I grinned at her. "Woman, you keep surprising me."

"You're still too hung up, Harry," she said with grave authority. "You're not impetuous enough. You're not allowing
your natural child to have a good time."

I shook my head and she laughed. "Tonight will be fine," Kate Davis said.
 
 

We went through the list name by name, Kate, Miss Moselle and I. Sitting about the little desk behind the circulation counter. With Miss Moselle's box of index cards at her side. the application forms didn't really tell us much more than names, addresses, and birthdates. But Miss Moselle had "a little something," as she put it, on most of the library's patrons. Who took what from where. Who was habitually late returning books. Who was belligerent with the librarians. Who was rowdy in the stacks. What each one looked like and what the stars, the imperishable, whirling stars, told her about their characters.

"To begin with, no tattoos," she said. "I would certainly remember a tattoo. Ugly things, they affect me like the smell of a cheap cigar left smoldering in an ashtray. I have a physical revulsion to them."

"That isn't so good, Jess," Kate said unhappily.

"On the other hand," Miss Moselle said. "I cannot be certain that I have seen the forearms of each of these boys. I try not to look at the forearms of young men. I have a slightly different reaction to them. But no less marked."

Kate and I laughed.

Jessie Moselle blushed bright red and Kate patted her gently on the hand.

"I have the same reaction," she said.

Miss Moselle drew herself up in the chair. "Shall we take these names alphabetically?" she said with great dignity.

I nodded. '

"Then we shall begin with Gerald Arnold. A fine old English name, Arnold. He is a Scorpio, which makes him mercurial," she said, glancing at me. "He is, as I recall, of medium height. Quite slender. With very long blonde hair and rather a ragged beard. He often wore peace emblems and religious symbols on his clothes and about his neck."

"A born-again hippie?" I said.

"Oh, I wouldn't know about that," she said, as if being a Jesus-freak to Miss Moselle were equivalent to membership in some secret society, like the Masons. "He did dress in denim clothing and was often in need of a bath. But I don't think labels like 'hippie' are of much use, do you? Some of my favorite patrons have long hair. Indeed, it wasn't until the last century that short hair became fashionable. It was a Prussian fad, you know. Odious people, the Prussians. I'm sure they thought short hair would be more convenient in warfare."

"And the next one?" I asked. "Haskell Lord?"

"A Capricorn. Which is a very perplexing sign. Half-goat and half-fish, you see. One part pointing downward and the other pointing up. This could be one worth looking into, I think, depending on what house he was born into. Besides, I remember him as being a very disagreeable young man. Darkhaired, swarthy, muscular. With rather a rude manner. I must admit that I haven't seen him about in many months. But he could be sulking. He failed to return his last withdrawal of books and we had to threaten to revoke his card in order to get them back. I believe his brother or his mother finally brought them in."

"And Isaac Mill?"

"A Cancer. A moon sign. He could easily be as mad as a hatter. Which is a peculiar phrase. It comes from the fact, I believe, that hatters used fulminate of mercury to work their felts and the vapors often made them giddy and contentious. Rather like our modern glue-sniffers. I may be being a bit hard on Mr. Mill, as he was a very quiet fellow. Very neat and wellgroomed and polite. But he had a little toothbrush moustache, like Hitler's. And I'm afraid it made me hate him. Oddly enough, we had to threaten him with a final notice, too. He claimed he'd been out of town and hadn't received our first and second notices. I tend to believe it, but I may be leaning too far toward charity since I secretly despised him."

"And finally Lester Towne."

"A Sagittarian," she said with delight. "Sign of philosophers   and poets. Although we can be rather impractical, as well. Lester, I'm afraid, is a bit on the impractical side. Quite odd, really, and terribly forgetful. He left his umbrella in the periodical reading room no less than three times last year. And he doesn't seem to be able to hold onto anything else. His mother, who comes here often, tells me that he's lost his job, too."

"Which was?" I said.

"He worked for the coroner's office, I think. Driving an ambulance."

I felt like laughing when Miss Moselle had finished and departed upstairs to help her plump friend at the juvenile desk.

"She could have made it easier," I said to Kate. "Each one of them has one or two of Howell's identifying features. If I didn't know Miss Moselle better, I'd say she'd done it on purpose."

"I guess that's the problem," Kate said, "when you start comparing people to a pathological model. We all end up looking a little mad."

"Fine words, coming from you."

"Don't be critical, Harry," she said tartly.

"All right," I said. "What about your six girls?"

"I've already been through the list with Jessie. Of course, that was before you'd talked to Mr. Aamons. What do you think I should be looking for?"

I shook my head wearily. "I'm not sure. According to Benson Howell it could have been a purely physical thing. The Ripper's version of lust. Or Twyla may have resembled someone in the Ripper's family or one of his friends."

"Then I'll need a photograph of her."

"On the other hand, it could have been something about her manner. Some characteristic gesture or look or something about her voice. Our Twyla was a romantic girl, we know that much. And she was lonely. And she did not think of herself as attractive. The murder at the Overlook could have been the upshot of a rendezvous she'd made with our friend."

"That would be pretty unsophisticated, wouldn't it?" Kate said. "Going off to the park with a sullen boy with a serpent on his arm whom she'd probably met in a bar?"

"Unsophisticated and pretty daring," I said. "Her drawings suggest that she was attracted to wild animals. Maybe she was intrigued with this fellow. Or maybe she felt sorry for him. Or it could be that she was just a very lonely girl looking for a little excitement."

"I sincerely hope that I'm never that lonely," Kate said.

"I'll see to it," I told her.

"I have the feeling that there's an unpleasant chauvinistic stereotype lurking in your version of Twyla Belton's psychology. This beauty-and-the-beast business smacks a little too familiarly of the old rape fantasy that all of us penis-envying girls are supposed to take to bed with us each night."

"The beauty-and-the-beast business wasn't my idea," I said. "It was Twyla's. If you'd seen her drawings, you'd understand."

"Yes, but how can you be sure?" she said. "You could be projecting again, Harry. You know your X-rays came back and I think we know what your problem is."

I got up from the desk and said, "My problem is you."

"You can't leave your problems behind you," she called out as I headed for the door. "Where are you going anyway? It's nearly five o'clock?"

"I'm tired of speculation," I called back to her. "I'm going to do a little field research. Pay a couple of quick supper-time visits to the first two men on our list. I'll be back by seventhirty. Then we can pick up the question of my fantasies where we left it."

"Oh, goodie," she said.
 

GERALD ARNOLD, he of the fine old English name and denim escutcheon, lived in a rambling frame apartment house on Ogden Avenue, about two miles west of the library. It had been quite a nice house at one time. Three-story, vaguely colonial. With maid's quarters and a second kitchen and an upstairs ballroom with French doors looking out on the street. But like just about everything else in this country, it had fallen on hard times. The veranda needed a coat of paint. The guttering looked like a sleeve full of cigarette holes. And if that weren't enough to discourage any self-respecting apartment hunter, what I could see through the two bay windows would have made his heart sink. Woodwork that looked as if paint had been poured over it out of a bucket. Cracked ceilings. Floral wallpapering that was peeling away in jagged strips, the way wrapping gets torn off a cardboard box. Even the elm tree in the front yard was sick. Someone had cut back the leafless branches like they were pruning a shrub and marked the trunk with a yellow X for the tree surgeons. It was a burnt-out, discouraged-looking spot; and as I sat looking at it from the front seat of the Pinto, I thought through what I was going to say to the burnt-out case who was living there.