Murder Can Cool Off Your Affair (20 page)

Emaline did a mediocre job on my hair. But with Emaline, mediocre is good—even to be hoped for. Of course, I can’t say that I was crazy about the Shirley Temple curls, but about ten minutes of energetic brushing should uncoil them.

That, however, would wait. Right now I was hungry. There was still a little leftover marinara sauce with mushrooms in the freezer, and this over a dish of rigatoni along with a nice salad would suit me fine.

While the sauce and the water for the pasta were heating, I shredded some lettuce and halved a few cherry tomatoes. I was about to slice up a couple of radishes when suddenly—pretty much as Barbara had suggested could happen—it struck me: the realization that something was very wrong here.

Setting down the knife, I leaned against the counter for a moment to steady myself. Then, in a kind of daze, I went into the living room for my attaché case. I pulled out my notes and thumbed through them quickly until I found the corroboration I was looking for.

Shaking, I sat down on the sofa to sort things out in my mind for a bit. After which I buried my head in the pillow and cried.

It isn’t easy to accept that someone you liked, someone you
trusted,
is a diabolical killer.

Especially when that someone is your own client.

Now, what had come to me somewhere between the cherry tomatoes and the radishes was that John didn’t react the way common sense dictates he should have reacted.

I’d better make that a little clearer.

According to Trudie, it was the custom for John and Edward to see each other every Wednesday for breakfast—she’d specified the day during our initial meeting. And there’s no reason to believe that their long-standing date had been scratched for the morning after the shooting. Actually, quite the opposite. When Trudie and I had coffee in the Village last week, she’d commented on how those get-togethers had been canceled only twice: at the time Edward’s daughter gave birth and again when his dog died.

Obviously, however, on that particular Wednesday Edward never made it to whatever restaurant the cousins had arranged to patronize that day.

But what does John do about this?

Strangely, nothing.

And in the face of Edward’s absence, wouldn’t it have been only natural for a concerned John to attempt to reach the man at home? My client, however, never phoned that apartment. And why do I say this? Because if he had, it wouldn’t have been necessary for Sara’s sister to contact him at work with the tragic news.

“. . . I got the impression he was not only shocked, but really,
really
upset,” Jane told me of her conversation with John.

Apparently, he had made no reference to his earlier appointment with Edward or to Edward’s failure to show up for it—which should have provided John with a pretty good clue that
something
wasn’t kosher.

There was more. Sitting in my living room now, trying to piece things together, I became aware of the fact that my client had also never mentioned that final engagement to me.

Think about it. He should have been able to offer it as a kind of substantiation that he’d had nothing to do with the murder.

“Would I have waited at that coffee shop for half an hour” (or fifteen minutes or whatever) “if I hadn’t expected Edward to be there?” is how he could have phrased it. “Check with the manager, Mr. So-and-so,” he might have added. “He’ll tell you how long I stuck around.”

Instead, having very personal knowledge that Edward was dead,
John had been a no-show himself
.

At this point it also occurred to me that John had never even apprised me of the
existence
of this long-standing practice of theirs. I imagine he must have been ready to go for Trudie’s jugular when she referred to it that time in my office. After all, this might well have precipitated my making inquiries at the restaurant where he and Edward were supposed to meet that morning. I mean, I’d have been anxious to present Fielding with verification of my client’s presence at the eatery—you know, as a further indication, however slight, of his innocence. Unfortunately, however, I’d been as thick as pea soup, not latching on to the significance of Trudie’s information until this very minute.

At any rate, with my newfound wisdom, I could
certainly appreciate why John had kept mum about the Wednesday thing. Which is why I’ve always maintained that what
isn’t
said often turns out to be far more revealing than what is.

I could barely manage to get the food down. Of course, my mood was definitely not aiding the digestive process. But the meal itself didn’t help, either. While I did remember to put up the rigatoni, I then promptly forgot it existed. When I finally turned off the flame, what lay at the bottom of the pot closely resembled a big blob of white paste. Add to this that most of the marinara sauce had boiled out by then. Plus, after that devastating revelation, I’d abandoned any further salad preparation, so I wound up picking away at plain—and boring—lettuce and tomatoes.

Once supper was over I sniveled a lot, blotting my eyes at frequent intervals. I’d been totally deceived, convinced that John was a fine and decent human being. So much so that almost immediately I had become more than a hired PI; I’d turned into a staunch advocate. And let’s not forget how much time I wasted worrying about the man. It was a toss-up at this juncture who it was I despised more: my treacherous client or myself for believing in him.

It took a while for the tears to turn to anger and even longer before I made a resolution: That bastard was going to pay for his cousin’s murder—I’d make sure of it. I only wished I knew how.

The next morning—Friday—right in the middle of my Cheerios, I came up with the germ of an idea.

Now, it seemed fairly likely that what was holding
up John Lander’s arrest was the missing murder weapon. And while I certainly couldn’t pinpoint its whereabouts, I had this little inkling as to the
kind
of place John might have chosen to dispose of the gun. At any rate, it was worth checking into.

I finished breakfast, then contacted Jackie at home to let her know I probably wouldn’t be coming to work. Listen, even if my apartment building had just been razed to the ground or I’d been attacked by a swarm of killer bees, I still wouldn’t dare stay out without notifying Jackie.

At nine-thirty I phoned John’s office, first arranging a hankie over the receiver to alter my voice.

“I’m sorry,” his secretary informed me, sounding, if possible, even more nasal than she had on Tuesday, “Mr. Lander isn’t in just now.” (WHEW! Of course if he
had
been there, I would simply have dropped the receiver back in its cradle.) “May I take a message for him?”

“No, thank you, I’ll try him later. When is he expected?”

“Not until after two o’clock. May I tell Mr. Lander who called?” she persisted.

“Uh, it’s okay. I’ll be in touch with him this afternoon.”

As it happened, was I ever right about that!

It had rained on and off for the past couple of days, sometimes heavily. Now, however, the sun was turned on full blast, making the city appear to positively sparkle. Actually, it was an almost perfect morning, with the temperature hovering around sixty-five and the humidity so low that it didn’t even perturb my Shirley Temple curls. (No, I still hadn’t managed to get rid of them completely.) Under other circumstances, it would have been a lovely day for a drive. But not today.

For most of the short ride out to Brooklyn Heights I went through the routine that always seems to go hand in hand with my discovery of a perpetrator’s
identity. I began by cursing myself for taking so long to spot what should have been all too obvious. And then, once I’d had my fill of the self-abuse, I did an about-face and made excuses for my myopia. Although in this present instance, I almost did have a legitimate reason for failing to see the light.

It was,
I alibied,
no wonder I hadn’t considered John a suspect and had therefore directed my focus everywhere but.
After all, why would a guilty person hire a PI to conduct an investigation that could wind up implicating him in a killing? It didn’t make sense. Besides, apparently on some level I
did
appreciate that something was amiss with my client. I mean, how else could I explain the truth’s suddenly hitting me over the head like that?

And speaking of that truth, why
hadn’t
John brazened it out and shown up at the coffee shop that Wednesday?

One explanation, of course, is that he was still too shaken by the enormity of his crime to carry off the deception. It was also possible that the breakfast had flown completely out of his mind. Understandable when you take into account that this
was
his first murder—that I’m aware of, at any rate.

I was already in Brooklyn Heights when I began chewing over another sticking point.

Trudie, of course, was familiar with those once-a-week get-togethers, and very probably Sara was, too—and who knows who else?
So,
I put to myself,
what would John have told anyone who questioned him about that morning?

I imagine he could simply have claimed that Edward had telephoned him on Tuesday to cancel. And while this would have been only the third time that had occurred in how many years?—there was really no way to dispute it.

But did I consider for a moment that this is what actually happened?

Pul-eeze! I may have been willing to accept as coincidence that John had called off his appointment with Sara on the night of her husband’s murder. But I wasn’t about to make the same kind of mistake with regard to the morning after.

John Lander’s office was on the ground floor of one of a group of four- and five-story brownstones that took up a good portion of what looked to be a mostly residential street. Only a few minutes by car from the Brooklyn Bridge, it was, I observed with disgust, a very convenient location from which to commute to those weekly trysts of his.

“Yes?” asked a female voice when I pressed the bell.

“I’m here to see Mr. Lander,” I advised the gizmo on the doorframe. “I’m Desiree—”

I was cut short by the buzzer admitting me to the building.

An attractive blonde, who appeared to be in her early twenties, sat just inside the door to the apartment, completely surrounded by a huge semicircular desk in a light brown wood laminate. A small brass-and-black sign on the desk informed me that this was Eloise Flugelman.

Ms. Flugelman was busy at the computer, and I watched in admiration as her hands flew effortlessly over the keyboard. Then when I realized that she was chatting on the phone at the same time, the receiver pressed against her shoulder, my admiration for Ms. Flugelman knew practically no bounds. She held up her index finger as a signal that she’d be with me in a minute. But the minute dragged on. And on. Standing off to one side, I began to get impatient. Particularly since after a while, being forced to listen to that nasally voice was like a punishment for my sins.

I glanced around the room, which was a pretty decent size, owing to its no doubt having served as a living room in a previous incarnation. The place was
furnished sparsely, with four black leather-and-chrome chairs and a couple of chrome tables. A chrome bamboo-style magazine holder sat on the floor in one corner and a wooden coatrack occupied another. A few colorful modern prints decorated the stark white walls.

“Is Mr. Lander in?” I asked when the call was finally over.

The question seemed to trouble the girl. “I’m afraid he’s out just now. Did you have an appointment?”

“Oh, no. I was in the area, so I thought I’d stop in.”

She relaxed then. “Good. I was afraid I might have forgotten to write it down or something. Mr. Lander should be here about two.” She checked her watch, and automatically, I did the same. It wasn’t quite twelve. “Umm, I don’t suppose you’d care to wait.”

“I can’t. Maybe you can help me, though.”

The secretary smiled tentatively. “Well, I’ll try.”

“My name is Desiree Shapiro. I was—”

“I know who you are,” she informed me, grinning. “You’re a private detective. I’m the one who told John about you.”

“You
did
? How did you hear abut me, anyway?”

“I’m a friend of Elvin’s.”

“Elvin?”

“Elvin Blaustein. You remember, the fellow who lost his boa constrictor.”

“Good grief! That was years ago. How did you happen to recall my name?”

Eloise giggled.
“Desiree Shapiro?”

She had a point.

“Elvin told me you handle a lot of cases like his—lost pets and stuff.”

Handled,
past tense. But I refrained from setting the record straight. “And you mentioned me to Mr. Lander?”

“Correct. It came up in conversation one day after I overheard him talking to his wife on the telephone.
I suppose you’re aware that somebody took a shot at him.” Embarrassed, she tittered. “That was really silly. Of course you are. Anyway, it was obvious to me that she—his wife—was really after John to call in a private detective, and I started telling him about you.”

“Did you also inform him that I deal primarily with missing-pet-type projects?”

“Well, yes.”

“I’m surprised he decided to hire me.”

“I was kind of surprised, too,” Eloise admitted, flushing. “When I brought up your name I was just making conversation. I didn’t intend it as a recommendation.” Flustered now, she added quickly, “Oh, not that you aren’t good at what you do; I’m sure you are. It’s just that you have a different . . . specialty.”

I had to smile at the “specialty.”

“Listen,” I said then, “there was something I wanted to check with John. But it occurs to me that you might be the person I should be speaking to anyway.”

“What is it you’d like to know?”

“The morning after somebody shot at John—can you tell me what time he arrived at the office? I need the information for a report I’m preparing for him.”

Eloise picked up a large appointment ledger from the desktop and began to riffle through the pages. “Let’s see,” she said. “That was on a Tuesday, right?”

“Yes, May 13.”

“It’s just what I thought; John didn’t get in until late in the afternoon—around four, I think. He had an appointment at this new development in Cobblestone Lake.”

My mouth went totally dry, and my heart forgot to beat.
Could I possibly be on the right track?

“Where is that?”

“Upstate. In Sullivan County. The builder is a friend of his, and he wanted to talk to John about handling the sale of the units. In fact, John has
another meeting scheduled up there for later on this week.”

“Would you by any chance know the name of the development?”

“Holbrook Estates. John’s friend is Glenn Holbrook.”

“This is great. Thanks so much, Eloise. Is it okay if I call you Eloise?”

“Sure, that’s my name,” the girl responded ingenuously.

“Anyway, the information should help a lot in getting John’s itinerary straight for that day. I—” Stopping abruptly, I covered my mouth and slowly shook my head. After which I bit my lip. I hate to brag, but it was an inspired performance.

Eloise’s eyes opened wider. “What’s the matter?”

“I just realized that in spite of John’s wanting me to have the information, he might not appreciate your giving it out without his permission.”

“Do you really think it would bother him?” She was clearly disturbed.

“I’m not sure, but I shouldn’t have involved you—just in case. I’m very sorry.” As if in concentration, I put my finger to my cheek and scrunched up my forehead. “But listen, there isn’t any reason for John to find out I was even here today. I won’t say anything if you don’t.”

Eloise nodded somberly. “Then there’s no problem. It’ll be just between the two of us.”