Murder Can Spoil Your Appetite (6 page)

“You’re absolutely positive the perpetrator was a man?”

“It was a man,” she replied firmly. A moment later, however, her voice was minus some of its conviction. “Of course it was a man.” A pause. “At least, that’s how it looked to me.”

Back in the car, Lou made a production of checking his watch. “It’s one-thirty-three,” he notified me, “which is past my feeding time. How about you?”

Well, it was past my feeding time, too. Way past. In fact, I was concerned that, even as we spoke, my stomach might be revving up to voice its complaints. “I guess I can eat.”

“What kind of food do you like?”

“It doesn’t matter. Burger or—”

He cut me off. “Burger suits me just fine.”

There was a Wendy’s only a block away, so a short while later we were eagerly devouring burgers and fries and sipping Cokes. When he’d polished off his food, Lou—sheepishly, it seemed to me—announced that he’d be having another burger and another order of fries. To make him feel more comfortable about this (I swear that was the reason), I forced myself to join him in his gluttony.

Now, until this second go-round we’d exchanged very few words. So mostly to initiate a conversation, I asked Lou what he thought about Lottie Schmidt’s statement.

“She wasn’t able to give us much to go on,” he answered tersely.

“She’s very credible, though. The murder probably went down exactly as she said.”

“Yeah. There’d be no question about robbery being the motive if not for Ross—he’s our second witness. He noticed—But you’ll be talking to him yourself in a few hours. I did tell you I got in touch with Ross before we left for Lottie’s, didn’t I?”

“Uh-uh, I don’t believe so.”

“Well, anyhow, the guy’s agreed to stop by this evening—somewhere around six.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“By the way,” I put in then, “who’s this Sergeant Peterson that Lottie mentioned? The detective who was originally supposed to be working the case with you?”

“That’s right.”

“Is he upset that he’s no longer involved?”

“Not with the amount of pressure there is to solve this thing.” And now, a fond look crossing his face, Lou added, “Pete’s never been your real motivated kind of guy.”

“And you are?”

“I suppose I am, in a way. Anyhow, I try to stay focused on the investigation and not let all the other bullshit get to me.”

I’m not exactly sure how it came about (okay, I might have grilled him just a little), but soon afterward I learned that Lou was a widower with an eighteen-year-old son. And I volunteered—although he didn’t seem at all anxious for the information—that I was a widow. Only with no dependents. Unless you consider emotional dependents—in which case Ellen could probably qualify. (Or, at least, she would have before Mike came into her life. These days, believe it or not, she’s not nearly as emotional
or
as dependent as she once was.)

At any rate, it was well after two when we finished eating and left Wendy’s to pay Sheila Vincent a visit.

 

The woman who stood in the doorway was slightly less than medium height, with frizzy, reddish-blonde hair and large brown eyes fringed with long, dark lashes. She had a figure that most members of her own sex would probably regard as chunky, but which the majority of men, I suspect, would characterize as voluptuous. She favored us with a restrained but pleasant smile.

“Mrs. Vincent?” Lou asked, producing his shield.

“No, I’m a friend of hers, also her cousin by marriage. The name’s Marilyn—Marilyn Vincent.”

“I’m Lieutenant Hoffman, and this is Detective Shapiro. We’re investigating Mr. Vincent’s death.”

“Sheila told me you’d be over this afternoon. Come in, please. I’ll let her know you’re here.”

Marilyn admitted us into an impressive, marble-tiled foyer, then excused herself for a moment, which gave Lou and me an opportunity to look around us.

Leading directly from the foyer and almost completely visible from our vantage point was a spacious, all-white living room. For once I could almost appreciate my own living room, boringly—and practically—furnished though it was. I mean, I actually pictured some of the ice cream dribbles and gravy splatters and wine sloshes that had so often decorated it—and then been sopped up without leaving a trace.

Anyhow, there were eight or ten people seated in the white room, most of them juggling plates and cups. Although the atmosphere could hardly be described as festive, there was none of the deep pall you might have expected to accompany the death of someone so young—particularly as the result of foul play. I guess
subdued
would be the best word for the mood here.

“Some place, huh?” Lou whispered as we watched Marilyn make her way over to a blonde woman perched on the arm of a plump, oversized chair. The blonde was speaking earnestly to an unusually good-looking man with wavy silver hair, who was occupying the chair next to her own. As soon as there was a break in the conversation, Marilyn bent down to talk to the woman. And after a brief exchange, she returned to the foyer.

“Sheila—Mrs. Vincent—asked if you’d mind waiting for just a little while. She won’t be long.” She indicated Sheila and the silver-haired gentleman with a toss of her head. “It’s business, and he has to drive back to New York in a few minutes,” she explained.

“No problem,” Lou told her. “We’re in no hurry.”

“Follow me,” Marilyn instructed, leading us to a small, oak-paneled study down the hall and to the left of the foyer. “Make yourselves comfortable. Oh, can I get you something? There’s baked chicken and a delicious Black Forest ham. Also half a dozen different salads. We have freshly brewed coffee, too. And all sorts of nice, gooey cakes.”

Now, after overdoing it like that at Wendy’s—I’m not sure if it was the second large order of fries or the generous slab of cherry pie that eventually did me in—I knew there wasn’t even a micron of available space left inside me. So I politely—and wisely—declined. Lou must have been equally overstuffed, because he responded in kind.

Marilyn had already begun to walk away when he said, “We’ll want to talk to you a little later, Ms. Vincent.”

“Well, I’m here,” she threw out amiably over her shoulder.

 

It was a man’s room. “Clubby,” I suppose you could call it. Lou immediately settled into a high-backed brown leather chair, while I took myself on a short tour.

Going over to the large desk under the window, I made a cursory examination of the collection of wood-framed photographs here. Then I made an equally brief inspection of the English hunting scenes that adorned the walls. (Call me a Philistine, but they all looked pretty much the same to me.) After which I took a seat on the brown Chesterfield sofa, facing Lou.

Seconds later the door opened.

The first thing I noticed about Sheila Vincent was her perfume—a heady, sophisticated scent that preceded her into the room. Then Sheila herself entered. While not exactly beautiful, she was certainly very striking—a tall, slim woman, most likely in her early thirties, with full lips and cool, wide-set green eyes. She was elegantly turned out in a black long sleeved, vee-neck, wool sheath with black suede pumps and large circular silver earrings, her shimmering blonde hair becomingly drawn back into a chignon.

I immediately became conscious of my own essence of Aqua Net hair spray (which I’d spritzed on with total abandon for the second time that day at the police station and which completely overpowered the small dab of Ivoire I’d applied earlier). And why had I decided to leave my trench coat in the car, anyway? It was certainly in decent condition, and at least it would have covered this ugly old beige suit of mine.

The truth is, Sheila Vincent made me feel dowdy. And this did not induce me to be very kindly disposed toward her. What I hated most about the negative response she had instantly elicited in me, however, was that it wasn’t even her fault.

She introduced herself, extending her hand to me.

“Detective Shapiro.” I rose and shook the outstretched hand. It was warm and dry. Da Silva was right about the Vincent marriage, I decided, taking my seat again. I mean, if this woman was in mourning, I was a Swiss yodeler.

Lou, who had gotten to his feet as soon as the widow put in an appearance, took the hand she was now holding out to him. He clasped it in his for a moment before clearing his throat. “We’ll try not to keep you long, Mrs. Vincent. I know this must be . . . uh . . . it’s a very difficult time for you.” It was obvious my temporary partner wasn’t exactly at ease with this aspect of his duties.

“That’s all right. I realize you have a job to do,” she graciously assured him. “Please sit down.” As she joined me on the sofa, I noted sourly that, unlike yours truly, Sheila Vincent didn’t have to position herself close to the edge in order for
her
feet to touch the floor.

“We—uh—that is, we now believe your husband may not have been shot during a simple robbery attempt, as we first assumed,” Lou said. Sheila’s eyebrows shot up in a question, but she refrained from asking it, waiting for him to go on. “Somebody has come forward who claims to have seen the perpetrator sitting in his car, parked across the street from your husband’s office, hours before the shooting occurred.”

“Then you think . . . ?”

“The way things are shaping up, we could be talking about premeditated murder,” he answered gently. “It seems as if the killer was biding his time until your husband left work.”

Sheila appeared genuinely stunned. “Can this person—this witness—identify the man who shot Frank?”

“Unfortunately, he didn’t get a good look at him. Incidentally, was it usual for Mr. Vincent to stay at his office until eight o’clock?”

“Only on Wednesdays. That was his late night. Quite often he didn’t finish up until seven-thirty or eight on Wednesdays—sometimes later.”

“Do you have any idea who might have wanted to harm your husband?”

Sheila shook her head. “There wasn’t anybody. At least, not that I’m aware of.”

I joined in the questioning for the first time. “Your husband had no enemies? There was no one with even a minor little grudge against him?” Lou appeared startled by the sound of my voice. I think he’d almost forgotten I was there.

Sheila turned toward me. “Not that I know of.”

I tried again. “How about his practice? Did he have any partners?”

“No, there was only Frank and a receptionist.”

“I understand your husband was in politics.”

“Well, I guess you
might
say that. He was a candidate for the state assembly last year. But he lost.” It seemed to me that Sheila Vincent’s expression was rather satisfied when she delivered this piece of information. “There was talk that the party wanted him to make another run for office, however.”

“Politics can be a pretty rough game,” Lou interjected here.

“I imagine that’s true. But my husband wasn’t successful enough to incur resentment. Also, he was careful not to step on any toes. Frank could be very charming, Lieutenant Hoffman. Ask anyone.”

I seized on her words. “You said your husband
could
be very charming.”

“Yes, that’s what I said. And, no, he wasn’t always. In fact, Detective Shapiro, he was a bastard, and I had been planning to divorce him. I hope that doesn’t make you suspect I hired a hit man or anything. Believe me, I didn’t want Frank dead; I only wanted him out of my life.”

Lou leaned forward. “Just when was it that you left the country, Mrs. Vincent?”

“I flew to Paris a week ago tomorrow. It was supposed to be a two-week stay.”

“You weren’t at your hotel for a couple of days, though.”

“That’s right. I revisited some of the places I’d been to when I was at school over there. That was a while ago, of course, but I still have a few good friends in Paris. And on Tuesday I got together with two of them, Josie Benoit and Claire Wu”—she interrupted herself—“Claire’s a transplanted Chinese lady, if you’re wondering. Anyhow, we drove out to the Loire Valley to Amboise, Blois, Chambord—places like that. We had a wonderful time. And then on Thursday evening I returned to my hotel in Paris and learned about Frank.”

“We’re going to have to verify this with the other women.” Lou’s apologetic tone made me want to barf. I mean, men—even policemen, who should definitely know better—can be such idiots when they’re around an attractive female.

“I understand. I’ll get their phone numbers for you. In fact, why don’t I do that now?” the widow offered with a kind of noblesse-oblige nod of her sleek blonde head in Lou’s direction.

“Nice woman,” he murmured, mostly to himself, when she left the room. Then perhaps slightly daunted by my scowl, he added, “Seems to be, at any rate.”

Sheila returned a few minutes later with a piece of note paper, on which she’d apparently written the information Lou required. She handed him the paper, then said she’d be happy to show him the airline ticket stubs, too. “I don’t know just where I put them, but it shouldn’t be too much of a problem digging them up.”

“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Lou responded.

Of course it won’t.
I mean, would those ticket stubs prove she didn’t fly home on Wednesday and, after shooting her husband, turn around and fly right back to Paris?

And now she moved to sit beside me again.

“Did your husband have a jealous nature, Mrs. Vincent?” I asked the instant her bottom made contact with the sofa cushion.

“No, not at all.”

“I hope you won’t mind my next question, but we’re talking about a homicide here.”

“Yes, of course. What is it you want to know?”

“Has there been anyone else in the picture lately?”

“I seriously doubt it.”

“I meant for you,” I explained quietly.

Sheila met my eyes. Her voice was low, but firm. “Absolutely not.”