The Fourth Deadly Sin (21 page)

“I wish we had the death penalty.

Doctor Simon was a dear, sweet man, and no one deserves to die like that. I cried for forty-eight hours after it happened. I Still can’t believe he’s gone.”

Delaney nodded and started for the door. Then he stopped and turned.

“One more thing,” he said.

“Did Doctor Simon ever mention to you that he had been attacked or threatened by a patient?”

“No, he never did.”

“In the past year or six months, did you notice any change in him? Did he act differently?”

She stared at him.

“Funny you should ask that. Yes, he changed. In the last year or so. I even mentioned it to my boyfriend. Doctor Simon became, uh, moodier. He used to be so steady. The same every day: pleasant and kind to everyone.

Then, in the last year or so, he became moodier. Some days he’d really be up, laughing and joking. And other days he’d be down, like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.”

“I see.”

“About a month ago,” she added, “he wore a little flower in his lapel. He never done that before. He really was a dreamy man.”

“Thank you, Miss Judd,” Delaney said, tipping his homburg.

When he came outside, he found the day transformed. A thick cloud cover was churning over Manhattan, the wind had taken on a raw edge, the light seemed sourish and menacing.

The gloom fitting his mood exactly.

He was disgusted with himself, for he had been trying to bend the facts to fit a theory instead of devising a theory that fit all the facts. That kind of thinking had been the downfall of a lot of wild-assed detectives.

It was those two sets of footprints soaked into the Ellerbees’ carpet that had seduced him. That and the gap in the victim’s time schedule. It seemed to add up to two late patients on the murder night. But though Carol Judd said it was possible, there wasn’t a shred of evidence to substantiate it.

Still, he told himself stubbornly, it was crucial to identify Ellerbee’s late visitor or visitors. One of them had been the last person to see the victim alive and was a prime suspect.

Plodding uptown, he remembered what he had said to Monica about assembling a jigsaw puzzle. He had told her that he had found some straight-edged pieces and was putting together the frame. Then all he needed to do was fill in the interior pieces of the picture.

Now he recalled that some puzzles were not pictures at all.

They were rectangles of solid color: yellow, blue, or blood red. There was no pattern, no clues of shape or form. And they were devilishly hard to complete.

When he entered the brownstone, he heard the phone ringing and rushed down the hallway to the kitchen. But Monica was there and had already picked up.

“Who?” she said.

“Just a minute, please.” She covered the mouthpiece with her palm and turned to her husband.

“Timothy Hogan,” she reported. “Do you know him?”

“Hogan? Yes, he’s one of the new men. I’ll talk to him.”

She handed him the phone.

“I couldn’t get a hold of Jason or Boone,” Hogan whined, “so that’s why I’m calling. I’m at St. Vincent’s Hospital.”

“What happened?”

“I started checking out that Joan Yesell. She didn’t report to work today.

Okay? So I go down to her place in Chelsea.

She ain’t home, and her mother ain’t home. So I start talking to the neighbors. Okay? This Joan Yesell, she tried to do the Dutch yesterday afternoon, but blew it. Just nicked her left wrist with a kitchen knife. A lot of blood, but she’s okay. They kept her here overnight, under observation. Her mother is signing her out right now. You want I should question them?”

“No,” Delaney said promptly, “don’t do that. But them go home. You can catch up with them tomorrow. Do you know what time yesterday she cut herself?”

“They brought her into St. Vincent’s Emergency about four-thirty, so I guess she sliced herself around four o’clock.

Okay?”

“Thank you, Hogan. You did exactly right to call me. Pack it in for the day.”

He hung up and turned to Monica. He told her what had happened.

“The poor woman,” she said somberly.

“If she tried suicide yesterday at four o’clock, it couldn’t have been more than an hour after Boone and I had questioned her. I hope to God we didn’t trigger it.”

“How did she seem when you left?”

“Well, she’s a mousy little thing and suffers from depression. She was very quiet and withdrawn. Dominated by her mother. But she sure didn’t seem suicidal. I wonder if it was anything we said.”

“I doubt that. Don’t worry about it, Edward.”

“This morning I was happy that things were beginning to happen, that we were nwking them happen. But I didn’t figure on anything like this.”

“It’s not your fault,” she assured him.

“She’s tried before, hasn’t she?”* ‘-Ibree times.”

“Well, there you are. Don’t blame yourself.”

“Son of a bitch,” he said bitterly.

“I just don’t get it. We talk to her, very politely, no arguments, we leave, and she tries to kill herself.”

“Edward, maybe it was just talking about the murder that pushed her over the edge. If she’s depressed to start with, reminding her of the death of someone who was trying to help her might have made her decide life wasn’t worth living.”

“Yes,” he said gratefully, “it could have been that. I’m going to have a slug of rye. Would you like one?”

“I’ll have a white wine. We’re having linguine with clam sauce tonight. I added a can of minced clams and a dozen fresh cherrystones.”

“Very good,” he said approvingly.

“In that case, I’ll have a white wine, too. By the way, Chief Suarez is stopping by later. I don’t know what time, but he’ll call first. I’d like you to meet him. I think you’ll like him.”

After dinner, Delaney went into the study to write out a report on Carol Judd. Suarez called around eight o’clock and said he was on his way uptown. But it was almost nine before he arrived. Delaney took him into the living room and introduced him to Monica.

“What can I get you, Chief?” he asked.

“You look like you could use a transfusion.”

Suarez smiled wanly.

“Yes, it has been that kind of a day.

Would a very, very dry gin martini on the rocks be possible?”

“Of course. Monica, would you like anything?”

“A small Cointreau would be nice.”

Delaney went into the kitchen and made the drinks. He put them on a tray along with a brandy for himself.

“Delightful,” Chief Suarez said, when he tasted his.

“Best martini I’ve ever had.”

“As I told you,” Delaney said, shrugging away the compliment, “I have no good news for you, but I wanted you to know what we’ve been doing.”

Rapidly, concisely, he summarized the progress of his investigation to date. He omitted nothing he thought important, except the lifting of the ball peen hammer from Ronald Bellsey’s Cadillac. He expressed no great optimism, but pointed out there was still a lot of work to be done, particularly on those vague alibis of the six patients.

Monica and the Chief listened intently, fascinated by his recital. When he finished, Suarez said, “I do not believe things are as gloomy as you seem to suggest, Mr. Delaney.

You have uncovered several promising leads-more, certainly, than we have found. I commend you for persuading Doctor Diane Ellerbee to furnish a list of violence-prone patients. But you should know, that lady and the victim’s father continue to bring pressure on the Department, demanding a quick solution.”

“That’s Thorsen’s problem,” Delaney said shortly.

“True,” Suarez said, “and he handles it by making it my problem.”

He glanced around the living room.

“Mrs. Delaney, you have a lovely home.

So warm and cheerful,”

“Thank you,” she said.

“I hope you and your wife will visit us, A social visit-no talk of murder.”

“Rosa would like that,” he said.

“Thank you very much.”

He sat a moment in silence, staring into his glass. His long face seemed drawn, olive skin sallow with fatigue, the tic at the left of his mouth more pronounced.

“You know,” he said with his shy, rueful smile, “since the death of Doctor Ellerbee, there have been perhaps fifty homicides in the city. Many of those, of course, were solved immediately. But our solution rate on the others is not what it should be; I am aware of that and it troubles me. I will not speak - to you of our manpower needs, Mr. Delaney; I know you had the same problem when you were in the Department.

I mentioned all this merely to tell you how grateful I am for your assistance. I wish I could devote more time to the Ellerbee murder, but I cannot. So I am depending on you.”, I warned you from the start,” Delaney said.

“No guarantee - Naturally. I realize that. But your participation lifts part of my burden and gives me confidence that, during this difficult time, I badly need. Mrs. Delaney, do you have faith in your husband?”

“Absolutely,” she said.

“And do you think he will find Ellerbee’s killer?”

“Of course he will. Once Edward sets his mind on something, it’s practically done. He’s a very tenacious man.”

“Hey,” Delaney said, laughing, “what’s this-the two of you ganging up on me?”

“Tenacious,” Chief Suarez repeated, staring at the other man.

“Yes, I think you are right. I am not a betting man, but if I was, I would bet on you, Mr. Delaney. I have a good feeling that you will succeed. Now I have a favor I would like to ask of YOU.”

“What’s that?”

“I would like it if we could call each other by our Christian names.”

“Of course, Michael.”

“Thank you, Edward.”

“And I’m Monica,” she said loudly.

They all laughed, and Delaney went into the kitchen for another round of drinks.

After the Chief had left, Delaney came back into the living room and sprawled into his chair.

“What do you think of him?” he asked.

“A very nice man,” Monica said.

“Very polite and softspoken. But he looks headed for a burnout. Do you think he’s tough enough for the job?”

“It’ll make him or break him,” Delaney said roughly.

“Headquarters is a bullring. Turn your back for a second and you get gored. Monica, when I was telling him what we’re doing in the Ellerbee case, was there anything special that caught your attention? Something that sounded false? Or something we should have done that we haven’t?”

“No,” she said slowly, “nothing in particular. It sounded awfully complicated, Edward. All those people …”

“It is complicated,” he said, rubbing his forehead wearily.

“In the first stages of any investigation, you expect to be overwhelmed by all the bits and pieces that come flooding in.

Facts and rumors and guesses. Then, after a while, if you’re lucky, they all fall into a pattern, and you know more or less what happened. But I admit this case has me all bollixed up.

I’ve been trying to keep on top of it with reports and files and time schedules, but it keeps spreading out in more directions.

It’s so complex that I’m afraid I may be missing something that’s right under my nose. Maybe I’m getting too old for this business.”

“You’re not getting older,” she said loyally, “you’re getting better.”

“Keep telling me that,” he said.

During the next two days, the disorder in the Ellerbee case that had troubled Edward X. Delaney showed signs of lessening.

“It’s still confusion,” he told Sergeant Boone, “but it’s becoming organized confusion.”

Driving his little task force with stern directives, he was able to move them around so each had the chance to eyeball several patients. By Wednesday night, Delaney, Boone, and Jason were able to achieve optimum pairings of detective and subject. They went like this: Benjamin Calazoisaac Kane.

Robert Keisman-Harold Gerber.

Ross Konigsbacher-L. Vincent Symington.

Helen K. Venable-Joan Yesell.

Timothy Hogan-Ronald J. Bellsey.

Brian Estrella-Sylvia Mae Otherton.

“If it doesn’t work out,” Delaney told his people, “we’ll switch you around until we start getting results.”

Brian Estrella, the pipe-smoker, hoped he wouldn’t be switched from Sylvia Mae Otherton. The woman fascinated him, and he thought he could do some good there.

On the morning he started out to meet her for the first time, his horoscope in the Daily News read: “Expect a profitable surprise.” And as if that wasn’t encouraging enough, his wife, Meg, called from the nursing home to report she was feeling better, her hair was beginning to grow back in, and she would be home soon.

Which was, Estrella knewa lie-but a brave, happy lie all the same.

Sergeant Boone had warned him what to expect, but still it was something of a shock to walk into that dim, overheated apartment and confront someone who looked like all she’d need would be a broomstick to soar over the rooftops.

She was wearing a voluminous white garment which could have been a bedsheet except that it was inset with triangles of white lace. It hung quite low, almost to the floor, but not low enough to hide Otherton’s bare feet. They were short and puffy, the toenails painted black.

Boone had mentioned the woman’s jewelry and perfume, the wildly decorated room and burning incense. It was all there, but what surprised Detective Estrella was Otherton’s patience. After all, this was the third time she had been braced by the cops on the Ellerbee kill, and he expected her to be hostile and indignant.

But she led him into her apartment without demur and answered his questions freely without once reminding him that she had replied to the same queries twice before. He appreciated that, and decided to try an absolutely honest approach to see if that might tempt her into additional disclosures * ‘ “You see, ma’am,” he said, “we’re most concerned about your whereabouts the night of the crime. You’ve told us you were here alone. That may be true, but we’d feel a lot better if we could confirm it. Did you go out at all that night?”

“Oh, no,” she said in a low voice.

“I very rarely go out.

That’s part of my problem.”

“And you say you had no visitors, saw no one, made and received no phone calls?”