Die, Little Goose: A Bret Hardin Mystery. David Alexander
and imbedded itself in the back of the chair.” He palmed a misshapen pellet, showed it to the lieutenant. “We pried it out. This is it. It’s a forty-five, that’s for certain. Ballistics can tell us more.”
The assistant D.A. was a youngish, tired-looking man named Senber. He had deep, liverish circles beneath his eyes. “Well, you Homicide guys have got an easy one this time,” he said. “It’s too hot to work hard, anyway. They found the old man on the fire escape a second after he chilled her, and he told a lot of lies about locked doors to explain how he got there.”
“You think you’ve got enough to ask for an indictment?” Romano asked.
“Enough?” the D.A. said. “How much you want? This is what you cops call catching a criminal with the meat in his mouth. Don’t try to make it complicated. It’s too damned hot for complications.”
Romano turned to the medical examiner. He was a spindly, middle-aged man who did not seem to be affected by the heat. His cord suit was crisply creased and his white collar wasn’t wilted. Romano said, “Anything to tell me, Dr. Grew?”
Grew shrugged. “It’s pretty cut and dried,” he answered. “I never say too much about the probable time of death without an autopsy. That would be particularly hard because of the blood coagulation and so forth of a woman who is paralyzed. But it’s a cinch she wasn’t killed very long ago and the time of ten fifty-five that is set by the two women who heard the shot would be just about right, I’d think. Oh, there’s one queer thing.”
“What?” Romano asked.
The M.E. leaned forward and plucked a small object off the blue robe. “Feathers,” he said. “White feathers like this one. We found a few of ’em. Some were stuck to the wound. Some others were on the robe or scattered around her feet and a few were on the fire escape where the old man was standing.”
Romano took the feather. “Feathers,” he said. He handed it to Grierson. “You make anything out of this feather, Grierson?” he asked.
Grierson looked at the feather briefly.
“I can tell you one thing,” he answered. “I can tell you what kind of feather it is. My brother-in-law runs a poultry farm on Long Island, and I go out there a lot.
“This is a goose feather.”
three
Two young men in white coats arrived, and at a nod from the medical examiner they began to lift the small body from the wheelchair onto a canvas stretcher. Hardin turned abruptly and walked out into the hall. Romano followed him.
Romano said, “Don’t take it too hard, honey boy. The jury isn’t in yet. Like I told you, I’ve known the old man a long time and I’ll give him every break I can.”
Bart said, “Are you really going to charge this old man with murder, copper?”
Romano shook his head despairingly. “Don’t make it so personal,” he said. “I don’t charge anybody with anything. I take ’em in, that’s all. You heard what the D.A. said. He wants me to take Lennox in. There won’t be any charge yet, not right away. At this stage we just say we’re holding them for questioning.”
“No matter what you call it, you’re arresting him on suspicion of murder,” Bart answered. “That will kill him. You won’t need the services of the executioner up at Sing Sing. It’s not just his heart and his blood pressure and this heat will do it. All that he has left is the memory of a long and blameless life and you’re taking that away from him. You’re not only labeling him a murderer, you’re implying he’s a detestable old man who killed a helpless, crippled girl for a dirty reason. There couldn’t be any other kind of reason for a man his age to kill a girl the age of Daphne.”
Romano regarded Hardin sadly. “You’re making me out a villain because I happen to have the rank and it’s my responsibility to take him in,” he said. “I’m not a villain. I’m just a cop and cops have to do nasty things sometimes. I can’t expect you to see it the way a cop has to look at it, but just the same I’m going to lay it on the line for you. Two women hear a shot fired. One of them is standing right outside the door of the room where the gun went off. Nobody comes out the door. There’s one other way out of the room—through the window and down a fire escape. They open the door and they find a dead body and they find a man standing on the fire escape just outside the window. The man is James Lennox. A few minutes later a cop finds a gun that probably fired the shot on the fire escape right where James Lennox has been standing. Lennox claims he’s standing on the fire escape because it was the only way he could get out of his room when he heard the shot. He says his door was locked from the outside. But the landlady who’s been a friend of his for thirty years and wants to help him if she can has to admit that she tried the door, that it wasn’t locked, that it opened easily. You think the D.A.’s office is going to let a Homicide lieutenant talk them out of taking Lennox in just because he’s a nice old man and has got a blood pressure condition?”
“But damn it all, another man confessed he murdered Daphne Temple!”
“Yeah,” said Romano. “And you’re the one who gave the other man a perfect alibi. He was standing alongside you in a Ninth Avenue bar when the murder was committed, you said. You think he killed her by remote control or something?”
“I think it’s damned suspicious that Adrian Temple confessed he killed his wife and we found her murdered.”
“He confessed he killed his wife last winter and she lived for about six months after that,” Romano answered. “Adrian Temple is a screwball with what they call an obsession. The only reason the medics at City didn’t bug him last time was that everybody is flipping his toupee these days and there’s a shortage of beds in the loony bins. They wrote him off as a harmless drunk and let him go after they’d hit his knee with a little hammer a time or two.”
Hardin said, “I’m going downstairs and talk to Jim Lennox. Then I’m going out to get him a lawyer. I’m going to get him Marty Land.”
“You’re getting him a good one,” Romano replied. “Marty Land’s just about the smartest cookie they ever baked in these parts.”
As Hardin descended the stairs the policeman on guard at the front door walked into the hallway with a well-dressed, jaunty young man. He called to the precinct detective, “This guy claims he lives here.”
Mrs. Mattingly walked into the hall to identify the newcomer. Hardin, who had visited often in the house, recognized the young man as Charlie Montgomery, the ventriloquist who conducted a kids’ show on television.
Montgomery said, “What’s this all about? Why all the gendarmes? Nobody kidnapped my dummy, Woodenhead Willie, did they?”
Mrs. Mattingly had regained some control of herself. Instinctively she had reverted to her role of actress as a defense mechanism in the emergency. When she spoke to Montgomery her voice was hollow-toned, like the portentous voice of Lady Macbeth on the night of Duncan’s murder. “Charles,” she said, “there’s terrible news. Daphne was murdered while we were at the theatre.”
The young man stared at her with disbelief for a moment. Then he paled and said, “Oh, my God, no!” and collapsed into a black walnut armchair.
Hardin walked into the Victorian parlor.
Lennox still sat on the little sofa, his face as white as his long hair, his eyes staring with bewilderment. The fat, sweaty detective hovered over him. The old man looked up at Hardin. “Bart,” he said, “they’re going to arrest me, aren’t they? They’re going to put me in jail. I’ve gone through a lot of human experiences in my time, but this is a thing I simply can’t believe. Did you talk to our good friend Romano, Bart? Does he actually believe I would murder Daphne? I loved her, Bart. She was sweet and gentle and brave and I loved her very much.”
Hardin’s voice was harsh and edgy, as it always was when he was deeply moved. He said, “It’s just routine. They have to take you in for questioning. I’m leaving now to get