“Believe it or not, I haven’t been hired by anybody. But there are people who seem to think your sister may not have died of natural causes, and that her husband may not have killed himself. Because I happened to be in town visiting my mother, some of these people have asked me to look into it. That’s mainly the truth,” I told him, spreading my hands in what I hoped would be seen as a gesture of candor.
Newman peered at me for several seconds before speaking. “You were an officer, a major, no less, and I respect you for that, even though I had to answer to some second looeys who didn’t know their heads from their tails. You know, a lotta people around here think that I’m tetched in my attic,” he said, tapping his forehead with a gnarled index finger. “And I suppose maybe I am at that. I don’t always feel right, and I don’t always remember things that I should. And sometimes I get these headaches like you wouldn’t believe. Doc tells me it’s because of what I went through in the war, and I’m not about to dispute him in his opinion.
“Now as far as what happened to my sister, I’d hafta say that miserable husband of hers didn’t do her any favors.”
“What do you mean by that, Mr. Newman?”
“By that I mean she didn’t get the kind of medical care she needed, ’specially when her mind began to desert her.”
“She had a full-time caregiver, didn’t she?”
Newman snorted. “If that’s what you want to call that Carrie Yeager floozy her husband brought in to look after Sylvia.”
“You don’t believe the Yeager woman was qualified?”
Another snort. “Qualified as what—a gold digger? You had better believe that word got down here to me about how friendly Mulgrew and that Yeager woman had become. You know, Mr. Goodwin, I’m something of a loner, don’t have a lot of friends, which is just fine by me.
“But some people around this town just can’t wait to bring you bad news. There’s a woman just across the street here who telephoned me to say she had seen my brother-in-law and that so-called caregiver having what she called ‘a cozy dinner’ at a restaurant in your town up north while Sylvia was at home and probably alone and suffering.”
“What do you think Miss Yeager expected to gain from her friendship with Logan Mulgrew?”
Newman gave me an Are you an idiot? look. “Well, what do you think? Money, of course! I can’t believe a young woman like her would have any kind of romantic interest in that dried-up old coot.”
“Did he leave her anything in his will?” I asked, knowing the answer.
“Not that I’ve heard. So whatever she was up to apparently didn’t work.”
“What has become of her?”
“That I couldn’t say. And to be honest, I really don’t give a tinker’s damn.”
“That’s understandable. Do you think Mrs. Mulgrew was killed?”
Newman paused for several seconds and ran a hand across his brow before answering. “I have asked myself that many times, and I just don’t know. I wasn’t around, of course; as I told you, I was not welcome. Which means I have no idea the kind of treatment that Sylvia was getting—or not getting. But let’s just say that I have my suspicions, strong suspicions.”
“Now on to her husband. Do you think that he killed himself?”
The prematurely aged soldier jerked upright and squared his shoulders. “Why are you asking me?”
I flipped a palm. “You knew all the people involved, and I figure you might have some observations, that’s all.”
“Do I think Mulgrew shot himself because he was devastated over Sylvia’s death?”
“Or do you think Mulgrew shot himself at all?”
It was obvious that Newman was getting agitated by the direction in which I was steering the conversation. He began hyperventilating, to the point where I felt he might be having some sort of attack or seizure. I waited as he slowly settled down and his breath became more normal.
He blinked at me as though seeing me for the first time. “I . . . sorry, I . . .” He held his head in his hands and shook it vigorously as if to clear it.
“Are you all right, Mr. Newman?”
“I think so, and I need to . . . need to go up to my room and lie down now.” He got to his feet slowly and walked toward the stairway to the second floor.
“Can I give you a hand?” I asked.
Newman shook his head but didn’t answer and slowly began climbing the steps as he gripped the railing. I went up behind him in case he fell, which seemed like a strong possibility. But he made it to the top and headed for the door to what I assumed was his bedroom. I saw no reason to stay any longer.
Chapter 18
I had plenty to think about on the drive back to my mother’s house. There was no question that Newman had become psychologically scarred by his war experiences. But did he use that scarring as a figurative crutch to avoid facing an unpleasant reality, one in which he was the shooter of Logan Mulgrew?
He seemed relatively lucid until I started talking about the possibility that Mulgrew might have been killed. Then he became unhinged—or did he? Nero Wolfe has on more than one occasion discussed the ways in which people can use their supposed mental or psychological deficiencies to their benefit by appearing to be more disturbed than they really are. I may have just witnessed such behavior from Lester Newman.
In fact, my boss had been on my mind often since my arrival in Ohio. As I continued to gather information about the deaths of both Logan Mulgrew and his wife, I found myself wondering: What would Nero Wolfe do with this fact or that comment? Over the years, I have tried to train myself to think like him, but it has almost never worked. He was born a genius, and I was born . . . well, not a genius.
Wolfe may have put it best when I told him once that I had some ideas about a case on which we were working. His response: “Your head full of ideas? Even my death by violence is not too high a price for so rare and happy a phenomenon as that.” I should have been insulted, but I wasn’t. He was right, and I have long since become aware that my role in our operation is not as a thinker but as a man of action.
That being the case, what action should I now take? First, I had one more individual to meet with—Eldon Kiefer. I was thinking about how best to approach him when I realized I had arrived at my mother’s home.
She had seen me coming and held open the front door. “Successful trip?” she asked.
“Mixed. Mr. Newman seems to be a very troubled man.”
“Well, the war did a lot of horrible things to a lot of people. I was proud of the fact that you were in the army but was also glad you were stationed in the States.”
“And ironically, I wished I had seen combat. Anything going on here?”
“Oh yes. Katie, the intrepid reporter, called—twice. She seemed very curious as to where you were.”
“You didn’t tell her?”
“Of course not, Archie. I just said you had gone out and were probably visiting some of your old haunts on your first visit back here in a long time.”
“You are a good liar, Mom.”
“I was not lying, I just wasn’t being specific.”
“Did Katie say why she was looking for me?”
“No, but if I were to make a guess, she was suspicious that you were doing some investigating and leaving her out of it.”
“A good guess. Not to take anything away from Katie, but I tend to operate more efficiently when I work alone. What’s different here is that after I’ve collected whatever information I get, there’s no Nero Wolfe to unload it on. I’ve gotten so used to having him do all the thinking that I may have forgotten how to do it myself.”
“I don’t believe that for a second!” my mother said in an admonishing tone. “I think you are selling yourself short.”
“Maybe, but after talking to all these people—and I still have Kiefer left—I’m no closer to figuring things o
ut than when I started.”
“Don’t you suppose it’s possible that Sylvia Mulgrew died of natural causes and her husband really did shoot himself?”
“Yes, it’s possible, but I don’t believe it, at least in the case of Logan Mulgrew. So far, nothing I’ve learned about the man would indicate he was so heartbroken over his wife’s death that he would kill himself.”
“I wish I could be of some help to you, Archie. Unfortunately, as I’ve told you, I’m not really tuned in to the talk that goes on around town. Sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about. You are not a gossip, and I happen to like that. It’s very possible that I’ll go back to New York without having accomplished a darn thing here.”
“You’ve already accomplished something just by being here so that we could have some time together, one-on-one.”
“Yeah, that has been nice, no question. But just because we have gotten caught up these last few days is no reason that you shouldn’t come to Manhattan in the fall, just as we had planned. Remember, Lily Rowan likes to have somebody to go shopping with at all those pricey clothing and shoe stores.”
“As I’ve mentioned to you before, she hardly needs an excuse,” my mother said, rolling her eyes.
“Still, I gather it’s more fun to have a partner in crime when shopping,” I replied.
“Leave it to my detective son to equate everything to crime. On that subject, when do you plan to see Mr. Kiefer?”
“Possibly as early as tonight, if he happens to be in town and at his favorite watering hole.”
Chapter 19
After two helpings of my mother’s roast chicken, I paged through the telephone directory and found Charlie’s Tap, the place Katie Padgett had told me was Eldon Kiefer’s hangout. I was on my way.
Charlie’s turned out to be a typical—if there is such a thing—neighborhood drinking spot: neon signs in the front window advertising beer brands; polished ebony bar running the length of the room that was longer than wide; half a dozen tables; tiny dance floor, currently unused; and a jukebox that was playing a Johnny Mathis ballad as I stepped in. A couple of heads turned my way and then returned to their drinks. Less than half the stools were occupied. I took a spot at one end of the bar and ordered a draft beer. The bartender, a glum, tight-lipped sort with droopy eyes, slid the foamy stein to a halt in front of me without spilling a drop.
“Is there a guy in here named Kiefer, by chance?” I asked.
“Eldon? Yeah, that’s him down there,” the barkeep said, indicating a burly man with a crew cut and a scowl. I picked up my beer and walked to an empty stool next to him. “Nice evening, huh?” I said, my version of snappy repertoire.
He grunted something unintelligible. “It’s a long time now since I’ve been back here, in what passes for my hometown,” I told him. “Seems like it’s about the same as I remember.”
He shrugged broad shoulders and drank his beer. “Things don’t ever change much around here.”
“I suppose not. Since I’ve been back, all the talk I’ve been hearing is about that Mulgrew banker shooting himself. Damnedest thing, eh?”
Kiefer didn’t respond, so I pushed on. “What do you think would drive a successful old fellow like that to kill himself? Maybe bad health, eh?”
“You tell me,” he mumbled, obviously not interested in conversation.
“Quite a puzzler,” I pushed on. “Did you know him?”
He glared at me. “Yeah, I knew him, as much as I wanted to.”
“I’ve heard rumors about Mulgrew, and not very nice ones. It seems that he was, well . . .” I let it trail off.
“Well, what?” Kiefer barked, turning to me with a fierce expression. I had awakened him.
“It seems he had a habit of taking advantage of young women, or so I have been told.”
“Is that any of your business?” he growled, causing others to look in our direction.
“I’m just commenting on what I’ve been hearing.”
“Well, keep your goddamn commenting to yourself!”
“Sorry,” I said, holding up a hand. “I didn’t mean to get you all riled up.”
“I will show you just who’s riled up,” Kiefer said, giving me a hard shove that knocked me off my stool and onto the floor on my rear end. As I got to my feet, he reared back and delivered a roundhouse punch in the direction of my jaw that I saw coming. It turned out to be a glancing blow as I backed away, and I delivered a right hand to his chest, which seemed to be made of armor.
Kiefer threw a second punch, which caught me in the shoulder and spun me around. I squared up and aimed a left jab at his face, staggering him. A second left to his gut, which wasn’t made of armor, doubled him over and sent him to the floor with a retch. During our flurry, the others along the bar had backed away and the bartender, as I was to learn, got on the telephone to the police.
It seemed like only seconds had passed, although it must have been longer, before a pair of young officers in uniform, one tall and skinny and the other short and well-fed, walked in, tensed and with hands hovering above their holsters. “Okay, what’s going on here?” the taller one demanded of the barkeep.
“These two,” he said, pointing at Kiefer and me, “they started mixing it up. They went at it before I even knew what was going on.”
“All right, you brawlers, get over there against the wall. Hey, wait a minute, it’s you again,” Shorty snapped, aiming his comment at Kiefer. “This is the third or fourth time you’ve gotten into a scrape with somebody. You need to control your—”
“It’s the first time anything’s ever happened with Eldon in my place, Officer,” the bartender interrupted. “There hasn’t been any trouble in here in years. You can check your records.”
“Yeah, Eldon’s always pretty quiet when he’s here,” one of the regulars put in. “Maybe it’s this other guy that caused the trouble,” he said, pointing at me.
“You, I’m sorry to say, I know,” the chubby cop told Kiefer and then turned to me. “You, I don’t know. Let’s see some identification.” I handed him my wallet.
“Goodwin, eh? Related to the Mrs. Goodwin who lives out on the Portsmouth Road?”
“My mother. I’m in town visiting her.”
“You’re in town stirring up trouble, is more like it,” he said with a sneer. “Hold on—you are a private cop?” He fingered my license and looked at me to see if my face matched the photo.
“In New York.”
“Maybe brawling is common where you come from, Mr. Goodwin, but we don’t take kindly to it here in what you probably think of as the sticks.”
“For the record, if anybody’s keeping score, I did not throw the first punch.”
“He’s right,” another of the onlookers said. “I saw Eldon shove him off his barstool and onto the floor. It was the start.”
“What do you have to say to that?” the beanpole asked Kiefer, who was wiping blood off his nose.
“I got nothin’ to say.”
The officer turned to me. “Okay, let’s hear your story. What did you tell Kiefer that got him all worked up?”
“I just started talking about some of what’s been going on around town.”
“Do you know Kiefer?”
“No, I just happened to sit down next to him.”
“That’s not true, Officer,” the bartender said. “When this man—Goodwin, isn’t it?—came in, he asked if Eldon was here, and I pointed him out.”
“Had Mr. Goodwin ever been in here before?”
“Not to my knowledge, and I’m behind the bar ninety-five percent of the time we’re open. Now I happen to run a peaceful place, and—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know, I know, you made your point before, don’t push it,” the tall cop said. “Mr. Goodwin, why did you specifically seek out Eldon Kiefer?”
“I’d heard
, I can’t remember where, that he knows a lot about what goes on around here.”
“And just why are you interested in ‘what goes on around here’? Does it have something to do with you being a private detective?”
“I’d prefer not to say any more here.”
“Kiefer doesn’t want to talk, and you don’t want to talk. Well, that’s just fine, because we’re going to be taking you both down to the station to meet Chief Blankenship. Maybe he can loosen up your tongues.”
Chapter 20
The police allowed both Kiefer and me to drive our own vehicles to the police headquarters, although we had to follow close behind their patrol car with its flashing lights, which made for a poor man’s parade through the downtown streets, drawing curious looks from pedestrians.
Our motley little entourage pulled up in front of the police station, an unimpressive one-story brick structure that I recognized from my youth, although I never had occasion to be inside. We trooped in, Kiefer in the lead, followed by me and then Mutt and Jeff, the unmatched pair of young coppers. They never drew their weapons, apparently seeing the two of us as harmless.
Hardly surprising, Kiefer and I did not speak to each other. He held a handkerchief to the nose I had bloodied, and I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder where his right had landed.
I regretted, at least slightly, having baited Kiefer back in the bar, but then, I didn’t expect the violent reaction that resulted, although maybe I should have, given what Katie Padgett had told me about him and his volatility. It seemed the man was like a grenade ready to discharge.
“We’ve got a couple of would-be prizefighters here,” the tall cop said to the bald desk sergeant, who wore a bored expression. “My guess is that the chief would like to meet them.”
“I’ll tell him you’re here,” the sarge said with a world-weary sigh, picking up a phone and muttering something into the mouthpiece. He hung up and said, “Okay, go on back and see him.”
Blankenship’s quarters were about what I would have expected of a small-town top cop’s office: bare walls; a single window looking out onto a parking lot; a three-drawer gunmetal filing cabinet; a neat maple desk with a framed color photograph of his wife and two young children; and a plaque that read Chief Thomas Robert Blankenship.
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