"Ran into him. Dragged him to headquarters. He's not the killer."
Len took another belt. “You sure?"
I took a hit of beer and spotted something that made my throat tighten. I had to wait for the swallow of beer to go down.
"What size you wear?” I said, making it sound light, friendly, nodding at his shoes.
"Fourteen.” He chuckled but all I could see was the worn spot on the left heel.
I tried to control my breathing as my mind put the pieces together. “Wasn't your father a professor?"
Len grinned drunkenly. “Ancient History at St. Mary's Dominican College.” He didn't sound as drunk as he looked. “First Catholic women's college in the south. Taught all those girls, but it didn't help me get any.” He took another long drink, raised his glass, and added, “Bet that jerk-off Mo Bullock gets lotsa women at Tulane with them Newcomb college coeds runnin’ around in tight sweaters."
The word “sweater” almost set me off. The pieces just kept coming and my neck burned, my hands opening and closing into fists. Tulane. I never mentioned Mo was at Tulane.
"Did you find anything for me around Washington Square?” I asked in a controlled voice.
"Huh? Oh, uh, no."
I'd bet he didn't even go there. And for a long moment I saw it all playing out like a horror movie. Len following us through the park, watching us kiss, watching me walk off. Len waiting, watching the lights in her house, then seeing her come out in that sweater, come right for him, and then...
"You know,” my voice came out deeper now, “cops don't need to know why. Don't need to prove motive at all. They just have to prove how it happened, when it happened, who was killed, and then who did the killing. Why isn't important to the police."
He gave me a shrug.
"But I'm a civilian detective and I want to know why."
Len stared back at me as if frozen in time.
"I knew her. I kissed her. We were going to be something, man.” My voice quivered in anger.
"Why you yelling at me?"
"Because I want to know why you did it."
He sobered immediately and I could see the guilt in his eyes. “You're crazy, man."
"Lupercalia,” I said and he wouldn't look me in the eye. “Got it from your old man, didn't you? All those years of him giving the family tidbits from history. Any prof would do that. You knew about Lupercalia and the Cave of Lupercal from your old man."
"Bullock teaches it,” Len snarled.
I got up, went to the phone, and tried calling Frenchy on Mardi Gras day. It took three calls to get someone at the detective bureau to answer. Thankfully it wasn't Hays. Hanging up, I stood there waiting for Frenchy to call back.
Len stared straight ahead, as if in a trance, not looking at me as the minutes ticked by. When the phone rang, it startled both of us. I snatched it up, my eyes still staring at my old friend.
"You better get over to my place,” I told Frenchy. “I'm looking at the killer right now. No, I haven't been drinking. It's Len Connelly. Yeah, my friend."
Len stood as I hung up and turned toward the door, glaring at me. “You gonna try and stop me?"
I pulled out my revolver, raised and cocked it, pointed it at his head.
"You gonna shoot me?” Len opened the door.
I hesitated, then slowly lowered the gun.
He left and I felt better, thinking like a detective now. I wanted him back at his house. When Frenchy arrived, I would talk him into getting a search warrant. We'd find something from the bushes, maybe some red clay, maybe even one of Annette's buttons.
When Frenchy arrived, I told him and he said, “Man, that's kinda weak."
"Not too weak for a search warrant. He's wearing shoes with a worn heel. Size fourteen."
Frenchy shook his head. “You're in luck it's Mardi Gras. I'll do about anything to get away from parade duty."
* * * *
Len Connelly lived in an apartment at the rear of a crumbling Creole cottage on Burgundy Street, on the far side of Elysian Fields, not three blocks from Washington Square. I waited outside with a rookie patrolman while the detectives searched inside. It didn't take a half-hour before Frenchy came out with a handcuffed Len, his head down. They put him in a prowl car and Frenchy came over to show me a button from Annette Bayly's skirt.
"It was up on the mantel, like a damn trophy."
On my way to the detective bureau, it occurred to me that Annette's father was right after all. The killer had returned to the scene of the crime. I could just envision Len watching the detectives in the square.
I sat out in the squad room again. At least the hand I'd hurt punching Bullock felt better. An hour after Frenchy took Len into an interrogation room, the other detectives who'd searched Len's house came in. Hays wouldn't look at me. Francona came over to show me Len's grass-stained pants, red clay embedded around the knees. He also showed me twigs from the bushes found in the bottom of my friend's dirty-clothes hamper.
Frenchy came out awhile later carrying Len's shoes, which he passed to Francona as evidence. “Check out the left heel.” He turned to me and said, “He copped out. Crying in there like a baby."
"He tell you why?"
"Made a pass at her and she slapped him. Said he was drunk and lost it."
Before I left, Frenchy asked me to write up something for him. “Put what he told you on paper for me, will ya?"
"Sure."
* * * *
Wednesday, February 19, 1947
Mo Bullock's place was a bright yellow, two-story Greek Revival wooden house with three bay windows in front. A three-step stoop led up to a front gallery with four wooden posts and fancy gingerbread trim painted pale blue. I rang the doorbell and retreated to the steps so he wouldn't think I was gonna pounce on him.
He answered wearing a maroon dinner jacket over off-white pants, a brandy snifter in his left hand. His pretty-boy face sported a purple bruise on his left jaw.
"I came to apologize. I was dead wrong.” I held out one of my business cards for him. “Here. You can spell my name right on the lawsuit."
His squeezed his left eye partially shut. “You're a peculiar bastard."
"I also came to tell you they caught the killer. It was a friend of mine. Played ball with me at Holy Cross.” I figured he'd read it in the paper.
His eyes widened. “Sonofabitch. I recognize you now. You're the speed demon from the championship game. I knew I knew that face."
I stepped closer so he could take the card. He did and then asked, “Want a drink?"
"Sure."
He opened the door wide and I stepped into a small foyer, following him into a formal living room with thick Persian carpets, walls filled with books, and copies of Impressionist paintings. Hell, maybe they weren't all copies.
"What's your poison?” Mo headed for a wet bar at the back of the room.
"Beer."
He brought me an imported brew, something called Stella Artois. It was icy cold, with a light taste. We sat across from one another in thick recliners. Mo gently touched the bruise on his chin and said, “You were always fast, but I didn't think you were that fast."
"It was a sucker punch."
"Well, it worked. Never been decked like that."
I took another hit of Stella Artois and he started talking about the game. I didn't remember him scoring Jesuit's only touchdown. I didn't play both ways like he did. My coach kept me fresh that way.
"Man, I'll never forget that run,” he said. “I was right on your butt, only you kept accelerating and I couldn't close."
"My friend Len Connelly was the one who bowled over two of your linebackers with one block. He sprung me."
"And he's the reason we're here right now."
I nodded, then asked, “I thought you went with the Detroit Tigers."
His turn to nod. “I made it to the big show for one season. Then the damn Japs hit Pearl Harbor and I went into the Corps.” He took a drink from the snifter. “Shoulda
died on Iwo Jima but they saved me, only I was shot in the back and never made it to the show again."
He'd framed his Navy Cross and had it on a wall between paintings.
"You in the war?” he asked.
I didn't mind talking about my Silver Star, since his Navy Cross trumped me.
"Cassino, huh? Couldn't have been as bad as Iwo Jima,” he said, “but I heard it was bad enough. How'd they catch your friend?"
I told him about the footprints and the other evidence.
"So you're the one who figured it, right?"
"Yeah, just like I figured you."
"Batting five hundred ain't bad."
"Maybe in baseball. Not when it comes to murder,” I said, finishing off the beer. I thanked him and said I didn't want to overstay my welcome.
Mo took my business card out of his pocket and said, “Caye. French, isn't it?"
I nodded and he slipped the card back into this pocket. “I'm not suing you. But you owe me one. I might need a private investigator someday.” He stood up. “And it takes a big man to admit a mistake and face up to it."
"Helluva mistake."
We shook hands and I headed back home. It was getting dark already and for a moment I thought about how it was different all over again. It was so different before the war, different again when I got out of the army, different after V-J Day, different after kissing Annette.
I drifted back to that night, seeing her for the first time, waiting to dance with her, how she felt pressed against me, the clean scent of her hair. I'd never forget those eyes. And as I walked, I let myself feel the loss all over again, let my heart stammer and ache. I wanted to feel something other than the rage to strangle my old friend to death.
Her name was Annette Bayly, of Scottish descent, nicknamed Too Wise for the two ys in her name.
It was a kiss with promise behind it.
If only.
Life was full of “if onlys."
(c)2008 by O'Neil De Noux
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The Alexandrian Solution BY EDWARD D. HOCH
Counting Chickens BYAMY MYERS
Manila Burning BY CLARK HOWARD
What's It Worth? BY MELODIE JOHNSON
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