Margaret Bowan was an agreeable looking, open-faced woman of thirty or so. At the moment, she was showing some signs of shock at the scene she had witnessed less than a hour before.
Hank asked her to describe what had happened, while Corky took notes and taped the interview.
“We'd just come up to the elevator to go up to our apartment, when I heard someone say the elevator was slow showing up. But, then, they always are.”
“Did you notice what floor it was at?” “ It was on floor three,” the blonde six-year-old said without hesitation. She had decided to stand next to her mother rather than to sit in the other chair which had been made available.
Margaret smiled and reached a hand out to her. “Patricia notices everything. I really couldn't tell you for sure what floor it was at when we got there.”
Patricia nodded her head with considerable vigor. “It was three, and then it started down just when we got there.”
“What happened then?” Hank addressed both of them.
“The door started to open,” Margaret answered, “and, you know how it is, everyone moved forward and then separated some to let people off.”
“The man fell out on his face, just the way Moro does,” the young girl said emphatically, holding her hands up to her face, palms out.
Hank showed his bewilderment, “Moro?”
Corky was quite certain the blue eyes became condescending, and the voice now held an inflection of disbelief. “Moro's the clown on the Happy Morning Hour.” More tolerant of ignorance than her daughter was, Margaret explained that the Happy Morning Hour was a Saturday morning show, a favorite of Patricia's, and Moro was a clown-puppet featured on it.
“ You're sure there was no one else on the elevator?” Hank addressed the question to Margaret. Patricia gave a vigorous nod of her head while her mother answered yes to the question.
“What happened then?” “ The doors started to close, when someone in the crowd in front of the elevator stepped in and caught them in time, and I guess pulled out the stop button.” Margaret gave a shudder.“The man was lying with his legs half in the elevator, and the doors would have closed on them.”
“His eyes were wide open when he fell.” Patricia added the remark to her mother's statement, a trace of awe apparent in her voice. “ Who was there when he fell out of the elevator?” “There was a bald man in shorts and shirt saying something I didn't catch,” Margaret said. “He seemed to be annoyed about something, and there was a taller man who'd just pressed the up button. There were a couple of cleaning women. I know one of them. Sandy.”
“There were two people speaking Japanese right next to us,” Patricia added.
Hank smiled. “Patricia, I think you're going to grow up to be a detective.”
Patricia gave a thoughtful frown, then asked, “Can I see your badge?”
*** Laurence Quincy more or less confirmed Margaret and Patricia's version of the tragedy. His New York accent gave him an aura of certainty which Corky later insisted was, in reality, a fundamental part of his personality.
“ We waited at least five minutes for that damn elevator,” Wayne began.“It'd just come down from the fourth floor and was stuck at the third floor and just hung there. I missed the other one by about one second. It was on its way up, must have stopped at every floor, and was on the way back down when the one with the dead man broke loose. Jeez! It was really something seeing that guy fall out the way he did. I thought, at first, it was some kind of jokeyou know like those fake arrows made to look like they go right through your head. Here he was standing there, not two feet away from me, with this big knife stuck into him, the blood spurting, and his eyes wide open.”
“Was his blood actually spurting?” “ Well, maybe not spurting. His shirt would have been in the way, I guess, but he was sure soaked with blood, I can tell you that. He damn near fell on me. Look!” he said, pointing to his feet. “Some of his blood even splashed on my sandals.”
Laurence Quincy confirmed there were two women there at the time, women he identified as “Orientals.” He recalled neither Margaret and her daughter nor the Japanese couple.
Patricia's a heck of a lot better witness, Corky thought, as she looked up from her notes at the man who was becoming increasingly restless and anxious to leave. Since they were taping the interview, Corky's note taking didn't require her undivided attention.
“What floor's your apartment on?” “ Seventh. It's not really my apartment. The Malalani overbooked and had to find accommodations for some of us attending the convention. They told us when we scheduled the convention that this was off season, but some Japanese tour group's flooded the island. I was p.o.'d at first at getting stuck out here, but the condo-apartment is a beauty. It's sure a lot better than being stuck in one of those cracker-box rooms at the hotel.” Quincy shrugged and continued, “Besides, their elevators don't run any better than these do.” He paused, then added, “Except theirs don't have bodies falling out of them.”
Corky had the vague feeling the owner of the Nikko Arms was skirting the law by allowing short term rental of any of his condominiums, but she could see no point to looking into the matter. Hank continued with the questioning.
Quincy went on to remark how Wayne Harlan, “The tall guy in the business suit,” had caught the door as it was closing on the body. “Yeah. He stepped in and pushed the stop button on the elevator. He kept his head, even though I think he was the one who let out that screech when the corpse came lunging out at us.”
Chapter 3
Wayne Harlan's description was another slight variant on the same theme. The tall, rather handsome and deeply tanned Harlan, gave a somewhat more graphic description of how the body had tumbled out as though it had been propped against the elevator door. “It caught me by surprise, I'll admit. I gave a yelp and stepped back, but he still brushed against me when he fell.” Harlan held up his right arm to reveal a dark stain on the underside of the coat sleeve.
“How long did you have to wait for the elevator?” “ I don't know. It seemed like a long time. I was the first one there. I'd just missed the other elevator. This short, bald guy came up about the same time. I'd already pressed the button, when he walked up. I don't know. How long does it take before you get impatient enough to press the button a second time? He said something about machinery always breaking down in Hawaii. Almost as soon as he said that, the elevator started back down again.”
“Started back down?” Harlan nodded. “Yeah. It seemed to be stopping a long time at each floor. I thought some of the kids in the condo were playing with the buttons again. You know, punching all the buttons to make the elevator stop at every floor.”
“Any guesses as to how long you waited?” “ Two minutes, altogether, certainly no more than three, even though it seemed longer at the time because I was impatient to get to my apartment for an appointment I was supposed to keep there. I was about to walk up when I saw the other elevator starting down. I live on the fourth floor,” he added the explanation.
“What floor was it at when you pressed the button?” “ I really couldn't say for sure. In fact, I don't think I even looked up at the panel at first. I just punched the button and looked at my watch. When I did look up, it was at the fourth floor. It hung up there for a while, then came down to the third floor and hung up there too. That's when I got impatient and pressed the button again.”
Like Patricia, Harlan had noticed everyone waiting for the elevator and even confirmed the presence of a young couple who had been speaking Japanese. Harlan volunteered that he was the one who had caught the door before it started to close and had stepped into the elevator to hit the stop button. “I was just about to check to see if he was still alive,” he said,“when the security guard came up, and saved me from doing something I wasn't relishing doing.”
“Were you still there when the guard rolled him over?”
“I sure was, and I was sure surprised.”
“Why?” “ Because I recognized him
. Actually, I thought I had when the doors opened, but the whole scene was so wild I couldn't believe my eyes. There was no doubt about who he was when the security man rolled him over. Anton Figueroa was the reason I was trying to get up to my apartment in such a hurry. I had a twelve-fifteen appointment to meet him there.”
*** Sandy Rodriguez seemed relieved when she saw Corky would be there for the interview and, fortunately, she was the more talkative one of the two cleaning women. Her garrulousness helped the shyer Lilly to unbend.
The one piece of new information they provided was a possible lead to finding the missing Japanese couple. Lilly had seen the pair on the fifth floor the previous day. Corky made a note to check the condominiums on the floor for friends or acquaintances of a visiting Japanese couple.
Following this last interview, Hank and Corky left the manager's office to find the county pathologist, Clyde Victorine, still at the scene of the death. The small, voluble Japanese manager was arguing vociferously with the doctor. Clyde, who looked enough like Hank to be occasionally mistaken for him, grinned over the little man's head on catching sight of Hank and Corky. “This is the man to talk to, Mr. Kurohara. Hank, Mr. Kurohara feels we're unnecessarily impeding traffic and wants us to get the body out of here.”
“ Oh! Lieutenant DeMello!” Kurohara exclaimed as he recognized Hank. “Isn't there any possible way you can conclude your investigations soon, at least before people start coming home from work? This is terrible. We have been having one disaster after another.”
Hank didn't have to ask about the previous disastera fire, a few months previouslywhich had done mainly smoke damage through the second and third floors and tied up traffic at the height of the rush hour, on the only access road coming into town from the north. The police department had been spread so thin, even Corky and Hank had had to do traffic duty at the fire scene.
“I'll check. If the men are through, there's no reason why we can't give the premises back to you. I would like to see you before we leave.”
“Of course, of course.”
Hank turned to Dr. Victorine, who was pulling off a pair of plastic gloves. “Any doubts, Clyde?”
“None so far. It's pretty clearly murder. Even more clearly, it's due to the knife in his chest. As usual, we'll check it out.”
“Any chance of suicide?” “ It's certainly possible, but highly unlikely. After all, if someone can commit harakiri, then this guy could have punched a knife into his own chest. It looks as though it hit a rib and then went in, which makes suicide less likely.” Clyde stopped to review what he had said, then added, “It sure would have taken a lot of pushing to get the knife so far in, but that's not what really makes suicide unlikely.”
“What does?”
“The elevator. Who ever heard of anyone committing suicide in an elevator?”
*** Sid's wish was not granted. Hank had left the scene of the crime, but hadn't yet gotten back to the office and couldn't be reached before Wayne Harlan showed up. Qual led Wayne into the conference room as Craig slipped out of the office. Kay and Sid followed Qual, and he introduced them.
“ You're lucky to catch us in,” Qual said.“We're not usually around on a Saturday afternoon. There's one more partner, but she had to leave early. No reason why we can't move along. We'll tape the interview, if that's OK with you, Wayne?”
Wayne shrugged. “No secrets,” he said, his lips barely turning up into a smile.
Kay and Sid were both silently evaluating him as he answered Qual's questions and explained why he felt he needed the firm's services. Kay thought he was rather handsome and looked better than his photos. He had dark hair, a nice even tan, and rather dark blue eyes. He seemed lean at first, but Kay sensed there was a heavily muscled frame under the suit jacket. Observing him closely, she also had the feeling his smile was forced, as though he was unused to using his face for such a purpose. She estimated he was just over six-foot tall and probably in his early forties.
Sid thought Harlan's eyes shifted about too much, though it seemed to be less from nervousness than from an attempt on Harlan's part to quickly evaluate everyone he was talking to. I can't fault him for that, Sid decided, since we're all doing the same thing to him. Knowing Wayne was a real estate man made Sid look upon his affability as an outgrowth of his trade. Ron Crockett, a friend of Sid's and Kay's, who was also in real estate, had pointed out long ago how ninety percent of real estate selling consisted of gaining the confidence of the customer. Sid decided Wayne was looking upon his interview with the attorneys as a potential sale to some especially tough prospects.
“Who was murdered?”
“Anton Figueroa.”
“Local?”
“Uh-huh. A painting contractor. Portuguese. I've known him for years. I did some business with him.”
“You're sure he was murdered? No chance of suicide or accident?” “ I can't see how it could have been an accident, though I guess suicide's a possibility. There sure wasn't anyone in the elevator with him, and he was standing up against the door when it opened. It's a weird feeling to be thinking someone's just stepping out of an elevator when, instead, they fall dead full length in front of you. He almost landed on top of me, in fact.”
“Would you describe exactly what happened?” “ I had a twelve-fifteen appointment to meet him at my apartment. It's on the fourth floor of the Nikko Arms. I was running late. Somehow, the time crept up on me at work. So I pulled into my parking place under the building, and ran upstairs to the elevator on the first floor.”
Kay broke in. “Why did you do that? Isn't there an elevator entrance in the basement?” “ Yes but there's no panel over them down there, so there's no telling where the elevators are. I've sometimes waited and waited on the garage level with no idea of whether the elevators were going up or down. Since I was in a hurry this time, I thought I'd go up to the first floor. I figured if there wasn't one coming down, I'd just walk up the other three flights. I've done it before.” He smiled at her. “It's good exercise. I should do it regularly. It would save me paying dues to the health club.”
Wayne proceeded to describe the scene at the elevator much as he had recounted it to Corky and Hank. “ I looked at my watch when I pressed the button the first time. It was 12:20. I wasn't too concerned, because I figured Anton would wait, since I was giving him some business. Except I've always been a stickler for being on time, so I was getting pretty impatient.”
“So the doors to the elevator probably opened shortly before 12:25,” Kay suggested. “ That wouldn't be far off,” Wayne remarked, looking at her closely, and finished describing the scene at the elevator following the security man's call and Sergeant Honda's arrival.
Sid was the first one to protest. “I don't see what you have to worry about. How could you possibly have killed someone who comes out of a closed elevator with a knife in his chest and falls dead at your feet? No one's going to accuse you of killing him.”
“ I agree no one's going to accuse me of killing him. That's really not what I'm concerned about. What I am concerned about is how any minute the police will accuse me of having hired someone to kill him.”
***
“Surprised to hear from you so soon, Clyde.” Hank said into the phone. “ I debated over whether or not I should call you. I don't want you to get spoiled by a quick pm like this one. It's just that all the other slabs were bare. Then, I'll be damned if business didn't begin picking up even before I finished with your latest. Anyhow, don't go bugging me to move this fast next time or to get the final in right away on this one.”
“Protest noted. Got anything for me?”
“Sure. I've got a ten inch butcher knife, which penetrated six and a half inches into the chest wall, pericardium, right atrium and aorta of the victim. There was…” “ Spare me the physiology. How long did he live? Anything to indicate whether or not the assailant was left handed or right handed? Did the attack occur in the elevator? What do you think now about the possibility of suicide?”<
br />
“Hell, Hank! Why don't I just tell you who did it?”
Hank grinned into the phone. “Not a bad idea. It'd save me a lot of time and trouble if you did.” “ I can answer some of your questions. If he'd been stabbed in an operating room, he might have survived. One of his ribs caught the blow and deflected the knife to the edge of the heart. Even so, it penetrated the right atrium sufficiently to produce a lot of blood, and then it ended up smack against the same rib in the victim's back. One hell of a blow! Any fingerprints on the knife?”
“Uh-uh. Why do you ask?” “ I just thought if someone had taken time to wipe off the handle, they might have seen Anton was still breathing. So it must have been gloves, which makes it more likely to be premeditated.”
“Good for you, Clyde. Keep it up and we'll make you an honorary member of the detective squad.” “ I guess that gives me the right to do some speculating. I don't think he was moved after he was stabbed, like being dragged into the elevator or anything like that, though it's pretty obvious he shuffled around some on his own. You can probably tell more about that than I can. From the location of the blood on his clothes and the amount in his pleural cavities, he was probably down for a minute or so and then got up. The photos we took at the scene showing blood at the back of the elevator seem to go along with that.
“ As far as how long he actually lasted, it couldn't have been more than a matter of minutes. If you're going to force me to give a time, I'd say a couple of minutes is the absolute outside limit. I've seen even worse cases of heart trauma where the victim walked around for a short while afterwards, but only for a few seconds.”
The Yoshinobu Mysteries: Volume 2 Page 18