“ Phew. You had me worried there for a moment. I thought you were going to tell me Anton died from a bad liver and not from a knife wound.” Hank wondered why Clyde had bothered to call with information having little relevance to the death. He had only the briefest time to wonder, as Clyde's voice became serious and concerned.
“ He died from a knife wound, all right, but there was a screw-up here I might as well tell you about now. You remember when I mentioned there weren't any hand wounds, and how puzzling it was there weren't?”
“Yeah.” “ I think we both agreed how an overhand knife thrust is pretty easy to anticipate if not to avoid. And, if the victim's conscious, he almost always gets his hands up to ward off the blow.”
Hank knew there was something coming and merely grunted into the phone. “It bothered me, especially considering the force of the blow. Whoever stabbed him had to have swung the knife through a wide arc, which would have given Figueroa even more opportunity to try and fend off the knife. Well, it looks as though I have an explanation.”
Hank felt a growing impatience, but decided there was nothing to be gained by expressing it. “Yeah,” he said into the phone, nodding as he did so. “ I didn't examine the scalp the way I should have. Some suspected carcinoma tissue came in from the hospital about the time I was in the last stages of the pm on Figueroa. The hospital's pathologist wanted a confirming report from me. He needed it in a hurry, since the patient was waiting on the operating table with her belly open. So I left the end of the autopsy to my assistant. I'm not blaming her. She did a good job of finishing up. In fact, she followed the book and found something I missed. The only thing is, she didn't tell me about it, thinking I'd already examined the corpse.”
Hank started rocking back and forth in his chair and looking up at the ceiling.
“The last thing she did was to shave him and take photos. I just got a look at them a while ago. There are definite signs of blunt cephalic violence.”
“Huh? Aw, for Christ's sake, Clyde!” Victorine seemed oblivious to the exclamation, but still gave an explanation. “Someone hit the victim on the head. Just a light tap. It was on top of the skull, so the bruiseif it is a bruisecouldn't have been the result of a fall. Naturally, there's no way I can tell now whether the blow occurred before or after death, but if it was before, it was almost immediately before. Now I can explain the lack of knife wounds on the hands.”
“Shit!” Hank said. “ Sorry. If it will help any, my guess is that someone hit him on the head, just hard enough to put him out, then knelt down beside him and drove the knife in as hard as he could. Whoever stabbed him may even have used both hands.”
“Which means it's unlikely it was a mugger.” “Which means it's very unlikely.”
Chapter 13
“So, now, what do I do?” Wayne had a half smile on his face as he looked across the desk at the frowning Kay. “Especially about this?” he added, indicating the note.
“There's not much question about what we're going to have to do with the note.”
“Police?” Kay nodded. “That's the easy decision. I'm going to have to talk it over with the others at the office before we go on to the big ones. I'm not sure how much of your story we should pass along to the police.” She smiled, shook her head, and added. “To think my main reason for coming here today was to tell you I didn't think you needed an attorney anymore.”
Wayne said nothing, only scanning her face as though waiting for further decisions. “ We're going to need a lot of names, addresses, and phone numbers,” Kay said. “We might as well get started, right now.” So saying, she pulled a yellow pad from her briefcase and unclipped the attached ball-point pen.”
“Who first?”
“Let's start with the man in Nevada you tried to kill. That's where the prosecuting attorney's going to start.”
*** Corky let out a soft whistle as she read the final postmortem report. Hank was sitting in a chair crammed up against her desk in the small cubbyhole serving as her office. Glancing up from the papers, she saw he was looking distinctly unhappy.
“ Don't go assuming you've been right all along,” Hank said grumpily. “All Clyde had to go by were color photographs. He's talked to the assistant, and she thinks the mark on the head is a blow from a blunt, probably a padded instrument. She doesn't have a lot of experience with what Clyde calls 'blunt trauma.' He admits it could be just a head rash, from what little he can make out in the photos.”
“He sure screwed up.” “ Yeah. He admits it. I kind of expected him to pass the blame along to his assistant, but he says he should have made a last check of the body before sending it out to the undertaker.”
“I suppose the body was cremated?”
“Yeah, early this morning, as luck would have it. Anton left a will with the request.”
“Will?” Corky's eyes lit up as she said the word.
“Don't get excited. His debts about canceled out his assets. What little's left goes to his mother in San Francisco.”
“You want me back on?” “ There's not much choice. I'm going to have to tell the chief about this.” Hank pointed to the report. “I'll have to tell him what the Fat Priest told us. The sooner the Honolulu PD picks up Surrette, the better. Knowing Chief Yamada, he's going to be breathing down my neck wanting to know why I'm not turning over rocks and mountains to find the killer.
“ I just hope he doesn't start pressuring me to charge Wayne Harlan. You know how hard it is to make a hit murder stick. Even if Harlan did hire someone, we have to find out who the someone is; we have to prove he did the murder; we have to prove he did it for hire; and we'll have to prove Wayne did the hiring. The prosecutor's not going to kiss us on both cheeks if we come up with less than that.”
“First things first,” Corky said, as she began to pile the forms and papers gathered on her desk into a single stack.
“Which are?”
“We've got to find out where the murder was committed.”
“Don't act dumb. It was in the elevator, of course.” “ Yes, Hank, but on what floor? Wayne says he saw it come to the fourth and stop. Then he saw it go down to the third and stop. The businessman who was there says he saw it stop at the fourth and go down to the third where it hung up. When I thought it was some dope head responsible, I could believe the witness.
“ After all, I can see some crazy mugger going wild and stabbing Figueroa, all the while the elevator's going down, and him not giving any thought to the audience he might suddenly find at the next stop. I wasn't completely sold on the idea, even though I thought it had some potential. But can you picture a hit man doing that? Whoever did this killing did a lot of planning ahead of timea hell of a lot of planning.”
Corky paused before adding, “You know, this is kind of exciting to think about.”
“What is?” Hank asked the question in his gloomiest voice. “This may the smartest killer we've ever had anything to do with.”
***
Kay was packing the yellow pad and the tape recorder into her briefcase getting ready to leave, when she noticed the brass key at the bottom of the case. “ I almost forgot about this,” she said, taking it out and putting it on Wayne's desk. “It was found on Anton. Norman thinks it might be a key to one of the condos. Do you know of anyone else there who Anton might have known?”
“ No,” Wayne said, picking up the key. “It doesn't look much like my key,” he added, reaching into his pocket. “I suppose it could just be a copy on a different blank.” He compared the two keys and then handed the pair to Kay, surprise written on his face. “That's exactly what it is. What do you think?”
Kay examined the keys closely. “The grooves sure look alike,” she said. “Do you have any idea what Anton would be doing with the key to your apartment?”
Wayne shook his head. “None at all.”
“He also had a key to the service elevator on him when he was killed.”
“That's weird. So far as I know, he'd never been in the N
ikko Arms before.” Kay sighed. “It looks like we have another mystery. Will you be home in the morning? I'll see if I can make it over to try out this key. By then I should have some strategy laid out. Then we can go over to the station with the note.”
“Fine. Just give me a ring ahead of time. I'll be here, since I have a few items to catch up on.” Kay was about to leave when a thought struck her. She turned and asked, “Didn't you say something before about hiring a private detective to see if your wife was having an affair? Could I get his name and address along with a note from you allowing us to look at what he found?”
While Wayne was looking through his desk for the detective's business card, Kay voiced a string of her thoughts aloud. “If it was a key to your apartment, what did Anton use it for? Could he possibly have been looking for something in there? You haven't noticed anything missing, have you?”
For the first time, Kay saw some defenses giving way. She remembered Sid saying Wayne never really volunteered information, and somehow it was available only if the right questions were asked. Kay was almost certain she had discovered one of those right questions, and the question seemed to free Wayne to volunteer information more startling and more disconcerting than anything else he had yet told Kay.
*** Craig was lonely, which was quite evident to Kay when she found him in Sid's office inviting him to dinner. Qual had gone to Honolulu on one of his frequent consultant jobs with his old firm. Ordinarily, the trip was a one day affair, but today Qual had called to say he would not be back until the following noon. Even one night of Qual's absence was too much for Craig, though he would never have admitted it. Instead, he usually managed to talk someone in the office into coming out for supper, and his skill in the kitchen made recruitment easy
“ Kay! You're just in time,” Craig said. “Sid said he'd have to check with you but I know you won't say no. I've a new recipe for broiled squab chicken, and I want the two of you to come over tonight and try it out.”
“Well, I don't know Craig. I sort of had my heart set on chili and beans for tonight. What do you think, Sid?”
“Did you open the can yet?”
“No. I always wait until the last minute. I like my chili and beans to be as fresh as possible.”
“Well, then, I suppose we can hold off on them until tomorrow night.” Sid sounded very reluctant. At Kay's first remark, Craig had taken her seriously and had immediately looked crestfallen, but he quickly picked up on the repartee, saying, “If you want to bring over the chili and beans we can have it as a side dish, though I'm not too sure the white Burgundy is the most suitable wine to go with it. It's too bad Laura went home early, but maybe I can catch her at home. I don't think she and Ken would mind having squab for dinner, if you prefer to stay home and eat your chili and beans.”
Sid grinned. “You know Laura and Ken are poor substitutes, Craig. Neither of them touches alcohol. You'd have had to kill the whole bottle by yourself.”
Craig shook his head. “I just can't understand people with such weird tastes. A fine wine is half the meal.”
Chapter 14
“There has to be an easier way to make a living than being a homicide lieutenant,” Hank said
“Aw, c'mon, Hank. You'd be bored shitless if you had to chase down shoplifters.”
“Maybe, but it's always a relief to get the easy cases. When some guy carves up his wife and calls us up to turn himself in, life around here is sure a lot simpler.” Corky made a face to show her distaste of such events. “No thanks. I'd much rather have someone like Anton picked off. From what I can make out, he's no great loss to the world, and he isn't leaving any orphans behind.”
“The elevator is what bothers me?”
“Finally. I've been talking about it for days. That's why I was almost willing to accept a mugger. Hell, elevators are a favorite mugging place.” “ Now we're left with a premeditated murder, and why should anyone premeditate a murder in an elevator–especially one at noon at the Nikko arms when a lot of people would be using it.”
“ Not all that many, Hank. Remember, there are two empty floors, and there are some vacancies, though nowhere near as many as Norman Kurohara keeps complaining about. Besides, most of the people who live there work someplace else and don't come back for lunch at noon. Now, it's probably really crowded at seven-thirty in the morning or five in the evening.”
“It's still a funny time of day. It's almost like the murderer wanted it to happen when there'd be people around.”
Corky shook her head in disbelief. “To think you accuse me of having crazy ideas.
*** While both Sid and Kay enjoyed the wine, they insisted to the beaming Craig he had vastly overestimated its importance. “A terrific meal, Craig,” Sid said as he spooned up the last of the homemade sweetsop ice cream, “The wine was just gilding on the lily.”
“Amen,” Kay said. “Every time I come here I swear I'm not going to stuff myself the way I did the time before, and then the food's so good I just set another record.” The three moved into the front room where Craig had a small brandy, while Kay and Sid settled for decaf. Sid tried to pat Chichi. Chichi was Craig's cat and had come from the same litter as Bluebeard and Corky's John Junior. Chichi barely tolerated Sid's attentions for a few seconds, slipped out from under his hand and then strolled away.
“How can she look so much like her mother and have such a different temperament?” Sid asked. Craig smiled at the independent feline as she wandered off to the rear of the house. “Actually, she can be quite affectionate,” he said, “but it has to be entirely on her own terms.” As the cat disappeared into the bedroom with a last flick of her tail, Craig asked, “What's the latest in the Figueroa case? Have you finally decided it was an attempted robbery?”
“Yeah,” Sid commented, turning to Kay. “I got so wrapped up with the prospects of this meal, I never did get around to asking you what you and Wayne decided.”
“Poor excuse,” Kay said.“The real reason is you aren't much interested in the case.”
Sid grinned. “Why should I be? You have interest in it enough for both of us.” “ Damn!” Kay exclaimed, getting up.“I clean forgot. I meant to call Qual to see if he'd have time to go by and talk to Wayne's ex-wife, which could save me a trip to Honolulu. Do you know where he's staying tonight, Craig.”
“Of course. It's the same hotel he always stays at in Waikiki. The number is in boldface on the pad next to the phone in the den.”
While Kay was making the call, Sid said, “I guess that's our answer, Craig. It sounds as though Kay's back in the case up to her ears.”
When Kay came back in, Craig asked,“Was he there?”
Kay nodded. “He's going to call Rissa and see if he can make a luncheon appointment with her for tomorrow. If it works out, he'll catch the two-twenty back.”
“Now, fill us in on the rest of the case,” Sid said. Kay told them about the blackmail note and the keys and gave a brief description of Wayne's abortive attempt to hire a hit man.“You were right, Sid,” she said. “Every little piece of information has to be pried out of him. He's a real poker face. Even when I find the right questions, I can't tell whether he's feeding me a line when he answers or whether he's actually telling the truth.”
“Some of it must be the truth,” Craig offered. “He certainly must have received the note. There wouldn't have been much point in his sending it to himself.” Kay agreed. “And I doubt he would have gone out and hired another hit man. Twenty-thousand doesn't mean much to him. He'd have gone with the first bidder, if he was going to go with one at all.”
“Are you turning the note over to Hank?” Craig asked. “ We don't have much choice. Wayne's adamant he's not about to pay. Blackmail's a crime, so I'm pretty much committed to letting Hank know about it. Wayne's going to drop by the station at noon with it, and I told him I'd be there. In fact, I'd like to go by his apartment first.” She explained about the key.
“ Everything seems to be coming unraveled,” Sid commented,
his tone not completely masking his amusement at the new revelations. “This morning you thought the case was closed for all practical purposes, but the note has opened it up all over again.”
“It's not only the note that's opened it up,” Kay said. “Just before I left, Wayne said something which really blows everything wide open.”
Craig and Sid both looked at her questioningly. “ Come to think of it, this was one time when he volunteered the information without much prompting on my part, though I guess I did ask the right question. Anyway, last night his girlfriend was over at his apartment and was preparing a chicken dinner. She rummaged around for a heavy butcher knife and couldn't find one. Neither could Wayne. The one he had is missing.”
“Jeezus!” Sid exclaimed. Kay nodded. “It's part of a set called 'Chef's Collection.' I wouldn't swear to it, because I haven't had a chance to check again, but I'm almost sure Chef's Collection was the name on the murder weapon according to the police report.”
*** Qual found it difficult to believe men were especially attracted to Rissa Harlan. He tried to look at her through the eyes of a“straight” male and could see nothing there. To him she looked like an average woman in her late thirties. Then it struck him he had read somewhere about the average being considered beautiful. Some researcher had used computer techniques to average out photos of large numbers of women. The larger the number of photos used, the more average the result–and the more attractive it was rated by subjects asked to judge.
Maybe that's it, he thought. She attracts men just because she is average. Looking more closely at her, he sensed Rissa was not feeling well. That could be part of the reason I can't see it too. She's just not looking her best, today.”
The Yoshinobu Mysteries: Volume 2 Page 25