Dead Run

by RICHARD LOCKRIDGE

  Merton Heimrich said, “Mmm.” He said, “Not too cold.”

  When he had half finished his drink, he went out and put the steak destined for rareness back on the grill. He went back and finished his drink, not hurrying with it. When he had finished it he went back to the breezeway and pushed a long-tined fork into one of the steaks. He flipped both of them over again. Yeah. He opened the door and said, “O.K.” to Susan, who was forking open baked potatoes. He carried the steaks to the kitchen and sliced them, and sorted slices onto hot plates. The rare ones were rare; the medium ones medium. Well, medium rare.

  They ate in the dining section of the long living room, which was some distance from the fire. Mite joined them and spoke at length about people who starved cats.

  They tried television after coffee and fruitcake, but television was full of jingle bells and people standing in snowstorms singing carols. After “Silent Night, Holy Night,” Michael carried blankets from his room and made up a bed on the long sofa. Nobody had suggested this, although both Susan and Merton had wondered. When jingle bells, jingle bells started up again, they all went to bed, although it wasn’t quite ten o’clock. Joan said, “Good night,” as she went into Michael’s room. She did not say, “Good night all,” an abstinence of which Heimrich approved. And she did not, as far as he could hear, lock the door behind her.

  Chapter 11

  Merton Heimrich woke up early. The sun was not up yet, but somewhere a church bell was ringing. St. Mary’s and a call to the faithful for early mass? Probably. It was “mass” at St. Mary’s. Heimrich shaved and dressed and went out to the living room. Michael had kept the fire up through the night. He was sitting near it and reading a book. He had folded the blankets neatly and put them on the end of the sofa and put the pillow on top of them. Apparently he had fluffed up the pillow. It showed no indentation of a head. Neat young man, Michael.

  Michael’s hair looked slightly damp, as if he had recently taken a shower. There were only two showers in the house, and the other was in the bathroom off Michael’s room. It’s none of my business whether he did sleep on the sofa, Heimrich thought. He could have held his head under a faucet in the half-bath. He said, “Morning, son.” He could not help adding, “Make out all right on the sofa?” although that was none of his business either.

  Michael said, “Fine, Dad. I made some coffee. Joan isn’t awake yet.”

  Heimrich said, “Good. She needs the sleep. After what she’s been through,” and went to the kitchen and poured himself coffee from the Chemex, keeping warm on an asbestos sheet over an electric burner set at SIM. Michael had learned his way around when he had been alone in the house last summer. He had learned to make good coffee.

  Merton had a second cup while he waited for his egg to boil and the toast to pop up. He made more coffee for Susan and the girl from Hanover and ate toast and egg in the kitchen. It was only eight thirty. Too early to call Charlie Forniss at the barracks. Charlie might even be a little late, considering it was Christmas Day. Heimrich rinsed out his eggcup and poured himself another cup of coffee and put the Chemex back on its asbestos pad. He carried the coffee into the living room and sat by the fire. Michael was still alone in the room. He was still reading a book. Heimrich lighted a cigarette and held the pack out toward his son.

  Michael shook his head. He said, “Given them up, Dad. Supposed to be bad for the wind.”

  Merton could hear Susan stirring in their bedroom. Then he could hear the shower running, which surprised him slightly. Susan usually showered in the evening, as he did. Special for Christmas, probably. He drank coffee and smoked and listened for sounds from Michael’s room. He heard none. Joan Collins was really sleeping in. He wondered if Michael had actually spent the night on the sofa. One cannot help wondering about things. Were the kids being considerate of the supposed prejudices of aged parents? It was only a few steps from sofa in the living room to the unlocked door of Michael’s room.

  When I was Michael’s age, would I have slept sedately on a sofa with a girl so near—a waiting girl? Heimrich thought. If, say, the girl had been Susan Upton? Years, too many years of course, before he had met Susan, who hadn’t been Upton when they met; Susan, who hadn’t any longer been Upton. Idle speculation, of course. And about a matter he couldn’t consider important. Perhaps Susan could. He doubted that.

  Susan came into the room. She was wearing a pantsuit. Usually, at breakfast time, she wore a robe. For Christmas, probably. Susan said, “Good morning, darling. Son. And Merry Christmas, of course.”

  “Merry and frigid,” Michael said. “It was ten above when I got up. But not as windy. On the phone they say partly cloudy with a chance of snow flurries. Joan’s still asleep, Mother. Do you think we ought to wake her up?”

  “She’ll need all the sleep she can get,” Susan said. “After her introduction to Van Brunt. Did either of you two think to leave some coffee?”

  “We both did,” Heimrich told her. “It’s keeping hot.”

  “You’re dears, both of you,” Susan said, and went into the kitchen for coffee.

  Heimrich looked at his watch. Charlie Forniss was due at the barracks, Christmas or no Christmas. He finished his coffee and stubbed out his cigarette. Susan came back, carrying her cup, as he lifted the telephone. She said, “I suppose there’s no point in telling you it is Christmas, Merton dear?”

  “I’m afraid not much,” Merton Heimrich said. “Since it’s still murder.” He dialed the barracks.

  Yes, Lieutenant Forniss was in his office, Inspector. Just a moment. And Merry Christmas.

  Forniss said, “Morning, M. L.” He didn’t mention Christmas. He didn’t expect it to be merry.

  “We’re splitting up today,” Heimrich said. “Send somebody down to dig a bullet out of the big ash by the terrace, will you? It will be too smashed up to be of any use, probably. Have it sent to the lab, anyway. Have they finished going over that wagon of ours, do you know?”

  Forniss didn’t. He had just got in; he had been just about to check with the lab boys. If M. L. wanted to hang on?

  Heimrich didn’t. Lunchtime would be soon enough. At the inn. About one, say. Forniss pointed out that lunch that day would be Christmas dinner, probably starting at noon. Did Heimrich want Christmas dinner at noon? And what was this about a bullet in a tree?

  “Fill you in at lunch,” Heimrich said. “Meanwhile, Charlie—”

  It took several minutes to tell Charlie Forniss the meanwhiles. Forniss said, “O.K., I’ll get at it. And you, M. L.? If, say, I run into somebody who wants to confess all? Not that I will.”

  “Not that you will,” Heimrich agreed. “I’ll be at Carmel. At the county jail probably. Or, possibly, at the D.A.’s office.”

  “District attorneys don’t work on Christmas, M. L. Only cops work on Christmas. And maybe bus drivers and subway crews. See you at the inn. We’ll hope there’ll be room there.”

  Heimlich put the telephone back in its cradle. He looked at Susan, who probably had overheard what he had told Forniss about going to Carmel, county seat of Putnam County.

  Susan had. Susan said, “Damn.”

  Joan Collins came out of Michael’s room, and Michael stood up and his face lighted up. She said, “Merry Christmas, Michael. And to both of you. I had a wonderful sleep. Didn’t even turn over all night. And isn’t it a beautiful morning?”

  She, too, had dressed up for Christmas. She was wearing a green and gold robe, and had tied back her long hair. She certainly wasn’t the “boy” they had expected. And if she said she had slept the night through without turning over, she had slept the night through without turning over. It was, of course, mildly interesting that she had thought to mention it.

  “Is there coffee?’” Joan said.

  “Of course, dear,” Susan said. “And juice and whatever else you want. Within reason, of course. Bacon. Eggs. The usual things.”

  “I’ll come and help,” Joan said.

  Susan has a rather marked lack of enthusia
sm about offers to help in the kitchen. Volunteers have to be told where everything is. They also tend to get in the way. Heimlich, knowing this, was a little surprised by the smiling readiness with which Susan accepted the offer.

  He went into the bedroom to put on city clothes, appropriate for a visit to a county jail on Christmas Day. Again in the living room, where now everybody was having breakfast, Heimrich said he’d be back when he could. Susan said she hoped it would be earlier than that, and Heimrich went through the kitchen and across the breezeway to the garage. It was very cold in the breezeway; it was also still a little icy. The Buick started reluctantly. Newish cars are lethargic cars. Heimrich thought wistfully of the Skylark, GS, they had had until the brakes failed—failed three times, and always with Susan driving. It had, understandably, given her a block which not even a new master cylinder had dissolved.

  He drove down the steep driveway and south on NY 11F and then east toward Carmel. He started in sunlight, but after the first few miles the sun vanished and it began, heavily, to snow. A flurry, of course. The blustery wind was from the northwest. Real snow came with the northeasterly. Only a flurry, Heimrich assured himself, trying to see through it. Snow blew across the pavement; the wipers fought snow. Finally, the heater began to fight against the cold. The wind continued its effort to blow the Buick off the road, a not very wide blacktop, with a few patches of ice still on it. Heimrich thought of Gilbert’s comment on the policeman’s lot. He also thought he could have put Carmel, and an interview with Loren Kemper, off a day. Not that tomorrow would likely be much better.

  He turned on the radio for the ten o’clock news. The President, in a speech in Denver, not too far from where he was having a “working vacation” at a ski lodge, had appealed for national unity. He had spoken strongly against divisiveness. He had said that he sought to cooperate with Congress on energy, but that cooperation was a two-way street.

  The weather service started with a cold-wave warning, temperatures dropping to near zero in the city and ten below or lower in the normally colder suburbs. Tonight would be very cold, but with diminishing winds. The outlook for Friday was for partly cloudy and windy, with a chance of snow flurries.

  Just before he reached Brewster, the current flurry stopped and the sun came out, blindingly in his eyes. North of Brewster on the way to Carmel it had been snow the night before, instead of freezing rain. The road had been scraped. Yes, it had been freezing rain first and then snow. But the metal studs bit in. For the most part, anyway. It was almost noon when he reached Carmel. He had underestimated the weather when he had told Charles Forniss one o’clock would be all right for meeting at the inn. But Charlie, too, probably would have a long morning.

  There was a guard in the courthouse lobby. No, District Attorney Jonathan Peters was not in his office. Neither was the Chief of County Detectives, although there probably was somebody on standby in that office. It was Christmas. Hadn’t the Inspector noticed?

  “And a lousy one,” Heimrich noted, and went to the jail.

  The head guard was also taking Christmas off. But there was a deputy who, after considerable hesitation, supposed it would be all right for Inspector Heimrich to interview Mrs. Loren Kemper. “Although it’s about time to feed them.”

  Loren Kemper, who was brought into a barren room, after a considerable wait, by a matron, was a slim, noticeably pretty woman somewhere in her mid-twenties. She had an almost boyish figure. She was wearing a close-fitting gray wool dress. Her golden-yellow hair, almost, but not quite, as long as the brown hair of Joan Collins, hung loose. There was no friendliness in the blue eyes which looked at Heimrich.

  “I won’t talk to you or anyone without my lawyer,” Loren Kemper said. “He says I’ve already talked too much to that Cochran man.”

  Heimrich knew Leon Cochran, Chief of County Detectives. He thought Cochran a man rather likely to get underfoot. He told the matron she could leave. The matron, a very heavy-set woman with almost black hair and a very visible mustache, also black, said, “Not allowed, Mister.”

  “Yes,” Heimrich said, “I’m allowing it, Miss. I’ll be responsible.”

  The matron said she’d have to see about that, but she went out of the room, presumably to do so.

  “Your lawyer was Mr. Jackson,” Heimrich said to the slim woman, who remained standing, and remained hostile. “Samuel Jackson?”

  “I don’t know why you say was,” Loren said. “He is my lawyer, whoever you are.”

  Heimrich told her who he was. He said, “Because Mr. Jackson is dead, Mrs. Kemper. He was killed night before last, under rather puzzling circumstances. And he was a longtime friend of mine, Mrs. Kemper. A friend whose judgment I very much respected.”

  She said, “Oh.” Then she sat down on one of the three very unwelcoming chairs in the barren room. “He’s really dead? Nobody told me. You’d think somebody would—” She put her hands over her eyes. “He was a nice man,” she said. “A kind man. What do I do now?”

  Now, he told her, she’d have to think about finding another lawyer. When she found one he would, undoubtedly, move to have her trial postponed. The motion would, equally without doubt, be granted. “So your new lawyer will have time to familiarize himself with the case.”

  “I don’t know anything about lawyers,” she said. “Not even how to go about finding one.”

  “You found Jackson,” Heimrich told her.

  She shook her head.

  “It was the other way around,” she said. “There was another one first. When they said I was a material witness and would have to put up bail or—or be locked up—the first one fixed up the bail and got me out of there. He said he would represent me, but I don’t think he wanted to much. Then Mr. Jackson offered to. He called and offered. I thought—just vaguely thought—lawyers weren’t allowed to do that. But I wasn’t a witness at all. Not material or anything. I was out by the pool when it happened. When somebody shot Burton.” She covered her eyes again and murmured something. Heimrich thought it was “Burton, oh Burton,” but he couldn’t be sure.

  “Just called you up and offered to represent you?” Heimrich said. “Yes, I suppose the county bar association might take a dim view. Call it advertising, or something. Lawyers are getting a little touchy about ethics since Watergate. Did Jackson say why he made this offer?”

  “No. Just said he’d be glad to represent me. And it was all right with the other lawyer—he’d cleared that up before he called me. And he said I wasn’t to worry.”

  “Did he tell you why you didn’t have to worry, Mrs. Kemper?”

  She shook her head.

  “Just not to. That he was sure things would come out all right.”

  “Did he say why he was sure?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t ask? Try to find out why he was so confident? Why, more or less out of a clear sky, it seems, he offered to represent you?”

  She shook her head again, her long hair sweeping her shoulders.

  “You don’t understand,” she said. “I was upset, terribly upset. Not about myself. I knew I hadn’t done anything. That Burton was dead. Dead in that awful way.”

  “You were fond of Mr. Lord?”

  She looked up at him, surprise in her eyes.

  She said, “Fond? You don’t seem to know much about any of this, do you, Inspector? That’s why I’m here, really. And what this man Peters saw, or thinks he saw. Burton and I were lovers. I don’t deny that. Sleeping together. I don’t deny that. That’s why they think I killed him. That we’d been lovers and-well, he decided to call it off. He didn’t. Oh, it was called off all right. But that was my idea. Because what had been bright was getting—messy. Not between us. I don’t mean that. But his wife had hired a detective—some dreadful man—to spy on us. We’d—well, we’d have to take to hiding around corners. I suppose Mrs. Lord thought she had a right to hire a man to spy on us. Maybe she did, I guess. The way a woman like Amelia Lord would look at it. She was so proud—so set up—about b
eing Burton’s wife. And having all that money he’d made. She’s that kind of woman, I think.”

  Heimlich waited a few seconds for her to go on, but it became evident she had gone as far as she intended to.

  “How long had this been going on, Mrs. Kemper? This affair of yours and Mr. Lord’s?”

  “Since—oh, about two years after my husband died,” she said. “At first, well, I was just lonely. Terribly lonely. Later it got to bewell, something different. Why are you asking me all these things? Things that man Cochran asked me over and over? Until I felt like screaming. You’re trying to trap me into something, aren’t you? Taking advantage of the fact Mr. Jackson’s dead to trap me. How do I know you’re not lying about that? About his being dead?”

  “He’s dead, Mrs. Kemper. We think somebody killed him,

  142.

  meaning to kill him. I’m not trying to trap you. Just to see whether there’s any connection between what we think was Sam Jackson’s murder and the murder of Mr. Lord.”

  “What connection could there be, Inspector?”

  “I don’t know. I’m trying to find out. We look for anything out of the way in the past of a murder victim, you see. Sam Jackson never practiced criminal law, far as we can find out. But he offered to be your attorney in a murder case.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t see why that would make any connection,” she said.

  “Probably there isn’t any, Mrs. Kemper. We try to cover all possibilities, naturally. It was your rifle used to kill Mr. Lord; I understand you don’t deny that?”

  “It was my gun. The one I used for target shooting at the club. And I kept it in the hall closet. All anybody would have to do would have been to open the front door and reach in while I was out by the pool. I told this Cochran man that, too. He wrote it down, but I don’t think he really listened to anything I said.”

  Heimrich supposed that Chief of County Detectives Leon Cochran had listened. Which didn’t mean he had believed anything he heard.

  The door to the barren room opened and the matron came in, her mustache perceptibly quivering.