by Ed McBain
“I told you …”
“You see, after we learned Mr. Bridges was from London …”
“Big city, you realize.”
“Yes, we know that.”
“If you’re suggesting he and I might have known each other, that is.”
“But you said you didn’t.”
“That’s right. I’m saying the population is even larger than it is here. So if you’re suggesting I might have known a Jamaican, no less, from Euston or King’s Cross …”
“But you don’t.”
“That’s right.”
“And you never met Cynthia Keating, either …”
“Well, not until …”
“The party at Connie Lindstrom’s, right.”
“That’s correct.”
“Never even spoke to her before then.”
“Never.”
“Which is what made us wonder. When we were going over our notes. After we learned Mr. Bridges …”
“Oh, you take notes, do you? How clever.”
“Mr. Palmer,” Carella said, “it might go better for you if you stopped being such a wise ass.”
“I didn’t realize it was going badly,” Palmer said, and raised his eyebrows and opened his eyes wide and smiled impishly. “I was merely trying to point out that scads of people are from London, that’s all.”
“Yes, but not all of them are linked to Cynthia Keating’s father.”
“I never met Andrew Hale in my life. And I’m certainly not linked to him, as you’re suggesting.”
“Mr. Palmer,” Carella said, “how did you know Martha Cole-ridge wanted a hundred thousand dollars from each of you?”
The blue eyes went wide again. The eyebrows arched. The lips pursed.
“Well … let me think,” he said.
They waited.
“Mr. Palmer?” Carella said.
“Someone must have told me.”
“Yes, who?”
“I can’t remember.”
“You didn’t talk to Miss Coleridge herself, did you?”
“Of course not. I never even met the woman!”
“Then who told you?”
“I have no idea.”
“Was it Cynthia Keating?”
Palmer did not answer.
“Mr. Palmer? It was Cynthia Keating, wasn’t it?”
He still said nothing.
“Did she also tell you her father owned the underlying rights to the play?”
Palmer folded his arms across his chest.
“And was refusing to part with them?”
Palmer’s look said his carriage had just run over an urchin in the cobbled streets and he was ordering his coachman to move on regardless.
“I guess that’s it, huh?” Carella said.
Palmer took an enameled snuff box from the pocket of his brocaded waistcoat, disdainfully opened the box, and sniffed a pinch of snuff into each nostril.
Or so it seemed to the assembled flatfoots.
They called Nellie Brand and spelled out what they thought they had. At the very least, they figured they were cool with conspiracy to commit first-degree murder. Nellie advised them to pick up Cynthia Keating and bring her in. She herself got there in half an hour. It was seven thirty-five on the face of the squadroom clock, and it was still snowing outside.
They brought Cynthia in ten minutes later. Todd Alexander came to the party at ten past eight. He promptly informed them that his client would not answer any questions and he warned them that unless they charged her with something at once she was marching right out of there.
It now remained to see who would blink first.
“I wouldn’t be so hasty, Todd,” Nellie said, “You stand to make a lot of money here.”
“Oh? How do you figure that?”
“I plan to consolidate the two murders. This’ll be a very long trial. I hope your client has a gazillion dollars.”
“Which two murders are you talking about?” Alexander asked.
“First off, the murder for hire of Mrs. Keating’s father …”
“Oh, I see, murder for hire.” He turned to Cynthia and said, “Murder for hire is first-degree murder.”
“Tell her what she’s looking at, Todd.”
“Why waste my breath? Is that what you’re charging her with? Murder One? If so, do it.”
“What’s your hurry? Don’t you want to hear me out? I can save your life,” Nellie said, turning to Cynthia. “I can also save you a lot of money.”
“Thanks,” Cynthia said, “but my life’s not in danger …”
“Don’t kid your …”
“… and I’ll be rich once Jenny’s …”
“The penalty for Murder One is lethal injection,” Nellie said. “I’m offering you a real bargain discount.”
“What exactly do you think you have?” Alexander asked.
“I’ve got an old man standing in the way of what your client perceives as a fortune. I’ve got a bird brain in London who looks at it the same way. The two conspire to …”
“Mrs. Keating and somebody in London, are you saying?”
“A specific somebody named Gerald Palmer. Who also stands to make a fortune if this show is a hit.”
“And they conspired to kill Mrs. Keating’s father, are you saying?”
“That’s our surmise, Todd.”
“A wild one.”
“The Brits have been known,” Nellie said.
“Sure, Richard the Second.”
“Even more recently.”
“You’re saying …”
“I’m saying the pair of them found a Jamaican hit man named John Bridges, brought him here to America …”
“Oh, please, Nellie.”
“The Metropolitan Police are checking his pedigree this very minute. Once they get back to us …”
“Ah, Sherlock Holmes now.”
“No, just a detective named Frank Beaton.”
“This is all nonsense,” Cynthia said.
“Fine, take your chances,” Nellie said.
“What do you want from her?”
“Her partner and the hit man.”
“That’s everybody.”
“No, that’s only two people.”
“What do you give her in return?”
“Is this me you’re talking about?” Cynthia asked.
“Just a second, Cyn,” Alexander said.
“Never mind just a second. If she had anything, she wouldn’t be trying to strike a deal here.”
“You think so, huh?” Nellie said.
“What can you give us?” Alexander asked.
“She rats them out, I drop the charge to Murder Two. Twenty to life as opposed to the Valium cocktail.”
“Go to fifteen,” Alexander said.
“Twenty. With a recommendation for parole.”
“Come on, at least give me the minimum.”
“Fifteen can come and go without parole,” Nellie said. “And then twenty, and thirty, and forty, and still no parole. Before you know it, your lady’s in there for the rest of her life. Take my advice. Twenty with a recommendation.”
“She’d be sixty when she got out!”
“Fifty-seven,” Cynthia corrected.
But she was thinking.
“On the other hand, you can always roll the dice. Just remember, you’re looking at the death penalty. You’ll sit on death row for five, six years while you exhaust all your appeals—and that’ll be it.”
“Recommend parole after fifteen,” Alexander said.
“I can’t do that.”
“Twenty just isn’t sweet enough.”
“How sweet is the cocktail?” Nellie asked.
10
IT IS Palmer who makes the first contact, toward the end of September.
He tells Cynthia on the telephone that he’s had a transatlantic call from Norman Zimmer, who’s producing a musical based on Jenny’s Room, is she familiar with …?
“Yes, he’s been in touch,” Cynthia says.
“Yes, I know.”
“It does seem a shame, doesn’t it?” he says. “All these people who’d stand to earn a little money.”
“I know,” Cynthia says.
“Couldn’t you talk with him?”
“I have,” she says. “He won’t budge.”
“It does seem a pity.”
“He’s protecting Jessica, you see.”
“Who’s that?”
“Jessica Miles. The woman who wrote the original play. He feels she wouldn’t have wanted the musical done again.”
“Really? Why’s that?”
“Because it was so awful.”
“Oh, I don’t think so, do you? I’ve read my grandfather’s book, and I’ve also heard the songs. It’s really quite good, you know. Besides, they’re having new songs written, and a new book, and—well, it’s truly a shame. Because I think it has a really good shot, you know. I think we can all become quite rich, actually. If it’s done.”
There is a crackling on the line.
She tries to visualize London. She has never been there. She imagines chimney pots and cobblestoned streets. She imagines men with soot-stained collars and women in long hour-glass gowns. She imagines Big Ben chiming the hour, regattas on the Thames. She imagines all these things. And imagines going there one day.
“Couldn’t you please talk with him again?” Palmer says.
It is she who makes the next call, sometime early in October. He has just come home from work, it is seven o’clock there in London, only two in the afternoon here in America. He tells her he works for “the last of the publishers in Bedford Square,” a line she surmises he has used often before. In fact, there is something about the way he speaks that makes everything sound studied and prepared, as if he has learned a part and is merely acting it. A lack of spontaneity, she supposes, something that makes whatever he says seem artificial and rehearsed, as if there is nothing of substance behind the words.
“Have you seen him again?” he asks.
“Several times,” she says.
“And?”
“Dead end.”
“Mmm.”
“He won’t listen to reason. He says the play is a sacred trust …”
“Nonsense.”
“It’s what he believes.”
“She must have written it in the year dot.”
“Nineteen twenty-three.”
“Norman tells me it’s bloody awful.”
“My father thinks it’s simply wonderful.”
“Well, as the old maid said when she kissed the cow …”
“It’s a shame this had to come along just now, though. The opportunity, I mean. To have the musical revived.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well … ten years from now would have been so much better.”
“I don’t under …”
“Never mind, I shouldn’t have said that.”
“I’m sorry, I still don’t …”
“It’s just … my father isn’t in the best of health, you see.”
“That’s too bad.”
“And I certainly don’t have the same problems he has.”
“Problems? What …?”
“With the play. With it being done as a musical. I have no emotional ties to Jessica Miles, you see. I never even met the woman. What I’m saying is I don’t give a damn about her play. In fact, I’d love to see the musical revived.”
“But what’s ten years from now got to …?”
“My father’s leaving the rights to me.”
“Oh?”
“To her play. When he dies. It’s in his will.”
“I see.”
“Yes.”
There was a long silence.
“But,” she said. “It isn’t ten years from now, is it?”
“No, it isn’t,” Palmer says.
“It’s now,” she says.
“Yes,” he says. “So it is.”
He calls her again on the eighteenth of October. It is midnight here in America, he tells her it’s five A.M. there in London, but he hasn’t been able to sleep.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about your father,” he says.
“Me, too,” she says.
“It seems such a pity he won’t let go of those rights, doesn’t it? Forgive me, but have you made your position absolutely clear to him? Have you told him your feelings about having this musical done?”
“Oh, yes, a thousand times.”
“I mean … he must realize, don’t you imagine, that the moment he’s passed on … forgive me … you’ll do bloody well what you like with the play. Doesn’t he realize that?”
“I’m sure he does.”
“It does seem unfair, doesn’t it?”
“It does.”
“Especially since he’s in bad health.”
“Two heart attacks.”
“You’d think he’d hand over the play immediately, why wouldn’t he? With his blessings. Here you are, Cynthia, do with it as you wish.”
“His only child,” Cynthia said.
“One would think so.”
“But he won’t.”
“Well, when they get to be a certain age …”
“It isn’t that. He’s just a stubborn old fool. Sometimes I wish …”
She lets the sentence trail.
He waits.
“Sometimes I wish he’d die tomorrow,” she says.
There is another silence.
“I’m sure you don’t mean that,” he says.
“I suppose not.”
“I’m sure you don’t.”
“But I do,” she says.
There is a Jamaican named Charles Colworthy who works in the mail room with Palmer, and he knows another Jamaican named Delroy Lewis, who knows yet another Jamaican named John Bridges, who by all accounts is what they call a “Yardie,” which Palmer explains is British slang for any young Jamaican male involved in violence and drugs.
“I wouldn’t want him hurt,” Cynthia says at once.
“Of course not.”
“You said violence.”
“He’s assured me it will be painless.”
“You’ve met him?”
“Several times.”
“What’s his name?”
“John Bridges. He’s quite ready to do it for us. If you still want to go ahead with it.”
“I’ve given it a lot of thought.”
“So have I.”
“It does seem the right thing, doesn’t it, Gerry?”
“Yes.”
There is a long silence.
It all seems to be happening too quickly.
“When … when would he do it?”
“Sometime before the end of the month. He’ll need an introduction. You’d have to arrange that.”
“An introduction?”
“To your father.”
“Is he black?”
“Yes. But very light skinned.”
“I don’t know any black people, you see.”
“Very pale eyes,” Palmer says. “A lovely smile. All you need do is introduce him. He’ll take care of the rest.”
“It’s just that I don’t know any black people.”
“Well …”
“I wouldn’t know what to say.”
“Just say he’s a friend of yours from London.”
“I’ve never been to London.”
“A friend of a friend, you could say. Who’ll be there for a few days. Who you wanted your father to meet. Is what you could say.”
“Why would anyone want to meet my father?”
“You could say he once worked in a hospital here. Just as your father did. That would give them something in common. I’ll give you the name of a hospital here in London.”
“I’ve never introduced my father to anyone in my life.”
; “It would just be to put him off guard.”
“He’d be suspicious.”
“Just someone you’d like him to meet. A nurse. Just as your father was.”
“He won’t hurt him, will he?”
“No, no, you needn’t worry.”
“When did you say it would be?”
“Well, he’ll come as soon as we authorize it. He’ll want half of his fee beforehand, half after it’s done.”
“How much did he say?”
“Five thousand.”
“Is that a lot?”
“I think it’s reasonable. Dollars, that is. Not pounds.”
“I wouldn’t want him hurt,” she says again.
“No, he won’t be.”
“Well.”
“But I have to let him know.”
“What do you think we should do?”
“I think we should go ahead with it. Twenty-five hundred dollars is a lot of money to me, but I look upon this as a serious investment …”
“Yes.”
“… an opportunity to advance myself. I can’t speak for you, of course … but … I’ve never really had very much in my life, Cynthia. I work in the post room, I don’t get invited to very many balls at Windsor. If this show is a hit, everything would change for me. My life would become … well … glamorous.”
“Yes,” she said.
“I think we should do it,” he said. “I truly do.”
“Well then …”
“What I’ll do, if you agree, I’ll give John my half of the fee just before he leaves London, and you can pay him the rest when he’s done it. There in America. Afterward. Would you be happy with that?”
“I guess so.”
“Shall I call him then?”
“Well …”
“Tell him we’re going ahead with it?”
“Yes.”
Now, sitting in the lieutenant’s office with her lawyer and the detectives, she lowers her eyes and says, “John was very charming. He and my father hit it off right away. But he caused me a lot of trouble later. Because he said it would look like an accident, and it didn’t.”
Gerald Palmer called the British Consulate the moment the cops told him what charges they were bringing against him. The consul who came over was named Geoffrey Holden, a somewhat portly man in his mid-forties, stroking a bristly mustache that made him look like a cavalry colonel. He took off his heavy overcoat and hung it on a corner rack. Under it, he was wearing a somber gray suit with a vest and a bright yellow tie. He told Palmer this was his first DBN of the week, which letters he jovially explained stood for Distressed British National.