by Ed McBain
Rolling her eyes heavenward.
He guessed that at her age, dating someone for a year and more was an eternity.
. . . but that she was really beginning to feel tied down, you know? Scott all the way up there, and her down here, you know? They were supposed to be going steady, but what did that mean? How could you go steady with someone who was all the way up near the Canadian border? In fact, how could you go with him at all?.
In the park now.
Leaves underfoot.
The rustle of leaves.
French-heeled shoes whispering through the leaves.
He was dying to slide his hands up her legs, under that rust colored skirt. Open that cotton blouse, find those breasts with their erect nipples, teenage nipples.
You know, she said, a girl misses certain things.
His heart stopped.
He dared not ask her what things she missed.
Kissing, she said.
Scuffing through the leaves.
Touching, she said.
He held his breath.
Making love, she whispered.
And stopped on the path.
And turned to him.
And lifted her face to his.
That was the first time.
He had been with her a total of fourteen times since that October night, the fifteenth of October, the night he'd accepted the industry's coveted award, the night he'd been gifted, too, with this girl, this woman, this unbelievably passionate creature he'd coveted since September. Fourteen times. Including their hurried coupling on New Year's Eve.
His eyes brimmed with tears.
For Christmas he'd given her a small lapis pendant on a gold-
'You saw it,' he said. 'It was on the floor. Beside her. The chain must have broken when . . . when ... do you remember it? A small teardrop-shaped piece of lapis with a gold loop holding it to the chain? I bought it in an antiques shop on Lamont. She loved it. She wore it all the time. I gave it to her for our first Christmas together. I loved her so much.'
She had broken off with Handler by then.
Told him she no longer wished to see him. This was when he came down for the Thanksgiving holiday. Told him it was over and done with. Said she wanted nothing further to do with him. He accused her of having found a new boyfriend. Told her he'd kill them both.
Hodding was in bed with her when she reported this to him.
A room he'd rented in a hotel near the Stem.
Hookers running through the hallway outside.
They both laughed at Handler's boyish threat.
On New Year's Eve . . .
He covered his face with his hands.
Wept into his hands.
Meyer felt no sympathy. Neither did Carella.
On New Year's Eve ...
* * * *
14
The Assistant District Attorney was a woman named Nellie Brand, thirty-two years old and smart as hell. Sand-colored hair cut in a breezy flying wedge, blue eyes intently alert. Wearing a brown tweed suit, a tan turtleneck sweater, and brown pumps with sensible high heels, she sat on the edge of the long table in the Interrogation Room, legs crossed, a pastrami sandwich in her right hand. A little cardboard dish of soggy French fries was on the table beside her, together with a cardboard container of Coca-Cola.
'Willing to risk a quickie, huh?' she said, and bit into the sandwich.
She was married, Carella noticed. Gold wedding band on the ring finger of her left hand. He was drinking coffee and eating a tuna and tomato on toast.
'According to what he told us,' Meyer said, 'he simply had to see her.' He was still angry. Seething inside. Voice edged with sarcasm. Carella had never seen him this way. Nor was he eating anything. He was trying to lose seven pounds. This probably made him even angrier.
'Ah, l'amour,' Nellie said and rolled her blue eyes.
In some countries, women wore the wedding band on the right hand. Carella had read that someplace. Austria? Maybe Germany. Or maybe both. Nellie Brand was a married woman who, Carella suspected, might not appreciate a married man her age playing around with a sixteen-year-old kid. He further suspected she might have preferred dining with her husband to eating deli with two weary detectives who'd spent most of the afternoon and evening with a man who may have killed his own baby daughter and the sixteen-year-old who'd been sitting with her. But here she was at eight o'clock on a cold and icy Friday night, trying to determine whether they had anything that would stick here should they decide to charge him. They would have to charge him soon or let him go. Those were the rules, Harold. Miranda-Escobedo. You played it by the rules or you didn't play at all.
'Got there at?' Nellie said.
'Quarter past one at the outside,' Carella said.
'Doorman told you this?'
'Yes.'
'Reliable?'
'Seems so.'
'And left when?'
'Quarter to two.'
'Half-hour even,' Nellie said.
'Had to see her,' Meyer said. Steaming. About to erupt. Thinking about his own daughter, Carella figured.
'How long did he say this'd been going on?'
'Since October.'
'When?'
'The fifteenth,' Carella said.
'Birth date of great men,' Nellie said, but did not amplify. 'Told you all this, huh?'
'Yeah. Which troubles us, too. The fact that he . . .'
'Sure, why would he?'
'Unless he's figuring . . .'
'Yeah, there's that.'
'You know, the . . .'
'Sure, show 'em the death and they'll accept the fever,' Nellie said.
'Exactly. If he thinks he's looking at murder, he'll settle for adultery.'
'He gives us the old Boy-Meets-Girl . . .'
'Pulls a Jimmy Swaggart . . .'
'Tearfully begs forgiveness . . .'
'And walks off into the sunset.'
Nellie washed down a fry with a swallow of Coke. 'He knew what the autopsy report said, is that right?'
'About sperm in the . . . ?'
'Yeah.'
'Yes, he was informed earlier.'
'So he knew one of the possibilities was rape-murder.'
'Yes.'
'And now you've got him up here, and you're asking questions about New Year's Eve . . .'
'Oh, sure, he's no dummy. He had to figure we were thinking he was our man.'
'Which you're still thinking,' Nellie said.
'Otherwise we wouldn't have invited you here for dinner,' Carella said, and smiled.
'Yes, thank you, it's delicious,' Nellie said, and bit into the sandwich again. 'So let me hear your case,' she said. 'You can skip means and opportunity, I know he had both. Let me hear motive.'
'We'd have to wing it,' Carella said.
'I've got all night,' Nellie said.
Carella repeated essentially what Hodding had told them in this very room not an hour earlier.
If it had not been so cold on New Year's Eve, he would have planned to walk Annie home, the way he'd done that first time in October and several times since. Make love to her in the park. Annie standing under a tree with her skirt up around her hips and her panties down around her ankles, Hodding nailing her to the tree. His words. But it was so damn cold that night. He and his wife had virtually frozen to death just waiting for a taxi to take them over to the Kerr apartment, and Hodding knew that lovemaking in the park was out of the question, however strong his desire. He had it in his head that he and Annie had to usher in the new year by making love. An affirmation-
'Really gone over this kid, huh?' Nellie asked.
'Totally,' Meyer said.
-an affirmation of their bond. To seal their relationship. Fuck her senseless at the start of the new year. His words again. And the more he drank-
'Was he really drunk? Or do you think that was an act? To get out of the place.'
'I think he was really drunk,' Carella said.
'Probably sobered up on the
way over to the apartment,' Meyer said.
'Doorman says he was sober.'
'So you have him sober at the scene of the crime.'
'Yes.'
'Okay, go ahead.'
The more he drank, the more the idea became an obsession with him. He had to get to his apartment, had to make love to Annie. When he talked to her on the phone at twelve-thirty, he whispered what he wanted to do ...
'Did he tell you this?'
'Yes.'
'That he whispered to her?'
'Yes.'
'Said what?'
'Said, "I want to fuck you."'
'The son of a bitch,' Meyer said.
'Uh-huh,' Nellie said. 'And she said?'
'She said, "Good. Come on over."'
'Precocious.'
'Very.'
'He told you all this?'
'We have it on tape.'
'What was his response?'
'He said, "In a little while."'
'You've got all this on tape?'
'All of it. We've also got his hostess overhearing him. Chastity Kerr. We've got a statement from her.'
'The exact words he gave you.'
'Yes. Telling Annie, "In a little while."'
'Okay. Go ahead.'
At one o'clock he leaves the Kerr party, ostensibly to clear his head. By the time he gets to his own building, four blocks uptown, he's cold sober. He goes upstairs, finds Annie waiting for him with nothing on under her skirt. They make passionate love on the living room couch, he goes in to kiss his baby daughter on her rosebud cheek, and then he leaves. The doorman clocks him coming out of the elevator at a quarter to two.
'Wham, bang, thank you, ma'am,' Nellie said.
'That's how his story goes,' Meyer said.
'And your version?'
'I think the strain of the relationship was beginning to tell on him,' Meyer said. 'The very fact that on New Year's Eve, he would risk running back to his apartment for a quick assignation . . .'
'Well, you yourself said he was totally gone on her.'
'Exactly my point. And getting in deeper and deeper. On Christmas, for example, he . . .'
'No puns, please,' Nellie said, and smiled.
Carella returned the smile. Meyer did not.
'On Christmas, he gave her a gift. Our first Christmas together,' Meyer said, bitterly repeating Hodding's words. 'And he caused her to break up with a decent . . .'
'What kind of a gift?' Nellie asked.
'Lapis pendant on a gold chain.'
'Expensive?'
'I would guess moderately expensive.'
'Well, there's cheap lapis, too,' Nellie said.
'He bought this on Lamont.'
'Okay, expensive,' Nellie said.
'What I'm saying, this was a man out of control . . .'
'Uh-huh.'
'Falling in love with a teenager to begin with ...'
'Uh-huh.'
'Getting in way over his head, buying her expensive gifts, making love to her in the park, for Christ's sake, meeting her in cheap hotels off the Stem, hookers parading the halls, taking risks no man in his right . . .'
'Detective Meyer, excuse me,' Nellie said. 'Why'd he kill her?'
Because he couldn't see any other way out.'
'Where'd you get that?'
'From everything he said.'
'He told you he was in over his head?'
'No, but . . .'
'Told you he couldn't handle this?'
'Well . . .'
'Couldn't see any other way out?'
'Not in those exact words.'
'What words then?'
'Mrs Brand, excuse me,' Meyer said. 'He was in that apartment making love to this girl between one-fifteen and a quarter to two. When he got home with his wife, forty-five minutes later, the girl is dead. Stabbed. Are we supposed to believe someone else got into that apartment during those forty-five minutes? Isn't it more reasonable to assume that Hodding either figured this was a good time to end his goddamn problems with this girl, or else he . . .'
'What problems? How did he indicate to you in any way that he considered this relationship a problem?'
'He said he had to see her, had to . . .'
'I don't see that as a problem. In fact, he was seeing her regularly. Seeing her was not a problem, Detective Meyer.'
'Okay, then let's say they argued about something, okay? Let's say they made love and she told him she didn't want to see him anymore. She'd bounced her boyfriend in November, why couldn't she now do the same thing with Hodding? Over and done with, goodbye. Only he wasn't having any of it. Not after all the deception of the past few months. So he flies off the deep end, goes out to the kitchen for a knife - he knows where they are, he lives in this . . .'
'I've granted you means,' Nellie said.
'And comes back and stabs her,' Meyer said.
'Uh-huh,' Nellie said.
'He was in that apartment for a half-hour,' Meyer said.
'Okay, let's say all this happened,' Nellie said. 'They made love and she told him thanks, it was nice, but that's the last dance, goodbye and good luck, and he stormed out into the kitchen and grabbed the knife and did her in. Okay? Is that your scenario?'
'Yes,' Meyer said.
'Let's say all of that - which you can't prove, by the way - is true. Then answer me one other question.'
'Sure.'
'Why'd he then kill his own daughter?'
And to that, there was no answer.
* * * *
Henry Tsu did not enjoy being bad-mouthed.
As far as he was concerned, he was a trustworthy businessman and he did not like people spreading rumors about him. That his business happened to be illegal had nothing to do with whether or not he conducted it like a gentleman. True, Henry had been forced on occasion to break a few collarbones and heads, but even when force had been called for, the business community understood that such action had been an absolute necessity. Henry had a good reputation. He hated to see it going down the toilet because of a little spic cocksucker.
José Domingo Herrera, who years ago used to do some work for the Chang people when they had what was called the Yellow Paper Gang in Chinatown. Henry had heard that Herrera was very good at what he did. What he did was a secret between himself and Chang Tie Fei, otherwise known as Walter Chang here in this city. Then again, Henry's full and honorable name was Tsu Hong Chin. How he had got to be Henry was a mystery even to himself. Perhaps it was because he looked very much like Henry Fonda when he was young. With Chinese eyes.
Putting together the pieces, Henry figured that Herrera had served as a liaison between the Chang people and certain Colombian interests eager to establish a foothold here in the city. The Colombians were sick to death of having to deal with the wops in Miami, who thought they owned the whole fucking world. They didn't want to start dealing with them all over again up here so they went to the Chinese instead. The Chinese needed somebody who could understand these people who looked and sounded either like sombreroed and raggedy-assed bandidos in a Mexican movie or else pinky-ringed and pointy-lapeled gangsters in a movie about Prohibition days. So they landed on Herrera as a go-between.
Was what Henry figured.
Little José Domingo Herrera, building himself a rep with the Chinese and the Colombians as well.
How Herrera had got involved with a Jamaican posse was another thing.
Which was why Henry on this bleak Saturday morning, the twenty-first day of January, was talking to a man named Juan Kai Hsao, whose mother was Spanish - really Spanish, from Spain - and whose father was from Taiwan. The two men were speaking in English because Henry had no Spanish at all and Juan's Chinese was extremely half-assed, his father having come to this country at the age of two.
'Let me tell you what I suspect,' Henry said.
'Yes,' Juan said. 'Please.'