“Dead?”
“Yes. Pills.”
“How did you get in?”
“I used a picklock.”
“Surely you know that’s illegal.”
“Yes.”
“What else have you done?”
“I took an envelope from the table. It was addressed to me, sealed and stamped. I consider it my property.”
“What you consider and what the police consider may be quite different. You’ve called them, haven’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Put the letter back. Stay cool. I’ll be right over.”
He hung up.
She opened her purse to put the letter back, then closed it again. It was her property, Roger wanted her to have it, no one had any right to take it from her. Clutching the purse under her arm, she went out the door into the afternoon sun.
Mr. Abercrombie was leaning against the hood of Roger’s car, watching her.
“I saw what you did,” he said. “Picked the lock like an old pro.”
“I had to. I thought he might be drunk.”
“And is he?”
“No. I think he’s dead.”
Abercrombie made a snorting little noise. “You women are always exaggerating. A man takes a drink, he’s drunk. He lies down for a nap, he’s dead.”
“I called the police and paramedics.”
“For crying out loud, you crazy lady. What did you do that for? Why didn’t you come to me? We can’t have police and paramedics cluttering up the property for no reason except your imagination.”
Two sounds were audible now: the full-scale siren of the police and the two-note electronic whelper of the paramedics.
“Crazy lady,” Abercrombie said again. But he unfolded a canvas chair for her to sit on and began fanning her with his straw hat.
“Mr. Lennard had a row,” he said. “You know, a quarrel. A man came to see him around lunchtime and I could hear their voices real loud until someone closed the windows. I saw the man leave, walk toward the street. He was a big fellow, heavyset, wearing a light grey suit and a Panama hat. Of course there’s no chance of foul play or anything like that,” he added anxiously. “Is there?”
“I can’t answer that.”
“Do you think I should tell the police about Mr. Lennard quarreling with that man?”
“Yes.”
“Should I tell him about you picking the lock to get in?”
“No,” Mrs. Holbrook said. “I’ll tell them myself.”
The paramedics arrived, four young men so quick and precise that their movements seemed choreographed. Abercrombie held the door open for them and they all went
inside, filling the tiny room to capacity. People were already coming out of the other housing units, some curious, some frightened, some annoyed. They were quiet, listening to the paramedics’ radio.
“This is Medic Two calling Santa Felicia Hospital . . . We have a cardiac arrest, a man about thirty, no pulse, no respiration . . . We’re applying CPR, no luck so far . . . We have him now on the scope, getting only a straight line . . . Adrenalin intravenous started . . . We’re moving right out . . .”
Roger was carried out, strapped to a stretcher. In the sunlight Mrs. Holbrook saw what she had missed previously: that his right eye and the whole right side of his face were badly swollen and discolored.
The police arrived as the emergency vehicle was pulling away, two black-and-whites and an unmarked car. The man who got out of the unmarked car looked like an ordinary middle-aged businessman on his way to his job at a bank or insurance office. He introduced himself to Abercrombie as Lieutenant Peterson, while three of the other men went inside.
“She discovered him,” Abercrombie said, pointing to Mrs. Holbrook. “I don’t know her. I never saw her before. She picked the lock. Go ahead, ask her.”
“What is your name, sir?”
“Abercrombie.”
“I’d like your full name and address, please.”
Abercrombie told him and the lieutenant wrote down the information on a note pad.
“And the victim’s name, please?”
“Victim?” Abercrombie repeated. “How do you know he’s a victim?”
“Well, he was certainly the victim of something or we all wouldn’t be here. Right?”
“His name was Roger Lennard.”
“And his occupation?”
“A schoolteacher, something like that. He didn’t call it a schoolteacher.”
“Mr. Lennard was one of the counselors at my school,” Mrs. Holbrook said.
“And your name is?”
“Rachel Holbrook.”
“Address?”
“I live at the school, Holbrook Hall. Mr. Lennard called in sick a few days ago and I’ve been trying to get in touch with him on a certain matter. When I couldn’t, I drove down here to see him, thinking he might be quite sick.”
“Or drunk,” Abercrombie said. “But I knew he couldn’t be drunk. He was a Mormon—they’re not supposed to drink. He wasn’t sick, either. He was messing around with some girl, told me he was going to be married and wanted to bring the bride here until they could find a nice apartment. This is a single unit, see, and we don’t allow—”
“You and I will talk later, Mr. Abercrombie,” the lieutenant said. “I’d like to question Mrs. Holbrook alone for a few minutes, if you don’t mind.”
They sat in the back seat of Lieutenant Peterson’s car. He closed the windows and turned on the air-conditioner.
“I called my lawyer,” Mrs. Holbrook said. “I believe I should wait for him before answering any questions.”
“That’s your privilege, ma’am.”
There was a silence. It didn’t seem to bother the lieutenant. He leaned back and closed his eyes, as if he’d been waiting for a chance to take a nap.
“I’ve never been in a situation like this before,” she said.
He didn’t find the statement interesting enough to make him open his eyes.
“I mean, this sort of thing doesn’t happen to a woman like me.”
“Women like you don’t usually go around picking locks either.”
“I’ve never done it before except at school when I’ve had to free some student who’d been locked in a room.”
“What did you use?”
“A picklock.”
“Show it to me.”
She opened her purse, taking no pains to hide the large envelope from Roger’s kitchen table. It bore no sender’s name or address; there was nothing to connect it with its source. She showed him the picklock.
“This belongs in a burglar’s tool kit,” he said, “not a lady’s handbag.”
“I gave you my reason for having it and my reason for using it. When you’re trying to extricate a wildly hysterical child from a locked room you don’t question the legality of what or how you do it. You just do it. On the last occasion it was a girl, fifteen. She wasn’t hysterical. She was unconscious from an overdose of Seconal. Her mouth and tongue and throat were bright red the way Roger’s were. The girl lived. I don’t think Roger will.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve had some experience with death. Roger’s body was already cooling.” Her voice shook in spite of her efforts to control it. “I’m—I was very fond of Roger. His work with the students was so positive, he emphasized what they had, not what they didn’t have. He gave them a sense of identity.”
“What about his identity?”
“I can’t answer that.”
“You’ve done pretty well so far.”
He gave her back the picklock and she returned it to her purse.
“Was Mr. Lennard depressed lately?” he said.
“No.”
“Did he say anything to you about g
etting married?”
“No.”
“Did you know he was having a love affair?”
“Yes.”
“Were you acquainted with the girl?”
“It wasn’t a girl.”
She could see Aragon’s old Chevy trying to get into the road that bisected the court. A patrolman waved him away and he backed up into the street.
“What’s his name?” the lieutenant said.
“Whose name?”
“The man you just recognized.”
“He’s my lawyer, Tomás Aragon.”
“Never heard of him.”
“I never heard of him either until a few days ago,” she said. “As a matter of fact, he doesn’t even know yet that he’s my lawyer.”
“You have surprises for everyone, Mrs. Holbrook.”
“I’ve been getting quite a few myself lately.”
“Well, let’s see how Mr. Aragon reacts to his new client.”
The lieutenant helped her out of the car and they stood waiting for Aragon’s approach. After the shade and coolness of the air-conditioned car the sun was blinding and the heat oppressive, but the lieutenant neither blinked nor unbuttoned his coat. He said to Aragon, “Mrs. Holbrook’s lawyer, I presume?”
Aragon acknowledged his sudden appointment with a somewhat baffled smile and the two men exchanged names as they shook hands.
“Mrs. Holbrook and I have just concluded a pleasant little chat,” the lieutenant said. “She has an interesting new hobby you should discuss with her some time. You might want to encourage her to take up something more conventional, like needlepoint.”
Aragon looked at Mrs. Holbrook. “You told him about the picklock?”
“I had to. Abercrombie saw me use it.”
“You wouldn’t make a very good criminal, Mrs. Holbrook.”
“Don’t sell her short,” the lieutenant said. “She may be telling me a little so I won’t ask her for a lot.” Then to Mrs. Holbrook: “I’d like you to stick around for a while until I talk to Mr. Abercrombie and get a report from the hospital on Mr. Lennard. Does that suit you?”
“It will have to, I guess.”
“You guessed right.”
He didn’t offer them the use of his car to wait in, so they walked back and sat on a bus stop bench under an oak tree.
“Did you tell him I was your lawyer?” Aragon asked.
“Yes. Aren’t you?”
“I don’t know. If anything comes up which makes you and Mr. Jasper adversaries, my prior commitment is to him.”
“Nothing has come up. Perhaps nothing will.”
“I’d like to find out a little bit more about what I’m getting into. Did you put the envelope back as I asked you to?”
“No.”
“No? That’s it, no?”
“That’s it.”
He said a word in Spanish that he hadn’t spoken since he was a teenager.
She looked at him curiously. “So what does that mean?”
“It means, what am I going to do with this dame and how did I get into a crazy situation like this?”
“It means all that?”
“To me it does.”
“You’ll have to spell it for me some time.”
“I don’t think so,” Aragon said. “Where’s the envelope now?”
“In my purse.”
“Will you let me see it?”
“What good would that do? It’s still sealed. I don’t intend to open it until I’m alone.”
“What have you got to lose?”
“It’s what Roger has to lose that concerns me. There might be something in here that, if he survives, he wouldn’t want people to know, things he might regret having written. The envelope is full and carries an extra stamp. There’s more to it than just a simple suicide note.”
“It may be more than just a simple suicide,” Aragon said. “When I came in I heard a couple of policemen talking about an attack. Someone hit Roger a hard blow on the right side of his face. His hands were unmarked, so apparently he didn’t put up much of a fight, either because he was knocked unconscious or because he didn’t want to.”
“Abercrombie told me Roger had a visitor around lunchtime, a big man wearing a grey suit and Panama hat. Abercrombie heard them quarreling.”
“Timothy North is a big man, and in view of Roger’s impending marriage he and Roger had a lot to quarrel about. But I somehow doubt that he owns any suits. They’re not part of his lifestyle . . . Mr. Jasper is also a big man.”
“Yes.”
“He probably owns a couple of dozen suits.”
“Very likely.”
“What’s more, he’s left-handed.”
“What does that have to do with it?”
“The injuries to Roger’s face were on the right side, one of the policemen said.”
She touched her own face as though it hurt and she expected to find it bleeding. “Roger—Mr. Jasper—these are not violent people. How did all this happen to them? And to me? I’m a respectable woman. I don’t go around breaking into people’s houses or picking up things I’m not supposed to touch. Yet I did.”
“It’s not too late to correct one of those mistakes. Return the letter.”
“It’s my property.”
“As long as it was on Roger Lennard’s table, it belongs to him. If he had posted it, it would be yours on delivery.”
He didn’t realize her intention until she was already in the street, darting between the cars. She must have been sixty or more, but she moved with the speed of a natural athlete and luck was with her. He didn’t catch up with her until the letter was in the mailbox, beyond the reach of everyone except the U.S. Postal Service.
“Roger intended to mail it,” she said calmly. “I simply did it for him.”
They returned to Hibiscus Court, walking in silence like strangers. The lieutenant was sitting in the front seat of his unmarked car, talking on a radiotelephone. He got out when he saw them coming.
His face remained impassive but he sounded rather amused. “You two look as if you’ve been playing games. A little hot for that, isn’t it?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “One of my men tells me you talked for a while at the bus stop, then Mrs. Holbrook suddenly dashed across the road and mailed something in the postbox. Is that right, Mrs. Holbrook?”
“Quite right,” she said. “I remembered a letter I’d forgotten to post earlier.”
“Memories like that pop up at the darnedest times, don’t they? I mean, one minute you’re sitting calmly talking to your lawyer and the next minute you’re tearing across the road waving your purse to stop traffic.”
“Things happen like that sometimes.”
“Was it an important letter?”
“It was to me.”
“Don’t you have a secretary who handles that sort of chore?”
“He had to go to the dentist.”
Because it was true it sounded true. He let the subject drop. To Aragon he said, “By the way, I didn’t ask you how you managed to arrive here so fast. You got ESP? Listen to police calls?”
“I answer my telephone.”
“Oh, never mind. I don’t expect the truth anyway. I haven’t met a lawyer yet who told the truth the first time around.”
“I’m sorry your experience has been so limited.”
“That could be taken as a hostile remark.”
“Yours wasn’t very friendly either, lieutenant.”
“Maybe not, but this is my show. You’re the guest. When the time comes and it’s your show I’ll be just as polite as I have to be.”
“I look forward to that.”
The lieutenant returned his attention to Mrs. Holbrook. “Is this your first visit to Mr. Lennard’s place?”
/> “Yes.”
“Abercrombie tells me Lennard had another visitor around lunchtime.”
“He told me that, too.”
“Can you guess who it might have been? Any ideas on the subject?”
“His description was very vague.”
“That’s not an answer to my question, Mrs. Holbrook. You said previously you were fond of Roger Lennard, very fond—I believe that was how you phrased it. If you were all that fond of him, you must know something about his private life.”
“We had many conversations, but they were mostly about his work with the students.”
“Do you know his friends?”
“Some of them.”
“One in particular?”
“I knew Roger had one in particular but I wasn’t personally acquainted with him. I only saw him when he came to pick Roger up at school occasionally.”
“What’s his name?”
“Timothy North.”
“Is he locally employed?”
“He’s a bartender. He’s not in Roger’s social class at all. I can’t understand how the two of them—”
“Where does he tend bar?”
Mrs. Holbrook appealed to Aragon. “Do I have to answer all these questions?”
“He’ll get the answers anyway,” Aragon said. “If you save him time he might save you trouble.”
“It’s called Phileo’s,” Mrs. Holbrook said. “I believe it’s a—well, a strange place. I’m sure Roger didn’t go there habitually. He might have dropped in now and then. But Roger was a very idealistic young man.”
“You keep referring to him in the past tense, Mrs. Holbrook.”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t aware of doing it.”
“You happen to be correct. Roger never regained consciousness. They’ve pulled the plugs.”
She stood very straight and stiff. The lieutenant had seen other people do this when they were stretched too taut and getting ready to snap. “Let’s stop the questioning for now.”
“My God,” she said. “What if I had come sooner? Could I have saved him? What if—”
“Look, this job is tough enough without the what-ifs. You go home and take a stiff drink. Or a couple of aspirin. To each his own.”
“Did he kill himself?”
“He might have had a little help. However, there was a piece of paper in his typewriter that might have been the beginning of a suicide note. But we have no proof that it was or that he wrote it. You go home,” he repeated. “Hit the booze or the aspirin and take a rest.”
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