by Emma Lathen
The adjuster knew the basics of Bridgeport geography.
“You mean he was near the Ecker plant at eleven?”
“That’s right.” The thin smile had blossomed into a broad grin. “And when they got busy on that part of town they were able to backtrack Hunnicut. He spent the interval before dinner having a few beers in the tavern where the Ecker line drops by after work. Some of them hang around to eat and watch the game on TV.”
For a moment the two men were silent, visualizing a solitary stranger quietly lingering in a crowded bar filled with regulars.
“He must have been trying to pick up ammunition for his fight. Just eavesdropping in the hope of hearing something he could use.”
“That’s the way I see it,” the marshal agreed.
The adjuster’s forehead was knotted in thought. “Okay, so we come to the home question. Do the New York police know what time Hunnicut finally got back to New Jersey?”
“Not yet. The guy lived alone in one of those big condo complexes and the nearest neighbor was out of town. All anybody knows so far is that he showed up for work the next day. He could have been anywhere between eleven o’clock that night and nine o’clock the next morning.”
“No wonder you’re looking like a cat with a mouse. This means we’ve opened up two possibilities and both of them are beauts.”
Belatedly the marshal introduced a caveat. “Only if we assume that Hunnicut hung around Bridgeport until the wee hours. In that case the first scenario is that he set the fire himself.”
“Right. And that brings us to the really tricky one.”
The fire marshal was with him every step of the way.
“If Hunnicut was hanging around the Ecker plant at the right time, he could have seen someone else sneaking in.”
Again they were faced with a compelling picture—a deserted factory obscured by icy sleet, a furtive figure at the gate, a hidden observer in the shadows.
“God, it all sounds so unnatural,” complained the adjuster, who had no taste for melodrama. “But then, so does trying to play detective in a saloon, and we know he did that.”
“He was a weirdo trying to get an edge.”
“Okay. So how many people did Hunnicut meet on this inspection tour?”
“All of the family. He would have recognized the Laverdieres, or Frayne. And he’d probably seen photos of old Conrad.”
This was going too far.
“Oh, come on. A seventy-year-old slinking around, waiting for the night watchman to clear the area? I don’t believe it. Besides, the Ecker people would have had a right to be there; but somebody from ASI? Hunnicut would have known right off the bat they were up to no good. Now what about access to the compound?”
“Easy enough. That fence is designed to prevent people backing in a truck and stealing a load of expensive equipment. Someone jimmied the pedestrian gate, either because it was an outside job or to make it look like one.”
“And getting into the boiler house?”
The marshal spread his hands. “Hell, half the windows in the place were broken by the time the first truck got there.”
With the general outlines established, the adjuster was prepared to zero in on the technical details in which they both specialized.
“Okay, suppose you tell me about the sprinkler system. If somebody tries to turn off the individual heads, an alarm sounds at the fire station. So there are only two ways to go. Either you beef up the fusible links so they don’t melt when the temperature rises or—”
“Hell, no. I told you this was a simple job. The guy jimmied open the fire-alarm box and threw the master switch.”
The adjuster pounced. “So he had to know where the box was.”
“And it’s sitting right in Tina Laverdiere’s operation, plainly marked. Both the visitors from ASI spent time there. And all these systems are identical. They’re bound to have the same setup at ASI.”
The adjuster already knew from the marshal’s tone that the facts would be of no help in isolating the arsonist. Nonetheless he persisted to the bitter end.
“And the accelerant?”
“Acetone. The stuff is so damn water-soluble, we had a hell of a time getting a spectrometer reading.”
Busily counting the industrial uses of acetone, the adjuster was silent for several moments. Then he snapped his fingers.
“Of course. They use it to clean up electrical connections after a manufacturing process. There’d be a ton of it over on Bob Laverdiere’s side.” His enthusiasm abated as his thoughts raced to the inevitable conclusion. “And I’ll bet you’re going to tell me that they have it at ASI, too.”
The marshal was smug. “They sure do!”
“Oh, all right. But I tell you, there’s one thing that still bothers me. Both the Laverdieres were at the fire and they were allowed to look at the damage. If Tina Laverdiere had locked her records in that cabinet and they were all over the floor, how come she didn’t know it was a torch job right away?”
“Give the lady a break. I told you this was a case of overkill. There were wooden shelves holding all the stuff from before computerization—ledgers, sales books, invoices, auditors’ reports, lab books. When that went up, the shelving collapsed over the cabinet. Then the ceiling came down, with the plaster and laths burning away. Finally a couple of tons of water were dumped on the whole mess. She just saw a war zone. After all, we couldn’t tell what happened until we sifted through the debris.”
Abandoning his attempt to play devil’s advocate, the adjuster now produced his own pitiful contribution.
“You know we’ve been doing some work at Winstead, too. All the standard arson suspects have been checked out. We ran down the list of disgruntled employees, competitors and so forth, and there just wasn’t a strong enough grievance anywhere. But this merger business opens up a new can of worms. We’re practically forced to assume somebody felt desperate enough about that to roast the Ecker records.”
As the marshal rose to his feet, he was jovial.
“And what’s so hard about that? After all, someone felt strongly enough to commit murder.”
The police had launched an all-out effort to pinpoint Victor Hunnicut’s return from Connecticut. Their inquiries inevitably filtered back to ASI, carrying the news that the Ecker fire was of suspicious origin.
Gardner Ives lost no time in disseminating his version of events.
“This explains everything,” he told Tom Robichaux. “Poor Hunnicut, in an excess of zeal, remained behind in Bridgeport to develop further background about the Eckers. Unfortunately he saw one of them surreptitiously enter the plant and had to be silenced. Naturally we’ll be holding off on any decision about the merger.”
Reluctant to see healthy profits disappearing over the horizon, Robichaux roused himself to say, “If somebody’s been skimming the profits, it could be an even better buy.”
“Very true. But until we know what’s going on over there, it would be folly to get involved.”
Gardner Ives, with a solid alibi, could afford to take a lofty view. Phil Pepitone and Sam Bradley had even better reasons for hailing the latest news. Neither of them, however, felt obliged to include a eulogy to the late Victor Hunnicut.
“That little shit was so busy trying to dig up something that he finally hit pay dirt,” Pepitone told his entourage.
“What in God’s name made him think he’d find out anything in the middle of the night?”
“Who can tell? If he hadn’t taken shots at every single person at Ecker, we might have some idea.”
It went without saying that, from now on, the only Hunnicut accusations worth recalling were those against the Ecker Company.
Sam Bradley’s approach was less abrasive, but it carried the same message.
“Folks tell me young Hunnicut was nosing around the Ecker place at just the wrong time. The way he was flailing around with charges, I suppose he was desperate to come up with something solid.”
“Well, he certainl
y chose the wrong guy to tangle with,” said one of the expensive scientists employed by R and D.
Bradley shook his head, becoming more avuncular by the moment. “Hunnicut knew people would be sore if they caught him blackening their names for no good reason. I’ll bet it never occurred to him things could get a lot more serious if he turned out to be right.”
“You’d think by now the police would know what’s going on at Ecker.”
“That’s not a normal company up there in Connecticut,” Bradley intoned, making Bridgeport sound like an outpost of Hudson’s Bay. “The Eckers are all kin, so they’ll cover for each other.”
Scientists can be cynics, too. “Don’t bet on it! They’ve all been feeding from the same trough. If one of them has been stealing from the others, they’ll turn on him.”
Sam Bradley was not demanding impossible standards of accuracy. As long as the brand of culprit was firmly affixed elsewhere, he was content.
“Then we’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?” he said lazily.
Given the drastic results of loose talk at ASI, Wiley Quinn waited until he reached the safety of his home to voice his own suspicions.
“I’ll bet that bastard set the fire himself,” he told his wife. “That way he could put some meat on his jabs at Ecker.”
“Then why was he murdered?”
“How do I know? But I’ll tell you one thing. When I left the Ecker booth, Bob Laverdiere was already boiling. If, on top of that, he realized Vic set the fire, it would have been enough to send him over the edge.”
Mrs. Quinn had been watching her husband age with every fresh round of police interrogation, and she had her own priorities. Theories about Hunnicut setting the fire could lead anywhere. Casting him as an innocent onlooker led straight into the Ecker camp.
“No,” she said, shaking her head, “it doesn’t make sense, Wiley. I know you think Victor would have done anything to stop you from getting the promotion. But he’d have to be crazy to set that fire.”
“I’m beginning to think he was,” Quinn said stubbornly.
Actually the person spending the most time with the police was no longer a suspect. Instead, Ken Nicolls had become their most promising witness. A disinterested spectator at both Bridgeport and the Javits Center, he had also produced a bonanza with his drink at the Holiday Inn. In return he picked up considerable information to be relayed back to the Sloan.
“They say the fire at Ecker was set,” he reported, “and there’s a possibility that Victor Hunnicut saw it done.”
Ken would have lurked modestly in the outer office until his superiors had finished their conference but Miss Corsa said philosophically, “They’ll all want to hear about this.”
As usual she was right. Charlie Trinkham welcomed him cheerfully and Thatcher waved to a chair. Even Everett Gabler, the most single-minded member of the staff, raised no objection.
“So Tom Robichaux tells us,” Thatcher said. “I gather the people at ASI are pretending that this explains everything.”
“The police aren’t,” Ken rejoined. “Ives is trying to sell them on Hunnicut as so dedicated to his job that he was simply working overtime.”
“And you don’t agree?”
Ken snorted. “He was trying to torpedo the deal for his own purposes. Which leaves one great big question.”
“It sure does,” agreed Trinkham, nodding happily. “If this dedicated employee saw somebody firing the place, why didn’t he tell them at ASI? Why keep it up his sleeve?”
Everett Gabler never had any difficulty espying human depravity. “And just what was Hunnicut’s ultimate purpose?”
“To get the next opening for division manager.”
Meticulously placing the tips of his fingers together, Gabler advanced into the realm of hypothesis. “Is it possible that with his knowledge about the fire he could blackmail one of his superiors into helping him achieve that end?”
“One of them wouldn’t do him much good,” Charlie objected. “It isn’t that easy. At places like ASI they work by committee.”
Thatcher waved aside this comment.
“Surely the important thing is whether Hunnicut thought so. From what you say and from my brief exposure, I doubt if he was very perceptive at reading people’s responses.”
“And there’s another side to the coin,” offered Charlie, swift to see interesting possibilities. “One of the rumors was about Pepitone taking a handout to arrange the merger. And didn’t somebody say there haven’t been any outside accountants at Ecker for a couple of months?”
These two seemingly unrelated points inspired Gabler to add a third. “Ecker is a closely held company.”
“I like the script,” caroled Charlie, who had no qualms about putting it all into words. “Let’s say there was a big stock transfer to a Pepitone nominee. Then the rumors start and he gets nervous enough to want to erase that transaction. While they’re reconstructing the files, they could use a better straw man. But Hunnicut sees him strike the match.”
Ken was swept along by this imaginative flight. “And I picked up something else from the police. Pepitone, after he talked with Bradley, was searching all over Javits for Victor Hunnicut. So look what could have happened. Hunnicut is publicly humiliated by Gardner Ives and plenty mad about it. Then, out of the blue, Pepitone catches up with him and gives him hell about the rumors at ASI. Hunnicut shoots back that at least he hasn’t been torching places.”
“Or,” said Gabler, who tended to ascribe his own fixity of purpose to everyone, “he immediately tried to blackmail Pepitone for the position he wanted.”
“Either way it makes a hell of a good motive,” Charlie announced.
Trying to keep his feet in this surging tide of speculation, John Thatcher brought them all to a halt.
“And Pepitone just happened to be carrying a skewer from the Ecker booth?”
There was a moment of silence.
“You’re saying that it must have been premeditated?” Gabler asked thoughtfully.
“Unless you can think of a good reason for someone to be carrying it. I admit that’s not beyond the bounds of possibility for one of the Eckers. But not for Pepitone.”
This disheartening realism was pursued by Ken Nicolls. “Or even Sam Bradley. I was right there when he left the booth and his hands were empty.”
“Bradley? Is that the R and D man?” queried Everett Gabler. “I thought the rumors about him were unrelated to the Ecker Company.”
“As far as I know he doesn’t have any connection with them,” Ken confessed. “Except that he went tearing up there right after the fire.”
Charlie Trinkham’s capricious fancy could always weave a connection. “What would make things perfect,” he suggested, “is to find that one of ASI’s stillborn projects had slid from their R and D to Ecker’s test lab.”
“Very neat,” applauded Thatcher.
But Everett Gabler was still searching for input. “I understand that Robichaux has been in the midst of ASI for some time. Doesn’t he have any idea about Hunnicut’s activities?”
Robichaux’s views on this subject had been brief and unalterable.
“Unfortunately,” Thatcher replied, “Tom is taking the position right now that all M.B.A.’s are certifiable lunatics.”
“I suppose they’ve got one over at his shop who’s giving poor old Tom a hard time,” said Trinkham with ready comprehension.
“He wants Tom to use a computer.”
A murmur of understanding greeted this announcement. Everyone present had, in his own way, survived the great computer revolution at the Sloan. Only Charlie Trinkham had succumbed to the lure of the monitor and could be found, at odd moments, pecking his way to knowledge.
“You learn to love it,” he said, trying to convert the heathen. “All you do is put in absolutely everything and then, whenever you want, there’s nothing you can’t find out.”
Ken Nicolls was another virtuoso of the keyboard.
“Tha
t’s the system Doug Ecker was following,” he chimed in.
John Thatcher surveyed the two enthusiasts.
“Then I think we can safely say that Doug Ecker is the cause of all this trouble,” he pointed out. “Those all-embracing files of his must contain an unexploded bomb.”
Chapter 15
BANK HOLIDAY
The Winstead Insurance Group sent its Christmas card by special messenger. It arrived a week before December 25.
“‘. . . cooperating with state and local authorities,’” Tina Laverdiere read aloud. “‘But, as is usual practice, Winstead will initiate a complete review of all Ecker coverage.’ And they want to start with an interview with us as soon as possible. Oh, Lord!”
With the flick of a wrist, she tossed the letter onto her desk and sat down. That rat-a-tat of long fingernails on metal was the only further personal comment she allowed herself.
Tina knew that in this context “interview” meant grueling hours of preparation, protracted disputes about every detail and, very likely, steep new charges to the Ecker Company. Marilyn Burrus, who had delivered the unwelcome communication, saw other negatives.
“We’re going to have to tell Conrad,” she said with a sigh. So often things went better without him.
“And he’ll hit the roof,” Tina predicted.
But on this particular subject, Mrs. Burrus knew more than she did.
“No, he’ll get stubborn. Nobody’s going to tell him what to do.”
“This time,” said Tina, “I’m afraid even Conrad can’t dig in his heels.”
But, of course, Conrad found a way. Before the day was out he had dictated a stiff letter to the Winstead Insurance Group and had taken special pains to have it delivered by courier.
In the sunshine of Fort Lauderdale, Conrad relived the episode.
“I told them we’d cooperate up to the hilt,” he was declaring a few days later. “What else could I do? They’ll tie up poor Tina with more paperwork—as if she isn’t swamped already. But, by God, I told them they were going to have to wait until after Christmas. Whoever set that fire did enough damage. I’m not letting them wreck our holidays.”
