Fourth Deadly Sin

by Lawrence Sanders

  “All right, go into the trunk. Just look it over, then call me back. If there’s any trouble, I authorized you to make the break-in, and Chief Suarez and Deputy Thorsen authorized me. Don’t put your ass on the line.”

  “There won’t be any trouble,” Boone assured him. “Right now the place is deserted, and the Kraut will stand lookout.”

  “Call me back,” Delaney repeated, and hung up.

  He tried to concentrate on the time schedule, but couldn’t. When the phone rang again, he grabbed it.

  “Boone again,” the Sergeant said in an excited voice. “I got in! There’s a ball peen hammer in there, an old one, all greasy.”

  “Glom on to it,” Delaney said at once. “Get it to the techs as soon as possible. Can you relock the trunk?”

  “No strain.”

  “Good. Bellsey will never miss his hammer for a day or two.”

  He hung up, smiling, and went back to the schedule, satisfied that things were beginning to happen. They were making them happen.

  He read over the timetable twice, paying attention to every word. Then he pushed the pad away, leaned back in his swivel chair, lighted a cigar.

  What interested him even more than those half-confirmed and unconfirmed alibis was what Dr. Simon Ellerbee did the last three hours of his life.

  Did the mystery patient show up and stay longer than usual? Not likely; every patient got the forty-five-minute hour. Did Ellerbee work at his caseload while waiting for the patient to arrive? Did he read, listen to music, watch television?

  Delaney looked at his watch and thought of a sandwich. Eat! When did the bastard eat? He told his wife he’d be leaving New York about nine o’clock. Even if he were planning on a late supper in Brewster at 10:30, that was a long time to go without food. Delaney didn’t think it was humanly possible.

  He retrieved the autopsy report from the file and flipped through the pages until he found what he sought. The victim had eaten about an hour before his death. Stomach contents included boiled ham, Swiss cheese, rye bread, mustard. Ellerbee had been a man after his own heart.

  So part of those three hours had been spent consuming a sandwich. Did Ellerbee go out for it? In that weather? Doubtful. He probably went down one floor to the kitchen and made himself a snack. But that wouldn’t use up many minutes of that three-hour period.

  The gap in the victim’s time schedule bothered Delaney. It was not neat, ordered, logical—the way he liked things. Too many unanswered questions:

  1. Why didn’t Ellerbee tell his wife the name of the late patient and when he or she was expected?

  2. Why didn’t he tell his receptionist?

  3. If the late patient was expected at, say, seven o’clock, then Ellerbee could have left for Brewster at eight. But he told his wife he’d be leaving at nine. Ergo, the patient was expected at eight o’clock. But if that was so, how come the autopsy showed he had eaten an hour before death? It was ridiculous to suppose he munched on a sandwich while listening to a troubled patient.

  4. How did Ellerbee spend the time from six to eight o’clock, assuming the late patient was scheduled for eight?

  5. Those two sets of tracks—did the doctor expect two late patients that night?

  It was, Delaney acknowledged, probably much ado about nothing. But it gnawed at him, and he suddenly decided he’d take on this puzzle himself. He couldn’t sit in his study all day, waiting for phone calls and reports from his task force. He’d hit the street and do a little personal sleuthing.

  He started by searching through the records for the name and address of Doctor Simon’s receptionist. He finally found them: Carol Judd, living on East 73rd Street. Clipped to her card was Boone’s report on her alibi for the night of the murder: She said she had been shacked up with her boyfriend in his apartment. He confirmed.

  Delaney looked up her phone number in the Manhattan directory. He called, mentally keeping his fingers crossed. It rang seven times and he was about to hang up when suddenly the receiver was lifted.

  “Hello?” A breathless voice.

  “Miss Carol Judd?”

  “Yes. Who is this?”

  “My name is Edward X. Delaney,” he said, speaking slowly and distinctly. “I am a civilian consultant with the New York Police Department, assisting in the investigation of the death of Doctor Simon Ellerbee. I was hoping you—”

  “Hey,” she said, “wait a minute, let me put these groceries down. I just walked through the door.”

  He waited patiently until she came on the line again.

  “Now,” she said, “who are you?”

  He went through it again. “I was hoping you might give me a few minutes of your time. Some questions have come up that only you can answer.”

  “Gee, I don’t know,” she said hesitantly. “Ever since my name was in the papers, I’ve been getting crazy calls. Real weirdos—you know?”

  “I can imagine. Miss Judd, may I suggest you call Doctor Diane Ellerbee and tell her that you have received a call from me and that I’d like to ask you a few questions. I’m sure she’ll tell you that I am not a weirdo. I’ll give you my number and you can call me back. Will you do that, please?”

  “Well … I guess so. It may take some time getting through to her if she has a patient.”

  “I’ll wait,” Delaney said and gave her his phone number.

  He cleared the clutter from his desk, replacing all the records back in their proper file folders. He kept out the time schedule and read it over again. That three-hour gap in Ellerbee’s activities still intrigued him, and he hoped Carol Judd could supply some answers.

  It was almost twenty minutes before she called back.

  “Doctor Diane says you’re okay,” she reported.

  “Fine,” he said. “I wonder if I could come over now; I’m not too far from where you live.”

  “Right this minute? Gee, you better give me some time to straighten up this place; it’s a mess. How about half an hour?”

  “I’ll be there. Thank you.”

  That gave him time for a Michelob and a “wet” sandwich, eaten while leaning over the kitchen sink. It consisted of meat scraped off the bones of leftover chicken wings, with sliced tomatoes and onions and Russian dressings—all jammed into an onion roll as big as a Frisbee.

  Then, donning his hard black homburg and heavy overcoat, he set out to walk down to East 73rd Street.

  It was the kind of day that made pedestrians step out: cold, clear, brilliant, with sharp light dazzling the eyes and a wind that stung. The city seemed renewed and glowing.

  He strode down Third Avenue, mourning the passing of all those familiar Irish bars, including his father’s saloon. There was now a health food store where that had been. It was change all right, but whether it was progress, Delaney was not prepared to say.

  Carol Judd lived in a fourteen-story apartment house that had glass doors, marble walls in vestibule and lobby, and a pervasive odor of boiled cabbage. Delaney identified himself on the intercom and was buzzed in immediately. He rode up to apartment 9-H in an automatic elevator that squeaked alarmingly.

  If she had spent the last half-hour tidying up, Delaney hated to think of what her tiny studio apartment had been before she started. It looked like a twister had just blown through, leaving a higgledy-piggledy jumble of clothing, books, records, cassettes, and what appeared to be a collection of Japanese windup toys: dancing bears, rabbits clashing cymbals, and somersaulting clowns.

  “Pardon the stew,” she said, smiling brightly.

  “Not at all,” he said. “It looks lived-in.”

  “Yeah,” she said, laughing, “it is that. Would you believe I’ve had a party for twenty people in here?”

  “I’d believe it,” he assured her, and thought, The poor neighbors!

  She lifted a stack of fashion magazines out of a canvas sling chair, and he lowered himself cautiously into it, still wearing his overcoat, his homburg on his lap. Unexpectedly, she crossed her ankles and scissored down
onto the floor without a bump, an athletic feat he admired.

  In fact, he admired her. She was tall, lanky, and in tight denim jeans seemed to be 90 percent legs. She was not beautiful, but her perky features were vivacious, and her mop of blond curls—an Orphan Annie hairdo—had an outlandish charm. She wore a T-shirt that had a portrait of Beethoven printed on the front.

  “Miss Judd,” he started, “I’ll try to make this as brief as possible; I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

  “I’ve got plenty,” she told him. “I’ve been looking for a job, but no luck yet. When I spoke to Doctor Diane before, she said she’s looking for me, too, and thinks she may be able to get me something with a shrink she knows who’s opening a clinic for rich alcoholics.”

  “How long did you work for Doctor Simon Ellerbee?”

  “Almost five years. Gee, that was a dreamy job. Good hours and very little work. No pressure—you know?”

  “I assume you handled his appointments, took care of the billing, and things of that nature?”

  “That’s right. And I could use their kitchen for lunch. They even invited me and Edith Crawley—she’s Doctor Diane’s receptionist—up to their Brewster home for a weekend every summer. That’s a dreamy place. And, of course, I got the whole month of August off every year.”

  “Did you like Doctor Simon?”

  “A wonderful, wonderful man. Swell to work for. I really had eyes for him, but I knew that would get me nowhere. You’ve seen Doctor Diane? Too much competition!” She laughed merrily, clasping her knees with her arms and rocking back and forth on the floor.

  “What hours did you work?”

  “Nine to five. Usually. Sometimes he would ask me to come in a little earlier or stay a little later if a hysterical woman was scheduled. You know, some of those crazy ladies could scream rape—it’s possible.”

  “Did it ever happen—that a woman patient screamed rape?”

  “It never happened to Doctor Simon, but it happened to a friend of his, so he was very careful.”

  “Let’s talk about the Friday he was killed. Did anything unusual happen that day?”

  She thought a moment. “Noo,” she said finally, “it was ordinary. Lousy weather; it poured all day. But nothing unusual happened in the office.”

  “What time did you leave?”

  “A few minutes after five. Right after Mrs. Brizio arrived.”

  “Ah,” he said, “Mrs. Lola Brizio … She was the last patient listed in his appointment book.”

  “That’s right. She came in once a week, every Friday, five to six.”

  “Tell me about her.”

  “Mrs. Brizio? Gee, she must be sixty—at least. And very, very rich. That dreamy chinchilla coat she wears—I could live five years on what she paid for that. But a very nice lady. I mean, not stuck-up or anything like that. Real friendly. She was always telling me the cute things her grandchildren said.”

  “What was her problem?”

  “Kleptomania. Can you believe it? With all her loot. She’d go in these stores, like Henri Bendel, and stuff silk scarves and costume jewelry in her handbag. Been doing it for years. The stores knew about it, of course, and kept an eye on her. They never arrested her or anything because she was such a good customer. I mean, she bought a lot of stuff in addition to what she stole. So they’d let her swipe what she wanted and just add it to her bill. She always paid. She came to Doctor Simon about three years ago.” Carol Judd burst out laughing. “The first session she had, she stole a crystal ashtray off Doctor Simon’s desk, and he didn’t even notice until she was gone. Can you imagine?”

  “Sixty years old, you say?”

  “At least. Probably more.”

  “A big woman?”

  “Oh, no! A little bitty thing. Not even five feet tall. And fat. A roly-poly.”

  “All right,” Delaney said, tentatively eliminating Mrs. Lola Brizio as a possible suspect, “after she arrived at five o’clock, you left a few minutes later. Is that correct?”

  “Right.”

  “Did Doctor Simon tell you he was expecting a late patient?”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “Wasn’t that unusual?”

  “Oh, no, it happened all the time. Like maybe in the evening he’d get a panic call from some patient who had to see him right away. The next morning he’d just leave a note on my desk telling me to bill so-and-so for a session.”

  “Did Doctor Diane ever have late patients?”

  “Oh, sure. They both did, all the time.”

  “Apparently, after six o’clock, when Mrs. Lola Brizio was gone, Doctor Simon told his wife that he was expecting a late patient, but didn’t tell her who or when. Isn’t that a little surprising?”

  “Not really. Like I said, it happened frequently. They’d tell each other so it wouldn’t interfere with their plans for the night—dinner or the theater, you know—but I don’t think they’d mention who it was that was coming in. There was just no need for it.”

  Delaney sat silently, brooding, and somewhat depressed. As explained by Carol Judd, the mystery patient now seemed no mystery at all. It was just routine.

  “And you have no idea who the late patient was on that Friday night?” he asked her.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Well, whoever had the appointment,” he said, trying to salvage something from his inquiries, “was probably the last person to see Doctor Simon alive. And may have been the killer. But let’s suppose the late patient arrived at seven and left at eight. Would it—”

  “Fifteen minutes to eight. Patients got forty-five minutes.”

  “What did the doctor do in those fifteen minutes between patients?”

  “Relax. Return phone calls. Look over the files of the next patient. Maybe have a cup of coffee.”

  “All right,” he said, “let’s suppose the late patient arrived at seven and left at fifteen minutes to eight. Do you think it’s possible that sometime during the evening Doctor Simon got a phone call from another patient who wanted to see him? A second late patient?”

  “Of course it’s possible,” she said. “Things like that happened all the time.”

  Which left him, he thought, nowhere.

  “Thank you very much, Miss Judd,” he said, heaving himself out of the silly canvas sling and putting on his hat. “You’ve been very cooperative and very helpful.”

  She rose from her folded position on the floor without using her hands—just unflexed her limber body and floated up.

  “I hope you catch the person who did it,” she said, suddenly solemn and vengeful. “I wish we had the death penalty. Doctor Simon was a dear, sweet man, and no one deserves to die like that. I cried for forty-eight hours after it happened. I still can’t believe he’s gone.”

  Delaney nodded and started for the door. Then he stopped and turned.

  “One more thing,” he said. “Did Doctor Simon ever mention to you that he had been attacked or threatened by a patient?”

  “No, he never did.”

  “In the past year or six months, did you notice any change in him? Did he act differently?”

  She stared at him. “Funny you should ask that. Yes, he changed. In the last year or so. I even mentioned it to my boyfriend. Doctor Simon became, uh, moodier. He used to be so steady. The same every day: pleasant and kind to everyone. Then, in the last year or so, he became moodier. Some days he’d really be up, laughing and joking. And other days he’d be down, like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.”

  “I see.”

  “About a month ago,” she added, “he wore a little flower in his lapel. He had never done that before. He really was a dreamy man.”

  “Thank you, Miss Judd,” Delaney said, tipping his homburg.

  When he came outside, he found the day transformed. A thick cloud cover was churning over Manhattan, the wind had taken on a raw edge, the light seemed sourish and menacing. The gloom fitting his mood exactly.

  He was d
isgusted with himself, for he had been trying to bend the facts to fit a theory instead of devising a theory that fit all the facts. That kind of thinking had been the downfall of a lot of wild-assed detectives.

  It was those two sets of footprints soaked into the Ellerbees’ carpet that had seduced him. That and the gap in the victim’s time schedule. It seemed to add up to two late patients on the murder night. But though Carol Judd said it was possible, there wasn’t a shred of evidence to substantiate it.

  Still, he told himself stubbornly, it was crucial to identify Ellerbee’s late visitor or visitors. One of them had been the last person to see the victim alive and was a prime suspect.

  Plodding uptown, he remembered what he had said to Monica about assembling a jigsaw puzzle. He had told her that he had found some straight-edged pieces and was putting together the frame. Then all he needed to do was fill in the interior pieces of the picture.

  Now he recalled that some puzzles were not pictures at all. They were rectangles of solid color: yellow, blue, or blood red. There was no pattern, no clues of shape or form. And they were devilishly hard to complete.

  When he entered the brownstone, he heard the phone ringing and rushed down the hallway to the kitchen. But Monica was there and had already picked up.

  “Who?” she said. “Just a minute, please.” She covered the mouthpiece with her palm and turned to her husband. “Timothy Hogan,” she reported. “Do you know him?”

  “Hogan? Yes, he’s one of the new men. I’ll talk to him.”

  She handed him the phone.

  “I couldn’t get ahold of Jason or Boone,” Hogan whined, “so that’s why I’m calling. I’m at St. Vincent’s Hospital.”

  “What happened?”

  “I started checking out that Joan Yesell. She didn’t report to work today. Okay? So I go down to her place in Chelsea. She ain’t home, and her mother ain’t home. So I start talking to the neighbors. Okay? This Joan Yesell, she tried to do the Dutch yesterday afternoon, but blew it. Just nicked her left wrist with a kitchen knife. A lot of blood, but she’s okay. They kept her here overnight, under observation. Her mother is signing her out right now. You want I should question them?”

  “No,” Delaney said promptly, “don’t do that. Let them go home. You can catch up with them tomorrow. Do you know what time yesterday she cut herself?”