He collapsed instantly. Maggie heaved him off and bounced to her feet, gasping. For a moment they both stood inspecting the crumpled figure. “Hun-Came,” said Mary Beth at last, shakily.
“The Lord of Death?” Maggie was still wheezing. “Maybe. I was thinking of the other one. The one who knew that women find little creatures irresistible. Hummingbirds or kittens.”
“Oyew Achi? Well, it doesn’t matter. He’s the same, whatever name we put on him.”
“Whatever name ... that’s it!” croaked Maggie excitedly. “God, I’m a dolt!”
“What?”
“D-O-L-T, dolt. I should’ve paid more attention to your Mayan wisdom, Swede. Damn!” She was pulling off her belt. “Let’s buckle old nameless here to that tree, in case he wakes up.”
Mary Beth took the belt and used it to lash his limp hands behind him, and then removed his belt and fastened his ankles together. She started to reach for the knife but Maggie said, “Uh-uh. Leave it. Fingerprints,” and for the first time Mary Beth thought of evidence. They left the knife where it lay and dragged him away from it, adding Mary Beth’s belt to the restraints and buckling his heavy form to a sturdy tree.
“Well,” Maggie said hoarsely, “he won’t go anywhere now for a while. Let’s get the police.” She gave Mary Beth a sidelong glance. “Guess maybe I’ll spare your Ixil tapes after all.”
“Sporting of you,” said Mary Beth dryly. “How’s your side?” There was blood spreading across Maggie’s shirt now, and blood coming from her nose and split lip.
“No problem,” said Maggie. “It’ll make nice color pix for the jury.”
They climbed back up to their car. The dazed kitten blinked at them from the roadside grass, but couldn’t get up. Mary Beth set it tenderly in the backseat.
“Got change?” Maggie asked as she drove toward the crossroads stores down the ramp road.
“For the phone? Sure.”
“I’ll drop you at the first booth, then go back to keep an eye on things.”
“Okay.”
“Tell the police he needs an ambulance.”
“Okay.”
“And tell them to pick you up so you can show them exactly where we are. And tell them about the kitten. It acts drugged.”
“Okay.”
“Oh. One other thing,” she added, pulling up at the public phone outside a Quick Mart store. Mary Beth paused with the door open.
“Yeah?”
“Just ... thanks.”
“Oh, sure. Anytime.” Their eyes met, smiling, and Mary Beth felt a clear, exultant, bubbling joy, like winning a race, like seeing the Cuchumatanes for the first time, like hearing Mozart. She said, “Guess I’m a swimmer too.”
Then she got out and called the police.
His name turned out to be Henry Cooke, and he filled and serviced candy machines. He was married, with a three-year-old son, and a young brown-haired wife who was furious and indignant. She held the little boy on her knee as they all waited upstairs in police headquarters for their statements to be readied for signature. Henry Cooke himself had a concussion; he was conscious again but hazy, and police, doctors, and lawyers were checking his fitness for questioning. The kitten was being tested for drugs.
Maggie had been carefully photographed, even submitting to an artistically draped study of the gash along the side of her left ribs. Then she had scrubbed and Mary Beth had checked the wound prior to a doctor’s inspection. She wasn’t bleeding much anymore, but it still looked ugly. Her lip was swelling too, and the bruised nose and chin would be colorful the next few days.
The child suddenly wriggled loose and ran over to Maggie and began to hit her knee violently. She moved to grab his fist but thought better of it and waited stoically for the mother to arrive and take the boy’s arm. She did it protectively, as though Maggie were the attacker.
“It’s a frame,” she said, intensely. “He didn’t do no murders. Who’s paying you?”
“No one, Mrs. Cooke. We’re telling the truth.”
“It’s a frame. He was just making his rounds and you framed him.”
“No, Mrs. Cooke. He really did it.”
“He never used no knife. Just wait, they’ll find your fingerprints on it!”
“No, Mrs. Cooke.”
“And they won’t pin those others on him either. Just wait. I’ll swear he was at work all day Monday. And those other times too. We’ll stop you.”
“No, Mrs. Cooke. We’re telling the truth.”
“Mrs. Cooke?” An officer came over at last. “It’d be better if you didn’t talk to the young ladies.”
“They’re trying to frame Hank!”
“That’s what we’re investigating now,” he said soothingly. “Just sit back down over here.”
“Well, it was Johnny here. I had to get him, didn’t I?” She allowed herself to be led back across the room.
“She’s got a lot of excuses for him,” said Mary Beth.
“Yeah.” Maggie was looking at them sadly. “I wish these guys didn’t have families.”
“Yeah.” Mary Beth wondered briefly if Chipmunk-Fur had a family. Whether he treated his wife as he did other women. Obviously Henry Cooke treated his wife well enough to inspire this blind loyalty.
Eventually they were able to sign the statements and were allowed to go. Nick, holding a brown sack, was waiting in the broad entrance hall downstairs as they came down the steps. When she saw him, Maggie moaned, “Oh no! Not now! That’s all I need! Why’d you tell him?”
Mary Beth was surprised. “Well, someone had to.”
“You didn’t have to tell him we were here. I would’ve lied.”
“What would you have said?” Nick asked with some interest. He had come to the foot of the stairs to meet them, glancing at Maggie’s battered face but not commenting. Her chin rose a fraction.
“I would’ve said that my ignition system had a short and that we’d see you some other time.”
“So that I could continue a few more hours in blissful ignorance?”
“No. So that tonight’s audience wouldn’t be cheated out of a great performance.”
He was surprised, a bit flattered and a bit rueful. “You always think of the greater good, don’t you?”
“Of course, if it happens to be convenient.”
“I’m an actor, Maggie. They won’t be cheated.”
She met his eyes an instant, grudgingly, then shrugged. “Yeah, I know. So Mary Beth is bang on target again. And I’m wrong.” She crossed to the window and stood looking out at the dingy street, arms folded in front of her, stern and unhappy.
“Look,” said Nick. “All Mary Beth said was that you helped catch the Triangle Murderer. A tantalizing come-on. Could someone please tell me what happened? Preferably in the next ten minutes because I’m supposed to be putting on my nose already.”
“Read the papers,” said Maggie grumpily. “There will be full and detailed accounts. Thanks to Mary Beth, it’s news that’s fit to print. No penetration.”
“Unless you count knives,” said Mary Beth quietly. Alarm flashed in Nick’s eyes and Maggie tossed her a look of disgust. He stepped wordlessly to Maggie’s side, tucking the sack under his arm, and moved her arm carefully to inspect the sticky rip in the stained shirt and what could be seen of the wound underneath. She suffered his investigation without actively helping or hindering.
“Good as new in a couple of days,” he said briefly.
Maggie relaxed a little. “Don’t tell the jury. That’s half our case.”
“I see: Woe to the hand that shed this costly blood.”
“Exactly.” She subdued the ghost of merriment that sprang to her eyes and stared out the window again.
“Have you seen a doctor?”
“Next step. We’re on our way to the university clinic now.”
“Fine. Now let’s hear how it happened.”
Maggie continued to stare obstinately out the window, so Mary Beth said, “Well, Maggie spotted
him on the ramp waving for help. He had a hurt kitten, and she realized that was the perfect way to make women stop to help. She made me hide behind the seat before I figured out what was going on. Then she pulled off the road by his car and got out. He said he’d damaged his car swerving to avoid the kitten, and asked her to give him a lift to take the kitten to a vet. But she went to his car and got him to follow her.”
“How?”
“Started looking under his hood. He was furious.”
“And then?”
“Then she got him to pull the knife on her.”
“How clever of her. So wise so young, they say, do never live long. Where were you all this time?”
“On the backseat floor under her raincoat.”
“A pretty picture all around,” said Maggie over her shoulder. “Entrapment and foolhardiness.”
“And then what happened?” Nick’s tone was insistent.
Maggie swung around to face them, arms still crossed. “Not much more to tell. The entrapper and the entrapped pop into the nearest bushes for a quick scuffle. The heroine pops out of the car with a wrench and dings the entrapped on the back of the head. The entrapper is saved, the entrapped is delivered to justice, the newspapers rejoice, the actor is late. End of story. Curtain.”
Mary Beth had been watching his warm brown eyes as he absorbed the curt story, concern and pride showing as he listened. She said, “Nick, she’s very tired.”
“And very hungry,” he added. Maggie glared at them both and turned away abruptly to look out the window again; but when he reached into his brown sack and pulled out a thick sandwich and held it toward her, she hesitated only a moment before turning to take it and bite in.
Mary Beth accepted half a sandwich too, and for a minute they all stood around chewing thoughtfully. Then Nick said, “Seems to me, Mary Beth, you deserve a medal.”
“Anyone would have helped.”
“Not if she’d gone through what you went through.”
“What I really wanted to do,” she admitted, “was roll up the windows and lock the doors.”
“But you had to save our headstrong friend here.”
“Well, I thought so at the time,” said Mary Beth slowly. Maggie stopped chewing and looked at her warily over the top of her sandwich.
“What do you mean?” asked Nick.
“I think now that she could have flipped him off whenever she wanted. She hadn’t forgotten your lesson at Litchfield Park. She was waiting for something. For me.”
“My God, Swede. What a stupid idea,” said Maggie, her mouth full, her eyes unsmiling.
“Well, you weren’t having any real trouble keeping his knife away. And when you needed a breath I saw you distract him by moving your knee so that he eased off your mouth a second. And that picturesque cut on your ribs is right where you aimed it. Not him. He was aiming at your throat.”
“Your faith is touching,” said Maggie. “A half-hour lesson from Uncle Nick and you think I can overcome a sturdy sort who outweighs me by fifty pounds and has a knife.”
“I won’t say it to a jury. Or even to a reporter.”
Maggie chewed for a moment, then said wearily, “Damn you, Mary Beth. All that work for nothing.”
“No, not for nothing,” said Mary Beth. “You fooled me at the time, Maggie. I thought you needed help, and I helped. Now I know I can.”
Maggie finished her sandwich and licked her fingers. “’Course you can.” She turned to Nick and added ungraciously, “You’re late. Why aren’t you gone?”
“Because, Mademoiselle, I too want to explain a couple of basic truths to you.”
“Oh God. This is getting boring.”
“Right,” said Mary Beth briskly. “I’ll wait in the car, Maggie.” She dodged out the door and ran down to Maggie’s car and slammed the door. Maggie, swearing, followed her out the door, but Nick caught up with her on the station steps and said something. She slowed, reluctantly. At the bottom of the steps they faced each other a moment, Maggie erect and defiant, Nick mild and unhurried despite his tardiness. Suddenly they both laughed at something he said, and Maggie, relaxed now, ran her fingers through her hair and then looked at him more gently. He smiled and took her right hand and, bowing in the correct theatrical fashion, carried her fingertips to his lips. Then he hurried to his car and drove away.
Maggie took a few slow steps toward her car but stayed on the sidewalk, looking after him. Mary Beth got out of the car again and joined her.
“What does he say?”
“That we are friends and therefore he won’t leave me alone.”
“No matter how snotty you act.”
“Right. But he didn’t put it so politely.”
His car had disappeared now but still they stood on the sidewalk looking at where they had last seen it. Maggie’s fingertips strayed to her sore mouth. Mary Beth knew suddenly, certainly, what her subconscious had been trying to tell her, what her overtaxed emotions had twisted into fear of physical violation, when the threat was from another quarter altogether. She realized how very much her proud and independent friend had lost last weekend.
“I was late, wasn’t I?” she asked gently.
“What?”
“Tuesday night when I stupidly decided to protect you from Nick. I was a whole day late.”
Maggie snatched her traitorous fingers from her lips and stared at them an instant, then rubbed them roughly on her jeans. “Goddamnit, you psychic Swede,” she said angrily. “You could let me have one secret!” She slammed into the driver’s seat and started the car, barely waiting for Mary Beth’s door to close before plunging unsafely into the traffic.
“It’s only fair,” Mary Beth observed a bit breathlessly when she had caught her balance again. “You’ve been known to look through me on occasion.”
Maggie didn’t answer for a block or two. Finally she said, “It was just good old Uncle Nick. He didn’t count. I stupidly let my guard down.”
Mary Beth remembered that look of panic at the dance. “You’re frightened,” she said wonderingly. “Of yourself.”
“Scared out of my skull. Another goddamn actor! God, it’s the dumbest thing I ever did!”
“Oh, come off it.”
“Well, second dumbest. Third. Third dumbest thing I ever did.”
“Well, all right. That’s more reasonable.”
Maggie looked at her suspiciously, then smiled a little at herself. “Yeah. It’s laughable. Well, there’s a lot to do in this rotten world besides worry about dumb mistakes. I’ll get over him. I’m getting a lot of practice at getting over things.”
“Yeah. We all are.”
Maggie nodded, and they sat with their own thoughts for a few miles. Then Mary Beth said, “Well, at least we did something for Jackie.”
“What?” asked Maggie absently. She was still thinking of other things.
“What do you mean, what? We caught her murderer!”
“No, we didn’t.”
“No?”
“No, Mary Beth,” said Maggie, as though surprised by her obtuseness. “Weren’t you paying attention? He’s not the one who murdered Jackie. Jackie’s murderer is still free.”
“Maggie, you’re crazy! There can’t be two like Henry Cooke!”
Maggie was passing a moving van and didn’t answer for a moment. Then she said, “Yeah, you’re right, Mary Beth. There can’t be two like him. I just hadn’t thought it all the way through.”
XVII
1 Chee (June 22, 1968)
After the night watchman had nodded at her and gone away, the building seemed desolate and ominous. Jane turned on Josh’s radio and rotated the dial impatiently until she found some instrumental music coming out of Syracuse. That was better, she could concentrate a little now. It had been so hard to concentrate this week. And the building seemed so deserted tonight, which was distracting in itself. Every creak or click from the machines around her in the basement lab became portentous of dread. She reached in her bag and took
a Valium.
The departmental approval had not really helped; she was more wound up than ever. The strain had just gone on for too long. She was really going to have to have a vacation soon. The finals for her summer school course would be tomorrow. Maybe Thursday or Friday she could leave. A beach somewhere, sea and sun. Could Roger go? She had lost track of his schedule completely. A long weekend, sea and sun and sex, that’s what she needed.
She pulled her willful mind back to its task. She was sitting at Josh’s desk in the equipment room, coding tapes for their new pilot study. This one did seem to be working better. Josh had rigged a double tape setup. The infant listened to a string of ba-ba-ba’s until it began to habituate, then the experimental tape was switched on. The eight subjects they had had so far took amazingly different lengths of time to reach the same level of habituation; no wonder the original experiment had washed out. Well, they had the problem licked now, she was sure. Not all problems, of course. Some babies, for mysterious infant reasons, began to squall before anything much had happened. No respect for science. This younger generation. But at least she was gaining on the habituation problem with the new technique.
The building really was very quiet tonight.
She had a set of blanks for transcribing the raw data for each child from the long spools of graph paper with the red inked lines. For each change in syllables, she had to record the heart rate at point A before the change, and at point B after the change. Then she’d get the computer cards punched from the data sheets and have the computer figure out the differences in heart rate for each type of change. The computer would do the statistics too. Everything was carefully counterbalanced, of course, so that no one could say, “Professor Freeman neglected to consider the possibility that practice (or fatigue) caused the difference (or lack of difference) in response to variable X (or Y, or Z).” Tedious, but necessary. Each subject was unique, receiving one of the twenty-four possible orders of the four syllables on the tapes. Since there had only been eight so far, she naturally didn’t have a complete balance yet. But things didn’t look too bad at this point. She started on the sixth baby’s data.
Murder Is Academic Page 17
