by Parnell Hall
“Why not?”
“Are you kidding me? You went up there because Amy told you she left a message on my machine asking me to meet her there. Even though in the same message she told me to forget it. Even though you left a message on my machine telling me to go to the office. So if I picked up my messages at all, my last instruction would be to come here. There’d be no reason to think I’d go anywhere else.”
“Yeah, but you did.”
“Yeah, but only because I happened to call while Amy was throwing up in the bathroom down the hall. Now, would you like to tell me how you deduced that might have happened, and decided to protect against that eventuality?”
“That’s not fair.”
“Fair?” Steve grabbed her by the shoulders. “Tracy, wake up. This is not a game. I think you went to that office for a reason. For something you forgot, or something you needed to do. Trouble is, you didn’t do it because you ran into me. I need to know what it was and I need to know now, because this is our last chance to fix it. While Amy’s on her way uptown. So forget the fact you think I’m going to be pissed, and just blurt out whatever the hell it is.”
“It’s not like that,” Tracy said.
Steve exhaled. “Aw, fuck. Then what is it?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s helpful.”
Tracy took off her glasses, pushed the hair out of her eyes, put them back on again. She held up her hand. “Okay,” she said. “The fact is, I don’t know.”
“You mind explaining that?”
“After Amy had hysterics, I got her into the office, I got her calmed down. But I had the feeling I forgot something. You ever have that? Nothing specific, just the feeling?”
“Can you cut to the chase?” Steve said. “If we’re going to take any action, it’s gotta be now.”
“Like what?” Tracy said. “That’s the whole thing. All I had was a general feeling I fucked up. That there was something I didn’t do that I should have done.”
“You mean like clean up?”
“No, I did that.”
“Oh yeah?” Steve said.
Tracy waved her hands. “No, no. It was nothing major. It’s just I didn’t know how you were going to play it, and I didn’t want to leave my fingerprints. That was one of the first things you asked me.”
“Yeah. And you said you didn’t.”
“Right. Because I cleaned them up.”
“From where?”
“The doorknob.”
“The outer doorknob?”
Tracy made a face. “No. The one to Fletcher’s office.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Yeah, but what was I going to do? We’re up there in the office, Amy’s too upset to talk, but she keeps pointing to the door. So I opened it.”
“You polished that doorknob?”
“Well, I wasn’t going to leave my prints.”
“Or anyone else’s.”
“I can’t help that,” Tracy said. “I couldn’t reach you. It was either call the police or get her out of there. Until you heard her story, I wasn’t going to turn her in.”
“Great,” Steve said. “Was that the only surface you polished?”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“The only evidence you destroyed?”
“Hey, give me a break.”
“I’m on your side. It’s the cops who take a dim view. Now, this feeling you have-you didn’t happen to lose your purse? Drop your keys on the floor? Perhaps leave a business card on the top of Fletcher’s desk?”
“Look,” Tracy said. “This may surprise you, but I’m not enjoying this much.”
“I’m not either,” Steve said. “I’m trying to jog your memory.”
“Well, it’s isn’t working. I’m just getting rattled.”
“So take your mind off it. Do something else.”
“Like what?”
“Call Mark Taylor. Get him down here.”
“What should I tell him?”
“Nothing specific. Just it’s an emergency and get his ass over here.”
“What if he asks me why?”
“You don’t have time to explain.”
“He’s not gonna buy that.”
“Well, it happens to be true.”
Tracy went into the outer office, returned a few minutes later. “He’s on his way.”
“What about you? You thought of anything yet?”
“No.”
“We are rapidly passing the point of no return, where it will be too late to do anything.”
“I know that.”
“Okay,” Steve said. He tipped back in his chair, rubbed his head. “Let’s try it the other way around. Forget the time pressure, let’s take it slow and easy, talk it out. Start from the beginning. You’re at home and you get the call.”
Tracy took a breath. “Okay. She called. Right around eight, like I said. I was reading a book. The phone rang. It was Amy. Hysterical. She had to see you.”
“This was the first time you called me?”
“Right. She gave me a number to call back. I called it, told her I couldn’t reach you. She didn’t want to hear it. She wanted your number. I told her I just called your number. She didn’t care, she wanted it anyway, she was gonna call you.”
Tracy pushed the hair out of her eyes. “So, there was no reasoning with her. I gave her your number.” She put up her hands. “I know I shouldn’t have.”
“It’s okay,” Steve said. “The least of our worries. You gave her the number, she called up my machine, left a message. What next?”
“She called back. Hysterical. You weren’t home. Well, she knew that. I’d just told her that. But she wasn’t rational. It was like she had to hear the answering machine herself to believe it. And when she couldn’t get you, she wanted to come to the office.”
“She wanted you to go to the office?”
“She thought I was at the office.”
“Why would she think that?”
“Because that’s where she called.”
“What?”
“Because of the trial,” Tracy said impatiently. “I had call-forwarding on. Because I wasn’t going to be here. I was gonna be in court. And there was no reason to come here after. I had the calls forwarded to my own phone and the answering machine on so I could pick ’em up when I got home.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Huh?”
“You can pick up the calls from the office machine from your own phone.”
“Yeah, I know. But sometimes it fucks up, and-”
Steve held up his hand. “Hey. Sorry. I’m upset, and I’m not rational. Who gives a damn about the answering machine? Anyway, she wanted to meet you here.”
“Right. I ran out the door and hopped in a cab.”
“And?”
“She was waiting right outside. When the cab pulled up, she actually ran up and opened the door. She said, ‘Did you reach him?’”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, right. Like I’d phoned you from inside the cab. I said, ‘No.’ She looked like I’d kicked her in the stomach. She said, ‘Oh god, what am I going to do?’”
“Did the cab driver hear all this?”
“I don’t think so. I had the money out and was paying him off when she opened the door.”
“Then you got out and the cab drove off?”
“Yeah.”
“Before or after she said, ‘Oh god, what am I going to do?’”
“Before. At least I closed the door before that. She asked me about you, I hopped out, slammed the door, said, ‘No.’”
“And she said, ‘Did you reach him?’”
“Right.”
“Is that exactly what she said?”
“What do you mean?”
“Are you sure she said him? Or did she use my name?”
“No.”
“What about yours?”
“Huh?”
“Did she say ‘Tracy’? Or ‘Miss Garvin’?”
/>
“No. All she said was, ‘Did you reach him?’”
“That’s a break. What happened then?”
“I was going to bring her up here, but she didn’t want to come. I said, ‘Why?’, but she wouldn’t say. She was acting real funny. They she says she wants me to come with her. I say, ‘Where?’, but she’s so upset that she can’t talk. She’s practically shaking. She just kind of gestures to me, says, ‘Come on.’”
“She took you to the office?”
“Yeah.”
“Showed you the body?”
“Uh huh.”
“She led you right to it? She knew it was there?”
“Oh yes. She didn’t say anything, but she knew.”
“Were the doors unlocked?”
“The downstairs door was unlocked. The upstairs door was ajar.”
“Just the way I found it?”
“Right.”
“Because that’s how you left it?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, give me the rest of it.”
Tracy took a breath. “Okay, we’re in there, we’re in the room, and I’ve seen it and I’m not really feeling great. But I pull myself together and I ask her what happened.”
“And?”
“She can’t talk. She starts blubbering, grabs my arm, drags me out of the room. I had to grab her, slap her, try to get her to calm down. All she says is, ‘I, I-’ And she’s gone again.”
“You ask her if she did it?”
“Yeah.”
“She answer?”
“Not so you could notice.”
“So when she wouldn’t answer your questions, you got her out of there?”
“Yeah.”
“After cleaning up first?”
“Just the doorknob.”
“Nowhere else?”
“That’s the only place I touched.”
“Are you sure?”
“That’s all I remember.”
“What about the petty cash drawer?”
“What about it?”
“Did you see it?”
“No.”
“Amy didn’t point it out?”
“She never mentioned it. First I heard about it was when you asked her.”
“So you were never around that part of the desk. Good. The worst case scenario was somehow or other you left a fingerprint there.”
“Well, I didn’t. Of course, Amy probably did.”
“It doesn’t matter. That’s the beauty of sending her back. It accounts for her fingerprints.”
“Yeah.”
Steve looked at his watch. “Okay,” he said. “It’s been long enough.”
“For what?”
“To kiss it off. Going back there, I mean. We’re at the point where the risks outweigh the advantages. It’s probably more dangerous now to try to cover something up than just let it be. Unless it was really major. Like you suddenly remember leaving the murder weapon next to the body with your fingerprints on it.”
“What murder weapon?”
“Exactly. You didn’t happen to roll the body over, did you?”
“Not that I recall.”
“Well, neither did I. He’s lying face down, the wound’s in the chest. I didn’t see it, but most likely it’s a gunshot wound. In which case, where’s the gun?”
“The murderer took it.”
“Why?”
“Why not?”
“Are you kidding? The gun can hang him. The smart move is to drop the gun.”
“Some killers aren’t smart.”
Steve shook his head. “Bad premise. You start with the idea the killer’s stupid, your theories all collapse. You start using it to explain away everything: maybe he just didn’t think of it; maybe he’s stupid; maybe he had a reason we don’t know about; maybe it made sense to him. Bullshit. You want to figure it out, it’s gotta make sense to you.”
Tracy stuck out her chin. “Hey, I’m not a first year law student. Spare me the lecture.”
“Then help me think it out. Why does the killer take the gun?”
“Because he’s not wearing gloves, so his fingerprints would be on it.”
“Why doesn’t he just wipe it off?”
“He doesn’t want to take the time. He’s fired the gun, he’s afraid the sound of the shot will attract someone, he gets the hell out of there.”
Steve nodded. “Much better. Or, he did ditch the gun, and it’s lying under the body.”
“There’s a thought. You like that?”
“Actually, not really. I mean, you shoot a guy, he starts to fall, you realize you killed him, so you throw down the gun under the body before it hits the floor.”
“That is a bit of a stretch,” Tracy said.
“What about Amy?”
“What about her.”
“I know she’s hysterical most of the time. But was there anything she said that she used the word shot? You know, like, ‘Someone shot Frank.’”
Tracy shook her head.
“Did you use it? In your questions. Like, Did she shoot him? Does she know who shot him?”
“I didn’t say shot.”
“You sure?”
“I didn’t say it. I certainly assumed he was shot, just like you did, but I never said so.”
“That’s a break.”
“Why?”
“When Amy tells her story to the cops, it’s better if she lets them determine the cause of death.”
“I see your point.”
“She didn’t say anything? Even when she was hysterical and you had to roughhouse with her-she didn’t blurt out something then?”
“No. She’d lost it. She wasn’t at all coherent.”
“Even when you wrestled her out the door?”
“No. I was talking. Telling her to shut up. She was just making sounds.”
“Sounds?”
“Yeah. Half sob, half scream. Loud. I was afraid she’d attract someone. I kept telling her to shut up.”
“She didn’t say anything then?”
“No, she just pushed me. I fell back against the desk. I had to lunge for her, grab her, and-”
“What?”
“Jesus Christ!”
“You pushed off the desk?”
“Yeah.”
“Amy Dearborn’s desk?”
Tracy nodded wordlessly.
“Oh shit.” Steve shook his head. “No wonder it was bugging you. You left your fingerprints on the desk with the rifled petty cash drawer.”
15
Mark Taylor flopped his two hundred and twenty pounds into Steve Winslow’s overstuffed clients’ chair, cocked his head at the attorney and said, “This better be important. I happen to have a date.”
“Oh?” Steve said.
“The young lady in question was not pleased. If this terminates the relationship, it will be reflected in your bill.”
“You’re already on time and a half for after hours, Mark.”
Mark Taylor ran his hand through his curly red hair and rubbed the back of his neck. “Small consolation,” he said. “I’ve been trying to get a date with this girl for a month.”
“Girl?” Tracy said.
Mark Taylor looked at her. “Huh?”
“Mind if I jump in here?” Steve said. “Tracy is about to take exception to your calling a grown woman a girl. Fascinating as that might be, we do happen to have this murder on our hands.”
“Murder?” Taylor said.
“That’s why you’re here,” Steve said. “So let me give you a rundown of the facts. This evening, at approximately ten P.M., the body of Frank Fletcher was discovered in his office at F. L. Jewelry on West 47th Street by a Miss Amy Dearborn.”
Mark Taylor frowned, held up his hand. “Whoa. Just a minute. Reality check. Did you say this evening?”
“Yes.”
“Did you say the body was discovered at ten P.M.?”
“Yes, I did. You got a problem with that?”
“A small one,” Taylor sa
id.
“And what is that?”
“Unless my watch is stopped, it happens to be nine forty five.”
“Yes, I believe it is.”
Mark Taylor shook his head. “I don’t want anything to do with this.”
“I can’t believe your attitude,” Steve said.
“Oh no?” Taylor said. “You didn’t just tell me about a murder that hasn’t been reported yet?”
“Did I say that?”
“You said it was discovered at ten o’clock.”
“That’s an approximation, Mark.”
“I don’t give a shit what it is. If you know about a murder the cops don’t, you’re in bad. Now you’ve told me, and I’m in bad.”
“No, you’re not, Mark. What I say isn’t binding, it’s hearsay. You don’t know about a murder. And even if you do, it’s your own damn fault.”
“Huh?”
“For getting here so fast. If you’d taken another half hour to get here, you’d be feeling fine. If you got here at ten-fifteen and I told you a murder was discovered at ten o’clock, you wouldn’t give it a second thought.”
Taylor stood up, put up his hand. “Steve,” he said. “You can kid around with the happy horseshit all you want. But this is where I draw the line. You’ve come close to costing me my license before. With your smooth talk and your there, there, everything will be all right. If you know about a murder before the cops do, and you’re not tellin’ them you know, you’re an accessory. You say, ‘Don’t I like your business?’ I like my business. I wanna keep my business. So if you don’t mind, I’m going in the outer office, I’m calling this girl, or woman, or whatever, and if she’s still talking to me I’m taking her out on a date and forgetting this whole thing ever happened. Which, considering what you told me, is a concession in itself.”
“Okay, Mark,” Steve said. “But I should tell you what you’re turning down.”
“I know what I’m turning down. A chance to get an ulcer or have a heart attack. Not to mention lose my license and go to jail. Thanks all the same.”
Mark Taylor started for the door.
“It’s Tracy this time,” Steve said.
Taylor stopped. Turned back. “What?”
“Just thought you should know. Tracy saw the body. She’s the one on the hook.”
Taylor sighed. “Aw, hell.” He rubbed his forehead, walked over and flopped back down in the chair. “All right,” he said. “Let’s have it.”
