Third Deadly Sin

by Lawrence Sanders

  She thought wildly of what she might do. Claim an attack by a would-be rapist whom she had repulsed with tear gas? Defended herself against a vicious dog? But she had already told Mr. Pinckney she had the dispenser at home.

  Finally, she decided miserably, she could do nothing but tell him she had lost or misplaced the container.

  Not for a moment did she believe the detective’s claim of investigating a burglary. He was investigating her, and what would happen when he was told Zoe Kohler had “lost or misplaced” her dispenser, she didn’t wish to imagine. It was all so depressing she could not even wonder how they had traced the tear gas to her.

  That evening, when she returned to her apartment, she did something completely irrational. She searched her apartment for the tear gas container, knowing she had disposed of it. The worst thing was that she knew she was acting irrationally but could not stop herself.

  Of course she did not find the dispenser. But she found something else. Or rather, several things …

  When she had placed Ernest Mittle’s engagement ring far in the back of the dresser drawer, she had paused a moment to open the box and take a final look at the pretty stone. Then she had shoved the box away, but remembered very well that it opened to the front.

  When she found it, the box was turned around in its hiding place. Now the hinge was to the front, the box opened from the rear.

  When she had put away her nylon wigs, wrapped in tissue, the blond wig was on top, the black beneath. Now they were reversed.

  The stacks of her pantyhose and lingerie had been disturbed. She always left them with their front edges neatly aligned. Now the piles showed they had been handled. They were not messy; they were neat. But not the way she had left them.

  Perhaps someone less precise and finicky than Zoe Kohler would never have noticed. But she noticed, and was immediately convinced that someone had been in her apartment and had searched through her possessions.

  She went at once to her front window. Drawing the drape cautiously aside, she peeked out. She did not see the white-shirted watcher in the shadows of the apartment across the street. She did not see him, but was certain he was there.

  She made no connection between the voyeur and the search of her personal belongings. She knew only that her privacy was once again being cruelly violated; people wanted to know her secrets. They would keep trying, and there was no way she could stop them.

  When Ernest Mittle called, she made a determined effort to sound cheerful and loving. They chatted for a long time, and she kept asking questions about his job, his computer classes, his vacation plans—anything to keep him talking and hold the darkness back.

  “Zoe,” he said finally, “I don’t, uh, want to pressure you or anything, but have you been thinking about it?”

  It took her a moment to realize what he meant.

  “Of course, I’ve been thinking about it, darling,” she said. “Every minute.”

  “Well, I meant every word I said to you. And now I’m surer than ever in my own mind. This is what I want to do. I just don’t want to live without you, Zoe.”

  “Ernie, you’re the sweetest and most considerate man I’ve ever met. You’re so considerate.”

  “Yes … well … uh … when do you think you’ll decide? Soon?”

  “Oh yes. Soon. Very soon.”

  “Listen,” he said eagerly, “I have classes Friday night. I get out about eight-thirty or so. How’s about my picking up a bottle of white wine and dropping by? I mean, it’ll be Friday night and all, and we can talk and get squared away on our vacation. Okay?”

  She didn’t have the strength to object. Everyone was pushing her—even Ernie.

  “Of course,” she said dully. “Friday night?”

  “About nine,” he said happily. “See you then. Take care of yourself, dear.”

  “Yes,” she said. “You, too.”

  He hung up and she sat there staring at the phone in her hand. Without questioning why, she called Dr. Oscar Stark. She got his answering service, of course. The operator asked if she’d care to leave a message.

  “No,” Zoe Kohler said, “no message.”

  She wandered into the kitchen. She opened the cabinet door. She stared at the rows and rows of pills, capsules, ampules, powders, medicines. They all seemed so foolish. Toys.

  She closed the door without taking anything. Not even her cortisol. Not even a salt tablet. Nothing would make her a new woman. She was condemned to be her.

  She thought vaguely that she should eat something, but just the idea of food roiled her stomach. She poured a glass of chilled vodka and took it into the living room.

  She slouched on the couch, staring into the darkness. She tried to concentrate and feel the workings of her body. She felt only deep pain, a malaise that sapped her spirit and dulled her senses.

  Was this the onset of death—this total surrender to the agony of living? Peace, peace. Something warm and comfortable. Something familiar and close. It seemed precious to her, this going over. The hurt ended …

  She was conscious that she was weeping, surprised that her dried flesh could squeeze out that moisture. The warm, thin tears slid down her cheeks, and she did not wipe them away. She found a glory in this evidence of her miserableness.

  “Poor Zoe Kohler,” she said aloud, and the spoken words affected her so strongly that she gasped and sobbed.

  What she could not understand, would never understand, was what she had done to deserve this wretchedness.

  She had always dressed neatly and kept herself clean. She had never used dirty words. She had been polite and kind to everyone. Whom had she hurt? She had tried, always, to conduct herself like a lady.

  There may have been a few times, very few, when she had forgotten herself, denied her nature, and acted in a crude and vulgar manner. But most of her life had been above reproach, spotless, obeying all the rules her mother had taught her.

  She had moved through her days refined and gentle, low-voiced, and thoughtful of the feelings of others. She had worked hard to succeed as dutiful daughter and loving wife.

  And it had all, all, come to this: sitting in the darkness and weeping. Smelling her body’s rot. Hounded by unfeeling men who would not stop prying into things of no concern of theirs.

  Poor Zoe Kohler. All hope gone, all passion spent. Only pain remained.

  July 23-24; Wednesday and Thursday …

  Delaney had to see her; he could not help himself.

  “You can learn a lot about people by observing them,” he explained to Monica. “How they walk, how they gesture. Do they rub their eyes or pick their nose? How they light a cigarette. Do they wait for a traffic light or run through traffic? Any nervous habits? How they dress. The colors and style. Do they constantly blink? Lick their lips? And so forth.”

  His wife listened to this recital in silence, head bowed, eyes on the mending in her lap.

  “Well?” he demanded.

  “Well what?”

  “I just thought you might have a comment.”

  “No, I have no comment.”

  “Maybe it’ll help me understand her better. Why she did what she did. Clues to her personality.”

  “Whatever you say, dear,” she said.

  He looked at her suspiciously. He didn’t trust her complaisant moods.

  He told Abner Boone what he wanted to do, and the sergeant had no objections.

  “Better let Bentley know, Chief,” he suggested. “He can tell his spooks you’ll be tailing her too. In case they spot you and call out the troops.”

  “They won’t spot me,” Delaney said, offended.

  But he spotted them: the unmarked cars parked near the Hotel Granger and Zoe Kohler’s apartment house, the plainclothes policewomen who followed the suspect on foot. Some of the shadows were good, some clumsy. But Zoe seemed oblivious to them all.

  He picked her up on 39th Street and Lexington Avenue at 8:43 on Wednesday morning and followed her to the Granger. He hung around for
a while, then wandered into the hotel and inspected the lobby, dining room, cocktail bar.

  He was back at noon, and when she came out for lunch, he tailed her to a fast-food joint on Third Avenue, then back to the Granger. At five o’clock he returned to follow her home. He never took his eyes off her.

  “What’s she like?” Monica asked that night.

  “So ordinary,” he said, “she’s outstanding. Miss Nothing.”

  “Pretty?”

  “No, but not ugly. Plain. Just plain. She could do a lot more with herself than she does. She wears no makeup that I could see. Hair a kind of mousy color. Her clothes are browns and tans and grays. Earth colors. She moves very slowly, cautiously. Almost like an invalid, or at least like a woman twice her age. Once I saw her stop and hang on to a lamppost as if she suddenly felt weak or faint. Sensible shoes. Sensible clothes. Nothing bright or cheerful about her. She carries a shoulder bag but hangs on to it with both hands. I’d guess the knife is in the bag. When she confronts anyone on the sidewalk, she’s always the first to step aside. She never crosses against the lights, even when there’s no traffic. Very careful. Very conservative. Very law-abiding. When she went out to lunch, I thought I saw her talking to herself, but I’m not sure.”

  “Edward, how long are you going to keep this up—following her?”

  “You think it’s morbid curiosity, don’t you?”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  “Sure you do,” he said. “But it’s not. The woman fascinates me; I admit it.”

  “That I believe,” Monica said. “Does she look sad?”

  “Sad?” He considered that a moment. “Not so much sad as defeated. Her posture is bad; she slumps; the sins of the world on her shoulders. And her complexion is awful. Muddy pale. I think I was right and Dr. Ho was right; she’s cracking.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t do it, Edward—follow her, I mean.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know … It just seems indecent.”

  “You are a dear, sweet woman,” he told her, “and you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

  He went through the same routine on Thursday. He maneuvered so he walked toward her as she headed up Madison Avenue on her way to work. He passed quite close and got a good look at her features.

  They seemed drawn and shrunken to him, nose sharpened, cheeks caved. Her lips were dry and slightly parted. The eyes seemed focused on worlds away. There was a somnolence about that face. She could have been a sleepwalker.

  No breasts that he could see. She appeared flat as a board.

  He was there a few minutes after 5:00 P.M., when she exited from the Hotel Granger and turned downtown on Madison. Delaney was behind her. Bentley’s policewoman was across the avenue.

  The suspect walked south on Madison, then went into a luncheonette. Delaney strolled to the corner, turned, came back. He stood in front of the restaurant, ostensibly inspecting the menu Scotch-taped inside the plate glass window.

  Zoe Kohler was seated at the counter, waiting to be served. Everyone in the place was busy eating or talking. No one paid any attention to the activity on the street, to a big, lumpy man peering through the front window.

  Delaney walked on, looked in a few shop windows, came back to the luncheonette. Now Zoe had a plate before her and was drinking a glass of something that looked like iced tea.

  If he had been a man given to theatrical gestures, he would have slapped his forehead in disgust and dismay. He had forgotten. They all had forgotten. How could they have been so fucking stupid?

  He loitered about the front of the luncheonette. He looked at his watch occasionally to give the impression of a man waiting for a late date. He saw Zoe Kohler pat her lips with a paper napkin, gather up purse and check, begin to rise.

  He was inside immediately, almost rushing. As she moved toward the cashier’s desk, he brushed by her.

  “I beg your pardon,” he said, raising his hat and stepping aside.

  She gave him a shy, timorous smile: a flicker.

  He let her go and slid onto the counter stool she had just left. In front of him was most of a tunafish salad plate and dregs of iced tea in a tall glass. He linked his hands around the glass without touching it.

  A porky, middle-aged waitress with a mustache and bad feet stopped in front of him. She took out her pad.

  “Waddle it be?” she asked, patting her orange hair. “The meat-loaf is good.”

  “I’d like to see the manager, please.”

  She peered at him. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” he said, smiling at her. “I’d just like to see the manager.”

  She turned toward the back of the luncheonette.

  “Hey, you, Stan,” she yelled.

  A man back there talking to two seated customers looked up. The waitress jerked her head toward Delaney. The manager came forward slowly. He stood at the Chief’s shoulder.

  “What seems to be the trouble?” he asked.

  “No trouble,” Delaney said. “This iced tea glass here—I’ve got a dozen at home just like it. But my kid broke one. I’d like to fill out the set. Would you sell me this glass for a buck?”

  “You want to buy that glass for a dollar?” Stan said.

  “That’s right. To fill out my set of a dozen. How about it?”

  “A pleasure,” the manager said. “I’ve got six dozen more you can have at the same price.”

  “No,” Delaney said, laughing, “just one will do.”

  “Let me get you a clean one,” the porky waitress said, reaching for Zoe Kohler’s glass.

  “No, no,” Delaney said hastily, protecting the glass with his linked hands. “This one will be fine.”

  Waitress and manager looked at each other and shrugged. Delaney handed over a dollar bill. Touching the glass gingerly with two fingers spread inside, he wrapped it loosely in paper napkins, taking care not to wipe or smudge the outside.

  He had to walk two blocks before he found a sidewalk phone that worked. He set the wrapped glass carefully atop the phone and called Sergeant Abner Boone at Midtown Precinct North. He explained what he had.

  “God damn it!” Boone exploded; “We’re idiots! We could have had prints from her office or apartment a week ago.”

  “I know,” Delaney said consolingly. “It’s my fault as much as anyone’s. Listen, sergeant, if you get a match with that wineglass from the Tribunal, it’s not proof positive that she wasted the LaBranche kid. It’s just evidence that she was at the scene.”

  “That’s good enough for me,” Boone said grimly. “Where are you, Chief? I’ll get a car, pick up the glass myself, and take it to the lab.”

  Delaney gave him the location. “After they check it out, will you call me at home and let me know?”

  “Of course.”

  “Better call Thorsen and tell him, too. Yes or no.”

  “I’ll do that,” Abner Boone said. “Thank you, sir,” he added gratefully.

  Delaney was grumpy all evening. He hunched over his plate, eating pork roast and applesauce in silence. Not even complimenting Monica on the bowl of sliced strawberries with a sprinkle of Cointreau to give it a tang.

  It wasn’t until they had taken their coffee into the air-conditioned living room that she said: “Okay, buster, what’s bothering you?”

  “Politics,” he said disgustedly, and told her about his argument with Ivar Thorsen.

  “He was right and I was right. Considering his priorities and responsibilities, picking the woman up and getting her out of circulation makes sense. But I still think going for prosecution and conviction makes more sense.”

  Then he told Monica what he had just done: obtaining Zoe Kohler’s fingerprints for a match with the prints found on the wineglass at the Tribunal Motor Inn.

  “So I handed Ivar more inconclusive evidence,” he said wryly. “If the prints match, he’s sure to pick her up. But he’ll never get a conviction on the basis of what we’ve got.”


  “If you feel that strongly about it,” Monica said, “you could have forgotten all about the prints.”

  “You’re joking, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “The habits of thirty years die hard,” he said, sighing. “I had to get her prints. But no one will believe me when I tell them that even a perfect match won’t put her behind bars. Her attorney will say, ‘Sure, she had a drink with the guy in his hotel room—and so what? He was still alive when she left.’ Those prints won’t prove she slashed his throat. Just that she was there. And another thing is—”

  The phone rang then.

  “That’ll be Boone,” Delaney said, rising. “I’ll take it in the study.”

  But it wasn’t the sergeant; it was Deputy Commissioner Ivar Thorsen, and he couldn’t keep the excitement out of his voice.

  “Thank you, Edward,” he said. “Thank you, thank you. We got a perfect match on the prints. I had a long talk with the DA’s man and he thinks we’ve got enough now to go for an indictment. So we’re bringing her in. It’ll take all day tomorrow to get the paperwork set and plan the arrest. We’ll probably take her Saturday morning at her apartment. Want to come along?”

  Delaney paused. “All right, Ivar,” he said finally. “If that’s what you want to do. I’d like a favor: will you ask Dr. Patrick Ho if he wants to be in on it? That man contributed a lot; he should be in at the end.”

  “Yes, Edward, I’ll contact him.”

  “One more thing … I’d like Thomas Handry to be there.”

  “Who’s Thomas Handry?”

  “He’s on the Times.”

  “You want a reporter to be there?”

  “I owe him.”

  Thorsen sighed. “All right, Edward, if you say so. And thank you again; you did a splendid job.”

  “Yeah,” Delaney said dispiritedly, but Thorsen had already hung up.

  He went back into the living room and repeated the phone conversation to Monica.

  “So that’s that,” he concluded. “If she keeps her nerve and doesn’t say a goddamn word until she gets a smart lawyer, I think she’ll beat it.”