by John Dunning
Now there was nothing to do but wait. Cops can take hours at a murder scene and these guys were in no hurry. I thought of Ralston, alone on the hot side of Mercury, sealed off in his own private hell. This was the first of many hellish hours, and all I could do for him was try to make it less awful than it had to be.
After a while two men brought a stretcher into the bedroom and they lifted the body off the bed. I didn’t want to watch this part—you never do with a friend—but I stood up and without moving from the spot looked into the room. I didn’t think of her as Denise now: Denise was gone and this shell was what she had left behind. Paxton directed the loading of the body, taking care to leave the dangling arm in the same position as it was when they’d found her. Joanne said something and he looked at the bed, took a long for-cepslike instrument and peeled back the covers. Then he said, “Hey, Whiteside, look what she was lying on,” and still using his forceps, he plucked what looked like a dollar bill from the folds of the rumpled sheet. But my eyes were good and I could see the picture of Franklin clearly from where I stood. It was a C-note.
Whiteside appeared at once with a plastic bag. Paxton reached over to drop it in. Joanne said, “Here’s another one,” and Paxton pulled it gingerly from the covers.
“Here’s some more,” Joanne said.
“I thought these people were supposed to be poor,” Whiteside said. “Looks like she had something going on the side.”
I held myself onto the chair. I hated Whiteside in that moment but I watched quietly while they bagged the other bills. With the body gone there was a general combing of the room. The bed was vacuumed for fibers and hairs, the floor around the bed was examined, and the small throw rug vacuumed as well. At some point Whiteside looked at his watch and said, “I’m going on in, see what the man’s got to say.”
I followed him out into the yard.
“I’ll see you down there,” Whiteside said without enthusiasm. “You know the way?”
“If I get lost I’ll ask somebody.”
“Remember, you’re only there by my permission. You keep your mouth shut, just like you said.”
I had never seen Whiteside work but I didn’t think much of him so far. There was no way I’d have let him sit in if I had been in his shoes and he’d been in mine. I wouldn’t have let him into the crime scene in the first place. I wouldn’t have crumbled under any threat of bringing a lawyer in. They’d have talked to me on my terms or I’d have found out why. It was obvious that Whiteside had something up his sleeve: he was confident he could handle me or maybe even show me up, and the chance to get a quick confession and clear this case in hours was too much to resist. Some cops are like that. I met a reporter once who said it was like that in his business too. The two biggest hot dogs were battling it out in the front-page derby, just like some cops who always wanted to be number one in clearing their cases. I wondered who the other hot dog was now that I was gone.
At the station Whiteside showed us into an office that suggested the atmosphere of an interview rather than an interrogation. I sat off to one side while he and Ralston faced each other across a desk. Whiteside offered coffee but Ralston made no response at all. I thought of the Harold Waters case and the similarities were chilling. Waters, a big black man; his wife by all accounts articulate, the joy of his life. I looked at Whiteside and in that half second he seemed almost predatory.
A stenographer came in and sat just behind Ralston in a corner of the room. “We’re making a tape of this conversation as well as a transcript,” Whiteside said, glancing at me. “The young man who just came in is Jay Holt, and he will take down everything we say. This is routine.”
Ralston’s wet eyes moved around the room and found mine. I nodded what I hoped was encouragement. Ralston said my name, first just “Janeway,” then “Jesus, Janeway,” and his tears began again. Whiteside said, “Speak to me, please, not to Mr. Janeway,” and the interrogation that was supposedly only an interview got under way.
The first questions were routine. State your name and address for the record, please. Where were you today and tonight? When was the last time you heard from Mrs. Ralston? What time did you get home? Had there been any hint of trouble prior to tonight? Had you noticed any strangers who seemed to have a special interest in your home? This went on for a while, and Ralston answered in words of one syllable. Twice he broke down and Whiteside called for a police-woman to bring him some water.
Whiteside asked about their finances. Ralston, in that same breaking voice, told him in a few words. They were dirt poor. They had almost nothing.
Then Whiteside said, “Eleven hundred dollars was found at the scene, Mr. Ralston. Can you explain that?”
“That’s impossible.”
“Uh-huh. Did you know your wife kept a diary?”
Ralston nodded.
“Please answer verbally.”
“Yes.”
“Are you aware what’s in her diary?”
Again Whiteside had to repeat the question. Ralston said no, he had never read it.
“It was there in the open on the dresser,” Whiteside said. “Is that where she usually kept it?”
Ralston nodded, then said, “Yes.”
“It was there in plain view, just a plain little notebook,” Whiteside said. “It wasn’t locked away, there was no lock on the book itself, and yet you were never tempted to look inside.”
Ralston looked somewhat dumbfounded, as if the question made no sense to him.
“You’re saying you never looked at it? Not once in all the time you were together?”
Ralston shook his head. “That would’ve seemed…”
“Seemed what, Mr. Ralston?”
“Wrong.”
“Wrong,” Whiteside said. “Well, you know what, I believe you. I believe exactly what you’re telling me when you say you never looked at that book. I believe it was such a habit not to look in that book that it just wouldn’t have occurred to you to do that, no matter what else might have happened in your lives. You just wouldn’t do that, would you, Mr. Ralston?”
“No.”
“No.” Whiteside shook his head. “That’s why you didn’t know what she wrote there.”
He got up and came around the desk, pulled up a chair, and faced Ralston from a distance of less than two feet. “What she wrote in her diary, just two days ago, was how this old woman just died in that bedroom of yours, and how she gave you all this great deathbed gift, this rare book which Mr. Janeway says is worth a lot of money. Have I got it right so far?”
“Denise wanted…”
Whiteside waited. Ralston faltered again and dabbed at his eyes.
“You were saying, Mr. Ralston? Denise wanted something. What did she want?”
“She wanted to do what the old woman asked.”
“Find the other books, is that right?”
“That’s right.”
“But you didn’t want to do that, did you? You wanted the money. And you two quarreled about it, didn’t you?”
“We never quarreled about anything. Not ever.”
“What would you call it then, when she wrote these lines?” He fished a notebook out of his pocket. “ ‘Michael wants so badly to take the money. So we have our first strong disagreement, but he’ll come to see this was the right thing to do.’ How would you interpret that, Mr. Ralston?”
Ralston shook his head. “That wasn’t any quarrel.”
“Maybe that’s not how it started. Maybe it was just a disagreement at first, then it got to be more than that. Hey, I know how it is: I have disagreements with my wife all the time. Sometimes I’d like to shut her up so bad I feel like pushing a pillow in her face.”
“Hey, Whiteside,” I said. “None of that shit.”
He turned on his chair. “Another word from you and you’re out of here.” He turned back to Ralston. “That’s what happened, isn’t it?”
“Don’t answer that, Mike.”
Ralston looked dazed, horrified.
“Don’t say another word, Mike. This guy has no honor, he’s trying to sandbag you and he’ll twist anything you say. He’s an asshole and a bad cop besides.”
Whiteside leaped up from his chair and grabbed my arm. “I warned you. Now you can get the fuck out of here or spend the night in jail. Go ahead, call a lawyer if that’s what you want.”
I pushed him away. “Touch me again and I’ll leave your ass on the floor.”
“As if you could.”
“Try it and find out.” I looked at the stenographer. “You getting all this down, Jay? I want the record to show that Mr. Whiteside is throwing charges around and he hasn’t even read Mr. Ralston his rights.”
“Goddammit, get out of here,” Whiteside said.
“When you make up the transcript of this, I want to see every word of it in the record.”
“You’re obstructing justice, Janeway. I’m giving you five seconds to get out of here.”
“You wouldn’t know justice if I chiseled it on your dick.”
“Jay, tell Matthews to get in here.”
“What are we doing now, calling the A-team? Hey, I’ll make it easy on you. I’ll walk out, but not quietly, pal, and I’m coming back with one helluva savage New York lawyer who is going to make buffalo chips out of you and your tactics. You hear that, Mike? Don’t say a word to this prick. Write that down, Jay. Janeway wants it on the record, this man was not Mirandized, and it better be there. Randy Asshole Whiteside can kiss Mrs. Ralston’s diary good-bye.”
I kicked over the chair and pointed at the stenographer. “Do you know how to spell asshole, Jay? It’s your ass if it’s all not in there.” I got right into Whiteside’s startled face. “Because you know what, asshole?” I patted my pocket. “I’ve got a tape of this whole sorry interview.”
I pushed my way past him. Ralston sat in wide-eyed disbelief. I had his attention at last. I looked down at him as I passed. “Remember, Mike, don’t sign anything, don’t say anything.”
I walked out and slammed the door, and the spirit of Harold Waters walked out with me.
Outside, I took a deep breath and touched my empty pocket as if I’d really had a tape there.
13
My pal Robert Moses came from an old New York family of lawyers. Named after a public official who had transformed New York’s parks in the La Guardia administration, he had moved to Denver years ago and I had met him when I was still a motorcycle cop. He always sounded wide awake and ready for battle, even when I woke him in the middle of the night.
“You should’ve called me right away. The minute you heard they wanted to question your friend, that’s when I should’ve gotten this call.”
“When have you ever known me to do what I ought to do?”
“This isn’t funny, Cliff. Do us both a favor and don’t try to play lawyer, please; you’re not that good at it. Do you know how lucky you are not to be in jail now?”
I said I did know that. I had known that possibility even before the dance got started. But I had been on the cop’s side of the table enough to know that Whiteside was after more than background information, and somebody had to be there to get Ralston a fair shake.
“You made Whiteside a promise and you broke your word. You said you’d be quiet. You call that quiet?”
“I said I’d be quiet if he’d be civil. You call that civil?”
He sighed loudly into the telephone. “All right, I’ll go down and see what they think they’ve got on your boy. With luck we’ll both walk out of there.”
An hour later he called me from downtown. The cops had released Ralston even before he had arrived. There were no charges pending; the evidence consisted only of motive, which the police still considered strong. Twelve thousand-five was a lot of money to a man with Ralston’s checkered past.
“Have they even asked along the block if anybody saw any strangers?”
“They weren’t about to tell me that. You’ve got to assume they did, and found nothing.”
“Which only means nobody was looking, nobody noticed, or nobody’s talking. Or they haven’t found the one who was, did, or will. But it gives them an excuse to stop looking, doesn’t it?”
“They think Ralston wanted the money so he could go back to his gambling, womanizing ways. The missus wouldn’t budge and things got out of hand. Frankly, Whiteside is having a hard time believing that a strapping young guy like Ralston, with his past, would form a personal attachment to a very plain older woman.Ugly I think is the word he used.”
“The son of a bitch had better not use it around me.”
“If he does, you smile, look in his pretty face, and say, ‘Thank you, Constable,’ on advice from your attorney.”
A cop had taken Ralston back to his home, Moses said, and it was assumed that’s where he was now. I thanked him and told him to send me a bill.
Then I drove back up to Globeville. Ralston’s car was no longer parked at the curb where I had seen it earlier, and now the street was quiet and dark. I went up onto the porch and banged on the door. Nothing. I came down into the yard and stood there for a moment wondering where he might be. Finally I realized I didn’t know him well enough to even begin such a hunt.
I was about to leave when I saw a shadow move on the porch next door. Then I saw the darting orange motion of a lit cigarette.
I walked over to the fence and said hi.
“Hey yourself,” came the gruff voice. A black male: not a kid, an older guy.
“You know Mike?”
“Yeah, I know him.”
“You know where he went?”
“Maybe I do. Who’re you and what do you want?”
“I’m his friend Janeway. I’d like to help him.”
“I don’t think anybody can do that.”
Before I could react, he said, “That man’s bleedin’. He’s bleedin’ out of every crack and sweat hole. Awful damn thing, what happened.”
“Yeah, it was. Denise was great. I didn’t know her real well, but I sure liked what I knew.”
He said nothing.
“You know them well?” I said.
“About like you. Not long but long enough. They ain’t been livin’ up here real long, and people here tend to mind they own business.”
“Did the cops talk to you?”
“Oh yeah. They talked to everybody.”
“You able to tell them anything?”
“Not a damn thing. I was sleepin’ all afternoon. The Salvation Army marchin’ band could’ve come through here and I wouldn’a seen ’em.”
There was a pause. “I work nights, sleep days,” he said. “This’s my night off.”
“Well,” I said. “You feel like telling me where he went? I want to help him if I can.”
“Then you better have one helluva fast car, friend. Mike said he was gettin’ out of here, goin’ to Vegas.”
Book II Baltimore
14
Eastern Avenue was the color of a Confederate uniform and just about as empty in the pale light before dawn. The Treadwells’ building squatted in the block like a brick fortress. At one time it might have been respectable, with its tiled portico and the leaded glass in its front door. Now the tiles were cracked and worn, the tiny glass pieces in the door replaced with glass that matched poorly or not at all. The sign saidBOOKS, and just inside the portico another sign, equally peeling, equally faded, was mounted on the door.TEN A.M. TO SIX P.M., SEVEN DAYS A WEEK. I had more than four hours to kill.
I cupped my hands against the one clear window, but I could see little more than the dim outline of the front counter, a rickety-looking bookcase with a sign hawking sale books at a dollar each, and just inside the door a poster advertising book fairs in Wilmington next week, Washington next month, and Baltimore later in the summer. Shadows of more substa
ntial bookshelves loomed in the darkness beyond.
I walked back to South Broadway and went down toward the harbor. I was looking for a café that might be open that time of morning, and what I found was a dingy place across from the market, which even then was beginning to come to life. I ordered a plate of grease and sat over coffee with my Baltimore Sun untouched on the vacant chair beside me. I could feel the weariness in my bones: the payoff for a general lack of sleep, compounded by the bumpy evening flight from Denver and the loss of two hours over the Mountain to Eastern time zones. It had been after midnight when I checked into a hotel not far from the bookstore. The events of recent days still played in my head, but I slept almost four hours, waking just before dawn.
I heard Willie Paxton’s voice like a broken record:smothered with the pillow…smothered with the pillow…smothered with the pillow…
I saw Ralston’s despair and felt my own.
I never know quite what to do at a time like that. I knew I could find Ralston if he had actually gone to Vegas. A man like that stands out. Give him time to settle and he’d be no problem.
Denise was another matter. If Whiteside didn’t find her killer, and I didn’t think he would, I would have to give it a try. Brave thoughts for an ex-cop who had just burned most of his bridges downtown. Brave thoughts when in all likelihood my first hunch had been the right one, that some two-bit burglar had killed her when she’d walked in and found him there. A spider, maybe a transient: a stranger, in any case. Those guys can be hell to catch, even when you’ve got the resources of a big-city department behind you. Even when you get prints, who do you match them to?
The guy jumps a train and he’s in Pittsburgh tomorrow.
Or he stays pat, right under your nose, and you still can’t find him.
I knew I couldn’t expect any help from the cops. Cops stick together, and I’d be an outcast after news of my snit with Whiteside made its way through the department.
