She smiled blankly when she saw me, and I walked to her slowly and embraced her, cradling the new hairdo gently.
“Hello,” was all I could think of to say.
Lorna dropped her cane and held me around the waist. “It’s not going to the grand jury, Freddy,” she said.
“I didn’t think it would. He confessed.”
“To how many?” I started to release Lorna, but she held on. “To how many?” she persisted.
“Just to Margaret Cadwallader. Let’s not talk about it, Lor.”
“We have to.”
“Then let’s sit down.”
We sat on the couch.
“I looked for you at the Hall of Justice. I figured you’d be there for the booking,” Lorna said.
“I got summoned to see the chief of detectives. I imagine Smith went back and booked Engels. I was dog-tired. I went home and slept. Why?” Lorna’s face darkened angrily. “Why?” I repeated. “What the hell’s going on?”
“I was there, I got a jail pass. The D.A. was there. He and Dudley Smith were talking. Smith told him that the Cadwallader killing was just the tip of the iceberg, that Engels was a mass murderer.”
“Oh, God.”
“Don’t interrupt me. He was booked on just the one count. Cadwallader. But Smith kept repeating, “This is a grand jury job, there’s no telling how many dames this maniac’s bagged!’ The D.A. seemed to go along with it. Then the D.A. saw me and mentioned to Smith that I read potential grand jury cases. Smith notices that I’m a woman, and starts to lay on the blarney. Then he asks me what I’m doing here, and I tell him that you and I are friends. Then he goes livid and starts to shake. He looked insane.”
Shaken, I said: “He is insane. He hates me, I crossed him.”
“Then _you’re_ insane. He could ruin your career!”
“Hush, sweetheart. No, I’ve been promoted. Smith reported first, I reported afterward. I’m going to the detective bureau. To a squad room somewhere. Thad Green told me himself. Whatever Smith told Green jibes with my report to you and my official arresting officer’s report, which is the truth. What Smith told the D.A. is just hyperbole. All I–”
“Freddy, you told me there was no hard evidence to connect Engels to any other murders.”
“That’s absolutely true. But . . .”
Lorna was getting more red-faced and agitated by the second: “But nothing, Freddy. I _saw_ Engels. He was beaten terribly. I asked Smith about that and he handed me some baloney about how he tried to resist arrest. I kept saying to myself, Good God, could my Freddy have had anything to do with that? Is that justice? What kind of man have I gotten involved with?”
I just stared at the Hieronymous Bosch print on the wall.
“Freddy, answer me!”
“I can’t, counselor. Good night.”
I drove home, steadfastly quelling all speculation regarding Lorna, woman-killers, and lunatic cops. I tried out my new rank: Detective Frederick U. Underhill. Detective Fred Underhill. The dicks. At twenty-seven. I was probably the youngest detective in the Los Angeles Police Department. I would have to find out. In November, the sergeant’s exam. Detective Sergeant Frederick Underhill. I would have to buy three new suits and a couple of sports jackets, some neckties and a half dozen pair of slacks. Detective Fred Underhil. But. It kept rearing its beautiful, burnished brown head. Lorna Weinberg, counselor at law. Lorna Weinberg.
Be still, I said to myself, trying to heed my own advice–just don’t think.
At home, after a roughhouse session with Night Train, some kind of nameless future-fear hit me and to combat it I dug out some textbooks.
I tried to engross myselL but it was useless; the words flew by undigested, almost unseen. I couldn’t stop thinking.
I was about to give it up when my doorbell rang. Not daring to guess, I flung the door open. It was Lorna.
“Hello, Officer,” she said. “May I come in?”
“I’m a detective now, Lorna. Can you accept what I had to do to get there?”
“I … I know I convicted you of an unknown crime on insufficient evidence.”
“I would have filed a writ of habeas corpus, counselor, but you would have beat me in court.”