“Did you tend to go out the same night of the week each time?” I asked.
He nodded. “Tuesdays as a rule.”
I made a note dutifully on the legal pad on my clipboard. I hoped I looked like I had some legitimate reason to be asking all this stuff. I pretended to consult a form or two, flipping back a page. I thought the clipboard was a nice touch. I guess Lily did too. She peered over, wanting to see me write down something she said too. ‘
“That’s the best night for me,” she ventured. “I get my hair done on Tuesdays and I like to go out when it’s looking nice.”
“Hair on Tues.,” I wrote. “How many people knew you went out on Tuesday nights?”
Leonard’s eyes slid over to mine with a curious look. The medication had opened his pupils to the full, perfect black holes that looked like they’d been made with a paper punch.
“Pardon?”
“I wondered how many people knew about your nights out. If the intruder was someone you knew, he might have thought she’d be out with you as usual.”
His expression flickered with uncertainty. “I don’t understand what this has to do with the insurance claim,” he said.
I had to be careful how I framed my reply because he’d put his finger on the flaw in my charade. My questions had nothing to do with anything except trying to figure out if
Elaine could have seen a murder. So far, I didn’t even know what had actually happened that night and I was trying to weasel the information out of him. Lieutenant Dolan wasn’t going to tell me, that was for sure.
I smiled briefly, keeping my tone light. “Naturally we’re interested in seeing this crime solved,” I said. “We may need a determination on the case before the claim is paid.”
Lily glanced at Leonard and then back to me, alerted by his wariness. “What kind of ‘determination’?” she asked. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
Leonard shifted back to his original attitude. “Now, Lil, it can only help,” he said. “The insurance company wants to get to the bottom of this just like we do. The police haven’t done anything on it for months.” He glanced at me again. “You’ll have to pardon Lil… .”
She flashed him a look. “Don’t apologize for me when I’m sitting right here,” she snapped. “You’re too trusting, Leonard. That’s what’s wrong with you. Marty was the same way. If she’d been a little more cautious, she might be alive today!”
She faltered, clamping her mouth shut, then surprised me by filling in some details. “She was on the phone to me that night and someone came to the door. She rang off to see who it was.”
He chimed in. “The police said it’s possible she knew the person, or it might have been someone off the street. Police said a lot of times a burglar rings the bell if the lights are on. If someone answers the door, he can act like he’s got the wrong address. Nobody answers, he might go ahead and break in.”
“Were there signs of a struggle?”
“I don’t think so,” Leonard said. “Not that I ever heard. I went through the house myself, but I couldn’t see anything missing.”
I looked back at Lily. “What had she called about?” I asked. “Or did you call her?”
“I called her myself when we got in,” she said. “We got back here a little later than we thought and Leonard didn’t want her to worry.”
“And she sounded all right when you talked to her?”
Lily nodded. “She sounded fine. She sounded just like she always did. Leonard talked to her for a bit and then I got back on with her and we were just winding down when she said there was someone at the door and she had to go see who it was. I was going to offer to stay on the line, but we were done anyway so I just said good-bye and hung up.”
Leonard pulled a handkerchief out of his pants pocket and pressed it to his eyes. His hands had begun to shake badly and there was a tremor in his voice. “I don’t even know what her last moments were like. Police said the guy must have hit her square in the face with a baseball bat, something that size. She must have been terrified-”
He broke off.
I could feel myself squirm, but I didn’t say anything. What actually occurred to me, as tacky as it sounds, is that a baseball bat in the face doesn’t leave time to feel much of anything. Crack! You’re gone. No terror, no pain. Just lights out, home run.
Lily reached over and place her hand on his. “They were married twenty-two years.”
“Good years too,” he said, his tone almost argumentative. “We never went to bed mad. That was a rule we made early. Anytime we had a quarrel, we got it settled. She was a fine woman. Smarter than me and I’m not ashamed to admit it.”
Tears glittered in his eyes, but I felt oddly removed, like the only sober person at a party full of drunks.
“Did the police mention any possibility of witnesses? Someone who might have seen or heard something that night?”
He shook his head, mopping at his eyes. “No. I don’t think so. I never heard that.”
“Possibly someone in the building next door?” I suggested. “Or someone passing by? I understand you’ve got people across the street from you too. You’d think someone would have noticed something.”
He blew his nose, recovering his composure. “I don’t think so. Police never said anything to us.”
“Well, I’ve taken up enough of your time and I’m sorry I’ve caused you so much distress. I’d like to go through the house and assess the fire damage if you don’t mind. One of our adjusters has already been through, but I’ll need to see for myself so I can make my report.”
He nodded. “My neighbor has a key. Orris Snyder right next door. You go knock on his door and tell him I said it was all right.”
I got up and held my hand out to him. “Thanks for talking to me.”
Leonard got to his feet automatically and shook my hand. His grip was solid, his flesh almost feverishly hot.
“By the way,” I said as if it had just occurred to me, “have you heard from Elaine Boldt lately?”
He focused on me, apparently perplexed by the reference.
“Elaine? No, why?”
“I was trying to get in touch with her on another matter and I realized she lived in that condominium right next door,” I replied with ease. “Someone mentioned that she was a friend of yours.”
“That’s right. We used to play bridge together before Marty died. I haven’t talked to her for months. She’s usually in Florida this time of year, I believe.”
“Oh, that’s right. I think somebody else mentioned that. Well, maybe she’ll call when she gets back,” I said. “Thanks again.”
By the time I got back out to my car again, both my armpits were ringed with sweat.
Chapter 10
It was now nearly three o’clock and I was feeling frazzled. I’d been up since two A.M. with just a brief time-out for sleep at dawn before the long-distance call from Mrs. Ochsner had wakened me. I couldn’t face the office again, so I headed for my apartment and changed into my running clothes. I use the word apartment here in its loosest sense. Actually I live in a converted one-car garage, maybe fifteen feet square, tricked out as living room, bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, closet, and laundry facility. I’ve always liked living in small spaces. For months as a child, just after my parents were killed, I spent my spare time in a cardboard box that I filled with pillows and pretended was a sailing vessel on its way to some new land. It doesn’t take an analyst to interpret this excursion on my part, but it’s carried over into my adult life, manifesting itself now in all sorts of things. I drive small cars and I favor “littleness” in any form, so this place suits me exactly. For two hundred dollars a month I have everything I want, including a debonair eighty-one-year-old landlord named Henry Pitts.
I peered in his back window on my way out, and spotted him in the kitchen rolling out puff pastry dough. He’s a former commercial baker who supplements his social security these days doing up breads and sweets, which he sells to or trades with local merchants. I tapped on the glass and he motioned me in. Henry is what I like to think of as an octogenarian “hunk,” tall and lean with close-cropped white hair and eyes that are periwinkle blue, full of curiosity. Age has boiled him down to a concentrate, all male, compassionate and prudent and wry. I can’t say that the years have invested him with spirituality, or infused him with any special wisdom, second sight, profundity, or depth. I mean, let’s not overstate the case here. He was smart enough when he first started out and age hasn’t diminished that a whit. Despite the fifty years’ difference in our ages, there’s nothing of the pundit in his attitude toward me, and nothing (I hope) of the postulant in my attitude toward him. We simply eye one another across that half a century with a lively and considerable sexual interest that neither of us would dream of acting out.