Murder on the Aisle

7

9:23 P.M.

For all the cops-and-robbers movies he’d reviewed, Tobin had to admit he didn’t know much about actual police procedure.

What seemed like dozens of men and women, some in suits, some in white lab smocks, some in uniforms, came and went in his dressing room. Some knelt and did inscrutable things to various pieces of furniture (dusting for prints? looking for pieces of fabric?); some moved among the dozens of onlookers from the show and asked quiet and seemingly routine questions; and some had what appeared to be an arsenal of tools — flashlights, tiny whisk brooms, tape measures.

Tobin watched a great deal of all this backward at his dressing table, where he sat with a water glass half-filled with bourbon Frank Emory had supplied him. He had been told by the detective in charge, a perpetually amused kind of guy named Huggins, to “please wait right here.” There had been no mistaking the way he’d meant “please” — as an order.

So now he sat watching as, miraculously, the half-filled glass became one-third, then one-quarter gone. He just sat and stared at it, scarcely conscious he was emptying it. He was trying to figure out how to feel. Or, more precisely, what to feel. In books, shock victims were always said to feel “unreal,” in a dreamlike state. Then he sure wasn’t in shock because everything was too real, from the puddles of blood surrounding Richard Dunphy’s covered body to the tart odors of the various bottles and flasks and vials the police people used in their investigation.

Something made him raise his eyes and then he saw her. Jane Dunphy.

She stood in the doorway, taller than the two uniformed policemen in front of her, gazing inside with a curiously beatific expression. She looked younger, sadder, and more vulnerable than he’d ever seen her, as if she’d cracked completely, then been put painstakingly back together.

Then her eyes raised from the body of her dead husband and fell on Tobin’s in the mirror. They stared at each other a moment and then she eased herself past the two cops and came into the room.

When she reached the body, she paused. Then she walked around it as if she’d somehow convinced herself it wasn’t there in the first place.

When she reached him, she put a hand on his shoulder and startled him by laughing. “My God, Tobin, this isn’t a joke or something, is it?”

He looked at her carefully. “No. No, it isn’t a joke.”

“He’s dead?”

“I’m afraid he is.”

“My God.”

“Maybe you’d better go over there and sit down.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Right now there’s nothing to say.”

Now that he saw her tears, the reality of the moment seized him.

He started to take her hand, and then instantly realized that — no, that was the worst thing he could do.

An image of Sarah Nichols screaming “My God, Tobin’s killed him!” cut through his confusion.

A good policeman — hell, the dumbest policeman in the world — would get suspicious if he saw a suspect holding the hand of the deceased’s widow.

He stopped himself.

She said, in control of herself now, “I need to ask a question.”

“What?”

“Did you do it?”

“My God,” he said. “Are you serious?”

He searched her face for an unlikely hint of humor but of course there was none.

She was serious. Quite serious.

“No,” he said. “No I didn’t kill him.”

He watched as relief brightened her eyes. “Oh, thank God, Tobin. Thank God.”

Then she did the very last thing he wanted her to do in this circumstance: She bent over and took his face in her lovely hands and kissed him. Not on the mouth, true, but gently, gently, a familiar kiss and not in any way a casual kiss.

Which was just when Detective Huggins appeared, as if by magic, and stood by them.

He was there watching as Jane took her warm, teary face from Tobin’s. Watching carefully.

“You told me, Mrs. Dunphy, that you and Tobin here were old friends. I guess I just didn’t know how friendly.”

An eavesdropping uniformed cop smiled to himself. Apparently part of Huggins’s act was to provide snappy patter to keep the interrogations from getting dull.

Jane did just what Huggins wanted her to do. Got flustered. “We’re friends — good friends — we’ve known each other since college — we—”

Huggins held up a hand. “It’s fine. I understand.” He managed to put just the right amount of smirk in his voice. Not enough so you could accuse him of smirking but enough that he annoyed you.

Now he moved closer to Tobin and all of a sudden Tobin knew why he’d disliked the man instantly. Huggins reminded him of Frog Face McGraw, the eighth grade’s most notorious bully. In addition to cracking Tobin across the naked ass with a whip-like towel, in addition to sneaking up behind Tobin and shouting so loudly in his ears that Tobin was literally lifted several inches off the ground, in addition to taking his new Schwinn and “hiding” it until he finally got tired of the gag and gave it back, in addition to all the garden-variety bully numbers, Frog Face had specialized in humiliating guys in front of girls. The longer he looked at Huggins, the more resemblance Tobin saw — this was Frog Face twenty-five years later, a chunky if not quite fat body, sleek dark hair (though beginning to thin), a face that managed to be almost fascinating in an ugly way, and an easy laugh for someone else’s grief. Now, confirming Tobin’s suspicions that he was Frog Face reincarnated, Huggins said, “I thought show-biz people were cutting out all that kissy-face stuff. With all the diseases around.”

“It wasn’t kissy-face,” Jane said, her face exploding into a blush. “We’re...”

Tobin stood up from his chair. Touched her hand. “He’s just trying to rattle us. Don’t give him the satisfaction.”

“You were about to say something, Mrs. Dunphy. You were about to say, ‘We’re...’ I believe you were going to explain your relationship to Tobin here.”

“We’re friends, that’s all I was going to say. We’re friends.”

“I see.” He looked at them and his dark eyes, nearly as shiny as his hair, became ironic again. “Friends. Yes.” Then he said, “There’s a lunchroom downstairs, Mr. Tobin. I wonder if you’d meet me down there in ten minutes.” He indicated the crowd of police officials in the room. “This isn’t a good place to talk.”

Tobin waited for a smart remark. When none came, he said, “Ten minutes. All right.”

Huggins turned to go and then said, “I know what good friends are, Mrs. Dunphy, but I’d really like to talk to Tobin alone.” He smiled. “You can get back to your personal business later tonight.”

She flushed again.