The Best American Mystery Stories 2001

Clark Howard Under Suspicion

From Ellery Quern’s Mystery Magazine

Frank Dell walked into the Three Corners Club shortly after five, as he usually did every day, and took a seat at the end of the bar. The bartender, seeing him, put together, without being told, a double Tanqueray over two ice cubes with two large olives, and set it in front of him on a cork coaster. Down at the middle of the bar, Dell saw two minor stickup men he remembered from somewhere and began staring at them without touching his drink. Frank Dell’s stare was glacial and unblinking. After three disconcerting minutes of it, the two stickup men paid for their drinks and left. Only then did Dell lift his own glass.

Tim Callan, the club owner, came over and sat opposite Dell. “Well, I see you just cost me a couple more customers, Frankie,” he said wryly.

“Hoodlums,” Dell replied. “I’m just helping you keep the place respectable, Timmy.”

“Bring some of your policemen buddies in to drink,” Callan suggested. “That’ll keep me respectable and profitable.”

“You’re not hurting for profits,” Dell said. “Not with that after-hours poker game you run in the apartment upstairs.”

Callan laughed. “Ah, Frankie, Frankie. Been quick with the answers all your life. You should’ve been a lawyer. Even my old dad, rest his soul, used to say that.”

“I’m not crooked enough to be a lawyer,” Dell said, sipping his drink.

“Not crooked enough! Hell, you’re not crooked at all, Frankie. You’re probably the straightest cop in Chicago.” Callan leaned forward on one elbow. “How long we known each other, Frank?”

“What’s on your mind, Tim?” Dell asked knowingly. Reminiscing, he had learned, frequently led to other things.

“We go back thirty years, do you realize that, Frank?” Callan replied, ignoring Dell’s suspicion. “First grade at St. Mel’s school out on the West Side.”

“What’s on your mind, Tim?” Dell’s expression hardened just a hint. He hated asking the same question twice.

“Remember my baby sister, Francie?” Callan asked, lowering his voice.

“Sure. Cute little kid. Carrot-red hair. Freckles. Eight or ten years younger than us.”

“Nine. She’s twenty-seven now. She married this Guinea a few years ago, name of Nicky Santore. They moved up to Milwaukee where the guy’s uncle got him a job in a brewery. Well, they started having problems. You know the greaseballs, they’re all Don Juans, chasing broads all the time—”

“Get to the point, Tim,” said Dell. He hated embellishment.

“OK. Francie left him and came back to live with my brother, Dennis — you know him, the fireman. Anyhow, after she got back, she found out she’s expecting. Then Nicky finds out, and he comes back too. Guy begs Francie to take him back, and she does. Now, the only job he can get down here is pumping gas at a Texaco station, which only pays minimum wage. He’s worried about doctor bills and everything with the baby coming, so he agrees, for a cut, to let a cousin of his use the station storeroom to stash hot goods. It works OK for a while, but then the cousin gets busted and leads the cops to the station. They find a load of laptop computers. Nick gets charged with receiving stolen property. He comes up for a preliminary hearing in three weeks.”

“Tough break,” Dell allowed, sipping again. “But he should get probation if he’s got no priors.”

“He’s got a prior,” Callan said, looking down at the bar.

“What is it?”

“Burglary. Him and that same cousin robbed some hotel rooms down at the Hilton when they was working as bellmen. Years ago. Both of them got probation on that.”

“Then he’s looking at one-to-four on this fall,” Dell said.

Callan swallowed. “Can you help me out on this, Frankie?”

Dell gave him the stare. “You don’t mean help you, Tim. You mean help Nicky Santore. What do you think I can do?”

“Give your personal voucher for him.”

“Are you serious? You want me to go to an assistant state’s attorney handling an RSP case and personally vouch for some Guinea with a prior that I don’t even know?”

“Frank, it’s for Francie—”

“No, it isn’t. If Francie was charged, I’d get her off in a heartbeat. But it’s not Francie; it’s some two-bit loser she married.”

“Frank, please, listen—”

“No. Forget it.”

There was a soft buzzing signal from the pager clipped to Dell’s belt. Reaching under his coat, he got it out and looked at it. It was a 911 page from the Lakeside station house out on the South Side, where he was assigned.

“I have to answer this,” he told Callan. Taking a cellular phone from his coat pocket, he opened it and dialed one of the station house’s unlisted numbers. When someone answered, he said, “This is Dell. I got a nine-one-one page.”

“Yeah, it’s Captain Larne. Hold on.”

A moment later, an older, huskier voice spoke. “Dell? Mike Larne. Where’s Dan?” He was asking about Dan Malone, Dell’s partner, a widower in his fifties.

“Probably at home,” Dell told the captain. “I dropped him off there less than an hour ago. What’s up, Cap?”

“Edie Malone was found dead in her apartment a little while ago. It looks like she’s been strangled.”

Dell said nothing. He froze, absolutely still, the little phone at his ear. Edie was Dan’s only child.

“Dell? Did you hear me?”

“Yessir, I heard you. Captain, I can’t tell him—”

“You won’t have to. The department chaplain and Dan’s parish priest get that dirty job. What I want you to do is help me keep Dan from going off the deep end over this. You know how he is. We can’t have him going wild thinking he’ll solve this himself.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“I’m going to assign you temporary duty to the homicide team working the case. If Dan knows you’re on it, he might stay calm. Understand where I’m coming from?”

“Yessir.” Dell was still frozen, motionless.

“Take down this address,” Larne said. Dell animated, taking a small spiral notebook and ballpoint from his shirt pocket. He wrote down the address Larne gave him. “The homicide boys have only been there a little while. Kenmare and Garvan. Know them?”

“Yeah, Kenmare, slightly. They know I’m coming?”

“Absolutely. This has all been cleared with headquarters.” Larne paused a beat, then said, “You knew the girl, did you?”

“Yessir.”

“Well,” Larne sighed heavily, “I hate to do this to you, Frank—”

“It’s all right, Cap. I understand.”

“Call me at home later.”

“Right.”

Dell closed the phone and slipped it back into his pocket. He walked away from the bar and out of the club without another word to Tim Callan.

Edie Malone’s address was one of the trendy new apartment buildings remodeled from old commercial high-rises on the near North Side. The sixth floor had been cordoned off to permit only residents of that floor to exit the elevator, and they were required to go directly to their apartments. Edie Malone’s apartment was posted as a crime scene. In addition to homicide detectives Kenmare and Garvan, there were half a dozen uniformed officers guarding the hallways and stairwells, personnel from the city crime lab in the apartment itself, and a deputy coroner and Cook County morgue attendants waiting to transport the victim to the county hospital complex for autopsy.

When Frank Dell arrived, Kenmare and Garvan took him into the bedroom to view the body. Edie Malone was wearing a white cotton sweatshirt with MONICA FOR PRESIDENT lettered on it, and a pair of cutoff denim shorts. Barefoot, she was lying on her back, elbows bent, hands a few inches from her ears, feet apart as if she were resting, with her long, dark red hair splayed out on the white shag carpet like spilled paint. Her eyes were wide open in a bloated face, the neck below it ringed with ugly purplish bruises. Looking at her, Dell had to blink back tears.

“I guess you knew her, your partner’s daughter and all,” said Kenmare. Dell nodded.

“Who found her?”

“Building super,” said Garvan. “She didn’t show up for work today and didn’t answer the phone when her boss called. Then a coworker got nervous about it and told the boss that the victim had just broken up with a guy who she was afraid was going to rough her up over it. They finally came over and convinced the super to take a look in the apartment. The boss and the coworker were down in his office when we got here. We questioned them briefly, then sent them home. They’ve been instructed not to talk about it until after we see them tomorrow.”

The three detectives went into the kitchen and sat at Edie’s table, where the two from homicide continued to share their notes with Dell.

“Coroner guy says she looks like she’s been dead sixteen, eighteen hours, which would mean sometime late last night, early this morning,” said Garvan.

“She worked for Able, Bennett, and Crain Advertising Agency in the Loop,” said Kenmare, then paused, adding, “Maybe you know some of this stuff already, from your partner.”

Dell shook his head. “Dan and his daughter hadn’t been close for a while. He didn’t approve of Edie’s lifestyle. He and his wife had saved for years to send her to the University of Chicago so she could become a teacher, but then Dan’s wife died, and a little while after that Edie quit school and moved out to be on her own. Dan didn’t talk much about her after that.”

“But Captain Larne still thinks Dan might jump ranks and try to work the case himself?”

“Sure.” Dell shrugged. “She was still his daughter, his only kid.”

“OK,” Kenmare said, “we’ll give you everything, then. Her boss was a Ronald Deever, one of the ad agency execs. The coworker who tipped him about the ex-boyfriend is a copywriter named Sally Simms.”

“Did she know the guy’s name?” Dell asked.

“Yeah.” Kenmare flipped a page in his notebook. “Bob Pilcher. He’s some kind of redneck. Works as a bouncer at one of those line-dancing clubs over in Hee-Haw town. The Simms woman met him a couple times on double dates with the victim.” He closed his notebook. “That’s it so far.”

“Where do we go from here?” Dell asked.

Kenmare and Garvan exchanged glances. “We haven’t figured that out yet,” said the former. “You’ve been assigned by a district captain, with headquarters approval and a nod from our own commander, and the victim is the daughter of a veteran cop who’s your senior partner. We’ll be honest, Dell: We’re not sure what your agenda is here.”

Dell shook his head. “No agenda,” he said. “I’m here to make it look good to Dan Malone so he’ll get through this thing as calmly as possible. But it’s your case. You two tell me what I can do to help and I’ll do it. Or I’ll just stand around and watch, if that’s how you want it. Your call.”

Kenmare and Garvan looked at each other for a moment, then both nodded. “OK,” said Kenmare, “we can live with that. We’ll work together on it.” The two homicide detectives shook hands with Dell, the first time they had done so. Then Kenmare, who was the senior officer, said, “Let’s line it up. First thing is to toss the bedroom as soon as the body is out and the crime lab guys are done. Maybe we’ll get lucky, find a diary, love letters, stuff like that. You do the bedroom, Frank. You knew her; you might tumble to something that we might not think was important. While you’re doing that, we’ll work this floor, the one above, and the one below, canvassing the neighbors. We’ll have uniforms working the other floors. Then we’ll regroup.”

With that agreed to, the detectives split up.

It was after ten when they got back together.

“Bedroom?” asked Kenmare. Dell handed him a small red address book.

“Just this. Looks like it might be old. Lot of neighborhood names where Dan still lives. None of the new telephone exchanges in it.”

“That’s it?”

“Everything else looks normal to me.” Dell nodded. “Clothes, makeup, couple of paperback novels, Valium and birth-control pills in the medicine cabinet, that kind of stuff. But I’d feel better if one of you guys would do a follow-up toss.”

“Good idea.” Kenmare motioned to Garvan, who went into the bedroom.

“Neighbors?” Dell asked.

“Zilch,” said Kenmare.

Kenmare and Dell cruised the living room and small kitchen, studying everything again, until Garvan came back out of the bedroom and announced, “It’s clean.” Then the men sat back down at the kitchen table.

“Let’s line up tomorrow,” Kenmare said. “Dell, you and I will work together, and I’ll have Garvan sit in on the autopsy; he can also work some of the names in the address book by phone before and after. You and I will go see Ronald Deever and Sally Simms at the ad agency, maybe interview some of the other employees there also. We need to track down this guy Pilcher, too. Let’s meet at seven for breakfast and see if there’s anything we need to do before that. Frank, there’s a little diner called Wally’s just off Thirteenth and State. We can eat, then walk over to headquarters and set up a temporary desk for you in our bullpen.”

“Sounds good,” Dell said.

Kenmare left a uniformed officer at the door to Edie Malone’s apartment, one at each end of the sixth-floor hallway, one at the elevator, and two in the lobby. When the detectives parted outside, Dell drove back to the South Side, where he lived. When he got into his own apartment, a little after midnight, he called Mike Larne at home.

“It’s Dell, Captain,” he said when Larne answered sleepily.

“How’s it look?” Larne asked.

“Not good,” Dell told him. “Only one possible lead so far: an ex-boyfriend who threatened to slap her around. We’ll start doing some deeper work on it tomorrow.”

“Was she raped?”

“Didn’t look like it.”

“Thank God for that much.”

“I’ll let you know for sure after the autopsy.”

“All right. How’s it setting with Kenmare and Garvan? You getting any resistance?”

“No, it’s fine. They’re OK. They’re giving me a temp desk downtown tomorrow. What’s the word on Dan?”

“The poor man is completely undone. The chaplain and the parish priest managed to get him drunk and put him to bed. Jim Keenan and some of the other boys are staying at the house until Dan’s sisters arrive from Florida. Listen, you get some sleep. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“OK, Cap.”

Dell hung up and went directly to the cabinet where he kept his bottle of gin.

At the Able, Bennett, and Crain advertising agency the next day, on the fortieth floor of a Loop building, Kenmare sat in Ronald Deever’s private office to interview him while Dell talked with Sally Simms in a corner of the firm’s coffee room. Sally was a pert blonde who wrote copy for a dental products account. She told Dell that Edie Malone had been employed by the agency for about eight months as a receptionist and was well liked by everyone she worked with. Sally had double-dated with her half a dozen times, twice with the man named Bob Pilcher.

“He’s from North Carolina, a heavy smoker,” she said. “That was the main reason Edie quit going out with him; she didn’t like smokers. Said kissing them was like licking an ashtray.”

“What’s the name of the club where he works?” Dell asked.

“It’s called Memphis City Limits. Kind of a hillbilly joint. Over on Fullerton near Halsted.”

“What made you tell your boss that you were afraid Pilcher might rough Edie up?”

“That’s what Edie told me. She said Bob told her he wasn’t used to women dumping him, and maybe she just needed a little slapping around to get her act together. Edie wasn’t sure he meant it, but I was. I mean, this is one of those guys that doesn’t just walk, he struts. And he wears those real tight Wranglers to show off his package. Got real wavy hair with one little curl always down on his forehead. Ask me, he’s definitely the kind would slap a woman around. I told Edie she was better off sticking with guys like Bart Mason.”

“Who’s he?” Dell asked.

“Bart? He’s a nice young exec works for the home office of an insurance company down on twenty-two. They dated for a while, then broke up when Edie started seeing someone else.”

“Who did she start seeing?”

Sally shrugged. “I don’t know. She went out a lot.”

“Have you told Bart Mason that Edie’s dead?”

“Why, no. That detective in Ron Deever’s office told both of us not to mention it.”

“We appreciate that you didn’t,” Dell said. “Besides this Bart Mason, do you know of any other men in the building that Edie went out with?”

“No,” Sally said, shaking her head.

Just then, Kenmare came into the room. He said nothing, not wishing to interrupt the flow of Dell’s interview. But Dell rose, saying, “OK, thanks very much, Miss Simms. We’ll be in touch if we need anything else.”

“Do I still have to not talk about it?” Sally asked.

“No, you can talk about it now. It’ll be in the afternoon papers anyway. But don’t call Bart Mason yet. We want to talk to him first.” When Sally left the room, Dell said to Kenmare, “Bart Mason, guy works for an insurance company down on twenty-two, used to date Edie. Supposedly doesn’t know she’s dead yet.”

“Let’s see,” said Kenmare.

Going down in the elevator, Dell asked, “Anything with Deever?”

“Nothing interesting.”

The insurance company occupied the entire twenty-second floor, and the detectives had a receptionist show them to Bart Mason’s office without announcing them. Once there, Kenmare thanked her and closed the door behind them. They identified themselves and Kenmare said, “Mr. Mason, do you know a woman named Edie Malone?”

“Sure. She works for an ad agency up on forty,” Mason said. “We used to date.” He was a pleasant-looking young man, neat as a drill instructor. “Why, what’s the matter?”

“She was found murdered in her apartment.”

“Edie?” The color drained from Bart Mason’s face, and his eyes widened almost to bulging. “I don’t believe it—”

“Can you tell us your whereabouts for the last forty-eight hours, Mr. Mason?”

Mason was staring incredulously at them. “Edie — murdered—?”

“We need to know where you’ve been for the last couple of days,” Kenmare said.

“What? Oh, sure—” Mason picked up his phone and dialed a three-number extension. When his call was answered, he said, “Jenny, will you come over to my office right away? It’s important.”

“Who’s that?” Dell asked when Mason hung up.

“My fiancée. Jenny Paula. She works over in claims. We live together. We’re together all the time: eat breakfast together, come to work together, eat lunch, go home, eat dinner, sleep together. We haven’t been apart since a week ago Sunday when Jen went to spend the day with her mother.” He took a deep breath. “My God, Edie—”

A pretty young woman, Italian-looking, came into the office. She looked curiously at the two detectives. Mason introduced them.

“They need to know my whereabouts for the last few days,” he said.

“But why?” she asked.

“Just tell them where I’ve been, hon.”

Jenny shrugged. “With me.”

“All the time?” asked Kenmare.

“Yes, all the time.”

“Like I said, we do everything together,” Mason reiterated. “We work together, shop for groceries together, stay in or go out together, we even shower together.”

“Bart!” Jenny Paula said, chagrined. “What’s this all about anyway?”

“I’ll explain later. Can she go now, Officers?”

“Sure,” said Kenmare. “Thank you, Miss Paula.” She left, somewhat piqued, and Kenmare said to Mason, “We may need to talk to her again, in a little more depth.”

“We’re both available anytime,” Mason assured him.

“How long did you date Edie Malone?” Dell asked.

“About six months, I guess.”

“Were you intimate?”

“Sure.” Mason shrugged.

“When did you break up?”

“Late last summer sometime. Around Labor Day, I think.”

“What caused you to break up?”

“Edie began seeing someone else. I didn’t like it. So I split with her.”

“Do you know who she started seeing?”

“Yeah. Ron Deever, her boss upstairs at the ad agency.”

Dell and Kenmare exchanged quick glances. They continued to question Mason for several more minutes, then got his apartment address and left.

On the way back up to the fortieth floor, an annoyed Kenmare, referring to Ron Deever, said, “That son of a bitch. He never mentioned once that he went out with her. I think I’ll haul his ass in and take a formal statement.”

“He’ll lawyer up on you,” Dell predicted.

“Let him.”

When they got back to Able, Bennett, and Crain, Kenmare went into Ron Deever’s office again while Dell took Sally Simms back into the coffee room.

“Did you know that Edie Malone had dated Ron Deever?” he asked bluntly. Sally lowered her eyes.

“Yes.”

“I asked you if you knew of any other men in the building that Edie had gone out with and you said no. Why did you lie?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, her hands beginning to tremble. “Look, this guy is my boss. I’m a single parent with a little boy in day care. I didn’t want to take a chance of losing my job.” She started tearing up. “First thing he asked me after you left was whether I told you about him and Edie.”

“Why was he so concerned?”

“He’s married.”

“Did Edie know that when she was seeing him?”

“Sure. It was no big thing for her.”

Dell sighed quietly. Reaching out, he patted the young woman’s trembling hands. “Okay. Relax. I’ll make sure Deever knows it wasn’t you who told us. But if I have to question you again, don’t lie to me about anything. Understand?”

“Sure.” Sally dabbed at her eyes with a paper napkin. “Listen, thanks.”

Dell sent her back to work and went into Deever’s office, where Kenmare was reading the riot act to him.

“What the hell do you think this is, a TV show? This is a homicide investigation, Mister! When you withhold relevant information, you’re obstructing justice!” He turned to Dell. “He’s married. That’s why he didn’t come clean.”

“I just chewed out Miss Simms, too,” Dell said. “Told her how much trouble she could get into covering for him.”

“All right,” said Kenmare, “we’re going to start all over, Mr. Deever, and I want the full and complete truth this time.”

A shaky Ron Deever nodded compliance.

When they got back to the squad room, Garvan was waiting for them and a spare desk had been set up for Dell.

“She wasn’t raped or otherwise sexually assaulted,” he reported. “Cause of death was strangulation — from behind. Coroner fixed time of death at between nine at night and one in the morning. Best bet: between eleven and midnight.” He tossed Edie’s address book onto the desk. “You were right about this, Dell: It’s old. Some of these people haven’t seen or heard from her in three or four years. The ones who have couldn’t tell me anything about her personal life. You guys make out?”

“Not really,” said Kenmare. “We’ve got one guy who could have slipped out while his fiancée was asleep and gone over and done it — but it’s not likely. Another guy, married, was at his son’s basketball game earlier in the evening, then at home with his family out in Arlington Heights the rest of the night. One of us will have to go out and interview his wife on that this afternoon.”

“I’ll do it,” Garvan said. “I need the fresh air after that autopsy. Oh, I almost forgot.” He tossed five telephone messages to Dell. “These were forwarded from Lakeside. Three are from your partner, two from your captain.”

“If you need some privacy to return the calls,” Kenmare said, “Garvan and I can go for coffee.”

Dell shook his head. “Nothing I can’t say in front of you guys. You both know the situation.” He could tell by their expressions, as he dialed Mike Larne’s number first, that they were pleased at not being excluded. “It’s Dell, Captain,” he said when Larne answered. “I told you I’d check in when I had the autopsy results. Edie wasn’t raped or anything like that. Somebody strangled her from behind, between nine Tuesday night and one on Wednesday morning.” He listened for a moment, then said, “Couple of soft leads, is all. Very soft.” Then: “Yeah, he’s called me three times. I guess I better get back to him.”

When he finished his call to Larne, Dell dialed Dan Malone’s home. The phone was answered on the third ring. “Hello.”

“Yeah, who’s this?” Dell asked.

“Who are you?” the voice asked back.

“Frank Dell. Is that you, Keenan?”

“Oh, Frank. Yeah, it’s me. Sorry, I didn’t recognize your voice. How’s it going?”

“Very slow. Dan’s been calling me, I guess. How is he?”

“Thrashed, inside and out. But the boys and me have him under control. And his two sisters are here with him. He’s sleeping right now. It means a lot to him that you’re working the case, Frank. He’s got a couple of names that he wants checked: old boyfriends of Edie’s that he didn’t like. Wasn’t for you being on the case, he’d probably be out doing it hisself. Pistol-whipping them, maybe.”

“You have the names?”

“Yeah, he wrote them down here by the phone.” Dell took down the names and told Keenan to tell Dan that he’d see him tomorrow with a full report of the case’s progress. After he hung up, he handed the names to Kenmare. “Old boyfriends,” he said.

Kenmare gave them to Garvan. “Start a check on them before you go out to interview Deever’s wife. Frank and I are going out to that line-dancing joint — it’s called Memphis City Limits — to interview Bob Pilcher. We’ll meet back here at end of shift.”

Memphis City Limits did not have live music until after seven, but even in midafternoon there was a jukebox playing country-and-western and a few people on the dance floor around which the club was laid out. It was a big barn of a building that had once been a wholesale furniture outlet, then remained vacant for several years until some entrepreneurial mind decided there might be a profit in a club catering to the area’s large influx of Southerners come north to find work.

Dell and Kenmare found Bob Pilcher drinking beer at a table with two cowgirl types and a beefy man in a lumberjack shirt. Identifying themselves, Kenmare asked if they could speak with Pilcher in private to ask him a few questions. Pilcher shook his head.

“Anything you want to ask me about Edie Malone, do it right here in front of witnesses.”

“What makes you think it’s about Edie Malone?” Kenmare asked.

“No other reason for you to be talking to me. Story’s been on TV news all morning about her being murdered.” Pilcher spoke with a heavily accented drawl that sounded purposefully exaggerated.

“When did you see her last?” Dell asked.

“ ’Bout a week ago.” He winked at Dell. “She was alive, too.”

“Can you account for your time during the past seventy-two hours?” Kenmare wanted to know, expanding the time period more than he had to because of Pilcher’s attitude.

“Most of it, I reckon,” Pilcher replied. “I’m here ever’ day ’cept Sundays from no later than six of an evening to closing time at two A.M. Usually I’m here an hour or two before six, as you can see today. As for the rest of my time, you’d have to give me specific times and I’d see what I could come up with.” His expression hardened a little. “Tell you one thing, though, boys, you wasting good po-lice time on me. I didn’t off the gal.”

“We have reason to believe you slapped her around now and then,” Dell tried.

“So what if I did?” Pilcher challenged. “You can’t arrest me for that: She’s dead, fellers, hell!” He took a long swallow of beer. “Anyways, one of the reasons women like me is that I treat ‘em rough. That one wasn’t no different.”

“So you did slap her around?”

“Yeah, I did,” Pilcher defied him, lighting a cigarette. “Go on and do something about it if you can.”

“Where can we find your employer,” Kenmare asked, “to verify that you’ve been here the last three nights?”

Pilcher smiled what was really a nasty half-smirk. “So she was offed at night, huh? For sure you’ll have to pin it on somebody else.” He nodded across the club. “Manager’s office is that door to the right of the bar.”

Pilcher blew smoke rings at the two detectives as they left him at the table with his friends and sought out the club manager. He confirmed that Pilcher had indeed been on duty from at least six until two every night since the club had been closed the previous Sunday.

“Brother, would I like to nail that hillbilly for this,” Kenmare groused as they walked back to their car. “I’d plant evidence to get that son of a bitch.”

“So would I,” Dell admitted. “Only there’s no evidence to plant. Anyway, the timeline doesn’t jibe. A second-year law student could get him off.”

When they got back to the squad room, Garvan had already returned. “Struck out,” he announced. “Deever’s wife puts him at home from about ten-thirty, after their son’s basketball game, until the next morning about eight when he left for work.” He turned to Dell. “And those two boyfriends your partner didn’t like: One of them’s in the navy stationed on Okinawa; the other’s married, lives in Oregon, hasn’t been out of that state since last July. You guys?”

“Pilcher’s a scumbag, but his alibi’s tight,” Kenmare said. He looked at his watch. “Let’s call it a day. Thursday’s a big night for my wife and me,” he told Dell. “We get a sitter, go out for Chinese, and see a movie.”

Dell just nodded, but Garvan said, “Go see a good cop picture tonight. Something with Bruce Willis in it. Maybe you can pick up some tips on how to be a detective.”

“Up yours, you perennial rookie,” Kenmare said, and left.

Garvan turned to Dell. “Buy you a drink, Lakeside?”

“Why not?” said Dell. “Lead the way, Homicide.”

At two o’clock the next morning, Dell was in his car, parked at the alley entrance to the rear parking lot of the Memphis City Limits club. He was wearing dark trousers and a black windbreaker, and had black Nikes on his feet. Both hands were gloved, and he wore a wool navy watch cap low on his forehead, and a dark scarf around his neck. The fuse for the interior lights on his car had been removed.

He had been there for half an hour, watching as the last patrons of the night exited the club, got into their vehicles, and left. By ten past two, there were only a few cars left, belonging to club employees who were straggling out to go home. The lot was not particularly well lit, but the rear door to the club was, so it was easy for Dell to distinguish people as they left.

It was a quarter past two when Bob Pilcher came out and swaggered across the parking lot toward a Dodge Ram pickup. Dell got out of his car without the light going on and, in his Nikes, walked briskly, silently toward him from the left rear, tying the scarf over his lower face as he went. When he was within arm’s length of Pilcher, he said, “Hey, stud.”

Pilcher turned, a half-smile starting, and Dell cracked him across the face with a leather-covered lead sap. He heard part of Pilcher’s face crack. Catching him before he dropped to the ground, Dell dragged the unconscious man around the truck, out of sight of the club’s back door. Dropping him, he rolled him over, face-down. Pulling both arms above his head, he pressed each of Pilcher’s palms, in turn, against the asphalt, held each down at the wrist, and with the sap used short, snapping blows to systematically break the top four finger knuckles and top thumb knuckle of each hand. Then he walked quickly back to the alley, got into his car, and drove away. The whole thing had taken less than two minutes.

Be a long time before you slap another woman around, he thought grimly as he left. Or even hold a toothbrush.

Then he thought: That was for you, Edie.

The next day, Dell went to be with Dan Malone when he came to the funeral parlor to see Edie in her casket for the first time. The undertaker had picked up her body when the coroner was through with it, and one of Edie’s aunts and two cousins had gone to Marshall Field’s and bought her a simple mauve dress to be laid out in.

There were a number of aunts, uncles, cousins, and other collateral family members in attendance when the slumber room was opened, and groups of neighbors gathered outside, easily outnumbered by groups of police officers, in uniform and out, who had known Dan Malone for all or part of his thirty-two years on the force and had come from half the police districts in the city to offer their condolences.

Dell was shocked by the sight of Dan when the grieving man arrived. He looked as if he had aged ten years in the three days since Dell had seen him. A couple of male relatives helped him out of the car and were assisting him in an unsteady walk toward the entrance when Dan’s eyes fell on Dell and he pulled away, insisting on a moment with his partner. Dell hurried to him, the two men embraced, then stepped up close to the building where people cleared a space for them to speak privately.

“Did you find those two bastards Keenan gave you the names of?” Dan asked hoarsely.

“Yeah, Dan, but they’re clean,” Dell told him. “They’re not even around anymore.”

“Are you sure? I never liked either one of ‘em.”

“They’re clean, Dan. I promise you. Listen,” Dell said to placate him, speaking close to his ear, “I did find one guy. He’s clean for the killing, but he’d slapped Edie around a couple of times.”

“The son of a bitch. Who is he?” The older man’s teary eyes became fiery with rage.

“It’s OK, Dan. I already took care of it.”

“You did? What’d you do?”

“Fixed his hands. With a sap.”

“Good, good.” Malone wet his dry, whiskey-puffed lips. “I knew I could count on you, Frankie. Listen, come on inside and see my little girl.”

“You go in with your family, Dan. I’ve already seen her,” Dell lied. He had no intention of looking at Edie Malone’s body again.

Dell gestured and several relatives hurried over to get Dan. Then Dell returned to a group of policemen that included Mike Larne, a couple of lieutenants, Keenan and other cronies of Dan’s, and a deputy commissioner. Larne put an arm around Dell’s shoulders.

“Whatever you said to him, Frank, it seemed to help.”

“I hope so,” Dell said. “Listen, Captain, I’m going to get back down to Homicide.”

“By all means,” said Larne. “Back to work, lad. Find the bastard who caused this heartache.”

In the days immediately following the funeral and burial of Edie Malone, the three detectives on the case worked and reworked the old leads, as well as a few new ones. A deputy state’s attorney, Ray Millard, was assigned to analyze and evaluate the evidence as they progressed. Disappointingly, there was little of a positive nature to analyze.

“It’s too soft,” Millard told them in their first meeting. He was a precise, intense young lawyer. “First, you’ve got the guy she worked for: older man, married, concealed the relationship when first questioned. Solid alibi for the hours just before, during, and after his son’s basketball game which he attended on the night of the murder. Decent alibi for the rest of the night: a statement by his wife that he was at home. He could have slipped out of his suburban home when everyone was asleep, driven into the city, and committed the crime — but why would he have done that, and who’s going to believe it?

“Second, you’ve got the good-guy ex-boyfriend. He’s well set up with a new girlfriend, and the two of them are practically joined at the hip: live together, work together, play together. Again, he could have slipped out of their apartment around midnight when his fiancée was asleep, gone to the Malone woman’s apartment, a relatively short distance away, and killed her. But again, why? Let’s remember that he dumped her, not the other way around. Soft, very soft.

“Third, bad-guy ex-boyfriend. The hillbilly bouncer.” Millard paused. “Incidentally, I understand that the night after you guys interviewed him, somebody jumped him outside the club and broke his nose, one cheekbone, and both hands. You guys heard anything about that?”

The detectives shrugged in unison, as if choreographed. “Doesn’t surprise me,” Kenmare said.

“Me either,” Dell agreed. “Scumbags like that always have people who don’t like them.”

“Well, anyway,” the young lawyer continued, “bad-guy boyfriend would be a beaut to get in court. I could try him in front of a jury of his relatives and probably get a death sentence — except for one thing: He’s got a home-free alibi on his job. No way he could have been away from the club long enough to go do it without his absence being noticed. He’s the bouncer; he’s got to be visible all the time.” Millard sat back and drummed his fingers. “Anything else cooking?”

Kenmare shook his head. “We’re back canvassing the neighbors again, but nothing so far. We had one little piece of excitement day before yesterday when a little old retired lady in the victim’s building said she’d heard that the building super had been fired from his last job for making lewd suggestions to female tenants. We checked it out and there was nothing to it. Turned out she was just ticked off at him for reporting her dog making a mess in the hallway a couple times.”

“Too bad,” Millard said. “The super would’ve made a good defendant. Had a key to her apartment, found the body, whole ball of wax. He alibied tight?”

“Very. Lives with his wife on two. They went to a movie, got home around eleven, went right to bed. He’s got a good rep — except for the little old lady with the dog.”

“Had to be somebody she knew,” Millard said. “No forced entry, no lock picked. No rape, no robbery. This was a personal crime. She let the guy in.” He tossed the file across the desk to Kenmare. “Find me that guy and we’ll stick the needle in his arm.”

The three detectives took off early and went to a small Loop bar, where they settled in a back booth. Dell could sense some tension but did not broach the subject. He knew Kenmare would get around to whatever it was.

“We’ve enjoyed having you work with us, Frank,” the senior detective finally said. “We had our doubts about your assignment, but it’s turned out OK.”

“Yeah, we had our doubts,” Garvan confirmed, “but it worked out fine.”

“I tried not to get in the way,” Dell said.

“Hey, you’ve been a lot of help,” Garvan assured him. “Got me away from this nag for a while,” he bobbed his chin at Kenmare.

“Listen to him,” the older man said. “Wasn’t for me, he’d be directing traffic at some school crossing.”

“What’s on your mind, boys?” Dell asked, deciding not to wait.

Kenmare sighed. “It’s a bit delicate, Frank.”

“I’m a big boy. Shoot.”

They both leaned toward him to emphasize confidentiality. “That first night in the apartment, you commented that Dan Malone and his daughter hadn’t been close for a while,” Kenmare recalled.

Garvan nodded. “You said he didn’t approve of her lifestyle.”

“You said he didn’t talk much about her after she quit college and went out on her own.”

Dell’s expression tightened and locked. “You’re getting very close to stepping over the wrong line,” he said evenly.

“I’m sorry you feel that way, Frank,” said Kenmare. “It’s a step that has to be taken.” He sat back. “You know as well as I do that if he wasn’t one of our own, he’d have been on the spot from day one. As soon as we decided there was no forced entry, no rape, no robbery, we would have included an estranged father in our investigation. But Garvan and me, we kept hoping that evidence would lead us to somebody else. Unfortunately, it hasn’t.”

“Look, Frank,” Garvan said in a placating tone, “it doesn’t have to be a complicated thing. It can be, like, informal.”

“Of course,” Kenmare agreed, his own voice also becoming appeasing. “Drop in on him. Have a drink. Engage him in casual conversation. And find out where he was during the critical hours, that’s all.”

“Sure,” said Garvan, “that’s all.”

Dell grunted quietly. Like it would be a walk in the park to handle a thirty-two-year veteran cop like that. He took a long swallow of his drink. His eyes shifted from Kenmare to Garvan and back again, then looked down at the table, where the fingers of one hand drummed silently. He did not speak for what seemed like a very long time. Finally Kenmare broke the silence.

“It’s either that way or it’ll have to be us, Frank. But it’s got to be done.”

With a sigh that came from deep inside of him, Dell nodded. “All right.”

The tension that permeated the booth should have dissipated with that, but it did not. Dell once again became, as he had been at the very beginning of the investigation, an outsider.

Dan Malone smiled when he opened the door and saw Dell.

“Ah, Frank. Come in, come in. Good to see you, partner. I’ve missed you.”

“Missed you too, Dan.”

They embraced briefly, and, Dell sensed, a little stiffly.

“I was just having a beer after supper,” said Dan. “You want one?”

“Sure.”

“Sit down there on the couch. I’ll get you one.” He turned off a network hockey game, picked up a plastic tray on which were the remains of a TV dinner, and went into the kitchen with it. In a moment, he returned with an open bottle of Budweiser. “So,” he said, handing Dell the beer and sitting in his recliner, “how’s it going?”

“It’s not going, Dan. Not going anywhere,” Dell replied quietly, almost dejectedly.

“Well, I figured as much. Else you’d have been in closer touch. Not getting anywhere on the case?”

“No. I’ve been meaning to drop by and talk to you about it, but I thought you probably still had family staying with you.”

“My two sisters were here for a week,” Dan said. “And there’ve been nieces and nephews running in and out like mice. Finally I had enough and ran them all off. Then my phone started ringing off the hook all day, so I finally unplugged that just to get some peace and quiet. I guess they all think I’m suicidal or something.”

“Are you?” Dell asked.

Dan gave him a long look. “No. Any reason I should be?”

Dell shrugged. “Sometimes things like this are hard to get over. Some people want to do it quickly.”

“That’s not the case with me,” the older man assured him. “I lost Edie a long time ago, Frank. I think I probably started losing her when she slept with her first man. Then every man after that, I lost her a little more. Until finally she was gone completely.”

“Were there that many men?”

“You’re working the case; you ought to know.”

“We’ve only found three.”

Malone grunted cynically. “You must not have gone back very far.” He stared into space. “I used to follow her sometimes. She’d go into a bar and come out an hour later with a man. Night after night. Different bars, different men. It was like some kind of sickness with her.”

They both fell silent and sat drinking for several minutes. Dell, who had always been so comfortable with his partner, felt peculiarly ill at ease, as if he had now become an outsider with Dan Malone as he had with the two homicide detectives. Finally he decided not to prolong the visit any more than necessary.

“How long have we known each other, Dan?” he asked.

“What’s on your mind, Frank?” the older policeman asked knowingly. It had been he who taught Dell that reminiscing frequently led to other things.

“The night of Edie’s murder.”

“What about it?”

“I need to know where you were.”

Malone nodded understandingly. “I wondered when they’d get around to it.” He smiled a slight, cold smile. “Suppose I tell you I was right here at home, alone, all night. What then?”

“Tell me what you did all night.”

“Watched the fights on television. Drank too much. Passed out here in my chair.”

“Who was fighting in the main event?”

Malone shrugged. “Some Puerto Rican against some black guy, I think. I was sleepy by the time the main go came on; I don’t remember their names.”

“Neither do I,” said Dell.

“What?” Dan Malone frowned.

“I don’t remember their names either. But you weren’t alone that night. That was the night I dropped over. We both drank too much. I fell asleep on the couch. Didn’t wake up until after one o’clock. Then I put you to bed and went home. That was the night, wasn’t it, Dan?”

The older man’s frown faded and his face seemed to go slack. “Yes,” he said quietly. “Yes, I do believe that was the night.”

There was silence between them again. Neither of them seemed to know what to say next, and they could not look at each other. Malone stared into space, as he had done earlier; Dell stared at the television, as if it had not been turned off. Only after several minutes did Dell drink the rest of his beer and put the bottle down. He rose.

“I’ll be going now. You won’t be coming back to work, will you, Dan?”

Malone looked thoughtfully at him. “No,” he replied. “I’m thinking of putting in for retirement. My sisters in Florida want me to move down there.”

“Good idea. You’d probably enjoy yourself. Lots of retired cops in Florida.” Dell walked to the door. “Goodnight, Dan.”

“Goodnight, Frank.”

Only when he got out into the night air did Dell realize how much he was sweating.

The next morning, Dell typed up a summary of Dan Malone’s statement, along with his own corroboration of the alibi. After signing it, he handed the report to Kenmare. The lead homicide detective read it, then passed it to Garvan to read.

“You’ve thought this through, I guess,” Kenmare said.

“Backwards and forward,” Dell told him.

Garvan raised his eyebrows but said nothing as he handed the report back to Kenmare.

“I don’t think the brass will buy this,” Kenmare offered.

“What are they going to do?” Dell asked. “Suspend Dan and me? Open an internal investigation? On what evidence? And how would it look on the evening news?”

“The higher-ups might feel it was worth it,” said Garvan.

“Worth it why?” pressed Dell. “What’s the gain? The department’s getting rid of Dan anyway; he’ll be retiring.”

“But you won’t,” Garvan pointed out.

“So? What have I done that the department would want to get rid of me?”

“Helped him get away with it, that’s what,” said Kenmare.

“If he did it,” Dell challenged. “And we don’t know that he did. All we know is that we can’t find anybody else right now who did do it.” He decided to throw down the gauntlet right then. “You guys going to let this report pass, or are you going to make an issue of it?”

“You didn’t mention this alibi last night when we were talking,” Kenmare accused.

“Maybe I had my days mixed up.” Dell shrugged. “Maybe I thought it had been Monday night I had dropped in; maybe Dan had to remind me it was Tuesday.”

“Maybe,” Kenmare said. He looked inquiringly at his partner.

“Yeah, maybe,” Garvan agreed.

“You’re sure Malone’s retiring?” Kenmare asked.

“Positive,” Dell guaranteed.

Kenmare pulled open a desk drawer and filed the report. “See you around, Dell,” he said.

“Yeah,” said Garvan. “Take it easy, Dell.”

Dell walked out of the squad room without looking back.

That night, when Dell came into the Three Corners Club and took his regular seat at the end of the bar, it was the owner, Tim Callan, who poured his drink and served him.

“I’ve missed you, Frankie,” he said congenially. “How’ve you been?”

“I’ve seen better days,” Dell allowed.

“Ah, haven’t we all,” Callan sympathized. He lowered his voice. “I’m really sorry about the young lady. Edie, was that her name?”

“Yeah, Edie.” Dell felt the back of his neck go warm.

“I seen her picture in the paper and on the news. Took me a few looks to place her. Then I says to myself, why, that’s the young lady Frankie used to bring in here. Always wanted the booth ‘way in the back for privacy.’” Callan smiled artificially. “I remember that every time I loaned you the key to use the apartment upstairs I had to make you promise to be out by midnight so’s I could get the poker game started. And you never let me down, Frank. Not once. ‘Course, we go back a longways, you and me.” Now Callan’s expression saddened, genuinely so. “I’m really sorry, Frank, that things didn’t work out between you and Edie.”

“Thank you, Tim. So am I.” Dell’s heart hurt when he said it.

“They still don’t know who did it?”

Dell looked hard at him. “No.”

They locked eyes for a long moment, two old friends, each of whom could read the other like scripture.

“What was the name of that brother-in-law of yours charged with receiving stolen property?” Dell finally asked.

“Nick Santore,” said Callan. “Funny you should ask. His preliminary hearing’s day after tomorrow.”

“I’ll talk to the assistant state’s attorney,” Dell said. “I’ll tell him the guy’s going to be a snitch for me, that I need him on the street. I’ll get him to recommend probation.”

“Ah, Frankie, you’re a prince,” Callan praised, clasping one of Dell’s hands with both of his own. “I owe you, big time.”

“No,” Frank Dell said, “we’re even, Timmy.”

Both men knew it was so.