But He Was Already Dead When I Got There (15 page)

Nicole grinned wryly. “I can't work either.”

Dorrie tossed her pencil away. “I'm about ready to give up.”

“I think I'll go home too. It's impossible to concentrate. I keep thinking of Uncle Vincent slumped over his desk with his head bashed in.”

Dorrie nodded. “It's an ugly picture. And so unnecessary! Uncle Vincent was sure to keep his valuables upstairs in that safe—the burglar couldn't have gotten anything of real value.”

“Ah yes, the bedroom safe,” Nicole remarked grimly. “It's just as well none of us tried to steal the promissory note after all.” She was watching Dorrie carefully.

“I suppose,” Dorrie said faintly.

“A safe!” Nicole tossed her head in disgust. “You know, we should have thought of that.”

“Yes, we should have,” Dorrie said more firmly. “None of us was thinking straight last night. We should have known Uncle Vincent wouldn't just leave the note lying about where anyone could get it.” Her face darkened. “You'd think he didn't trust us!
He
was the one who was always pulling tricks.
He
—”

“Dorrie,” Nicole said quickly, “don't get angry. It won't help.”

Dorrie inhaled deeply, let it out. “I'm not angry—just exasperated. To think that note's probably up in his bedroom right now!”

“I wonder,” Nicole said carefully, “whether he had the combination written down somewhere. Do you think he'd depend on his memory for something as important as a safe combination?”

“No-o-o-o, I don't think he would,” Dorrie said just as carefully. “I wonder where he kept it.”

“Right there in the bedroom with him, I should think.”

“Like maybe taped to the inside of a drawer or like that?”

“Or something fancier. Circles around dates on a calendar, perhaps?”

“Do you think Gretchen knows?”

“The combination? I doubt it.”

After that, they seemed to have no more to say on the subject. Both women agreed there was no hope of getting any work done that day and they might as well go home.

The law offices of Buhl, Fenning, and Conner had the look of a British gentlemen's club—hushed, discreet, and solid as Gibraltar. It had to be a cultivated look instead of an evolved one, since the firm had been in existence only ten years. Lieutenant Toomey wondered idly if a lawyer might find it a disadvantage to have a name like “Conner.” A secretary wearing a no-nonsense gray suit ushered him and Sergeant Rizzuto into Malcolm's office.

Malcolm Conner was also wearing a gray suit, and a conservative haircut as well. His manner was courteous but restrained as he invited the two policemen to sit down. “I suppose you're here about Uncle Vincent. I'm sorry he's dead. What can I do to help?”

Whether he meant it or not, Malcolm had been the first to express regret over the old man's death, and Lieutenant Toomey didn't overlook it. Nor did he miss the fact that the home address and telephone number Malcolm supplied were the same as those of Nicole Lattimer. So that made three ties Malcolm Conner had to Ellandy Jewels—as attorney, as brother, and as lover.

Malcolm the attorney told Lieutenant Toomey the same story the others had told but in a more precise way. Malcolm the brother expressed concern for Dorrie Murdoch. Malcolm the lover had no comment.

“Was the fire still going when you left?” Toomey asked.

Malcolm frowned. “I think it was. I'm not sure.”

“Nicole Lattimer says it was out.”

“Then it probably was. I don't really remember.”

“Where did you go when you left, Mr. Conner?”

“We all went to a bar—it's called Danny's Tavern, I believe. All of us except Gretchen Knox, that is. I hadn't had dinner and wanted a sandwich.”

Rizzuto shot Toomey a glance that the Lieutenant ignored; nobody had said anything about a bar before. “How long were you there?” Toomey asked.

“About an hour. It was shortly after ten when we left.”

Just long enough to talk things over
, Toomey thought. “Then where did you go?”

“Dorrie, Lionel, and Nicole went in to Ellandy's—in Lionel's car. I went home. I presume Simon Murdoch did the same.”

Without changing his tone of voice Toomey asked, “What time did Ms. Lattimer get home?”

Not even a flicker of expression passed over Malcolm's face, but Sergeant Rizzuto looked surprised. “It was sometime after midnight,” the attorney said. “I'm sorry I can't be more exact, Lieutenant, but I fell asleep watching television. Now may I ask you something? Why are you questioning
our
movements? Wasn't it a burglar who killed Uncle Vincent?”

“I thought so at first,” Toomey said honestly, “but now I'm not so sure. Too many incongruities. For instance, why would a burglar scatter Mr. Farwell's papers all over the place?”

Malcolm shrugged. “Looking for what he could find.”

“In the file cabinet? Come now, Mr. Conner, ordinary burglars don't search file cabinets. Only extraordinary ones do, burglars who are looking for something specific. By the way, how did you know there were papers scattered about?”

Malcolm's face gave nothing away. “You just told me.”

“But you weren't surprised.”

“Should I have been? Lieutenant, a man has been killed—I'm supposed to be surprised because the murder room was in disarray? I don't know what happened there last night. There could be any number of reasons why those papers were scattered about.”

“Such as?”

But Malcolm cautiously refused to speculate over the events that had transpired in the library during the night. When pressed to speculate about Vincent Farwell's decision concerning the loan, however, Malcolm expressed full confidence that Uncle Vincent would have renewed once he'd had time to study the figures more thoroughly.

When Toomey was convinced he was going to learn nothing more, he and Rizzuto left. In the elevator on the way down, Rizzuto asked, “Howja know Conner and the Lattimer woman was livin' together?”

“Same address and phone number. An odd pairing—they're nothing alike. He's so conservative and she's so … not. But maybe he has a Bohemian streak in him that appeals to Nicole Lattimer, who knows?”

“The bar,” Rizzuto said just as the elevator reached the ground floor. “None of 'em said nothin' about a bar.”

Toomey waited until they were in the car to answer. “It does help fill in the timetable, though. They all left Farwell's house around nine, all except Gretchen Knox. They spent about an hour in Danny's Tavern—plotting their next move? Rizzuto, I want you to check at that bar tonight. See if you can find their waitress and confirm the times.”

“Okay,” said Rizzuto.

“Then shortly after ten,” Toomey went on, “according to Conner, the three Ellandy people left together, Lionel driving. Those three stayed together until after midnight, past the time Farwell was killed. Conner and Simon Murdoch left separately, meaning—”

“Meanin' no alibi,” Rizzuto said.

“Meaning no alibi,” Toomey agreed. “Let's hear what Mr. Simon Murdoch has to say for himself.”

Simon's place of business was about a twenty-minute drive from Malcolm Conner's law offices. Simon Murdoch and two other diamond merchants shared quarters and facilities, and a guard at the door would not let them in until both Toomey and Rizzuto had shown their badges. The guard directed them to a cubicle containing several unfamiliar instruments resting on tables. Simon Murdoch was seated at another table with a small pile of diamonds on it, one of which he was examining through a loupe.

Toomey was amused to see that Simon's hair was the same off-shade of blond as his wife's. And the tie he was wearing was the same soft green as Dorrie's pantsuit. A
color-coordinated marriage
, Toomey thought.
My, my
. He cleared his throat. “Mr. Murdoch?”

Simon removed the loupe from his eye, put down the diamond, looked straight at Lieutenant Toomey, and said, “Fisheye.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Simon gestured toward the diamond he'd been examining. “Dead in the center. No fire. From your air of quiet authority, I would say you must be Lieutenant Toomey. And you are …?”

“Sergeant Rizzuto.”

“I've been expecting you,” Simon nodded, brushing the diamonds into a small paper packet that he folded and slipped into a pocket. “Unfortunately, there's only one extra chair in here. We can go to my office—”

“I'll stand,” Rizzuto said, and leaned in the doorway as Toomey took the chair. The Lieutenant remarked on the absence of display cases.

“We're all wholesale merchants here,” Simon explained. “We buy rough diamonds and sell them to retailers, so there's no need for display cases and all that foofaraw. Actually, I do deal in polished stones on occasion—it depends on what comes my way.”

Toomey said, “I see. You go to that place in London to buy diamonds and then bring them back—”

“No, I'm not a sightholder,” Simon interrupted. At Toomey's puzzled look, he went on, “There are about three hundred diamond merchants in the world who are invited to London for periodic ‘sights', as they're called. The London operation is run by the De Beers Corporation, which decides who can buy and who can't. If you're a sightholder, you go to London and you're shown a packet of rough and told the price, which can range anywhere from eight hundred thousand to five million. There is no dickering. You are not permitted to buy some of the diamonds in the packet and leave the others—you have to take the lesser goods to get the premium stones. Your only choice is to accept the whole packet or refuse. No one refuses. After all, De Beers controls about eighty percent of the world market. I'm part of the other twenty.”

“Ah. So where do you get your diamonds?”

“Antwerp, Brazil, from other dealers—anyplace I can. I don't know a dealer anywhere who wouldn't give his right arm to find a good, steady source of diamonds that would make him independent of the De Beers people. The world will eventually run out of diamonds, you know. Some say soon.”

Toomey turned the conversation toward Vincent Farwell's murder, and listened one more time to the same story of the preceding night's activities. Simon said he thought the fire had gone out by the time they'd left.

“You went directly home from Danny's Tavern?” Toomey asked.

“Directly.”

“What time did Mrs. Murdoch get home?”

“Around twelve-thirty or one. Excuse me, Lieutenant, but this sounds suspiciously as if you are investigating Dorrie or me. Or both of us—heaven forbid! I understood from Lionel Knox that a burglar was responsible for Uncle Vincent's death.”

“That's Mr. Knox's conclusion and not necessarily mine. Right now I'm trying to pin down everyone's movements. Exactly why were you at that meeting, Mr. Murdoch? You have no connection with Ellandy's other than being married to one of the partners, do you?”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” Simon murmured. “Ellandy's buys their diamonds through me—they're one of my regular clients. But last night had nothing to do with that. It was a courtesy invitation, Lieutenant. I was there not as a diamond merchant but as Dorrie's husband.”

“Vincent Farwell was given to extending courtesies, then?”

Simon smiled thinly. “I don't think Uncle Vincent knew the meaning of the word. I should have said he knew I'd come with Dorrie whether I was invited or not, so he just went ahead and included me in the invitation.”

“I see. Then you must know a lot about the inner workings of Ellandy Jewels.”

“Fairly much. Dorrie talks freely about the business.”

“What about Nicole Lattimer and Lionel Knox?” Toomey asked, meaning did they talk freely too.

“Oh, you know about that, do you?” Simon answered with raised eyebrow. “You have been busy, Lieutenant. It's my understanding that it was more a fling than a real affair, and it was over long ago. Of course, Gretchen didn't quite see it like that.”

Rizzuto dropped his notebook. Toomey waited until he'd recovered it and then said, “She was upset?”

“She was furious,” Simon laughed shortly.

Toomey nodded. “So she decided to stay the night at her uncle's house instead of going home.”

“I suppose she needed some time to think things over,” Simon nodded back. “It may have been old news, but it was new to her.”

Toomey couldn't let it end there. “How did Vincent Farwell find out about the, uh, fling?”

“He'd hired a detective.” Simon Murdoch seemed to find the thought vastly amusing. “Usually it's a suspicious spouse who hires the detective, isn't it? Not a suspicious
uncle
.”

Toomey waited until Rizzuto had picked up his notebook a second time and asked, “What was the detective's name?”

“Bernstein,” Simon said promptly. “I don't remember his first name.”

Paul Bernstein
, Toomey thought. “I thought the meeting was to discuss the loan. How did this other business come up?”

“You have to understand about Uncle Vincent, Lieutenant,” Simon drawled, his half-smile firmly in place. “He enjoyed playing with people. He liked the feeling of power it gave him. Holding that loan over Ellandy's collective head—well, that was Uncle Vincent's idea of good clean fun. He reveled in the role of decision-maker, judge. But it was all warped, the way he did it.”

“How so?”

“Well, look at the way he treated Gretchen. He was supposed to be her benefactor, but he hurt and humiliated her by revealing before a roomful of people that her husband had cheated on her. He made her feel like a fool and reinforced his own authority at the same time. Uncle Vincent was not,” Simon said dryly, “a nice man.”

Rizzuto spoke up. “Is that why nobody seems to care he's dead?”