The Judge Is Reversed (12 page)

There was another longish pause.

“I didn't kill Blanchard,” Mears said then, and spaced the words out slowly. He paused again. “O.K.,” he said, “I've been holding out. Because it didn't mean anything and—wouldn't look good. I—I didn't think about prints on the grip. All right, I was there—”

“Wait,” Bill said. “If you are going to change what you told us before, what you say now will be taken down by a stenographer. It will be written up in the form of a statement and you'll be asked to sign it. Such a statement can be introduced into evidence in court. You realize that?”

“O.K.,” Mears said, and sounded very weary. “O.K. I heard you. So—I did go there in the morning. I did handle the racket. I didn't hit him with it, or hit anything with it. It was this way—”

What he said about meeting John Blanchard the previous evening at Forest Hills was true. He had apologized; he had asked whether, at some time that was convenient, Blanchard would show him what was wrong about the way he served. “They keep on changing the damn foot-fault rule,” Mears said, aggrieved. Blanchard had suggested the following evening, if Mears happened then to be in town.

That morning, Mears had waked up early, and in a broody mood. He was out of the men's singles, which was what mattered. He had admitted earlier, when he first talked to Weigand, that it mattered. But—he still had a semi-finals in the mixed doubles; something that might be salvaged. “I didn't know then Nellie'd been on the—” he said, and suddenly flushed and said, perhaps to some distant Nellie, “Sorry.”

If an explanation of his foot-faulting was to do him any good at Forest Hills, even the little good of getting somewhere in the mixed doubles, he would have to get it before the match. Not in the evening, after it. So, he had telephoned John Blanchard. At about eight thirty.

“Eight thirty? On a Sunday morning?”

Blanchard had a match to umpire—a semi-finals in the men's senior division. Because rain had postponed some matches earlier in the week, there had been a jam-up in schedules. The match Blanchard had agreed to umpire was set for ten in the morning. So if Blanchard wasn't up in his apartment on Riverside Drive by eight thirty, he'd damn well better be.

He had been. He had hesitated; he had said O.K., if Mears would be quick about it. With almost no traffic, Mears had been able to be quick. He had rung the doorbell of the apartment at about nine o'clock. Blanchard had been fully dressed; had warned that he didn't have much time.

“He showed me,” Mears said. “You want the details? It's easier to show than to explain. That's why—”

“Never mind that now,” Bill said. “So?”

“The way he saw it,” Mears said, “when I went across the line I touched down with the free foot before I hit—”

“Never mind,” Bill said. “I'm not a tennis player.”

“Could have been,” Mears said, looking at Bill Weigand across the desk. “Even now, if you—”

Bill smiled for the first time. It was not a prolonged smile. Bill shook his head. He said, “Get on with it, Mr. Mears.”

Blanchard had demonstrated, using the edge of a carpet as a base line. Mears had gone through motions; he hadn't, he said now, seemed quite to get it. It was Blanchard who suggested that it might be easier if he actually swung a racket, who had said there was one in the hall closet, if he wanted to try it; had said, again, that they'd have to hurry.

Mears said he had got the racket; had not wasted time removing the press or cover; had simulated a few service swings.

Bill looked at the long young man, mentally added the length of a racket to an arm.

“Just could,” Mears said. “Damned high ceilings in that old place.”

There were. Bill remembered that.

Mears thought he had it. Blanchard had promised that, if he got a chance, he would watch Mears play during the afternoon. If Mears wanted to, he could drop by in the evening—around six—and learn what Blanchard had seen. Meanwhile—Blanchard, Mears told them, had looked at his watch and Mears had taken the hint and left. He had offered to drive the older man to Forest Hills, and been thanked, and told that Blanchard wanted his own car along.

Mears was not sure, but he thought he had put the racket back in the closet. He had left Blanchard in the apartment. “He was all right then.” It had been, then, only about nine fifteen.

Had Mears got, in any way, an impression that Blanchard was expecting anybody else? Had another appointment?

For a moment, Bill Weigand thought, the young tennis player looked hopeful. Looked as if he saw an opening?

“No,” Mears said, “I can't say I did—or come to that, didn't. He didn't say anything about one.”

“Right,” Bill said. “That's a very interesting explanation, Mr. Mears. Clears up that point.”

“Does it?”

“Say it does,” Bill said. “Now—how well do you know Miss Latham, Mr. Mears? Perhaps better than you—either of you—let on this afternoon?”

For a moment it appeared that Mears was going to get up from the chair he sat in—get up with violence. He did not. But his voice was hard again as he said, “Now, what the hell?”

Bill Weigand merely waited.

“I don't get it,” Mears said, and the puzzlement in his voice was obvious—possibly too obvious. “She's a nice girl. I meet a lot of nice girls on the circuit. How well do I know her? Like I know a lot of nice girls.”

“Mr. Mears,” Bill said, “when you and she left the Norths this evening it seemed to me that you more or less ordered her to come with you. As if you had a right to order—a right based on—let's call it on a relationship. And you and she went to dinner together.”

“What's so damn—” Mears began, and then his face flushed. “You had us followed?” he said. “What the hell gives you the right?”

“Never mind,” Bill said. “You went to a place called Mario's. Your attitude there—yours and hers—was not as casual as if—say as if she were any nice girl you'd happened to come across on what you call the circuit. It appeared you had a good deal in common.”

“Slipped up, didn't you?” Mears said. “No hidden mike? No lip-readers stationed at suitable places? My, my, captain?”

He overdid it. Even as he spoke, there was something in his face which suggested his own realization that he was overdoing it.

“Anyway,” he said, “it's none of your damn business.”

“Anything that has to do—”

“This doesn't. Blanchard was an old friend of her family. She'd known him since she was a kid. She—”

“She told me that,” Bill said. “Also, that you were just one of the tennis players she knew—the tennis-playing kids, she said.”

“So? Just what I—”

“Mears,” Weigand said, “suppose you listen a minute. We like to do things the quick way—get facts from people who haven't anything to hide. Anything important to hide. But we can do things the slow way. And we can hold you as a material witness while we do. We can talk to people who know you and Miss Latham. People who have seen you together. People to whom you may have talked when there wasn't any reason to be cagey. Other men and women you've—oh, had dinner with, gone dancing with. We'll find people who were observant, assuming there was anything to observe. All that will slow things up. Take days instead of minutes. You and Miss Latham are merely casual acquaintances?”

“That's what I—” Mears said, and stopped.

Weigand waited again, watched the considering face of the lanky young man. It was not a poker face. It occurred to Bill Weigand that Hilda Latham had been right when she had said that, whatever his age, Mears was a “kid.” Now he was an uncertain kid, carrying on a debate in his own mind, the wavering between courses reflected in his face.

“All right,” Mears said. “I want to marry her. Has that anything to do with you?”

“I don't know,” Bill said. “Has it, Mr. Mears? How does she feel about it?”

Mears hesitated. He said, “All right, I guess.” He stopped again. “O.K.,” he said, “she feels fine about it. Only—”

Weigand waited.

“Only,” Mears said, “I'm a tennis bum. A pretty good one, in spite of losing to Ted Wilson. Ought to have taken him. Maybe have taken Farthing. So. I've missed it this year. Could be I'll miss it next year and the year after. Could be I'll never get it. You don't have a hell of a lot of years, unless you're a Gar Mulloy. And then—then what? Unless you've made a stake as a pro, then what?” He looked at Weigand as if he expected an answer. Bill had no answer. “My people,” Doug Mears said, “haven't got any money. Just get along.”

“If you feel that way—” Bill said.

“Because I like to play tennis—like it more than anything else. Because maybe one of these days—maybe next year—I'll be tops. Because—why does anybody do anything? Except clerk in a store?”

He was earnest, then. It occurred to Bill Weigand, oddly, unexpectedly, that Doug Mears was as much in earnest as a young poet might be, asked why he wrote poetry. Or a painter—It also occurred to Bill Weigand that he was himself a policeman because he wanted to be.

“Mr. Mears,” Bill said, “do you know that Miss Latham inherits a very substantial sum from Mr. Blanchard? It's—” Bill paused for a moment and considered. He saw no reason why not. “The sum is half a million dollars,” he said. “Did you know that?”

Mears said “No.” He said it quickly.

“Did she?”

“She's never said so.”

“Right,” Bill said. “So it's going to be a pleasant surprise?”

For all Mears knew. But it did not seem to Bill that, to Mears, it came as a surprise of magnitude—a surprise appropriate to the size of the inheritance, which was certainly of magnitude. Unless, of course—

“Is Miss Latham's father a rich man?”

“Now what the hell—”

“Wait,” Bill said. “Let's not get off on this what-the-hell business again. You and Hilda Latham are planning to get married—thinking about it, anyway. You talk about yourselves. A lot about yourselves. About all the things that concern yourselves.”

“No,” Mears said. “They've got this big place, and I guess they did have money. But—now I guess not.”

He looked, quickly, at the stenographer, who was making quicker movements with pencil, on notebook.

“No,” Bill said. “This isn't part of the statement. You've given us an account of your actions at pertinent times. We'll ask you to sign that. Not this.”

“This,” Mears said, “is just fishing. In the hope you can get something on—” It seemed to reach him, then. He stood up, very tall, face red under tan.
“Damn you to hell,”
he said. He spoke loudly.

Mullins moved toward him.

Bill Weigand seemed to pay no attention to these movements.

“Mr. Mears,” Weigand said, “Mr. Blanchard was an old man from where you stand. I suppose he was. He was in his late fifties. But he was a vigorous man, from all accounts. And from the appearance of his body. He might have lived a good many years. Twenty—perhaps even thirty.”

Mears glared down at him.

“A half million dollars is a lot to leave to a young woman who is—” Bill hesitated. “Who is merely the daughter of an old friend. Don't you think so?”

Mears did not change position; he did not stop glaring. But the hot color under his tan lessened—lessened markedly. His lips became very tight.

“Well?” Bill said.

Mears shook his head. In denial? Or, in stupefaction that a man could be so wrong, so obtuse?

“A vigorous man,” Bill said. “A man in his fifties, Mears, isn't limited to the role of—say the role of an uncle. You must know—”

“You—”
Mears said.
“You lying—”

Bill Weigand has been called all the usual names, and some unusual ones. All occupations have their hazards.

“Sit down, Mears,” Mullins said. “Sit down and shut your mouth.”

Mears turned on Mullins. Mullins was as tall as Mears, and considerably heavier. Mullins said,
“Now!”
Mears sat down. He continued to look, intently, at Bill Weigand. Finally, he said, “I suppose you've got to be like this?”

“Right,” Bill said. “I've got to be like this. Well?”

“Damn it all,” Mears said. “She was fond of him. Everything else aside—the kind of person she is—the—Aside from all that, she was fond of him. Had been since she was a child.”

If a job makes a man, at times, a terrier, he has to learn to shake like one.

“It is possible,” Bill Weigand said, “to work up considerable affection for half a million dollars. If Blanchard had lived out his life, Miss Latham might have had to wait a long time for the money, mightn't she? Conceivably, until she, too, was in her fifties. A long time for a girl whose family has a big house and not the kind of money that ought to go with it. A girl, say, who was brought up in the environment of those who do have a lot of money. A girl—”

“Damn it all,” Mears said. “Let it lie, can't you?”

“No. Why should I?”

“Because,” Mears said, and seemed triumphant. “Because if the money mattered that much to Hildy, all she had to do was to say, ‘Yes. I'll marry you.' There wouldn't have been anything hard about that. She was fond of him. He was an all-right guy, I guess. And—he sure as hell wasn't doddering. So—”

He stopped abruptly. Bill could watch the triumph die as Mears listened to his own words.

“Mr. Mears,” Bill said, “had she ever said, ‘Yes, I'll marry you,' to Blanchard. Say—
before you and she met?
Was that the reason for the bequest? So that his fiancée would be taken care of if something happened to him before they were married? And then did he find out how things were between you and her and, maybe, say that under the circumstances he might decide to make a change—”