Lawrence Block - Even the Wicked

“That’s just perfect,” he said. “You managed to find him a rock-solid alibi for the one murder Will didn’t commit.”

“I know.”

“You think he set it up that way? He knew Scipio was going to do it and made sure he covered himself?”

“I think it was coincidence.”

“Because it’s hardly incriminating, having an alibi.”

“No.”

“Any more than it’s incriminating not having an alibi for the other two murders.”

“True.”

“But we’ve left one out, haven’t we? The abortion guy. Except he’d hate to be called that, wouldn’t he? I’m sure he’d much rather be known as the anti-abortion guy.”

“Protector of the unborn,” I said.

“Roswell Berry. Killed not here in nasty old New York but halfway across the country in the tele-marketing capital of America.”

“Omaha?”

“You didn’t know that about Omaha? Whenever there’s an ad on a cable channel, a twenty-four-hour eight hundred number for you to order a Vegematic Pocket Fisherman CD of Roger Whittaker’s greatest hits, nine times out of ten the person who takes your order is sitting in an office in Omaha. Did Adrian have an alibi when Berry got killed?”

“Yes, he did.”

His eyebrows went up. “Really? That sinks your whole theory, doesn’t it?”

“No,” I said, “it’s the closest thing I’ve got to hard evidence, and it’s strong enough to have brought me here tonight. See, Adrian did have an alibi for Berry’s murder. And it’s full of holes.”

“He went to Philadelphia,” I said. “Rode down and back on the Metroliner, had a seat reserved both ways in the club car. Charged the ticket to his American Express card.”

“Where’d he stay in Philly?”

“At the Sheraton near Independence Hall. He was there three nights, and again he used his Amex card.”

“And meanwhile Roswell Berry was being murdered in Omaha.”

“That’s right.”

“Which is what, two thousand miles away?”

“More or less.”

“Don’t make me dig,” he said. “This would appear to clear Adrian. How does it implicate him?”

“Here’s what I think he did,” I said. “I think he went to Philly and checked into the hotel and unpacked a bag. Then I think he took his briefcase and caught a cab to the airport, where he paid cash and showed ID in the name of A. Johnson. He flew to Omaha via Milwaukee on Midwest Express. He registered at the Hilton as Allen Johnson, showing a credit card in that name when he checked in but paying cash when he left. He got there in plenty of time to kill Berry and he got out before the body was found.”

“And flew back to Philadelphia,” Ray said. “And packed his bag and paid his hotel bill and got on the train.”

“Right.”

“And you’ve got nothing that places him in Philadelphia during the time that our Mr. Johnson was either in or en route to Omaha.”

“Nothing,” I said. “No phone calls on his hotel bill, no meals charged, nothing at all to substantiate his presence in the city except that he was paying for a hotel room.”

“I don’t suppose there was a maid who would remember if the bed had been slept in.”

“This long after the fact? The only way she’d remember is if she slept in it with him.”

“Matt, why’d he go to Philly? You’ll say to set up an alibi, I understand that much, but what was his ostensible purpose?”

“To keep some appointments, evidently. He had four or five of them listed on his desk calendar.”

“Oh?”

“Times and last names. I don’t think they were real appointments. I think they were there for show. I checked the names against his Rolodex and couldn’t find them. More to the point, I checked his phone bills, home and office. The only call to Philly that fits the time frame was the one he made to the Sheraton to book his room.”

He thought about it. “Suppose he was seeing somebody in Philadelphia. A married woman. He calls her from a pay phone because—”

“Because her husband might check Adrian’s phone records?”

He started over. “He can’t call her at all,” he said. “She has to call him, and that’s why there are no calls to her on his phone bill. The appointments on his calendar are with her. The names are phony so no one can glance at his calendar and recognize her name. He goes there and never leaves his room, she visits him when she can, and somebody else named Johnson flies out to Omaha and back, not because he’s Will but because he wants to discuss investments with Warren Buffet.”

“And Adrian stays in his room all that time and never orders a sandwich from room service? Or eats the mixed nuts from the mini bar?”

I went over it again, letting him raise objections, knocking them down as he raised them.

“Allen Johnson,” he said. “Is that right? Allen?”

“Allen at the Hilton, just the initial at the airlines counter.”

“If you’d found a wallet full of identification in that name in the top drawer of Adrian’s desk, I’d say you had something.”

“He could have it tucked away in his closet,” I said, “or stashed it in a safe-deposit box. My guess is he got rid of it once he knew he wouldn’t need it anymore.”

“And when was that? When he got back from Omaha?”

“Or when he wrote the letter designating himself as Will’s last victim. Or later. It would be nice if it showed up on a list of recent cyanide purchasers.”

“Where would you find a list like that?”

“You’d have to compile it, which is what someone very likely did once the autopsy results confirmed cyanide as the cause of Adrian’s death. We can be sure his own name didn’t show up on the list, or we’d have read headlines about it. He’d have thought of that. If he needed to show ID in order to buy cyanide, he’d have made sure it was in another name.”

“And he’d have felt safe enough using Allen Johnson again.”

“Unless he’d already destroyed it, yes. I don’t imagine he’d be overly concerned about someone putting the two Johnsons together, one from a hotel in Omaha and the other from a poison-control ledger in New York.”

“No.”

He excused himself, and came back saying how lucky he was — there had been no one lurking in the bathroom with a garrote.

“Though I wouldn’t have made his list,” he said, “if only because he already had a criminal lawyer on it. Hell of an eclectic list he came up with, wouldn’t you say?”

“Very much so.”

“A sexual psychopath, a Mafia boss, a right-to-lifer, and a black rabble-rouser. All along everybody’s been trying to find the common denominator. You’d think it would become apparent when you know who did it, but it’s still hard to spot.”

“He only really needed a reason for the first one,” I said, “and he had that. There he was, brooding over his role in Richie Vollmer’s release, and McGraw’s column stirred him to action. At that point he very likely intended just to commit one single act of murder.”

“And then what happened?”

“My guess is he found out he liked it.”

“Got a thrill out of it, you mean? Middle-aged lawyer all of a sudden finds out he’s got the soul of a psychopath?”

I shook my head. “I don’t imagine he suddenly blossomed as a thrill killer. But I think he found it satisfying.”

“Satisfying.”

“I think so, yes.”

“Killing people who had it coming, making the world a better place for it. That what you mean?”

“Something like that.”

“I suppose it could be satisfying,” he said. “Especially for a man who’s under a death sentence himself. ‘What can I do to improve the world before I leave it? Well, I can take that son of a bitch off the boards. There, I may not live forever, but at least I outlived you, you bastard.’”