Colleen McCullough - Too Many Murders

“Was there anything different about him yesterday morning?”

“No, not really. If anything, his mood was somewhat sunnier than usual. I remarked on it to him over breakfast-we ate in the dining hall-and he laughed, said he’d had good news.”

“Did he tell you what this good news was?”

The yellow eyes widened. “ John? Pigs would fly first, Captain. Frankly, I thought he was tormenting me.”

“How did you feel when you were told what had happened?”

“Stunned. Yes, I think that’s the most accurate word to describe my feelings. John just wasn’t the kind of man to be murdered-at least, not in this way, and inside his own study. Nor by such a subtle method, if one may call a brief agony subtle.”

“What kind of murder wouldn’t have left you so stunned?”

“Oh, something violent. Shot-beaten to death-stabbed. No matter how careful one might be, it’s dangerous to philander with young girls. They have fathers, big brothers, boyfriends. I never remember his being afraid of the consequences, because of his special genius, and it was genius! Any one affair lasted from three to six months, depending upon the girl’s sexuality allied to her intellectual stupidity-he didn’t choose them for their brains. But the moment he began to tire of a girl, he became carping, critical, unpleasant. It usually took two weeks for her to break off the relationship, convinced that the grievances were all hers.”

“He satisfied her self-esteem, you mean.”

“Precisely. And he did have a genius for it, Captain! He played those silly young things like a virtuoso plays a violin. And when she broke it off, the girl would be terrified of being found out, since she was leaving it behind her.”

“Did he foul his own nest, Dr. Denbigh?”

“Never. A Dante girl-this is the first year we’ve had girls, of course-was absolutely safe. He picked up his prey in Joey’s Pancake Diner on Cedar Street. I gather that’s a haunt for kids from East Holloman State College and the Beckworth Secretarial College. He rented a little apartment in Mulvery Street, just a walk from the diner, and went by the name of Gary Hopkins, which he said had a plebeian ring. To the best of my knowledge, he was never found out.”

“Sooner or later he would have been.”

“Then I’m profoundly glad about whoever put the cyanide in his tea, Captain.”

Wow! thought Carmine, leaving Dante College some time later. Dean John Kirkbride Denbigh was quite a guy. Until his murder, luck had smiled on him. With a patricianly beautiful wife whose scholarship matched his own and whose frigidity allowed him to indulge a perilous penchant for undergraduate girls, he couldn’t lose. That is, if what his wife said was accurate. And there was no reason for her to lie; dead or alive, Dean Denbigh had ensured that her career would prosper. Still, rarely had he encountered such a cold fish. Had her husband been equally detached? No, probably not. He at least had appetites above and beyond scholarship. How old was he? Thirty-six. Plenty of time left to scramble up the academic ladder, not toward a full professorship in his field, but toward university administration. M.M., who was President of Chubb, still had a full ten years in the job, but the Secretary of Chubb, Henry Howard, was due to retire in four years. Odd that Mawson MacIntosh was always known as M.M., whereas Hank Howard had never managed to become H.H.

Midafternoon: time to return to County Services and see what his men had learned.

Abe and Corey shared an office, but when Carmine walked in, only Abe was there, head bent over sheaves of paper.

“How goes it, Abe?” he asked.

“Skeps’s murder is one not short on suspects,” Abe said. “By tomorrow I ought to have a paper trail a mile long for you.”

“Fantastic,” said Carmine, going out the opposite door.

A quick visit to Patrick revealed no further progress, so he went down to the basement parking lot, climbed back into his Ford Fairlane while its engine was still cooling down, and drove out to the Cartwright residence, himself behind the wheel. He just wasn’t in the mood to hang around waiting for a driver, and he had Delia for his paperwork anyway.

The mood at the Cartwrights’ had changed, and drastically; with Grant in custody for the murder of Jimmy, a pall of gloom had descended over the three remaining Cartwrights, suddenly horribly aware of Cathy’s death. The haughty princess Selma was in the kitchen trying to prepare dinner, her tears running unchecked into a bowl of cooked elbow macaroni. Several different kinds of cheese stood on the counter together with a carton of milk. Carmine took pity on her.

“Grate a cup each of cheddar, Romano and Parmesan,” he said, tearing off a sheet of paper towel and handing it to her. “Wipe your face and blow your nose, then you’ll be able to see.” He took a piece of macaroni, popped it in his mouth, and made a face. “No salt in the cooking water.”

The girl had obeyed him and was now gazing into a cupboard. “What does a grater look like?” she asked, sniffling.

“This,” said Carmine, producing it from a cabinet. “Hold the block of cheese against it and shove it downward-onto a plate, not the counter. Find the measuring set and keep each cheese separate. While you do that, I’ll find your father. When you’re finished, wait for me, okay? We’ll get there.”

Gerald Cartwright was in his office upstairs, weeping quite as hard as his daughter.

“I don’t know what to do, what would work out for the best,” he said helplessly when Carmine came in.

“Get your mother down here, first off. And a sister, yours or hers. You can’t bring up your daughter in ignorance of domestic routines and then expect her to pitch in like a trained housekeeper-which you should have employed when Jimmy was born, then at least the Grant half of this mess wouldn’t have happened. Can’t you afford a housekeeper, Mr. Cartwright?”

“Not right now, Captain,” Cartwright said, too dejected to defend himself. “Michel just quit-he’s gone to a restaurant in Albany.

Now I have to decide what to do with l’Escargot-close it, or change the cuisine along with the name.”

“I can’t help you there, sir, but I do suggest that you think a little less about your businesses and a little more about your children!” Carmine said tartly. He sat down and glared fiercely at Gerald Cartwright. “However, right at this moment I want to know about your wife. You’ve had time to think, and I hope you’ve used it. Did she have any enemies?”

“No!” Cartwright said on a gasp. “No!”

“Did you engage in pillow talk when you were home?”

“I guess so, insofar as Jimmy let us.”

“Which one of you did the talking?”

“Both of us. She was always interested in what Michel was doing. She thought I was too soft on him.” Cartwright stopped to mop his eyes. “She talked about Jimmy, how unhappy the other kids were-and you’re right, she kept asking for a full-time housekeeper. But I thought she was exaggerating, honest! We’ve always had Mrs. Williams once a week for the heavy cleaning.”

“Did Mrs. Cartwright ever mention anyone stalking her, or otherwise annoying her? What about her friends? Did she get on with them?”

“It’s like I told you before, Captain, Cathy didn’t have time for a social life. Maybe other wives complain about catty friends or the bargains they picked up in Filene’s Basement, but not Cathy. And she never once mentioned a man.”

“So you have no idea why she was murdered?”

“No, none at all.”

Carmine got up. “Make your business decision quickly, Mr. Cartwright, and bring some family in. Otherwise you might have Junior in trouble with the law too.”