Margaret Maron - The Right Jack

The volatile Frenchwoman moved lightly to the table and smiled up at Lieutenant Knight as he held her chair, but it was an automatic gesture. Her heart didn'ts eem to be in it. Her lovely face had begun to. show signs of strain and was pinched around the mouth and eyes.

"What is happening here?" she asked them sadly. " Cette bombe Friday night. At first I can think this is a crank. Someone who hates my poor Maintenon or who wants to make some big statement about the politics in his country, but this! Ce Petit Johnson? Non !"

"No," Sigrid agreed. She rested her elbows on the tabletop with her fingers tented together and watched Knight's pen poised over the note pad as she gathered her thoughts. "Tell us please, Madame, of your movements this morning. When did you arrive on this floor? What did you see or hear?"

"When did I arrive? The first time it is perhaps ten or fifteen minutes past ten. On Sundays I am very lazy, you understand. I sleep late and I do not rush straight to my office below. It is a good day to poke around, to look in supply closets, to check the kitchens, to make certain all is as it should be, comprenez-vous ?"

They nodded. Interviews with the staffy esterday had given them both a clear idea of La Reine's ways. Not a reign of terror exactly, but something more akin to l'ancient régime intimidation, surprise inspections and unexpected appearances at the most awkward moment.

"So I enter through there," she said, indicating the service door. Her right hand flashed with diamonds almost as large as the sapphire on her left finger.

Knight had sketched a rough floor plan of the area and he showed it to them now.

The grand staircase rose to a wide landing, at the rear of which were a bank of three elevators and the two wide halls leading off in either direction. On one side of the elevators was an inconspicuous door marked 'No admittance,' which opened onto another spacious landing with two more elevators, a large one for freight and another for staff, that used the same shaft as the passenger elevators out front.

A maze of corridors led to various storerooms, pantries and the service entrances of both the d'Aubigné and Bontemps rooms.

"How very clever you are," Lucienne Ronay told him. With a pink-enameled fingertip, she traced her route this morning.

"First, I come down on the staff elevator here, then I go through the halls here. I see no one on this side."

"Were the lights on?" asked Sigrid.

– "No, and this makes me très agitée . I turn on lights as I come and then I push open that door là , I see all is as before. You have said we may begin to repair the damage and yet no beginning has been made! I look at all that must be done and then I come out the front door-"

"Was it locked?"

" Oui . I must turn the knob and push the buttons so. And before you ask, I will tell you that I left the door unlocked."

Again her polished fingernail touched Knight's sketch and her rings glittered.

"I come along the corridor here, and go down the stairs to Miss Baldwin's office, but she is not there. Someone says she is upstairs at this card tournament, so back I come."

"Immediately?" asked Sigrid. "About ten-thirty?"

"Perhaps. People are coming from the Bontemps Room as I ascend the stairs. I look through the room, but no Miss Baldwin. I speak to Mr. George about a doughnut I see on the floor and then I give up and go to my office and try to concentrate on letters my secretary has left for me to sign, but my mind will not."

She shrugged her slender shoulders and made a charmingly rueful face. "Never can I be tranquille when things are left undone. At last, I go and find some maids who are not very busy and I come myself to show them what must be done. The elevator stops, we get off, and there is Miss Baldwin with you and M'sieur Froelick. We speak and you know the rest, non ?"

By now, more police officers had trickled into the room. Sigrid saw that the medical examiner had finished with the boy's body and was waiting to speak to her. Elaine

Albee and Jim Lowry had arrived together and Sigrid motioned them over as she finished with Lucienne Ronay.

"We'll try to be as unobtrusive as possible," she promised. "The body can go down in the freight elevator and out the back if one of your people will show them the way. Again, you'll have to wait to begin clean-up on this room and we'll want to talk to everyone who worked this floor today."

"I am resigned, Lieutenant," said Madame Ronay with a fatalistic sigh. As she stood, her eyes fell on Molly Baldwin and her face was stern. But the sight of so much misery seemed to soften her. "Poor Molly! Do not look so fearful, chérie . This time I forgive all your faults."

"Thank you, Madame," murmured Molly, but she seemed only partially relieved as Lucienne Ronay left the room almost as if she expected the police to have harder questions. From the way Molly braced herself apprehensively, Sigrid knew that the waiting must be getting to the girl, but there was no help for it. Joined by Lowry and Albee, shea nd Knight walked back toward the body to hear what the assistant M. E. had to tell them.

"Not much for now," said Cohen in his usual breezy manner. "The kid bought it between, oh, say ten and eleven, give or take a little. He was probably unconscious when the tie cut off his air supply."

"Hit over the head first?" asked Sigrid.

"Now, Lieutenant, it's too soon to tell. No obvious blow to the head, but no scratches around the throat as would've been if he was awake and fighting it. I'll let you know more tomorrow, okay." He unwrapped a stick of gum and cheerfully turned his back on them.

The ambulance attendants had already lifted the slight body onto the gurney and strapped a covering over it, and a hotel employee appeared to escort them out through the basement garage.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, Ms. Baldwin," Sigrid said as they passed the young assistant manager. "It won't be much longer now."

She assigned a uniformed officer to keep an eye on the girl and motionedf or Vassily Ivanovich to accompany them to the Bontemps Room.

"No, I wish to stay here," said the gray-haired Russian, who had seldom taken his eyes off Molly since entering the room.

"You can speak to Ms. Baldwin later," Sigrid told him firmly. "Right now, I want all the players back at their tables."

Reluctantly, the big man followed.

Three reporters were waiting outside in the hall. Sigrid made a brief statement and continued toward the Bontemps Room. The lunch break was scheduled for twelve-thirty and already a few early finishers were pushing through the doors.

Albee and Lowry had been joined by three other officers, who herded the players back inside while Sigrid and Alan Knight briefly apprised Ted Flythe of the current situation. The hotel grapevine had reached him a moment or two before, however, so they were deprived of his initial reaction. At the moment, he seemed totally exasperated.

"That does it! There's no way we can finish now. You're going to questione verybody again, aren't you? Get 'em all stirred up-"

Alan Knight began to bristle, and to stop him from alerting Flythe of their suspicions, Sigrid interrupted coldly. "I realize this tournament is important to you, Mr. Flythe, but we are investigating three murders here."

Flythe immediately backed down and tried to repair the damage. "It's just that there're so many people and so much money involved, Lieutenant. Makes it complicated. But that's not your problem, of course. Don't worry. We'll work something out."

"I'm sure you will," Sigrid said flatly. "Lowry, Albee, ask the staff to come in, please."

The players listened in shocked silence as Sigrid spoke into the microphone and told them of the young busboy's death. "We know you've had a long morning and that you'll want lunch now. As you leave the room, please show some identification to the officers at the door.