Ed McBain: The Last Dance

He was there to tell them what he had learned downtown at Rockfort. The four detectives listening to him were Carella, Brown, Meyer, and Kling, who'd been dogging various aspects of this case for what seemed forever but was in actuality only since October . Ollie felt somewhat like a guest on a talk show. Carella was the host, and the others were earlier guests who'd moved over to make room for Ollie when he'd come on to exuberant whistling and thunderous applause. Brown and Meyer were sitting on chairs they'd pulled over from their own desks. Kling was sitting on one corner of Carella's desk.

This was a nice cozy little talk show here, with the temperature outside hovering at somewhere between twenty and twenty-two degrees Fahrenheit, which came to six or seven below zero Celsius, more or less, good to be inside on a night like tonight. The clock on the squadroom wall read a quarter past five, or , depending on your point of view. Ollie had called from downtown right after he'd spoken to Mr Michael and then again to the lady who'd offered him another banana, asking Carella to wait for him, he'd be right there. That had been at ten to four. The snow had delayed Ollie, what can you do, an act of God, he explained. It was still snowing, the flying flakes spattering against the squadroom windows like ghosts desperately seeking entrance.

"The way I understood it," Ollie said, "Bridges was there with his cousin for a week or so at the beginning of November. Rec room guy remembers him coming in to practice his saxophone. I figure this was after he done the Hale murder and before he flew back home."

"The rec room guy told you all this?"

"Not about the murder, that's my surmise. He didn't know anything about that."

"Then what?"

"The cousin, the sax, him flying back home."

"Did you talk to the cousin?"

"Knocked on the door, no answer. But I figured this was important enough to get moving on it right away. Which is why I'm here."

"Who told you the sax player's name was John Bridges?"

"The rec room guy."

"And told you he'd flown back home to Houston?"

"Yes and no," Ollie said, and grinned.

"Let us guess, okay?"

"He did not fly home to Houston, Texas."

"Then where did he go?"

"Euston, England. Sounds the same, ah yes, but it's spelled different. E-U-S-T-O-N. That's a locality, is what they call it in London. I went back to my lady who cooks fried bananas . . ."

"Huh?" Carella said.

"A lady in the project, her name is Sarah Crawford, she cooks great fried bananas."

Ollie felt he now had their complete attention.

"She's Jamaican, she told me all about Euston and also King's Cross—which is a nearby ward, is what they call it in London—where there are lots of hookers, drug dealers, and train stations. She didn't know Bridges personally, but his cousin told her he lived in Euston. So that's it, ah yes," Ollie said. "You know anybody else from London?"

They were waiting outside the Ferguson Theater when Gerald Palmer showed up for the eight o'clock performance that night. He was wearing a dark blue overcoat

over the brown suit, canary-colored, white-collared shirt, and brown silk tie they'd seen on his bed earlier that day. His hair and the shoulders of the coat were dusted with snow. He opened his blue eyes wide when he saw Carella and Brown standing there near the ticket taker, waiting for him. There was a blond woman on his arm. She looked puzzled when the detectives approached.

"Mr Palmer," Carella said, "would you mind coming along with us?"

"What for?" he asked.

"Few questions we'd like to ask you."

As if trying to impress the blonde—or perhaps because he was merely stupid—Palmer assumed the same wide-eyed, smirky, defiant look they'd seen on his face earlier.

"Awfully sorry," he said. "I have other plans."

"So do we," Brown said.

The blonde accepted Palmer's gracious offer to go see the play alone while he took care of this "silly business," as he called it, still playing the Prime Minister dealing with a pair of cheeky reporters. All the way uptown, he kept complaining about the police in this city, telling them they had no right treating a foreigner this way, which of course they had every right in the world to do, the law applying equally to citizens and visitors alike unless they had diplomatic immunity. They read him his rights the moment he was in custody. These were vastly different from those mandated in the UK, but he had no familiarity with either, as he explained to them, never having been in trouble with the law in his life. In fact, he could not understand why he seemed to be in police custody now, which was the same old song they'd heard over the centuries from ax murderers and machine-gun Kellys alike.

Out of deference to his foreign status, they sat him down in the lieutenant's office, which was more comfortable than the interrogation room, and offered him some of Miscolo's coffee, or a cup of tea, if that was his preference. In response, he affected his Eyes Wide Open, Eyebrows Raised, Lips Pursed in Indignation look again, and told them there was no need to presume stereotypical behavior, in that he rarely drank tea and in fact much preferred coffee as his beverage of preference, redundantly sounding exactly like the sort of Englishman he was trying not to sound like.

"So tell us, Mr Palmer," Carella said. "Do you know anyone named John Bridges?"

"No. Who is he?"

"We think he may have killed Andrew Hale."

"I'm sorry, am I supposed to know who Andrew Hale is?"

"You're supposed to know only what you know," Carella said.

"Ah, brilliant," Palmer said.

"He's from Euston."

"Andrew Hale?"

"John Bridges. Do you know where Euston is?"

"Of course I do."

"Know anyone from Euston?"

"No."

"Or King's Cross?"

"Those aren't neighborhoods I ordinarily frequent," Palmer said.

"Know any Jamaicans in London?"

"No."

"When did you first learn Andrew Hale was being difficult?"

"I don't know anyone named Andrew Hale."

"He's Cynthia Keating's father. Did you know he once owned the underlying rights to Jenny's RoomT

"I don't know anything about him or any rights he may have owned."

"No one ever informed you of that?"

"Not a soul."

"Then you're learning it for the first time this very minute, is that right?"

"Well ... no. Not precisely this very minute."

"Then you knew it before now."

"Yes, I suppose I did. Come to think of it."

"When did you learn about it?"

"I really can't remember."

"Would it have been before October twenty-ninth?"

"Who can remember such a long time ago?"

"Do you remember how you learned about it?"

"I probably read it in a newspaper."

"Which newspaper, do you recall?"

"I'm sorry, I don't."

"Do you remember when that might have been?"

"I'm sorry, no."

"Was it a British newspaper?"

"Oh, I'm certain not."

"Then it was an American paper, is that right?"

"I really don't know what sort of paper it was. It might have been British, I'm sure I don't know."

"But you said it wasn't."

"Yes, but I really don't remember."

"How well do you know Cynthia Keating?"

"Hardly at all. We met for the first time a week ago."

"Where was that?"

"At Connie's party."

"The Meet 'N' Greet?"

"Why, yes."

"Never talked to her before then?"

"Never. Am I supposed to have spoken to her?"

"We were just wondering."

"Oh? About what?"

"About when you first spoke to her."

"I told you . . ."

"You see, after we learned Mr Bridges was from London . . ."

"Big city, you realize."

"Yes, we know that."

"If you're suggesting he and I might have known each other, that is."