Ричард Деминг - The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK®

“Oh yeah, the guy who sent happy birthday wires to his victims before he killed them.” Glancing around, I spotted on the wall over the stove a rack of knives with black wooden handles similar to that of the murder weapon. They were of assorted sizes, ranging from a small paring knife to a carving knife with an eight-inch blade. The only vacant space looked as though it might accommodate the butcher knife stuck into the corpse.

Seeing me looking at the rack, Harry said, “That’s what we figured, too. The killer grabbed it from there because it was handy.”

Grunting, I looked back down at the dead woman. “What was her name?”

“Joan Turnbell. Mrs . Joan Turnbell, although her husband don’t live here. According to Mrs. Crowder, they’ve been separated about four months, and the victim lived here alone. Mrs. Crowder also has pretty well pinpointed the time of death to within a minute or so of five-thirty.” Glancing at a wall clock, he said, “About an hour and five minutes ago.”

“How’d she pinpoint it?” I asked.

“She heard Mrs. Turnbell come home, then discovered the body only minutes later.”

Although that wasn’t awfully clear to me, I decided the details could wait until I talked to Mrs. Crowder. “She know who did it?” I asked.

Harry shook his head. “Seems to have been a prowler who panicked when she walked in on him. There’s some drawers dumped out in the other rooms. My guess is nobody saw him because he lammed out the back way. If you’ll look out back, you’ll see the yard is enclosed by a high wooden fence that would have kept him from being seen by neighbors if he headed for the alley. At any rate he wasn’t seen.”

“Oh, you’ve asked all those people out front?”

He flushed slightly. “Well, no, but no one has come forward to report seeing anything.”

That was why Harry Dodge was still a patrolman after twenty-five years. If he had been a rookie, I would have jolted him alive with some acid comments on how to make a preliminary investigation, but you can’t do that to a veteran of twenty-five years even if he deserves it.

I said, as pleasantly as I could manage, “Better go see if anyone saw anything before the crowd disperses. Maybe you’d better hit the nearby houses on both sides of the street too, just in case some of the neighbors have gone back inside.”

“Okay,” he said agreeably, and headed for the front of the house.

I went over to peer through the glass pane of the back door into the yard. In mid-March, sunset was about six p.m., and it was just now starting to get dark. It was still light enough, though, to see that the yard was enclosed by a seven-foot-high board fence. At the rear of the yard, some fifty feet away, was a garage that gave onto an alley. Next to it was a gate in the fence, also leading to the alley.

I tried the back door, found it unlocked and stepped out onto the back porch. From it I could see over the top of the fence onto the back porches on either side, which meant anyone on their back porches at the time the killer emerged from the house could have seen him too. I could also see the back porches of the houses whose rears faced this way from the other side of the alley.

I went down the porch steps and along a concrete walk to the garage. The door leading from the yard into the garage was unlocked. A red, two-seat sports car was parked inside. A car radiator will stay warm for a couple of hours after the car has been driven long enough to heat the engine thoroughly, and this one was still warm enough to indicate it had been standing for not much more than an hour. It seemed reasonable to assume that Joan Turnbell had arrived home in that car.

The garage door giving onto the alley was the overhead type. I swung it up, then back down again. It made considerable noise going both ways, the springs creaking loudly and the door settling into place with a subdued slam.

Returning to the kitchen, I told Carl Budd to go across the alley and inquire at each house if any neighbors had seen anyone enter or leave here by the back door an hour or so earlier.

When the young patrolman had left, I stooped to examine the victim’s shoes. They had those thick, ungraceful Italian heels that have become so popular, with metal cleats on them to retard wear.

Rising from my stooped position, I went into the front room. Dr. Lischer had taken a seat there, but when I came in he rose and picked up the medical bag alongside his chair. Apparently he was in more of a hurry than he had indicated.

“Sorry to have kept you waiting, Doctor,” I said. “May I have your report now?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you much except that she’s dead, Sergeant. I understand from Mrs. Crowder here that death occurred about five-thirty. That conforms to the physical condition of the body. Mrs. Crowder phoned me at twenty of six. I called the police, then came over as soon as I could. I had an emergency patient, so I wasn’t able to get here until about six-fifteen. By then the police were already here.”

“I see. I assume you didn’t move the body.”

“Oh, of course not. I also instructed Mrs. Crowder over the phone not to touch anything.”

I gave him an approving nod. “Was Mrs. Turnbell a regular patient of yours?”

“Yes. Mrs. Crowder also, which I assume is why she called me.”

“Any particular condition you were treating Mrs. Turnbell for?”

He shook his head. “When I say she was a regular patient, I merely mean I was her family physician. Aside from an occasional viral infection, she was in generally good health, you see.”

“Okay, Doctor. Thanks for your trouble.”

“You’re welcome, Sergeant. I’m happy to be of service.”

When he had left, I turned to the Crowders. “Just how close of neighbors are you people? Right next door?”

Both nodded. The leathery Henry Crowder pointed toward the dining room. “On that side.”

I looked at his wife. “It was you who discovered the body, Mrs. Crowder?”

“Yes,” she said. “Henry wasn’t even home from work yet. He just came over to keep me company after the police got here.”

“I see. Then actually you have no direct knowledge of events, Mr. Crowder?”

“Just what Emma told me.”

Turning back to Mrs. Crowder, I said, “Just how did you happen to discover the body so quickly after it happened?”

“I was waiting for Joan to come home so I could show her a pattern I had bought. She always got home from work exactly at five-thirty. You could set your clock by it. She worked in a law office at Grand and Gravois as a legal secretary, you know. The lawyers all left at four-thirty, then she could close up when she wanted. She always left there exactly at five-fifteen, and it took fifteen minutes for her to drive home. So I was listening for her.”

“Listening?” I said. “Don’t you mean watching?”

She shook her head. “The fence is too high to watch. But I could always hear her come home because her garage door squeaks and bangs when it’s opened and closed, then I could also hear her heels click on the walk. Today when I heard her, I looked at my kitchen clock, and sure enough it was right at five-thirty. I gave her five minutes to get her coat off and get herself settled, then I came over.” She gave a little shiver. “He must have just barely left when I got here. If I hadn’t waited that five minutes, more than likely I’d be dead too.”

“Possibly,” I agreed. “How did you come over? I mean out your alley gate and in by this one, or out your front door to this front door?”

“Neither. Out the front way, down the walk between our houses, and in by the gate at the bottom of the back porch steps. Don’t ask me why I do that instead of going to Joan’s front door, which would be closer. I just always have. Maybe because we always ended up in the kitchen anyway for coffee.”