Monkey Puzzle Page 6

  ‘Or ugly with influential contacts,’ Stryker muttered. Neither of them had taken much to Heskell.

  ‘Heath and Grey-Jenner went out together, then parted. She went home to her lonely bed, and . . .’

  ‘Beautiful woman, for her age,’ Stryker observed. ‘Beautiful and sad.’

  ‘So?’

  Stryker shrugged. ‘Just noticed, that’s all.’

  ‘Glad to hear you’re still alive in there,’ Toscarelli growled. He turned over a page. ‘Heath went home to see to his invalid mother, but then went out for a jogging session, alone. Left about ten, he says, didn’t look at the clock when he came in. You buy that?’

  Stryker shrugged again. ‘Ex-athlete, bound to want to keep in shape.’

  ‘Maybe he used it as an excuse to visit someone.’

  ‘Such as Adamson?’

  ‘I had more in mind something female,’ Toscarelli said. ‘He didn’t strike me as a locker-room-lover type.’

  ‘Didn’t strike me as the living-with-Mummy type, either,’ Stryker countered. ‘I think we should look into Mr Heath a little more.’

  ‘Oh, great,’ Toscarelli said. ‘They’ll say we’re picking on him because he’s black.’

  Stryker smiled to himself. ‘I think we should look into them all a little more. Go on.’

  ‘Right. Let’s see. Stark and Fowler next . . . no, Stark’s secretary, Karen Lasterman, next. Another one living with mummy – but engaged, she says. Saving up for a house. I didn’t know people did that, any more.’

  ‘Some people do.’

  ‘Anyway, Stark and Fowler, they left together and went downtown like they do every Friday, to Stark’s club, for a game of handball and a steak, but Fowler develops a headache so they come back early and go home to their wives about eleven.’

  ‘You make it sound as if they keep a harem.’

  ‘They go home to a wife, one each, I meant. This place is getting to you.’

  ‘Yeah. That’s all?’

  ‘And Pinchman last. He worked on at his desk until he felt cold, and then left about nine-thirty, he says. He also says Adamson was still in his office, on the telephone, and that’s that.’

  ‘Friendly bunch, aren’t they?’ Stryker said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Heath and Grey-Jenner have a drink together, Stark and Fowler play handball together, Wayland and Trevorne sleep together . . .’

  ‘You didn’t like that much, did you?’

  ‘Shocking breach of morals,’ Stryker said, sitting up. ‘She’s the last?’

  ‘You know damn well she is,’ Toscarelli said. ‘You made sure she would be. Now why did you do that, I ask myself?’

  ‘Ask yourself, not me,’ Stryker said. ‘I’m busy. Wheel her in, please, and while you’re out there you might as well get Pinsky to organise getting all these alibis checked out. It has to be done.’ He stared at the door as it closed behind Toscarelli. ‘It all has to be done,’ he muttered to himself, and stared down at his tight, white knuckles as they interlocked, and clenched.

  Chris Underhill emerged from Grantham Hall, dodged the crowd standing by the entrance, and turned into the wind. He wished it could blow through his brain the way it was blowing through the leafless trees. ‘For I have sown the wind, so shall I reap the whirlwind.’ He trudged on until he slipped on some ice and had to grab the edge of a splintered wooden fence to stay upright. He looked around and found he had wandered into Junktown. The empty eyes of condemned buildings looked back blankly over the vacant lots where snow barely covered the litter. Against a lamppost on the farther corner a black in a leather jacket lounged, smoked, and watched him with an air of assessment. Down the road an old woman shuffled along the narrow ice-free path in the centre of the broken pavement, her arms stretched down by heavy shopping bags. A dog barked in the distance, a thin sharp snap of sound. Underhill shivered. He’d come too far, didn’t know where he was. He looked back and above the rickety houses saw the clean white curve of the Science Building, oddly flat against the grey sky. Aware of the black watching him, he started back, the unpredictable wind thrusting at his shoulders and spine. He managed a wry smile. ‘Woe to him that is alone when he falleth,’ he whispered to himself.

  ‘Frank.’

  The big negro turned at the whisper, and after glancing back up the hall, went into the office opposite his own and closed the door.

  ‘My God . . . this is terrible.’ Lucy Grey-Jenner’s eyes were wide and her mouth trembled. ‘What did you say?’

  Heath leaned against the door, his hands behind him. ‘I said that we went down in the elevator together, walked to the car park together and then went our separate ways. What did you say?’

  ‘The same. Oh, thank God . . . the same.’

  ‘Well, it was obvious.’ His massive calm reassured her.

  ‘You don’t think . . . I mean . . . will they question it?’

  ‘Why should they?’

  Lucy went to the window and looked down at the Mall. All white with snow, a few students in bright winter coats crisscrossed it, drawn to the University even between terms. It was the centre of their lives, with or without lessons. They shouted and waved at one another, meeting and pausing in small knots. Many of them looked up at Grantham Hall, pointing to the English Department. Lucy knew she couldn’t be seen, but she automatically stepped back from the window.

  ‘What if one of the others overheard you talking to Aiken, last night?’ she asked, in a tense, low voice. ‘What if one of them heard him threaten to tell her?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind that,’ Heath said. “What worries me is whether any of them heard me say I’d wring his goddamn neck if he did.’

  The reporters, disgruntled by a brief and uninformative statement made by Stark, lay in wait for the next member of the Grantham University English Faculty to step from the lift. It was Mark Heskell.

  He glanced around at the men with their notebooks, smiled, and blinked repeatedly as the flashbulbs went off in his face. ‘I’m sorry, I have nothing to say . . .’

  They clamoured and pleaded, and he hesitated.

  ‘Well, of course, it’s a terrible thing . . . for him to have been stabbed and mutilated in that way. Society has a lot to answer for when . . . I beg your pardon? No, really, I can’t tell you any more . . . Please, let me through. Surely the police will have released the details through the usual channels?’ He looked around at the reporters. Reporters who would still be around when this was over, who might move up to be editors, one day. He took a breath and conveyed the impression of reluctant kindness. ‘My name is Heskell. No, I have no idea who might have done this, except that it must have been a fiend of some kind. Who else could cut out a man’s tongue, except some psychotic madman? It’s frightening to think that he’s at large at this very minute, perhaps watching another one of us. I shall certainly demand police protection.’

  When Heskell had finally walked away, the reporters looked at one another and grinned. January was a slow news time, a flat time. What better than this, a loony killer who cut people’s tongues out? Last man to a telephone booth is a loser –

  NINE

  Kate hadn’t been in Dan’s office more than three or four times in the past year, and she’d forgotten how small it was. Smaller, even, than her own – but so luxuriously furnished that the lack of size seemed somehow prestigious. It was in the inner corner of the building, connected directly to the conference room and the large departmental office. Tucked away, it had always seemed a retreat, a private sanctum, protected from the traffic of the halls.

  Invaded now, by Stryker, the room had become lopsided. Although seated behind the desk, he was somehow the room’s centre. He needed a shave and the lines of his face were blurred by tiredness, she thought. Still the blue eyes sparkled, and he seemed in imminent danger of exploding in all directions at once. She seated
herself gingerly on the edge of the leather chair that faced the desk, ready to run if he broke free.

  She smiled at him, but he didn’t smile back.

  Oh, well.

  The door beside her opened and Sergeant Toscarelli came in. He settled himself beside the desk, and produced the notebook he’d used before. For such a big man he had an amazing ability to gradually disappear into his own stillness.

  ‘Tell me about last night,’ Stryker suggested, not even glancing at Toscarelli, his eyes only for her.

  ‘About the meeting, you mean?’

  ‘No, after the meeting.’

  ‘Richard and I went out to dinner. We went downtown to Chows. Afterwards we walked around a bit and then . . .’

  ‘It was cold, last night.’

  ‘Yes, it was.’

  ‘Weren’t you cold, “walking around”?’

  ‘Not at first. Richard wanted to clear his head before driving.’

  ‘Oh, very commendable.’ Stryker’s voice was sarcastic. ‘And then? When his head was clear?’

  ‘Then – we went back to my place, for coffee.’

  ‘Your place, not his.’

  ‘Richard lives at the Delta Theta house – it’s not very private.’

  ‘Isn’t he a little old to be a fraternity man?’

  ‘He was a Delta Theta when he attended Grantham. Now he’s their resident faculty advisor. He likes living there – it keeps him in touch with what the kids are thinking. He does a lot of work with students, outside class. The attic of the house has been converted to an apartment. It’s close to campus and easy for him. He doesn’t like possessions or fuss.’ She heard herself babbling, and forced her mouth shut. She wished he’d look away from her once in a while.

  ‘He apparently likes some possessions.’

  She frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Neither do I, yet.’ He looked away, finally, but only for a moment. ‘I do understand you used to be engaged to Wayland.’

  ‘Oh, well – yes. Years ago. College romance.’

  ‘What happened?’

  She sighed and gave a careless shrug. ‘We grew up. I don’t see it has anything to do with this.’

  ‘Bear with me,’ Stryker said, ‘Do you often go out with Wayland, now? As you did last night?’

  ‘From time to time. We’re still good friends, we have a lot in common.’

  ‘Old friends? Or more than old friends?’

  ‘Old friends, that’s all.’ Through the window beyond Stryker’s head she could see the tops of the trees in the inner courtyard. They moved, fitfully, silently, their branches crossing and re-crossing. The grey sky was reflected in the curved windows of the Science Building. The small office was warm, and she felt momentarily stifled. ‘Nothing more.’

  ‘But you share sentimental memories.’

  ‘Yes, of course we do.’

  Stryker reached into his jacket pocket and brought out a pair of spectacles. He clapped them on his nose, peered down at his notes, then looked up at her over the rims. ‘In fact, according to Mr Wayland, yesterday was by way of being an anniversary for you. Is that true?’

  ‘Anniversary?’ Kate was puzzled. What on earth had Richard said? They’d been watched in the conference room, there had been no opportunity to talk privately. But just before coming in to make his statement, he’d leaned over, kissed her on the forehead, and said something about having to tell the whole truth. And he’d called her darling, something he hadn’t done in years. He’d said it rather loudly, too, as if for the benefit of the blank-faced policeman by the window.

  ‘That’s what he said.’ Stryker was obviously waiting for an explanation or comment of some kind, and she had the feeling he knew she was floundering.

  ‘Oh, well, that was probably his joke. We have all kinds of anniversaries – he makes them up when he feels like it. The First Time We Ate Asparagus Together. The First Time We Went to a Concert Together. The First Time We Climbed a Tree Together. It’s just a silly thing.’ She smiled to herself. ‘Richard is . . .’

  ‘How about the first time you ever screwed together?’ Stryker asked, with every appearance of lively interest. ‘You celebrate that, do you?’

  ‘What?’ She felt as if he’d slapped her.

  ‘You heard me.’ He gave a mocking leer. ‘Wayland says you did, last night.’

  ‘Does he?’ she stalled.

  ‘He says you spent the night doing that. Did you?’

  She felt her face getting hot, and hated her treacherous complexion. ‘He stayed very late,’ she said, her mind racing. How late had he said he’d stayed? What time should she say? ‘Very late.’

  ‘You slept together?’ Stryker kept his eyes down, now, his hand propping his head as if it were too heavy for him. ‘You were in bed together all night?’

  ‘We were together,’ she said, and realised she was twisting her watchband around her wrist, an old, bad habit. She tucked her hands beside her. ‘What we did or didn’t do is hardly relevant or any of your damn business.’ What was it about Stryker? she kept asking herself. Why couldn’t she keep it light and natural with him? From the first moment she’d seen him, some memory had nagged her, something about his harsh-edged voice, his way of moving, of speaking. She was already making a poor job of this interview because of the way he made her feel – wary, defensive, angry. What was it? ‘But if it gives you a cheap thrill, good luck to you, Lieutenant.’

  ‘Sorry if I disappoint you, Miss Trevorne.’ He looked up, challenging her. A break in the clouds let a thin shaft of sunlight into the room, momentarily turning the big lenses of his glasses into a blank mask, and Kate’s heart fell like a stone through fifteen years of dismay. She stared at his face, the blankness of the glasses, the shadow of his hand across his forehead, and she remembered. Oh, God, the smug, smiling, laughing bastard – she remembered him, now. She remembered.

  He was still talking. ‘I get the impression that you don’t think much of the police. Or am I wrong?’

  ‘No, you’re not wrong.’ Her throat was so tight she was surprised to hear sound coming from it.

  ‘Oh?’ The sun blinked out and his eyes were visible again, surrounded by the glasses. Bright, sparking blue, dangerous. ‘Anything you’d care to tell us about?’ He added a friendly, dangerous smile.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Unpaid parking tickets? Come on, ’fess up, Miss Trevorne.’

  This archness was worse than the menace. ‘Don’t be silly.’ (Did he remember? Oh, Lord – did he?) ‘Nothing like that.’

  Stryker, apparently, was feeling impish. He leaned forward, grinning. ‘Bathtub gin?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Daddy on the Ten Most Wanted List?’

  ‘Oh, for goodness sake, no.’ (Was he doing this because he remembered? Was it going to be as bad as that?)

  ‘Let me see – you tried to join the Force but your feet were too small?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Too big?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Did Richard Wayland screw you last night?’

  ‘No!’ She heard it too late. ‘Yes.’ She’d been looking down, everywhere, anywhere. Now she looked at him. He wasn’t laughing. He wasn’t smiling. And he wasn’t amused. He was waiting.

  ‘We were together until very, very late.’

  ‘What time did he leave?’

  ‘I didn’t notice the clock.’ She took a deep breath. ‘There’s no clock in my bedroom.’ That was true enough.

  ‘Then how do you know it was very, very late?’ He looked at her hands, busy again at her wrist. ‘Did you look at your watch?’

  ‘I . . . I’d taken it off.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘It was very late.’ She’d have to pick a time.

  ‘Tell me about Aiken Adamson.’

 
Wrong-footed, she glared at him. Did he want her to name a time or not? Did he believe her or not? ‘He wasn’t with us.’

  He smiled and leaned back in his chair, removing the glasses. ‘That’s right – he was here, having his tongue cut out. There was just you and Mr Wayland, alone together, in a room with no clocks. Time, as it were, stood still. Romance. Birds singing. Orchestras playing. Were there any birds singing, Miss Trevorne?’

  ‘What?’ She stared at him. Was he mad?

  ‘When Mr Wayland left you – were any birds singing?’

  ‘No. What on earth – ’

  ‘What time was dawn this morning, Sergeant Toscarelli?’

  Toscarelli shifted in his chair, considering this question. A gust of wind touched the window, the blank branches beyond twisting and cringing. Somewhere, far away, a door banged. ‘About six, I guess.’

  ‘Which means the little birds started up around five-thirty. So Mr Wayland. left before five-thirty. Well, well, we’re getting somewhere at last. Did you see him to the door?’

  ‘No.’

  Stryker looked terribly disappointed. ‘What a shame. Still, it was before five-thirty. Unfortunately, we just don’t know how much before five-thirty it was.’

  ‘Didn’t he say what time he left?’

  ‘Alas, no.’ Stryker’s face was a parody of regret. ‘He didn’t look at his watch, either. My, that must have been a truly wonderful evening.’ He smiled, blinked and sighed. ‘Why did you hate Aiken Adamson?’

  She leaned back in her chair and made herself relax. ‘You’re very good at that aren’t you?’

  ‘At what?’

  ‘The fancy foot-work, the quick change of angle, the shark at the top of the stairs.’ She could smile, too. ‘Unfortunately it becomes a little repetitious. One is – ready.’