“As I will yours if you contradict anything I know to be the truth when you’re in court.” The women nodded their agreement and shook again as a sign of professional respect. Then Cindy turned back to her man.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, Hannibal, but has anyone called the police yet?”
“Police?” Bea’s eyes were wide with fear. “No. They’ll put my poor Dean in jail. He’s in no condition. Look at him. Mister Jones, now that you’ve found him won’t you protect him? Please?”
Hannibal rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. “I’m on board as long as you want me,” he said, but his eyes were on Cindy. He was always grateful for her ability to maintain the practical and legal views. “How much trouble are we in if we don’t call the cops?”
“Probably none, until we confirm that a crime’s been committed,” Cindy said. “Mister Edwards, it looks as if you’ll need legal representation very soon. Do you have a lawyer?”
Dean shook his head.
“Can you represent him?” Bea asked. “Can I retain you on his behalf?”
“Yes, unless he objects,” Cindy replied. “Right now I want time to hear his story without pressure. And to keep him out of jail. Is he hurt in any way? Is any of this blood his?”
“He’s not hurt,” Bea said, unconsciously rubbing Dean’s head as she spoke. “When he called me he could barely speak, I think. When I got here I found the… the mess. I took off his shoes and checked him over pretty well. He’s okay.”
Cindy dropped to her knees to be on eye level with Bea. “He doesn’t look well, Bea. He looks like he’s in shock, or maybe it’s more than that. Do you know if Mister Edwards has been in therapy?”
“Therapy?” Bea said, her voice ripe with irony. “I didn’t even know his mother was alive. How would I know? I know so little about him. I mean, he told me all his family was dead.”
“Back home,” Dean said, staring right through Cindy. “After Mama killed Daddy.”
Hannibal leaned over Cindy. “Back home? Where’s home, son?”
Dean seemed to find that a hard question. His brow knit in concentration. “Oh it’s right there. The other side. Silver Spring.”
“Mister Edwards,” Cindy said, “Can you tell us the name of your doctor back home?”
“Oh, that was years ago,” Dean said. “Years and years. Auntie, she took me to see Doctor Roberts after I saw it. That scared me.”
“What did you see, sweetheart?” Bea asked, too late for Hannibal to stop her.
“You know. Daddy. What Mama did to Daddy with that knife.”
Behind them, Kate whispered, “Oh my God.”
“And… and Oscar,” Dean went on. “He looked just like Daddy did. The same. The same. Blood everywhere.”
Bea hugged Dean and he lapsed into silence. Cindy stood and turned toward the living room.
“I’m going to see if I can find this Doctor Roberts in Silver Spring. If I can, he’s our best hope for protecting Edwards. He might be willing to help us keep his former patient out of the hands of the police. He’d have no trouble convincing a judge his condition is shaky.”
Cindy moved quickly across the room but stopped when she came face to face with another woman on her way in. Joan Kitteridge stared past her until Cindy finally stepped aside. Joan didn’t stop again until she was in the middle of the room. Her glittering brown eyes settled on Kate, then Bea, then Dean, and finally Hannibal.
“All right Jones, I can see this is your show. What the hell’s going on here?”
At that moment Hannibal had the oddest thought: That there were just too many women involved with this case. “What makes you think something’s going on?” he asked. “And do you make it a habit to walk in here unannounced?”
“Don’t be flip with me,” Joan said, her auburn locks flipping as her head snapped around so she could glare from the corner of her eye. “I went to get in my ‘Vette and there’s a trail of what looks like bloody footprints coming out of it, leading up here. Well Dean’s been driving my car, and I want to know where he’s been.”
“I’m sorry,” Dean said in a small voice. “I didn’t mean to make a mess. I just went over to Oscar’s. To talk.”
“Oscar Peters?” Joan continued to speak only to Hannibal.
“Dean says Oscar’s dead,” Hannibal said. “I was just getting ready to call the police.”
“Wait a minute,” Joan said, hands raised. “Police. Shouldn’t we know for sure what happened first? I mean, we don’t even know if anyone’s dead. Why don’t we go around there and see what Dean saw? Oscar could be lying there in need of first aid or something.”
“You’re right,” Bea said, clearly considering for the first time that Dean’s report might not be accurate. “He could just look dead. Maybe we should send an ambulance.”
“I need some sanity here, Jones,” Joan said in a sarcastic tone. “He was driving my car and it’s covered with blood. Don’t you think we ought to check out the situation?”
10
The man running out of Oscar Peters’ house was much too tall to be its owner. But half a block away from the nearest street lamp, that was all Hannibal could tell about him.
Joan had ridden with him because Cindy cautioned that no one should touch Joan’s car. In a worst-case scenario, the police might accuse them all of an attempt to obstruct justice by tampering with evidence. They had barely left Hannibal’s car when the house’s front door opened. Joan called out Oscar’s name and rushed ahead. Hannibal purposely hung back a bit, to see what interaction there might be between them. But then Joan stopped dead in her tracks, the man on the porch stared at her for a split second, looked at Hannibal beyond her, and sprinted down the street. Only then could Hannibal judge his height. He was much too tall to be Oscar, with long, black, stringy hair. He wore a black silk shirt and black jeans.
Hannibal charged down the street behind the running man. His breath came in short puffs while his body adjusted to the chase, but in seconds he was in his distance runner groove, arms pumping, lungs expanding to accept all the oxygen they could drag out of the air.
The stranger was a suspect, possibly a murderer. With him in hand, no mystery would face Hannibal. Dean Edwards would be in no danger, his mother would be in the clear, and Bea could perhaps convince him to return to a normal life. All of that was motivation driving Hannibal down the street behind the rapid-fire clop clop of his quarry’s footfalls.
But the other man appeared to be driven by fear. That perhaps gave him an adrenal edge. In thirty seconds of running he had opened his lead to almost a block and then he turned the corner to the left. Hannibal cursed his suit coat and dress shoes as he watched the man disappear around the house on the corner. Hannibal still followed, nearly falling as he rounded the corner himself. Then he coasted to a stop.
Hannibal found himself on a narrow deserted lane. He moved to the middle of the street and pulled off his shades. Then he rested his hands on his knees and drew deep breaths as he scanned the street. His man could have run into any of the houses, or possibly reached the corner and turned either way. Of course, he could be hiding anywhere in the darkness. He dropped his head, mentally berating himself for being unprepared and missing a rare chance.
His head snapped up at the roar of a big engine coming to life. On the right side of the street a big car pulled away from the curb from behind another parked vehicle. Its headlights stabbed into his eyes as he tried in vain to see the person behind the windshield. Too slowly his mind registered that it was coming right at him. Too tired to run or reach for his pistol, Hannibal leaped to the side and rolled onto the sidewalk. As the big sedan pulled away he caught a fleeting glimpse of the license plate. Then his murder suspect disappeared down the darkened street.