“And what’s Arnold Hamilton’s story?” I asked.
“He agrees that Forrest was in the hall, apparently about to leave, when he entered the house. Forrest explained about the service call and Mrs. Hamilton not being home and the set being all right. Then he left. As for Hamilton, he claims he spent a few minutes in the bathroom, then he passed the bedroom and looked in and saw his wife lying there dead in her own blood. He insists that Forrest must have done it.”
“The hour that passed,” I murmured.
“Yes, the hour between the time you two saw Hamilton come home and the time he called the police. Hamilton admits it. He says he went into shock — that he was so numb, it was a long time before he could rouse himself to call the police. And that’s his story.” Breen struck a match; like most pipe-smokers, he smoked more matches than tobacco. “I’m not supposed to discuss a case with outsiders. But you’ve both been of help, and I’m hoping you can both be of still more.”
I said, “Arnold seldom came home for lunch.”
“I see,” Breen said. “That’s the kind of thing I’m trying to learn. Possibly Hamilton suspected Forrest and set a trap for him. He didn’t catch them together, but he caught Forrest there and nothing wrong with the set. Let’s say Mrs. Hamilton had gone out for a few minutes and Forrest was waiting for her and Hamilton guessed why. She came home after Forrest left and—” Breen paused. “You folks didn’t see Mrs. Hamilton come home, did you?”
“We were eating lunch in the kitchen,” I told him. “You can’t see the street from there.”
“Well, it could be that she came home after Forrest left and she and her husband had a fight because of him and in a fit of jealous rage, he grabbed hold of that vase and struck her with it.”
Margaret, still rocking, had a kind word to say for somebody. “I can’t believe it Arnold is such a nice, mild person.”
“You think so, ma’am?”
“Oh, yes. Arnold couldn’t hurt a fly. It must have been the other one — that Larry Forrest He was here once to repair our set. He looked so — well, I wouldn’t put it past him having an affair with a married woman and then murdering her.”
“We’re considering that,” Breen said, and suddenly he looked around.
The hush had again descended on the street A stretcher covered by a sheet was being brought out of that red-brick house. I could imagine Norma Hamilton under there — not as I had seen her a short time ago but vibrantly alive. The stretcher was shoved into a police ambulance, which then rolled to the corner and made a U-turn and passed the house.
“Let’s see,” Breen said. “Isn’t that where the new Green Acres development is?” He had got off the porch rail; facing the street, he waved his left hand.
“That’s right,” I said.
“Mostly dead-end streets and loops, as I remember. Hard to get through. So I guess most cars come to this street from that direction and go the same way.” This time he waved his right hand, toward where nearly all of the city lay.
Again I told him he was right I had no idea why that should interest him, and I brought him back to what we had been discussing by saying, “Isn’t it possible to tell which one killed her by determining the exact time of her death?”
“If we could,” Breen said. “It’s never simple, and circumstances make it even tougher than usual in this case. First of all, it’s a hot day, which delayed the onset of rigor mortis. Secondly, quite a lot of time passed before the body was finally examined. That was why I was anxious to have you do it, Dr. McKay, when I thought you were an M.D. No, I’m afraid we won’t be able to pin the time of death down close enough to mean much.”
Suddenly Margaret stood up. The chair continued to rock for a moment after she was on her feet. “Would you like a cool drink, Mr. Breen?”
“Very much, ma’am. But something soft, please. I’m on duty.”
I noticed that as she moved to the door, he looked after her figure the way men hanging around on street corners look after almost any passing woman. Detectives, I supposed, were as human as anybody.
He drank the lemonade Margaret brought out and then left the porch. But he didn’t leave the street. He mingled with the people lingering on the sidewalk and talked to them. Later, after practically all of our neighbors had gone back to their houses, I saw him move down the street like a door-to-door salesman.
Needless to say, we didn’t go swimming that afternoon. Much of the day was gone; anyway, we weren’t in the mood. Margaret went into the house to work on a skirt she was sewing for our daughter, Betty, and I got out the lawn mower.
I was mowing the front lawn when Detective Breen, having been in about every house on the block, passed by and stopped. I said, “You seem to be the only detective working on this case.”
“There are plenty more,” he said. “This particular angle happens to be mine.”
“Which angle?”
“What the neighbors know about the Hamiltons. They agree with your opinion that Norma Hamilton was rather free and easy with the men.”
“That was my wife’s opinion, not mine.”
Breen pushed back his slouch hat and ran a handkerchief over his brow. Going from door to door must have been hot work. “Were you, Dr. McKay?” he said.
“Was I what?”
“A man Mrs. Hamilton was free and easy with?”
“Look at me,” I said, patting my pot belly. “Am I the kind of man who would appeal to an attractive young woman?”
“Let’s turn it around. Did she appeal to you?”
“I’m a normal man,” I said. “Every now and then I see a woman who appeals to me. So what? That doesn’t mean I do anything about it. Or could even if I wanted to. You’ll have to concentrate on a handsome young man or on a jealous husband.”
“My job is to concentrate on everybody.” He looked across the street. “Your wife wasn’t the only one who noticed Forrest’s truck parked often in from of that house.”
“Then there’s your proof she had an affair with him.”
“Not exactly proof, but something.” Breen clicked his pipe against his teeth. “Well, it’s been a long afternoon.”
“Just a minute,” I said as he started to move on. “I’m curious about one thing. Weren’t there fingerprints on the vase?”
“Somehow, they’re seldom where you want them. The vase had been handled too much before the murderer did to leave anything but smudges.”
And his lazy eyes studied me — as if to see, I thought, if I was relieved by that information. Then he said good-by and crossed the street to where he had left his car.
I went into the house and told Margaret my conversation with the detective — except for the part where he had asked me if Norma Hamilton had been attractive to me.
“You see, I was right about the hussy and the TV truck out there so often,” Margaret said. “And you refused to believe me.”
As usual she had the last word.
After dinner, we did what we always did after dinner — we settled down in the living room to watch television. We started at eight o’clock, when a movie we hadn’t seen in years came on. It ran an hour and a half. After that there was a half-hour Western and then a comedy show that would last a full hour and bring us to our bedtime, at eleven o’clock. We never saw it all. At about a quarter to eleven, the doorbell rang.
“Who can that be at this hour?” Margaret said in a tight voice.
She knew as well as I who it was. I went to the door and admitted Detective Breen.
He took off his hat. For the first time, I saw him without it on and he was quite bald on top. He said hello to Margaret and stood in the middle of the living room, watching the television screen as if that was what he had come here to do.