‘Miss Turner,’ Carella said, ‘Detective Lipman at Missing Persons tells us...’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘... that you’ve identified a photograph in his files as ...’
‘Yes,’ she said again.
‘... your sister, Elizabeth Turner.’
‘That’s correct.’
‘Miss Turner, I wonder if you could look at that picture again ... I have a print here...’
‘Must I?’ she said.
‘I know it’s difficult,’ Carella said, ‘but we want to make sure...’
‘Yes, let me see it,’ she said.
Carella took the photograph from the manila file envelope. As photographs of corpses went, it was not too grisly—except for the exit wound in the hollow of the throat. Inge looked at it briefly, said, ‘Yes, that’s my sister,’ and then reached for her handbag, took a cigarette from it, said, ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ and lighted it without waiting for an answer.
‘And her full name is Elizabeth Turner?’ Carella said.
‘Yes. Well, Elizabeth Anne Turner.’
‘Can you tell us how old she was?’ Brown asked.
‘Twenty-seven,’ Inge said.
Both detectives thought, at precisely the same moment, that for once in his lifetime Monoghan had been right.
‘And her address?’
‘Here or in California?’ Inge said.
‘I’m sorry, what... ?’
‘She used to live with me in California.’
‘But she’d been living here, hadn’t... ?’
‘Yes. For the past three years now.’
‘What was her address here, Miss Turner?’
‘Eight-oh-four South Ambrose.’
‘Any apartment number?’
‘Forty-seven.’
‘Do you still live in California?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re just visiting here, is that it?’
‘Yes. Well, I came specifically to see my sister. We—do I have to go into this?’ She looked at the detectives, sighed, and said, ‘I suppose we do.’ She uncrossed her legs, leaned over to an ashtray on the night table beside the bed, and stubbed out her cigarette. ‘We had a falling-out,’ she said. ‘Lizzie moved east. I hadn’t seen her in three years. I felt it was time to ... she was my sister. I loved her. I wanted to ... set things straight again, on the right course again.’
‘You came here seeking a reconciliation?’ Brown asked.
‘Yes. Exactly.’
‘From where in California?’ Carella asked.
‘Los Angeles.’
‘And when did you arrive?’
‘Last Thursday.’
‘That would have been...’
‘The twenty-seventh. I was hoping ... we hadn’t seen each other for such a long time ... I was hoping I could convince her to come home for Christmas.’
‘So you came here to...’
‘To talk to her. To convince her that bygones should be bygones. I think I had in mind ... I guess I thought if I could get her to come home for Christmas, then maybe she’d stay. In California, I mean. We’d ... you know pick up where we left off. We were sisters. A silly argument shouldn’t...’
‘What did you argue about?’ Brown asked. ‘If you’d like to tell us,’ he added quickly.
‘Well...’
The detectives waited.
‘I guess she didn’t approve of my life-style.’
Still they waited.
‘We led very different kinds of lives, you see Lizzie worked at a bank, I was...’
‘A bank?’ Carella said at once.
‘Yes. She was a cashier at Suncoast Federal. Not a teller, you understand, but a cashier. There’s a big difference.’
‘And what sort of work do you do?’ Brown asked.
‘I’m a model,’ she said.
She must have caught the glance that passed between the detectives.
‘A real model,’ she said at once. ‘There are plenty of the other kind out there.’
‘What sort of modeling do you do?’ Carella asked.
‘Lingerie,’ she said. ‘Mostly stockings and panty hose.’ She reached into her bag, took out another cigarette, lighted it, and said, ‘I have good legs,’ and crossed them again.
‘And you say your sister disapproved of this?’
‘Well, not the modeling as such ... though I don’t suppose she was too happy about my being photographed in my underwear.’
‘Then what was it about your life-style... ?’
‘I’m a lesbian,’ Inge said.
Carella nodded.
‘Does that shock you?’
‘No,’ he said.
‘You’re supposed to say something like, “What a waste,”’ Inge said, and smiled.
‘Am I?’ Carella said, and returned the smile.
‘That’s what most men say.’
‘Well,’ Carella said, ‘actually we’re only interested in finding whoever killed your sister. You don’t believe your life-style—quote, unquote—had anything to do with her murder, do you?’
‘Hardly.’
‘But you did argue about it.’
‘Yes.’
‘In what way?’
‘She disapproved of the friends I invited to the house.’
‘So she came all the way east...’
‘Not immediately. She moved into an apartment on La Cienega, a temporary arrangement until she could find work here.’
‘Did she find work here?’ Brown asked.
‘Yes,’ Inge said.
‘Where?’
‘A bank someplace.’
‘Here in the city?’
‘Yes.’
‘Which bank?’
‘I have no idea. This was all hearsay. A friend of mine used to live here in the city, and occasionally she’d run into my sister...’
‘Does that mean you’d had no word from her ... directly, I mean ... in the past three years?’ Carella said.
‘That’s right. Not since she left California.’
‘But you came here to see her...’
‘Yes.’