Tibbs paused and waited a moment, but none of his four hearers showed any signs of interrupting him.
“Now we come to the matter of Mr. Wood. On the night of the murder, Mr. Wood drove his police car past the Purdy home. This was entirely consistent with careful performance of his duty; he had already covered almost every other part of the city and for him to patrol this area was both his privilege and his obligation. He went past a few minutes after three in the morning. He has not told me what took place at that moment, but I can guess. A few nights later, when I was riding with him, Mr. Wood pointedly avoided driving past the Purdy house; not knowing why, I jumped to the conclusion that he had something to conceal. My faith in him was shaken for a time; I was wrong, and for thinking that of him, I apologize.”
“How did you know where the Purdys live?” Gillespie asked.
“Harvey Oberst mentioned it when I interviewed him here a few days ago, and I checked for myself with the records.”
Gillespie nodded that he was satisfied.
“Now putting the pieces together as far as we have them, here is what happened as closely as I can reconstruct it. At some time in the recent past, Miss Purdy was indiscreet with a man of her acquaintance and ended up either pregnant or believing she might be. Who that man is is not important at the moment, except that she couldn’t or didn’t want to marry him. Believing herself to be ‘in trouble,’ she did what many young women have done-she looked around for someone to blame who would be unable to defend himself positively and who would be a more desirable temporary husband or source of obstetrical and child-care expenses. Fortunately this variation on the old badger game is thoroughly understood in police circles so that the unsupported word of a girl is seldom taken at its face value without some sort of supporting evidence. Of course, Mr. Gillespie knows this well.
“Miss Purdy knew that Mr. Wood patrolled the city at night on the graveyard shift and therefore it could be believed that he had made one or more stops at her house during the year that the Purdys have lived in Wells. Secondly, she knew that he was unmarried and therefore might be trapped into marriage. Lastly, she was attracted to him, at least to a degree, as evidenced by the fact that she revealed herself to him at least once during his nightly rounds, probably in such a way as to make it appear an accident. It would be my guess that this had happened more than once, but not often enough to arouse the suspicion of a conscientious police officer.” Tibbs looked at Sam Wood. “I don’t want to embarrass you, Mr. Wood, especially in Miss Mantoli’s presence, but can you confirm that?”
Sam took a moment to find the words. Then all he said was, “Yes.”
“Now comes a matter of probability,” Tibbs went.on. “If Mr. Wood were guilty of accepting the attentions of such women, or inviting them, this tendency probably would have been visible at some time during the three preceding years that he has been guarding this city at night. This is not completely true, because people who have always led exemplary lives have been known to commit murder or run off with bank funds without warning. However, Mr. Wood is a bachelor, with the right, therefore, to invite young women out in as great a variety as he chooses; if he had been inclined to take advantage of an unschooled girl, he probably would not enjoy the very good personal reputation that he has in Wells. No one knows a man’s standing better than his bank, and the bank where he transacts business thinks very highly of Mr. Wood; they told me so.
“Summing up,” Virgil said, taking a deep breath, “concerning the charge Delores Purdy made against Mr. Wood, I think it’s a damn lie.”
“Could you make her admit it?” George Endicott asked.
The intercom buzzed.
Bill Gillespie flipped the switch. “Mr. Purdy and his daughter are here to see you,” the voice came through.
Gillespie carefully scanned the faces of the four people before him. “Bring them in,” he instructed, “and bring a couple of chairs with you.”
There was a tense quiet in the office while the footsteps of the Purdys could be heard coming down the hall. Everybody watched the doorway.
Delores came first. Her steps were short and slow. Her father’s face was as hatchet hard as before, and the lines around his mouth seemed to have been etched even deeper. Arnold, who was behind them, came through the doorway sideways, juggling two chairs, which he set in position. No one spoke until he had left.
“Sit down,” Gillespie invited.
Purdy nodded toward Tibbs. “Get him out of here,” he ordered.
Gillespie appeared to grow taller in his chair. “He stays,” he said, and motioned toward the chairs. The Purdys sat down.
“I ain’t gonna talk with no nigger in the room,” Delores announced.
Gillespie ignored her. “We have quite a bit of routine to put both of you through,” he told the Purdys. “The medical part of it may take some time. Is there anything you’d like to tell me before we get started?”
There was a long silence. Gillespie leaned back and his chair creaked under his weight. Then the room was quiet again.
Delores squirmed in her chair and smoothed her skirt with her hands. “I guess maybe I made a mistake,” she said finally.
“You told us about that last time,” Gillespie answered.
Delores waited for her slow mind to find the words she wanted. “I mean I guess maybe it wasn’t him.”
“You mean Mr. Wood?” Gillespie asked.
“Yeah, him.”
Purdy cleared his throat and took the floor. “You see, Delores, she don’t sleep so good at night sometimes. She seen the police car come past and she knowed who was in it. Then when she went to sleep after that she dreamed about him and that’s just what give her the idea.” ”You mean,” the chief said, “your daughter saw Mr. Wood in the patrol car and then just dreamed that he had had relations with her?”
The muscles of Purdy’s jaw worked before he answered. “Yeah, something like that,” he said.
Gillespie tilted forward. “I find it pretty hard to believe a girl like Delores would dream so vividly about a thing like that that she would come down here and file a formal complaint. If she’d been a few months younger she could have put a man in danger of his life.”
“Well, she ain’t,” Purdy snapped. “She’s old enough to do as she pleases.”
“Now I don’t have to be examined, huh?” Delores asked.
“No,” Gillespie answered. “If you and your father state here before witnesses that the charges you placed against Mr. Wood were in error, then there is no need for a physical examination.”
“You couldn’t now, anyway,” Delores added.
Duena Mantoli made a slight noise, then the room was quiet again.
It was Virgil Tibbs who broke it. “You showed great courage in coming here this evening,” he said to Delores. “Lots of girls wouldn’t have been willing to do it.”
“Paw made me,” Delores admitted candidly.
“There’s something you can do to help if you will,” Tibbs went on. “It’s more important than you might think. Could you tell us how you happened to dream about Mr. Wood?”
“I said she seen him come past and that put her mind to it,” Purdy said angrily.
Tibbs ignored the remark and kept his eyes on Delores. Finally she took notice. She smoothed her skirt again and for the first time showed the beginning signs of embarrassment.
“Well,” she said slowly, “he’s a real OK guy. I never got to meet him, but I heard talk. He’s got a real good job, steady, and a car, and I thought about him. I thought maybe he’d like me, especially ‘cause I heard he didn’t have no girl.”
“I’m his girl,” Duena said.
Sam Wood looked at her with wonder and disbelief.
Delores, too, looked at Duena. When she had finished, she turned listlessly back to face Bill Gillespie. She was inert, ready to topple whichever way she was pushed.