A door at the other end of the hall opened.
“Who is it there?” a woman’s voice said.
“Friend of Al’s,” Carella answered.
“What you doing knocking down the door in the middle of the night?”
“Have to see him about something,” Carella said. The landing was dark, and no light came from the woman’s apartment. He strained to see her in the gloom, but could make out only a vague shape in the doorway, clothed in what was either a white nightgown or a white robe.
“He’s probably asleep,” the woman said, “same as everybody else around here.”
“Yeah, why don’t you just go do that yourself, lady?” Carella said.
“Punk,” the woman replied, but she closed the door. Carella heard a lock being snapped, and then the heavy bar of a Fox lock being wedged against the door, solidly hooked into the steel plate that was screwed to the floor inside. He fished into his pocket, took out a penlight, flashed it onto Weinberg’s lock, and then pulled out his ring of keys. He tried five keys before he found the one that opened the door. He slipped the key out of the lock, put the ring back into his pocket, gently eased the door open, went into the apartment, closed the door softly behind him, and stood breathing quietly in the darkness.
The room was as black as the landing had been.
A water tap dripped into a sink somewhere off on his left. On the street outside, a fire engine siren wailed into the night. He listened. He could see nothing, could hear nothing. Cupping his penlight in his hand, he flashed it only a few feet ahead of him and began moving into the room, vaguely making out a chair, a sofa, a television set. At the far end of the room, there was a closed door, presumably leading to the bedroom. He turned off the flash, stood silent and motionless for several moments while his eyes readjusted to the darkness, and then started for the bedroom door. He had moved not four feet when he tripped and fell forward, his hands coming out immediately to break his fall. His right hand sank to the wrist into something soft and gushy. He withdrew it immediately, his left hand thumbing the flash into light. He was looking into the wide-open eyes of Albert Weinberg. The something soft and gushy was a big bloody hole in Weinberg’s chest.
Carella got to his feet, turned on the lights, and went into the small bathroom off the kitchen. When he turned on the lights there, an army of cockroaches scurried for cover. Fighting nausea, Carella washed his bloody right hand, dried it on a grimy towel hanging on a bar over the sink, and then went into the other room to call the precinct. A radio motor-patrol car arrived some five minutes later. Carella filled in the patrolmen, told them he’d be back shortly, and then headed crosstown and uptown to Irving Krutch’s apartment. He did not get there until 3:15 A.M., two and a half hours before dawn.
Krutch opened the door the moment Carella gave his name. He was wearing pajamas, his hair was tousled, even his mustache looked as if it had been suddenly awakened from a very deep sleep.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Just a few questions, Mr. Krutch,” Carella said.
“At three in the morning?”
“We’re both awake, aren’t we?”
“I wasn’t two minutes ago,” Krutch said. “Besides...”
“This won’t take long,” Carella said. “Did you speak to Arthur Brown tonight?”
“I did. Why? What...?”
“When was that?”
“Must have been about... eight o’clock? Eight-thirty? I really can’t say for sure.”
“What’d you talk about, Mr. Krutch?”
“Well, Brown told me you’d found a piece of that photograph in Ehrbach’s apartment, and he said you’d also got another piece from Weinberg. I was supposed to come up to the squadroom tomorrow morning and see them. In fact, you were supposed to show them to me.”
“But you couldn’t wait, huh?”
“What do you mean, I couldn’t...”
“Where’d you go after you spoke to Brown?”
“Out to dinner.”
“Where?”
“The Ram’s Head. The top of 777 Jefferson.”
“Anybody with you?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“A friend of mine.”
“Man or woman?”
“A girl.”
“What time’d you leave the restaurant?”
“About ten-thirty, I guess.”
“Where’d you go?”
“For a walk. We looked in the store windows along Hall Avenue. It was a beautiful night and...”
“Where were you along about midnight, Mr. Krutch?”
“Here,” Krutch said.
“Alone?”
“No.”
“The girl came back here with you?”
“Yes.”
“So she was with you between what time and what time?” Carella said.
“She was here when Brown called at eight — or whenever it was.” Krutch paused. “She’s still here.”
“Where?”
“In bed.”
“Get her up.”
“Why?”
“One man’s been assaulted and another’s been killed,” Carella said. “I want her to tell me where you were when all this was happening. That all right with you?”
“Who was killed?” Krutch asked.
“You sound as if you know who was assaulted,” Carella said quickly.
“No. No, I don’t.”
“Then why’d you only ask who was killed? Aren’t you interested in who was beaten up?”
“I’m...” Krutch paused. “Let me get her. She can clear this up in a minute.”
“I hope so,” Carella said.
Krutch went into the bedroom. Carella heard voices behind the closed door. The bedsprings creaked. There were footsteps. The door opened again. The girl was a young blonde, her long hair trailing down her back, her brown eyes wide and frightened. She was wearing a man’s bathrobe belted tightly at the waist. Her hands fluttered like butterflies on an acid trip.
“This is Detective Carella,” Krutch said. “He wants to know...”
“I’ll ask her,” Carella said. “What’s your name, Miss?”
“Su... Su... Suzie,” she said.
“Suzie what?”
“Suzie Endicott.”
“What time did you get here tonight, Miss Endicott?”
“About... seven-thirty,” she said. “Wasn’t it seven-thirty, Irving?”
“About then,” Krutch said.
“What time did you go out to dinner, Miss Endicott?”
“Eight or eight-thirty.”
“Where’d you eat?”
“The Ram’s Head.”
“And where’d you go afterwards?”
“We walked for a little while, and then came here.”
“What time was that?”
“I guess we got here at about eleven.”
“Have you been here since?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Did Mr. Krutch leave you at any time between seven-thirty and now?”
“Yes, when he went to the men’s room at the restaurant,” Suzie said.
“Happy now?” Krutch asked.
“Overjoyed,” Carella answered. “Are you familiar with timetables, Mr. Krutch?”
“What do you mean? Train timetables?”
“No, investigating timetables. You’re an insurance investigator, I thought you might...”
“I’m not sure I’m following you.”
“I want you to work up a timetable for me. I want you to list everything you did and the exact time you did it from six P.M. until right this minute,” Carella said, and paused. “I’ll wait,” he added.
7
There’s nothing like a little homicide to give an investigation a shot in the arm. Or the chest, as the case may be. Albert Weinberg had been shot in the chest at close range with a .32-caliber pistol. His demise caused Brown to have a heated argument with the hospital intern who kept insisting he should be kept there under observation, and who refused to give him back his trousers. Brown called Carella, who brought his partner a pair of pants, a clean shirt, and his own spare gun. The two men had a hurried consultation while Brown dressed, deciding that Carella should go out to Calm’s Point for a chat in Italian with Lucia Feroglio, the late Carmine Bonamico’s sister-in-law. In the meantime, Brown would go over to the Ferguson Gallery, presumably closed on a Sunday, let himself into the place (against the law, but what the hell), and do a little snooping around. The nurse came in as Brown was zipping up his fly.