Lullaby

'Just tell her that Mike Fournier would like to talk to her. His number here is . . .'

'Mr Carella? Excuse me, but . . .'

There was a sudden silence on the line.

'Miss Ogilvy?' Carella said, puzzled.

'Sir . . . I'm sorry, but . . . Joyce is dead.'

'What?'

'Yes, sir.'

'What?'

'She was murdered, sir.'

'When?'

'Monday night.'

Carella realized he was frowning. He also realized he was shocked. He had not been shocked in a long, long time. Why the murder of Joyce Chapman should now have such an effect on him . . .

'Tell me what happened,' he said.

'Well, sir, maybe you ought to talk to her sister. She was out here when it happened.'

'Could I have her number, please?'

'I don't have her number back east, but I'm sure it's in the phone book.'

'Where would that be, Miss Ogilvy? Back east where?'

'Why, right where you're calling from,' she said.

'Here? She lives here in this city?'

'Yes, sir. She came out because Mr Chapman was so sick and all, and everybody was expecting him to die. Instead, it was poor Joyce who . . .'

Her voice caught.

'And she's back here now?' Carella asked.

'Yes, sir, they flew home yesterday, her and her husband. Right after the funeral.'

'Which part of the city, would you know?'

'Does Calm's Point sound right? Is there a Calm's Point?'

'Yes, there is,' Carella said. 'Can you tell me what her married name is?'

'Hammond. Melissa Hammond. Well, it'd probably be under Richard Hammond.'

'Thank you,' Carella said.

'Not at all,' she said, and hung up.

Carella immediately dialed Seattle Directory Assistance, asked for the Seattle PD and looked up at the clock. 9:15 a.m. their time. If it worked the way it did here, the day shift would have been in for an hour and a half already. He dialed the number. Identified himself. Asked to talk to someone in Homicide. A sergeant told him he was just passing through with some papers, heard the phone ringing, picked it up. Didn't seem to be anyone up here at the moment, could he have someone get back? Carella told him he was trying to reach whoever was handling the Chapman case. Joyce Chapman. The Monday night murder. He said it was urgent. The sergeant gave his solemn word.

The man who called back at one o'clock Carella's time identified himself as Jamie Bonnem. He said he and his partner were working the Chapman case. He wanted to know what Carella's interest was.

'Her daughter was murdered here on New Year's Eve,' Carella said.

'Didn't know she was married,' Bonnem said.

Sort of a Western drawl. Carella didn't know they talked that way in Seattle. Maybe he was from someplace else.

'She was single, but that's another story,' he said. 'Can you tell me what happened out there?'

Bonnem told him what had happened.

Killed in her own bed.

Pistol in her mouth.

Two shots fired.

Gun was a Smith & Wesson 59.

'That's a nine-millimeter auto,' Bonnem said. 'We recovered both bullets and one of the cartridge cases. We figure the killer picked up the other one, couldn't find the one he left behind. He couldn't do anything about the bullets 'cause they were buried in the wall behind the bed.'

'Anything else involved?' Carella asked.

'What do you mean?'

'Was she raped?'

'No.'

'What've you got so far?'

'Nothing but the ballistics make. What've you got?'

Carella told him what he had.

'So we've both got nothing, right?' Bonnem said.

* * * *

'He asks for protection, and then he disappears on me,' Kling said.

He had the floor.

The detectives were gathered in Lieutenant Byrnes's office for the weekly Thursday afternoon meeting. The meetings were the lieutenant's idea. They took place at three-thirty every Thursday, catching the off-going day shift and the on-coming night shift. This way, he hoped for input from eight detectives, all of them airing their various cases. If he ended up with six of them in his office, what with vacations and people out sick, he considered himself lucky. The lieutenant called these meetings his Thursday Afternoon Think Tank. Detective Andy Parker called them the Thursday Afternoon Stink Tank.

There were only five detectives with Byrnes that afternoon. O'Brien and Fujiwara were on stakeout and had relieved on post. Hawes was out interviewing a burglary victim. Parker wished he could have thought up some good excuse to miss the meeting. He hated these fucking meetings. He didn't like hanging around late if his shift happened to be the one getting relieved, and he didn't like coming in early if he was the one about to do the relieving. Anyway, he had enough problems with his own case load without having to listen to somebody else's troubles. Who gave a damn what was happening with Kling and this Herrera character? Not Parker.

He sat in a straight-backed chair, looking out the window. He was willing to bet anyone in the room that it would start snowing again any minute. He wondered if that blue parka was still downstairs in his locker. He was glad he hadn't shaved this morning. A two-day growth of beard kept you warm when it was snowing. He was wearing rumpled gray flannel trousers, unpolished black shoes, a Harris tweed sport jacket with a stain on the right sleeve, and a white shirt with the collar open, no tie. He looked like one of the city's homeless who had wandered into a warm place for the afternoon.

'Maybe he only needed cover till they turned off the heat,' Brown suggested.

He was wearing a dress shirt and tie, the trousers and vest to a suit; he'd been in court all day, testifying on an assault case. His jacket was draped over the back of his chair. He was a huge man, his complexion the color of his name, a frown on his face as he tried to work through Kling's problem with him. The frown came out as a scowl.

'Okay, Artie,' Kling said, 'but why would the posse suddenly quit? Two weeks ago, three weeks, whenever it was, they tried to kill the man. So all at once all bets are off?'

'Maybe the color of blue scared them,' Carella said.

'What'd you have on him?' Willis asked. 'A round-the-clock?'

'No, sun-to-sun,' Kling said.

'All we could afford,' Byrnes said. 'The man's small time.'

He sat behind his desk in his shirt sleeves, a man of medium height with a compact bullet head and no-nonsense blue eyes. It was too damn hot in this room. Something wrong with the damn thermostat. He'd have to call Maintenance.

'Don't forget the one who came after me,' Kling said.