"Then think," said Mendoza… Because, he thought, while the Corliss woman wouldn't have had any reason to murder Nestor, still there was something in that part of the puzzle. Art Hackett was no fool. He had started to suspect what was behind the Nestor setup, and maybe by Friday night he'd seen through it. And seen that possibly, if Nestor had kept any records of his illicit patients, that list would bear looking into. It could be that some frightened, ashamed young innocent had confessed to her parents, who had threatened Nestor with exposure-something like that. Hell, they didn't even know that the gun hadn't been Nestor's. Or there could have been an argument about money with a new patient's boy friend. Anyway, that list would be interesting: and if Hackett had seen through the Corliss woman's actions that Wednesday morning, he could have guessed that she'd have it. If, of course, there was one. And gone to see her…
"Think hard," he said. "Miss Corliss says you were at her apartment?
"Sure, that's right," said Webster. "I remember now. We had dinner together-"
"Where?"
"Uh-some grill out on Olympic. And we went back to her place and-and played cards-"
"?Damelo! " said Mendoza. "All very innocent. And how late did you stay, playing cards?"
"I don't know. Maybe midnight?
"Did anyone come calling on Miss Corliss that night while you were there?"
What looked like genuine surprise showed in Webster's eyes. "Why, no, sir."
"A sergeant of detectives? Sergeant Hackett?"
"No, sir. I never heard that name. Excuse me, why you asking all this, sir? Madge wouldn't be up to anything wrong, honest, sir. She was awful sorry about Dr. Nestor getting shot like that, it was some burglar broke in, wasn't it, and-"
"I'll bet she was sorry. Suddenly losing a profitable job. Do you know what cut he gave her?"
Webster shifted uneasily. "I dunno what you mean. Listen, we're both straight, Madge never-"
"That's fine," said Mendoza. "Then you won't object to my having your apartment searched, as we searched Miss Corliss'."
After a moment Webster said, "Why, I got no objection. I'm clean."
"Let's just see if the warrant's come through… Did Miss Corliss ever give you anything to keep for her?"
"No, sir."
"If she did, better tell me now," said Mendoza.
"No, she never. I don't know what you're getting at. I told you all I know, can I go now?"
"No," said Mendoza. "You'll stay right here until a couple of men have looked through your place." He looked at his watch; they'd be night-shift men. He took Webster out to the anteroom. The search warrant was on its way up; Sergeant Lake was just leaving. Mendoza told Sergeant Farrell, just coming on, about the warrant, to send out a couple of men.
He went back to his office and called Alison to tell her he'd be late. Possibly not home at all until God knew when.
"All right, darling, we won't expect you… Yes, she's fine, we've been so relieved ever since they called this morning? Alison laughed. "And, Luis, Mairi's taking all the credit for it-her solemn novena beginning to work, you know!”
"One good Christian soul to intercede for the heathen," he said. "Yes. Expect me when you see me, hermosa."
Time enough to tell them, if…
He put the phone down.
It was a definite headache now. He hadn't wanted much lunch, and come to think he hadn't had any breakfast. Ought to go out and get something.
Sixty hours, said Dr. MacFarlane. My God, thought Mendoza in vague surprise, is this still only Monday? These long, long days, since he'd ripped open that yellow envelope in the Bermuda hotel room…
It was seven-fifty, and he'd taken two aspirin Sergeant Farrell had found for him, which hadn't done much for the headache, when Glasser and Higgins came back from Larry Webster's apartment. Higgins said, "Sorry, we'd have been here before but we thought they ought to be checked for prints, just in case. Webster's are all over most of 'em-they checked Records." He laid a manila envelope on the desk; he was looking pleased.
Mendoza upended it and a dozen little glass ampoules rolled out. The kind containing one set dose each, for convenience in filling a hypodermic syringe. They were all neatly labeled. Morphine.
"?Que bello! " said Mendoza. "Where?"
Higgins smiled. "In the middle of a couple of pounds of sugar in a cannister in the kitchen. A lot of people don't realize we're halfway bright."
Mendoza said, "Fetch him in.”
Webster came in smiling ingratiatingly. "Now you found out I'm clean, I never-"
Mendoza crooked a finger at him. "Come here, friend. Where'd you get these pretty little things? Are you breaking in on the big time, with dope?"
Webster looked at the ampoules and said despondently,
"Oh hell. Hell and damnation. I never figured you'd fnd 'em where I hid 'em. But they're not mine. Honest, sir, I never- Madge asked me to hold 'em for her. I'm not taking no narco rap, not even for Madge. I'm leveling with you, they're hers, see-"
Mendoza said resignedly to Higgins, "Go bring her in, George. Fast. Tell Farrell to get the warrants, Webster and Corliss-narco possession. And he might send out for a sandwich and coffee."
"With pleasure," said Higgins, and went out.
"You can't hold me- I didn't have anything to do-it was Madge!
I-"
"Sit down, Larry," said Mendoza tiredly. "You're going nowhere for a while."
FOURTEEN
Margaret Corliss didn't come apart as easily as Webster had, of course. She went on stolidly denying it, calling Webster a liar, saying they couldn't prove anything. Mendoza kept at her for some time before the sense of what he was saying seemed to reach her.
"We will prove it, you know. We're already on the way to proving that most of those names in the appointment book are fakes, and who else could have put them there and why? On that bloodstained smock, we're going to find that no legitimate patient ever bled in his office, and we know it's not his type of blood, but it is his smock. Why did he want a sterilizer? Why did he want morphine? And so on and so on. You'd be surprised what evidence the lab can find when they go looking, and they'l1 be taking those examination rooms apart. Now we've charged you with something, I can get an order to open that safe deposit box you've got at the Bank of America, and I'll bet I'll find some interesting things in it."
That was what got to her. She shrugged and sat back, accepting it coolly: a gambler who'd lost this throw. "I guess you will," she said calmly. "You win. I did all I could-it was reely very awkward, Doctor getting shot like that, you can see it was. But if you open that box, well, you'll get the evidence all right. Just how the luck goes. Can I have a cigarette?"
He gave her one. "Now, let's have some straight answers."
"I don't know why I should tell you anything."
"Look," he said. "You'll get a one-to-three and serve the minimum term, on a first offense. You're still ahead in a way-I expect you've saved some of your cut. But whoever killed Nestor, again in a way, put you in this spot, didn't he? All I want to know-"
She was quite informative, eventually. Once she saw she couldn't get out of it, she told him what he wanted to know; and he thought she was telling the truth. Frank Nestor had approached her much as Mendoza had imagined, seeing her name in the paper in connection with the beauty shop. He'd said frankly he intended to set up a mill and needed a woman contact. She'd sized him up and thrown in with him, and it had turned out a very profitable venture. In one way, thought Mendoza, those two had been much alike: all business, taking the main chance.
"Doctor was very clever," she said. "He had a lot of ever so clever ideas. You know those ads in the personal columns that say, Any girl in trouble call this number? Well, of course they're put in by real charities or social workers, like that, and they don't exactly mean the kind of help Doctor meant." She smiled. "But he had a lot of cards printed with that on, and my phone number. I left them all sorts of places, places he picked out-at the college libraries at U.S.C. and U.C.L.A., and so on, and in ladies' rooms in all the expensive night clubs and big hotels-"