“You won’t tell him, will you?”
“Of course not. We only want to know about David Arthur Cohen, Mrs. Redfield. Can you tell me how he behaved that night?”
“I don’t know,” she said. She moved back on the seat of the chair, and her voice came from her throat like a whine, as though he were holding a club and were threatening her with it. Her eyes had widened, and she visibly moved deeper into the chair, her back climbing it, her shoulders pulling away from him.
“What did he do, Mrs. Redfield?”
“I don’t know,” she said, and again the words were a whine, and her eyes were beginning to blink uncertainly now.
“Mrs. Redfield, I’m not asking you what you did that night. I only want to know—”
“I didn’t do anything!” she shouted, and she gripped the sides of the chair with both hands, as though knowing he would hit her now, and bracing herself for the shock.
“No one said you did, Mrs. Redfield. I only want to know if anything happened that might have caused Cohen to—”
“Nothing happened,” she said. “I want to go home now. I want my husband.”
“Mrs. Redfield, we think we have a murderer downstairs. He claims he had nothing to do with the murders, but if we can find something, anything, that’ll start him talking…”
“I don’t know anything. I want to go home.”
“Mrs. Redfield, I don’t want to have to…”
“I don’t know anything.”
“…embarrass you, or make this difficult for you. But unless we can find something concrete to—”
“I told you, I don’t know. I want to go home. I don’t know.”
“Mrs. Redfield,” Carella said evenly, “we know everything that happened that night at Randy Norden’s. Everything. Helen Struthers told us about it, and so did Cohen.”
“I didn’t do anything. They did it.”
“Who?”
“The…the others.”
“What others?”
“Helen and Blanche. Not me. Not me.”
“What did they do?”
“They couldn’t get me to do it,” Margaret said. “I wouldn’t, and they couldn’t force me. I knew what was right. I was only seventeen, but I certainly knew what was right and what was wrong. It was the others, you see.”
“You had no part of anything that happened, is that right?”
“That’s right.”
“Then why didn’t you leave, Mrs. Redfield?”
“Because they…they held me. All of them. Even the girls. They held me while…Listen, I didn’t even want to be in the play. I was Mag, the barmaid, she was a barmaid, not a girl like the others, my mother wouldn’t let me be in the play at first because of the kind of girls they were supposed to be, I was only in the play because Randy talked me into it. But I didn’t know the kind of boy Randy was until the night of the party, when he was with Helen. That’s what started it all, his being with Helen, and everybody drinking so much…”
“Were you drunk, Mrs. Redfield?”
“No, yes, I don’t know. I must have been drunk. If I’d been sober, I wouldn’t have let them…”
Margaret stopped.
“Yes?”
“Nothing.”
“Mrs. Redfield, do you want to tell this to a policewoman?”
“I have nothing to tell.”
“I’ll get a policewoman.”
“I have nothing to say to her. What happened wasn’t my fault. I’ve never…do you think I wanted what happened?”
“Miscolo, get me a policewoman, on the double!” Carella yelled.
“The others did, but not me. I was drunk, or they wouldn’t have been able to hold me. I was only seventeen. I didn’t know about such things, because I came from a good home. If I hadn’t been drunk…I wouldn’t have let them ruin my life. If I’d known the kind of boy Randy was, the kind of filth in him, in his body, and the others, Helen especially, if I’d known what she was, I wouldn’t have stayed at the party, I wouldn’t have had a single drink, I wouldn’t even have been in the play, if I’d known what kind of boys they were, and girls, if I’d known what they could do to me, if I’d only known. But I was seventeen, I didn’t even think about such things, and when they said they were going to have a party after the show, I thought it would be a nice party, after all Professor Richardson was going to be there, but they were drinking even with him in the room, and then when he left, it must have been about midnight, they really began drinking. I’d never even drunk anything stronger than beer before that, and here they were pouring drinks, and before I knew it, only the six of us were left…”
Alf Miscolo saw the policewoman going down the corridor toward the squadroom, and he figured it wouldn’t be long before he could stop the pretense of entertaining Lewis Redfield. Redfield had tired quickly of even the new Saturday Evening Post, and he fidgeted uneasily in his chair now in the sparsely furnished, loosely titled “reception room,” which was really a small cubicle off the clerical office. Miscolo wished both Redfield and his wife would go home so that he could get back to typing and filing, but instead the policewoman vanished down the corridor, and Redfield sat in his chair and fidgeted as though his wife were in the hands of heartless torturers.
Miscolo was a married man himself, so he said, “Don’t worry about her, Mr. Redfield. They’re only asking a few questions.”
“She’s a nervous woman,” Redfield answered. “I’m afraid they might upset her.” He did not look at Miscolo as he spoke. His eyes and his complete attention were riveted to the open doorway leading to the corridor. He could not see the squadroom from where he sat, nor could he hear a word spoken there, but his eyes stayed on the hallway, and he seemed to be straining to catch stray snatches of sound.
“How long you been married, sir?” Miscolo asked, making conversation.
“Two years,” Redfield said.
“You’re practically newlyweds, huh?” Miscolo said, grinning. “That’s why you’re so worried about her. Me, I been married…”
“I don’t think we fall into the ‘newlywed’ category,” Redfield said. “We’re not exactly teenagers.”
“No, I didn’t mean…”
“Besides, this is my wife’s second marriage.”
“Oh,” Miscolo said, and couldn’t think of anything to add to it.
“Yes,” Redfield said.
“Well, plenty of people get married late in life,” Miscolo said lamely. “Lots of times, those turn out to be the best marriages. Both parties are ready to accept family responsibility, ready to settle…”
“We don’t have a family,” Redfield said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“We don’t have any children.”
“Well, sooner or later,” Miscolo said, smiling. “Unless, of course, you don’t want any.”
“I’d like a family,” Redfield said.
“Nothing like it,” Miscolo answered, warming to his subject, “I’ve got two kids myself, a girl and a boy. My daughter’s studying to be a secretary at one of the commercial high schools here in the city. My son’s up at MIT. That’s in Boston, you know. You ever been to Boston?”
“No.”
“I was there when I was in the Navy, oh, this was way back even before the Second World War. Were you in the service?”
“Yes.”
“What branch?”
“The Army.”
“Don’t they have a base up near Boston someplace?”
“I don’t know.”
“Seems to me I saw a lot of soldiers when I was there.” Miscolo shrugged. “Where were you stationed?”
“How much longer will they be with her?” Redfield asked suddenly.
“Oh, coupla minutes, that’s all. Where were you stationed, Mr. Redfield?”