'Could have,' I said. 'Yes. It's hard to believe an emotionally disturbed man intent on suicide would wait for an elevator to take him up one floor when he could have walked it in less than a minute. But I agree, yes, he could have done it.'
'Let's figure he did,' Stilton said. 'Let's not try jamming facts into a theory. I've known a lot of good men who messed themselves up doing that. The trick is to fit the theory to the facts. How you doing? Any great detecting to report?'
'Two things,' I said.
I told him about those bills from Martin Reape I had found at Kipmar Textiles. The bills that had been approved for payment by Sol Kipper. And the cancelled cheques endorsed by Reape.
I awaited his reaction. But there was only silence.
'Perce?' I said. 'You there?'
He started speaking again, and suddenly he was sober. .
'Josh,' he said, 'do you realize what you've got?'
'Well, yes, certainly. I've established a definite connection between Sol Kipper and Marty Reape.'
'You goddamned Boy Scout!' he screamed at me.
'You've got hard evidence. You've got paper. Something we can take to court. Up to now it's all been smoke. But now we've got paper. God, that's wonderful!'
It didn't seem so wonderful to me, but I supposed police officers had legal priorities of which I was not aware. I went ahead and told Detective Stilton what I had learned about Tippi Kipper and the Reverend Godfrey Knurr, that they were having an affair and it had existed prior 263
to Sol Kipper's death.
'Where did you get that?' he asked curiously.
I hesitated a moment.
'From the maid,' I said finally.
He laughed. 'Miss Horizontal herself?' he said. 'I'm not going to ask you how you got her to talk; I can imagine.
Well, it could be true.'
'It would explain the Kipper-Reape connection,' I argued. 'Sol got suspicious and hired Marty to find out the truth. Reape got evidence that Knurr and Tippi were, ah, intimate. That's when Sol called Mr Tabatchnick and wanted to change his will.'
'Uh-huh. I follow. Sol gets dumped before he can change the will. Maybe the lovers find and destroy the evidence. Photographs? Could be. Tape recordings.
Whatever. But street-smart Reape has made copies and tries blackmail. Goodbye, Marty.'
'And then after he gets bumped, his grieving widow tries the same thing.'
'It listens,' Stilton admitted. 'I'd be more excited if we could figure out how they managed to waste Sol. And come up with the suicide note. But at least we've got more than we had before. When I get in on Monday, I'll run a trace on Knurr.'
'And on Tippi,' I said. 'Please.'
'Why her?'
I told him what the Kipper sons had said about her Las Vegas background and how she had originally come from Chicago, which had also been Knurr's home.
'May be nothing,' Stilton said, 'may be something. All right, I'll run Tippi through the grinder, too, and we shall see what we shall see. Hang in there, Josh; you're doing okay.'
'I am?' I said, surprised. 'I thought I was doing badly.
As a matter of fact, one of the reasons I called you was to ask if you could suggest a new approach. Something I 264
haven't tried yet.'
There was silence for a brief moment.
'It's your baby.' he said at last. 'But if I was on the case, I'd tail Tippi Kipper and the Reverend Knurr for a while.'
'What for?' I asked.
'Just for the fun of it,' he said. 'Josh, my old lady is yelling and I better hang up. I think she wants to put me to work. Keep in touch. I'll let you know what the machine says about Knurr and Tippi.'
'Thank you for calling,' I said.
'You're perfectly welcome,' he responded with mock formality, then laughed. 'So long, Josh,' he said as he rang off. 'Have a good weekend.'
I finished the Times and my cold coffee about the same time, then mixed a weak Scotch-and-water, turned the radio down low, and started rereading my notes on the Stonehouse case. I went back to the very beginning, to my first meeting with Mr Teitelbaum. Then I read the record of my initial interviews with Mrs Ula Stonehouse, Glynis, and Mrs Effie Dark. I found something interesting. I had been in the kitchen with Mrs Dark, and the interrogation went something like this:
Q: What about Glynis? Does she work?
A: Not anymore. She did for a year or two but she quit.
Q: Where did she work?
A: I think she was a secretary in a medical laboratory.
Q: But now she does nothing?
A: She does volunteer work three days a week in a free clinic down on the Lower East Side.
I closed the file folder softly and stared into the cold fireplace. Secretary in a medical laboratory. Now working in a clinic.
It was possible.
But Mr Teitelbaum had given me only another week.
I put in some additional hours reading over the files and planning moves. After a solitary dinner I went out to get 265
early editions of the Times and News. It was around 8.30, not snowing, sleeting, or raining, but the air was so damp, I could feel icy moisture on my face. I walked rapidly, head down. The streets were deserted. Very little traffic. I saw no pedestrians until I rounded the corner on to Tenth Avenue.
The Sunday News was in and I bought a copy of that.
But the Sunday Times hadn't yet been delivered. There were a dozen people warming themselves in the store, waiting for the truck. I decided not to wait, but to pick up the Times in the morning. I started back to my apartment.
My brownstone was almost in the middle of the block.
There was a streetlamp on the opposite side of the street. It was shedding a ghastly orange glow. The lamp itself was haloed with a wavering nimbus.
I was about halfway home when two men stepped out of an areaway a few houses beyond my brownstone and started walking towards me. They were widely separated on the sidewalk. They appeared to be carrying baseball bats.
I remember thinking, as my steps slowed, that what was going to happen was going to happen to me. Almost at the same time I thought it was an odd sort of mugging; attackers usually come up on a victim from behind. I halted and glanced back. There was a third assailant behind me, advancing as steadily and purposefully as the two in front.
I looked about wildly. The street was empty. Perhaps I should have started screaming and continued screaming until windows opened, heads popped out, and someone had the compassion to call the police. But I didn't think of screaming. While it was happening, I thought only of escape.
The two men to my front were now close enough for me to see they were wearing knitted ski masks with holes at the eyes and mouth. Now they were swinging their weapons menacingly, and I knew, knew, this was not to be a 266
conventional mugging and robbery. Their intent was to inflict grievous bodily injury, if not death.
I took another quick look back. The single attacker was still approaching, but at a slower pace than the two ahead.
His function appeared to be as a blocker, to prevent me from retreating from a frontal assault. He was waving the baseball bat in both hands, like a player at the plate awaiting the first pitch. He, too, was wearing a ski mask, but though I saw him only briefly, I did note that one of the eyeholes in the mask appeared opaque. He was wearing a black eyepatch beneath the mask.
Parked cars, bumper to bumper, prevented my fleeing into the street. I didn't dare dash up the nearest steps and frantically ring strange bells, hoping for succour before those assassins fell upon me. I did what I thought best; I turned and ran back, directly at the single ruffian. I thought my chances would be better against one than two.