“I can obtain a court order if you need one,” Virgil answered. “However, since this is a murder investigation and time is an important element, I would like to ask for your cooperation.”
His ego and conscience satisfied, Greenwood buzzed for his secretary. “Have these lenses checked in the shop,” he directed. “Find out if you can who we made them for. If you can’t do that, find out about how many similar sets we have made in this style.”
The girl took the box with the lenses and closed the door behind her. Greenwood made small talk until she returned a few minutes later. She put the box on his desk and with it a slip of paper.
Greenwood read it and nodded. “We are very fortunate,” he said. “The lenses are quite distinctive; one eye is very different from the other and that isn’t too common. Now, understand that I can’t guarantee we made these lenses. However …” He picked up the paper and studied it again for a second or two, clearly for dramatic effect. “We did manufacture a set of lenses to this exact prescription within the last two years. I don’t have the patient’s name, of course, but the order came from Dr. Nathan Shapiro. He’s very well known here in the contact-lens field.”
Virgil Tibbs had an almost uncontrollable desire to stand up and shout. Instead he rose, expressed his thanks, praised the company’s efficiency, and escaped to his car. He stopped at the first phone booth, consulted the yellow pages, and was on his way.
Dr. Shapiro’s white-frocked receptionist regarded him as a curiosity. “Doctor is very busy this afternoon,” she informed him. “I doubt very much he will be able to see you.” There were patients waiting who bore out her statement.
Tibbs reached into his wallet and produced a card, a considerably less conspicuous procedure than showing his badge. The girl looked at it, then back at him, and laid the card down. “You’ll have to wait,” she said.
Tibbs sat down and waited. He leafed through the outdated magazines, read a pamphlet on eye care, and noted the studied coolness of the receptionist, who was making an effort to pretend he was not there. Some time after the last of the waiting patients had been shown in, she picked up the phone and pressed the intercom button. When the answer came, she spoke in a tone so low Tibbs could not catch a sound. He did not need to; he knew without watching the words her lips were forming.
Ten minutes later Dr. Shapiro came into the waiting room. He was a big man with a round face and a sharply receding hairline that gave him the look of having been polished. He wore the customary white jacket, which set off a pair of big muscular hands the backs of which were almost covered with black hair. He walked directly to Tibbs with a brusqueness that allowed no time for casual talk.
“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to take time to see you,” he said directly. “I suggest you phone for an appointment. It may be some time. I seldom see anyone in less than thirty days.”
“I’m not a patient,” Tibbs answered. “I came on official police business.”
The doctor glanced at his receptionist; when he looked back, Tibbs was holding out his shield. “I didn’t understand,” the doctor said. “Come in. I’ll take a few minutes now.”
Once he grasped the situation, Dr. Shapiro listened carefully, looked at the lenses, and instructed his receptionist to check the records. She checked and supplied the name of Mr. Michael Casella, president of the Casella Construction Company. Mr. Casella had once sustained a minor eye injury that had required a later radical correction of his vision.
Although it was late in the day, Tibbs borrowed the office phone long enough to call the Casella Construction Company. Mr. Casella was not in; he had not been in for the past several days. His secretary was not certain where he was; she believed he was out in the field inspecting construction sites.
Struggling to keep his voice normal, Virgil made an appointment for nine the following morning. Then he went home to enjoy the fruits of his labors.
Precisely on time the next morning, he drove into the yard of the Casella Construction Company and parked his car on the unpaved area before the white clapboard building that was the office. There were several large pieces of earth-moving equipment standing in the yard and a small assortment of cars. Among them was a Lincoln Continental; when he saw it, Tibbs frowned.
Inside the door there was a railing that separated the working area from the few square feet set aside for a lobby. Tibbs presented himself to the receptionist-typist-switchboard operator and asked if Mr. Casella was in.
Without replying the girl plugged in a cord and said, “Someone to see Mike.”
A middle-aged and ample woman, who looked as if she might be a bookkeeper, appeared and asked, “Are you the man who phoned last night?”
After Tibbs replied, she opened the railing gate for him and showed him into the single corner office. From behind the desk, a powerful man with a thick tangle of black hair on his head offered a fast handshake and motioned toward a wooden chair. “I didn’t get your name,” he said.
“Tibbs. Virgil Tibbs.”
“Mike Casella, Virgil. What’s your line?”
Tibbs produced his card.
“Cop, heh? O.K., what’s the beef?”
“No beef, just two fast questions. One-do you wear contact lenses?”
“Yep, love ’em to death. If you want some, I can give you the name of a damn good doctor-Nat Shapiro. Really knows his stuff.”
“Thanks. One more-have you lost or misplaced a set of lenses recently?”
Casella pulled two cigars from his pocket and offered one to Tibbs, who declined. “Nope. I only have one set and I’ve got them on now. I know you can’t see ’em-nobody can. Great invention. What’s it all about?”
He was entitled to an answer. “We found a man dead with lenses similar to yours. We wanted to be sure you were O.K., that’s all.”
“Well, fine,” Casella answered. “About those kids that were hanging around the yard. If you catch ’em, give ’em a good scare and then let them go. They can’t hurt the equipment, but they can hurt themselves and then we’re in trouble.” He stopped. “And thanks for the protection. Stop around before Christmas. We like to keep in touch with our friends.”
Tibbs shook hands and left. Halfway across the yard he saw a golf-ball-sized stone in his path, drew back his right foot, and kicked at it with vicious power. He missed a square-on kick; the stone skidded a few feet to the side and stopped.
He got into his car and sat motionless for a moment, his frustration settling in him like a huge leaden lump. “Damn,” he said between his teeth. He was in no fit mood for anything as he drove toward the civic center and his waiting office.
chapter 6
For the next twenty-four hours Virgil Tibbs lived in a world of hope. He kept a close and continuous vigil over all sources of information concerning missing persons and reviewed crime reports in the hope of finding some faint connection with the body in the pool. He checked with other law-enforcement agencies throughout California, Nevada, and Arizona. At the end of another day of concentrated effort he drew a complete and absolute blank.
Meanwhile in the morgue in San Bernardino the body of an unknown man rested on a slab, unclaimed and yielding no clue that might lead to an identification. The most frustrating thing about the whole stalemate was that no one seemed to care. No anxious wife phoned in anywhere to ask about a missing husband; no business associates made inquiry. The man, whoever he had been, seemed to have lived in a vacuum.
People, Tibbs decided, seldom gave a damn about one another. Landlords weren’t concerned about their tenants so long as the rent was paid. Neighbors were not much inclined to be neighborly any more. Most car drivers had little sympathy for others on the road. And often when a serious crime had been committed, few citizens would come forward to help the police; they were too afraid of getting involved.