Guttmann shrugs his shoulders, not eager to share his foolishness. “Oh, it was just grade-school geometry. It occurred to me that we know where each of the three men was killed, and we know where each was going at the time. So, if we extended the lines back on the map…”
LaPointe laughs. “The lines would meet on the doorstep of the killer?”
“Something like that. Or if not at the doorstep of the killer, at least on the doorstep of the woman they all made love with. I assume it was one woman, don’t you?”
“Either that or a whorehouse.”
“Well, either way, it would be one dwelling.”
LaPointe looks up at the map on which Guttmann’s three lines enclose a vast triangle including the east half of the Main district and a corner of Parc Fontaine. “Well, you’ve narrowed it down to eastern Canada.”
Guttmann realizes how stupid his idea sounds when said aloud. “It was just a wild shot. I knew that any two lines would have to meet somewhere. And I hoped that the third would zap right in there.”
“I see.” LaPointe moves aside the files Guttmann brought along with him and picks up a splay of unfinished reports. He wants the kid to see he came here to do some work. Not because he was lonely. Not because his bed was too big.
“Can I get you a cup of coffee, sir?”
“If you’re getting one for yourself.”
While Guttmann is at the machine down the hall, LaPointe’s eyes wander back to the wall map. He makes a nasal puff of derision at the idea that things get solved by geometry and deduction. What you need is an informer, a lot of pressure, a fist.
With a brimming paper cup in each hand, Guttmann has some trouble with the door; he slops some and burns his fingers. “Goddamn it!” He gives the door a kick.
LaPointe glances up. This kid is usually so controlled, so polite. As Guttmann sits in his old chair against the wall, his long legs stretched out in front of him, LaPointe sips his coffee.
“What’s your problem?”
“Sir?”
“Trouble with this girl of yours?”
“No, that isn’t it. That’s turning out to be a really fine thing.”
“Oh? How long have you known her? A week?”
“How long does it take?”
LaPointe nods. That is true. He had been sure he wanted to spend his life with Lucille after knowing her for two hours. Of course, it was a year before they had the money to get married.
“No, it isn’t the girl,” Guttmann continues, looking into his coffee. “It’s the force. I’m thinking pretty seriously about quitting.” He had wanted to talk to LaPointe about this that evening after they’d been at the go-go joint, but there hadn’t been an opportunity. He looks up to see how the Lieutenant is taking the news.
There is no response at all from LaPointe. Perhaps a slight shrug. He never gives advice in this kind of situation; he doesn’t want the responsibility.
There is an uncomfortable, interrogative quality to the silence, so LaPointe looks up at the wall map for something to fill it. “What’s that northwest-southeast line supposed to be?”
Guttmann understands. The Lieutenant doesn’t want to talk about it. Well… “Ah, let me see. Well, that X is the alley where we found Green.”
“I know that.”
“And the circle is his apartment—the rooming house with the concierge with the broken lip? So I just drew a line between them and continued it on southeast to see where it would lead. Just an approximation. It cuts through the middles of blocks and such, but it must have been the general direction he came from.”
“Yes, but he wasn’t going back to his rooming house.”
“Sir?”
“He was going to the Happy Hour Whisky à Go-Go, remember? He had a date with that dancer’s retarded kid.”
Guttmann looks at the map more closely and frowns. “Yeah. That’s right!” He takes out his pencil and crosses to the map. Freehand, he sketches in the revised line, and the vast triangle is reduced by a considerable wedge. “That narrows it down a lot.”
“Sure. To maybe thirty square blocks and six or eight thousand people. Just for the hell of it, let’s take a look at the other lines. What’s the one running roughly east-west?”
“That’s the McGill professor. The X is where his body was found; the circle is his office on the campus.”
“How do you know he was going to his office?”
“Assumption. His apartment was up north. Why would he walk west unless he was going to the campus? Maybe to do some late work. Grade papers, something like that.”
“All right. Assume it. Now, what about the other line? The north-south one?”
“That’s the American. His body was found right… here. And his hotel was downtown, right… ah… here. So I just extended the line back.”
“But he wouldn’t have walked south.”
“Sure he would. That was the direction to his hotel, and also the best direction to go to find taxis.”
“What about his car?”
“Sir?”
“Look in the report. There was something about a rented car. It was found three days later, after the rental agency placed a complaint. Don’t you remember? The car was ticketed for overparking. Bouvier made some wiseassed note about the bad luck of getting a parking ticket the same night you get killed.”
Guttmann taps his forehead with his knuckle. “Yes! I forgot about that.”
“Don’t worry about it. One line out of three isn’t bad. For a Joan.”
“Where was the car parked?”
“It’s in the report. Somewhere a few blocks from where they found the body.”
Guttmann takes up the folder on MacHenry, John Albert, and leafs quickly through it. He misses what he’s looking for and has to flip back. The major reason Dr. Bouvier is able to come up with his little “insights” from time to time is his cross-indexing of information. In the standard departmental files, the murder of MacHenry, the report of the car-rental agency, and the traffic report of the ticketed car would be in separate places; in fact in separate departments. But in Dr. Bouvier’s files, they are together. “Here it is!” Guttmann says. “Let’s see… the rental car… recovered by the agency from police garage… ah! It was parked near the corner of Rue Mentana and Rue Napoléon. Let’s see what that gives us.” He goes to the map again and sketches the new line. Then he turns back to LaPointe. “Now, how about that, Lieutenant?”
The three lines fail to intersect by a triangle half the size of a fingernail. And the center of that triangle is Carré St. Louis, a rundown little park on the edge of the Main.
LaPointe rises and approaches the map. “Could be coincidence.”
“Yes, sir.”
“We would be looking for a woman somewhere around Carré St. Louis who has made love three times in the past six years. It’s just possible that more than one would fit that description.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Murders aren’t solved by drawing lines on maps, you know.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hm-m.”
Guttmann lets the silence extend awhile before offering, “I’ll bet Sergeant Gaspard would let me go with you. I’ve just about finished his paper work too.”
LaPointe taps the pale green rectangle of the square with his thick forefinger. It has been about a week since he wandered through there on his rounds. The night of the Green killing, come to think of it. He pictures the statue of the dying Cremazie.
The empty pond, its bottom littered. The peace symbol dripping rivulets of paint, like a bleeding swastika. The word love, but the spray can ran out while they were adding fuck yo…
LaPointe nods. “All right. Tomorrow morning well take a walk around there.” He returns to his desk and finishes his cooling coffee, crushing the cup and tossing it toward the wastebasket. “What does she think about it?”