No one offered her a chair so she remained standing, leaning against the enormous refrigerator. She looked around at the well-appointed kitchen: copper-bottomed pots and pans hanging from an overhead frame; a Cuisinart on the counter; a hardwood rack holding knives and a butchers' round; a double-sink of stainless steel; gleaming white appliances; and glass-doored cupboards holding enough tableware to feed a regiment.
"I just have a few questions," Dora said, addressing Charles. "I understand that on the evening Mr. Starrett was killed, there was a cocktail party for family and friends."
He nodded.
"Where was it held-in the living room?"
"Mostly," he said. "That's where I served drinks and canapes. But people wandered around."
"You mean they all weren't in the living room constantly during the party?"
"They wandered," he repeated. "Only Mrs. Olivia remained seated. The others stood and mingled, went to their bedrooms to fetch something or make a phone call."
Clara turned from the sink. "Sometimes they came in here," she said. "For more ice, or maybe for another drink while Charles was busy passing the tray of hors d'oeuvres."
"Were there any arguments during the party? Did anyone make a scene?"
Wife and husband looked at each other, then shook their heads.
"How long have you been with the Starretts?" Dora asked, bedeviled by the fear that she wasn't asking the right questions.
"Seven years, come March," Charles replied. "I started with them first. Then, about a year later, the cook they had left and Clara took over."
"Both of you get along well with the family?"
Charles shrugged. "No complaints," he said.
"I understand the late Mr. Starrett had a short temper."
Again the shrug. "He liked everything just so."
"And when it wasn't, he let you know?"
"He let everyone know," Clara said, turning again from her task at the sink. "He was a mean, mean man."
"Clara!" her husband warned.
"Well, he was," she insisted. "The way he treated people-it just wasn't right."
"Speak only good of the dead," her husband admonished.
"Bullshit," Clara said unexpectedly.
Hopeless, Dora decided, realizing she was getting nowhere. These people weren't going to reveal any skeletons in the Starretts' closet, and she couldn't blame them; they had cushy jobs and wanted to hang on to them.
She took a final look around the kitchen. Her gaze fell on that hardwood knife rack attached to the wall. It had eight slots. Two were empty. She stepped to the rack, withdrew a long bread knife with a serrated edge, and examined it.
"Nice," she said.
"Imported," Charles said. "Carbon steel. The best."
Dora replaced the bread knife. "Two are missing," she said casually. "What are they?"
Clara, at the sink, held up a paring knife she was using to scrape carrots. "This is one," she said.
"And the other?" Dora persisted.
Charles and Clara exchanged a quick glance. "It was an eight-inch chefs knife," he said. "I'm sure it's around here somewhere, but we can't find it."
"It'll probably turn up," Dora said, knowing it wouldn't.
Chapter 12
Mike Trevalyan had frequently urged Dora to use a tape recorder during interviews. Most of the investigators on his staff used them, but she refused.
"It makes witnesses freeze up," she argued. "They see that little black box and they're afraid I'm going to use their words in court, or they might say something they'll want to deny later."
So she worked without a recorder, and didn't even take notes during interviews. But as soon as possible she wrote an account of her conversations in a thick spiral notebook: questions asked, answers received. She also made notes on the physical appearance of the witnesses, their clothing, speech patterns, any unusual gestures or mannerisms.
She returned to the Bedlington after her session with Clara and Charles Hawkins and got to work writing out the details of her meeting with the servants and with Mrs. Eleanor Starrett. That completed, she slowly read over everything in the notebook, all the conversations and her personal reactions to the people involved. Then she phoned Detective John Wenden.
He wasn't in, but she left a message asking him to call her at the Bedlington. She went into the little pantry and poured herself a glass of white wine. She brought it back into the sitting room and curled up in a deep armchair. She sipped her wine, stared at her notebook, and wondered what Mario was doing. Finally she put the empty glass aside and read through her notebook again, searching for inspiration. Zilch.
She went downstairs for an early dinner in the hotel, and had a miserable meal of meat loaf, mashed potatoes, and peas. At that moment, she mournfully imagined, Mario was dining on veal scaloppine sauteed with marsala and lemon juice. Life was unfair; everyone knew that.
She returned to her suite and, fearing Wenden might have called during her absence, phoned him again. But he had not yet returned to his office or called in for messages. So she settled down with her notebook again, convinced those scribbled pages held the key to what actually happened to Lewis Starrett-and why.
When her phone rang, she rushed to pick it up, crossing her fingers for luck.
"Hiya," Wenden said hoarsely. "Quite a surprise hearing from you."
"How so?" she asked, genuinely puzzled.
"The way I came on to you the other night; I thought you'd be miffed."
"Nah," she said. "It's good for a girl's ego. When the passes stop, it's time to start worrying. My God, John, you sound terrible."
"Ah, shit," he said, "I think I got the flu. I have it alclass="underline" sneezing, runny nose, headache, cough."
"Are you dosing yourself?"
"Yeah. Aspirin mostly. I get these things every year. Nothing to do but wait for them to go away."
"Why didn't you call in sick, stay home, and doctor yourself?"
"Because three other guys beat me to it, and the boss got down on his knees and cried. You feeling okay?"
"Oh sure. I'm healthy as a horse. John, I was hoping to see you tonight, but I guess you want to get home."
"Not especially. I feel so lousy I don't even want to think about driving to Queens."
"That's where you live?"
"If you can call it that. What's up?"
"A couple of interesting things. Listen, if you can make it over here, I'll fix you a cup of hot tea with a slug of brandy. It won't cure the flu but might help you forget it."
"On my way," he said. "Shouldn't take more than twenty minutes or so."
She put a kettle on to boil, set out a cup and saucer for him, and then went into the bathroom to brush her hair and add a little lip gloss, wondering what the hell she was doing.
When Wenden arrived, carrying an open box of Kleenex, he looked like death warmed over: bleary eyes, unshaven jaw, his nose red and swollen. And, as usual, his clothes could have been a scarecrow's castoffs.
She got him seated on the couch, poured him a steaming cup of tea, and added a shot of brandy to it. He held the cup with both hands, took a noisy sip, closed his eyes and sighed.
"Plasma," he said. "Thank you, Florence Nightingale."
"You should be in bed," she said.
"Best offer I've had today," he said, then sneezed and grabbed for a tissue.
"Now I know you're not terminal," she said, smiling. "Anything new on the Starrett case?"
"Nothing from our snitches. We've checked the whole neighborhood for three blocks around. No one saw anything or heard anything. We searched every sewer basin and trash can. No knife. We've got fliers out in every taxi garage in the city. The official line is still homicide by a stranger, maybe after an argument, maybe by some nut who objected to Starrett's cigar smoke-who the hell knows."
"Uh-huh. John, did you see the medical examiner's report?"
"Sure, I saw it. I love reading those things. They really make you want to resign from the human race. The things people do to people…"