"You going home, too?"
"No. I think I'll go up to the Jordon place for another look around."
51
WHEN THE RABBI CALLED THE STATIONHOUSE, HE WAS TOLD that the chief was not there.
"Can you tell me where he is?"
The desk sergeant was evasive. "Gosh, Rabbi. I don't rightly know."
He called Lanigan's house and Mrs. Lanigan said. "No. Rabbi, he's not here. Is it important?"
"It's terribly important."
"Then I'll tell you where I think you can find him, he called to say he was going to have another look around at the Jordon house."
Lanigan was not too pleased when he opened the door and saw who his visitor was. "Oh, it's you." was the way he greeted him. But then he added. "Well, come on in. I owe you something for your help with Maltzman. I suppose."
The rabbi looked about curiously as he entered the living room, he pointed to the recliner. "That's where the body was found?"
"Uh-huh."
He pointed to the clock on the floor. "And the clock?"
"That's where we found it. Nothing has been moved except the body, of course. Originally, the clock was on the mantelpiece there. When it was hit by a bullet, naturally it skidded off onto the floor." He pointed about the room. "Another bullet hit that painting right in the mouth, and one hit the light, and another the finial on the lamp, and one hit the pill bottle over there on the floor, that was on the table there originally, according to Martha Peterson, the housekeeper. But if you want to talk, come in the dining room. I’ve been using it as my office."
Lanigan sat down at the table and, gathering the papers he had spread out before him, put them back into their folder, the rabbi sat down on the other side. Elbows on the table, his chin resting on his hands. Lanigan faced his visitor and said. "I suppose you're here about Mrs. Mandell."
"That's right. Is she suspect?"
Lanigan pursed his lips and then said. "No comment."
"Because if she is." the rabbi went on. "it puts me in a most awkward position. You see, she came to you on my advice. On my urging, in fact."
Lanigan considered, the rabbi was his friend, and as a fair-minded man, he could see some justice in his request for information, and what harm would it do? He could be relied on to keep confidential matters confidential.
"All right,” he said. "She's suspect." "Just because she was here that night?"
"That, and because she's a she." He smiled. "Come on back in the other room, and let me show you." He led the way and stopped about fifteen feet from the recliner. "Jordon was lying back in that armchair, dozing or asleep. Ballistics figures the person with the gun was standing right about here where I'm standing. Now, suppose he fires and misses, a twenty-two doesn't make much noise, but in a room like this, it would be enough to wake anyone, no matter how sound asleep he was. So Jordon wakes up. Is he going to just lie there with someone pointing a gun at him and shooting? Of course not, he'd try to get up, make a run for it, hide, anything but just lie there waiting for the next shot. Right?"
"Go on."
"So we figure it was the first shot that got him. But it was right in the head, in plain sight, the killer knew immediately that he'd hit him and that he was almost certainly dead. If he had any doubts and wanted to make sure, he would have come closer and fired another shot into him. But no, he stands right here and goes on shooting until the cylinder is empty. Why would he do that? One shot might go unnoticed, but half a dozen might very well be heard and noticed. It doesn't make sense. So we come up with a scenario, as they call it these days, of a woman grabbing up the gun, and shutting her eyes and firing away until there's a click and no more bullets, then she opens her eyes and sees that she has killed him. Of course, there's a possibility that the first shot didn't hit him, but that it gave him a heart attack and he either died of that or was unable to move. But it doesn't change anything, and the medical examiner said it was most unlikely, well, the only woman in the case, the only one we knew about, was Martha Peterson, the housekeeper, and we concentrated on her. But we backtracked her and came up with clear evidence that she couldn't have been
here at the time. So then we thought of Billy Green—"
"As someone who might shut his eyes tight while firing a gun?"
"Something like that. Or he might shoot the old man and then figure he might as well fire off the remaining bullets, we even considered Stanley Doble on the grounds that he might have been so drunk that night that he didn't really know what he was doing. But we weren't comfortable with either of those."
"And then I sent you Mrs. Mandell." "Right."
"But couldn't it be that after Jordon was killed with the first shot, the murderer went on firing for a good reason?" said the rabbi doggedly. "He might have shot out the lamp, for instance, because he didn't want to be seen."
Lanigan grinned. "It would have been a lot easier to just snap the switch, wouldn't it? Of course, you could dream up reasons for shooting all the items he hit, he shot the portrait because he hated the original, he shot the pill bottle because he's one of these nature food nuts and is opposed to medicines, he—"
"He could have shot the clock to establish an alibi." the rabbi observed. "He could have set it ahead and then shot it to stop it."
Lanigan's grin broadened. "Sure, except that no one connected with the case offered an alibi, not Stanley, not Billy, not Martha Peterson, not Gore—"
"He had an alibi." the rabbi pointed out.
"Not one that he offered, all he said when we questioned him was that he stopped on the road to Boston to make a phone call and that it was sometime after eight. Now, he could have, because in the office of the gas station where he made his call, there was a big clock on the wall advertising some kind of motor oil, the easiest thing in the world would be to say to the station attendant. 'Hev, is that clock right?' But he didn't, the point is he didn't offer any kind of alibi, we had to dig it out."
"Maybe that's the best kind." "What kind is that?"
"The kind where the police dig it out for you."
The phone rang, and with a muttered damn. Lanigan went to answer it, he picked up the receiver and, after listening for a moment, said. "Yes, he is. Just a minute." He called out. "For you. David. It's Miriam."
The rabbi took the phone and Miriam said. "Oh, David, do you know how long you'll be? Because the Reuben Levys called, they're in town, in Cambridge, for a wedding, they didn't want to call yesterday because of the Sabbath. But they'd like to see us if we can make it. I said I'd call them back."
"The Reuben Levys?" "You know, from the seminary." "Oh, of course, the Voice." "That's right."
"The Voice is in town? Well, what do you know. Yeah, I'd like to see him, but—Look, why don't you call him back and ask if you can call him a little later."
"You mean. I should call him now and—all right. I understand."
It was an abstracted Rabbi Small who returned to the living room. Lanigan smiled sympathetically. "An old friend call you up?"
But the rabbi did not answer, he stopped and stood straight and tense with his arms rigid at his sides, the fists clenched. His head was thrown back and he was staring at the ceiling.
"What's the matter?" asked Lanigan in alarm. "Anything wrong?"
The rabbi relaxed and said sheepishly, "No. I just thought of something. Tell me, have you ever fired a gun with your eyes shut?"
Lanigan blinked at the unexpectedness of the question. "No,” he said cautiously, "can't say that I ever did."
"Well, I did." said the rabbi, and told about his experience at the shooting gallery in Revere. "I can see pretty well with my glasses, but when I take them off. I might just as well shut my eyes as far as anything more than a couple of feet away is concerned."