The evening Tasia tried to kill herself had been a painful one, and Elaine hated Detective Connery for making her relive it. She did everything she could to dissuade the young detective from asking the inevitable, but to no avail. Connery was thorough, determined, and the most stubborn man she’d ever met. He refused to leave any questions unanswered.
Elaine studied the nails of her left hand, stalling for time. Sighing, she put both hands back on her lap and looked across the desk at his unrelenting face. Connery wasn’t taking no for an answer.
Slye was there as well; he’d found one of Silas’s paddles with a rubber ball attached to it and was striking the ball in rapid succession, trying hard to keep it going. The biggest pitfall for him was keeping his stubby fingers out of the ball’s way. For a klutzy-looking guy, he was doing pretty well. Finally he missed, and so he put the toy down and then sat back in his chair. His weight strained the joints. Elaine was sorry to see his fun come to an end, because now his attention was all hers again.
“What could Tasia’s suicide attempt possibly have to do with Mr. Kastenmeier’s being murdered?” she asked them.
Connery rested his elbows on the arms of his chair and pressed all ten of his fingers together. “Knowing even minor details allows me to understand the people involved and how they relate to one another.” He paused, lowering his hands. “I’m in a houseful of strangers, and I have to get to know everyone fast before this case gets cold. You can help me do that.”
“Is Tasia a suspect?”
“Everyone acquainted with Carl Kastenmeier is a potential suspect at this point.”
“Even me?”
“Even you, Elaine,” Slye said, enjoying the chance to tell her so.
“So why should I help you? Why should I implicate myself and my friends just to help you do your job?”
“Because obstruction of justice is a major offense,” Connery said, standing up and walking over to a towering bay window. Pushing aside a red velvet drape, he looked out. “If it’s any consolation,” he added, turning away from the window and facing her again, “I personally don’t consider you or Tasia a suspect.”
Elaine was surprised to hear him say that, especially considering Tasia’s suspicious actions on the night of the murder. “You don’t?”
“No, I don’t,” he said, leaning against a pier table full of bric-a-brac and folding his arms against his chest. “Quite frankly, you aren’t the type to take the law into your own hands. And Tasia’s wrists are far too weak for her to have lifted a cinder block over her head, let alone beat Carl senseless with a walking stick.”
“Perhaps more than one person could’ve been involved…?”
“She’s got a point,” Slye said, gesturing to Elaine in an effort to convince his partner of that possibility.
“Anything is possible, but the media do have something right: this was a crime of passion. It has all the signs of being executed by one person. A strategy was planned, and everything was carried out quickly and methodically. We’re talking about months of preparation, but just a short time deciding to go through with it.”
“Are you able to tell if the assailant was a man or a woman?”
“Now that’s harder to say, but I’m beginning to think that it could’ve been either. Physical evidence suggests that nothing was done by the perpetrator that a strong woman couldn’t do.”
“Right- or left-handed?”
“Based on the angle of attack on Carl’s body and some other facts we’ve established, the killer is definitely right-handed.”
“Mrs. Kastenmeier is left-handed,” Elaine said. “So is Zach Cutteridge.”
Connery nodded. “Whoever killed those men, he or she must’ve been a friend of John Linton’s.”
“A friend of John’s? Why do you say that?”
“The killer obviously had John’s absolute trust. Otherwise, the assailant wouldn’t have been able to get close to him. After all, he had an automatic pistol on his body, but it had never been removed from its holster.”
“Maybe the killer was a woman, then.”
“Why do you say that?”
“If the killer had been a woman, her approaching him might’ve made him rest easy and drop his guard. John was like that.”
“Really?”
“Yes. I mean, he didn’t think much of women. And he’d never consider one much of a threat.”
“That was the last mistake he ever made,” Slye said, a half-smile on his round face.
Elaine didn’t answer. As a matter of fact, she never even looked at Slye; she preferred doing business with his less offensive counterpart.
Connery stood there, scratching his sideburns thoughtfully. Having been up all night and working straight through into the following afternoon, he was in bad need of a shave. “Information like what you’ve been able to give me is going to help me crack this case,” he told her. “Your cooperation is essential to helping me do that.”
She stared into his dark blue eyes until she almost imagined them fading into one, like wisdom’s eye. Or like the one-eyed giant looking for a bite to eat in The Odyssey. Regardless, she didn’t relish coming face-to-face with either one.
“All right,” she said, “I’ll tell you about that night.”
“The night Tasia slit her wrists?”
“Yes.”
Elaine rested back and cleared her throat. She started from the beginning.