Judging Time (10 page)

"No, I was off last night." She laughed. "But who of us is ever really off? No, I like to know what's coming down. I have a beef about these non-MD inspectors going to the scene. You know how much training they have? Believe me, it may seem cheaper in the short term. But the public is going to suffer in the long run. These guys miss a lot, that's for sure. No, I pick up what's on the scanner. If I'm in the neighborhood, I'll hop over."

The pretty Chinese woman had a closed face. She sat on the end of her chair. She wasn't relaxed. Rosa wished she'd lighten up. "And I thought I got lucky last night. No way these two babies aren't mine. Am I right?" she asked April.

"Sure. So, what's going to happen now? We need a death report."

"Blinky's out sick, too," Rosa went on.

"Who's Blinky?" April asked.

"Blinky's the other deputy. He's got a drooping eyelid, so we call him Blinky."

"You mean George?" Mike asked.

"Yeah, Blinky."

"Is that why he's out sick? The eyelid?" The Chink was still deadpan. Not exactly a barrel of laughs, that one.

Rosa laughed anyway. "Oh no, he's out because one of his babies infected him with hepatitis A. I'd call that pretty careless, wouldn't you?"

Mike nodded. "It kind of gives you the willies about playing with other people's blood, doesn't it?"

"You have any leads yet?" Rosa got serious and tapped her desk with a pencil.

"Early days," Mike said. "Give us a call tomorrow. I'd like to be present."

"Fine, I'll let you know." She stood up to show she was done with them, then changed her mind and took them to the door. Then she walked down the hall with them to the elevator. But after all that they still didn't tell her anything worth knowing.

10

Y
es, sir, he told me to go straight home from the theater." Until this point in the interview Wallace Jefferson, Jr., had held Mike's eye without wavering. Now he looked down at his big-knuckled hands, clenching the natty cap he held in his lap. "I'm sorry I did. If I'd been there to pick them up, that fine gentleman and lady would still be alive."

And how could they be sure of that? April was feeling less than patient with this one. Her exhaustion was returning after a second wind that had lasted most of the day. Now it was nearly six, and she was in a hurry to get out of there and meet with Jason and Emma, who'd left a message saying she could come to their apartment at six-thirty.

Okay, there it was. A patch of white showing in Jefferson's apparently downcast eyes, as if he was actually trying to look up at her and Mike from his half-closed lids to gauge their reaction without the appearance of doing so.

"They were fine people. I will miss them," he intoned, speaking like a worshiper in church and not a suspect in a grubby precinct interview room.

"Did your boss often send you home to fend for himself in the middle of snowstorms?" Mike asked.

"He was a thoughtful man. I live in New Jersey."

"Doesn't it seem contrary to the point of having a chauffeur, though?" Mike mused.

"Sir?"

"Isn't the point of a chauffeur to have him around in the worst weather?"

Jefferson's eyes came alive at this. "I do—did— whatever Mr. Petersen asked me to do. Whenever he sent me home he had his own reasons."

"What reason do you think he had last night?"

"What reason?"

Wally Jefferson seemed acutely respectable with his dark suit and dark driver's cap, his manner of almost exaggerated gentleness, and his voice that was soft, reverent, and well spoken. To April he seemed old-style African-American in the same way her mother was old-style Chinese. Everything hidden behind a predetermined formula for expression that could be altered neither by flattery nor torture.

If
he was nervous in the interview room, he did not show it. Jefferson was a broad slab of a man of about five nine, weighed something over two hundred pounds, was the color of roasted coffee beans. They'd run him through the computer. He had no priors. Still, there was something about him that April did not trust.

"What was his relationship with Mrs. Liberty?" she asked.

"They were in the same social set," Jefferson said easily.

"Is that a way of saying they were friends?"

"I'm sure I don't know. I just drive the car." He raised his hand to his mouth and coughed delicately.

"Were they possibly more than friends?"

"I wouldn't know."

"What was your work schedule?" Mike changed the subject.

"You mean with Mr. Petersen?"

"Yes, what days did you work?"

"It wasn't the same every week. Mr. Petersen traveled a great deal. When he was here, I sometimes worked every day until midnight, one a.m. When he was away—" He shrugged.

"You drove other people."

"Not really." Jefferson looked wary.

"How about
Mr.
Petersen's wife?"

"Oh, yes, I drove her."

"What about Liberty?"

"Well him, too. Sometimes."

"Why was that? Doesn't Mr. Liberty have his own driver?"

"He did when Mrs. Liberty was working. But she isn't working—wasn't working anymore. He likes the walk to work. So now when they need someone, they caU a service for a driver." Jefferson poked under his coUar to scratch at the skin on his neck.

"Or you drive them."

"Yes." Jefferson famed his attention to his knuckles. They were thick and crooked, almost deformed.

"Did
Mr.
Liberty call you to drive him to the airport yesterday?"

"No, he didn't."

"Why not?"

Jefferson reached for his nose and pinched it between two fingers. "I really couldn't say."

"Is it because he didn't have a car?" Mike leaned forward in his hard chair, shrugging his shoulder holster a little.

Jefferson seemed particularly interested
in
the gun. "Sir?"

"Liberty's car? What happened with that?"

"Oh, yes. Mr. Liberty's car." Jefferson nodded solemnly.

"It was stolen, right?"

"A bit of bad luck."

"How and when was the car stolen?"

Jefferson hunched his shoulders, shaking his head, as if the whole thing were a sad story he'd heard.

"Come on, now, Wally. We know you took Mr. Liberty's

Jefferson was stunned. "Mr. Liberty didn't tell you that!"

"Oh, yes, he did. He said you stole his car."

"Oh, now, that just ain't true. Let's correct that right now. I had permision to use that car. Ask the boys at the garage. I could take it out anytime."

"You had permission to take the car out of the
garage when you were going to drive him. Just as you could take Mr. Petersen's car out of the garage for
his
use."

Jefferson shook his head. "I could use the cars."

"Both of them?"

"Yessir."

"Well, what happened to Mr. Liberty's car then?"

Jefferson shifted his position. "His inspection sticker was expired. Before he went to Europe he asked me to take the car to a service station and get a new one. I did that." He shook his head. "I left it there. The car was gone when I came back for it."

"It only takes a few minutes to check a car out. How long did you leave it?"

"Three days."

"You left Mr. Liberty's car at a service station for three days?" Mike said incredulously.

"I had the flu.
Mr.
Petersen can confirm that"

"No, he can't. He's dead. And Liberty was in Europe."

"Well, Mrs. Petersen can confirm it."

"Wally, where did you go last night after you dropped Mr. Petersen and Mrs. Liberty at the theater?"

"I took the car and drove home. I've been home with my wife since then. You can ask her."

"We will ask her. Thank you, Wally. I want you to write down here on this pad the name of that service station where you left
Mr.
Liberty's car. Then I want you to sit here for a while and gather your thoughts about all the things-you've told us. Maybe your memory will improve a little over time. In a few minutes we're going to send in a detective to go -over all this with you again. We want you to make a full statement about the last few weeks, as well as the events leading up to the murders last night. You've got some explaining to do, understand?"

"The car was not in my possession when it was taken," Jefferson said flatly.

"Well, Wally, I don't think a judge would see it that way. Liberty certainly doesn't."

"But he didn't press charges against me, did he? And if he didn't press charges, I guess that proves I didn't do anything wrong."

Wrong. April glanced at her watch. She'd had enough of this.

"And I was in New Jersey with my wife when poor Mr. Petersen, and Mrs. Merrill, were killed," Jefferson went on. "Bless their souls, I'll miss them."

Feeling sick, April got up and left the room.

Fifteen minutes later she was on her way uptown in an unmarked unit. This time she'd decided to forget worrying about having someone drive her. Once again, it was dark outside and the weather was bad. All the way up to Jason's apartment, she worried about when his next patient was scheduled. Unless there was a major crisis, Jason would not cancel an appointment. That meant if she got there too late, he'd cancel her. What was it with these mental cases that made them so special that all life had to stop when they were with their shrinks? Jason's inaccessibility really annoyed her as she slid around ice-encrusted construction sites and skidding taxis, trying to keep calm behind the wheel. She did not think about her refusal to have diner with Mike because she had to get some rest, or about the problem that Wally Jefferson presented them with a wife as his alibi. He was clearly lying about a lot of things.

The only good thing about the lousy weather was the decrease in traffic. Problem was, the lousy taxi drivers from hot countries who didn't have any experience with snow or ice were the only ones left on the hazardous streets. Her parking effort was to ram the car into a snowbank in front of a hydrant. She knew she was going to have trouble getting it out later.

By the time she was in the cage elevator in Jason's building, jerking slowly up the five floors to
his
apartment, she was panting with anxiety. She swallowed, breathed eight counts in, held her breath for six counts, exhaled for eight counts, and did it again a few times to slow down her heart. Jason opened the door almost before she put out her finger to ring
his
bell.

"Hi," he said, looking her over.

About to meet the famous Emma Chapman again, April felt shabby and double ugly in the new navy wool coat she'd bought only a few weeks ago, the long navy-and-maroon-printed scarf wrapped several times around her neck, and the Chanel-copy shoulder bag that Emma Chapman would certainly know she'd bought on the street in Chinatown but that was strong enough to hold anything April wanted to put into it.

"Hi.
Sorry I'm late. I got tied up."

Jason smiled as she removed her leather gloves and extricated herself from the scarf. "No problem. Come on in."

"Thanks." She followed him into the hall where the table with the glass dome covering a large clock made to show its works was piled with unopened mail.

April didn't know any people who lived in apartments like this. The living room was large with windows facing Riverside Drive and the Hudson River. Many books and clocks covered every surface. Neutral colors on the walls and furniture were chosen to soothe, as were the large upholstered club chairs and sofa that April knew from earlier experience were deep and soft. She longed to sink in for a long winter's nap. From the dent in the sofa, it looked as if recently someone might have been doing just that. No sign of Emma now, though. She probably took off when she heard the downstairs buzzer ring.

April knew that Emma didn't like her and could understand why. Years ago, Ja Jien, April's best friend in high school, had gotten pregnant by a white guy. Her family had been murderously angry, had told Ja Jien she would die if she had an abortion. The doctor would blunder, he'd kill her, or do it wrong so if she lived, she wouldn't be able to have more children. At the same time they'd said—didn't matter if she lived, might as well be dead since she was ruined anyway. Ja Jien had the abortion, changed her name to Jennifer. Afterward she didn't want to see April, who had supported her during her ordeal. The two friends drifted apart. Later, when Jennifer became successful as a beautician and opened her own salon, she made it clear she didn't want to cut April's hair, didn't want her in the shop. Didn't ever want to know her again. April had seen Emma Chapman as a naked hostage, her whole body and face painted, her stomach in the process of being tattooed. Emma would not forget that.

Jason gave April one of his penetrating looks. "You hungry, want something?" he asked.

She was starved. She shook her head. "Not at the moment, thanks."

"Yell when you want something." He took her coat and hung it on a doorknob.

"Emma around?"

"Yes, she's coming." Jason went through the opening into the living room. "How's the investigation going?"

April ignored the question. "Liberty mentioned your name when we went to inform him of the death. I gather you've spent some time with him since."

"He's an old friend."

"From the way he spoke about you, I got the feeling he was your patient."

"He's not."

"Oh, really, then you might be able to help us," April murmured.

Jason nodded noncommittally.

April moved into the living room and picked the chair she'd sat in the last time she'd been in the apartment, sank into it gratefully. Her last visit had been in November before she'd made sergeant. She wondered if Jason knew about her promotion.