Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 51, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2006
- Автор: Бетанкур Джон Грегори, Jr. William J. Carroll,
- Год: 2006
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Magazines/Crosstown Publications
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 51, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2006». Краткое содержание книги:
Her smile disappeared when she spotted Beau’s badge. “I saw it on TV last night. Poor woman.”
Beau went through his questions, coming up with only one new piece of information. Sally didn’t want to cast suspicions on someone who might be innocent, but there was a man who’d been going around, knocking on doors, asking about odd jobs.
“What’s he look like?”
Sally described a white male in his forties, a little shorter than Sally’s five ten, with short brown hair and tattoos on both arms.
“He was polite, but I didn’t like his eyes.”
“What about his eyes?”
“They were set too wide apart.” Sally put a hand in front of her mouth and shrugged. “Sounds silly, but my gramma always said be wary of men with their eyes set too wide apart. Too much trash going on inside the head of those kinda men.”
“Did you catch this man’s name?”
Sally hadn’t. She apologized for “generalizing” about the man because of an old gramma’s tale.
“No need to apologize,” Beau said. “My mother’s full of such notions.”
“Really?” Sally’s eyes lit up. “About what?”
Beau shrugged. “The White Eyes.”
“Who?”
“White folk.”
Sally’s head tilted to the side.
“Especially men in blue riding horses.”
Sally put a hand on her hip, a mischievous look on her face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Beau took a moment to tell her about the Battle of the Greasy Grass, when his great-great-grand uncle Crazy Horse went up against Custer and his boys in a battle the whites called Custer’s Last Stand, better known, now in the twenty-first century, as the Battle of the Little Big Horn.
Sally’s mouth formed an “O” as Beau passed her a business card and asked if she thought of anything else, to call.
At a small diner on Hampson Street called Café Bayonne, Beau discovered a great steakburger meal and the name of the man with the tattoos — Lee Rumbold.
Waitress Ann Falimy, mid thirties, five five, on the heavy side, with short brown hair and a lean face with a pointy chin, described Lee Rumbold as a “pretty regular customer the last few weeks.”
The well-seasoned steakburger, the Bayonne Burger Special, came with curly fries and a chocolate malt. Between juicy bites and Ann’s waiting on other customers, Beau learned that Lee Rumbold sometimes parked his lawn mower and edger outside when he came in.
“I think he does odd jobs for people around here. He’s nice. Quiet.”
“Do you know where he lives?”
Ann wasn’t sure but thought Rumbold lived in one of the cheap apartment houses up Hampson on the other side of Carrollton.
“We’ve only spoken once for more than a minute. Couple days ago. He came after the lunch rush.”
“He mention anything about working up on St. Charles?”
“Nothing specific, but he did complain how rich people didn’t pay well. He preferred cutting smaller yards away from St. Charles.”
Ann stepped away for another customer and Beau went back to his burger. When she eased back, he asked through a mouthful, “He ever mention any elderly women customers?”
“No. As I said. Nothing specific.”
He left Sally a tip to match the bill and his business card. “If Lee Rumbold comes in, call this number and tell the dispatcher for me to 10–19 Bayonne. I’ll know to come right away.”
“Should I be afraid of Lee?”
Beau shrugged. “He could be completely innocent.”
Sally chuckled. “Nobody’s completely innocent.” She winked at Beau as he stepped out.
Lee Rumbold stayed at the Capri Apartments on Hampson, half a block from Carrollton Avenue. Six apartments had been carved from what once was a southern mansion with six columns out front. Two more apartments had been created from the garage. Lee occupied the lower garage apartment and wasn’t in. The manager didn’t seem concerned, having a cop ask about a tenant.
“You wanna see his lease?”
Beau was tempted, but if this Lee was involved, he’d better get a search warrant.
“If you could tell me his date of birth, that would help.”
Sitting back out in his unmarked black Chevy, Beau ran Lee Rumbold through the police computer, discovering the man had two arrests for disturbing the peace by being drunk in public.
Beau went back into the Capri to use the phone to call the Crime Lab and ask to have Rumbold’s prints compared to the prints from the scene.
“Any luck with the other prints?” Beau asked.
“No. Everyone came back negative.”
Beau mentally crossed off cableman Jerol Philiber as well as the nine known burglars arrested in the area over the last two years. He’d asked the Crime Lab to compare their prints to the ones lifted from Lily Chauchoin’s glass box.
“There he is now.” The manager pointed outside. Beau caught a glimpse of a man pushing a lawn mower around the corner toward the garage apartment. Beau followed him, catching him before he got inside.
“Police,” Beau said, showing his credentials. “How’s it going today, Mr. Rumbold?”
Rumbold was thirty-nine, stood around five nine, about one-fifty, with short brown hair that looked as if Rumbold had cut it himself.
Looking around Beau, batting his wide-set brown eyes, Rumbold shrugged. “I’m okay, I guess.”
Tattoos ran down both his arms, an anchor and mother on his left arm, a sailing ship and usn on the right arm.
“I’d like to come in and talk with you,” Beau said in a flat voice, not friendly but not unfriendly.
Rumbold closed the door of his apartment, said, “You can’t go in.”
“Then let’s go to my place.” Beau smiled now, but not friendly at all.
Rumbold insisted on locking up his lawn mower and edger in the small wooden shed attached to the back of the apartments and followed Beau back to his car.
“You have any weapons on you?” Beau asked, opening the back door of his car and patting Rumbold down quickly. No knives, no guns.
“No.” Rumbold’s voice sounded tired.
He never said another word all the way to the Detective Bureau.
Beau’s former partner, Detective Jodie Kintyre, sat at her desk, which abutted Beau’s in the Homicide squad room. Jodie was thirty-six, stood five seven, slim, with blond hair cut in a page boy. She wore a white blouse and black slacks, her weapon in a shoulder rig hanging beneath her left arm. A blond-haired civilian sat in the folding chair next to her desk. He looked to be about twenty.
Beau winked at Jodie as he led Rumbold into one of the small, windowless interview rooms and sat him behind the small table, leaving him to simmer for a half hour.
Jodie joined Beau at the coffee pot, her catlike hazel eyes more narrow than usual as she nodded back toward her desk. “He turned himself in.”
“For what?”
“Said you were looking for him.”
Beau realized this was the blond guy with the red car and smiled, stirring his coffee as he approached their desks. Beau didn’t say a word, letting the man explain how a TV cableman told him Beau was looking for him, how he was a student at Tulane, and how his car breaks down just about every day.
“I rang the doorbell but didn’t go inside. Really.”
Beau secured the man’s driver’s license and ran him on the computer. No arrests, but he’d been fingerprinted. Tulane ROTC. So Beau had his prints compared to the ones from the scene. For the next twenty minutes the three sat and talked, Jodie smiling as the young man tried to flirt with her, awkwardly, nervously.
“Olds or Pontiac,” Beau asked.
“Huh? Oh. Pontiac.” He seemed to relax slightly.
When the phone rang, Beau snatched it up before the first ring was finished. It was the Crime Lab.