Free Only Make Believe by Elliott Mackle Page A

so, he turned to headwaiter Homer Meadows, who I’d asked to stand by, just in case. “Eee-you don’t suppose Miss Emma Mae had the fishing boat out over the weekend? I hear grouper and sea bass have been running nicely. So would you see if there are any fresh fish on hand? Fillets to be fried perhaps? With a dab of that delicious Cole slaw you make? And pie? Chocolate cream? Lemon? Yes?”
    I nodded at Homer. He nodded back. “Sah.”
    “An hour?” I asked Doc. “Or longer?”
    Doc drew a pair of rubber gloves from his hip pocket and slapped them together. “An hour at least. Now if eee-you will kindly lead the way?”
    Bud met us at the door of room 522. “Ain’t been unsealed, sir. I locked it and nailed it shut myself after the medics left with the, uh—Mr. DiGennaro.” He indicated a smaller man standing beside him. “Officer Hurston here, he’s been posted the whole morning.”
    Walter Hurston, the half-Filipino grandson of a pioneer family, was the first mixed-race cop ever hired by Lee County. He was twenty-two years old, five feet tall and solid as a mahogany log. A switch-hitter, he worked both the Anglo and Negro areas of town.
    “Maid tried to get in, sir,” Hurston said, looking from Doc to Bud and briefly to me, seeking approval. “Name of Mrs. Concertina Brown. Claimed 522 was a check-out and at the top of her list to clean this morning first thing. Had to get the head housekeeper up here.”
    “Good thinking,” I said. “Mrs. Smallwood must have forgotten to tell Mrs. Brown the room was off limits.”
    “Sir. Thank you, sir.”
    Bud quickly removed the nailed-up board, pulled on his own set of gloves, inserted a key in the keyhole, cursed when the lock wouldn’t budge, turned the key in the opposite direction and pushed the door inward.
    Doc led the way. Drawing a breath, he said, “Ah, Chanel No. 5. I’d know it anywhere.”
    The room was indeed heavily perfumed—a mixed bouquet of jasmine and roses, hair oil, male sweat, floor wax and cigarette smoke.
    I stood in the doorway, watching Doc’s initial inspection of the scene. Bud had been right behind me early that morning when we rushed upstairs, so he held back too, at least at first.
    The room was quiet now, no shouting, no agonized groans, no barked orders. Doc glanced at the closet and bathroom doors, the disordered bed, the overturned chair, the gloves and the jewelry, surveying the room.
    “Dust the doorknobs, please,” he said, turning to Drackett. “And up and down the door’s butt edge.”
    “Sah.”
    “Wallet’s there on the dresser,” said Bud. “Can you get prints off that?”
    “Leather? Highly unlikely.”
    Bud moved forward to inspect the wallet at close range. “Appears to of been gone through.”
    “Dust it, Drackett. Also the wrist watch, the rhinestone tiara, the pearls, the small change, that big ring with the inset diamonds—looks like a ruby or a garnet—might as well do the entire dresser top while you’re at it. And the drawer pulls and top rail.”
    “Suh.”
    “Note the position of the chair, the bed and what looks very much like blood on the floor. Mose, the Graflex if you please. With the flash. Thank you.”
    Shepherd quickly documented a series of drops and one smear of coagulated blood on the floor, did the same with the dresser top and handed the camera back to Mose.
    “Lovely light in this room,” Doc murmured. “These shots will come out very nice.”
    Next, Doc knelt beside the dresser and peered beneath it. A weak spot along the polished floor’s boards creaked as if pained by the man’s weight.
    “Where would the throw rug normally be, Mr. Eeew-ing?”
    “Between the door and the bed.”
    “But it’s scrambled all up under this chest of drawers. A struggle?”
    “Don’t think any man would just let somebody kick him in the nuts,” Bud said, “without putting up some kind of fuss.”
    “I take that as a yes. Now Mr. Eeew-ing, how should the furniture be positioned? Do