Free Long Time No See by Ed McBain Page B

hats,” Carella said.
    “Gentlemen wear hats,” Fanny said, and went out into the kitchen, where there was a wet bar recessed into what had long ago been a dumbwaiter shaft. In the spare room, the ten-year-old twins were watching television. Carella stopped in the doorway and said, “Hi.”
    “Hi, Dad,” April said.
    “Hi,” Mark said.
    “No kisses?”
    “Wait till she wins the money,” April said.
    “Who?”
    “Shh, Dad, there’s five thousand dollars at stake here,” Mark said.
    “See you later,” Carella said, and started toward the living room, and then turned back and said, “Have you eaten yet?”
    “Yes, Dad, shhhh,” April said.
    Carella went down the corridor to the living room. Teddy was sitting by the fire. She had not heard the doorbell ringing, she had not heard the conversation with Fanny or the twins, she did not now hear her husband approaching; Teddy Carella was a deaf-mute. She sat by the fire, looking into the flames, the firelight touching her midnight hair with reds and oranges and yellows, as though it had been sprinkled with sequins. He hesitated in the doorway, watching her face, the dark luminous brown eyes staring into the flames, the full mouth and finely sculpted cheekbones. As always, his heart soared. He stood watching her speechlessly, feeling as he had the very first moment he’d met her. That would never change. He could guarantee that. In a world he sometimes did not understand, he understood completely his love for Teddy. He went to her. She sensed his approach now, and turned, and her face changed in the tick of an instant from meditative privacy to shared intimacy. There was nothing hidden on that face, her eyes and her mouth declared all her tongue could not. She rose from the easy chair and went into his arms. He held her close. He stroked her hair. He gently kissed her lips.
    Her hands fluttered with questions, which he answered with his own hands, using the sign language she had taught him, occasionally lapsing into speech, her eyes searching his mouth. When Fanny came into the room with his drink, she did not interrupt their animated conversation. He told her about the second victim, and Teddy’s eyes clouded, and she watched as his hands and his face and his voice defined his outrage. He told her about Sophie Harris and Charles C. Clarke, whose middle name they still did not know, and Maloney from Canine, and she asked him what would happen to the dog, and he said he didn’t know. They ate dinner alone in the wood-paneled dining room, and later the children came to be kissed before going off to bed. April said the lady on television had blown it. Mark said any dope could have answered the question. April, not realizing what she was saying, said, “ I couldn’t have answered it,” and they all burst out laughing.
    It was almost 9:30, it had been a long day. They sipped their coffee in silence, holding hands across the table. Insidiously, the case began to intrude again. Carella found himself hurrying through the last of his coffee. When he rose abruptly from the table, Teddy looked up at him in puzzlement.
    “I’ve got to call this guy Preston,” he said.
    She waited, her eyes watching his mouth.
    “Why don’t you go upstairs, get ready for bed?”
    Still she waited.
    “I won’t be a minute,” he said, and grinned boyishly.
    She nodded briefly and reached up with one hand to touch his face. He kissed the palm of her hand, and then nodded, too, and went out into the living room to dial Preston’s number from the telephone there.
    “Hello?” a man’s voice said.
    “Mr. Preston?”
    “Yes?”
    “This is Detective Carella, I called earlier.”
    “Yes, Mr. Carella.”
    “We’re investigating the murders of Isabel and Jimmy Harris, and I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
    “ Now , do you mean?”
    “If it’s convenient.”
    “Well…Yes, I suppose so.”
    “When I spoke to Mrs. Harris yesterday, she told me she worked for your