Free Murder Most Strange by Dell Shannon Page B

him for a good many years, could snatch the time to
attend the wedding.
    Hackett had just finished telling Mendoza about
Parmenter when the hospital called to tell them that Ken Price had
died during the night. One more homicide to work. Hackett looked grim
as he put the phone down and passed that on. Higgins, Grace, Glasser,
Landers had hung around to hear about the new one. "Bal1istics
said the slug was a thirty-eight, a Colt of some sort. Did that
pharmacist make any mug shots, George?”
    "Nary a one, but you can't take it for granted
he would. When people are scared and nervous they don't always see
straight. He liked a couple of the pictures the computers turned up,
said that was the type—big, brawny, and mean. One Leonard
Osterberg, Ernest Docker, both counts of heists and violence. We
haven't dropped on them yet, but Osterberg's former P.A. officer gave
us a lead on him."
    "And now this damned rapist pulling another one.
I wonder how the girl is."
    "I called when I saw Matt's report," said
Mendoza. "She'll be all right. We can probably talk to her
sometime today."
    "And we know what she's going to tell us,"
said Landers disgustedly.
    "That Coffman woman's coming in to make a
statement," said Hackett. "We ought to have a look around
Parmenter's store, see if any leads show there. I wonder if he hired
any help. And we ought to get the autopsy report on Cooper today—"
    "Also anonymous," said Mendoza. "We
seem to be getting them."
    "We never talked to her boy friend."
    "You have to wait for
the Coffman woman. I'll do that," said Mendoza, "and the
rest of you have places to go. Vamos and buena
suerte .”
    * * *
    "Look, I'm damn sorry about it but I don't know
one damn thing about it," said Jerry Wall.
    "So you won't mind answering a few questions,"
said Mendoza placidly. He had found Wall at the garage on Vermont
where he worked, and Wall had reluctantly taken him into the
closet-sized cluttered office of the owner.
    "Listen, I didn't even know about it till I went
to pick up Marion on Friday night, this woman in the next apartment
says she's dead! Look, it doesn't look so good, the fuzz come asking
me questions—Mr. No1an's due back from the bank anytime—"
    "Anybody can be acquainted with a suicide,"
said Mendoza, getting out a cigarette.
    Wall looked at him uncertainly. He was rather
obviously good-looking, a husky six-footer with overlong sandy-blond
hair, a boyish face that ended in a narrow weak jaw. Mendoza put him
around thirty-two or -three, but he looked younger: only the faint
lines at eye corner and mouth gave him away. Like Landers, thought
Mendoza amusedly, forever being told he didn't look old enough for a
detective; but that was a matter of shape and structure, and there
was nothing weak about Tom's long jaw. "Did she kill herself?"
asked Wall. "That woman didn't know much."
    "Why, were you expecting her to be murdered?"
asked Mendoza, trickling smoke through his nostrils.
    "We1l, for God's sake, no! How should I know
what happened?"
    "You were the steady boy friend, you'd know how
she'd been feeling lately."
    "She never said anything— Only for a whi1e,"
he said sullenly. He hadn't sat down, leaned against the wall; his
white T-shirt clung to his broad torso. "She had some other
ones."
    "At the moment I'm interested in you. Where did
you get together to make out?"
    "Listen, it wasn't nothing like that, Marion was
a nice girl—I—we really hadn't been goin' together very long—"
    "Oh, now, come on," said Mendoza. "Give
us the credit for some sense, Wall. I'm not going to swallow a tale
that you took her out to a movie and bought her an ice-cream soda and
kissed her good night at the door. Nobody's accusing you of anything,
I just want the facts."
    "Oh, for Christ's sake!" said Wall roughly.
"So all right, all right, there wasn't anything in it, see?
Neither of us wanted to get hooked up again—at least I was lucky
not to come in for the alimony, I could show the judge Marie was a
lush and a