“Where’d you get her address?”
“From the phone book. Same as you.”
“Yeah,” Horowitz said somewhat mournfully. “Well, is that it?”
“No, there’s more. She left driving a ‘71 blue Buick station wagon, registration 83L dash 4710.”
“This state?”
“Yes, Dave.”
“That’s good,” Horowitz said, “I’ll get on it right away.” He paused, and then said, “I guess I owe you one.”
“Did you find any prints on the pendant or the crowbar?” I asked immediately.
“Lab’s checking them out now. I should have something by morning. What the hell time is it, anyway?”
“Quarter past two,” I said.
“I feel like I’ve been up for a week,” Horowitz said. “Anything else, Ben?”
“That’s it. I’ll keep in touch. Oh, one other thing, Dave. The lady’s a bedbug. She thinks she’s Cleopatra.”
“How come I always get the fucking lunatics?” Horowitz said.
“Talk to you later,” I said.
“So long,” he said, and hung up.
I debated waiting till a more respectable hour before hitting Violet Fletcher, but time is of the essence in a homicide investigation. Out of courtesy, and because I didn’t want to startle anyone’s mother out of her wits by rapping on her door in the empty hours of the night, I looked up her number in the directory hanging from a chain on the wall, and then dialed it. She answered on the fifth ring. Her voice was fuzzy with sleep.
“Hello?” she said.
“Mrs. Fletcher?”
“Yes?”
“This is Lieutenant Smoke of the Police Department,” I said. (A lie.) “I hope I didn’t wake you, but a man’s been killed, and I’ve been assigned to the investigation.” (A partial lie.)
She was silent for a moment. When her voice came back on the line, she sounded decidedly awake. And decidedly skeptical. “What is this?” she asked. “A crank call?”
“No, Mrs. Fletcher, this is legitimate. If you’d like to call me back here at the squadroom, the number is Field-stone 8-0765,” I said, reading the number from the dial on the wall phone.
“Well... what do you want?” she said.
“I’d like to talk to you.”
“So talk,” she said.
“May I come there?”
“How do I know you’re really a detective?”
“Mrs. Fletcher,” I said, “I’ll identify myself before you let me into the apartment. Or I’ll stand in the hallway, if you prefer, and we can talk through the door.”
“What did you say your name was?” she asked.
“Detective-Lieutenant Benjamin Smoke.”
“What’s that number again?”
“Fieldstone 8-0765.”
“What precinct is that?”
“The Twelfth.”
“I’ll call you back,” she said, and hung up.
In this city’s telephone directories, an emergency number is listed for calls to the police, but the numbers of the individual precincts are listed as well. I was gambling now that Violet Fletcher, at 2:17 a.m., wasn’t going to search through a phone book to verify the number I’d just given her. The phone rang not a minute later. I lifted the receiver from its hook and immediately clamped thumb and forefinger over my nose.
“Twelfth Precinct,” I said, “Sergeant Knowles.”
“Is there a Lieutenant Smoke there?” she asked.
“Yeah, lady, shall I ring?”
“Please,” she said.
“Moment,” I said, and released my nose, and let her wait a respectable forty seconds. Then, in my own voice, I said, “Twelfth Squad, Lieutenant Smoke.”
“Yes,” she said, “this is Violet Fletcher.”
“Thank you for calling back, Mrs. Fletcher.”
“You said someone’s been killed.”
“Yes. A man named Peter Greer.”
“Does this have anything to do with my daughter?”
“Why? Does the man’s name mean anything to you?”
“No. You haven’t answered my question.”
“It might,” I said. “That’s why I want to talk to you.”
“When did you want to come here?”
“Immediately, if I may.”
Mrs. Fletcher sighed. “I’ll be expecting you,” she said, and hung up.
I rang the doorbell and waited. The peephole flap swung back.
“Yes?” a woman’s voice said.
“Lieutenant Smoke,” I said, and held my shield close to the peephole.
She studied it for what seemed an inordinately long time. Then she said, “All right,” and unlocked the door, and slid off the night chain. The door opened wide. She looked me over, and said, “Come in,” and stepped back a pace. I went into the apartment, and she locked the door again, but she did not put on the night chain, presumably because she was in the presence of a policeman.
“I’ve made some coffee,” she said. “Would you care for a cup?”
“Yes, thank you,” I said.
She was a woman in her middle seventies. It was now two forty-five in the morning, and my phone call had undoubtedly awakened her, but she was attired as though for church, wearing a simple blue dress and low-heeled pumps, a string of pearls at her throat, her hair neatly coiffed, her face made up. She offered me a seat in the modestly furnished living room, and then went out to the kitchen. When she returned, she was carrying a tray with two cups of coffee, two spoons, a sugar bowl, and a creamer on it.
“I don’t know how you take it,” she said. “Please help yourself.”
“I like it black,” I said, and picked up one of the cups.