Monument to Murder - Margaret Truman [76]
“I’m touched, Wayne.”
“And ahm flattered that you are. Not easy touching the cement head you’ve become. Let’s both head on home now. Care to drop by for some libation?”
“No, thanks. Before I go, Wayne, you told me when I first contacted you that you’d taken a look at the Louise Watkins records from twenty years ago.”
“That’s right.”
“Nothing in them of interest, you said.”
“Right again.”
“I’d like to browse through them. You said there wasn’t much there.”
“To be honest, Robert, I didn’t do more than browse them myself. But sure, happy to oblige. When?”
“How about now?”
St. Pierre shook his head. “You are one stubborn man, Robert Brixton. You know where the records room is. I’ll call and tell them you’re on your way.”
“Thanks, Wayne. I appreciate it.”
St. Pierre made his call and escorted Brixton to the main lobby, where they shook hands.
“One last thing, Wayne,” Brixton said.
“You’ve changed your mind and will accompany me home for a drink?”
“No. This guy Felker was murdered. I checked his eyes. Tiny red spots, just like the forensics books describe them. Presumptive evidence of suffocation.”
“And the forensics books also point out that they can be caused by a number of other factors, none involving murder. Felker had terminal cancer, Robert. He died of his cancer. But the ME will confirm that. I’ll pass along his findings soon as I receive them. Adios, my friend. And at least consider what I said this evenin’.”
The officer in charge of the records room that shift had been there for years. He greeted Brixton warmly but said, “This ain’t exactly kosher, Detective.”
“Nice hearing me called Detective again,” Brixton said, slapping the officer on the shoulder. “I won’t be long.” He gave him the information necessary for the Watkins file to be located. Five minutes later he was handed a slim folder. “That’s all there is,” the officer said.
“Looks like I’ll be quicker than I thought,” said Brixton.
He sat in a far corner of the room at a small, scarred desk illuminated by a single gooseneck lamp. He adjusted the lamp and opened the folder. Had Louise Watkins pleaded not guilty and gone to trial, the folder would have been considerably thicker. He read the typed reports filed by various officers assigned to the stabbing and its follow-up and saw nothing of potential interest. Fifteen minutes later, he’d gone through every piece of paper in the folder and was about to call it quits. But he absently turned over one of the reports. On its reverse side were notes handwritten in pencil that were faded to the point of being almost illegible. One of the notes contained the names of a few people who’d been interviewed following the stabbing but who didn’t appear in the final typed report. One name screamed off the page at him: Jeanine Montgomery. Next to her name was written the date and time of an interview of her. Next to that was “Subject cleared.”
CHAPTER 27
On his way home Brixton had stopped at Lazzara’s for a drink and an order of mussels to go. Now in his apartment, he sat at a table by the window; the folded-up file folder and a piece of paper on which he’d copied the notation about Jeanine Montgomery lay next to the platter of empty mussel shells, leftover garlic bread, and a half-empty bottle of pinot grigio. He’d jotted down the name of the detective listed on the front of the report, someone with whom Brixton had worked while with Metro. That detective would be of no help, having died shortly after taking retirement.
The night had been a blur once he’d discovered Jack Felker’s body and the police had arrived. Now, with solitary time to think, he tried to put things in perspective and to fathom what up to now had been unfathomable.
He cleared the dishes, brought his laptop to the table, and started typing, hoping that the act of putting