Jesse didn’t miss the cutting edge in the remark. The department .was Lou Burke’s life, and Jesse had taken it from him.
“There was no typewriter in his
apartment,” Jesse said.
“I’m sure there
wasn’t,” Molly said. “Lou was a won
derful cop but he hated to write anything. I used to do half his reports for him.”
“So where did he type out his suicide
note?” Jesse said.
Molly looked up at Jesse and started to speak and stopped and frowned.
“There’s no typewriter at his
house,” she said.
“That’s correct,” Jesse
said.
“The note wasn’t printed out of a
computer.”
“No,” Jesse said.
“Maybe he went to somebody’s
house that had a typewriter.”
Molly said.
Jesse picked up a pad of blue-lined yellow paper from Molly’s desk. There were fifty pads just like it in the office supply cabinet in the squad room.
“Wouldn’t it have been easier to
have handwritten the note?” Jesse said.
“That is odd,” Molly said.
“Though suicidal people are, you know‘
’—Molly tossed her hands—‘
’crazy.”
Jesse put the notepad back down on Molly’s desk. He didn’t .say anything.
“Unless he didn’t write the
note,” Molly said. “And whoever did it just assumed that there’d be typewriters in the station. But even if there were, we’d find out pretty quick that they weren’t used for the note.”
“Which means whoever wrote it was
stupid,” Jesse said.
“That’s not all it
means,” Molly said.
“No,” Jesse said,
“it’s not.”
He walked back toward his office. Molly watched him as he went.
“Jesus,” she said softly.
of the Episcopal chUrch,rectory. It was a big brick bui with a green center entrance door and green shutters. I a bright morning, and the grass of the rectory lawn wa
· with the early morning frost that had melted in the st woman wearing an apron over a flowered dress ansv Jesse’s ring.
She said, “Reverend is expecting you, Chief Store Jesse followed her into the study, where the reverem at his desk.
The room was lined with books, and ther a fire burning in the fireplace. Reverend Cotter was i haired and pink- cbeeked. He was wearing a brown’t jacket over his black minister’s front-and-backwards c He stood and shook lesse’s hand and gestured him chair beside the desk. He waited until the housekeepe left before he spoke.
“Thank you very much for coming so
promptly, said.
He had a deep voice, and he was pleased with it.
“Glad to,” Jesse said.
Cotter unlocked the middle drawer of his desk with a small key on his key chain, and tucked the key chain back into his pants pocket. He opened the drawer and took out a five-by-seven manila envelope and placed it on his desk, taking time to center it and to adjust it so that it was neatly square in the middle of his clean desk blotter.
