'I thought I'd save a call.'
He nodded. His outfit looked the same as he'd worn to Armstrong's, except that the tie was different.
I'm sure the suit and shirt were different, too. He probably had six identical suits, and two drawers of white shirts.
He said, 'I'm going to have to ask you to drop the case, Mr.
Scudder.'
'Oh?'
'You seem unsurprised.'
'I picked up the vibration walking in here. Why?'
'My reasons aren't important.'
'They are to me.'
He shrugged. 'I made a mistake,' he said. 'I sent you on a fool's errand. It was a waste of money.'
'You already wasted the money. You might as well let me give you something for it. I can't give it back because I already spent it.'
'I wasn't expecting a refund.'
'And I didn't come here to ask for any additional money. So what are you saving by telling me to drop the case?'
The pale blue eyes blinked twice behind the rimless glasses. He asked me if I wouldn't sit down. I said I was comfortable standing. He remained standing himself.
He said, 'I behaved foolishly. Seeking vengeance, retribution.
Troubling the waters. Either that man killed her or some other maniac did and there's probably no way we'll ever know for sure. I was wrong to set you to work raking up the past and disturbing the present.'
'Is that what I've been doing?'
'I beg your pardon?'
'Raking up the past and disturbing the present? Maybe that's a good definition of my role. When did you decide to call me off?'
'That's not important.'
'Ettinger got to you, didn't he? It must have been yesterday.
Saturday's a busy day at the store, they sell a lot of tennis rackets. He probably called you last night, didn't he?' When he hesitated I said, 'Go ahead. Tell me it's not important.'
'It's not. More to the point, it's not your business, Mr. Scudder.'
'I got a wake-up call around one thirty last night from the second Mrs. Ettinger. Did she give you a call about the same time?'
'I don't know what you're talking about.'
'She's got a distinctive voice. I heard it the day before when I called Ettinger at home and she told me he was at the Hicksville store.
She called last night to tell me to let the dead stay buried. That seems to be what you want, too.'
'Yes,' he said. 'That's what I want.'
I picked a paperweight from the top of his desk. An inch-long brass label identified it as a piece of petrified wood from the Arizona desert.
'I can understand what Karen Ettinger's afraid of. Her husband might turn out to be the killer, and that would really turn her world upside down. You'd think a woman in her position would want to know one way or the other. How comfortable could she be from here on in, living with a man she half-suspects of killing his first wife? But people are funny that way. They can push things out of their minds. Whatever happened was years ago and in Brooklyn. And the wench is dead, right?
People move and their lives change, so there's nothing for her to worry about, is there?'
He didn't say anything. His paperweight had a piece of black felt on its bottom to keep it from scratching his desk. I replaced it, felt-side down.
I said, 'You wouldn't be worried about Ettinger's world, or his wife's world. What's it to you if they get hassled a little? Unless Ettinger had a way to put pressure on you, but I don't think that's it. I don't think you'd be all that easy to push around.'
'Mr. Scudder-'
'It's something else, but what? Not money, not a physical threat.
Oh, hell, I know what it is.'
He avoided my eyes.
'Her reputation. You're afraid of what I'll find in the grave with her. Ettinger must have told you she was having an affair. He told me she wasn't, but I don't think he's that deeply committed to the truth.
As a matter of fact, it does look as though she was seeing a man.
