“It was taken by our friend Spenser here, from a man named Roy Levesque.”
“Roy had it?”
“You know Roy Levesque,” Quirk said.
“Sure, I mean of course, we went to high school together.”
“When did you last see him?” Quirk said.
“Oh, I really, really… I see so many people. All the time. I’m really a people person, I guess.”
“Levesque says you gave him the gun.”
“Roy said that?”
“Yes.”
“Why did he say that?” Mary said.
“Did you give him the gun?”
“Not to keep,” Mary said.
Mary was confused. She turned and gazed at Larson Graff, as if maybe Larson knew and would help her out with the hard questions. Larson didn’t look at her.
“Did you give him the gun? And tell him to get rid of it?” Quirk said again. There was no threat or anger in his voice. He seemed perfectly patient about it.
“I think maybe my client and I need to talk a little,” Rita said.
Quirk nodded toward the door, and Rita took Mary outside and closed the door and stayed in the hall with her for maybe ten minutes. While we waited Quirk turned to Graff.
“So, Larson,” Quirk said. “You think Levesque is telling the truth?”
“I really have no idea, Captain.”
“So what was it you were doing here?”
“I came at Mrs. Smith’s request.”
“She take you everywhere?” Quirk said.
“There’s no need for attitude, Captain. Mary is much more at ease in any situation if I’m with her.”
“You think she might have killed her husband?” Quirk said.
“My God, Captain. I don’t know anything about that.”
“Lucky she brought you,” Quirk said.
No one spoke. Russo doodled on his yellow pad. Graff fidgeted, looking hopefully at the doorway through which Mary had disappeared. Quirk sat quietly looking at nothing. Belson watched Graff watch the door. The door opened after a while and Rita brought Mary back in. They sat. Quirk waited quietly.
“Are you planning to arrest my client?” Rita said.
“We might,” Quirk said.
“We might be prepared to make a statement if there was something in it for us.”
Quirk looked at Russo.
“What are you looking for?” Russo said.
“If, and this is hypothetical, in her statement Mrs. Smith admitted to a minor crime, she would not be prosecuted for it.”
“How about the murder of her husband,” Quirk said.
“If she made a statement, it would clarify that issue, and make it moot.”
“The deal would depend on what she had to tell us,” Russo said.
“If it is useful information, do we have a deal?”
“The deal being?” Russo said.
“No prosecution for any crime she might admit in her statement.”
They then spent five minutes talking incomprehensibly about misdemeanors and C felonies and gobbledygook, while I looked at various parts of the room and found all of them equally uninteresting.
Finally Russo said, “Deal.”
Rita nodded at Mary Smith. “Go ahead, Mary. Tell them.”
“What should I tell them?” Mary said.
“What you told me in the hall.”
“Can’t you tell them for me?”
“I think they’d rather hear it from you.”
Mary sat frowning. She looked at Graff again. He didn’t look back.
