After two days of threat, it had finally begun to rain again.
'Well, I don’t know what to say,' said the manager of the Globe Grill. 'I suppose-my office isn’t very big-you could use the dining room, we don’t open that until four.' He was a rather handsome sharp-faced man with friendly eyes and a quiet voice; his name was Rappaport, He eyed Mendoza, Conway and Galeano worriedly. 'Police coming-you’re a new bunch-but Marta’s a good girl, and of course I’ve heard something about it. The damnedest thing-I don’t understand it. We’ve got to cooperate with you, and I don’t like to ask you, don’t keep her-but it’s working hours and we get kept busy here. If you want to go in the dining room, I’ll get her.'
Rappaport, and this whole place, was a little surprise. Galeano had taken it for granted, from Carey’s report, that the blonde worked in a greasy spoon somewhere for peanuts. The Globe Grill, while down this side of Wilshire and not in the gourmet class of the better-known places out on La Cienega, was a quietly good restaurant. It was divided into a coffee shop on one side and a large dining room on the other, it was shining bright with cleanliness and polished chrome and sleek modern lighting, and was larger and busier than they had expected.
'Very nice,' said Mendoza as they went past a red velvet curtain into a large dining hall with crystal chandeliers, red vinyl upholstery, a vaguely Mediterranean decor. The tables were octagonal, with low heavy chairs; he pulled out a chair, sat down and lit a cigarette.
'Maybe a little classier than we thought,' agreed Conway. Galeano sat down too, and accepted a light from Conway.
The curtains parted. 'Again, you want to ask questions? Oh, you are different police.'
Carey’s blonde was blonde only in the sense that she wasn’t dark. Her thick hair was tawny russet to dark gold, obviously as nature made it, and she wasn’t conventionally pretty; she had high wide cheekbones, a face slanted to a slender chin, a wide mouth, uptilted brows and grave dark eyes. She was only about five-three, and had a neatly rounded figure in her yellow and white uniform. She came farther into the room and all the men stood up formally.
'Mrs. Fleming? Lieutenant Mendoza-Detective Conway, Detective Galeano. Sit down, won’t you?' Mendoza offered her a cigarette.
'Thank you, I do not smoke. You want to ask all the questions again?'
'Well, you see, Lieutenant Carey has passed the case on to my department.' Mendoza was watching her. 'Robbery-Homicide.'
Her eyes didn’t change expression; she looked down at her folded hands and said, 'You think Edwin is dead. So do I.' She had the faintest of accents; her speech betrayed her more by its formal grammar. 'I thought that from the first.'
'We’ve heard all the-mmh-circumstances from Carey,' said Mendoza, emitting a long stream of smoke, 'and you must admit it all looks very odd, doesn’t it?'
'It is a mystery, yes,' she said. 'I have thought and thought, and I cannot decide what has happened.' She was watching them too, looking from one to the other. 'I am sure he has killed himself, but I do not understand how.'
'Mmh, yes, it seems rather an impossibility.' Mendoza’s tone was only faintly sardonic. 'When he was confined to a wheelchair, he couldn’t even get downstairs by himself. And couldn’t, of course, drive-though you have a car.'
'We were going to sell it. A young man down the street wishes to buy it. It is too expensive to operate an auto now. No, he could not have driven.'
'You told Carey your husband had threatened suicide?'
She said carefully, 'He has been very-very despondent about life, since the baby died.' Her mouth twisted a little. 'He was fond of little Katzchen. Before, he had been-a little optimistic, that perhaps in time the doctors could make him walk again. But lately, it was as if-he said, there was nothing, no reason to go on living, he was only a worry and a burden to me, and it was not right.'
'And how did you feel about it? The same way?' asked Mendoza.
She looked surprised. 'I? It was-a thing life had brought to us. How should I feel? I was sorry.'
'Mmh, yes,' said Mendoza. 'You work long hours here? Walk to work and home again?'
'Yes. I am here mornings and evenings, six days a week.' She looked at him impassively and then said, not raising her voice, 'You do not believe me either. That other policeman, that Carey, he asked questions over and over again, who are our friends, do I have a special friend, perhaps a special man friend, what did I do that day, where did I go, were there any telephone calls-and the other girls here, Betty and Angela who work with me, he asked them questions about me. It is almost a little funny.' But she was looking angry. 'Do you all think I have murdered my husband? That is very funny indeed, how could I do that? Even if I were so wicked?'
'Did you?' asked Mendoza.
'Please do not be so foolish. I beg your pardon,' she said tiredly. 'I know the police always have to deal with criminals, wicked people, and perhaps you come to suspect everyone is so. You have to find out, ask questions, to know. But all I can do is tell you the truth. I do not know what has happened to Edwin.'
Mendoza had stubbed out his cigarette, now lit another. 'You came home that day, nearly two weeks ago- two weeks ago tomorrow-at about five o’clock? You got oif here at two, and went shopping, you said. It was raining very heavily that day.'
Her eyes fell before his. 'Yes,' she said. 'Yes. I am-you forget-European, I am used to the rain.'
For no reason Galeano’s heart missed a beat. There was a curious purity of outline to her wide forehead, and that mass of tawny hair-she looked like a Saxon madonna. But this story-this impossible tale-and there, just one second, she had flinched over something.
'And found your husband gone? Missing from his wheelchair. Did you look for a suicide note?'
'Yes, yes, yes. I would have thought he would leave such a note, if he meant to kill himself. There was nothing. I looked all about the apartment building, I thought if he had jumped out a window-'
'But he couldn’t have jumped,' said Conway.
'No, no, a figure of speech. I have said all this before, it must be in reports. There was no one else in the house except the old man, Offerdahl. He was drunk, he could not say anything. I said, since we are living there, just a few times when I came home Edwin had been drinking, and it is this Offerdahl who has done it, brought him drink. I did not--'
'Did it make him less despondent'?' asked Conway deadpan.
'No, it did not! It was very bad for him. All this, it is all I can tell you. When I had looked, I called the police and told them. Then this Carey came, and his men, and asked questions and looked at the apartment, and they did not believe me. Do you want to look at my apartment also?'
'Why, I think we would,' said Mendoza cheerfully.
'Thanks so much, Mrs. Fleming.'
She stood up abruptly. 'I will get you the key.'
They watched her stalk past the curtain. 'Now that is some blonde,' said Conway. 'Different type than I expected. And a very, very nice act. She’s smart not to try to ham it up with my God what’s happened to poor darling Edwin, I don’t think she’s that good an actress.'
'You could be right,' said Mendoza meditatively, and Galeano exploded at them.
'My good God in heaven, a child in arms could see that girl’s as innocent and honest as-as a nun!' he said furiously. 'Of course she’s not acting, she wouldn’t know how-I know what the story sounds like, but I’ll be Goddamned if I don’t believe it, that girl is as transparently honest as-as-'
'?Que hombre! ' said Mendoza, staring at him. 'Don’t tell me our confirmed bachelor has fallen for a suspect.'
'You go to hell, of course I haven’t fallen for her, if you want to be vulgar,' said Galeano. 'But I’d think anybody could see-' He stopped as the curtains came apart and she marched up to Mendoza, stiffly erect.
'Here is the key. You will know the address. I ask only that you return it before I must go home, I have no other. There are no secrets there, you may look as you please.'
'Thanks so much,' said Mendoza. She marched out again, her shoulders squared. 'Saint Nicholas to the defense of accused womanhood! We don’t need Carey to point out obvious facts. Who had a motive to be rid of
