They were standing alone in the entrance foyer, and Masuto said to Beckman, speaking softly, “Tell me about Mitzie.”
“What’s to tell? I’m forty-three years old, Masao. If I was fifteen years younger, I’d leave my wife and marry Mitzie. Except why the hell should she look twice at a cop who makes fifteen thousand a year? I’d have to put away three years of wages to buy that Porsche of hers.”
“You’ve spent twenty-four hours with those women, and that’s all you’ve got?”
“What do you want?”
“Who is she?”
“You mean where does she come from? I’m not totally a jerk, Masao. She comes from Dallas, Texas. Her mother was a laundress. Her father was a no-good bum and a drunk. Mitzie cut out of there first chance she got and came here like all the other kids do to become a movie star. She worked around as a waitress and for a while she worked in a hair-dressing place.”
“Wait a minute-not Tony Cooper’s place?”
“That’s right. She gets a big bang out of the fact that she can go there now and lay down thirty bucks for the same service she used to dish out.”
“It’s a small world. Did you ever ask her why she and Billy Fuller split up?”
“There’s a general consensus among all three dames that he’s a son of a bitch.”
“Okay, Sy. Now I want to talk to Mrs. Crombie. I’ll wait here. Where are they?”
“Watching TV.”
“Get her.”
Laura Crombie came into the foyer with Beckman and said, “I’m sure you’ve solved everything, Sergeant, and we can stop living this nightmare.”
“Not quite.”
“Of course it can’t go on, you know that. We can’t continue to live here shut up and away from the world like this.”
“I know that.”
“When?”
“Soon, I hope,” Masuto told her. “I have just a few questions that might help. For one thing, did your ex- husband own a pistol?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what kind?”
“I’m afraid not. To me, one pistol is the same as another.”
“Did you ever see it?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you do know what an automatic pistol looks like and how it differs from a revolver. Was his an automatic pistol or a revolver?”
“I think it was an automatic pistol. I’m hot sure.”
“And by any chance did he belong to the same pistol club that Alan Greene belonged to?”
“Yes, I think he did.”
“Thank you,” Masuto said. “I’ll only ask you to endure this through the rest of this evening. One way or another, it will come to an end.”
“I hope you’re right,” Beckman said as Masuto was leaving.
“We’re trying.”
Masuto got into his car, but instead of driving off, he sat there brooding. He was a meticulus man; that came with his Japanese ancestry and with his Zen training. His Zen training had taught him how elusive the truth is and it had also enabled him to use his insight to capture flashes of the truth. The meticulous quality went along with his distrust of his flashes of insight.
He released the hood of the car, got out, raised the hood, and stared at the motor. He had never wired a car with dynamite, yet faced with the necessity he felt he could pull it off. Six sticks of dynamite in a confined spot behind the engine, a detonator stuck in place with so simple a device as a couple of Band-Aids, and then a lead from the ignition.
He closed the hood of his car and sat down behind the wheel. Again he brooded for a while. Then he called the station on his radiophone. “Put me through to the captain,” he told Polly.
“For a dashing, handsome Zen Buddhist Oriental, you are the most unromantic person I know.”
“The captain, Polly.”
“What’s up?” Wainwright asked.
“I’m troubled and I’m nervous.”
“Maybe you ought to knock it off. Go home. Give it tomorrow.”
“That’s no good. If I let this go until tomorrow, something will happen tonight. I feel it in my bones.”
“You got the three dames boxed up with Beckman. If you want me to go over there and lecture them, I will. I’ll talk them into staying put another night.”
“That won’t do it. He’s too aggressive, too bold. He’s running for his life now.”
“Well, damn it, Masao, what do you want me to do?”
“I want to pick him up.”
“Are you crazy?” Wainwright exploded. “Maybe you got another career lined up, but I got twenty years in this police force. What are you going to charge him with? Picking his nose in public? You got nothing on him, nothing but that crazy intuition of yours. I believe you because I know you and I seen this happen before, but you got nothing. Bring me something. Bring me the gun, and we’ll pick him up in a minute.”
“It wouldn’t help. He’s using Billy Fuller’s gun.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“It means that Fuller’s gun was stolen.”
“Did he report it?”
“He only discovered the theft today.”
“And what makes you so sure our man stole it?”
“I’m not. Just another guess. You can be sure the gun will turn up, and then when the bullets are matched, it leads straight to Fuller.”
“And it’s also a beautiful alibi for Fuller.”
“Yes, it works both ways. You won’t pick him up then?”
“Masao, we can’t. All we’ll have is one beautiful lawsuit, and if he hits the city for a million bucks, we can pack up and go.”
“All right.”
“Where are you off to now?”
“Maybe to find the missing piece.”
Masuto started his car and pulled out of the driveway. It was only about a mile to Tony Cooper’s hairdressing establishment on Camden Drive. It was past six o’clock, and the streets of the business section were empty. Masuto wondered whether he had delayed too long.
He parked his car in front of the beauty shop, and through the glass window, it appeared to be a repeat of the night before. Cooper stood over a single customer, combing and shaping a head of black hair. He glanced at Masuto as the detective entered, raising an eyebrow. Masuto nodded, took a seat at the side of the room, and then sat silently and thoughtfully, watching Cooper. Cooper, he decided, was quick, skilled, and meticulous. He recognized the quality. Whatever Cooper did, he decided, he would do well. Why then had he come to hairdressing? Why does any man come to what he gives his life to? Why had Masao Masuto become a policeman?
Questions were easier than answers. The woman whose hair was being cut had fingernails as long as a Mandarin’s; they were painted bright red. They were claws on the ends of her long fingers, and above the hands, the wrists were encased in jeweled bracelets.
Cooper finsished. The woman signed the pad he held out to her. Masuto wondered what the monthly bill of a woman who used Tony Cooper’s hair-dressing shop amounted to.
Cooper took her to the door, and then closed and locked the door behind her. “Do you wait until you see me with my last customer?” he asked Masuto.
