'You feelin' OK, Rabbi?' Hanrahan asked.
'Diet again, the new doctor. Cholesterol. Don't ask. You, you had your cholesterol checked?'
'Yeah, last year. Levels are low. Doc chalked it up to heredity,' Hanrahan said, scanning the pages of his notebook.
There were Cubs on first and third with one out. Grace hit into a double play. The Cockers groaned and the little boy in the next booth turned to look at the crazy old men.
'So, Father Murph,' Lieberman said just before sipping his coffee, 'what do we have?'
'None of Rozier's neighbors remember a handyman coming to their door. None of them has hired a handyman in months. Checked three blocks square. Should have brought my raincoat.'
'So either our thief was checking out the Rozier place…' said Lieberman.
'Or there was no thief,' said Hanrahan, looking up. 'I don't like our recent widower. His grief is fake.'
Lieberman nodded. Hanrahan was a world-class griever.
'That doesn't make him a killer, Father Murph.'
The Cockers chattered. The family at the next table left. Harry Carey said there were two more chances for the Cubs, and a trio of truck drivers came in and sat at the counter.
'Man can be happy his wife is dead, or at least not unhappy, and not be responsible for her death,' said Lieberman. 'And he has a hell of an alibi.'
'Could have hired somebody,' Hanrahan countered.
'Could have. Could also be telling the truth.'
'Could. You don't like him either, do you?'
'No,' Lieberman confessed, wondering if he could start his diet tomorrow. What could one day hurt? One last bash before the long starvation. Who ever died of a hot dog? But he knew he wouldn't do it. There was no tempering for Abe Lieberman, never had been. He could give it up, but he couldn't settle for just a little.
'So?'
'You take Harvey,' Lieberman said. 'Find out if he inherits from his wife, if he's been cheating on her, or if she's been cheating on him. Check the alibi. Be careful. Our Harvey is an important man.'
'I'll make it quick and quiet, call in a few favors,' said Hanrahan as Manuel returned and placed a huge sandwich in front of him. The pickle on the plate shone green and new.
'I'll go for the thief,' said Lieberman, looking at the toasted bagel in front of him and the small carton of red jelly. 'Rozier asked me the names of five perps in the mug books. Says none of them was the would-be handyman. For a man who claims to remember faces the way Charlton Heston remembers Shakespeare, his asking for the names strikes me as-'
'Odd,' said Hanrahan, opening his mouth to attempt to encompass the enormity of the sandwich in his hands.
Lieberman took a bite of his toasted bagel and stood up.
'I'll call Evidence and the coroner,' he said. 'Enjoy your sandwich.'
The phone was through the door to the kitchen, right next to the men's room. He made his calls, took notes holding the receiver tucked under his chin, asked questions, and hung up. When he got back to the booth, the Cubs had miraculously tied the game, the truck drivers' mouths were stuffed, and the Alter Cockers were laughing. The new Cocker, Morris Becker, was doing something with his face that may have been smiling.
Hanrahan had, thanks to God, finished his sandwich and pickle.
'What do we have?' he asked.
'Puzzles,' said Lieberman.
'I don't like puzzles,' said Hanrahan, sucking at something in his teeth.
'Doing the autopsy now,' he said. 'I talked to Reasoner. He said he'd wring my neck if I let anybody know before Brice told us officially, but it looks like Dana Rozier was killed by multiple stab wounds in her arms, legs, back, stomach, chest, and face. No sexual assault with or without the weapon.'
'So where's the puzzle?'
'They found ipecac in her stomach,' he said. 'The stuff that makes you throw up fast.'
'I know. So, she accidentally ate something that she thought was-' Hanrahan began, but Lieberman was shaking his head.
'Our friend Dr. Reasoner says it doesn't look like there was anything in her stomach, that she hadn't eaten for at least six to eight hours. Still preliminary, but…' Lieberman shrugged.
'I'll see if there's any ipecac at the Rozier house,' said Hanrahan, working on his coffee as the Pirates scored one in the top of the ninth to go back out ahead by a run. 'What else?'
'Remember the mark in the blood, rectangle, about six inches by a foot and a half?'
'Yeah, looked like the blood had flowed around it.'
'Evidence said they didn't take anything from the room. Didn't move anything,' said Lieberman.
'Maybe,' Hanrahan tried, 'the killer put something down when he killed Mrs. Rozier. Then when he was done, he picked it up and ran.'
'Nope,' said Lieberman, working on his now-cold bagel. 'Whatever was there was a good seven or eight feet from the body. It took awhile for the blood to get to there.'
'How long?' Hanrahan asked.
'Who knows? Two, maybe three minutes. Man kills a woman in panic when he's caught in a burglary and then waits a minute or goes back to looking for candlesticks?'
'Not likely, unless he's a real hard-core addict,' Hanrahan answered. 'But it's still possible, Rabbi.'
'Most self-respecting thieves who hadn't planned the crime would get the hell out of there as fast as they could. So I ask you, Father Murphy, what made that shape in the blood and where is it?'
'Cubs win! Cubs win!' Harry Carey shouted. 'Holy cow.'
'I'll be looking for our mysterious object,' said Hanrahan, 'but…'
'It's probably nothing. I know. Last puzzler. Fingerprints found match Rozier, Franklin, his wife, the dead woman. Footprints in the blood also check for Rozier, Franklin, and his wife plus two others, one with sneakers.'
'Two burglars?' said Hanrahan.
'We'll ask when we find one of them, Father Murphy,' said Lieberman.
Manuel came to the table bearing two side orders of potato pancakes with sour cream.
'Compliments of the boys,' he said, nodding at the Cockers' table. 'In honor of the Cubs' victory.'
Lieberman looked at the Cockers, who raised their seltzer, chocolate phosphates, and coffee in a toast to the Cubs.
Were latkes on Doc Berry's hit list? Absolutely not, Lieberman decided. At least not till I ask Doc Berry. And with that he dug in.
When he left to drive Bill Hanrahan home fifteen minutes later, Maish had still not returned.*** The hardest thing for Harvey Rozier to do was keep from working. Playing the role of grieving husband was proving to be the most difficult part of murdering his wife. He sat in the living room trying to look overwhelmed while Betty Franklin, who had relieved her husband, fielded endless calls from business associates, Harvey's secretary, near and distant relatives, and the media.
The bloody toolbox the thief had left was locked inside Harvey's second safe in the garage. The safe was behind the tool cabinet and looked as old as the house, which had been built in the 1920s.
He had to find that thief, the witness to his crime. He had his name, George Patniks or Eupatniaks. He would check the city and suburban directories and, if necessary, ask a friend in the phone company to see if the man had an unlisted number. No, Harvey decided. He couldn't do that. No more than he could simply have someone in City Hall call the thief's parole officer or check the files to find the man's address. He couldn't have anyone who could trace him to the thief, particularly if Harvey had to kill him.
If the man were reasonable, Harvey told himself, he might consider threatening him with revelation as the murderer, complete with the man's bloody toolbox as evidence. He might. But Harvey doubted it.
Tonight, when he was alone in his room, he would check the directories and hope that the man was listed. If he wasn't, the job would be that much harder.
There were no parking spaces on the street in front of his house, not even the one by the fire hydrant. A van with a CLERGY sign on the pulled-down visor was illegally parked there.
