slightly opaque, cornflower blue. You can’t call the glass cloudy, because that implies wispiness, whereas this is uniform. It really is an eerie opalescence, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” he said, fascinated. Where was she going?
“What really makes each eye so mesmerising is the six-pointed star in its depths. I mean, the star isn’t anywhere near the surface, yet if you could turn the big marble over, it would give you the same impression. The star kind of floats in space. Fabulous!” she cried.
“It must have been very hard to get the stars in its eyes.”
“That’s just it-he didn’t!” Helen said excitedly. “No human hand made those eyes, Captain. They’re star sapphires.”
“Jesus!” He stepped back involuntarily. “What are we looking at in pedestrian terms like dollars?”
“First, sir, you have to understand that this matched pair of gems is unique,” said that remarkable young woman. “Star sapphires are a dismal blue-grey color that detracts hugely from their value. The perfect color for a sapphire is cornflower blue, and star sapphires don’t come in cornflower blue. They just don’t. Except for this teddy bear’s eyes. Their value is inestimable, but if I had to put a price on a wonder of the world complete with two huge, matched, cornflower-blue star sapphires for eyes, I would go into the double millions.
He grinned. “Does Miss Procter’s teach gemology too?”
“Captain, really! Did the Russians get into space first? Gemology is number one on the Miss Procter’s syllabus- name me a debutante who doesn’t have a jeweler’s eyepiece in her evening bag to check out any offered diamonds.”
“Quite,” said Carmine, keeping his mouth straight. “So a museum piece sits unprotected in a window with a vandal on the loose. Except that the Vandal has a carefully laid plan. And were it not for Miss Procter’s syllabus, we wouldn’t know that the teddy bear is anything other than very lovely and moderately expensive. The Vandal must have had a shock when Hank Murray succeeded in hiring Shortland Security. They’re the best, so getting the glass teddy bear out is now almost impossible.”
“Do you think he’s what the vandalisms have been about?”
“It begins to look that way.”
“According to Mr. Murray, Miss Warburton will be back in the shop tomorrow. Her injuries were slight.”
“What did she lose in breakage?”
“Just a one-off Orrefors bowl made by someone called Bjorn Wiinblad. Her books give its retail price as a thousand dollars.”
“The other piece wasn’t harmed?”
“No, sir, it survived. It’s cute, if wacky. Art glass is highly individualistic-there is no other substance can be worked in so many different ways than glass,” Helen said.
“This is shaping up as a peculiar case,” Carmine said. “I want you to cultivate a friendship with Miss Warburton if you can, and work other aspects of the case as well. I want a full report on Robert and Gordon Warburton, ex San Diego. That means all the way back to times before their birth. And investigate Amanda Warburton’s life too. How did she come to get possession of the glass teddy bear?”
Helen looked at Captain Delmonico’s obdurate face and made an intelligent decision: not to hope for the Dodo.
“Yes, sir,” she said, looking willing. “I can do that.”
On his way into the County Services parking lot, Carmine got lucky; Morty Jones was arriving too, and because a captain rated a better spot, he was able to trap Morty as he walked past the Fairlane everybody knew was Carmine Delmonico’s unmarked-a crotchet that the Commissioner condoned. Morty made the mistake of assuming the Fairlane’s driver was gone; when Carmine opened his door and leaned out, Morty gasped.
“Get in,” said Carmine curtly.
There was no escape; Morty slid on to the passenger’s seat.
“You can smoke, Morty,” Carmine said as he slewed sideways to examine the sergeant, eyes busy. Yes, no doubt he was drinking. Not so much the stink as the trembling hands, the rheumy eyes.
He’d been such a promising cop, Morty Jones, twenty years ago; Danny Marciano, not a dinosaur then, had put in as much work on Morty as he did later on Nick Jefferson, bullied him into taking a degree from West Holloman State College at nights, and put him in patrol with Virgil Simms, another great guy.
All the girls were after him. He was going to have a big career in law enforcement, and he was easy on the eyes: tall, a graceful mover, handsome in a dark and broody way he used to joke branded his ancestors as Welsh. He passed his sergeant’s exams with distinction, and, armed with his degree and a new wife, applied to join Detectives. The move had upset Captain Danny Marciano as much as his choice of a bride, but nothing could budge Morty: Ava said a detective was better. He was wild about her, would do anything to please the woman all his friends knew was a tramp-only how to tell Morty? It couldn’t be done.
By the time he made it to Detectives he was the father of a son, Bobby, an event that predisposed him to like his whole world, including Larry Pisano, the lieutenant to whose team he was posted. Not a good boss for Morty Jones. Elderly and embittered, especially after he was passed over in favor of Carmine Delmonico as head of the division, Pisano lived for only two things: his looming retirement, and creating as much trouble as he could for Carmine. Among other ploys, he set out to ruin Morty Jones’s roseate life by informing him of Ava’s extramarital activities. Morty hadn’t believed him, but the seed of doubt was sown; the cheerful, enthusiastic cop gradually lost his good humor and-worst of all, in Carmine’s view-his interest in his work, which he continued to perform, but sloppily.
“I know what your troubles are, Morty,” Carmine said in a warm voice, “but the drinking has to stop.”
“I drink on my own time, Carmine.”
“Horse shit you do. Right at this moment your boozing is so consistent that they’re thinking of giving you your own stool in the Shamrock Bar. The Shamrock Bar, for God’s sake! A cop bar! You’re like a man in a car with no brakes at the top of the roller coaster’s worst hill-you won’t pull up when you get to the bottom, you’ll wind up mangled in a heap of broken parts-the parts that make up your life, Morty! I know about the bust-up with Ava, and it’s bad, but think of your kids. You owe them a duty. What happens when the Commissioner finds out, huh? You’re out on your ear, no pension, no references to help you get another job. You’re on contract, have you forgotten?”
“I’m not drinking on the job,” Morty maintained.
“Have you talked to Corey?”
“No, he’s got his own problems.”
“Then talk to me! I want to see you the kind of guy-and cop!-you used to be. Try to see your life on the job as the one place where you can forget your personal problems, bury yourself in the work. It’s a good technique, Morty, and it’s not beyond you. But while the alcohol is swilling around in your brain, you can’t think straight. That’s why it’s number one priority-stop drinking entirely,
But Morty’s response was a sudden bout of despairing tears; Carmine watched and listened in his own kind of despair.
The story came out again; the accusation that his kids didn’t belong to him, Morty’s striking her, how awful it was to exist without Ava. His kids cried, he cried…
“If I can’t get through to you, Morty, you’ll have to see Dr. Corning,” Carmine said eventually. “You need help.”
“The department shrink? I won’t go!” Morty said.
“You will go, because I’m seeing Corey and making sure of it,” Carmine said. “Doc Corning’s a good guy.”
In answer, Morty opened the car door and bolted.
Which left Carmine to see Corey.
Who was in his office, apparently having some kind of argument with Buzz Genovese.
“Later,” said Corey, glancing at Carmine’s face.
Buzz gave Carmine a smile, and vanished. Carmine sat down; not the right moment to tower across a desk at a
