schedule, satisfied that things were beginning to happen. They were making them happen.
He read over the timetable twice, paying attention to every word. Then he pushed the pad away, leaned back in his swivel chair, lighted a cigar.
What interested him even more than those half-confirmed and unconfirmed alibis was what Dr. Simon Ellerbee did the last three hours of his life.
Did the mystery patient show up and stay longer than usual? Not likely; every patient got the forty-five-minute hour.
Did Ellerbee work at his caseload while waiting for the patient to arrive?
Did he read, listen to music, watch television?
Delaney looked at his watch and thought of a sandwich.
Eat! When did the bastard eat? He told his wife he'd be leaving New York about nine o'clock. Even if he were planning on a late supper in Brewster at 10:30, that was a long time to go without food. Delaney didn't think it was humanly possible.
He retrieved the autopsy report from the file and flipped through the pages until he found what he sought. The victim had eaten about an hour before his death. Stomach. contents included boiled ham, Swiss cheese, rye bread, mustard. Ellerbee had been a man after his own heart.
So part of those three hours had been spent consuming a sandwich. Did Ellerbee go out for it? In that weather? Doubtful. He probably went down one floor to the kitchen and made himself a snack. But that wouldn't use up many minutes of that three-hour period.
The gap in the victim's time schedule bothered Delaney. It was not neat, ordered, logical-the way he liked things. Too many unanswered questions:
1. Why didn't Ellerbee tell his wife the name of the late patient and when he or she was expected?
2. Why didn't he tell his receptionist?
3. If the late patient was expected at, say, seven o'clock, then Ellerbee could have left for Brewster at eight. But he told his wife he'd be leaving at nine. Ergo, the patient was expected at eight o'clock. But if that was so, how come the autopsy showed he had eaten an hour before death? It was ridiculous to suppose he munched on a sandwich while listening to a troubled patient.
4. How did Ellerbee spend the time from six to eight o'clock, assuming the late patient was scheduled for eight?
5. Those two sets of tracks-did the doctor expect two late patients that night?
It was, Delaney acknowledged, probably much ado about nothing. But it gnawed at him, and he suddenly decided he'd take on this puzzle himself.
He couldn't sit in his study all day, waiting for phone calls and reports from his task force.
He'd hit the street and do a little personal sleuthing.
He started by searching through the records for the name and address of Doctor Simon's receptionist. He finally found them: Carol Judd, living on East 73rd Street. Clipped to her card was Boone's report on her alibi for the night of the murder: She said she had been shacked up with her boyfriend in his apartment. He confirmed.
Delaney looked up her phone number in the Manhattan directory. He, called, mentally keeping his fingers crossed. It rang seven times and he was about to hang up when suddenly the receiver was lifted.
'Hello?' A breathless voice.
'Miss Carol Judd?'
'Yes. Who is this?'
'My name is Edward X. Delaney,' he said, speaking slowly and distinctly.
'I am a civilian consultant with the New York Police Department, assisting in the investigation of the death of Doctor Simon Ellerbee. I was hoping you-2' 'Hey,' she said, 'wait a minute, let me put these groceries down. I just walked through the door.'
He waited patiently until she came on the line again.
'Now,' she said, 'who are you?'
He went through it again.
'I was hoping you might give me a few minutes of your time. Some questions have come up that only you can answer.'
'Gee, I don't know,' she said hesitantly.
'Ever since my name was in the papers, I've been getting crazy calls.
Real weirdos-you know?'
'I can imagine. Miss Judd, may I suggest you call Doctor Diane Ellerbee and tell her that you have received a call from me and that I'd like to ask you a few questions. I'm sure she'll tell you that I am not a weirdo. I'll give you my number and you can call me back. Will you do that, please?'
'Well… I guess so. It may take some time getting through to her if she has a patient.'
'I'll wait,' Delaney said and gave her his phone number.
He cleared the clutter from his desk, replacing all the records back in their proper file folders. He kept out the time schedule and read it over again. That three-hour gap in Ellerbee's activities still intrigued him, and he hoped Carol Judd could supply some answers.
It was almost twenty minutes before she called back.
'Doctor Diane says you're okay,' she reported.
'Fine,' he said.
'I wonder if I could come over now; I'm not too far from where you live.'
'Right this minute? Gee, you better give me some time to straighten up this place; it's a mess. How about half an hour?'
'I'll be there. Thank you.'
That gave him time for a Michelob and a 'wet' sandwich, eaten while leaning over the kitchen sink. It consisted of meat scraped off the bones of leftover chicken wings, with sliced tomatoes and onions and Russian dressing-all jammed into an onion roll as big as a Frisbee.
Then, donning his hard black homburg and heavy overcoat he set out to walk down to East 73rd Street.
It was the kind of day that made pedestrians step out: cold, clear, brilliant, with sharp light dazzling the eyes and a wind that stung.
The city seemed renewed and glowing.
He strode down Third Avenue, mourning the passing of all those familiar Irish bars, including his father's saloon. There was now a health food store where that had been. It was change all right, but whether it was progress, Delaney was not prepared to say.
Carol Judd lived in a fourteen-story apartment house that had glass doors, marble walls in vestibule and lobby, and a pervasive odor of boiled cabbage. Delaney identified himself on the intercom and was buzzed in immediately. He rode up to apartment 9-H in an automatic elevator that squeaked alarmingly.
If she had spent the last half-hour tidying up, Delaney hated to think of what her tiny studio apartment had been before she started. It looked like a twister had just blown through, leaving a higgledy-piggledy jumble of clothing, books, records, cassettes, and what appeared to be a collection of Japanese windup toys: dancing bears, rabbits clashing cymbals, and somersaulting clowns, 'Pardon the stew,' she said, smiling brightly.
'Not at all,' he said.
'It looks lived-in.'
'Yeah,' she said, laughing, 'it is that. Would you believe I've had a party for twenty people in here?'
'I'd believe it,' he assured her, and thought, The poor neighbors!
She lifted a stack of fashion magazines out of a canvas sling chair, and he lowered himself cautiously into it, still wearing his overcoat, his homburg on his lap. Unexpectedly, she crossed her ankles and scissored down onto the floor without a bump, an athletic feat he admired.
In fact, he admired her. She was tall, lanky, and in tight denim jeans seemed to be 90 percent legs. She was
