“This is all you had on the security guard?” I asked.
“Since he worked for a subcontractor, we don’t have any specific information on him. I’m sure you can get that from Seattle Security.”
Once more I paged through the extensive list. On further examination it proved to be even more impressive than I had at first thought.
“How did you manage to get all this pulled together in such a short time?”
Kendra Meadows laughed. “Of course, I had some help from the computer,” she said, “but there are some things people do best, wouldn’t you say?”
“I certainly would,” I told her. “I can see it was a good deal of work. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, Detective Beaumont.” Kendra Meadows’ dark eyes were suddenly serious. The good humor disappeared from her face and the laughter from her voice.
“You’re right. It was work, hard work. I was here half the night, pulling it all together, but I’m glad to be of use. You see, I knew Marcia Kelsey. We weren’t close, but I’ve known her for years. Something terrible must have gone wrong in her life. I can’t imagine what it would have been. Do you know?”
I shook my head. “We’re working on it, Mrs. Meadows. That’s all I can say for right now.”
“You must find out what happened, and quickly too, so we can all put it behind us and go on with the real job of educating children. It’s impossible for children to learn to live non-violent lives when they see well-respected adults behaving this way.”
“That’s true, Mrs. Meadows,” I said, rising to go. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”
At the door to her office, I turned back. “One other thing. Do you happen to have a key to this building?”
She frowned. “Yes. Of course. Why?”
“Do many other people?”
“A few. Not many. It’s bad for security.”
“Did Marcia Kelsey have a key?”
“Probably. I could check the list. It won’t take a moment.”
Kendra Meadows heaved herself out of the chair, hurried over to a file cabinet in the far corner of the room, and extracted a file folder. She moved her finger down a piece of paper inside.
“That’s right. Marcia had a key. It says so right here. And the locks were changed as of the first of October.”
“Are all the people with keys on that list?”
“As far as I know.”
“May I see it?”
She passed it to me without a murmur and I scanned down it to the S’s Andrea Stovall may have had a key, but her name did not appear on the master list.
“Thanks,” I said. “That tells me exactly what I need to know. May I have a copy of this?”
Kendra Meadows smiled her gap-toothed smile and shrugged her broad shoulders. “Certainly. I don’t see why not.”
I left Kendra Meadows’ office with wonderfully comprehensive lists of people to interview and with one real additional bonus-the sure knowledge that, for whatever reason, Andrea Stovall was a liar.
It was a lead. Maybe only a small one, but in this business, a small lead is a hell of a lot better than no lead at all.
I wanted to make a series of phone calls, fairly private calls, so instead of returning to the reception area, I went to the superintendent’s suite of offices and threw myself on Doris Walker’s mercy. She politely showed me into a small private office and then left me to use the phone, discreetly closing the door behind her. In view of what happened next, I was tremendously grateful for that closed door.
I called down to the department to check in and got hold of Margie. She sounded relieved to hear from me.
“It’s a good thing you called in,” she said quietly. “Watty’s on the warpath. He’s looking for you. And where’s Detective Kramer? The prosecutor needs him in court this afternoon.”
“Kramer’s on his way downtown; in fact, he should be there by now. What’s Watty pissed about?”
“How should I know? I’ll connect you and let him tell you himself.”
Sergeant Watkins came on the phone a moment later. “Where the hell are you, Beau?”
“At the school district office. I just finished interviewing Kendra Meadows, the lady in charge of Personnel. We also talked to the president of the teachers’ organization.” I was still operating under the faint hope that this could end up as a friendly conversation.
“Well, I’m glad to hear that you’re finally working.”
The word “finally,” said with that peculiar emphasis, gave me the first hint that I was in deep trouble.
“Did you say ”finally‘? What’s that supposed to mean?“
“It means get cracking, Beau. It means stop playing around at this and get to work. I saw the reports. Paul Kramer wrote every damn one of them. You stuck him doing the reports; I know that for a fact. You also left him here working long after you went home. Where the hell do you get off treating him like some junior errand boy, sending him around picking up lab reports and autopsies? You think you’re too good to do some of the grunt work, Beaumont? Detective Kramer’s supposed to be your partner, a full-fledged goddamned investigator, not your personal gofer.”
“Wait just a goddamned minute here, Watty. Did he tell you…”
“No, you wait a minute, Detective Beaumont, and don’t interrupt. Just because Kramer’s a dedicated cop, and just because he’s low man on the totem pole here in Homicide, doesn’t mean you old-timers get to take advantage of him and stick him with all the shit work. Do I make myself clear?”
“Perfectly,” I responded bleakly.
From Watty’s tone of voice, I could tell it was useless to object or offer any excuses or to suggest that things Kramer had done were things he had appointed himself to do without any kind of request or consultation from me.
“I want to see results, Beau,” Watty continued. “I want to see reports on my desk with your signature on them. I want to know who you’ve interviewed and what was said. I want to know what kind of contribution you’re making, because this is now, and always has been, a team effort, Detective, and don’t you forget it.”
With that, Watty hung up. It was a good thing Kramer was long gone, because if he hadn’t been, I probably would have wrapped the phone cord right around his damn ass-kissing neck. I felt like one of those poor schmucks in the comics who suddenly has a lightbulb click on over his head.
So that was how Kramer was playing the game, and I’d walked right into the trap like a lamb to the slaughter.
For several minutes, I stood there seething, my hands shaking with rage, while the blood pounded in my ears. Eventually I got a grip on both myself and my anger. If Watty wanted interviews, then by God, I’d give him interviews, and after a moment’s thought, I knew exactly where I’d start.
My mother was always one to do the worst things first and get them over with. Talking to Maxwell Cole was very low on my list of wonderful things to do. Unfortunately, other than talking to Charlotte Chambers, Maxwell Cole seemed like the next logical interview step.
But Charlotte Chambers didn’t live on Queen Anne Hill, and Maxwell Cole did.
I knew Max lived only a few blocks away from the school district office. If he happened to be home, it would take only a few minutes to trudge on up there to see him. If not, if he was already at work, then the Post- Intelligencer office was located at the very bottom of Queen Anne, and I could maybe catch him there on my way back downtown.
I tried calling his office first. No luck. I was told he was ill, out for the day. I looked in the book, but as a public personage, Max naturally has an unlisted phone number. Since I’m hardly on a best-buddy basis with him, I’m not privy to his number any more than he is to mine. That left me only one viable alternative-to show up unannounced.
In the long run, it was probably just as well that I didn’t call in advance. If I had warned him I was coming, chances are Maxwell Cole wouldn’t have answered the door.
On my way past her desk, Doris Walker flagged me down, signaling for me to wait until she finished a phone call. “Dr. Savage wanted to know how to get in touch with you, in case anything comes up that he needs to talk
