wasn’t. He was just sitting there with that blank brown face, rolling a new stogie between mitts that looked like they could crack coconuts.
Then he said, “Why would she have to know the number of the ticket? Say she wanted five ninety-six to win. All she’d have to do would be to look at the ticket—whatever number it was—and call out five ninety-six. Who’d know the difference? The little girl? She was blindfolded. After the number was called, the ticket would go back into the barrel.”
I stopped chewing while he lit up. He looked like a guy who’d carry kitchen matches, but it was an old beat-up Zippo, the kind that works forever.
“Those folks watching weren’t gamblers,” he said, “and your mother’s a prominent woman there in Barton. Nobody’ d accuse her of cheating. Nobody has.”
“You just did.”
“No, Miss Hollander, I didn’t. I told you it wouldn’t have been utterly impossible to get Munroe up on that platform. You didn’t believe me, so I gave you an instance.”
“Elaine couldn’t have know what his ticket number was,” I said.
Sandoz shook his head, “Hypothetically I could give you three ways, easy.”
“Okay, give them! I still won’t believe you.”
Sandoz looked from me to Blue as if he was waiting for Blue to object. When he didn’t, Sandoz said, “In the first place, we asked about those tickets. There were two gates where people could get in, and there were rolls of tickets at each gate. The tickets on each roll were numbered sequentially. Suppose that somebody—anybody—was hanging around there and spotted Munroe in line. Say there were nine ahead of him and this somebody saw that the person being sold a ticket right then had five eighty-seven. That’s one.
“Or suppose that this somebody had herself a badge and a ribbon. She goes up to him and says, ‘Pardon me, sir, but do you have a ticket?’ What would he do—holler that he’d never been so insulted in his life? I don’t think so. I wouldn’t have, if it was me. I’d have just pulled out my stub, the stub I was saving because I knew there’d be a drawing, and shown it to her. I think most people would. That’s two.
“Or she could just ask him. Why not? That’s three.”
“Because it would be dumb,” I told him. “That’s why not. Elaine was in charge of everything, and in charge of the drawing especially. And it would have looked as fishy as hell for her to go around asking people what their numbers were.”
“I wasn’t talking about your mother,” Sandoz said. “I was just talking about somebody who wanted to find out. But if this somebody were involved with the drawing some way, she could have somebody else do it for her. A kid, maybe. After all, they got a little girl to pull out the winning ticket, and that’s because people tend to trust little girls.”
“She’s my mother. God knows I’m not crazy about her, and you’ve probably found that out. But do you think that if she … I’d …”
For a minute I could have sworn that wooden face looked unhappy. “No,” he said. “No, I don’t.”
Softly, Blue told me, “He wanted to watch your expression.”
It took me a while to get it. Then I said, “Well, he saw it.”
Sandoz was looking at Blue. “You a lawyer?”
Blue shook his head.
“Well, you look like one. What are you?”
“I’m a criminologist.”
“I thought you said you worked for the father.”
“Didn’t it ever strike you that a company that manufactures safes and locks might make good use of a criminologist? I said I was a Hollander employee, I think. I am.”
“Did
Blue shook his head again.
“How about Lief?”
“Yes. I knew Lief.”
“Everybody knew Lief, it seems like. Only not together. Did you meet him through Mr. Hollander or Mrs. Hollander?”
“No.”
“See, I told you. How did you meet him?”
“That’s my affair.”
“You’re not going to cooperate with the police?”
“Not to the point of divulging my personal affairs when they are not germane.”
Sandoz turned back to me. “What about you, Miss Hollander? You said you knew him because he was your best friend’s brother, which is entirely reasonable; but you said that your father knew him, too. Are you willing to tell me what the connection between them was?”
“Sure,” I said. “Locks.”
“Locks?”
