Shadow of a Broken Man

O'Connell was clearly impressed. 'Yeah! Hey, how'd you know that?'

'Oh, I've been talking to some other people. How did Rafferty get away?'

O'Connell flushed angrily. The memory still bothered him. 'Somebody let him out.'

'Then you must have seen who it was.'

'No,' O'Connell said defiantly. His eyes glinted. 'Those bastards wanted to be so goddamned secretive, well, they paid the price! Nobody told me Rafferty was a hypnotist.'

Nobody had told me, either. 'What makes you say that?'

'Because he put me to sleep, that's why!' He'd begun to tremble. O'Connell settled himself and addressed his beer can. 'I was told to shoot him in the legs if he tried to escape. Whatever he'd done was that serious. Naturally, I pulled my gun on him when he woke up; I wanted to show him right away who was in charge. But when I saw he wasn't going to give me any trouble, I kind of relaxed. That was my one big mistake.'

I got us two more beers. 'How did Rafferty react when he first woke up, Mr. O'Connell?'

He shook his head. 'Cool, he was. No more concerned than if he was waking up from a nap in his own bed. Pretty strange.'

'He wasn't hurt?'

'Not that I could tell. He just woke up, looked me over, then started to get out of bed. I stopped him pretty damn quick when I pulled my gun on him, but he didn't give me any arguments. He said it was obviously a mistake that would be cleared up.' O'Connell paused, frowned as he looked at the memory. 'He didn't even seem surprised to find himself in a locked hospital room with a cop. That's when I started thinking that they'd locked me up with some kind of nut.'

We sat in silence for a time while O'Connell ran a finger around the rim of his beer can. 'What happened then?' I prompted.

'He just started talking. He was a good talker.'

'You mean, he was just making conversation?'

'That's right. Came on like a real nice guy.' O'Connell's lip curled contemptuously. 'That's what I thought at the time. Now I can see what he was up to. He started talking about how tired I must be, like he was reading my mind. He was right. I was just starting in on a second tour of duty, and probably looked like hell. He suggested I sleep. I didn't intend to do any cooping on that job, but all of a sudden I couldn't keep my eyes open. Dropped right off. You see what I mean about his being a hypnotist?'

'Yeah.' It was an interesting thought; I remembered Rafferty's black, brooding hawk eyes. But he hadn't hypnotized the door open. 'And Rafferty was gone when you woke up?'

'Like a big bird,' he said with some bitterness. 'He'd locked me in.'

'You're absolutely sure there was no way he could get out of that room by himself?'

'Absolutely. There wasn't even a hinge on the inside, and no way to jimmy that outside bolt. Somebody had to let him out.'

'How many people could have known he was in that particular hospital?'

He considered it, finally said: 'Just the two guys in the ambulance and a few people in the hospital, besides whoever knew about the orders. Maybe whoever it was found out some other way.'

'With all that secrecy?' It didn't seem likely.

'I know it sounds like I'm making excuses, but somebody just had to help him get out of that room. Once out, all he had to do was walk down one of the fire exits to the street.'

'Maybe you helped him.' I let it drop cold and watched O'Connell's growing anger. His face blotched pink and white.

'You're calling me a liar, mister,' he said in a choked whisper.

I stared at the clenched fist that had suddenly appeared under my nose. 'You must have been asked the same question before.'

'No, mister, I wasn't. Damn, that makes me angry! I may be a fool, but I don't give up prisoners! I ain't no crook! I'm telling you, they knew he was a hypnotist. Christ, I was sound asleep when this Lippitt walked in on me!' O'Connell squeezed the beer can until foam squirted out of the opening and rolled down over his hand. 'I think you just asked your last question, Frederickson. I don't like being called a liar.'

'C'mon, O'Connell,' I said quietly. 'I'd have to be an idiot not to ask that question.'

O'Connell exhaled sharply and looked away. 'What else do you want to know?'

'Tell me about this Mr. Lippitt.'

'Real weirdo. There was something wrong with him: Here he is wearing a heavy overcoat in August. You could see him shiver every once in a while.' He paused, staring hard into the past. 'When he found out Rafferty was gone, he chewed my ass good.'

Lippitt was beginning to sound like a stand-in for Boris Karloff. But he was real enough; he'd certainly made an impression on O'Connell. 'He actually shivered?' I asked. 'Even with the overcoat?'

'Sure did. And it must have been eighty-five or ninety degrees; he still seemed cold. Didn't make him any less mean, though,' he added as an afterthought.

'Did he say what agency he worked for?'

'No, and I didn't ask.'

'Don't misunderstand me, Mr. O'Connell,' I said, touching his elbow, 'but I'm surprised you weren't disciplined in some way.'

'The Department was thinking about it, I'm sure of that. My guess is that the weird guy talked them out of it.'

'Why should Lippitt have done that?' I asked.

'I suppose he was decent enough not to want to see me punished for something that wasn't all my fault. He knew Rafferty was a hypnotist.'

'Were you asked to file a report?'

He laughed. 'Hell, I was told not to.' He paused, coughed. 'I probably shouldn't be talking about it now.'

'I appreciate the fact that you did, Mr. O'Connell. I won't keep you any longer.'

I shook his hand and started for the door.

'Frederickson!' I stopped and waited while O'Connell shuffled after me on his sore feet. 'I just remembered something else,' he said. 'Whoever helped Rafferty get out of that room may not have been his friend.'

'Oh? What makes you say that?'

'I think they hurt him. There were spots of blood all over the floor and scratches on the doorjamb, like a man would make with his fingernails. It looked to me like Rafferty'd put up a struggle. Maybe he didn't want to go.'

My firm intention was to kill half of Sunday in bed, but I found myself wide awake at eight thirty, thinking about Victor Rafferty. So I got up, brewed a pot of strong coffee, and fried two eggs. One of my neighbors had been kind enough not to steal my paper that morning; I ate over the Times sports and editorial sections.

I'd planned to spend the day getting my packing out of the way and recording my notes on the case, so that whoever took over for me would have a solid foundation of information to work with. At the moment I didn't feel like doing anything.

When I went to the window and pulled back the curtain, I could see that Foster had already been around to pick up his car, which made me suspect that he wasn't sleeping too well either. Directly across the street, two men were sitting in a black Chevrolet. It seemed an odd thing to be doing on a Sunday morning, so I got my binoculars out of a drawer and looked the men over. Both were well dressed in light summer business suits and had close- cropped hair; they'd popped out of the same cookie cutter as the men in the newspaper photograph. I was under surveillance.

My telephone rang and I picked it up.

'Garth, Mongo.' My brother's voice was tense and low. In the background, I could hear the distinctive sounds of the station house. 'I see you've been goosing elephants with your usual casual abandon.'