Murder Can Ruin Your Looks (5 page)

‘‘Well, then let
me
eat,’’ he said, taking a large bite of his grilled Taylor ham. ‘‘And by the way,’’ he informed me after a couple of minutes, ‘‘Meredith wasn’t just shot in the face; neither of them were. They both sustained body wounds first; one of them in the thorax—that’s the chest area—and—’’

‘‘I
know
where the thorax is,’’ I put in, slightly miffed.

‘‘—And the other,’’ Fielding continued, ignoring the in

terruption, ‘‘in the abdomen. Only we don’t know which one was shot where,’’ he said, rolling his eyes back in his head, ‘‘because EMS screwed up. What we got with this case, Dez,’’ he grumbled, ‘‘is a really beautiful example of Murphy’s law: ‘Anything that
can
go wrong
will
go wrong’; isn’t that how it goes?’’

A few seconds and another bite of Taylor ham later, he added characteristically, ‘‘Not that I can really blame those guys.’’ (I
told
you how nice he is.) ‘‘Both women were a bloody mess but they were both alive at that point—al

though barely—and the Emergency people were in a hel

luva hurry to get them to a hospital. So I guess what happened is understandable. But, damn it, it would cer

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tainly make it easier on everyone if we knew who was lying in St. Catherine’s right now.’’

‘‘What
did
happen, anyway?’’

‘‘EMS didn’t discover the body wounds until the women were in the ambulance;
that’s
what happened.’’

I have to confess that, for a moment at least, I had no idea what Fielding was getting at. And I must have been wearing my stupidity on my face, because he went ahead and cleared things up for me. ‘‘Look,’’ he explained pa

tiently, ‘‘I told you we’re sure Mary Ann was shot near the living room sofa and that Meredith bought it at the end of the foyer. So if the EMS guys had been able to tell us where the woman who had the chest wound was lying—

she happens to be the survivor, incidentally—we’d know if it was Meredith or Mary Ann who made it.’’

Of
course!
I
should
have
picked
that
up
right
away!

‘‘Don’t feel so bad,’’ Fielding consoled, aware of my em

barrassment. ‘‘This case is such a ball-buster it has me bit

ing my nails up to the elbow. A few more days like the ones we’ve had, and I’ll probably wind up talking to myself.’’

‘‘I suppose you checked to see if anyone in the building knows anything,’’ I said, anxious to move on.

‘‘No, we didn’t,’’ Fielding replied in this deceptively pleasant voice. ‘‘That’s why I agreed to have lunch with you. I was hoping to get some tips on how to conduct a proper homicide investigation.’’

‘‘I’m sorry. Naturally you checked; I know that. It’s just that sometimes my brain can’t catch up with my mouth.’’

‘‘Sometimes
nothing
can catch up with that mouth,’’ Fiel

ding muttered. But I could see that he was trying to smother a grin. ‘‘For your information, we started talking to the other tenants on Tuesday morning, and we’re still talking to them on the chance that we’ll find someone who saw something. We’re
sure
no one
heard
anything; that’s one of the few new luxury buildings around that’s really soundproof. Figures, doesn’t it?’’

‘‘What did the doorman say? About visitors, I mean,’’ I asked then.

‘‘Just what you could predict he’d say, with the way things are shaking out. That the twins didn’t have any visi

tors that night—at least while he was on duty. He insists no one could have gotten past
him
.’’

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CAN
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‘‘Incidentally, how could you tell it was the second shot that was the one in the face?’’

‘‘Because, from the position of the bullets, we know the perp was standing over his victims when the facial wounds were inflicted. Both women were already
flat
on
their
backs
when he let them have it in the face.’’

I shuddered and hoped Fielding—hardened homicide de

tective that he was—hadn’t noticed. But he had. ‘‘If you think it
sounds
grisly, you should have seen those two.’’

‘‘What did he use?’’

‘‘A thirty-eight. And we’re still looking for it.’’

‘‘It’s amazing that one of those girls is still with us.’’

‘‘More than amazing. This doctor I was talking to yester

day morning called it a miracle. The bullet missed the sur

viving victim’s heart by
that
much
.’’ He held up his thumb and forefinger, positioning them so there was barely an inch of space between them. ‘‘And then the second bullet—the one in the face—ricocheted off the jaw and up into her brain. That woman must have some constitution! All I can say is, it’s gotta be the genes, because the other sister lasted until she got on the operating table. And with the damage
she
sustained, the doctors consider that an even bigger mir

acle. But listen, I need for you to promise me something.’’

‘‘What?’’

‘‘That business about the twin with the chest wound being the one who’s hanging on? That’s not for publication. In fact, I’d be in big trouble if it got out I told you. We don’t want the perp to know which of his victims is still around. The hospital personnel’s under strict orders not to discuss her condition with anyone, and there’s a twentyfour-hour guard in the room to make sure no one gets a close enough look at her to find out.’’

‘‘I won’t tell a soul; you have my word.’’

‘‘That includes your client, you know. We’ve even had the hospital put her in a special gown to conceal the chest wound.’’

‘‘Peter won’t find out about it from me. Hey, you don’t think—’’

‘‘No, I don’t. Otherwise we wouldn’t let him camp out in the room like that, even
with
a man stationed there. Although, to be honest, I’m not too comfortable about let

ting anyone at all in to see her.’’

‘‘But you
are
allowing it.’’

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‘‘The doctors tell us that, comatose or not, if the patient is Mary Ann, Winters’s presence could do her a world of good. And if it’s Meredith, his being there might still help some. At any rate, it won’t do any harm. Unless, of course, he’s our killer.’’

I was about to protest when Fielding smiled. ‘‘Look, if I considered that to be a serious possibility, there’s no way I’d let him within a hundred feet of her,’’ he said. I suppose I must have been frowning then without even realizing it, because Fielding broke into my thoughts.

‘‘What?’’ he wanted to know.

‘‘This business about their both being shot in the face like that. What do you make of it?’’

‘‘I wish I knew. All I can say is that there’s something personal in an act like that. Something
very
personal.’’

‘‘I think so, too.’’

‘‘That’s another reason I can’t buy this thing as a bur

glary. Although I gotta admit the pickings in that apartment would probably not be too shabby. You should see the place.’’

‘‘I’d like to,’’ I told him pointedly.

Fielding ignored the remark, commenting instead that the death of their parents must have left the twins ex

tremely well off.

I tried again. ‘‘I’d really like to have a look at the apartment.’’

‘‘I’ll think about it—after we’re through with it. But I don’t know why you’re so anxious. I’m
telling
you every

thing you could learn by going up there, aren’t I?’’

I decided to drop it—for a while. ‘‘Who discovered them, anyway?’’

A neighbor. Man named Charles Springer. He rang their

doorbell around ten of eight. When no one answered, he couldn’t understand it. Seems he called ten minutes earlier and told Mary Ann he’d be by in a few minutes.’’

Well, we’d finally gotten around to it! So
that’s
why Fielding was so sure Mary Ann was the twin in the living room! ‘‘Ohhh, now I get it,’’ I said, mostly to myself. He grinned. ‘‘See? Didn’t I tell you to be patient and I’d explain? Anyway, from Springer’s statement we know it was Mary Ann who came in at seven-thirty. She even said something to Springer on the phone about her sister not being home yet. By the way, Meredith left the theater a

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little before seven, and she mentioned to this other woman in the cast who happened to be leaving the theater at the same time that she was going to run up to Macy’s and return a blouse. So I can’t see how she could possibly have made it home earlier than eight o’clock. And that would be cutting it pretty damn close.

‘‘At any rate, at some time after eight, Meredith opened the door to the apartment, hung up her coat in the foyer closet, and started to walk into her own living room. She never made it.’’

Something about the sad, simple way Fielding said that made my stomach constrict and then drop straight down to

my toes. I could picture Meredith lying there, with Mary Ann only a few yards away, both of them covered with blood, their beautiful faces all smashed up. . . .

‘‘Anything wrong, Dez?’’ Fielding asked anxiously. ‘‘You

don’t look too hot.’’

‘‘It’s nothing. I’m fine. Tell me about Springer.’’

‘‘Yeah. Well, after a while he tried calling the apartment on the phone. No answer. Then, around nine o’clock, for some reason, he went back there again. The door was open

about six or eight inches. He started to walk in and saw Meredith at the end of the foyer. He rushed back to his own place and dialed nine-one-one.’’

‘‘So Mary Ann could have been shot any time between seven-forty and nine,’’ I said, more or less replaying what Fielding had just laid out for me. ‘‘And Meredith had to have been hit sometime after eight.’’

‘‘You got it.’’

‘‘Which means that when Springer rang the bell at ten of eight,’’ I murmured, thinking aloud, ‘‘either Mary Ann was being restrained at gunpoint or she’d already been shot.’’

‘‘Right,’’ Fielding concurred. Then, abruptly: ‘‘Okay, now you know what I know, and, according to that clock in back of you, it’s twenty after one already. So let’s get the check and get the hell out of here.’’

I decided, in view of Tim’s being so forthcoming with me, that I had to share what I’d learned from Peter. ‘‘Hold on just a few more minutes. I am about to give
you
some leads,’’ I informed him, trying to sound like Lady Bountiful.

‘‘Did you know,’’ I asked, ‘‘that one of the other women

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in Meredith’s show was jealous of her? Seems the other woman was promised the part that went to Meredith.’’

‘‘That would be Lucille Collins,’’ Fielding said, a little smugly, I thought.

I tried again. ‘‘Did you also know Meredith and her brother didn’t get along?’’

‘‘Yup. Foster contacted us the day after the murder. He had a lunch date with Mary Ann set up for Tuesday, and she was supposed to call him in the morning to confirm. When he didn’t hear from her, he telephoned her store, but no one answered. He finally went to lunch by himself, and after he left the restaurant he stopped at a newsstand. And there were these pictures of his sisters plastered on the front page of the
Post
. I can’t even figure out how they got ahold of them.’’

‘‘So he called the police?’’

‘‘As soon as he saw the paper. Anyhow, that’s what he claims.’’

‘‘What did he say about the feud with Meredith?’’

‘‘The man
volunteered
that he and his sister hadn’t spo

ken in years because he tried to interfere when she was going to marry this drug addict—the guy she eventually married anyway. He—Foster—is taking this thing pretty badly; seems to be really busted up over it.’’

‘‘You haven’t let him see his sister in the hospital?’’

‘‘Just the one time. When we were through questioning him, he pleaded with us to let him go up there. So Walt and I went over with him.’’

‘‘Apparently, he couldn’t help with the identification.’’

‘‘C’mon, Dez. The woman’s face—what’s left of it, any

way—is all bandaged up.’’

‘‘I wasn’t thinking about his
recognizing
her,’’ I coun

tered. ‘‘I was thinking maybe he could give you some familytype information. Like one sister’s having a birthmark or a mole or something.’’ As soon as I said it, I was reminded of the question I’d had so much trouble putting to Peter. It must have showed.