Widows' Watch (6 page)

“Don't know why the police would be hangin' round a bunch of old folks anyway,” said T. Bob to Lydia.

“You may consider yourself an old folk. I'm not,” retorted Lydia.

Portia Lemay wanted to give Leo advice on refinancing his house since interest rates were at an all-time low, but Leo circumvented that by refusing to divulge his current rate. Forced to talk about the Potemkins, Miss Lemay agreed that Lance and his father had had a sour relationship for years. She wasn't sure who had arranged for Dimitra to take Lydia's place at the bridge table.

By the time they had finished with Portia Lemay, Leo wanted to ask questions at random among the center's population.

“Lydia Beeman knows who suggested that Dimitra take her place,” Elena pointed out. Mrs. Beeman rose and pushed back her chair without being asked.

T. Bob piped up, “How come you're goin' in, Miz Lydia? You wasn't even here yesterday.”

“Neither were you from what I hear,” said Lydia crisply. “Maybe they want to know where I was. Maybe they'd like to know where you were when Boris Potemkin was getting himself shot, you being such an admirer of Dimitra's.”

As Lydia marched into the classroom, T. Bob was saying, “Ah was too here. Waz she mean by that?”

“You were?” asked Emily.

“Ah was. Where else would Ah be? This is where Ah always come of an afternoon.”

Leo cleared his throat at the classroom door. “Why don't you talk to Mrs. Beeman, Elena, and I'll see what else I can dig up.” Elena nodded and followed Lydia in.

“The other ladies think your partner is very rude, Detective Jarvis,” said Lydia. “He kept interrupting them.”

Elena flushed. Questioning senior citizens was the pits, and she wished Leo had stayed for this. He hadn't seemed to mind being rude, while Elena remembered all those years of Grandmother Portillo rapping her knuckles with a weaver's shuttle if she interrupted. If Mrs. Beeman was a blabbermouth, Elena was going to be stuck because she'd grown up in Chimayo, where everyone was scrupulously polite to their elders.

She cleared her throat self-consciously. “I realize you weren't here yesterday, Mrs. Beeman, but I did want to ask whose idea it was that Dimitra take your place in the bridge game.”

“I said I needed a substitute. Dimitra offered.”

“So it was her idea?”

“Yes, but that doesn't mean she was providing herself with an alibi.”

Not much got by this lady, Elena thought.

“Dimitra couldn't have known until day before yesterday that she'd be sitting in for me,” said Lydia. “If she wanted to have her husband killed, I imagine it would take more than overnight planning.”

On the other hand, thought Elena, Dimitra could have seen her chance, called her son or Omar, and set the whole thing up on the spur of the moment. Or maybe Boris did something that night that triggered her to plan his death while she had the opportunity.

“How long have you been a policewoman?” asked Lydia.

“Three and a half years,” Elena replied, wondering if the question was an evasive tactic indicating that Mrs. Beeman had information she didn't want to divulge.

“It's a great and proud responsibility,” Lydia declared. “I hope you find your work satisfying.”

Elena shrugged. “We arrest them, but the courts don't always send them to jail. Now about—”

“There are certainly flaws in the system,” Lydia agreed. “As it happens, I take a great interest. Many of the men in my family were judges, Texas Rangers, sheriffs, or contributed in other ways to law and order in the state. In fact, Farwell Brant, my great-great-great-grandfather, fought at the Alamo, which was certainly a struggle for justice. The Mexican legal system was an abomination. If you've read your Texas history, Detective Jarvis, you know that there was no law in Texas at that time. The Revolution was not just a land grab.”

“Actually, I grew up in New Mexico,” said Elena.

“And the Mexicans still follow the Napoleonic Code.”

Elena tried to think of a question before Lydia started explaining the drawbacks of the Napoleonic Code.

“You're very lucky that women can make a contribution these days,” the lady went on. “Such opportunities hardly existed when I was young—at least, not professional opportunities, opportunities for which one received a salary. I would never say that women weren't heard or active in matters of legal importance, just that we exerted indirect influence.”

“I'm sure you did. Do you—”

“I suppose I might have joined one of the women's units of the armed forces during the Second World War. Instead I married a soldier, a career army man.”

“An honorable calling,” murmured Elena. She found Lydia Beeman's attitude interesting. Many older women didn't approve of Elena's profession. Grandmother Portillo certainly didn't.

“I shall watch with interest your progress on this case,” Lydia was saying. “The police deserve all the support they can get in these violent times.”

“Thank you.” Elena wished her mother could hear this. Even married to a sheriff, Harmony still slipped and used the word pigs occasionally. Usually when referring to the good old days at Berkeley.

“Do you have other questions for me?” asked Lydia.

“Ah—yes.” Elena had to collect her thoughts. “Does Dimitra often play bridge?”

“Occasionally. She prefers chess and plays that very well.”

Dimitra might be having a chess game this very minute at Omar's house, Elena thought.

“The general perception is that women do not have the sense of spatial relationships required for chess,” said Lydia, making it clear that people who held that opinion were fools. “You even hear women saying that they have no sense of direction. In my opinion, this is a societal rather than a hereditary or gender-related trait. I, for instance, have an infallible sense of direction. Dimitra was an excellent chess player. Unfortunately,” Lydia added, “her broken hip has affected her mental capacities.”

“I noticed that myself,” said Elena.

“You know Dimitra?”

“She's my neighbor.”

“Good. I'm glad to hear there'll be someone looking out for her.”

“Won't her son do that?” murmured Elena.

“If you mean in the sense that he'll move back in, I rather imagine Lance would prefer to follow his own lifestyle. It has been some years since he lived in the family home. You've met Lance?”

“In the course of investigating another case last spring.”

“I'm surprised that you haven't talked to him in reference to this one.”

“We haven't got hold of him yet,” Elena admitted.

“I hope his mother has been able to reach him,” said Lydia, frowning. “She'll need his help with the funeral arrangements and other problems. A husband's death generates reams of paperwork.”

Reams of paperwork? That was a peculiar way to look at it. “Lance isn't answering his telephone.”

“Nonetheless, I would not count on discovering that Lance is the murderer. A thief caught in the act would be a more likely suspect.”

“Why do you say that?” Elena asked.

“Because the older population is a target for crime.”

“Is there anything you could tell me about the family that would shed some light?”

“Such as what?”

“Do you think that Dimitra was a battered woman?”

“That is a question that you should ask Dimitra,” Lydia replied evenly. “It is not information that I would be likely to have, is it?”

“Well, if you were friends with her—”

“Acquaintances,” corrected Lydia. And then she surprised Elena with a warm smile. “I wish you the best of luck, my dear. Both with this case and your career. If I can ever be of assistance, do not hesitate to call on me. It is my feeling that every citizen should contribute in whatever way they can to the cause of justice.”

When Elena left the classroom, Leo was waiting for her. They walked out together, and she asked if he had come up with anything.

“Well, there's that old cowboy. He left as soon as he saw I was talking to people, and although he claims he was here yesterday afternoon, nobody remembers seeing him.”

“That doesn't necessarily mean he wasn't here,” Elena pointed out. “Some of these people are bound to be forgetful.”

“Sure, but the thing is Mrs. Beeman said he's an admirer of Dimitra Potemkin, so I asked around. It turns out he was her country-music dancing partner here at the center, and her husband didn't like it. Dimitra and old T. Bob were a real two-stepping, Cotton-Eyed-Joe couple until she broke her hip, and we've got a pretty fair idea of who caused that. Think about it. Maybe this T. Bob Tyler, who everybody agrees just loves the ladies, felt it was his old-timey Western duty to rub out Boris for Mrs. Boris' safety. Maybe he feels responsible for that broken hip. Maybe he figures, with Boris gone, he and Dimitra can get together.”

“Good grief!” said Elena. “Two boyfriends?”

“Two?”

“Omar Ashkenazi.” Elena shook her head and opened the door to the car they had checked out of the police garage. “Weird case,” she muttered, starting the motor. “We got one dead old man; one crippled-up, happy widow; an absentee son and two possible boyfriends as suspects. Not your usual murder case.”

“Our usual murder case is a drive-by shooting. Be thankful for the change of pace.”

Tuesday, September 28, 5:40 P.M.

Finding her mother at the stove cooking, Elena went to the refrigerator for salad ingredients. “How come I didn't see you at Socorro Heights?” she asked. “I thought you were going to spend the day there.”

“Only the morning. Setting up weaving demonstrations and discussing the possibility of lessons. Have you heard rumors that Dimitra Potemkin was a battered woman?”

“Everyone dances around it, but the implication is there.” After chopping green onions and tomatoes, Elena added lettuce to the salad bowl.

“Not that I think she killed Boris—even in self-defense.” Harmony was dicing potatoes at the counter.

Elena agreed. “Her alibi probably covers the time of death.”

“And she didn't have the aura of someone who just committed murder.”

“Right, Mom.” Elena grinned, tossing the salad while Harmony put the finishing touches on a skillet full of chile verde, which smelled ambrosial. “The son, Lance, might have done it.”

“Why would you think that?” Harmony spiced and tasted the chile, then added the diced potatoes.

“Well, I've heard that he threatened Boris because of Dimitra. And nobody thinks they got along well. They didn't even speak in recent years—except for a few fights.”

Harmony nodded. “Greek tragedy on the border.”

“Right. Sophocles for seniors. Maybe Dimitra asked Lance to kill Boris.”

“Nonsense.”

“Anyway, it looks bad that we can't get hold of him. What'd you think of the bridge group? Did you meet them?”

Harmony put a lid on the skillet and leaned against the counter. “The bridge group,” she mused. “Well, I find it very touching that those women have been together for so many years. They all went to the same private school here in town. Some as boarders, some as day students.”

“I didn't know that.” Elena got out beer and tilted a chilled stein sideways so that she could pour without getting too much foam.

“Of course, some moved away, but they all ended up back here.”

“Lydia Beeman would be one of the ones who moved away. Her husband was in the army.” Elena handed a stein to Harmony and filled one for herself. “She's an interesting woman, don't you think?”

“Lydia?” Harmony raised the lid to give her chile verde a stir, then took her first sip of beer. “I really didn't care for her.”

“Why not?” asked Elena, surprised.

“The woman has an angry aura.”

“Oh, come on, Mom. Lots of citizens are angry. It's a tough world. Especially if you're her age.”

“That's true,” Harmony agreed and changed the subject. “I can't understand why you haven't done anything about your living room, Elena.”

“I did. I swept up the glass, put the books back on the shelves—”

“—and left your sofa and chairs in hopeless condition. Fortunately, your neighbor, Mr. Ituribe, has offered to work on the springs and help me with the upholstering. You'll have a designer

living room before I leave.” Harmony ladled the chile verde into large bowls as Elena scooped the salad into small ones.

Then they sat down to dinner, Elena savoring the first mouthful of her mother's delicious beef and green chile stew. As she ate, she thought about the case. Lance Potemkin loved his mother and hated his father. Boris abused Dimitra, had even threatened to kill her if Lance didn't stay away. So if Dimitra hadn't killed the old man, Lance was the most likely suspect. That scenario made more sense than a robber killing Boris to get his hands on a medal that wouldn't be worth anything with a local fence.

“Have you seen Dimitra today?” asked Elena as she helped herself to more chili verde.

“Just briefly. She brought me cabbage rolls, but she couldn't stay to chat because one of the neighbors had invited her to go to the movies. A Mr. Ashkenazi.”

Elena shook her head. Omar was another suspect. And if T. Bob Tyler was the murderer instead of Lance or Omar, Omar Ashkenazi might be the next victim. Maybe she ought to run all three men through the computer for priors.

Wednesday, September 29, 8:30 A.M.

They caught Lance Potemkin arriving at the English Department the next morning. He stowed a backpack behind his desk and said, “Aren't you the detectives who investigated the non-murder of Angus McGlenlevie last spring?”

“Right. Where have you been?” asked Leo. “We've been trying to get hold of you for two days.”

“I've—” Lance looked surprised, then uneasy. “I've had the flu.”

“It's too early for the flu,” said Elena, thinking he really was cute. Blond curls, a clean-cut face, and nice build. He also looked guilty as hell.

“It's striking early,” said Lance defensively.

“So where were you while you had the flu?” asked Elena. “We called your house.”

“I—turned the phone off.”

“Don't you ever read the Los Santos papers or talk to your mother?” asked Leo.

“I haven't seen a paper.”

“You didn't listen to the radio or watch TV? You have to do something while you're sick,” Leo prodded.

“I go to bed and sleep.” Alarm suddenly flashed in Lance's eyes. “Is something wrong with my mother?”

Was he worried that his mother had been arrested, when he himself was the murderer? Elena wondered. Maybe both Potemkins were guilty. Or innocent. If innocent, she and Leo would be the first to break the news of his father's death. Not that she expected Lance to take it hard.

“What's happened to her?” He sounded almost frantic.

“Your father died day before yesterday,” said Leo.

“What about my mother?”

Not What happened to Dad? Elena noticed. “Dimitra's O.K.” Pity Lance didn't like women. At a guess, she didn't think he was that much younger than she.

“But your father was shot in the head,” said Leo. “Your mother said he had a gun, but it's missing.”

“Well, he couldn't have killed himself with his own gun,” said Lance. “I have it.”

“Oh?” Leo, who had been leaning against the desk, straightened.

“We'll need to take a look at it,” said Elena.

“Sure, but it's at home, and I don't get off till five, so—”

“We're going to have to ask you to come over to headquarters anyway,” Elena interrupted.

“Now? I have to proof the galleys of the literary magazine today.”

“You're the editor?”

“Angus McGlenlevie is. He just doesn't do the work.”

“Uh-huh. Well, maybe he'll have to this time.”

Lance looked surprised, then laughed, then went back to looking anxious. “I don't know anything,” he assured them.

“We still need to question family members.”

Reluctantly he agreed and excused himself to tell the chairman.

They could hear through the open door Dr. Mendez's condolences on the death of Lance's father, his groan when he realized that he'd need to track down Angus McGlenlevie for the

proofing of the galleys, his heartfelt plea that Lance get back as soon as possible because the department was falling apart in his absence.

Elena found this all very interesting. Dr. Raul Mendez was a noted scholar of Hispanic-American literature, according to Elena's friend Professor Sarah Tolland. Now Elena was getting the impression that Mendez might be the department chair and Gus McGlenlevie the editor of the department's literary magazine, but Lance Potemkin, the secretary, was doing the work.

They escorted him to their tan Taurus, confiscated in a drug bust with three million dollars worth of cocaine stashed in the trunk in leaking baggies. Detectives joked about getting high inhaling if they had to change a tire, or vacuuming the trunk and retiring. “Am I a suspect?” Lance asked as he fastened his seat belt.

“At this point it's sort of everyone and no one,” Leo replied.

Looking uneasy, Lance said, “We might as well stop by my place if you want his gun.”

“How did you come to have it?” asked Elena.

“He threatened my mother. I took the gun so he couldn't shoot her.”

“Did your father threaten her often?”

“Not just threats,” said Lance darkly. “But she refused to tell the police.”

“She was pretty up front about not liking him.”

“In her place, would you like him?”

Elena was driving, talking to Lance, while Leo took notes as they pulled up to a prairie-style house, probably designed earlier in the century by Henry Trost, a Frank Lloyd Wright follower. Elena would have loved to own a Trost house, but they were too big and undoubtedly too expensive.

“I have the second floor,” said Lance. They mounted outside wooden steps that must have been added later when the attic was converted to accommodate a renter. Lance had one large room and a bath. There was a Pullman kitchen behind slatted doors and a large couch upholstered in a nubby black fabric. It evidently opened out into a bed. A beautiful reproduction eighteenth-century writing desk and chair stood by the large dormer window, and a glass and wrought-iron dining set occupied one corner. Several large abstract paintings, whose predominant colors were black and white with touches of red, hung on matte white walls.

Elena found herself liking the paintings, although her taste usually ran to Indian and Southwestern art. The Hopi painters who had modernized traditional Hopi designs were among her favorites. If she were rich, she'd buy one of those corn-maiden pictures. They featured a muted shade of green that sent shivers up her spine. “Nice place,” she said to Lance.

He thanked her with a pleased smile and added deprecatingly, “It's affordable.”

The most interesting thing in the apartment, case-wise, was the streamlined bicycle hanging from the wall on pegs. Elena went over to inspect it and jotted down in her notebook “green Cannondale R600.” The Ituribes had thought the bike in the alley was green.

“Do a lot of bicycle riding?” asked Leo casually.

Lance turned to follow the direction of Leo's gaze. “I'm a racer.” His face lit with enthusiasm. “It's the greatest high in the world, riding a bike so fast the roadside blurs at the corners of your vision and the horizon hurtles into your face.”

Very poetic, thought Elena and asked prosaically, “You own a car?”

Lance shook his head. “I bike to work.”

“That's ten miles!” exclaimed Elena. Ten miles on a bike would probably lay her up for a week.

“Not quite, but it keeps me in shape for the next race. The gun's in the drawer of my writing desk.”

Leo went to the desk, opened it, fished a gun out with a pencil, and dropped it, barrel up, into an evidence bag he pulled from his pocket. “Looks like a Luger.”

Lance nodded. “My father found it on the body of a German officer during the Second World War.”

Before he sealed the bag, Leo leaned over to sniff. “Smells like it's been cleaned.”

“Probably. He'd rather disassemble and clean that Luger than read a book or watch TV.”

“Ammunition in here,” said Leo. He used a handkerchief to remove the box and open it. “Some gone.”

“He liked to shoot ground squirrels out back.”

“Surprised he didn't notice the gun was missing if he was so fond of it,” said Leo.

“Maybe he did. I haven't talked to him or my mother since I took it.”

“Nine millimeter hollow point,” Leo murmured to Elena.

The autopsy report had come in that morning. Boris had been killed by a 9 mm hollow-point bullet through the brain. It had smashed against the plate at the back of his skull, making it impossible for Ballistics to give them rifling information that would tie the bullet to a specific gun. The markings at the end of the cartridge, however, had been identified as probably coming from an old Luger. The gun, the bullets, and the bicycle made Lance a very good suspect, especially since he'd been overheard threatening to kill his father.

They left the apartment and went to headquarters at Five Points, where they put Lance in the large interrogation room with the one-way window. He sat down on the blue polka-dot sofa as Elena and Leo excused themselves for a private conversation in the hall.

“He was lying about the flu,” said Leo.

“I agree. You'd think he'd at least come up with a better story. And he only rides a bicycle, which explains the green bike in the alley.”

“You wanna question him while I listen?” Leo offered. “You know more about the mother.”

“Sure. And let's get a warrant for his apartment. If we find the czar's medal, it would make our case.”

“I'll fill out the form while you're talking to him.”

Elena walked into the interrogation room and sat down on a brown vinyl chair facing Lance while Leo holed up next door, where he could listen and watch without being seen.

“You're about to ask if I want a lawyer,” said Lance. “Don't bother. I didn't kill my father.”

“Good. You said you were home with the flu. Did you go to a doctor?”

“Of course not. You have the flu, you go to bed, drink lots of liquids, take aspirin.”

He seemed more comfortable with the story now. Elena figured he'd been thinking up elaborations on the way over. “Did you see or talk to anyone while you were sick?”

“No, I stayed in bed, only got up to use the bathroom and drink tea.”

“Sounds like my mother's prescription.”

“It's my mother's too.”

“How come you didn't call her if you were sick?”

Lance gave her a hard look, belying the shy poet façade. “When I got in touch with my mother, it set my father off.”

“Your mother never said your father abused her.”

“That's right. Even when he pushed her downstairs and broke her hip, she didn't admit it. You've never met women like that?”

Elena nodded. There was anger there, enough to fuel a murder, she thought. “What was the problem between you and your father?”

“Just about everything. The way he treated her. It infuriated him if I tried to defend her. He'd probably rather they never had a child. Especially one like me.”

“Could you be more specific?”

“He thinks writing poetry is unmanly—I'm a poet. Then he found out I'm gay; he hated that.” Lance eyed Elena bitterly. “I suppose my being gay gives me favored status as the suspect.”

“Neither Leo nor I have anything against homosexuals,” said Elena, which was an evasion of sorts. There had been problems between the department and the homosexual community. “Are you—ah—out of the closet?”

“If you mean do I run around joining organizations, stumping for gay rights, marching in weird parades, no. It's neither a secret nor widely known. Do you run around talking about your sex life?”

Elena laughed. “Right now I don't have any. I suppose someone lives downstairs at your place.”

“Sure. The owners of the house.”

“Would they be aware that you were home sick?”

“I don't know.”

“They might have heard you moving around.”

“I didn't move around that much.”

“Going up and down the stairs?”

“I didn't leave the apartment.”

“You're telling me that you have no alibi.”

“I don't need an alibi. I didn't kill him.” He was sounding nervous and defensive again, as if it were beginning to dawn on him that he might be in big trouble. “And you can keep the gun. I don't want it back now that my mother's safe.” He paused, then said, “My God, has she been trying to get hold of me?”

“She has.”

“I need to get over there.”

Leo came in from the listening room and said, “We're gonna have to ask you not to leave Los Santos until our investigation is complete, Mr. Potemkin.”

“But I'm entered in a bicycle race on the High Road to Taos the end of the week.”

“Sorry. Unless we've found the killer, you can't go.”

“I'm under arrest?” He looked terrified. “Do you realize how gays are treated in jail? I can't—”

“You're not under arrest,” said Leo. “But you are a suspect.”

“Another thing. We're going to have to impound your bicycles,” added Elena. “I assume there's a second at H.H.U.?”

“What am I supposed to use for transportation?”

“Rent a car. Take a bus,” suggested Leo.

“What do my bicycles have to do with this?”

“One of the neighbors”—Elena almost said who but thought better of it—”saw a bike out in the alley the afternoon of your father's death.”

Lance paled. “It couldn't have been one of mine.”

“Still, sir, we'll need to impound them,” said Leo. “If you refuse, we can get a warrant.”

“What are you going to do? Have a bicycle lineup for one of my mother's doddering old friends?” he snapped.

Elena hadn't thought of it, but it was an idea.

Lance looked dejected and muttered, “Did it occur to you that someone might have broken into the house and killed him?”

“Sure, we thought of that, except the house wasn't broken into. We also thought of your mother,” said Leo.

“Mother wouldn't.” Lance looked horrified. “Good lord, she wasn't there when it happened, was she?”

Nice touch, thought Elena. “She says she was playing bridge at the senior citizens center.”

He looked relieved. “I hope you're giving me a ride back to the English Department.”

“Well, we'll have to pick up the bicycle there, and we'll want to search your apartment,” said Elena.

“What for?”

“Evidence.”

“But there isn't any,” Lance protested. “I didn't do anything.”

“The question is, do we have to get a warrant for your apartment?”

“If I give permission, what happens? You discover I have some homosexual novels and charge me with—”

“Lance, we're not interested in your library. You have my word that we won't take anything that doesn't pertain to your father.” He looked scared and confused. If Lance was innocent, confusion was understandable. Either way, she could understand scared.