Deadline for a Critic Read online

  “Oh, he was mad, all right,” Harison said. “I’ve never seen him so angry.”

  “I found something else,” Papkin said. He held up an object he had enclosed in a plastic bag, protecting possible latent fingerprints.

  “Oh?” Ewing studied it without reaching for it. It appeared to be an empty syringe. “Where was it?”

  “On the floor under the desk—next to that letter.”

  Ewing turned to Harison. “Do you know anything about this?”

  Harison seemed startled. “It’s a syringe.”

  “We know that. Do you know of any reason we should find it close to Groendal’s desk and near a letter he had discarded?”

  Harison appeared to have recovered from his initial shock. He shrugged. “It’s probably Rid’s. He is—was—a diabetic. He had to take regular insulin injections. It’s the same size and type that Ridley used.”

  “Then we should find traces of insulin—and nothing else—in the syringe.”

  “I . . . I suppose so. Of course.”

  “One more thing: Do you have any idea how the syringe got on the floor?”

  Harison shook his head. “Not really. I guess he must have missed the wastebasket. Or, maybe the cleaning lady was careless when she emptied the basket.”

  Wordlessly, Papkin placed the plastic bag with the four letters, apparently the last ones Groendal had read. These letters by themselves constituted more than enough to initiate a homicide investigation. But it was always nice to have a possible weapon as evidence—the proverbial smoking gun. In this case, a syringe that had been used by somebody—Groendal, or, perhaps, his killer.

  “We’ll have it checked out,” Papkin said. “Are you done with Harison?”

  “For the moment, yes.” Ewing turned back to Harison. “We’ll undoubtedly have more questions. We’d appreciate your keeping yourself available.”

  Harison left the detectives with some reluctance, though he had no singularly attractive option. A few reporters were still waiting to ask more questions, most of which would undoubtedly be impertinent. Eventually he would have to make funeral arrangements. He was not looking forward to that. And, inevitably, he would have to go home—by himself. He knew that would be wrenchingly lonely.

  All in all, he minded least talking to the detectives, especially Ewing. He, for one, did not ask some of the more embarrassing questions. But now the detectives had sent him away. So there was nothing to do but face the unpleasant tasks that lay ahead.

  In wordless agreement, Ewing and Papkin moved to an otherwise empty section of the newsroom so they could compare notes uninterrupted.

  So far, all had gone by the book. The EMS had been first to respond to Harison’s emergency call. That emergency medical squad had been followed by uniformed police and then by the medical technicians. Then Homicide had been summoned, and the routine investigation into an unexplained death had begun.

  It was routine procedure. In the wake of a sudden, unexplained death, when there was any question whatsoever, the homicide department was summoned. Homicide detectives spent much of their time in the fruitless investigation of what often turned out to be very natural deaths. The theory was: Take every precaution; don’t let a big one get away just because, on the surface, it appeared to be a natural death.

  In answer to Papkin’s question as to what might have directly precipitated this apparent heart failure, Harison had mentioned the letters Groendal had been both reading and reacting to just before he had collapsed.

  Both plainclothes officers and the uniforms had then begun a search of the desk and wastebasket. They found all the third and fourth class mail in the basket; as well as three letters and four first class envelopes (together with some unopened first class) on the desk. It was not until Sergeant Papkin found the fourth letter crumpled into a wad on the floor—and picked up the syringe next to it—that they felt they had everything. Now, each read the letter that Papkin had done his best to smooth out.

  “Well, what d’ya think?” Papkin asked.

  “I’m not sure. These letters are dynamite. They’d be enough to get a rise out of just about anybody.”

  “I agree. So, suppose these people knew that Groendal had a history of high blood pressure and a bad heart . . .”

  “Yeah, suppose.”

  “Seems to me they’d be creating a degree of risk so high they could figure that Groendal would get so worked up about them that he’d croak.”

  “Uh-huh.” Ewing nodded. “And I get the impression almost everybody knew about Groendal’s condition—his heart condition.”

  “Not everybody.” Papkin smiled crookedly. We didn’t know.”

  Ewing’s answering grin evidenced a more genuine amusement. “Charlie, I’ve been telling you for years you ought to be reading the fine arts section of the paper. Ain’t no use both of us knowing just the box scores and the major league standings.”

  “So why should I have to sacrifice myself just so’s we can be a well-rounded team?”

  “Now that you mention it, no reason. Not as long as there’s other people we can ask. And I did. And it turns out that, at least among the crowd that pays attention to the stage and books and the like, Groendal is very well known and so is his delicate condition.”

  “So,” Papkin concluded, “what you’re saying is that we’ve got a collection of four people, each presumably aware that Groendal had a bad ticker—and each of them sends the guy a letter so threatening and so filled with hate that any one of them could drive him up a wall.” Papkin looked sharply at his partner. “Are you implying something like murder by remote control?”

  “On top of that,” Ewing continued to pursue his own line of thought, “we’ve got all four letters landing on him at the same time. So we could have not only the possibility of remote control murder, but a nice case of conspiracy on top of it all.”

  “You’ve got a suspicious mind, Ray. Have you considered that with all his health problems, maybe it was just time for this guy to go-period?” He reached for the letters and riffled through them. “See—” he looked triumphantly at his partner, “these letters aren’t even all dated the same day. One is dated Sunday, one Wednesday, and two Thursday.”

  Ewing waved a hand as if chasing a mosquito from in front of his face. “There’s one more thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “These four letters Groendal read before he keeled over: Each of them was geared to drive him up a wall, but one of them stands out above the others. Did you notice? It would have put the fear of God into a normal healthy person, let alone a guy with a bad heart.”

  “Yeah, I know the one you mean. But even assuming you’re right—and that’s a pretty far-fetched assumption—how could we prove that one particular letter did the trick?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe the internal evidence. The content of the letter itself. We’ve got either the amazing coincidence of four letters just happening to get here about the same time. Or, it was no coincidence; it was a conspiracy. Or, one of the four really knew how to reach Groendal. And that one letter deliberately written did it . . . and the other three letters just happened to arrive at the same time . . . what do you think?”

  Papkin cocked an eyebrow. “How about this Harison character? Were he and Groendal fags?”

  “I don’t think there’s much doubt about that. They lived together. Neither one’s ever married. As far as I can tell, Harison lived off Groendal. Harison’s a little swishy. And—the bottom line—Groendal had AIDS.”

  Papkin nodded. “That should do it.”

  “I think the only reason Harison admitted it is that he knew the M.E. would find it. I guess he figured we would really think something was fishy if we had to discover that for ourselves.”

  Papkin shook his head. “That sort of opens up the book on Harison.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Maybe he doesn’t figure into all this, but it does put a new light on him.”

  “Huh?”

&nbs
p; “Assume that Harison is the one who infected Groendal: How did Groendal feel—well, how would you feel about someone who gave you AIDS? Say Harison is a carrier—some guys are, you know, without having symptoms themselves—I mean if you sexually transmitted a fatal disease to somebody, what does that say about your feelings for him? It’s hardly a loving gesture. And if you did give AIDS to somebody and he wasn’t dying fast enough, maybe, just maybe, you could scare him to death.”

  “That’s stretching, Charlie. For all we know, Groendal got AIDS from somebody else, not from Harison. Hell, for all we know, Groendal got it and gave it to Harison . . . if you want a motive for Harison, that makes more sense.

  “So,” Ewing concluded, after a moment’s silence, “What’ve we got?”

  Papkin glanced at his notes. “What we’ve got is one very sick guy. Jeez! He’s got AIDS, he’s a diabetic, and God knows what else. He has one hell of an evening for himself. He eats all the wrong things, he drinks way too much. He gets mad as hell, he has a stroke or a heart attack or whatever—the M.E. will tell us—and he croaks.”

  “Or?” The twinkle in Ewing’s eye made it clear that he didn’t believe a word of it.

  “Or,” Papkin continued, “we got a guy who managed to make quite a few dedicated enemies. Any one of those four letter writers could—and probably did—want him dead. Each one knew him well enough to know that his health was in an iffy state. What if each one decides to let it all hang out and see if some pretty definite threats can push him over the edge? It wouldn’t be the first time someone scared somebody to death.”

  “Only, in this case, they would have angered him to death.”

  “Yeah . . .” Papkin stroked his chin. “. . . nice twist.” He pondered. “But . . . what if the four of ’em get together and decide there’s strength in numbers? And all four agree to send their letters at roughly the same time?”

  “Why not at exactly the same time?”

  “To throw us off. I don’t know—just a guess for now. But they get together on it to zap him. Now that’s conspiracy!” Papkin sounded downright exhilarated.

  “Possible,” Ewing acknowledged.

  “Seems all Groendal had was enemies . . . ’cept of course for Harison. But Harison probably gave him AIDS. With friends like that, what would Groendal need with enemies?”

  “Harison again! How would Harison have done it?” Ewing turned devil’s advocate. Someone had to.

  “I don’t know. We’ve just started . . . wait a minute: Groendal was a diabetic. He needed insulin. Harison lived with him. He could’ve monkeyed with the insulin. He could have seen that Groendal got too much—or too little—of the stuff. Or, he lived with the guy, maybe he added something to the insulin.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “Why’d he give him AIDS?”

  “Who says he did?”

  “Okay, say he didn’t. Say he’s clean. Maybe he was mad as hell because he knew that if Groendal had AIDS that had to mean that Groendal had sex with somebody else. He couldn’t have been happy about that—”

  “Unhappy, okay. But mad enough to kill?”

  “Why not?”

  “And you claim I’ve got a suspicious mind! But if Harison did it, what about the letters?”

  Papkin shrugged. “Just a coincidence . . . or”—he grinned—“maybe not.” He made ready to leave. “Either way, we may need every suspicion in your suspicious mind. Right now, we’ve got a dead man. It could be accidental or it could be death by natural causes. But if I had a last buck—”

  “I know: You’d put it on homicide. So would I.”

  4

  Looks like a full house, thought Father Robert Koesler as he searched for a parking space. Thanks to some thoughtless and inconsiderate parking, there was no room in the mortuary lot. At least it was appropriate, the priest mused. We have just finished with the feast commemorating a night when the Holy Family found no room at the inn. Almost blasphemous, since Koesler was cruising in his small but well-heated car.

  There was nothing for it but to park on one of the neighboring streets. The bad news was that it hadn’t snowed quite enough yet to have had the secondary streets plowed. The good news was very much like the bad; it hadn’t snowed enough to render driving and parking next to impossible.

  He had to park a couple of blocks from the Morand Funeral Home. As he automatically locked his car, he had to admit he shouldn’t have been surprised by the number of people who had come to pay their respects. Ridley C. Groendal had been a Very Important Person: a onetime columnist for a prestigious New York paper, a critic whose opinion had been known to contribute to the premature closing of plays and an occasional concert. And a writer whose reviews were feared by authors.

  Now that Koesler had phrased the career of Ridley Groendal in just those thoughts, the conclusion seemed inevitable that Groendal might not be remembered for anything very positive. Just for creating depression and dread in the hearts of writers and performers.

  Because Groendal had been very much a Catholic as well as a Very Important Person, he was, by corollary, a Very Important Catholic. That meant that Koesler could expect a bumper crop of priests at tomorrow’s funeral. Which was no problem; it merely entailed the reservation of a few pews for the visiting clergy. None of whom, undoubtedly, would be attending tonight’s farewell rosary.

  Koesler, stamping snow from his rubbers, was greeted by the mortuary owner.

  “Hi, Lou. Looks like an SRO crowd.”

  “Right, Father.” Morand took Koesler’s coat and hat. “And almost all for the Groendal wake.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “He’s in there.” Morand indicated a room out of which spilled an overflow crowd. By opening several sliding panels, Morand had made this the largest slumber room in the home. Still it was not large enough.

  “I sort of figured that.”

  “Want me to escort you to the bier?”

  “No, no, Lou. I can make it okay.”

  Morand headed for his office with Koesler’s hat and coat, leaving the priest, by his own choice, to fend for himself.

  Koesler, at some inches over six feet, was able to get a better than average perspective of the crowd. It was like old home week. He recognized quite a few parishioners. That was to be expected. Koesler was pastor of St. Anselm’s parish in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn Heights. And Ridley Groendal had been a parishioner for the past year or so.

  But there were quite a few others whom Koesler recognized from the old days at Holy Redeemer parish on Detroit’s near west side. Koesler was pleased they had remembered. It had been many long years since he and Groendal, among many others, had grown up in that venerable neighborhood. It was good to see the familiar faces, although many of them remained no more than familiar—at present no names came readily to mind.

  He began to make his way through the crowd, something he had done many times before. Two ceremonies that regularly bid for the services of a priest are weddings and funerals. For Koesler, after some thirty years as a priest, all the weddings and funerals at which he had presided seemed to blend into one massive hodgepodge.

  Only a few such occasions stood out individually and clearly in his memory. Koesler, like many of his confreres, was forever being greeted, often effusively, by seeming strangers who took it for granted that he remembered their wedding or the funeral of a loved one. There were just too many to keep them all distinct in his mind.

  Of course the funeral of Ridley C. Groendal, for many reasons, was one of the few he would remember.

  Getting through this crowd was not unlike swimming upstream. Koesler had to struggle against a current that kept everyone cheek by jowl. As he tapped shoulders and excused himself, he was greeted first by hostility that resisted relinquishing hard-won and established space. But as soon as his clerical collar was recognized, he was graciously ushered on. Old friends from Holy Redeemer days or present parishioners would exchange a few words with him as he resolutely made his way toward th
e bier. He recognized his parishioners, of course, but did not fare so well with the Redeemerites. Most he could not identify until they introduced themselves. Then, usually, he remembered them.

  At long last, he reached the remains of Ridley C. Groendal. Here at least, as at all such gatherings, there was room to breathe. No matter how many mourners attended a wake, the deceased was always accorded some breathing room. The deceased, of course, needed it least. However, the prime beneficiaries of this ample space were the chief mourners who invested the most time in this vigil.

  In the case of Ridley Groendal there was only one chief mourner. Among those aware of the situation, it was no surprise that Peter Harison evidently was the one and only bereaved.

  Harison, at Father Koesler’s approach, rose immediately. “Good of you to come, Father.”

  “Sorry for your loss, Peter.” The priest knew that neither greeting had any genuine meaning. In reality, he had to attend the wake, so there was no need to thank him for coming. In another sense, he was there quite willingly for a great number of reasons, not the least of which was the fact that Ridley Groendal and Robert Koesler went back a long way together. On the other hand, Koesler’s salutation had been empty—a response not unlike the traditional “Fine” when someone automatically asks, “How are you?”

  Now came that familiar void that so often occurs at funerals when no one, neither the visitor nor the bereaved, knows quite what to say.

  After some moments, Harison broke the awkward silence. “Appropriate, don’t you think?” He was pointing upward.

  Koesler reflexively looked up. What was “appropriate”? The ceiling? Heaven? “Appropriate?”

  “Why, the music.” Harison seemed surprised that Koesler was unaware of the music.

  “Ah, the music.” Koesler had been vaguely conscious that there was something “extra” going on. Until his attention had been directed to it, he had paid no mind. Something like many of the movies of the forties whose inane musical score never quit. Once one became conscious of it, one became painfully conscious of it. So it was now. The piped-in music had blended in with the conversational murmur throughout the room. Now that he heard the music, he didn’t like it. “What is it, Peter?”