Sleep of the Innocent (26 page)

“What in hell are you talking about?”

“Let me explain to you what has been happening.” And Lucas's quiet, steady voice went on and on, setting out the string of events, enumerating the coincidences, until he came to his reasons for hiding out in the woods.

“If you're so sure of all this, what made you come back?”

“We had to. I think they're convinced they won't be safe until they get rid of her, even though she can only identify them by voice. They have a point. Her identification wouldn't be worth much in a jury trial, but once you know who they are, it'll be easy to find better evidence. Or they may think she saw them. Anyway, we can't spend the rest of our lives hiding. And she knows a fair amount of detail that should help in the investigation. Like, Neilson was expecting delivery of cash—a lot of cash—at the apartment; that's why he let his murderers in. The money must be somewhere, and you might be able to trace it.”

“Is she sure of that?”

He nodded. “It was something Neilson said to her. About his pension being delivered that afternoon.”

“Where is Miss Hunter now?”

He shook his head. “She's safe.”

“For chrissake, Rob, I have to talk to her.”

“No. Somebody here, some guy maybe standing out there in the hall right now listening, murdered Neilson. And killed Jennifer Wilson. And injured Grainne.”

“Who?”

“I don't know.” He looked very young and helpless. “The only person I can think of,” he said, lowering his voice even further, “is Baldwin. He got my reports. He was the one who wanted to keep the investigation contained, to run every aspect of it himself. He sent me out to Neilson's place yesterday. It was crazy, the way he was doing things. If you think about it.”

Sanders suddenly felt very tired. “Shit,” he muttered, jumped up, and threw open the door. “Dubinsky!” he roared.

“No,” said Lucas frantically. “Don't tell anyone else. Not yet.”

“I can't do anything without help. And if I can't trust Ed, I can't trust anyone. Even myself. You're sure it's someone in the department?”

“Or a friend of someone in the department.”

The door opened. “Yeah?”

“Who worked on that case—the one that involved Neilson? You know—the murder of the hooker in the alley behind his restaurant.”

“Baldwin and Patterson.”

“No. Not just them. Everybody. I want the name of anyone who could possibly have talked to Neilson around the time of the investigation. And when you've got that, get an ID shot of everyone on the list. No matter who they are. And then call Harriet, apologize to her very carefully for me, and take the pictures over to her place. She knows about it. Sort of. Thanks.” He turned back to Lucas. “Now, your witness. You can't keep her hidden under a bed somewhere forever. You may think she's safe, but I'd be willing to bet that thirty minutes over coffee with a couple of your pals and a quick look through your file, and I'd find her. She's at an apartment belonging to a friend or relative you trust—right? So I'd check with parents, cousins, aunts, uncles—not really hard to find if you go about things carefully. It's better for us to get there first.”

A distant pounding lingered in Grainne's ears. It took her a measurable length of time to orient herself—to the silky covering, the darkened room, the crisp sheets, the dying odor of expensive perfume. The pounding continued, and then she knew that it existed in the real world, not in some dream or nightmarish vision. She had been heavily, dizzily asleep, but fear rapidly cleared her head. She sat up.

Tricia's lazy voice drifted in through the door. “Who is it, Mrs. Henderson?”

“It's a policeman, madam.” Mrs. Henderson sounded cool and unperturbed. “He'd like to talk to you.”

Grainne drew the warm comforter to her chest like a shield and listened intently. “Ask him to wait outside, please.” The lazy voice had developed a sharp edge. She heard the click of narrow heels on the parquet floor. Now the conversation dropped to a distant murmur, and she could no longer distinguish what was going on. Finally, Tricia Lucas's voice rose enough for her to catch the words. “Not a chance. Not without a warrant. Now if you would just step back, I'd like to close the door.” There was another pause, during which Grainne heard nothing but faint background noise. Then Tricia Lucas's voice, shaking with anger, rose again. “Mrs. Henderson. Call Thomas and Thomas. Button five.” The wall shook as the heavy front door smashed open against the foyer wall.

Grainne was off the bed and half-running toward the door on the far side of the room. It was a bathroom. A bathroom with one door and a skylight, in an apartment that was twenty-four stories above the surface of Lake Ontario. She was trapped. Destined, she thought wryly in spite of her fear, to cower forever in bathrooms. She looked about for some avenue of escape, some place to hide, but this room was not equipped with woman-size shelving. She headed back into the bedroom.

They were almost at the apartment building when the call came. An uncertain, guilt-ridden Rob Lucas, shaved and tidied up, and John Sanders. The call was from Thomas and Thomas, barristers and solicitors to the rich, furious that their client, Mrs. Bertram Lucas, had had her apartment door forced open a few moments ago by a police officer without a warrant.

“Oh, God,” said Lucas, turning ash-gray. “You were right. They're after Grainne.”

A patrol car, lights flashing, pulled up ahead of them in front of the apartment building. “That's fast,” said Sanders to the two constables as they jumped out. “Who sent you?”

“Building security. There's been a break-in on the penthouse floor.”

All four men raced for the front door. The concierge flung it open and rushed toward the open door of the elevator. “Oh, hello, Mr. Lucas,” he said politely, mindful of all his duties. “But you don't have to worry. It's the Schneidermanns' apartment. I locked the elevators, in case,” he added. “And so maybe someone should stay down here by the stairs.” Sanders nodded at one of the constables.

When they arrived at the penthouse level, they were met by Tricia Lucas, standing in the open door to her apartment, in silk-embroidered dressing gown and high-heeled bedroom slippers, perfectly made-up, and absolutely furious. Leaning against the wall outside the apartment, was Eric Patterson, smiling in his ironic, self-deprecating way.

“Hi, Rob, old boy,” he said. “Inspector. Nice to see you.”

“What in hell is going on here?” Sanders glared at Patterson.

“This man forced his way into my apartment, damaging the door and the wall as he went,” Tricia snapped, pointing a long, perfect finger in the direction of his chest.

“Acting on information received—” Patterson's voice began its professional drone.

“Without a warrant—”

“From whom?”

“A source,” said Patterson. “I got a tip that the witness we were searching for was in this apartment.” He shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “So I didn't have time to grab a judge and get a warrant. What else is new? But I couldn't find her.”

“Which is breaking and entering, as far as I'm concerned—”

“Look, I'm sorry about the door, lady. But you were being damned uncooperative.”

“Excuse me, officers,” said the concierge for the fourth time.

“What now?” Sanders was getting tired of the demanding little voice.

“I don't know what's going on at the Lucases', but it was the Schneidermanns' apartment that was broken into.” His voice throbbed with desperation. “And I don't know how,” he added, “because no one went up to the penthouse this morning but this man, and the only staircase up to the roof is monitored all the time, and there was no one on it this morning. I'll open the door for you, but I'm not going in. I'm not getting killed.”

Before he had finished, the elevator chimed discreetly. Everyone turned as the ornamented brass doors slid apart and a red-faced Matt Baldwin stepped out, followed by a much paler Patrick Kelleher.

“Hello, Matt.” Sanders raised a hand in greeting. “What brings you here this morning?”

“You won't need me, then?” said Patterson.

“Stick around,” said Sanders. “I'll be with you in a minute.”

“Do you mind?” said the concierge, his voice rising to a near shriek. “Anything could be going on in there.” And with a flourish of his keychain, he opened the Schneidermanns' door. Absolute quiet billowed out of the apartment. The six men, Sanders and Lucas, Baldwin and Kelleher, Eric Patterson and the uniformed constable—followed by Tricia Lucas, who had never seen the inside of the Schneidermanns' apartment and was not going to miss the chance now, burglar or no burglar—moved with only a faint swish of shoe leather toward the living room.

And there, sitting huddled on the chesterfield, wearing a warm nightgown belonging to Tricia and a wool dressing gown belonging to Rob Lucas, sat Grainne Hunter, staring fixedly at the procession. As soon as Rob came around the corner, she leaped to her feet like a nervous cat and took one step in their direction.

A voice rang out in the enormous room. “Watch it! She has a gun.”

Kelleher yanked his weapon out and raised it just as Lucas threw himself at the man's arm on its upward swing. The noise of a shot smashed through the room; Grainne's arms flew to her chest, and she rolled onto the floor. At almost the same moment, Ed Dubinsky stepped in the doorway and grabbed Kelleher's wrist, clutching it in a grip so massive that his fingers splayed helplessly. The weapon fell to the floor with a small clatter. Dubinsky bent down and scooped it up with his other hand. Grainne lay without moving.

Lucas was on his knees beside the fallen girl. As he wrapped his arms around her, she opened her tightly shut eyes, smiled tentatively, and tried to move her arms away from her chest, hampered somewhat by Lucas's ferocious grip. “I hate loud noises,” she whispered.

“My God, darling, I thought you were dead,” said Lucas.

“No, just getting out of the way. It seemed like a good idea at the time.” Her voice faded away to the faintest of whispers and she began to tremble violently.

“What in hell is going on?” asked Patterson. Dubinsky had released his grip, and Patrick Kelleher was rubbing his wrist. “Does she have a gun on her? Who saw it, anyway?”

“I don't know,” said Kelleher angrily. “I thought it was Inspector Sanders.”

There was silence. Sanders shook his head. “Does she, Lucas?” he asked. “Have a gun in her pocket?”

“My pocket, sir, actually,” said Lucas, one arm still holding her firmly by the shoulders while he patted the two roomy pockets of his dressing gown with the other. He shook his head. “Who was it said that Grainne had a gun?” he asked.

An awkward hush fell across the group, separating it into a collection of uneasy individuals. Dubinsky glanced around impatiently and then pulled Sanders over to the door, talking all the while. Matt Baldwin stepped back, his eyes flickering rapidly from person to person, until he allowed his gaze to rest finally on Rob Lucas and Grainne Hunter.

“I want that woman—” he started.

Sanders nodded to his partner, and moved over until he was right next to Baldwin's right ear. “Look, Matt,” he whispered, “we have a potentially explosive problem here.”

“Explosive?”

“Yeah. One of us is going to have to get Kelleher and Patterson out of here and downtown. Get them to write some sort of reasonable report on this. Otherwise, you know what's going to happen. Jesus, look at this place. Willful damage. There's a hole in that goddamn Persian rug from Kelleher's weapon. Cost a fortune to fix it. Maybe even unlawful discharge of a firearm. And Patterson. Breaking into the apartment next door, all that damage. And the other one can stay and try to straighten things out with Mrs. Lucas there. She looks mad as hell.”

As Sanders's voice droned softly on, Baldwin's expression changed. “Good idea,” he muttered. “I think I'd better go with Kelleher and Patterson, though. They're my responsibility, after all.”

“I suppose they are,” said Sanders, as though this was the first time the idea had occurred to him. “Well, I'll stay and tackle the lady.”

“What about Lucas and that woman?”

“Don't worry, I'll take care of them.”

With an impatient nod, Baldwin summoned up his two problems and stalked out of the apartment. They were followed closely by the constable from the break-and-enter detail, who was not anxious to wait around for any potentially awkward repercussions. Sanders turned quickly to Grainne Hunter. “John Sanders, Miss Hunter. Now, what can you tell us?”

Grainne sat down on the couch again, hunched forward, every muscle taut. “The person who shouted,” she whispered, “the one who said, ‘She has a gun,' he was one of the men who killed Neilson.”

“Who was it?” asked Sanders, looking around. “I wasn't sure.”

“I was in the hall,” said Dubinsky. “I couldn't tell.”

“Neither could I,” said Lucas. “I assumed it was Baldwin, but now—I don't know. It could have been any of them. Are you sure, Grainne?”

She nodded. “Positive.”

“What about the other one, then?” said Sanders. “You said there were two, didn't you? Did you hear him?”

“This morning? No. And he's hard to miss. He has a really distinctive voice. High-pitched but raspy. Like a tenor with screwed-up vocal cords. Anyway, he's too short to be any of the gang that came in here.”

“Shit!” said Dubinsky, who had been listening intently. He grabbed the Schneidermanns' phone. “Get me Collins,” he barked into the receiver.

“By the way, what are you doing in here?” asked Sanders. “We were expecting to find you next door.”

Splotches of color appeared in Grainne's cheeks. “Oh. Well, when I woke up this morning, I heard Tricia arguing with a policeman. I figured he was looking for me, and so I climbed out of the bedroom window onto the roof, and came around here. They have a Japanese garden,” she said, pointing to the floor to ceiling draperies. “I borrowed a rock and smashed a hole in the French window. It's not a very secure system for an expensive apartment,” she added. Her tone was censorious.