Cheating at Solitaire(135)

“Because it was cold,” Linda said. “It’s freezing up here this time of year, Mr. Demarkian, in case you hadn’t noticed. But you can’t operate those cameras he has with a hand in a thick leather glove, and you can’t go without the gloves completely or your fingers fall off. So he wore the glove on his left hand and kept his right hand free to work the cameras.”

“And it was his camera hand that was attacked,” Gregor said. It was not a question.

“I think it was one of those other photographers,” Linda said. “One of those people from New York or Los Angeles. Jack is a very good photographer. I think those people didn’t like the competition from somebody local, and then of course there was all that stuff about the Vegas trip, where Jack was the only photographer to be asked along. I think they’re jealous.”

“I think they very probably are,” Gregor said. “Somebody I talked to in town said that Jack had a crush on Kendra Rhode, or possibly on Marcey Mandret. That he was emotionally involved.”

Linda Beecham shrugged. “He was, of course he was. He was way out of his league in terms of the personalities. They all seemed special to him. You couldn’t tell him otherwise. And I suppose, to someone with limited experience, they did seem special. They are special. They’re, I don’t know, shinier than the rest of us.”

“But not better?”

“Better at what?” Linda asked. “They’re not very bright, at least not the ones I’ve talked to, and I’ve talked to most of them these past few months. They tend to be rude, and to think they can do whatever they want without consequences. They’re rich and they’re spoiled, but so are a lot of other people on Margaret’s Harbor. They get their pictures in the news a lot, although I’ve never been able to figure out what for. I think that for Jack, there was just too much dazzle and he was just too unused to it. He’ll figure it out in the long run.”

“You don’t think he had a particular crush on any one of the group of them?”

“I don’t think Jack’s ever had a particular crush on anybody.”

“All right,” Gregor said. “What happened after you found him behind the building?”

“I went back into the building and called the hospital,” Linda said, “and then I called Jerry Young, because it was obvious that what we had was a crime scene. It was a criminal attack. It had to be. I mean, there he was, drugged up like that, and his hand bleeding all over everything. But Jerry didn’t come out, not right away. He had to wait until somebody came in to babysit Arrow Normand.”

“Was that illegitimate?” Gregor asked. “He couldn’t leave Arrow Normand in a cell without supervision, could he?”

“Why not?” Linda asked. “This isn’t Rikers Island. We have people in those jail cells all the time without supervision. Not in the summer, of course, but during the offseasons. Drunks, mostly. Nobody bothers to get somebody to sit around and babysit them. And what did Jerry think Arrow Normand was going to do in his absence? Stage a jail-break? Commit suicide?”

“Maybe,” Gregor said.

“Don’t be ridiculous. Arrow Normand wouldn’t commit suicide unless she could be guaranteed ringside seats at her own funeral, and if she staged a jailbreak she’d be caught in a minute and a half when she stopped to pose for the first set of photographers. It wasn’t that. It was just that Jack is Jack and not some Hollywood celebrity. It’s like a virus everybody’s been catching around here. Jerry Young had too much to do to actually investigate a crime.”

“Are you saying he didn’t come to the scene at all?”

“He came, at the last minute. By then the ambulance was already there, and they were loading Jack into it. They had to do that. Jack was alive. It was an emergency. They couldn’t just leave him lying in the snow while Jerry took his own sweet time showing up.”

“Did anybody else show up?”

“Some of those photographers poked their noses in when the ambulance first got there, just to see what the siren was about, but they didn’t stay long. There isn’t much money in photographs of Jack Bullard with an injured hand. There isn’t much money in photographs of Jack Bullard. They went away.”

“And then what? ”

“Then the ambulance took Jack to the hospital, and I stayed around for a while, and then I went looking for Clara Walsh,” Linda said. “And then I met you, come to think of it. But none of you were much interested in Jack either.”

“We did come and interview Dr. Ingleford, on the spot.”