“What Annie needs is a million dollars,” Sophia would say between her teeth. “All that left-wing crap would be forgotten in ten milliseconds.”
The case was drawing toward the end of its second week, and the arrest of Uda Savovich was all Carmine had to show for the days of dogged investigation. Because her defense attorney was the great Anthony Bera, she would probably be acquitted; the evidence was purely circumstantial in that no one had seen her commit murder. What an incompetent lawyer would have bungled, Bera would use brilliantly: her unprepossessing appearance, her servant’s status in her sister’s home, her sheer foreignness. The jury would go into their debate convinced that someone else had put those two damning tubes of paint there — how could a poor little soul with tiny, twisted fingers do it?
It always came back to Jim Hunter. Now Carmine and his team would have to interview every member of Hunter’s extensive laboratory world, probing for mentions of tetrodotoxin without ever actually using the name. A futile business.
Delia came in, a telex in her hand. “From Liam,” she said handing it to Carmine, “and no, I haven’t read it.”
“On the red-eye out of L.A. tonight,” Liam said, “and here’s hoping no hijackers on board to disturb my sleep.
“Not much to report, but I guess you expect that. First item is that John Hall was a simple depressive, no oscillations into mania. Gold Beach enquiries showed a withdrawn kid from early childhood, a science nerd in high school, and a real loner in college, all local. Good grades. Seems to have really loved Wendover, spent his spare time with the old man. A lot of stuff about trees and forestry, also paper manufacture.
“Caltech was his first time out of Oregon and his sphere. He started there a year earlier than the Hunters, September of 1957, but dropped out a month later. The halfway house in San Francisco dates to this time, not his teens. No one admits to having kept any records, but talking to a couple of long term helpers suggests a homosexual element in his depression. Not, as far as I could ascertain, that Hall was ever involved with a man. He just had the reputation.
“He went back to Caltech in September of 1958 and met the Hunters the first week. After that he never left their vicinity. According to a classmate, he was nuts on both the Hunters, but the general feeling in the classroom was that he was more taken with Jim than with Millie. Some of the implied homosexuality may be due to his phsyique and his face, neither a thousand per cent masculine, seems to be the consensus.
“After the Hunters went to Chicago he broke down again and spent some months in San Francisco being treated and staying in the halfway house. Then Wendover Hall brought him back to Oregon and put him into private full-time hospitalization, which seemed to do more for him. Since 1963, he’s been more or less okay, though living with Wendover.
“Talk to you some more when I get home. Liam.”
“The poor young man!” said Delia, finished reading.
“It’s not the Hunter story, though, is it?” Carmine asked.
“I don’t agree. What Liam has garnered is hearsay, from observers on the outside. It’s a great trouble to young men of John Hall’s physical type — they tend to be labeled as homosexual whether they are or not,” Delia said, sounding passionate. “Don’t say it doesn’t happen in our own police force — it does! You and I both can name half a dozen men mistakenly labeled queer. As well as one or two super-masculine types who were anything but. We have a background for John Hall, and it’s a sad one, but it doesn’t say anything about his relationship with Jim and Millie Hunter.”
FRIDAY, JANUARY 17, 1969
At eight that morning, Carmine assembled his troops.
“By now you will have concluded that we’ve exhausted all our avenues of enquiry,” he said, standing. They were not neatly seated in rows, but rather scattered over the fairly large room with chairs turned at different angles; each body, however, was twisted so that its eyes could rest on Carmine in comfort.
“Here’s what we have: the murders of four people, three by an esoteric poison, tetrodotoxin, and one by a gunshot wound to the base of the brain. The first death, John Hall, was by tetrodotoxin subcutaneously administered to the back of his neck before the men went into Max Tunbull’s study. It could have been by any hand. The second death, Thomas Tinkerman, was by an intramuscular injection of tetrodotoxin to the back of his neck. It was administered by his wife in the belief that she was giving him his customary dose of vitamin B-12.”
Carmine straightened. “We were led on a merry dance that only became obvious after we learned of the B-12. There were home-made gizmos to confuse us, valuable time wasted chasing down leads that went nowhere, a web woven to deceive. Our first break consisted of two ampoules and one letter found inside tubes that had contained phthalocyanine green gouache paint, which is absolutely water-soluble and therefore easy to get rid of. Anyone care to comment at this stage?” Carmine asked.