The Helium Murder(37)

Matt, on the other hand, came through quickly and to the point.

“Controlling interest in a private consulting firm? Are you saying you have an anonymous partner?”

“Yes, you could say that.”

“No one stays anonymous for very long in a murder investigation, Mr. Cavallo,” Matt said. “Who is your partner?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

Matt sighed and put his pencil down on his desk.

“All right, Mr. Cavallo, but you know we’ll get this information sooner or later, and your cooperation would mean a lot here.”

Cavallo gulped, and I thought I saw perspiration on his forehead.

“I’m going to have to check things out first.”

Matt stood up, and Cavallo followed suit.

“I have one other question for you, Mr. Cavallo,” I said. “Does the nickname ‘mole’ mean anything to you?”

Cavallo ran his tongue over his teeth and shook his head.

“No,” he said, “it doesn’t. Sorry.”

Matt looked at me and scratched his neck, then addressed Cavallo.

“We’ll be in touch,” Matt told him.

Cavallo left the office without another word.

“Mole?” Matt said. “You still think that’s a clue, don’t you?”

“I do, and as for Cavallo, I think he’s shady, and I’m embarrassed that he’s a physicist, but I don’t think he’s a killer.”

Matt sat down, and it seemed we were going to pick up where we were before Cavallo’s interview, when I’d almost lost my job. I tried a preemptive strategy.

“What exactly did Busso’s confession say?” I asked him.

“Of course, I haven’t seen it,” he said, apparently caught off guard by my tactic, “but he did know some details about the murder that we haven’t released to the press or to anyone else, for that matter.” He leafed through his notebook and, to my amazement, continued feeding me information. “He wrote something about Hurley’s garment bag and flashlight.”

“Flashlight?”

“She was holding a flashlight in one hand and her garment bag in the other when she was found.”

“She was holding a flashlight? So she could have seen something?”

“It was just a small one, like the kind you’d carry on your key ring.”

“Still,” I said, while some neurons traveled through my head, unable to find the connection they knew they should make.

“And that about wraps it up, Gloria,” Matt said. “I can’t think of a single other thing I’ll be needing you for before Saturday night.”

He came around to my side of his desk and, smiling, put his arms on my shoulders and spun me around toward the door. It was the most playful gesture he’d ever made, and because of that, I didn’t mind leaving.

I knew better than to take Matt’s light tone in ushering me from his office as a sign that he was willing to have me continue working on the case. But I couldn’t stop thinking about the pieces of the investigation, even after I got home.

Around four o’clock, I made coffee, put on a CD of Christmas hymns sung by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and brought one of my rockers close to the window. I left my apartment lights off and watched the darkness move in on the beautiful elms of Tuttle Street.

Christmas lights came on, as far as I could see, up and down the street, but the music and lights were no longer enough to give me a feeling of security. What had I been thinking? I asked myself. Hadn’t Al died four days before Christmas? And now Margaret Hurley and Rocky Busso were struck down amid sleigh bells and cheerful wrapping paper.

I felt a chill as I acknowledged that murder doesn’t take a holiday. I turned on my lights and took out my notes.

I didn’t for a minute believe that the powerful man who’d delivered my engagement ring had taken his own life. I thought it strange that it was easier for me to accept Rocky as the murderer of Margaret Hurley than of himself.

Since I’d had at least a few minutes with Gallagher and Cavallo, the only unknown left was Buddy Hurley. I needed to find out more about him. But there was no technical connection, and I didn’t relish Matt’s finding out that I’d dropped in on a chief suspect. Eventually, another, more reasonable plan took shape in my mind.

How, I asked myself, do writers come up with long articles about celebrities, even when they refuse to be interviewed? The way they do it, I answered myself, is the way detectives “interview” dead people—they talk to friends, relatives, neighbors. At last, I thought, mentally hitting my forehead with the palm of my hand, I’m catching on to police work.

I picked up my copy of the Revere telephone directory, and opened to Whitestone. I found several, but no Frances, and the only F. Whitestone was not on Oxford Park. It made sense that Frances Whitestone would have an unlisted telephone number. It also made sense that the funeral director in charge of her friend’s services would have that number.