He turned to the children, seeking some idea what kind of family theirs was. The little girl, Marlene, was aggressive and intelligent—probably not popular at school, he thought. The little boy, Tommy, apparently lived for food; when he grabbed at the cookies put out for Carmine, his mother slapped his hand away viciously, with a look on her face the child retreated from.
“You have no outside interests of your own at all?” Carmine asked.
“No, none—Tommy, leave the cookies alone!”
He plucked it out of thin air. “Women’s liberation?”
“I should think not!” she snapped, bridling. “Of all the stupid, embarrassing things—! Do you know they actually tried to proselytize me? I don’t remember her name, but I sure sent her packing with a flea in her ear!”
“When was this?”
“I don’t remember,” said Mrs. Norton, fighting the drugs and losing. “Some function or other, a long time ago.”
“What did the woman look like?”
“That’s just it! She looked normal! Shaved her legs, wore makeup and nice clothes. For a while I was quite taken in, then she—she stood forth in all her evil panoply! I learned that at school, and it fit, Captain, it fit. When I told her what I thought of women’s libbers, she got nasty, and I got nasty right back! I must’ve frightened her—she gave up and left.”
“Was she a blonde? A brunette? A redhead?”
“I don’t remember,” said Mrs. Norton, yawning. “I’m tired.”
* * *
“I told you,” said Carmine to Abe and Corey, “this is a case full of women. Now where the hell does feminism enter into it? Because I believe it does, at least in the death of Peter Norton. Someone or something influenced our killer to punish Mrs. Norton by making her watch him die. It worked—she’s still under a lot of sedation—but she had a lucid moment when she talked of the feminist who looked ‘normal.’ I wish I knew more about the Nortons! Something is escaping me, but what it is, I have no idea. Maybe it’s not knowing for sure what kind of woman Mrs. Norton is. Like a psychiatrist inheriting a patient so doped up he can’t get to square one on a diagnosis.”
“You couldn’t get any more out of her?” Corey asked.
Carmine looked at him sympathetically; Corey’s wife wouldn’t let him rest, nagged nonstop. “She only remembers what suits her,” he said. “Corey, you’re on the Norton background. I want to know the name and the date of every function Mrs. Norton ever attended—well, modify that. Make it five years.” He turned to Abe. “Abe, you’re on the feminist angle. Use the good Dr. Denbigh as your starting point. She’s in the thick of the movement, and she fits Mrs. Norton’s description—no hairy legs or armpits for our Pauline. Incidentally, she told me she was frigid, but I doubt that very much. I know we’ve got her for the Dean’s murder, but her past still bears looking into. What was her reason for picking April third for the deed, huh?”
“You didn’t believe it had nothing to do with the other murders?” Corey asked, fretting that he wasn’t chalking up enough points.
“She’s a congenital liar. When she does tell the truth, it’s obliquely.”
He watched them leave his office, then put his chin on his hands and prepared for a think session.
“Carmine?”
He lifted his head, surprised; it wasn’t like Delia to interrupt a thinking boss. “Yes?”
“I have an idea,” she said, not sitting down.
“Coming from you, that’s encouraging. Explain.”
“The filing’s all up to date and you haven’t exactly snowed me under with letters lately,” she said delicately, looking at him with eyes that always reminded him of a kewpie doll—wide, ingenuous, impossibly painted.
“That’s true, Delia, I’m the first one to admit it.”
“Well—ah—would you mind if I followed a hunch of my own? That is the right word, isn’t it?”
“For a gut feeling, yes. Sit down, Delia, please! I can’t bear watching a woman stand while I’m on my butt.”
She sat, pink with pleasure. “You see, most of these deaths have to be connected, don’t they? You’ve always felt that, but nothing has come to light to support it. What I’m wondering is, where could they all have been present at one and the same time? The only answer, I believe, is at either a public meeting or a function of some sort. You know what I mean—you sit in a row waiting ages for the curtain to rise or whatever, and you start talking to those around you. Or you sit at a table with strangers and strive to chum up—if you don’t, you have an awful evening. Most people are naturally gregarious, so they achieve this end. You do see what I mean, don’t you?”