Blind Tiger, page 34
A door with the doc’s name printed on it opened into a waiting room where a woman was seated near a small table, smoking a cigarette. She was unkempt. There were blood smears on her dress. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her expression harsh. “Who are you?”
He took off his hat. “Thatcher Hutton.”
“What are you doing here?”
Before he could reply, Bill Amos opened a door with “Examination Room” stenciled on it. “I called him,” he said to the woman, then hitched his head, indicating for Thatcher to join him in a small room with glass-fronted supply cabinets on two walls. The center was dominated by the examination table.
“Through here,” Bill said as he led Thatcher through yet another room into an operating room. He drew up short when he saw the table on which a female person lay.
A white sheet covered her from toes to chin. All that showed was a mass of thick, dark hair and her face, which looked like it had had a head-on collision with a locomotive.
Wearing a white lab coat, Doc Perkins was washing his hands at an industrial-size porcelain sink. Thatcher recognized the strong smell of antiseptic from his days in the army hospital.
Bill said, “That’s Norma Blanchard.”
Stunned, Thatcher remembered the pretty, shapely woman with the saucy walk whom he’d seen going into Gabe Driscoll’s house late one night. “She dead?”
“As of when I called you. I wanted you to see her to get an idea of what we’re dealing with here.”
Thatcher wanted to object to the plural pronoun. In his mind, he’d taken a stand against the likes of the violent Johnsons, but he hadn’t been sworn in as a deputy yet, and he wasn’t wearing the badge. However, now wasn’t the time to go into all that.
Thatcher said, “Who’s the woman outside?”
“Miss Blanchard’s sister. Patsy Kemp.”
She was no doubt the woman who’d chauffeured Norma to Gabe Driscoll’s house, but Thatcher hadn’t gotten a good look at her face that night and wouldn’t have recognized her.
Bill said, “I asked her to stay, so we could talk to her about the assault.”
“Assault? This wasn’t an accident?”
“No. Mrs. Kemp brought Norma to Dr. Perkins around four o’clock. She was barely alive. He evaluated her condition and called me right away. She never regained consciousness.” To the doctor, he said, “Give him a run-down. No medical jargon, please. Plain talk.”
The doctor unhooked the wire stems of his eyeglasses from behind his ears, removed them, and began polishing them with the towel he’d used to dry his hands.
“Her nose is broken. Pulverized, actually. Fractured cheekbone, broken jawbone, three loose teeth. A flap of scalp about an inch in diameter had been ripped away. I sewed it back, but that’s the least of it.”
He replaced his glasses and looked down at the draped figure. “The back of her torso appears to have been pummeled repeatedly, I suspect with fists. I also tweezed out several shards of mirror glass that had sliced through her garment.” He pointed to a silky dressing gown wadded up in a chair.
“I detected three broken ribs. Others may have been cracked. She might have survived, in time, and under the care of physicians better trained and skilled at treating the more serious of her injuries.”
“What were they?”
“She has a sizable bruise and swelling above her left kidney. It’s so precisely placed, it appears the organ was targeted. Perhaps by the heel of a shoe. I suspect the blunt force caused internal hemorrhaging. She bled to death.”
The doctor’s eyes looked apologetic behind the round lenses of his glasses. “I did what I could, but I’m a country doctor, unqualified to deal with something like this. Perhaps Gabe Driscoll would have been a better choice.”
Bill glanced at Thatcher, then turned to the doctor. “Tell him the rest.”
The doctor bowed his head and addressed the floor. “She was raped. Barbarically. Considerable damage was done to tissue.”
The men stood silent, looking neither at each other, nor at Norma Blanchard’s still form. After a moment, the doctor covered her face.
In a quiet voice, Bill said, “Her injuries are of such a sensitive nature, I’d like to keep the details between us, doc.”
“Of course.”
“Do you mind if we use your waiting room to talk to Mrs. Kemp?”
“Not at all. I’ll stay with Miss Blanchard until the ambulance arrives.”
“Ambulance?” Thatcher asked.
“I want the autopsy done in Dallas,” Bill said. “They have a lab, forensic specialists.”
Thatcher took a last look at the sheet-draped figure then followed Bill from the surgery and back out into the waiting room. Patsy Kemp hadn’t changed her position since Thatcher had come in.
Bill pulled a chair over closer to her and motioned for Thatcher to do the same. When they were seated, Bill said, “I’m awful sorry this terrible thing has happened, Mrs. Kemp.”
She gave him a curt nod.
“This is Thatcher Hutton.”
“So he said.”
“He’s new to my department. We’d like to ask you some questions, gain as much information as we can, in an effort to catch the person who assaulted your sister.”
She sat stony-faced.
Bill asked softly, “Where’s her baby?”
“I dropped him off with a lady I buy fresh eggs from. She has a baby close to Arthur’s age. She’ll wet-nurse him and look after him until I can pick him up.”
“Good.” Bill paused, then said, “You know the extent of what was done to your sister?”
“I found her, remember?”
“Do you know who attacked her?”
“No.”
“At any point, was she conscious?”
“Conscious but out of her head.”
“Did she say—”
“Did you see her mouth? She couldn’t talk.”
Bill eased away from her, as though sensing, as Thatcher did, that pressuring her wasn’t the tack to take. “Tell us what happened today.”
“Do we have to do this now?”
“Do you want us to catch the man responsible?”
Bill won the stare-off. She took a deep breath. “Today started out like any other. I did chores while Norma tended to Arthur.”
“You told me earlier that the assault took place while you were away from the house.”
She told them about receiving a telephone call from First State Bank. “I don’t remember the man’s name. He asked me to come in and take care of a matter. Something I needed to sign. Arthur was down for a nap. Norma was primping. It was easier to go without her than to wait for her to get ready. She was very particular about her appearance.”
She glanced toward the examination room. Her eyes turned watery. “Norma wouldn’t have wanted to live looking like that. Jesus God.” She shook a cigarette from her pack. When she had difficulty striking the match, Thatcher struck it for her and held it to the tip of the cigarette.
She gave him a nod of thanks.
The men allowed her time to compose herself and take a few puffs before Bill asked, “What time did you leave the house?”
“One-thirty. I was trying to beat it to the bank before it closed. But when I got there, nobody knew anything about a phone call. There wasn’t a problem with my account. I didn’t know what to make of the mix-up, but rather than waste a trip to town, I stopped in Logan’s for some groceries.” Her voice trembled. “I’ll never forgive myself for not going straight home.”
Thatcher noticed that her hand was shaking when she flicked an ash into the ashtray she was holding on her knee.
“I could hear Arthur screaming the minute I pulled up to the house. Norma wouldn’t let him whimper without picking him up, so I knew something was wrong. I ran into the house. Arthur was still in his bassinet, where he’d been when I’d left. He was wet and hungry, but otherwise okay.
“Norma…” She choked up and had to force the words out. “She was facedown on her bed. She wasn’t moving. There was blood. I would have thought she was dead, except that she was making sounds like…like…I don’t know…a wounded animal.”
She took another drag off her cigarette. “I’m not sure she knew it was me who was handling her. She flailed her arms, trying to fight me off. I liked to have never gotten her into the car.”
“No sign of who had been there?”
“Don’t you think I would have told you by now?”
“Was anything missing that you noticed?”
“I didn’t take the time to look, sheriff.”
“I ask only because if the house had been ransacked, it could have been a vagrant.”
“The house hadn’t been ransacked.”
“You sister’s bedroom?”
“It was a mess, but it always is. The vanity stool was overturned, the mirror had been shattered. Glass was everywhere.”
“When you left for your errand, had you locked the front door?”
“Yes.”
“Was it locked when you returned?”
She had to think for a second, then said, “No.”
“Was the lock damaged?”
“I think I would have noticed if it had been broken.”
“Then it’s possible that Miss Blanchard knew her attacker and let him into the house.”
She bent her head down and massaged her forehead.
Bill cleared his throat. “Where is Mr. Kemp?”
“His name is Dennis. He’s in Colorado.”
“What’s he do there?”
“Sets dynamite. He blasts through mountains for railroad and highway construction.” She raised her head and gave Bill a baleful look. “Is this important?”
“When did you last hear from him?”
“Barking up that tree will be a waste of your time. Every two months I go to see him. He hasn’t come home since Norma moved in with us.”
“They didn’t get along?”
“Couldn’t stand each other. She called him a bore. He called her silly and conceited.” In a mumble, she added, “Among other things.”
“If there’s so much animosity between them, why did she come to live with you?”
She hesitated, looking resentful of the question. Finally she said, “Because the man she had been living with in Austin kicked her out for cheating on him. She had no money, no job, nowhere else to go.”
Bill asked her to write down the name of the company her husband worked for. She did. The sheriff tucked it into his breast pocket.
“What about the father of her son?”
She smoked, saying nothing.
Bill prompted. “Had Norma been asking him for money? Demanding that he marry her? Something like that?”
Having smoked her cigarette down, she ground it out. “I wouldn’t know, Sheriff Amos, because I don’t know who Arthur’s father is.”
She caught the skeptical look Thatcher and Bill exchanged. “You don’t believe that? It’s true. Swear to God, I don’t know.” She turned to Thatcher. “You’re young and good-looking. Were you acquainted with my sister?”
“No, ma’am. But I saw her once.”
“Did your eyes pop out of your head?”
He gave a shy smile, and she snuffled.
“Norma had that effect on men.” Turning back to the sheriff, her momentary mirth disappeared. “She used her looks to her advantage. She had a lot of men. But to be dragging her name through the dirt while her body is still warm just doesn’t sit right with me.”
Before Bill could respond, Thatcher said, “It isn’t right. But neither is a brutal, fatal assault. What Sheriff Amos is trying to do is find out who did it. The more information you give him, the better chance he has of catching the man and seeing him punished.”
Patsy’s chest caved in a little. Her hostility cooled. As she thought over what Thatcher had said, she picked at the loose stitching on the handbag in her lap. “Norma had been carrying on an affair with Dr. Gabe Driscoll.”
She looked at Bill and Thatcher in turn. He wondered if she noted that neither was surprised to hear this.
Bill asked, “For how long?”
“Close to a year.”
“Where did they rendezvous?”
“He always came to the house. Or did. He hasn’t been there since the night his wife disappeared. Norma wasn’t happy about not seeing him.”
“Up until Mrs. Driscoll’s disappearance, how often did they meet?”
“Two or three times a week. He would come by while he was out making rural calls. But he isn’t Arthur’s father. Norma was already pregnant when she met him. She only passed the baby off as his to reel him in. She set her sights and went after him.”
Watching her closely, Bill tugged at the corner of his mustache. “Did they conspire to get rid of Mrs. Driscoll?”
“I don’t think Norma had anything to do with it.”
“Mrs. Kemp—”
“I’ll tell you why,” she said, cutting Bill off. “Norma didn’t consider Gabe’s missus competition. She had convinced herself that Gabe would ultimately choose her and Arthur over ‘that fat German cow,’ as she called her.
“She had big plans for Gabe to move her and Arthur into that large, pretty house. As his wife, she would become a society maven. I told her she was delusional. But I also saw how besotted Gabe was with her.” She shrugged. “Maybe he gave in to her impatience.”
“Gabe claims to have been at your house twice on the day his wife went missing. Once in the afternoon, once late that night.”
“He was, but not to help with Arthur’s breech birth, because Arthur was already a month old. Gabe came that afternoon. He held the baby for half an hour and spent another thirty minutes in the bedroom with Norma. They were lovey-dovey. She begged him to stay longer and was pouty when he left.
“When he came back that night, it was a different story. He was frantic. I mean berserk. Batshit crazy. I had to deal with him myself because Norma was out.”
“Out where?”
Thatcher could tell she was reluctant to answer, but finally she did. “There was someone else. Before Gabe, and the whole time she was with him.”
“The baby’s father?”
“That would be my guess, but I don’t know. It was a very secretive affair. She always went to him. She was with him that evening of Mrs. Driscoll’s disappearance. When she got back home, Gabe was there, but he was too distraught even to ask where she’d been.”
“What time did she get home?”
“Midnight or better. Honestly, I believe Gabe is rather thick. She smelled of sex. He’s a doctor, right?” She snorted with derision. “Arthur was a hefty newborn. Any fool could see he was too big to be six weeks early, as Norma claimed. But Gabe never raised a question about his size or seemed to doubt that he was the father. In my opinion he’s a loser.”
Bill said, “But you covered his lie about the breech birth.”
“I did, yes. Norma insisted that we back him up, for Arthur’s sake, she said.”
“Did Gabe kill his wife, Mrs. Kemp?”
“I swear to you I don’t know.”
“Did you ever question Norma about the convenient timing of Mrs. Driscoll’s disappearance?”
“No,” she replied in her wheezy smoker’s voice, “I didn’t want to know the answer.”
Bill sighed. “When two people share a secret like that, it tends to erode the relationship, whether it’s between siblings, husband and wife, illicit lovers. If it turns out that Gabe Driscoll assaulted your sister today—”
“Then all bets are off. I’ll dance naked at his hanging. But…” She shook another cigarette from the pack. Thatcher lit it for her.
Bill said, “You were about to say, Mrs. Kemp?”
“I’m not sure Gabe has it in him to do that. I told you she was pouty when he left that afternoon. It was because he wouldn’t make love to her. Our walls are thin. I could hear her trying to seduce him. He refused, saying it was too soon after the baby for them to have sex. So the way she was violated today just doesn’t seem like him. Murder maybe, but not that.”
“Not even if he’d found out the baby isn’t his?” Bill asked. “Maybe he realized that he’d been duped, suckered into killing his wife and his own unborn child for another man’s. That could have motivated him to fly into a blind rage.”
She said, “Then they ought to hang the bastard twice.”
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, the ambulance from Dallas arrived. Bill directed it to the back of the building, where Norma Blanchard’s body was loaded. Patsy was going to follow in her car. She told Bill that her husband had family in Dallas, and that she had arranged to stay with them until her sister’s body could be released for burial.
“Please remember that you’re a material witness in two crimes,” Bill said. “I’ll need to reach you.”
“I understand.” She gave him her relative’s telephone number and address.
As they watched her departure, Bill said to Thatcher, “She could also face charges of obstruction if Mila Driscoll suffered the fate I suspect. But I didn’t want to tell her that.”
They returned to the doctor’s office so Dr. Perkins could sign off on departmental paperwork. Thatcher remained in the waiting room. He noticed that Patsy had left her last cigarette smoking in the ashtray. He went over and stubbed it out, then he and Bill left the office together and started downstairs.
Bill slipped a small stoppered bottle into the pocket of his jacket, and when he saw that Thatcher noticed, he said, “For Daisy.”
“Is she all right?”
“For the past few days, she’s had a stomachache. Doc said this would settle it.”
Thinking of the picture gallery in the Amoses’ foyer, Thatcher said, “I wonder if Mrs. Kemp has a picture of Norma.”
“Lots. I saw them in the house when I went to interview them.”
“That’s good. When the boy gets older, he’ll want to know what his mother looked like.” Bill gave him an inquiring look, but he pretended not to see it and returned to the topic of the attack on Norma Blanchard. “I’ve been thinking about something.”
“Don’t hold back.”
“A man in a blind rage would have killed her outright. Whoever attacked that woman wanted to punish her to death. There’s a difference.”
