The visitor found himself beginning to be convinced of this. But he said nothing, only turned to watch the gothic doorway leading to the hall, where two seconds later there appeared the figure of a man.
The newcomer was about thirty, sparely muscular, tough-faced, fair-haired, dressed with classless American informality in boots, jeans, and a plaid jacket over a plaid shirt of different pattern. He favored the old man with a quick but judgemental glance that to the latter once more suggested the police. But when he spoke it was to their host: “Andy? Judy said you were back here. I just wanted to tell you—God, what can anybody say?”
Andy—the European visitor could not really manage to think of him by that name—pressed his lips together and shook his head and looked away. So it was left to the old man to break a slightly awkward pause, which he did by putting out a cordial hand. “I am Dr. Emile Corday, an old friend of Clarissa’s grandmother.”
“I heard about you from Clarissa. Pleased to meet you.” The young man’s grip was firm, though probably moderated in consideration of Dr. Corday’s age. “I’m Joe Keogh, Kate and I were . . .” Glancing toward Kate’s father, he let his words trail off.
“I understand. Well, Andrew?” Trying to fit the American style, he could just about manage Andrew. “Shall we all rejoin the ladies?”
Southerland agreed spiritlessly and came with them, walking now as if he were the aged one of the group. “If you don’t mind, gentlemen, I think I’m going to lie down for a while . . . Lenore?” They had just re-entered the newer portion of the house, where his wife met them. “Will you call me at once if anything important comes up?”
“Of course. Lie down if you like.” His wife, hardly looking at any of them, seemed as distracted as before. “Dr. Corday? Joe? You’re both going to stay to dinner, aren’t you?”
Corday bowed neatly. “Much as it would please me, Lenore, I cannot. Tomorrow I should like to drop in again, and talk over old times with Clarissa. And of course to do what I can to lighten the burdens on you all. Meanwhile, messages can reach me at the Shores Motel.”
Joe in turn made vague excuses for not staying, and then put forward the offer, quickly accepted, to drop off Dr. Corday at the Shores. Lenore did not press either of them to remain. Judy, rejoining them at the last moment, did, but desisted when she saw that both really preferred to leave.
Outside, walking backwards into a gust of wind that howled across the floodlit gravel drive, Joe Keogh had a considerate eye out for the old man’s footing. “Watch out, kind of icy here with these frozen puddles.”
The old man wondered for a moment if his arm was going to be taken. But that indignity did not occur, and he followed Joe among the parked cars of family members and the police—some of whom were still in the house, listening for ransom demands at one of the telephones. Joe’s vehicle, a small, gray German import, was the most modest of the lot.
They had driven perhaps half a mile south on Sheridan road, here fronted mostly by the driveways, walls, and gates of other set-back mansions before the old man spoke again: “You grieve for her deeply.” Probing, he put a kind of challenge into the words.
The driver glanced over at him. “I do.” He paused. “Do they get this kind of weather much in your part of Europe?”
“You have noticed my accent, which I fear still betrays my central European origins. And my French name, of course. But I really do now make my home in London, where these days cold this intense and snow this heavy are rare. Now I see that you do grieve, indeed. Even though you were never formally betrothed, I take it?”
Joe let a little time and traffic go by. “There were difficulties about that. Maybe you noticed, Kate’s parents aren’t exactly crazy about me. I felt like I was engaged to her, though she hadn’t actually said she’d marry me. You know?”
“You had, perhaps, a rival?”
“That wasn’t it.” Pause. “She . . . just hated to give up her freedom.” A longer pause. “Some of her wealthy acquaintances must have wanted to marry her too.”
“Which ones?”
“I wouldn’t know.” Again snow was falling, a flurry of stray white blurrings in the slow-moving headlights.
“You are not wealthy, then.”
“No, I’m just a Chicago cop.” Joe felt his lips quirk in a smile half a second in duration. “Some people in my line have gotten wealthy, but I doubt I ever will.”
“I suppose you have not been assigned any official part in Kate’s case? Or her brother’s?”
“The specialists will do a better job. I’m in the Pawnshop Detaiclass="underline" recovering stolen merchandise, things like that. Right now they’ve given me a few days off.”
The road curved, and its new angle had been blown clean by some trick of the wind. Now the houses flanking it on both sides were less monumental, the driveways shorter.
“See,” said Joe, “I don’t have much family.” He cleared his throat and tried again. “I belong to this kind of Catholic social club for single people. Kate got into it too. Sometimes the people in the club go to hospitals, children’s homes, and so on, do a little volunteer work. I met her on one of those deals . . . here we are, Shores Motel.”
But when the car had stopped, in a splendor of light from the signs and windows of the ornate office, the old man made no immediate move to get out. He just sat there, looking at Joe so regally that Joe wondered for a moment if the chauffeur was expected to get out and walk around and open the door for the distinguished passenger.
But it turned out that his passenger had only been mulling over another question. “Do you know where poor Kate’s body is at present?”
“The Chicago morgue. Why?” Joe was suddenly a little angry at this pointless nosiness. He shifted in his seat to face the other more fully. The lights from the motel showed Corday’s chin smooth-shaven, lean and firm despite the lines of age. The mouth was tough in a thin-lipped way, beneath a mildly beaky nose. The eyes above were still in shadow, though lights made motionless spots of bright reflection in them. Joe thought suddenly: I would not want this old man for my enemy.
The thin-lipped mouth said: “Determination of the cause of death has long been something of a specialty of mine. Would you be kind enough to drive me to the Chicago morgue tonight? Or at least give me the address?”
“Tonight?”
The old man nodded, minimally.
“Doctor, I don’t know what kind of hours they keep in Europe, but they’re not going to let any strangers into that place tonight.”
Corday’s mouth smiled solidly. “But I should like to see the building, at least, that I may know where it is. And I am eager to discover something of the great city near us, and eager also to continue our so-interesting conversation. Would it be a great inconvenience, for you to drive me there?”
“They’re not going to let you in,” Joe explained, with what he felt was beautiful patience.
“Or would you prefer to go to your home, and brood alone upon life’s sadnesses?”
The morgue was a little south of the Loop, only a couple of blocks from central police headquarters on State. After driving past both buildings, Joe found a vacant parking space about halfway between them, on a street of tall office buildings all locked up and darkened for the night. He needed a parking space because it seemed that he was going to have to do a little more patient explaining still.
“Look, Dr. Corday, you’re a real good listener, for which I’m grateful. It’s been a help talking to you. But as far as trying to get into that place tonight, it’s silly. They won’t let us in just because I’m a cop or you’re a doctor.”