“Just one more thing,” Ewing responded. “Can you account for your whereabouts through the day yesterday?”
Whitman took several deep puffs from his pipe, rekindling tobacco that had almost gone out. He seemed to be collecting his memory. The officers noted that, unlike Galloway, Whitman showed no reluctance to account for his time.
“We got up about seven, jogged our five miles, had some breakfast, read the papers, got ready, and went to the stadium about noon.”
“Excuse me,” Ewing interrupted, “but who is ‘we’?”
“My wife and I.”
“The two of you were together throughout the whole morning?”
“Why, yes.” Whitman seemed surprised at the question.
“I see. Okay, continue, please.”
“Well, we watched the game from our box. After the game, we went out to dinner with some of our friends. Then we went home, watched a little TV, the eleven o’clock news, and then retired.”
“Then you were with your wife or others all day?” Ewing asked.
“Far as I can remember.”
“Just a moment, Mr. Whitman,” said Harris. “If I recall correctly, you said you arrived at the stadium at noon. But the game didn’t start till two. What about those two hours?”
Whitman looked disconcerted-at having forgotten the two hours, or because they had spotted the gap?
“I was up in my office catching up on some business.”
“Anyone with you?”
“Why, no. I was alone.”
“Alone? Where was your wife during all that time?”
“I can see you haven’t been to many Cougar games, Lieutenant. Or, at least, you haven’t come early to the games. There’s a regular ritual many fans enjoy before a game. It’s called tailgating. It can become a genuine banquet. That’s where my wife was, Lieutenant, with some friends of ours at a tailgating party.”
“So there are two hours for which you have no corroboration.”
“I suppose so. Why should I need any?”
“During that time, you could have left the stadium.” Harris pressed the point.
“I could have. I didn’t. Why would I?”
“Between the time Hunsinger left for the stadium and the time he returned, somebody went to his apartment and set the trap that would kill him.”
For the first time in this interview, Whitman placed his pipe in the ample ashtray and sat forward. “Are you accusing me of killing Hunsinger? Are you serious?”
“No one is accusing anyone of anything-yet,” said Ewing. “But the investigation will proceed. We may have more questions for you later, Mr. Whitman. In the meantime, it would not hurt if you could think of anyone who could establish that you did not, indeed, leave this office between noon and two yesterday.”
“And for your part, gentlemen,” Whitman was standing, “it might help your flimsy suspicion if you could come up with a single solitary reason why I would even think of cutting off an attraction like Hank Hunsinger.”
In better restaurants it was called ground round or chopped steak. To Father Koesler, it was hamburger. And he had built a considerable reputation as the gourmand of the local hamburger circuit. As an expert-acknowledged or self-appointed-he disdained as hopelessly inferior the beef served in all fast-food chains, with the possible exception of Wendy’s.
Nonetheless, he was eating in a fast-food restaurant and it was not Wendy’s. It had been selected by Lieutenant Harris. Sergeant Ewing had concurred. Father Koesler’s opinion had not been solicited.
They were at the coffee stage of the meal. The one bright spot in this lunch as far as Koesler was concerned was that they served brewed decaf.
Luncheon conversation had been studied. The officers could not talk shop without leaving the priest awkwardly out of it. Koesler sensed that policemen might not be interested in parish matters or theology. So they advanced through lunch pushing one word after another.
“You come here often?” Koesler essayed.
“First time for me.”
“Me too.”
“I thought. . since you found it. . and it was so close to the stadium. .”
Harris smiled. “We don’t come to the stadium that often either.”
“Too expensive,” Ewing said. “And, besides, you have to invest too much time getting out of that parking lot. How about you, Father?”
“Only once in a long while. Actually, once since I joined the Bible discussion group. I thought I ought to patronize the business of the other members of the God Squad. But since attending in person, I realized that TV just doesn’t cover the game.”
Ewing sat back and for the first time appraised Koesler carefully. Redistribute the weight a little and take off maybe thirty years and he would at least look like a pro football player.
“How about you, Father? Did you ever play the game?”
“Me? Yeah. But I went through high school and college in the seminary and we played touch. Which sounds a lot more innocent than it was.” He grinned. “No conditioning, no pads, the blocking identical to tackle football-and there were some pretty big guys playing.
“Teams like the Cougars have thirty seconds to huddle and get the next play under way. Our plays originated in maybe a three-minute huddle. And we didn’t call the plays in shorthand. It was more, ‘You block so-and-so. You block so-and-so. You go out for a deep pass. You go out for a short pass. You go out in the flat and buttonhook-that means turn around-and you get out and cut behind the wheelbarrow.’
“So there’s a limit to how much I am able to identify with the Cougars.
“Before I got involved in this discussion group, the closest contact I had with a pro football player was a gentleman I’ll never forget. The name wouldn’t mean anything to you. But he played in the years just after the professional league was formed in 1922. I met him in his last days. He had terminal lung cancer. We became quite good friends. When he died, I had his funeral Mass and because I’d come to know him so well, I gave a eulogy that, I guess, was kind of affecting.
“Anyway, after the Mass, I went back to the rectory to get ready to go to the cemetery. The doorbell rang. It was a huge, elderly gentleman, who, it turned out, had been a teammate of the deceased. I don’t know whether he was embarrassed or just didn’t have the words to express himself, but he stammered something like, ‘I just wanted to tell you. . I mean. . I just wanted you to know. . uh. . that. . I thought. . well. . you played a good game!’”
The two officers smiled.
“I got to thinking about my friend this morning while I was listening to Mr. Galloway and Mr. Whitman explain what the loss of Hank Hunsinger would mean to the Cougars. How attendance would drop as it always did when he had to be out of a game.
“I remembered that my friend had told me of a similar experience. He had been a good player, but not nearly as famous as players like Red Grange and Bronco Nagurski. In fact, attendance in those early years was very poor until Grange became a professional. Anyway, my friend told me that when word got out that one of the superstars would not be able to play, attendance always suffered. But when, inevitably, a superstar retired, it had no effect at all on attendance.
“It was as if the fans felt cheated when a superstar-a pheenom I believe they call them now-would not perform. The star played last Sunday and he’ll probably play next Sunday. But this Sunday, when I pay my hard-earned money, he’s not going to play. So I’m not going to pay until he plays again.
“Whereas, when the player retired, the fans didn’t feel cheated when he no longer played. In fact, if it went anywhere, attendance used to go up because the fans wanted to see who would be taking the star’s place.
“So I thought it rather odd that both the owner and the general manager would assume that the Hun’s permanent loss to the team would necessarily hurt the gate. Seems to me attendance is just as likely to improve.”
There was a moment of silence. Toward the conclusion of Koesler’s monologue, Harris has paused with his coffee cup halfway raised. It was still in that position. “Out of the mouths of babes,” Harris murmured.