"It's a weirdo."
"Weirdo my ass. Wait until you see who wants to meet you."
"Oh?"
"We have a new assistant district attorney who wants to speak to you. With her is somebody from the governor's office in Albany. He has a pretty heavy letter on embossed stationery that requests we give him full cooperation."
"And that he gets."
"Certainly," Pat acknowledged. "Let's go meet your enemy."
New York City has numerous assistant district attorneys, but they aren't numbered in order of rank or seniority so they can all sound like the top dog on the block. Candace Amory was far from being a dog.
She was a tall patrician-looking blonde with a cover-girl face and a body that didn't just happen. Every bit of her was carefully cultivated and when she moved you knew she danced and could ski and in the water could take two-hundred-foot dives in scuba gear. The high-breasted look she had was for real, enhanced by a suit so dramatically underplayed in spectacular design that it reeked of money that could buy whatever it wanted.
You would never call Candace Amory "Candy." You would want to kiss the lusciousness of those full lips until the thought occurred that it might be like putting your tongue on a cold sled runner and never being able to get it off.
One day I would like to catch her off base and tag her with a ball where she would never forget.
In that one second our eyes touched she knew everything I was thinking and knew I realized it as well. I nodded and said, "Miss Amory," and held out my hand. It wasn't lack of etiquette, just a challenge she met without any change of expression at all. I knew she would have a good grip and let her feel mine too.
"Mr. Hammer," she said. Her voice even matched the rest of her. Throaty, but not altogether soft. There was a firmness there. A tiny Phi Beta Kappa pin was suspended on a fine golden chain around her neck, nestling between her breasts.
There was a dominance about her that she was exuding like an invisible veil and I smiled, just barely smiled with my eyes licking hers, and for an instant there was the minutest change of expression, the cat suddenly realizing the mouse was a cobra, and the veil was sucked back in.
The man from Albany was Jerome Coleman and he didn't specify what his position was. But he was official, he looked legal and he could have been a cop. We said a brief hello and took Pat's offer to sit down around the small conference table. The chair I was offered made me the target for all remarks, so I ignored it and sat in the one next to it. If somebody wanted to fence me in they had better book me first. I saw Pat suppress a smile and Coleman seem annoyed. Miss Amory knew I did it deliberately and just as deliberately took the seat opposite me.
"Who starts?" I said.
Jerome Coleman felt inside his jacket and took out a folded sheet of paper and spread it out in front of him. It was upside down, but I saw it was a copy of the note left on my desk by the killer. "We don't like enigmas, Mr. Hammer."
I kept my mouth shut and waited.
Miss Amory said, "You seem to be implicated in a murder. The alibi you gave Captain Chambers checked out, so you weren't involved with participation in the killing, but nevertheless, you seem to be a principal in the act."
"I'm glad you said seem."
She ignored my remark. "Apparently the victim was mistaken for you and horribly brutalized. If that was an act of vengeance, the killer certainly must have had a reason."
"Miss Amory," I said, "I'm glad you didn't read me my rights."
"You're not being arrested, Mr. Hammer."
"This is a direct interrogation, you know."
"Quite so. And you are a licensed private investigator under the laws of New York State, with a permit to carry a weapon and expected to be in full compliance with the laws and statutes of this state and to cooperate fully in assisting in their enforcement."
There was nothing I had to crawl out from under, so I smiled that little smile again. "What can I tell you?"
"The note has reference to you killing somebody," she said.
"The note has reference to me killing the killer," I reminded her.
"And that is the enigma," Coleman put in. His finger underlined the capitalized YOU DIE FOR KILLING ME.
So far Pat had said nothing. He was letting me carry the ball. "Mr. Coleman . . . I've never been indicted for murder. Nor for a felony. What you seem to have here is some psycho who decided to crash my place to pull a wild stunt off."
"We understand you never go to the office on Saturdays."
"Rarely," I said.
"You had an appointment with a person you never met."
"Most of my business is like that."
"Your secretary didn't give you any indication of what the meeting was about," he stated.
"In my business, clients aren't interested in stating their affairs to secretaries. I'm the prime mover."
He stared at me a long moment, then: "The entire charade, it seems, was to set you up to be killed. That it was circumvented is not what we're after. It is why it happened at all. The killer apparently blames you for killing someone."
"And if he went to such lengths to avenge it, then it must have happened?" I waited. Nobody said anything. I added, "Your enigma is a beaut. He left the office alive with an accusation of having already been killed."
"Who is Penta?" Candace Amory asked.
But I was ready for that one too. "Why ask it of a dead man?"
"Because that note was written to be read by a man who wasn't dead yet. He was making sure the victim knew why he was dying and who was doing the killing. If he thought it was you he was murdering then he knew you would recognize the name before you died."
"Clever thinking, ma'am, very clever. It could be possible, but unfortunately it isn't. Now I want to tell you something right now. If I had any information at all on this matter I would have given it to Pat on the scene last night. We have a fluke going here and I don't know where or how, but damn it, I'm involved now. I'm sure as hell involved. When he put Velda down I was in and I'm going to stay in until that fucking psycho gets nailed to the wall. Sorry about the language, lady, but that's what it's all about."
With a beautifully modulated tone of voice she said, "You'll do nothing of the fucking kind, Mr. Hammer. You stay completely away from this matter or your license will be revoked immediately. Pardon the language, please."
"The ball's in your court," I said sarcastically.
"Yes, I know. And if I were you, I'd reflect a little on the origin of this name Penta. As a matter of fact, I think I'd reflect for no longer than one more day before you have a letter from the Bureau of Licenses." She stood up and looked down at me. "Clear?"
I stood up slowly and she wasn't looking down at me any more. She was tall, but not that tall. "Very clear," I said.
When they walked out of the room Pat let out a short laugh. "She really dumped one on you." He laughed again. "She really doesn't know you very well, does she?"
"Hell, can't she read the papers?" I kicked the chair out and sat down again. "What did your guys find in my office?"
"Nothing."
"Just like that? Nothing?"
"You and Velda laid down most of the prints, some came from the cleaning lady and a couple others seemed to have come from the dead guy. Our killer left smudges, so he was wearing gloves, and not the surgical kind that can transfer prints to surfaces on occasion. The adhesive tape was the kind you buy in any drugstore. He used two full spools of two-inch-wide stuff and took the spools with him."
"They vacuumed, didn't they?"
"And that's tedious lab work. A couple days and we'll see what they picked up."
"Didn't anything turn up on the Penta ID?"
Pat gave me an annoyed scowl and shook his head. "That went out on the wires first thing. Washington, Interpol . . . they've all been notified. Trouble is, it's the weekend. Everybody takes off the weekend and some overworked clerk has got everything backed up." He sat back, stretched and said, "What are you planning to tell the Ice Lady?"