“Does your doctor regularly prescribe Seconal for you? Dr. Brolin, is it?”

  “Yes, James Brolin. I have difficulty sleeping, and the stuff you can buy over the counter wasn’t working for me. Dr. Brolin saw no danger in prescribing a barbiturate.”

  “How long have you been taking Seconal?” Kling asked.

  “Ever since…well, it’s been several years now.”

  “Ever since what, Mrs. Newman?”

  “Ever since Jerry began drinking so heavily. Living with an alcoholic isn’t an easy task, I’m afraid.”

  “Did you take the drug every night?”

  “No, not every night.”

  “Was the prescription a refillable one?”

  “No, that’s forbidden by law in this state. Too many refillable prescriptions were falling into the hands of addicts.”

  Kling felt mildly reprimanded. He plunged ahead regardless. “Then Dr. Brolin wrote a prescription for you each and every month, is that right?”

  “Sometimes less frequently. Depending on how low my supply was.”

  “And it was low just before you left for California.”

  “Yes. As I say, I had six or seven capsules left, something like that. I’m the sort of person who doesn’t like loose ends hanging. I try to tidy things up before going away anyplace. So I asked Dr. Brolin for a new prescription.”

  “Do you go away frequently?”

  “Only occasionally. When there’s a show I feel I must see. I never miss the one in Chicago, for example, and the one in Los Angeles this year promised to be particularly good.”

  “Mrs. Newman, the Medical Examiner’s report indicates that your husband was intoxicated at the time of his death. When you—”

  “I’m not surprised,” Anne said.

  “When you spoke to him last Tuesday, did he sound drunk?”

  “It was sometimes difficult to tell. He’d very often be drinking steadily and still manage to sound quite lucid.”

  “Did he sound lucid the night you spoke to him?”

  “He sounded…normal. Depressed, but normal. Then again, depression had become almost a normal state with him in recent months.”

  “Did he ever discuss suicide with you?”

  “Well…I’m reluctant to admit this because it might sound callous.”

  “In what way?”

  “You may wonder why I left him to go to California when I knew how he was feeling.”

  “How was he feeling, Mrs. Newman?”

  “He told me…he said he’d had enough.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of living. Of life.”

  “When was this?”

  “The day before I left.”

  “That would’ve been a Thursday…”

  “Yes, Thursday night.”

  “July thirty-first.”

  “Yes.”

  “He told you he’d had enough of living?”

  “He was drunk, of course, I…he’d told me the same thing many times before.”

  “That he was thinking of taking his own life?”

  “Not in those exact words.”

  “What were his exact words?”

  “He said his father had the right idea.”

  “Meaning…”

  “He was referring to his father’s suicide. His father killed himself two years ago.”

  Mrs. Newman came back into the room. She had cut a lime in the kitchen, and a slice now floated in the tall glass containing Anne’s gin and tonic. She overheard the last of her daughter-in-law’s words, and said, “I’ve already told the gentlemen about that, darling. Here you are.”

  Anne accepted the drink, said, “Thank you,” and then said to the detectives, “Are you sure?”

  “We’re on duty, ma’am,” Kling said.

  “Ah, yes, of course. Cheers,” she said, and took a sip of the drink. “Oh, that’s good,” she said. “I find this heat insufferable, don’t you?”

  “Regarding the heat,” Carella said, “I’d like to ask you some questions about the air conditioning in your apartment.”

  “The air conditioning?” Anne said, looking surprised.

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m sure you noticed how hot the apartment was…”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Well, the windows were all closed, and the air conditioner was turned off, and I was wondering—”

  “We always had trouble with the air conditioning,” Anne said, and sipped at her drink again.

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “We were constantly calling the super to have it repaired.”

  “Well, it was functioning properly, ma’am. I know because I personally turned it on after the techs were through with it. The point is, it was turned to the off position, and I’m wondering whether it was in that position when you left the apartment on Friday morning.”

  “I really don’t know,” Anne said. “I mean, the apartment seemed cool enough, I simply didn’t check to see whether the air conditioner was on or not.”

  “But the apartment did seem cool.”

  “Yes, definitely.”

  “When you spoke to your husband on Tuesday night, did he mention anything about the heat?”

  “He said the temperature had hit ninety-eight that day.”

  “But he didn’t say the apartment was unusually hot, did he? He didn’t say the air conditioner had been malfunctioning, anything like that?”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “Or that anyone had been there to look at it.”

  “No.”

  “I’m trying to account for that switch being in the off position, you see. If someone had worked on the unit, then perhaps it was left off by accident.”

  “No, Jerry didn’t mention anyone coming in to look at it.”

  “Uh-huh,” Carella said. “Bert?”

  “Just a few more questions,” Kling said, “and then we’ll let you go. I’m sorry we’re taking so much of your time.”

  “Not at all,” Anne said.

  “Can you tell me what you remember of your conversation the night before you left for California?”

  “Not in exact detail, I didn’t think it was that important at the time.”

  “As much as you can remember.”

  “Well, Jerry had been drinking, and he told me again—this was a usual complaint—about what a poor artist he was in comparison to his father. Jerry was an illustrator, you have to realize, and his father was quite a well-known artist, and Jerry felt he could never live up to his father’s high achievement. He idolized him…Well, isn’t that true, Mother?”

  “Yes, it is,” Mrs. Newman said.

  “And…well…I sometimes felt he wanted to be like him in every way possible. I suppose I should have taken his constant threats of suicide more seriously, given the past circumstances. But I didn’t. When he began talking again about how it was all so meaningless, so pointless, I…I hate to admit this, but I cut him short. I had a long trip ahead of me, and this was close to midnight, and I had to get some sleep. I told him we’d talk about it when I got back. I didn’t know I’d be seeing him for the last time at breakfast the next morning.”

  “How did he seem then? At breakfast, I mean.”

  “Hung over.”

  “Mrs. Newman, did your husband know you were taking Seconal?”

  “Yes, he did.”

  “Did he know where you kept the drug?”

  “We kept all our drugs in the bathroom medicine cabinet.”

  “And that was where you kept the Seconal?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is that where you put the new prescription you’d had filled?”

  “Yes.”

  “The bottle containing thirty capsules?”

  “Yes.”

  “When did you do that?”

  “The day I had the prescription filled.”

  “That would’ve been the twenty-ninth of July.”

  “Yes.”

  “And your husband knew this? He knew you’d put that bottle of Seconal in the medicine cabinet?”

  “I assume he did.”

  “Thank you. Steve? Anything?”

  “No, that’s it,” Carella said. “Ladies…thank you for letting us talk to you. We’re sorry for the intrusion, you’ve been very gracious with your time.”

  “Not at all,” Mrs. Newman said.

  “Please keep us informed,” Anne said.

  In the corridor outside, as they waited for the elevator, Kling asked, “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know,” Carella said. “I want to check with the Beverly Wilshire out there, see how long she talked to him last Tuesday night. Might help us in establishing the time of death.”

  “What’ll that get us?” Kling asked.

  “Who the hell knows?” Carella said. “But the heat in that goddamn apartment still bothers me. Doesn’t it bother you?”

  “Yes.”

  It was almost 5:30. They said good-bye on the sidewalk outside, Carella walking to where he’d parked his car, Kling walking toward the kiosk on the corner and the subway ride home to his wife, Augusta.

  The note, tacked with a magnet to the refrigerator door, read:

  She did not get home until almost eleven.

  He was watching the news on television when she came into the apartment. She was wearing a pale green, silk chiffon jumpsuit, the flimsy top slashed low over her naked breasts, the color complementing the flaming autumn of her hair, swept to one side of her face to expose one ear dotted with an emerald earring that accentuated the jungle green of her eyes, a darker echo of her costume. As always, he caught his breath at the sheer beauty of her. He had been tongue-tied the first time he’d seen her in her burglarized apartment on Richardson Drive. She had just come back from a skiing trip to find the place ransacked; he had never been skiing in his life, he’d always thought of it as a sport for the very rich. He supposed they were very rich now. The only problem was that he never felt any of it was really his.

  “Hi, sweetie,” she said from the front door, and took her key from the lock, and then came to where he was sitting in front of the television set, a can of warm beer in his hand. She kissed him fleetingly on top of his head, and then said, “I have to pee, don’t go away.”

  On the television screen, the newscaster was detailing the latest trouble in the Middle East. There was always trouble in the Middle East. Sometimes Kling thought the Middle East had been invented by the government, the way the war in Orwell’s novel had been invented by Big Brother. Without the Middle East to occupy their thoughts the people would have to worry about unemployment and inflation and crime in the streets and racial conflict and corruption in high places and tsetse flies. He sipped at his beer. He had eaten a TV dinner consisting of veal parmigiana with apple slices, peas in seasoned sauce, and a lemon muffin. He had also consumed three cans of beer; this was his fourth. The thawed meal had been lousy. He was a big man, and he was hungry again. He heard her flushing the toilet, and then heard the closet door in their bedroom sliding open. He waited.

  When she came back into the living room, she was wearing a wraparound black nylon robe belted at the waist. Her hair fell loose around her face. She was barefoot. The television newscaster droned on.

  “Are you watching that?” she asked.

  “Sort of,” he said.

  “Why don’t you turn it off?” she said and, without waiting for his reply, went to the set and snapped the switch. The room went silent. “Another scorcher today, huh?” she said. “How’d it go for you?”

  “So-so.”

  “What time did you get home?”

  “Little after six.”

  “Did you forget the party at Bianca’s?”

  “We’re working a complicated one.”

  “When aren’t you working a complicated one?” Augusta asked, and smiled.

  He watched as she sat on the carpet in front of the blank television screen, her legs extended, the flaps of the nylon robe thrown back, and began doing her sit-ups, part of her nightly exercise routine. Her hands clasped behind her head, she raised her trunk and lowered it, raised it and lowered it.

  “We had to go see this lady,” Kling said.

  “I told you this morning about the party.”

  “I know, but Steve wanted to hit her this afternoon.”

  “First twenty-four hours are the most important,” Augusta said by rote.

  “Well, that’s true, in fact. How was the party?”

  “Fine,” Augusta said.

  “She still living with that photographer, what’s his name?”

  “Andy Hastings. He’s only the most important fashion photographer in America.”

  “I have trouble keeping them straight,” Kling said.

  “Andy’s the one with the black hair and blue eyes.”

  “Who’s the bald one?”

  “Lamont.”

  “Yeah. With the earring in his left ear. Was he there?”

  “Everybody was there. Except my husband.”

  “Well, I do have to earn a living.”

  “You didn’t have to earn a living after four P.M. today.”

  “Man dies of an overdose of Seconal, you can’t just let the case lay there for a week.”

  “First twenty-four hours are the most important, right,” Augusta said again, and rolled her eyes.

  “They are.”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  “You mind if I turn this on again?” he asked. “I want to see what the weather’ll be tomorrow.”

  She did not answer. She rolled onto her side, and began lifting and lowering one leg, steadily, methodically. He put the beer can down, rose from where he was sitting in the leather easy chair, and snapped on the television set. As he turned to go back to his chair, the auburn hair covering her crotch winked for just an instant, and then her legs closed, and opened again, the flaming wink again, and closed again. He sat heavily in the leather chair and picked up the beer can. The female television forecaster was a brunette with the cutes. Smiling idiotically, bantering with the anchorman, she finally relayed the information that there was no relief in sight; the temperature tomorrow would hit a high of somewhere between ninety-eight and ninety-nine (“That’s normal body temperature, isn’t it?” the anchorman asked. “Ninety-eight point six?”) with the humidity hovering at 64 percent, and the pollution index unsatisfactory.

  “So what else is new?” Augusta said to the television screen, her leg moving up and down, up and down.

  “Marty Trovaro is next with the sports,” the anchorman said. “Stay tuned.”

  “Now we get what all the baseball teams did today,” Augusta said. “Can’t you turn that off, Bert?”

  “I like baseball,” he said. “Where’d you go after the party?”

  “To a Chinese joint on Boone.”

  “Any good?”

  “So-so.”

  “How many of you went?”

  “About a dozen. Eleven, actually. Your chair was empty.”

  “On Boone, did you say?”

  “Yes.”

  “In Chinatown?”

  “Yes.”

  “All the way down there, huh?”

  “Bianca lives in the Quarter, you know that.”

  “Oh, yeah, right.”

  The television sportscasters in America all had the same barber. Kling had thought the distinctive haircut was indigenous only to this part of the country, but he’d once gone down to Miami to pick up a guy on an extradition warrant, and the television sportscaster there had his hair cut the same way, as if someone had put a bowl over his head and trimmed all around it. He sometimes wondered if every sportscaster in America was bald and wearing a rug. Meyer Meyer had begun talking lately about buying a hairpiece. He tried to visualize Meyer with hair. He felt that hair would cost Meyer his credibility. Augusta was doing push-ups now. She did twenty-five of them every night. As the sportscaster read off the baseball scores, he watched her pushing against the carpet, watched the firm outline of her ass under the nylon robe, and unconsciously counted along with her. She stopped when he had counted only twenty-three; he must have missed a few. He got up and turned off the television set.

  “Ah, blessed silence,” Augusta said.

  “What time did the party break up?” he asked.

  Augusta got to her feet. “Would you like some coffee?” she asked.

  “Keep me awake,” he said.

  “What time are you going in tomorrow?”

  “It’s my day off.”

  “Hallelujah,” she said. “You sure you don’t want any?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “I think I’ll have some,” she said, and started for the kitchen.

  “What time did you say?” he asked.

  “What time what?” she said over her shoulder.

  “The party.”

  She turned to him. “At Bianca’s, do you mean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We left about seven-thirty.”

  “And went across to Chinatown, huh?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “By cab, or what?”

  “Some of us went by cab, yes. I got a lift over.”

  “Who with?”

  “The Santessons,” she said, “you don’t know them,” and turned and walked out into the kitchen.

  He heard her puttering around out there, taking the tin of coffee from the cabinet over the counter, and then opening one of the drawers, and moving the percolator from the stove to set it down noisily on the counter. He knew he would have to discuss it with her, knew he had to stop playing detective here, asking dumb questions about where she’d been and what time she got there and who she’d been with, had to ask her flat out, discuss the damn thing with her, the way he’d promised Carella he would. He told himself he’d do that the moment she came back into the room, ask her whether she was seeing somebody else, some other man. And maybe lose her, he thought. She went back into the bathroom again. He heard her opening and closing the door on the medicine cabinet. She was in there a long time. When finally she came out, she went into the kitchen and he heard her pouring the coffee. She came back into the living room then, holding a mug in her hand, and sat cross-legged on the carpet, and began sipping at the coffee.

  He told himself he would ask her now.

 

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