Long Time No See by Ed McBain Page B

that?”
    “Well, I…I think so.”
    “Good. If it turns out I’m a fake cop, you can sue the city. In the meantime, Mr. Otis—”
    “How can I sue the city?”
    “Mr. Otis, you’re irritating me,” Carella said.
    “I’m sorry, sir, but how can I sue the city? Let’s say you’re somebody’s husband calling to find out—”
    “Let’s say I’m a real cop who’s getting very irritated. Have you got your register there in front of you?”
    “Yes, sir, but I think you can understand why I’m not at liberty to reveal the names of any of our guests.”
    “Mr. Otis, I can go downtown for a court order to look at your register, but that’s going to make me even more irritated than I am right now. If I’m forced to do that, and I come over to the Golden Inn and find so much as a cockroach in one of the rooms, I’ll call the Department of Health and have the place closed down. So you’d better make sure your establishment is spotless, you’d better make sure it’s absolutely pristine if you’re asking me to go all the way downtown for a court order on a Saturday morning.”
    “Is that a threat of some kind, Mr. Carella?”
    “That is whatever you choose to consider it, Mr. Otis. What do you say?”
    “There are no cockroaches in the rooms here.”
    “Fine. In that case, I’ll see you later with the court order.”
    “But if you’re really a cop—”
    “I’m really a cop, Mr. Otis.”
    “And if this is really a homicide—”
    “It’s really a homicide. Mr. Otis, why are you a desk clerk? Why aren’t you a noted Philadelphia lawyer?”
    “I’m not a desk clerk. I own the Golden Inn.”
    “Ah,” Carella said. “I see.”
    “So of course I’m eager to protect my guests.”
    “Of course. Mr. Otis, did you register a Mr. and Mrs. Pratt Thursday afternoon? Or a Mr. and Mrs. Pitt? Felix would have been the first name.”
    “Just a moment.”
    Carella waited.
    “Yes, I have a Mr. and Mrs. Felix Pitt.”
    “Were you at the desk when they registered?”
    “I don’t recall. Oh, wait a minute. Was she the blind girl?”
    “Yes,” Carella said.
    “Yes, I registered them. Beautiful woman, married to a much older man. I didn’t realize she was blind at first. She was wearing very large sunglasses, I had no idea she was blind. Until he led her to the elevator, of course, and then I realized.”
    “What time did they check in?”
    “The register entry doesn’t indicate that.”
    “Would you remember?”
    “Sometime in the late afternoon.”
    “And when did they check out?”
    “At about eight o’clock, I guess it was. I’d stepped out for a bite to eat, and when I came back, they were leaving. He paid me in cash. I remember.”
    “Thank you, Mr. Otis,” Carella said.
    “I hope you understand why—”
    “Yes, I understand. Thank you,” Carella said, and hung up.
    He sat with his hand on the receiver for quite some time. He had just confirmed that Isabel Harris and Frank Preston had indeed spent at least an afternoon and evening together in a motel on Thursday. Locked as they’d been in blind passionate embrace, so to speak, neither of the pair could have scooted uptown to Hannon Square to slit the throat of Jimmy Harris between 6:30 and 7:30 P.M. At 8:00, in fact, they had been seen leaving the establishment by none other than Gary Otis the Golden Innkeeper. Isabel Harris had probably got to her apartment just a few minutes before Carella knocked on her door. By that time her husband had been dead for at least two hours, and possibly longer.
    He thought back to the question he’d asked her on the night of the murder, thought back to the specific question: “Are you involved with another man?” The terse answer: “No.” Liars didn’t surprise him. In the murder business, there were lots of liars. Tears didn’t surprise him, either. You sometimes got tears for somebody who’d been hated for years. They came unbidden, the response as primitive as the howl of the first man who