The Unraveling of Violeta Bell by C.R. Corwin Page B

said, in an exaggerated British accent. “The bobbies in their ‘aste confiscated all me bloody footwear, they did.”

    “And was there actually blood on one of your shoes?” I asked.

    “I’m sure you can find all kinds of stuff on anybody’s shoes,” Eddie said. “Life being the untidy juggernaut it is.”

    “So, there was blood?”

    “So sayeth the men in blue,” said Eddie. “But I sternly cautioned them not to jump to conclusions. That if indeed it proved to be blood, then there was a high probability that said blood did not dribble from the veins or arteries of a bipedal primate.”

    I was pretty sure I was following him. “Not human?”

    “Eddie’s got a cat,” Jeannie explained.

    He corrected her. “It ain’t my cat. Sort of a neighborhood cat. I put out a can of tuna every once in a while. And the grateful beast rewards me with a variety of headless beasts. Rats. Mice. Moles. Rabbits. Right here at my door.”

    I studied the stain again. “That’s animal blood, then?”

    “I’d be surprised otherwise,” Eddie said.

    “Why don’t we go inside and talk,” Jeannie said.

    The living room in Eddie’s apartment was exactly what you’d expect. Hot. Stuffy. Darkened by cheap, half-pulled shades. There was a plaid sofa decorated with an Indian blanket. A rocking chair stacked with newspapers. A bookcase crammed full of paperbacks. A sisal rug long overdue for the city’s landfill.

    Jeannie offered me the rocker. Eddie dutifully removed the newspapers. They sat on the sofa. He with his cigarette and coffee cup. She with her twitching smile. “Bob seems pretty confident you can find the murderer,” Jeannie said.

    “For all I know the murderer is sitting across from me, polluting my lungs with second-hand smoke,” I said, rocking back and forth.

    Jeannie was stunned. Her voice jumped two octaves. “I thought you were on board with Eddie’s innocence?”

    Eddie was merely amused. The result, I suppose, of being interrogated by the police a time or two. “Chill, darlin’,” he said, patting his sister’s knee. “She’s good-cop-bad-copping me, that’s all. Playing both parts with aplomb.”

    With no idea what I should say, or should not say, I blundered straight ahead. “Everybody knows about your gun phobia,” I said. “So there’s no need to get into that. And it’s pretty clear your alibi for the night of the murder isn’t worth a hill of beans. Otherwise you wouldn’t have been arrested.”

    Jeannie immediately protested. “He was only arrested for the antiques.”

    “Antiques from the condo of a dead woman,” I barked. “Your brother has got to take this thing seriously. We may be only a few days from a murder charge here.”

    The guilt of blowing smoke in my face finally got to Eddie, apparently. He smashed his cigarette into the cup. He told me what presumably he’d told the police. “Those antiques were gifts. She gave them to me approximately two weeks before her unfortunate demise. Perhaps the reason no one saw me load them into that truck I don’t own is because it was late at night. The reason it was late at night is because the economic realities of my hardscrabble, law-abiding life force me to work from early morning to long after more affluent people are asleep. Hannawa ain’t exactly New York cab-driving-wise.” He sniffed the smoke wafting from his coffee cup. “The long and short of it is that I did not kill the lady and I did not steal her precious shit.”

    I told him that I’d seen the police department’s list of the antiques they found in his apartment. “Why would she give you all those expensive things?”

    “She knew how excruciatingly dire my financial situation was.”

    “So she knew you’d sell them.”

    “I imagine so.”

    I studied his body language. I couldn’t tell if he was lying or having a nicotine fit. “Given your police record, it’s easy to believe that you might know how to sell those fireplaces and