Murder Most Strange Read Online Free PDF Page B

out anything? What
have you—"
    "Are you the policemen?" asked a thin
little voice.
    "Yes, that's right," said Mendoza.
    "What—what happened to Mama?" She was a
nice-looking little girl, if not exactly pretty: thin and pale, with
dark-brown hair in a modified Dutch bob, and steady hazel-green eyes,
a straight little mouth.
    "Our doctor will find out," said Mendoza.
He hesitated; questioning a child could be tricky; but she looked
back at him gravely and began to answer questions unasked.
    "She never got up as early as me, I always get
my own breakfast. Her alarm's set for eight, so she can get the
nine-fifteen bus—she doesn't have to go to work till ten, see. So
I—I never saw her this morning—it wasn't till I got home from
school—I saw she was still—still in bed, and it was funny—"
Suddenly the square little chin quivered, and she clamped her jaw
tight. "I thought—I'd better ask somebody—if she was sick—"
    "You did just right, honey," said Mrs.
Werner.
    Mendoza sat down uninvited. "What about last
night, Harriet?" he asked gently. "Did your mother have a
friend come, or was she out somewhere? Or—"
    "Oh, she was out. Like usual," said
Harriet. She sounded surprised that he hadn't known that. "She
went out most nights, someplace where there were people to talk to,
and TV. Barney's, or the Ace-High Bar, mostly. I was asleep when she
came home, I usually am. I didn't hear her come home, but this
morning I saw—I saw she was in bed—just like usual, and—"
She swallowed. "Please," she said, "she's—she's
dead, isn't she?"
    Nobody said anything until Mrs. Werner got out
stiffly, "Yes, honey, I'm afraid she is."
    "I thought—prob'ly she was," said
Harriet. A tear rolled down one cheek, and she sniffed valiantly. "I
suppose—somebody'd better call Daddy. I mean Grandma. Daddy'll be
at work, but Grandma's usually home."
    Mrs. Werner, who had sat down again, got up with
sudden decision and said to Harriet, "Yes, we'll do that in just
a minute. I just want to talk to the officers a little while, you
stay here, honey." She led them out to the hall, and shut the
door behind them, went down the hall. She had a rather sheeplike
face, and continually reached to push overlarge fashionable
spectacles up on her nose, but her eyes were unexpectedly
intelligent. "Now I don't know anything about this," she
told them uncompromisingly, "but I guess neither do you yet, and
I might as well tell you what I do know about Mrs. Cooper."
    "Yes, Mrs. Werner?" Mendoza waited
interestedly.
    "Which isn't all that much, but a woman can read
another woman, you take me. That's a nice little girl in there, nicer
than you'd expect a woman like that to have. But I don't think there
was any harm in her—she was just flighty. Sort of, you know,
irresponsible. She held a job—she was a waitress at a coffee shop
on Beverly," and she named it. "I've only been in her place
a time or two, we didn't neighbor, but you could see she was a
terrible housekeeper—dressed her- self up like a bandbox, but that
was as far as it went. And she left Harriet alone a lot too much,
even when she first moved here four years ago when Harriet was just a
little thing. She was divorced from Harriet's father, he has her on
weekends, I only met him once but he seems like a real nice steady
fellow."
    "I see," said Mendoza.
    "She didn't die of anything natural, did she?"
she asked shrewdly. "Well, all I'll say is, I don't think there
was any harm in her. She didn't throw wild parties, or bring men
home, or get drunk or anything. I was sorry for the little girl, she
wasn't any kind of mother to her, but that's the worst anybody could
say."
    "Thanks very much," said Mendoza.
    "I suppose somebody had better phone the father.
I mean, she can't be left alone, and he always has her weekends—"
    Mendoza and Higgins consulted mutely and shrugged at
each other. That certainly made more sense than taking the child to
Juvenile Hall. They went back to the Cooper apartment and