The Baby Blue Rip-Off Read Online Free PDF Page B

pudgy hand. “Jesus Christ, will you look at it! So much gone, so much ruined!”
    He padded into the kitchen and the house seemed to tremble.
    I heard him say, “She’s dead?”
    There was a mumbling that must’ve been Brennan or somebody saying, “That’s right,” or something. It wasn’t a question that took much of an answer. It didn’t take a doctor to pronounce
that
body dead.
    “What can be done?” he said. He spoke loud. His voice was baritone, but not very masculine.
    There was another mumbling: somebody saying, “Nothing can be done,” or the equivalent. Maybe somebody said, “Bury her,” which is about all you can do for a dead person, after all.
    It was silent for a while.
    Brennan waved the ambulance boys in, and some of the people in there (which ones I don’t know, because I was still in the living room and couldn’t see into the kitchen) got Mrs. Jonsen’s remains untied from the chair and moved onto the stretcher. It was a slow process. Five minutes went by before the attendants passed through the dining room with the covered stretcher. The fat man in the brown suit followed along behind them like a pallbearer. Brennan closed the door after the fat man and the ambulance attendants.
    No siren.
    “Who was that?” I said, knowing.
    “The son.”
    “Edward Jonsen?”
    “Edward Jonsen.”
    “Isn’t there a married sister?”
    “Lives out of town. Not contacted yet.”
    “Oh. He sure seemed upset. About the house, that is.”
    “People react funny in these situations. What do you know about it anyway, Mallory?” Brennan said that, and then his face flushed, as he remembered I had lost both my parents in recent years. “Sorry,” he mumbled.
    “Why was this place torn up, Brennan?”
    “I don’t know. Add insult to injury, I guess. Looking for something, maybe. Buried treasure. The Jonsens had a reputation for being hoarders, stingy, that sort of thing. Who knows? Now I want you out of here, Mallory.”
    “I thought you wanted to talk.”
    “You thinking about getting involved in this, Mallory?”
    That phrase again.
Getting involved.
Damn.
    “What if I am?” As if I wasn’t.
    “Just don’t. You used to be a cop once, I hear. Now you’re a big mystery writer, with a book coming out one of these days. Maybe you want some publicity. Forget about it.”
    “Can I ask you one thing?”
    “No.”
    “Can you find the people that did this?”
    “I don’t think that’s your concern.”
    “Oh, it’s my concern. For one thing, I knew the woman they killed. She was a friend of mine. For another thing, those sons of bitches kicked me more than any man should ever have to get kicked. And one last thing, Brennan—I’m a taxpayer and you work for
me
; I pay your goddamn salary, so don’t tell
me
it’s not my concern.”
    I guess I expected my little speech to get a rise out of Brennan, but he disappointed me.
    Because my outburst had cooled him down, if anything, and he touched my shoulder in a fatherly way that would’ve angered me if it hadn’t been sincere. “Let’s not bitch at each other,” he said. “Tonight you think you’re the detective in your book. Tomorrow morning you’re going to know better.”
    “Answer my question, Brennan.”
    “I don’t know, Mallory. I can tell you some about it tomorrow. Come talk to me. Can you wait till then?”
    “I guess.”
    “How you feeling?”
    “Bruised. In every way imaginable.”
    “Will you go on over to the hospital and get looked over? I’ll call them at Receiving and tell ’em you’re on your way.”
    “That’s not necessary....”
    “Yes, it is. Get checked over.”
    “Well. Okay.”
    “Feel up to driving there yourself? I’d like Lou to stick here with me awhile, or I’d have him drive you.”
    “I can manage.”
    “You take it easy, Mallory.”
    “Yeah. You too, Brennan. Uh, sorry I....”
    “Yeah, I know. We shouldn’t be bitching at each other right now. There’s a woman dead, and that’s more