Read Online Lady Yesterday by Loren D. Estleman - Free Book Online
Authors: Loren D. Estleman
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cubicle like all the rest, sequestered inside amber pebbled glass that fell a foot short of the squad room ceiling, but tidier than most. The paperwork was arranged in neat piles on the gray steel desk and bound copies of the Michigan Penal Code stood in order of year in a metal bookcase with a coffee machine on top, its little red light glowing. A spray of bright flowers grew out of a cut-glass vase on the corner of the desk opposite the telephone. Peonies, if it matters.
A trim woman in her mid-thirties sitting behind the desk looked up from her writing when I knocked. She had light brown hair that could have been honey blonde with no trouble, curling under at her shoulders and pushed back to form bangs on her forehead by a red plastic hairband like little girls wear. It didn’t look out of place on her. She wore tortoiseshell glasses with large round frames and a tailored khaki suit with a white jabot frothing at her throat. The nameplate on the desk read LT. MARY ANNE TAYLOR .
She said, “Yes?” She had a dimple at the corner of her mouth and her forehead wrinkled a little when she raised her eyebrows.
“John Alderdyce said I’d want to get along with Thaler,” I said after a moment.
She sat back and unscrewed her ballpoint pen. Her eyes flickered over me from behind the glasses. They were baby blue and nowhere near the size of hen’s eggs. “You’re not going to challenge me to an arm-wrestling match, are you?”
“Uh-uh. You might win. I’ve got a delicate ego.”
“It looks like the only thing about you that is. You’re with who?”
I opened my folder, turning the badge around back. It wasn’t likely to impress her. “John’s a friend. He said you had a leg up with ballistics.”
“How is he?”
“Drinking Millers like Prohibition’s coming back tomorrow. He’ll be okay.”
She screwed the pen back together, measuring me still. After a second she glanced at the chair in front of the desk. I sat down. She lifted the receiver off the telephone, dialed, waited a long time, spoke for a minute, and hung up. “John says you’re okay.”
“That’s more than he ever said to me.”
“He sounded drunk.”
“That would explain it.”
“What’ve you got for me?”
I unwrapped the bullet and laid it atop one of the piles of paper. She looked at it without picking it up.
“Thirty-eight. Where’d you get it?”
“Lady I’m working for found it in her driver’s seat. Someone put it through the windshield. She wasn’t in the car at the time and she’d like to know who’s responsible.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
She looked amused. “You want me to spell it?”
“I was expecting a lecture. Taxpayers’ money and like that.”
“I was one of four sergeants up for this promotion,” she said. “The other three were black and one of them was a woman, and what do you think my chances were in the town that invented Affirmative Action? John took my jacket and my score on the looey’s exam upstairs and didn’t come back down until I had this spot. So when he says you’re okay I figure you’re up for Pope at least.”
I scratched my ear.
“Something?”
“Just reconsidering my stand on women’s rights.”
“I was against them from the start. All those women running around fulfilling themselves while some poor schnook couldn’t get a job to feed his family. Or hers.” She unscrewed the pen. “Leave your card, Mr. Walker. I’ll call if we raise anything.”
8
T HE PLOW HAD JUST been down my street, followed by a salt truck to break up the ice the plow had uncovered and start dissolving my fenders and rocker panels. The cold air had frozen the ridges of snow hard as mortar and it was easier to pass a needle through the eye of a camel than to get into my driveway. I backed up and floored it and made it on the third try, tearing hell out of my new mudguards and throwing brine as high as the windows. Fortunately, much of the car is plastic.
The house was chilly. There is
A trim woman in her mid-thirties sitting behind the desk looked up from her writing when I knocked. She had light brown hair that could have been honey blonde with no trouble, curling under at her shoulders and pushed back to form bangs on her forehead by a red plastic hairband like little girls wear. It didn’t look out of place on her. She wore tortoiseshell glasses with large round frames and a tailored khaki suit with a white jabot frothing at her throat. The nameplate on the desk read LT. MARY ANNE TAYLOR .
She said, “Yes?” She had a dimple at the corner of her mouth and her forehead wrinkled a little when she raised her eyebrows.
“John Alderdyce said I’d want to get along with Thaler,” I said after a moment.
She sat back and unscrewed her ballpoint pen. Her eyes flickered over me from behind the glasses. They were baby blue and nowhere near the size of hen’s eggs. “You’re not going to challenge me to an arm-wrestling match, are you?”
“Uh-uh. You might win. I’ve got a delicate ego.”
“It looks like the only thing about you that is. You’re with who?”
I opened my folder, turning the badge around back. It wasn’t likely to impress her. “John’s a friend. He said you had a leg up with ballistics.”
“How is he?”
“Drinking Millers like Prohibition’s coming back tomorrow. He’ll be okay.”
She screwed the pen back together, measuring me still. After a second she glanced at the chair in front of the desk. I sat down. She lifted the receiver off the telephone, dialed, waited a long time, spoke for a minute, and hung up. “John says you’re okay.”
“That’s more than he ever said to me.”
“He sounded drunk.”
“That would explain it.”
“What’ve you got for me?”
I unwrapped the bullet and laid it atop one of the piles of paper. She looked at it without picking it up.
“Thirty-eight. Where’d you get it?”
“Lady I’m working for found it in her driver’s seat. Someone put it through the windshield. She wasn’t in the car at the time and she’d like to know who’s responsible.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
She looked amused. “You want me to spell it?”
“I was expecting a lecture. Taxpayers’ money and like that.”
“I was one of four sergeants up for this promotion,” she said. “The other three were black and one of them was a woman, and what do you think my chances were in the town that invented Affirmative Action? John took my jacket and my score on the looey’s exam upstairs and didn’t come back down until I had this spot. So when he says you’re okay I figure you’re up for Pope at least.”
I scratched my ear.
“Something?”
“Just reconsidering my stand on women’s rights.”
“I was against them from the start. All those women running around fulfilling themselves while some poor schnook couldn’t get a job to feed his family. Or hers.” She unscrewed the pen. “Leave your card, Mr. Walker. I’ll call if we raise anything.”
8
T HE PLOW HAD JUST been down my street, followed by a salt truck to break up the ice the plow had uncovered and start dissolving my fenders and rocker panels. The cold air had frozen the ridges of snow hard as mortar and it was easier to pass a needle through the eye of a camel than to get into my driveway. I backed up and floored it and made it on the third try, tearing hell out of my new mudguards and throwing brine as high as the windows. Fortunately, much of the car is plastic.
The house was chilly. There is
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