Poisoned Pins

I was considering using my one telephone call to order a pizza when the cell door opened and Jorgeson came in. “Good evening, Ms. Malloy,” he said as if we were meeting under the portico of the Book Depot. Had he been wearing a hat, I was certain he would have touched its brim ever so urbanely. “I understand you’re in a jam.”

“It’s actually a cell. How did you know I’d been left here to rot for hours and hours?”

“According to the arresting officer and the desk sergeant, you’ve been in here for less than half an hour- although I’m sure it felt longer. Time doesn’t fly in the Farberville City Jail, or so I’ve been told.”

“What else have you been told?”

He seemed to have a decent idea of the events that had led to my incarceration, and related them in a carefully noncommittal tone, then said, “One of the officers at the scene recognized your name and called Lieutenant Rosen, thinking he’d want to hear about it. He called me.”

I’d been irritated earlier, but now I was begi

Jorgeson’s bulldog face turned red and his ears quivered-a response I’d seen on previous occasions when he was deeply uncomfortable. Looking at something on the wall above my head, he said, “Ah, the lieutenant said something about being busy, being tied up. Once he heard Arnie Riggles had been picked up in the raid, he said he figured you were up to your old-that you were interfering-I mean, involved in an investigation. He said he’d call the desk and tell ‘em to release you to my custody until the arraignment.”

“The arraignment, Jorgeson? Are you implying that Lieutenant Peter Rosen has no plans to have a quiet word with the head of the operation and make it clear that I am totally i

“I don’t think he’ll let it go that far, Ms. Malloy. The call caught him in a bad mood, and he was kind of sputtery when he heard about your friend with the motorcycle. I’m sure he’ll do something to help in the morning.”

“What did you mean when you said he was busy?” I continued relentlessly, my face quite as red as his and my ears tingling, if not quivering. “Just precisely what was he doing when he received the call?”

Jorgeson closed his eyes for a moment, and his gulps were audible. “I think maybe he had company. Let’s go back to the desk and arrange your release. You’ll be home in no time, sitting on your sofa with a nice hot cup of tea, and all this will seem like a bad dream.”

“Company?” I said, although I did leap to my feet and follow him down the corridor.

“I believe he mentioned something about Lieutenant Pipkin. It’s none of my business, Ms. Malloy; I’m just following orders.”

“That was an inadequate defense at Nuremberg, Jorgeson. Who’s this Lieutenant Pipkin? Is he on the CID squad?”

He stopped so abruptly that I narrowly avoided a collision, and he pulled me aside as another of my coconspirators from the Dew Drop I

Despite the unruliness of my thoughts, I remained impressively impassive as Jorgeson did the necessary paperwork to gain my release, drove me to the Airport Arms, and waved as he pulled onto the highway. Ed Whitbred’s motorcycle was not there, and I felt a little guilty as I realized he wouldn’t have been in the Dew Drop den of iniquity had he not escorted me there. Arnie deserved everything that happened to him, and a good deal more, but Ed had been minding his own business- until I’d shown up.

I opened my car door, then glanced at the second story Ed’s apartment was dark, as was the one next to it; I knew where the renters were, and were likely to be until their arraignments in the morning. Would I take advantage of the fortuitous circumstances that had led to my premature release? Would Oral Roberts accept a blank check?

I went upstairs and along the balcony to the penultimate apartment. Back in the Airport Arms’ heyday, a renter might have been able to lock the door to protect himself from his feral neighbors, but now the knob felt loose enough to come off in my hand with only a minimal yank. It was just as well; Arnie would have lost a key as easily as he did consciousness. I opened the door a few inches and said into the darkness, “Hello? Is anybody here?” If anyone was there, he or she was not in a congenial mood. I went inside, closed the door, and felt for the light switch, trying not to think about the last time I’d been in a similar situation. Arnie’s environment was more likely to host rats.

I flipped on the light and hastily pulled the drapes together. Although the light was visible, I hoped that anyone bothering to notice would assume the tenant was home. The living room was squalid, to be charitable, and decorated primarily with beer cans, plates of petrified food, teetery piles of yellowed magazines and newspapers, and furniture that looked downright dangerous. I knew I was in the right apartment.

The kitchen was filthy, the bathroom more so, and the bedroom surely had been the target of an invasion of the magnitude of Desert Storm. Like the Kappa Theta Etas, Arnie preferred to utilize the floor rather than the closet, although there were no pink cashmere sweaters amid the paint-splattered overalls and dingy gray jockey shorts.

It was hopeless. If there was anything to explain his involvement, I was not going to stumble across it without several hours of intensive search through nasty stuff. I opened the dresser drawers, looked inside the closet, and forced myself to kneel for a quick peek under the bed. If I’d been hunting for dust bu

On the inside of the doorknob hung a camera on a black plastic strap. I wasn’t any more familiar with cameras than I was with male rites of spring, but I examined it and concluded a roll of film remained inside it. Would one shot be of a startled bookseller, her mouth agape, fingers splayed to block the blinding flash? And, more interestingly, of whom or what would the others be? Arnie was not an amateur engaging in his hobby beneath the windows of the Kappa Theta Eta house. Earlier I’d opined that he was not a murderer, but this was in no way to imply that I’d ever doubted his capacities as a voyeur. Or a blackmailer, in which case the film was likely to hold his evidence.

After a series of futile attempts to disengage the roll of film, I decided to borrow the camera long enough to have one of the nice young people at the one-hour photo service assist me. I switched off the light and opened the door.

Ed Whitbred blocked my way, intentionally or otherwise. “‘Sometimes they shut you up in jail-dark, and a filthy cell; I hope the fellows built them jails, find ‘em down in hell.’ E. F. Piper, of course.”

“Of course,” I echoed lamely. “I’m delighted that you’ve been released, Ed. It was my fault that you were at that place, and I want to apologize to you. If they end up pressing charges, I’ll certainly testify on your behalf.”

“And I won’t have to call you at an office in Washington, D.C., will I? I can drop by your upstairs apartment next to the sorority house, or catch you at the Book Depot on Thurber Street.”

I was disturbed not only by his faintly sardonic tone, but also by his undeniable bulk, which seemed to have taken root on the balcony outside Arnie’s door. “Any time, Ed. Thanks for the motorcycle ride. It was the first time I’d been on one, and it really is a special sensation of its own, isn’t it?” My hands were sweating as I clutched the camera, but it was a little late in the scenario to put it behind my back. ‘Well, I’d better run along home now. My daughter will be worried, and my brief time in jail has left me ravenous, and of course a cup of tea will be divine. You won’t believe this, but I was thinking about using my call to order a pizza when… they released me. Isn’t that silly?”