Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 44, No. 7 & 8, July/August 1999

“About three years. He’s my best transmission builder when he shows up. Is he in jail?”

“No, sir. He was found dead along Route 5 this morning.”

Hick sat down again and recited the names of one or two biblical figures with explosive fervor. “He get hit by a car, or what?”

“We think it’s a homicide. Blunt injury to the head. Would you know offhand of anybody who might have wanted him out of the way?”

“No. No, I sure wouldn’t. He got along good with everybody here. My guys’ private life I don’t mess with.” The phone rang and he made an appointment for a transmission tuneup the first of the following week.

“What can you tell me about a TV repair service Brendel ran on his own?”

“He had some kind of a thing going, Hot Rod Enterprises, something like that. Lee was handy. He could set up a torque converter in the dark. I ain’t so sure about TV, though. I thought it was custom cars.”

“What kind of car did he drive?”

“Lee was mostly a biker. Sometimes he showed up in different cars, but most generally it was a ’cycle. You can lose five or six minutes of a lunch hour just waiting to pull a car out in that traffic at noon. He used to shoot out of here on his bike every noon and ride along the lane markers between the cars. You sure he didn’t get hit?”

“We’re sure. Did he have any special friends here at the shop?”

“Not special. Like I said, he got along good with all the guys.”

“You mentioned women. Would you know any by name?”

Hick stood up again, put his thumbs back inside his belt, and shook his head. “Their name,” he said with a hoarse chuckle, “was legion.”

Although there was no departmental regulation on the subject, officers working on a homicide were encouraged to attend the autopsy whenever possible. Unfortunately it usually wasn’t possible without delaying critical steps in the investigation. At two o’clock Auburn reported to the county morgue to witness the autopsy on Lee Brendel, whose body had been formally identified by his apartment manager.

Dr. Valentine, the forensic pathologist, was just taking photographs of the head wound with the help of his assistant, an ancient, wizened man in a rubber apron with tattoos all over both arms. Auburn stood outside a chest-high Plexiglas partition that enclosed the autopsy table. Next to him Stamaty, the only other observer, was busy shuffling papers and making notes. He told Stamaty about his visit to Hick’s transmission shop.

On the strength of several years’ experience as a beat cop in another city, Stamaty fended himself a pretty good detective. “I would have talked to all the guys in that shop,” he said. “You can bet they know more about Brendel than his boss does. They could probably put a name to that woman on the answering machine, too. And one of them probably helped him steal all that stuff we found in his closet.”

“If he did, he isn’t going to tell me about it. But I see Brendel working as a lone wolf.”

“Somebody got close enough to him last night to give him a terminal headache,” objected Stamaty.

“But why in that particular place? There’s got to be a reason why he ended up on that path, ten miles from his apartment and twelve or thirteen from where he worked.”

“Maybe the girl lives around there.”

“Or anyway her dad. Let’s watch the show.”

After an hour and a half of meticulous examination, Dr. Valentine concluded that death was due to laceration and hemorrhage of the brain in an otherwise healthy adult male.

Auburn was back at his desk updating his memoirs when, around four, background checks came in on the residents of Roseland Court. Conrad Neldrick, Ph.D., was a licensed clinical psychologist. Blind from birth, he had an IQ that was off the charts, spoke four languages, and carried on an international practice by telephone. His sister Beth, widowed for years, traveled widely as the spirit moved her.

Karl Roetherl was a retired architect, grandson of the Karl Roetherl who had designed and built half the big buildings in town. He and his wife had also traveled extensively until she fell victim to senile dementia. Their record was clean except that, years ago, Roetherl had been held for some weeks in Canada as a suspect in the death of a cousin, also named Karl Roetherl. The death had eventually been ruled a hunting accident.

John D. Rayster’s firm supplied specialty hardwoods to shipbuilders, furniture manufacturers, and cabinetmakers. He and his wife Martha were patrons of the arts and champions of oddball causes, but had no criminal records or associations. The last report of a break-in on Roseland Court had been six years ago.

Preliminary laboratory reports showed no drugs or alcohol in Brendel’s blood. So far, none of the property in his closet had been traced to its rightful owners. His car was still being studied. Kestrel had found Brendel’s own prints in it and a few partials that hadn’t been identified yet and probably never would be. There were no bloodstains in or on the car. It contained no significant trace evidence and nothing that didn’t belong in it.