Part 21 (2/2)
”I knew her.”
”Isn't that remarkable.” He rose swaying and clasped my hands in both of his, using me to support him. ”Helen was a remarkable girl. I've just been reading over one of her poems. Wrote it when she was just a teen-age girl at City College. Here, I'll show you.”
He made a fairly elaborate search for the orange-covered magazine, which was lying in plain sight on the floor where he had dropped it. The name of it was the _Bridgeton Blazer_, and it looked like a school production.
Haggerty picked it up and handed it to him: ”Please don't bother with it, Earl. Helen didn't write it anyway.”
”Didn't write it? 'Course she wrote it. It's got her initials on it.” Hoffman flipped through the pages. ”See?”
”But she was only translating from Verlaine.”
”Never heard of him.” Hoffman turned to me, thrusting the magazine into my hands. ”Here, read this. See what a remarkable gift poor little Helen had.”
I read: When the violins Of the autumn winds Begin to sigh My heart is torn With their forlorn Monotony.
And when the hour Sounds from the tower I weep tears For I recall The loss of all My perished years.
And then I go With the winds that blow And carry me There and here Like a withered and sere Leaf from a tree.--H.H.
Hoffman looked at me with one of his unfocused eyes. ”Isn't that beautiful poetry, Mr. Arthur?”
”Beautiful.”
”I only wisht I understood it. Do you understand it?”
”I think so.”
”Then keep it. Keep it in memory of poor little Helen.”
”I couldn't do that.”
”Sure you can. Keep it.” He s.n.a.t.c.hed it out of my hands, rolled it up, and and thrust it into my jacket pocket, breathing whisky in my face.
”Keep it,” Haggerty whispered at my shoulder. ”You don't want to cross him.”
”You heard him. You don't want to cross me.”
Hoffman grinned loosely at me. He clenched his left fist, examined it for defects, then used it to strike himself on the chest. He walked on spraddled legs to the roll-top desk and opened it. There were botfies and a single smeared tumbler inside. He half-filled the tumbler from a fifth of bourbon and drank most of it down. His son-in-law said something under his breath, but made no move to stop him.
The heavy jolt squeezed sweat out on Hoffman's face. It seemed to sober him a litfie. His eyes focused on me.
”Have a drink?”
”All right. I'll take water and ice in mine, please.” I didn't normally drink in the morning but this was an abnormal occasion.
”Get some ice and a gla.s.s, Bert. Mr. Arthur wants a drink. If you're too mucky-muck to drink with me, Mr. Arthur isn't.”
”The name is Archer.”
”Get _two_ gla.s.ses,” he said with his foolish grin. ”Mr. Archer wants a drink, too. Sit down,” he said to me. ”Take the load off your feet. Tell me about poor little Helen.”
We sat on the couch. I filled him in quickly on the circ.u.mstances of the murder, including the threat that preceded it, and Helen's feeling that Bridgeton was catching up with her.
”What did she mean by that?” The lines of the grin were still in his face like clown marks but the grin had become a rictus.
”I've come a long way to see if you can help me answer that question.”
”Me? Why come to me? I never knew what went on in her mind, she never _let_ me know. She was too bright for me.” His mood swayed into heavy drunken self-pity. ”I sweated and slaved to buy her an education like I never had, but she wouldn't give her poor old father the time of day.”
”I understand you had a bad quarrel and she left borne.”
”She told you, eh?”
I nodded. I had decided to keep Mrs. Hoffman out of it. He was the kind of man who wouldn't want his wife ahead of him in anything.
”She tell you the names she called me, crook and n.a.z.i, when all I was doing was my bounden duty? You're a cop, you know how a man feels when your own family undermines you.” He peered at me sideways. ”You are a cop, aren't you?”
”I have been.”
”What do you do for a living now?”
”Private investigation.”
”Who for?”
”A man named Kincaid, n.o.body you know. I knew your daughter slightly, and I have a personal interest in finding out who killed her. I think the answer may be here in Bridgeton.”
”I don't see how. She never set foot in this town for twenty years, until last spring. She only came home then to tell her mother she was getting a divorce. From _him_.” He gestured toward the back of the house, where I could hear ice being chipped.
”Did she do any talking to you?”
”I only saw her the once. She said h.e.l.lo-how-are-you and that was about it. She told her mother that she'd had it with Bert and her mother couldn't talk her out of it. Bert even followed her out to Reno to try and convince her to come back, but it was no go. He isn't enough of a man to hold a woman.”
Hoffman finished his drink and set his tumbler down on the floor. He remained slumped forward for about a minute, and I was afraid he was going to get sick or pa.s.s out on me. But he came back up to a sitting position and muttered something about wanting to help me.
”Fine. Who was Luke Deloney?”
”Friend of mine. Big man in town back before the war. She told you about him, too, eh?”
”You could tell me more, Lieutenant. I hear you have a memory like an elephant.”
”Did Helen say that?”
”Yes.” The lie didn't cost me anything, not even a pang of conscience.
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