In the Heat of the Night (14 page)

A
S A BOY
B
ILL
G
ILLESPIE
had been, from the first, considerably bigger than his classmates and the other children with whom he associated. Because of this fact he could dictate the terms of the games that were played and impose his will on others who were not physically his equal. To his credit, Gillespie did not use his size to become a bully and he did not deliberately “pick on” those who might have wanted to disagree with him. But his automatic leadership deprived him of an early education in one of the most important accomplishments he could have had—diplomacy. He was aware of this and it bothered him occasionally.

It bothered him mightily the night after he arrested Sam Wood on suspicion of murder. He thrashed about in his bed, turning from side to side and pounding the pillows, which remained completely docile but gave him not the slightest cooperation. He then got up and made himself some coffee. In his mind he kept reliving the scene in his office; no man had ever stood up to him as Sam Wood had and he admired him for it. Gillespie had won, of course, as he always won, but now plaguing doubts began to parade before him until they seemed to be forming ranks like a Roman phalanx. One large contributing factor was Virgil Tibbs’s insistence that Sam Wood was innocent. Gillespie did not want to think much of the Negro investigator, as he had made completely clear, but he knew that the man from Pasadena had an impressive record of being right.

Gillespie hoped, and nearly prayed, for one good, solid, concrete piece of evidence to back his judgment. He liked Sam Wood, apart from the fact that he didn’t think he was much of a cop, but he detested murderers, and Sam Wood, he was sure, was a murderer.

Only Sam had denied the charge to the limit of his power and then Virgil Tibbs had backed him up. Gillespie went back to bed and slept the uneasy sleep of the guilty. He felt no better in the morning and went to his office wishing, for the first time, he had not accepted the appointment for a job he was not properly qualified to fill.

He could feel the strain in the air as he walked through the lobby. Pete greeted him respectfully as always, but the words were as empty as blown eggshells. Gillespie sat down in a businesslike way behind his desk and began to go through the pile of mail that was waiting for his attention. Even as he read, an idea shaped in his mind: he would check further into the evidence he had and if it could be satisfactorily explained away, he would consider releasing Sam. He knew he wouldn’t actually do it without a “break” one way or the other, but it eased his conscience to feel that he was being fair.

Presently he became aware that something was taking place out in the lobby. He heard voices and he thought he caught the mention of his own name. He would have liked to go out to see what was happening, but the dignity of his office required him to wait to be asked.

He didn’t wait long. Arnold appeared in the doorway and paused to be recognized.

“Sir,” he said, “we’re receiving a complaint out here that I think you should hear. I mean I’m sure of it. Shall I bring the people in?”

The chief nodded his agreement. There were confusing footsteps in the corridor and then two people were ushered into his office. The first was a rawboned man with an extremely lean face which had been weathered into a maze of hairline wrinkles. He was dressed in work clothing and stood with his shoulders forward in an attitude of perpetual suspicion. He wore steel-rimmed glasses, which gave his face an added hardness. He held the corners of his mouth tight from force of habit; Gillespie’s first reaction to him was that he would be a mean one if he got drunk.

The other person was a girl, in her mid-teens as far as Gillespie could tell. She wore a sweater-and-skirt combination that emphasized the round ripeness of her body. She was slightly overweight, a fact which her flat-heeled shoes emphasized, but there was no mistaking the significance of every part of her body. Her clothes were much too tight and thrust her breasts upward and out in an exaggerated, unavoidable display. Gillespie thought she was headed for trouble if she had not already arrived.

“You Chief Gillespie?” the narrow man asked. The three words were enough to show his lack of schooling and to reassure Gillespie that he was this man’s master.

“That’s right,” Gillespie said. “What’s your problem?”

“My name’s Purdy this here is my daughter Delores.” Upon being in roduced, Delores turned on a wide smile that was clearly designed to be captivating and significant. Gillespie looked back at the father.

“She’s been got into trouble, Chief, and that’s why we came down here.”

“The usual kind of trouble?”

“I mean she’s gonna have a baby. That’s the kind of trouble I mean.”

Gillespie turned to the girl. “How old are you, Delores?” he asked.

“Sixteen,” she drawled brightly.

Her father laid a hand on her shoulder. “That ain’t exactly right. You see, Delores, she was sick for a while and got behind in school. Kids is awful hard on somebody who ain’t as far as she ought to be, so we let it out Delores was fifteen when we moved here a year past. Actually she was seventeen then, so that makes her just eighteen now.”

“That makes a lot of difference,” Gillespie explained. “In this state if a girl of sixteen gets in a family way, that’s statutory rape even though she gives her consent.”

“Unless she’s married,” Purdy put in.

“That’s right, unless she’s married. But if she’s eighteen or over, and gives her consent, then it’s fornication, which is a lot less serious offense.”

Purdy’s face grew harder still. He looked as though he were listening for some sound he expected to hear in the far distance. “Well, what is it if some guy takes an innocent girl like my Delores here and smooth-talks her into doing what she hadn’t oughter. Ain’t that rape?”

Gillespie shook his head. “That’s seduction, and while it’s a serious offense, it isn’t as bad as rape. Rape belongs with murder, armed robbery, and other offenses that are the most serious in the book. Suppose you both sit down and tell me just what happened.”

Taking the cue, Arnold disappeared from the doorway. While Purdy and his daughter were still seating themselves, the intercom buzzed. Bill flipped the switch. “Virgil’s in the lobby, Chief. He wants to know if he can have your permission to come in. He says it’s important to the case he’s working on.”

Gillespie drew breath to turn the request down flat. Then a sadistic thought hit him; he wondered how Purdy would like to describe his daughter’s troubles with a Negro listening in. Purdy had interrupted him with a correction while he had been explaining the law and that Gillespie had not liked. “Let him come in,” he said.

Tibbs entered the room as quietly as possible and sat down on the bench as though he were there to await orders to do some job of work.

“Send him out of here,” Purdy said. “I ain’t gonna talk about this with no nigger in the room.”

“If I want him here, he stays,” Gillespie stated. “Now go on with your story and forget he’s here.”

Purdy refused to give up. “Get him out of here first,” he demanded.

To Gillespie’s surprise, Tibbs rose quietly to his feet and started for the door. Gillespie looked up in anger, and Tibbs spoke quickly. “I forgot something; I’ll be right back.” When Purdy looked away from him, Tibbs pointed at the intercom. Then he shut the door behind him on his way out.

Since the situation had been resolved without loss of face, Gillespie moved some papers on his desk, opened a drawer and looked inside, and then flipped a switch on his intercom. Then he leaned back in his chair. “All right, we’re alone,” he said. “Now tell me what you have to say.”

“Well, Delores, she’s a real good girl, never done nothin’ wrong except what kids always do. Then, without me knowing nothing about it, she meets this here guy who’s twice as old as she is. He ain’t married so he starts trying to go places with my girl here.”

“Why didn’t you stop it?” Gillespie demanded.

Purdy turned sour. “Mister, I work all night. I ain’t got no time to stay home and take care o’ the kids or see what they’s doin’ every minute. Besides, Delores didn’t tell me nothing about it until afterwards.”

“He was a real nice guy,” Delores contributed. “I couldn’t see nothing wrong in it. He was real nice to me.”

“Come to the point,” Gillespie said. “When did it happen?”

“Real late one night. The missis was asleep like she oughta be, when Delores got outa bed to see this guy, and that’s when he had her.”

Gillespie turned to the girl. “Tell me about it; exactly what happened.”

Delores did her best to look coy; it was a fair imitation. “Well, like Pa said, he was real nice to me. We talked and then we sat real close together and then …” She ran down only from lack of words.

The chief picked up a pencil and tapped it against the desk. “I want you to tell me one thing,” he demanded. “Did this man force himself on you so that you had to struggle against him, or did it just work out that he went farther than he should?”

Delores hesitated a long time, long enough to give Gillespie the answer he needed. “I didn’t rightly understand everything at the time,” she said at length.

Gillespie let his body relax a little. “All right, Delores, this man did you wrong, of course, and we’ll arrest him for it. We can charge him with seduction and that’s plenty. Now what can you tell me about him?”

Purdy refused to remain silent any longer. “You know him right enough,” he exploded. “That’s why we wanted to see you personal. It’s that night cop you got out supposin’ to be protectin’ the women all the time. I know his name, too—it’s Sam Wood.”

When Bill Gillespie was once more alone, he pushed the intercom and gave an order. “Send Virgil in here,” he instructed.

“Virgil isn’t here,” Pete’s voice came back.

“Well, where in hell is he?” Gillespie demanded. “I thought he was listening on the intercom.”

“Yes, sir, he was. Just as the interview ended, he said something about having been the biggest fool in the country, and beat it.”

“Is that all?”

“Yes, sir, except for the fact that he made a very brief phone call on the way out.” In that statement Pete lied to his chief. It was not a very serious lie and it was, in fact, Pete thought, an act of mercy. As he had rushed out of the lobby, the Negro detective had paused just a moment to say quickly, “Tell Sam Wood not to worry.” Pete required only a fraction of a second to decide not to repeat that remark to Gillespie. It might go hard with the man who did.

The ancient car that Jess the mechanic had loaned to Virgil Tibbs had been designed with adequate but conservative power; consequently it labored somewhat as it steadily pushed its way up the winding curves of the road that led to the Endicott home. When at last it reached the top, the radiator was showing signs of strain. Tibbs parked it on the small level area beside the house, set the brake firmly, and climbed out. A moment later he pressed the bell.

George Endicott opened the door promptly. “Come in, Mr. Tibbs,” he invited. He was courteous without being cordial. He led the way to his spectacular living room, sat down, and waved his guest to a seat. “What did you want to see me about?” he asked.

“I want to ask you some questions which I should have thought of long ago,” Tibbs replied. “Due to some events which have just taken place down in the city, they are now quite urgent. That’s why I asked if I could see you right away.”

“All right then,” Endicott agreed. “You ask them and I’ll do my best to answer you.”

“All right, sir. On the night that Maestro Mantoli was killed, I believe he was up here earlier in the evening; is that right?”

Endicott nodded. “That’s right.”

“Who was the first person to leave the house?”

“Mr. Kaufmann.”

“At about what time did he leave?”

“I should say ten o’clock.” Endicott pondered for a moment. “I can’t be too exact about that; I don’t believe anyone was paying very close attention to the time. We were very much engaged with other things.”

“Exactly who was here that evening?”

“There was Enrico—that’s Maestro Mantoli—his daughter, Mrs. Endicott and myself, and Mr. Kaufmann.”

Virgil Tibbs leaned forward and laced his fingers tightly together. He stared hard at them as he asked the next question. “Can you estimate the time when Maestro Mantoli left here?”

“Eleven, eleven-thirty,” Endicott replied.

Tibbs waited a moment. “When he left, how did he get from here down to the city?”

This time Endicott paused before he replied. “I drove him,” he said finally.

“Were you two alone?”

“Yes, we were. As soon as we left, the ladies retired.”

“Thank you. And about what time did you arrive back here?”

“About an hour after I left. I can’t give you the exact time. I told you we were absorbed in other matters that night.”

“Where did you drop Maestro Mantoli?”

Endicott showed slight signs of impatience. “I dropped him at his hotel. We had offered to put him up here. He declined because he was a very considerate man and he knew that if he accepted, Mrs. Endicott and I would have had to move out of our room for him. We have a guest room but his daughter was occupying it. So he chose to stay at the hotel despite the fact that it is decidedly second rate.”

“From the time you left here together,” Tibbs went on, “did you meet anyone else or see anyone else until you returned?”

Endicott stared firmly at his guest. “Mr. Tibbs, I’m not sure I like the tone of that question. Are you asking me to prove an alibi? Are you suggesting that I killed a very close and dear friend?”

Virgil Tibbs pressed his fingers even tighter together. “Mr. Endicott, I’m not implying anything. I am after information, pure and simple. If you saw anyone at that hour when you were down in the city, that could offer a clue as to who might be guilty of the murder.”

Endicott stared out of the huge window at the remarkable view which extended for miles over the distant mountains. “All right, I’m sorry,” he said. “You have to explore every possibility, of course.”