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

“Mrs. Hazelton — Trish — I would love to, but I’ve got so much work to do I don’t know where to start.”

Saturday morning Bunk was leaning back in his swivel chair at the station, throwing darts at a blowup of Saddam Hussein pasted to a dartboard. “Why don’t I get better at this?” he said as the dart stuck in the edge of the board. From the far corner of the room Sergeant Bannister, bent over a computer and going through his fourth cup of bad coffee that morning, called out for Bunk to hang in there.

“You’d just better hope Heather doesn’t catch you doing this,” Dean told him. Heather was the police department secretary, with an office in the next room.

“An odd thing,” said Bunk, cocking his arm for another throw, “but I prefer darts to guns. I should’ve been born two thousand years ago when the cops were still using spears. I’d have been a better shot then, too.”

There was a loud thunk as the dart embedded itself in the walnut veneer.

The door to the squad room jerked open, and Heather’s face appeared, flushed under neatly curled, blue-rinsed hair. “How old are you, Bunk?”

“That’s an indelicate question.”

Dean was trying to keep from laughing, but he also felt a wrench. He suspected that Heather, recently widowed, had more than a professional interest in Bunk, who also, five years ago, had lost his spouse. But Bunk, though he clearly liked and respected their secretary, wasn’t responding. It was almost as if he liked being lonely.

The chief rose and headed for the dartboard. “I’ll have to get a bigger board,” he said.

Shaking her head, Heather went back into her office.

“Almost forgot.” Bunk was back in his chair. “This stuff just came back from the lab.” From a box on his desk he took out the whisky glass, the ashtray, Tennis magazine. “Charlie thinks the killer used a hankie to wipe his prints off the glass and ashtray. Oh, here’s something you might be interested in. A little souvenir of the case.” Bunk held up a matchbook with, on the cover, a trumpet amid floating notes and the words BLUE NOTE. “I saw another one of these in the library, so we know they belonged to Lacy, not the killer. Here, you’re into jazz.” He tossed the matches to Dean.

“Maybe a ghost shot him,” said Dean, turning the matchbook in his hand. He opened it, saw that only one match was missing, and shoved it into his pocket.

“We know one thing; this wasn’t a crime of passion, it was planned.”

“So who does that narrow it down to?”

Bunk had gone to the window, was looking at a light rain falling on Church Street. “This is enough to start me smoking again.” He turned and faced his lieutenant, his lined face grim. “Heather got in touch with Lacy’s lawyer, learned that his brother Marty is the main beneficiary, gets the house and close to two million. And get this. The rest goes to setting up tennis clinics in New Jersey for disadvantaged kids. Isn’t that something? Nobody seems to like the guy, but there was something there. He had a dream, I guess.” Bunk picked up a dart, set it down again. “So what about the brother? That house and two million bucks isn’t exactly pocket change.”

“He claims he’s happy being poor. Doesn’t want the money.”

“Oh boy.” Bunk sat on the sill, shaking his head. “You know what I like about you? You’ve been a cop for how long, three years now? You drive a souped up Trans Am, dig jazz, women aren’t exactly repelled by you, and yet you’re naive as the day is long. You actually believe a guy who says he doesn’t want to inherit two million bucks?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Bunk pushed off from the sill. “Keep believing it because the world needs innocent people. But I can’t. I’m trying, but I can’t.”

It was quiet in the squad room, just a faint clicking from Bannister’s computer. Dean was tempted to put a hand on the shoulder of his chief but decided not to.

“What about Rob Clampitt?” said Bunk. “We didn’t get much of a chance to talk to him. You want to check him out?” Bunk smiled. “You know him better than I do. Didn’t you get him to make a little contribution to the town for running a red fight?”

“Well, look who’s here,” said Rob Clampitt, getting up from his desk. “My favorite arresting officer.” Clampitt was a large man with fading good looks, thick gray hair, bags under his eyes. But he looked alert and moved with a quick step. When Dean had pulled him over a year ago, Clampitt had grumbled and cursed but afterwards didn’t seem to hold it against him. The realtor nodded toward a side chair and sat back down behind his desk. A lucite cube on the desk held photos of himself, a woman his age, and two twenties-something children standing outside an RV. On a shelf behind the desk were several tennis trophies.

“Did I ever tell you about that traffic fine, Dean? My lawyer wanted to fight it, can you believe that? The same guy who cost me an arm and a leg over a septic system suit two years ago. You know what I told him?”

“No idea.”

“You’re fired. That’s what I told him. You know who does most of my law work now?”