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“It looks that way, Mr. Detweiler,” Monahan agreed. “I’m really sorry.” He paused. “Mr. Detweiler, I have to see the room where she was found. Maybe we’ll find something there that will help us. Could you bring yourself to take me there?”
“Why not?” H. Richard Detweiler replied. “I’m not doing anybody any good here, am I?”
“That’s very good of you, Mr. Detweiler,” Sergeant Monahan said. “I appreciate it very much.”
He waited until Detweiler had stood up and started into the house, then motioned for Wells to follow them.
“What’s your daughter’s name, Mr. Detweiler?” Monahan asked gently. “We
have to have that for the report.”
“Penelope,” Mr. Detweiler said. “Penelope Alice.”
Behind them, as they crossed the foyer to the stairs, Officer Wells began to write the information down on Police Department Form 75–48.
They walked up the stairs and turned left.
“And who besides yourself and Mrs. Detweiler,” Sergeant Monahan asked, “was in the house, sir?”
“Well, Violet, of course,” Detweiler replied. “I don’t know if the cook is here yet.”
“Wells,” Sergeant Monahan interrupted.
“I got it, Sergeant,” Officer Wells said.
“Excuse me, Mr. Detweiler,” Sergeant Monahan said.
Officer Wells let them get a little ahead of them, then, one at a time, he picked two of the half-dozen Louis XIV chairs that were neatly arranged against the walls of the corridor. He placed one over the plastic hypodermic syringe that both he and Sergeant Monahan had spotted, and the second over a length of rubber surgical tubing, to protect them.
Then he walked quickly after Sergeant Monahan and Mr. Detweiler.
Sergeant John Aloysius Monahan was impressed with the size of Miss Penelope Alice Detweiler’s apartment. It was as large as the entire upstairs of his row house off Roosevelt Boulevard. The bathroom was as large as his bedroom. He was a little surprised to find that the faucets were stainless steel. He would not have been surprised if they had been gold.And he was not at all surprised to find, on one of Miss Detweiler’s bedside tables, an empty glassine packet, a spoon, a candle, and a small cotton ball.
He touched nothing.
“Is there a telephone I can use, Mr. Detweiler?” he asked.
Detweiler pointed to the telephone on the other bedside table.
“The detectives like it better if we don’t touch anything,” Monahan said. “Until they’ve had a look.”
“There’s one downstairs,” Detweiler said. “Sergeant, may I now call my funeral director? I want to get…her off the patio. For her mother’s sake.”
“I think you’d better ask the Medical Examiner about that, Mr. Detweiler,” Monahan said. “Can I ask you to show me the telephone?”
“All right,” Detweiler said. “I was thinking of Penny’s mother.”
“Yes, of course,” Monahan said. “This is a terrible thing, Mr. Detweiler.”
He waited until Detweiler started out of the room, then followed him back downstairs. Officer Wells followed both of them. Detweiler led him to a living room and pointed at a telephone on a table beside a red leather chair.
“Officer Wells here,” Monahan said, “has some forms that have to be filled out. I hate to ask you, but could you give him a minute or two?”
“Let’s get it over with,” Detweiler said.
“Officer Wells, why don’t you go with Mr. Detweiler?” Monahan said, waited until they had left the living room, closed the door after them, went to the telephone, and dialed a number from memory.
“Northwest Detectives, Detective McFadden.”
