“Colour?” asked Gilligan.
“Not black,” said Daisy, “and not that new shade of blue that’s so fashionable at the moment. I suppose it must have been brown or grey. Or navy, possibly. No, not navy.”
“Not navy! That’s a great help,” Rosenblatt said sarcastically.
“So we gotta look out for a man in a derby and a brown or grey overcoat. How many d’ya figure there are in Noo York, Mr. Rosenblatt?”
“It might have been a disguise,” proposed Lambert.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern looked at him in silent disgust.
“Yeah, sure. You come up with any new ideas about where the shot came from, Mrs. Fletcher? It coulda come from behind you?”
“Yes, but not from Mr. Thorwald. He was quite close to me. I’m sure I’d have known if he had fired.”
“Even if his gun had a silencer?”
“Yes,” said Daisy, with somewhat less certainty.
“Thorwald!” Miss Genevieve exclaimed scornfully. “Talk about clutching at straws. That man wouldn’t have the guts to … though hedidtackle Lambert,” she reminded herself. “Still, what possible motive could Thorwald have?”
“He was with me for at least an hour beforehand,” Daisy pointed out. “He had no reason to know Carmody would be there. Carmody worked for Pascoli, not Mr. Thorwald.”
“No interest in politics,” Miss Genevieve confirmed. “Words were always his passion, ‘Words, words, words,’ no matter what the matter.”
Gilligan gazed at her blankly. “A word’s a word. You mean Thorwald had words with Carmody?”
“No, Sergeant, I mean nothing of the sort.”
“Sergeant Gilligan,” Rosenblatt broke in, “you better check with Pascoli whether Thorwald had anything to do with Carmody or expressed any interest, but I’d say you’re barking up the wrong tree. Mr. Lambert’s another matter.” He turned to Lambert, who shrank.
“It wasn’t me!”
“Maybe it wasn’t, but there’s this Washington connection we have to follow up. I’ve put in a telephone call to Washington to check your credentials.”
Lambert looked relieved. “Oh, that’s O.K. then.”
“I’m afraid not, not the way things have been in D.C. One of the Harding crowd Carmody blew the whistle on could have hired you to put him away and used his own or his pals’ influence to get you taken on as an agent, for cover.”
“I can’t help feeling,” Daisy murmured, “that they would have chosen someone with decent eyesight and a better aim.”
“It wasn’t like that at all,” Lambert protested. “My dad’s in insurance, see, and I didn’t want to go into insurance. I always wanted to be a federal agent, ever since I was a kid. My dad knows Mr. Hoover, so he …”
“Pulled strings. Yeah, maybe, but it’ll all have to be checked out, which could take a while. I’ll have to ask you not to leave New York, Mr. Lambert, and to notify me or Sergeant Gilligan if you move from this hotel.”
“Oh, I don’t mind doing that. I can’t leave before Mr. Fletcher gets here, anyway.”
“What?” demanded Miss Genevieve. “Why not?”
Daisy hastened to explain before anyone else could get their version in. “I’ve been involved in one or two—well, maybe three or four—of my husband’s cases. Apparently his superiors at the Yard saw fit to advise Mr. Hoover to set a watchdog onto me to make sure I didn’t get mixed up in anything over here.”
“In vain!” Miss Genevieve clapped her hands. “My dear Mrs. Fletcher, I just knew we were kindred souls. One of these days, you must tell me all about everything. But right now, I have to say the role of watchdog seems to me far more appropriate for Mr. Lambert than that of hired assassin.”
Everyone stared at Lambert. His ears turned red and he looked like an overgrown schoolboy.
“Yeah, sure,” said Gilligan in disgust. “O.K., let’s have what you saw and heard over again. Maybe if you think real hard, you’ll remember noticing sumpin Mrs. Fletcher didn’t. Or even think of some other guy that coulda a croaked Carmody.”
“Orlando,” interrupted Miss Cabot. “Orlando, sister?”
