Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver Read Free Book Online

like that of the jail proper, was battleship gray: gray walls, gray ceiling, dirty gray outside bars over gray-trimmed sooty windows. I blinked. There was even a gray cement floor. What unsung genius of a paint salesman, I wondered, had thus seduced the county purchasing agent? The gray walls were
mostly mercifully overlaid with a lush mural of commercial calendars variously depicting and advertising handcuffs, leg irons, straitjackets, riot guns, tear-gas bombs and similar adjuncts to institutional decorum. There were still other calendars devoted to the more gracious aspects of jail living, such as seatless toilets (warranted absolutely unbreakable), roach powders, various insecticides and delousers, and—I found my gaze lingering—a miraculous spray compound guaranteed to make any jail in the world smell like the middle of a pine forest … .
    â€œCan it be possible?” I thought, wistfully skeptical. Maybe I could wire for a supply if I took this case.
    Stuck against the far wall was the inevitable optical chart to test the vision of applicants for drivers’ licenses, and about which some of the Sheriff’s political detractors claimed darkly, I suddenly recalled, that all but the most myopic applicant would pass if he could but discern the chart itself.
    â€œP-L-U-T-O,” the Lieutenant was repeating glibly, “5, 0, 7, 8, 4 …” and so on down the list. I tilted my horn-rim glasses up on my forehead and was greeted by a blur. I walked over to the chart. “Once more, Lieutenant,” I said. “Please. I can’t believe it.”
    The Lieutenant again read rapidly and accurately down through the list.
    â€œWell,” I said, returning to my chair, “there goes one possible defense out the window.”
    The Lieutenant’s dark eyes bored into mine. “What’s that?” he said.
    â€œI’m afraid,” I said dryly, “that you can’t very well claim that your shooting was a case of mistaken identity.”
    The Lieutenant grunted unsmilingly and resumed his cool inventory of the room. Here was one murder defendant, I saw, who did not like to joke about the fix he was in.
    One entire gray wall, like a sort of shrine, was devoted to the great man himself, Sheriff Max Battisfore. It was all but covered with photographs, all framed under glass, of the Sheriff as a Public Man, all testifying mutely, in various brotherly attitudes, of his undying love for his fellow citizens—and voters. The Sheriff was shown shaking hands, embracing or being embraced, and occasionally both; he was depicted eating pie, catching and eating smelt, giving or receiving various awards, cups and plaques, and crowning, of course, an endless assortment of queens.
    â€œLove, your spell is everywhere,” I murmured.

    â€œHm …” the Lieutenant said. “He must own stock in Eastman Kodak.”
    There were other pictures of the Sheriff, many others, posed smilingly with politicians ranging from notaries to governors, all winners, and others with people whose affiliations, amidst such a glut of good fellowship, I could not immediately make out. Also prominently displayed, of course, were the framed diplomas which the Sheriff had won for the cleanliness of his jail. One diploma that caught my eye I determined I must one day steal, I simply had to have it. Some ironic wag had squashed a cockroach on the outside glass, where it remained, and from whence, embalmed in its own juice, it beckoned the beholder in a sort of macabre good-jailkeep-ing seal of approval. I sighed and turned to the Lieutenant.
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    â€œBefore we talk about your case, Lieutenant, suppose we talk a little about you,” I said. “Sort of helps a lawyer to get the feel of his case, to sense some of the things that mightn’t be in the law books. I believe the psychologists sometimes call this the frame of reference.”
    â€œI wouldn’t know,” Lieutenant Manion