Father's Day Murder by Lee Harris Read Free Book Online Page B

number.”
    I held. I had the feeling that all of a sudden I had learned something significant.

5
    I sat there with the number of the Waldorf-Astoria and the room the Bellers were staying in staring me in the face. There was no question in my mind that Fred Beller had known well in advance of his trip to New York that the Morris Avenue Boys were having a reunion on Father’s Day. Just because he never showed up didn’t mean he didn’t receive an invitation. He had received one and timed his visit to coincide with the reunion. For all I knew, he might have had dinner in the same restaurant at the same time. I wondered if the detectives investigating the Wien homicide knew about this, and I thought it was very likely that they did not.
    I picked up the phone again and dialed the Waldorf. The phone in the Bellers’ room rang several times and I was about to give up when a woman answered.
    “I’d like to speak to Fred Beller, please.”
    “Just a minute.” Off the phone she called, “Come on back, Fred. It’s for you.”
    He answered a moment later.
    “Mr. Beller, my name is Christine Bennett. I’m looking into the murder of your friend Arthur Wien for Dr. Morton Horowitz, and I’d like to talk to you while you’re still in New York.”
    There was a moment of silence. “Mort told you I was here?”
    Another bombshell. Morton Horowitz had known all the time we were talking this afternoon that Fred Beller was in town and he had never mentioned it. “He didn’t. But I’d like to talk to you.”
    “My wife and I are on our way out. Can this wait until tomorrow?”
    “Tomorrow would be fine. What time is good for you?”
    “Uh, let’s see.” He covered the phone and I heard murmurings. “How’s lunchtime tomorrow? We’ll be back at the hotel around noon.”
    “I’ll be there.”
    He told me quickly where to find him—or where he would look for me—and we hung up. I was tempted to call Dr. Horowitz and confront him with what I had learned, but I decided I would gain nothing and I didn’t want to alienate him.
    Instead, I went into the family room and sat down. I had scarcely read the paper today, and I picked it up and started turning pages while Jack kept his nose in his book.
    Finally, he looked up. “For God’s sake, Chris, tell me!”
    I laughed and put the paper aside. “You were eavesdropping.”
    “Eavesdropping schmeavesdropping. What the hell is going on?”
    “The elusive Mr. Fred Beller, who has not attended a Morris Avenue Boys reunion in lo these many years, was in New York during the reunion and still is.”
    “That’s a big wow. How the hell did you find that out?”
    I told him. When I was finished, I asked, “Do I call NYPD and give them this information?”
    Jack looked conflicted. He always looks conflictedwhen I ask him questions that put the job and me on opposing sides. “Save it,” he said. “You’re seeing this guy tomorrow?”
    “Lunchtime. I better call Elsie.”
    “I’ll watch Eddie. It’s OK. We’ll talk about it when you come back. If you give this up to the cops now, they’ll move in and crowd you out. This is something good, Chris. I want you to run with it before they stop you.”
    I was glad he’d said it. I have to admit that when I stumble on something as tantalizing as this, I hate to think that it’s my duty to tell the police and then politely back off, because it’s a personal thing for me. My ego gets involved in the cases I work on even more than it does for the detectives whose jobs are investigating whatever hits their desks. I also know that their case loads pile up while for me a case is the center of my interest. Eventually, if I was successful, everything I knew would be turned over to the proper people, but for the moment, I wanted to track down my lead as far as I was able.
    When I finished with the Times , I took a few clean sheets of paper and organized what I had learned today about the men who were my best suspects. I listed them