Murder on the Potomac by Margaret Truman Read Free Book Online Page A

said.
    He followed Chip up a wide curved staircase to the study on the second level where Tierney sat in a large red leather chair facing the door. He sprang to his feet, crossed the room, and extended his hand. “Right on time, Mac. But no surprise there. Come in, come in.”
    Smith said something noncommittal; to say he was pleased to be there would have misrepresented the truth. Tierney led him to where the others now stood. “Mac Smith, let me introduce you to these gentlemen, and lady, from the police department.” The two men wore discount-store suits of an undefined color and sported requisite short haircuts. They were detectives Winters and Casale. The woman was introduced as “Detective Darcy Eikenberg. The lead investigator in this tragedy.”
    As Smith took her outstretched hand, he was aware that it was exquisitely manicured: Long red nails, more like talons, seemed distinctly at odds with her job.
    “Detective Eikenberg and I have met,” Smith said. “You were a student of mine not long ago.”
    “I certainly was. You gave a night course on the law and contemporary urban ills. A requisite course, I believe. I’m a thesis away from my Ph.D. at GW in urban studies.”
    Smith smiled. “And I attended one of
your
lectures,” he said. “About a year ago. You spoke to a criminal-justice class on new forensic techniques. I had some free time and dropped in. I was especially interested in that electrostatic detection equipment. What did you say? It can analyze indented writing as many as twenty pages down in a pad of paper?”
    She’d held his hand throughout the exchange. Now she withdrew it, smiled, and said, “You have a good memory, Professor. And I should tell you that your class was the highlight of my Ph.D. program.”
    “I hope not,” he said.
    As he sat next to Tierney, he thought that of all the detectives with whom he’d come in contact during his long career as a criminal attorney, none looked like Darcy Eikenberg. She was tall—five-eleven, he guessed—had a head of thick, luxuriant brown hair that was more a mane and a face shaped by a master craftsman who’d had an uncanny sense of symmetry and proportion.
    Her tall, lithe body was no less carefully crafted. Most female detectives Smith had known (their numbers grew at an astounding rate) tended to dress in the same uncaring way as the majority of their male counterparts. Not Detective Eikenberg. She looked ready to present takeover plans to General Motors’ board. The black linen suit said it had come from the most expensive rack in an expensive shop. The white silk blousefeatured a large bow at the neck, and it said: Woman. A detective? If the old game show
What’s My Line?
were still on TV, she’d be certain to stump the panel.
    With everyone seated again, Smith asked Eikenberg to fill him in on Pauline Juris’s murder.
    “Not much to tell you,” she said, one shapely leg crossing over the other. “The body was found early this morning by a park ranger on Roosevelt Island. Positive I.D. on Ms. Juris. Blow to the head with a heavy but clearly defined object.”
    “ ‘Clearly defined’?” Smith said. “Like the head of a hammer?”
    “It wasn’t a hammer. Body was partially submerged along with debris on the shoreline, just below the pedestrian causeway to the island.”
    “Fully clothed?” Smith asked.
    Eikenberg laughed and looked at her male assistants. “Do you have the feeling
we’re
being investigated by the learned professor?” She said it in such a way that Smith would not take offense. Which he wouldn’t have no matter how she’d said it.
    “Sorry,” Smith said. “Can’t get out of the habit.”
    Eikenberg said coyly, “Teasing.”
    Smith turned to Tierney. “Wendell, I’m not sure why I’m here. Could we go into another room?”
    Tierney looked to the detectives for the answer. “Are you through with me?” he asked.
    “I think so, Mr. Tierney,” Eikenberg said, recrossing her legs.