Victims by Collin Wilcox Read Free Book Online Page A

Friedman asked genially, trying to settle his two hundred forty pounds more comfortably on his hard metal chair. “We haven’t let him talk,” he said to me, waving a pudgy hand. “We’ve been doing all the talking.”
    “What about it, Kramer?” I asked. “Will you tell us what happened yesterday? You don’t have to say anything, though. You don’t have to say a word, without your lawyer being present.” I paused, emphasizing the crucial legality of the statement. Then I said, “But if you’re innocent, you’ve got nothing to lose.”
    “And everything to gain,” Friedman put in.
    Kramer snorted: a rueful, contemptuous sound. “Do you expect me to believe that?”
    Friedman shrugged, disarmingly spreading his hands wide across the table. “You help us, we’ll help you. It’s as simple as that. You look to me like someone who’s been around. You should know how it works. You help us, we appreciate it. Everyone profits.”
    “And who helps Alexander Guest? Everyone else? Everyone else in the whole goddam world?”
    “Guest has accused you of murdering Charles Quade at approximately five minutes after one this morning, September twenty-first.” As I said it, I unconsciously lifted my chin, mindful of the microphone built into the room’s single light fixture, directly above us. Because we’d decided not to caution the suspect that he was being recorded, the tape couldn’t be used as evidence. But, to the D.A.’s office, the recording of the interrogation would be an important tool.
    “Acting on Alexander Guest’s written statement,” I said, “which was witnessed by two policemen, we picked you up. We found you exactly where Alexander Guest said you’d be—at the airport, with two tickets in your pocket. That’s a pretty powerful point in his favor.”
    “So, to defend yourself against Guest’s accusations,” Friedman said, “you’ve got to tell us what happened. You’ve got to give us your version. Otherwise, as nearly as I can see, you’re screwed. Badly, permanently screwed.”
    Kramer’s eyes had fallen. The twitching at the corners of his mouth was spasmodic now, constant. His voice was dogged, dull. “I’ve got nothing to hide. Nothing at all.”
    “Then tell us what happened,” I said. “Tell us everything. From the top.”
    Kramer raised his eyes, looked at me for a long, haunted moment. Then, slowly, he shook his head. “I’m so tired,” he muttered. “I didn’t sleep all night.”
    Friedman and I exchanged a covert glance. Instinctively, we felt that this confidence—this admission of confusion—was critically important. Tentatively, the suspect was trusting us with a small confession. He was testing us, making his decision. He was deciding whether to cooperate, whether he thought we’d do as we promised, and help him, if he told us his story. This was the moment that could make the interrogation—make it, or break it.
    The silence lengthened. Then, once again, Kramer began shaking his head. At the same time, his face changed. It was as if some crucial circuit that controlled his facial muscles had suddenly malfunctioned. In seconds, his calm executive’s assurance disappeared, replaced by pain, and uncertainty, and fear, each emotion on painful display, beyond his conscious control. Gordon Kramer was ready to talk.
    “At first,” he said, staring down at the table in front of him, “I was going to have it done. I was going to hire Lester Bennett.” With an effort, he raised his eyes to mine, inquiringly. I nodded. Yes, I knew Lester Bennett. He was a local private investigator with an elegant penthouse, an expensive live-in boyfriend, a pair of his-and-his Porsches—and absolutely no ethics.
    “But Bennett decided not to do it,” Kramer said, speaking faster now, more precisely. Having committed himself to telling his story, he wanted to get through it as quickly as possible. “And I didn’t know of anyone else. So I decided to do it myself. I wasn’t