The Drowning Pool Read Free Page B

first, he observed nothing out of the ordinary. Then he saw a few dark brown spots on the floor and the back wall.
    “We’ll check them against Bradshaw’s type. Someone washed up most of it. The victim’s wound would have caused profuse bleeding. There should be a lot more blood than this.”
    “Assuming he was killed here,” St. Croix said with a slight note of skepticism.
    “Oh, he was,” Fitzpatrick said. “I even think we’ve got the murder weapon.” The lab man carefully displayed a long-bladed, all-purpose knife.
    “Where was it?”
    “On the floor, over in that corner.” Fitzpatrick pointed to the darkest part of the room. Gardner noticed how clean the blade was.
    “Find any prints?”
    “I sincerely hope you mean that as a joke, Mike.”
    If there were anything else, Fitz would find it. Except for an occasional drinking binge when his wife was out of town visiting her family, Fitz was competent—and having met the termagant, Gardner could readily understand why Fitz felt the need to celebrate her infrequent departures.
    “I think we ought to bring Ms. Rhoades and Sonny in here.”
    St. Croix remained silent but left immediately, only to return like a Mercurial messenger moments later with both parties in tow.
    “How accessible is this storeroom?” Gardner asked Ms. Rhoades.
    “Obviously, we keep it locked at all times. There are a lot of valuable pieces of equipment in here. Only staff have keys.” As Gardner scrutinized Martha Rhoades more closely, he decided her unattractiveness went beyond mere physical appearance; it had more to do with her attitude, which struck him as patronizing and overbearing.
    “And the same key opens both doors?”
    “Of course.”
    Gardner looked around. One door led to the pool area, and the second led outside. If Bradshaw had been able to enter through this second door, no one in the pool area would have seen him.
    “Do either of you know who owns this knife?”
    “It’s mine,” Sonny said, his lips drawn thin.
    “Where do you usually keep it?”
    “Right here in the utility room.”
    “In plain view?”
    “Well, sure, it has to be handy. I need a blade sometimes, ’cause of the maintenance work.”
    Gardner couldn’t think of any more questions to ask for the moment so he let them go. Besides, the glare from Sonny’s teeth was hard to take even in a dark room.
     
    On the brief drive to Richard Bradshaw’s apartment, Bert began to talk. “It must have been a man. A woman couldn’t do it.”
    “Why not?”
    Bert shot him a disapproving look. “You saw the size of that Bradshaw guy. Must have weighed at least two hundred pounds, and he was easily over six feet tall.”
    “Six feet two,” Gardner corrected.
    “And you think a woman could have carried or even dragged him to the pool from that utility room?”
    “An especially strong woman.” He thought fleetingly of Martha Rhoades and her physical characteristics. “I’ve seen some women body builders who were amazingly strong. And then, of course, a woman might have a male accomplice, or it could have been two women acting together.”
    “Wacko theories. Nine times out of ten it’s the obvious choice that’s right.”
    “So you think it was Sonny?”
    “That’s right, I do.”
    “What was his motive?”
    “How the hell should I know right off? They say around headquarters that you got some special kind of insight into people. I think maybe you’re over-rated.”
    Gardner trusted his instincts; they told him Bert’s hostility was directed at the world in general, not himself in particular. Whatever was troubling her, and something definitely was, she needed to talk it out—still, that couldn’t be hurried or forced.
    St. Croix rang the bell to the Bradshaw apartment and then waited with impatience.
    “Who is it?” a woman’s soft voice wafted through the door.
    “Police,” Bert called out in a throaty voice.
    The door was opened by a willowy brunette whose age Gardner estimated