Page 22 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Polished Off

“Let’s go inside,” she said, guiding us toward the shop entrance.
Barely past the portal we were halted by the pell-mell approach
from within of Iris Call and a short bespectacled man in a rumpled
tweed jacket. Iris had a handful of that garment, crushing it further in
a vain attempt to impede his forward motion. Upon spotting us the
normally subducting features of the soon-to-be erstwhile clerk’s facial
map drifted quickly into a continent of high relief.
“Ah! Mr. Keane. Lieutenant Gramercy. This is Paul Wandisi. He
somehow got into the shop while you were out. I found him
rummaging among the rare books. He asked me about the yellow
tape blocking the office and when I told him Mariana had died, he
headed straight for the front door. I did try to stop him.”
“Let me go, you—you harridan!” Wandisi chirped and twisted and
half-pirouetted into a semblance of dignity. He smoothed his jacket
and cranked his clip-on bow tie back to horizontal. “You have no
right to detain me.”
“But I do,” said Labelle Gramercy, showing him her badge. While
the man made a show of scrutinizing her ID, Labelle’s gaze darted
briefly to the plate glass shop window. I followed it and saw the
uniformed officer still on duty. My eyes returned to lock on the
magnified orbs of Wandisi.
“And who, may I ask, are you, sir?”
“I am the decedent’s attorney, Pliny Gracchus Keane. Did you
come in here through the front door?”
The poor fellow had exceedingly foul breath. I could not imagine
Mariana putting up with his entreaties at close range in that cramped
cubbyhole where she had held court.
“If it’s any business of yours, I took the shortcut from the alley
through the back door. It’s usually open, and I see no reason to waste
time walking around to the front of the building when it is out of my
way to do so.”
His tone of voice was as offensive as his halitosis, and I would
have preferred to force an admission that he had bribed the guard. I
didn’t know if Bibliopoly had a rear entrance—much less an alley—
so I held my peace.
“Mr. Wandisi, why did you come back here this afternoon?”
Labelle confronted the man directly. Could he be ambidextrous? I
looked for watches on both wrists.

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