Page 6 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Polished Off

A firm contralto on my left made me jump. “Counselor, I am
Lieutenant Labelle Gramercy. I understand you knew the deceased
rather well.”
“You gave me quite a start, Lieutenant.”
“Training. I prefer to approach people I do not yet know from the
right, unless, as in your case, they are left-handed.”
That should have been enough to warn me that I was dealing with
no ordinary plainclothes policewoman. But I was still rather full of
myself.
“Wristwatch gave it away, eh? I assume you are in charge. Why
don’t we sit down somewhere private and you can fill me in on the
details.”
“That suits me.” She was certainly shorter than my slightly
stooped five-foot ten, but somehow gave the impression of looking
down at me from a pair of unblinking cold green eyes. “Where do
you suggest?”
She watched my face as I scanned the environs for a nook or
cranny where Iris Call could not overhear us. Finding none, I
shrugged helplessly.
“Let’s go out for a cup of coffee,” she said.
Iris brayed at our backs as we left the shop. “Hey! Bring me back
something to eat, would you?”

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We made our way easily through the now-thinning cordon of
spectators, the lady detective leading the way. A couple of people,
reporters perhaps, tried to approach her with some very serious
questions, but they quickly found themselves dealing with another
sort of gravity. One of them lost control of a hand-held tape recorder
and then stumbled trying to catch it, falling into the other person.
Although I could not see what had happened, I later realized that,
like those of a stage magician, Labelle Gramercy’s hands were often
ignored by her audience at critical moments.
“Let’s go in here,” she said, holding open the door of a coffee
shop at the end of the block. I resisted the old-fashioned urge to grab
the door and insist upon her entering first. We sat down across from
each other at a small table in the back of the place, Labelle facing the

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