“You think I did that to Norma? That’s what this is about?” He lurched to his feet and, with contempt, took a swipe at the sheet of paper on his desk and sent it flying. “I would never, could never, do that to her. I loved her.”
“Sit down, Gabe.”
“How can she be dead?” he said, his voice cracking. “I did not harm her.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Sit down and tell me about yesterday. Where were you midafternoon, say between one-thirty and three-thirty?”
The doctor assumed a posture of righteous indignation. Bill waited him out. After half a minute, Driscoll lowered himself into his chair. “I haven’t called on my rural patients since Mila’s been missing. I resumed my route yesterday.”
“Why yesterday? Any particular reason?”
“I felt it was time that I stopped dwelling on my…my personal tragedy and got back to work.”
“Can you provide us with the names of the people you saw, and the route you took?”
“Of course.” He took a fountain pen and paper from his lap drawer and began listing names. When he finished, Thatcher sat forward, took the paper from him and pocketed it.
“Thank you, Gabe,” Bill said. “I’ve talked myself dry and could do with a glass of water. Mr. Hutton?”
“Sounds good.”
Thatcher could tell that Driscoll saw through the ploy and didn’t like leaving them, but his other choice was to appear overly nervous. “Of course.” He got up and left the room. His footsteps echoed down the hallway toward the back of the house.
Bill leaned toward Thatcher, his eyebrows raised in an unspoken question.
“He believes the baby is his,” Thatcher said quietly. “He’s convinced that her love was true and that he was her only lover. He’s lying about them parting on good terms, though. There was something there.”
“I caught that, too. Maybe she was being pushy about marriage plans. He was afraid of public opinion. That would have given him a motive to shut her up, and yesterday’s route gave him opportunity.”
Thatcher stated flatly, “I don’t think he did it.”
Bill was taken aback. “Why not?”
“If he’d’ve inflicted those injuries, he’d’ve come apart while he was talking through them.”
“He lied to Bernie about seeing Norma only one time. He gave a good performance of an hysterical husband the morning after Mila’s disappearance.”
“But he wasn’t at the scene of the crime.” Thatcher bent down and picked up Dr. Perkins’s list from the floor. “This amounts to the scene of the crime. I don’t believe he did these things.”
“But?”
“But I think he got rid of Mrs. Driscoll.”
“To be with Norma?”
“He admitted that he couldn’t help himself, that she was a drug and he couldn’t get enough. Guys in the trenches would say he was pussy whipped.”
“What do you say?”
“That’s my thinking, too.”
Bill gave him a wry grin, but it was short-lived and turned into a frown. “We don’t have a body, Thatcher. Not a solid clue as to what happened to Mila. As you know, the prosecutor won’t indict on circumstantial evidence alone. A mistress, even an exotically beautiful, sexually uninhibited one, isn’t evidence.”
Thatcher said, “Well then, only one thing left to do.”
“Let him get away with it?”
“Get him to confess.”
Before Bill could comment, they heard Gabe returning. He walked into the room carrying a glass of water in each hand. He set one in front of Thatcher, the other in front of Bill, and returned to his chair behind the desk.
Then the three sat with nobody saying anything. Bill drank from his water glass, then smoothed his mustache as he did when muddling through a dilemma. This time, however, Thatcher believed it was more for effect.
Finally he said, “Gabe, the view from where I’m sitting doesn’t look good. Within two months’ time, your wife has gone missing, and your mistress died of injuries sustained during a brutal sexual assault.”
Gabe swallowed audibly but didn’t say anything.
Bill continued, “Now either the stars just really aren’t lining up favorably for you, or an enemy is setting you up to do you in, or you’re doing yourself in. Help me out here.”
The doctor took several shallow breaths, like he was pumping up his courage. “I’ve owned up to having a passionate affair with Norma. Like all lovers, we had our spats. But I would never have done to her what was done.”
“You were with her on two separate occasions the day Mrs. Driscoll disappeared.”
Mention of that out of context momentarily flustered him. “I told you that myself.”
“I remember.” Bill looked down and seemed to study the pattern of the rug