Read The Godwulf Manuscript for Free Online Page A

said Haller.
    "What's its effect on Quirk?" I asked.  
    "Hard to say. He doesn't show much, but I don't think he's easy about it. I think he'll book her, but I don't think he's sure she's guilty."
    "What do you think?" I asked.
    "All my clients are innocent."
    "Yeah," I said, "of something, anyway."
    While we waited, the shift changed. Al and Sideburns left. The black cop with the phone departed. The day people came in. Faces shaved, wind-reddened. Smelling of cologne. Some of them had coffee in paper cups they'd bought on the way in. It smelled good. No one offered me any. Belson came back into the office with Terry. They went back into Quirk's office. Haller with them. Quirk yelled from inside.
    "Spenser, come in. You might as well hear the rest."
    I went in. It was crowded in there. Quirk was behind his desk. Terry in a straight chair beside it. Belson, Haller, and I standing against the wall. Quirk's desk was absolutely bare except for a tape recorder and a transparent plastic cube that on all sides contained pictures of a woman, children, and an English setter.
    Quirk turned the recorder on.
    "All right, Miss Orchard, your story and Spenser's match. But that proves nothing much. You had plenty of time to arrange it before we were called. Can you think of any reason why two men would wish to come and kill Dennis Powell?"
    "No, I don't know-maybe." Terry spoke barely above a whisper, and she seemed to sway slightly in the chair as she spoke.
    "Which is it, Miss Orchard?" Quirk's voice was almost entirely without inflection and his thick, pockmarked face was entirely impassive. Terry shook her head.
    Haller said, "Really, Lieutenant; Miss Orchard is about to fall from the chair."
    When Haller talked, the orange level light on the recorder flared brightly.
    "Which is it, Miss Orchard?" Quirk said again, as if Haller hadn't spoken.
    "Well, I think he was involved in the manuscript."
    "Which manuscript?"
    "The one that Mr. Spenser is looking for, the whatchamacallit manuscript."
    I said, "Godwulf," and Quirk said, "Is it the Godwulf Manuscript, Miss Orchard?"
    She nodded.
    Quirk said, "Say yes or no, Miss Orchard; the recorder can't pick up signs."
    "Yes," she said.
    "How was he involved?"
    "I don't know, just that he was, and some faculty member was. I heard him talking on the phone one day."
    "What did they say?"
    "I can't remember."
    "Then why do you think it involved the theft of a manuscript?"
    "I just know. You know how you remember having an idea from a conversation but don't remember the conversation itself, you know?"
    "Why do you think a faculty member is involved, Miss Orchard?"
    She shook her head again.
    "Same reason," she said.
    "Do you think one of the men who you say killed Powell was a professor?"
    "No."
    "Why not?"
    "I don't know. They didn't look like professors."
    "What did they look like?"
    "It's hard to remember. It was so fast. They were both big and had on dark topcoats and hats, regular felt hats, like businessmen wear. The one who shot Dennis had big sideburns, like Prince Albert, you know, along his jaw. He was sort of fat."
    "Black or white?"
    She looked startled. "White," she said.
    "Why would the theft of a manuscript cause two big white men in hats and topcoats to come to your apartment at two thirty A.M. and kill Powell and frame you?"
    "I don't know."
    "Why-" Quirk stopped.
    Tears were running down Terry Orchard's face. She made no sound. She sat still with her eyes closed and the tears coming down her face.
    I said, "Quirk, for crissake…"
    He nodded, turned to Belson.
    "Frank, get a matron and book her."
    Belson took her arm. She stood up. There was no sign that she heard him, or that she heard anything.
    Belson took her out. Haller went with her.
    Quirk said, "So far you're out of it, Spenser. I got nothing to hold you for. But if something does come up I want you to be where I don't have to look for you."
    I got up. "There are whole days at a time, Lieutenant, that go by without me ever