The Body Looks Familiar by Richard Wormser

you can prove, but some good leads for you to investigate?”
    Cap Martin said, “Sure.”
    Dave Corday’s voice had its solid, judicial boom back in it. “Well, report to me the moment you have anything.”
    “Sure,” Cap Martin said, and then there was a click as the captain hung up.
    Dave Corday laid his hands flat on the desk blotter, rested his weight on them. The box said, “The district attorney would like to see you, Mr. Corday. I told him you were on the phone.”
    Dave Corday said, “Sure.” He raised his hands, and saw that they had left damp marks on the blotter.
    But the district attorney only wanted him on a matter of magistrates; one was resigning, and the mayor wanted advice as to the appointment of a successor. It was just a routine matter.

 
Chapter 12
     
    AFTER HE FINISHED TALKING to Dave Corday on the phone, Cap Martin allowed himself to smile, something he rarely did in office hours. As he saw his duty, his primary function at the moment was to be the conscience of the city’s law-enforcement agencies; and in goading Dave Corday, he had insured his intangible boss, Justice, that the D.A.’s office would not drop the Guild case for another twenty-four hours.
    He sighed.
    Though the head of no homicide squad can ever be absolutely certain when his day’s work will end, Cap Martin indulged himself in a daydream of leaving the office at five-thirty, getting home at six.
    The barb he had sunk in Dave Corday’s rather thin hide would keep on working, festering. Frightened—but not so frightened that they struck back and wiped out one Captain B. Martin—the politicians would turn up his witness for him… He could go home pretty soon now.
    His wife would have martini makings laid out, and he would stir two good ones for himself and one for her; with the cocktail he would have—if there were any in the house—some of those little cocktail sausages that Lora broiled under the electric skillet…
    Unless the missing witness was a very, very big man indeed, no Dave Corday, no mayor, no politician at all would cover up for him at the risk of his own career. Politicians are not that unselfish.
    Renewed by the cocktails, he would suggest that Lora have her brother and his wife over for the evening. Matt was as silent as Cap Martin pretended to be around headquarters; unlike traditional brothers-in-law, Matt’s idea of a big evening was sitting in a deep chair and listening to Cap Martin sound off. On any subject—art, politics, the movies.
    Let the wiseacres over at City Hall and the County Building sleep in fear tonight. Tomorrow they’d make a move that would go to Chief Latson and draw utility men to help him and—
    At the silent mention of Jim Latson, Cap Martin stopped rubbing his hands together and looking at his wrist watch.
    Instead of running for cover—and leaving a trail to that cover—Jim Latson was perfectly capable of doing something so wild and unpredictable that the whole case would disintegrate.
    To hell with it. He had earned his pay today.
    He got up, put on his hat and coat, moved to the door. Then he stopped, and stood there. From somewhere around his toenails he gathered a sigh, shot it out into the empty room.
    Then he went over to the closet, put his hat and coat away again, went back to his desk, sat down, and flipped the intercom. “Jake? Bring me the logs of every cruiser that was working within three miles of Hogan DeLisle’s apartment on the watch when she was killed, and the watch before it.”
    He flipped the box shut and picked up the phone, dialed his home and got ready to tell his wife he’d be late for dinner. He didn’t think he’d surprise her.
    She had been with him most of the years he had walked his tightrope in the department. She was used to his hours.
    He told himself fiercely that it was not civic conscience, the desire to earn all his pay, that made him stay. It was simple self-defense.
    Somebody big enough to get personal protection from Jim