Murder on the Tropic

by Todd Downing

  “Good God! There’s nothing more to tell!” Falter broke out in open impatience. “It was early in the afternoon, during the siesta, when the sun is at its hottest. Stahl wasn’t used to it and went out in the patio without a hat on. He was found there, where he had fallen.”

  “Who found him?”

  “His stepson, Mark Arnhardt.”

  “How soon after that did he die?”

  “A little after midnight that night.”

  “Was he conscious any of the time?”

  “Yes, I suppose you’d call it conscious. He acted sort of dazed and afraid and was in a lot of pain—in the stomach and abdomen, it seemed. I think the sun affected his brain. For a long time he kept talking about how yellow the air was.”

  Rennert said sharply: “Yellow?”

  “Yes.” Falter reached over, filled another glass with water and drank it. “Several times while I was in the room with him he mentioned it.”

  “Was anyone with him before he died?”

  “Yes, Arnhardt and Ann Tolman took turns staying by his bed.”

  Rennert leaned forward to tap ashes into a brown earthenware bowl. His face was grave.

  “Were there any flowers in his room?” he asked.

  “Flowers? Why, I don’t remember.”

  “In what part of the patio,” Rennert persisted, “was Stahl lying when he was found?”

  “On the south side, the corner between the main door and your room.”

  “Near the bed of yellow marigolds?”

  “Yes. In fact, I believe he had actually fallen into the marigolds.” Falter continued to look at him speculatively. “What’s the matter?” There was a tight strained quality to his voice. “What have those flowers got to do with it?”

  Rennert didn’t answer for a moment. He raised the cigarette to his lips and inhaled slowly. He let the smoke trickle through his nostrils and said: “Nothing, probably. But don’t you see the coincidence?”

  Falter stared at him. There were little beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead.

  “You mean with Miguel’s talk about the flowers being yellow?” He spoke as if unwillingly.

  “Yes—and with that particular color of flower.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t you know what yellow flowers—specifically yellow marigolds—mean throughout the length and breadth of Mexico?”

  “No, I can’t say that I do.”

  “They mean,” Rennert said quietly, “death.”

  6

  Moist Fingers on Glass

  Falter sat upright in his chair, his hands gripping the edge of the desk. The handkerchief lay unheeded before him.

  “Oh, see here!” he protested. “That’s being rather melodramatic, isn’t it?”

  Rennert nodded. “Very. I merely remarked on the coincidence.”

  The light glinted against Falter’s narrowed blue eyes. His voice was faintly derisive: “Yet you put some stock in it,” he stated rather than asked.

  “At least,” Rennert said evenly, “I don’t deny the possibility that there’s some factor there I haven’t grasped yet. Things have a way of happening in a melodramatic manner in Mexico.”

  Neither of them spoke for several seconds.

  Rennert felt a thin trickle of perspiration run down his cheek. His clothing adhered to his body. The exhilaration which had followed his bath was gone now and in its place he was conscious of a sensation of lassitude, as if the air in the room were growing stale and oppressively heavy. He realized that he was breathing with his mouth partially open. He glanced into the patio, half-shadowed by the slanting rays of the sun, and wondered when the coolness that comes with sunset on the desert would begin to make itself felt.…

  The doorway was vacant one moment. The next moment a figure stood there, silhouetted against the light.

  “Lee! I’ll be damned!” Falter cried. He got to his feet and strode around the side of the desk as a little wizened Chinaman came into the room.

  The man wore a baggy blue serge suit and, incongruously, a tight slipover sweater of robin’s-egg blue. He was nodding vigorously, a broad smile rounding his face.

  “Hello, boss! Glad see you again.”

  Falter went up and clapped a hand on his shoulder.

  “Glad to see you, Lee. Where in the hell have you been?”

  Lee’s black button-like eyes twinkled with inner merriment.

  “Mexico City, boss. Have good time, see uncle and cousins. Money all gone now. Come back cook.”

  “Fine. The kitchen’s yours. What about a good dinner tonight, like you used to cook?”

  “Good dinner, good dinner, yes. Velly soon now.” Lee nodded his small sparsely covered head.

  “There are seven of us now, Lee. Mr. Rennert here is staying with us.”

  The Chinaman jerked his head toward Rennert and, after a moment’s scrutiny, said with no alteration of his smile: “Velly glad to know, boss.”

  When he had gone Rennert said to Falter: “Suppose we take this opportunity to look at the kitchen ourselves.”

  “All right.”

  Outside Falter stopped for a moment at the edge of the paving and thrust a toe into the ground.

  “You’re right,” he nodded without looking at Rennert, “water has been spilled out here. Lots of it, too.”

  They entered the inner patio through an arch, over which climbed a many-tendriled vine alive with a species of russet and maroon orchid.

  The patio itself was similar to the outer one, but smaller and without a fountain. Rennert, glancing hastily over the flowers with which it was filled, caught the red of hibiscus and the golden yellow of marigolds. He said to Falter: “I can’t get over my surprise at these flowers. If this were in New York a florist would have a fortune here.”

  Falter said without much interest: “Yes, I suppose it is unusual to find so many kinds growing in this part of the country. I understand that in the old days the Flores family went in for flowers in a big way, brought specimens here from all over Mexico. Being right on the Tropic of Cancer they could cultivate both tropical and temperate varieties. I understand that Toledano Flores—that was the grandfather of the young Mexican who’s staying here—did a lot of experimenting and produced some new varieties. Lots of them died during the Revolution but Maria has kept most of them alive.”

  ‘“Flores’ means ‘flowers.’ I suppose these gardens were a sort of family monument, as it were.”

  “I suppose so.” Falter turned to the left and led the way to a room on the west.

  It was a large square room, paved with worn dark red tiles. The ceiling was darkened by smoke. A tiled charcoal stove stood opposite the door. Polished pans and other utensils hung about the walls.

  Lee stood in the center, his gaze darting quickly from object to object, as if taking inventory.

  Maria Montemayor was in the corner, bending over a steaming pottery bowl that rested on a flat circular tray of clay set on a horseshoe-shaped hearth of plastered stones. She looked up as they entered but said nothing. Rennert noticed that she kept her eyes carefully averted from the Chinaman.

  Lee gestured with a thumb toward the adjoining room.

  “Have all same room, boss?” he inquired.

  “Yes,” Falter told him, “you can have the same room. Nobody’s used it since you left.”

  Rennert had walked over to the south wall and was kneeling upon the floor, where stood five glass bottles. One of them was empty, another partially so. He gestured toward the empty one.

  “This was emptied last night?”

  “Yes.” Falter came and stood beside him.

  Rennert stared at it thoughtfully for a moment.

  “Do you mind,” he asked, getting up, “if I take it to my room?”

  “Sure not.” Falter’s perpetually narrowed eyes fastened on Rennert’s face. “Fingerprints?” he asked in a low voice.

  Rennert had taken out his handkerchief and with it picked up the bottle.
r />   “Yes, unless I’m mistaken there are some on this glass.”

  “I thought about looking for them on those bottles but had no way of examining them. You have?”

  “Yes, since Solier employed me as a detective I have tried to live up to the best detective standards.”

  Falter turned to Maria, who had removed the bowl from the rude stove and was moving toward the door.

  “You don’t need to do the cooking any more, Maria. Lee will take charge now.”

  “Si, señor.” Her expression did not change.

  Falter followed Rennert into the patio.

  “I think,” he said, “that I’ll go to my room and lie down a while. I don’t feel very well. The heat has been almost too much for me the last few days. Dinner will be served about six. In the meantime make yourself at home. The living room—the sala we call it—is over there to the left of the main entrance. There’s a radio.”

  “Very well, thanks.”

  Rennert was watching Maria’s progress through the flowers toward a door on the north side. He saw her stop once, bend over and remove with careful fingers a withered leaf from the stalk of a red poinsettia.

  “One more question while I’m giving vent to my curiosity,” he said as he followed Falter into the front patio. “I saw a young Mexican out here this afternoon. I suppose it was Esteban Flores?”

  “Yes, he’s still waiting for parts for his plane.”

  Rennert watched Falter’s face as he spoke. “He was carrying a black case and a spade when I saw him. It struck me that this was a hot afternoon for digging.”

  “Oh, that!” Falter smiled. “The young fellow spends his time in the mornings and the late afternoons digging up on the hillside back of the house.” He paused at the door of his room and gazed up at the sky. “It seems that that grandfather of his I was telling you about was killed here during the Revolution. They’ve never found his body. Flores is looking for it.”

  “This is rather a late date to be doing that, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, but they dug up the whole place after they came into possession again. No luck. Flores hasn’t said much since he’s been here but I think he’s run across some proof that the body was buried up there on the hill. These old Mexican families are proud as hell, you know, and they think it’s a disgrace if some member isn’t given Christian burial. Personally, I doubt whether he’ll ever find any trace of the old boy.”

  Rennert walked toward his room, the water bottle held carefully under an arm.

  He happened to glance in the window beside his door and stopped stockstill.

  Mark Arnhardt was standing upon a chair and reaching over the top of the tall wardrobe. As Rennert watched he drew back his hand and got down. He held an oblong pasteboard box, decorated gaudily with multicolored ribbons.

  Rennert opened the door and went in.

  7

  Unguessed Depths

  “Hello,” Rennert said. A slow flush mounted to Arnhardt’s cheeks and he screwed the side of his mouth into a wry smile. He had changed to a white Palm Beach suit that looked too small for his large muscular body. It emphasized, too, the tanned skin of his face and hands.

  “Oh, hello, Rennert.” He shifted his weight awkwardly from one foot to the other. “I’m intruding again. Sorry. You see,” he cleared his throat with unnecessary force, “I wanted to get this box that had been left in here. I knocked but you weren’t in so I took the liberty of coming in anyway. Hope you won’t mind?” His smile was suddenly pleasant and boyish, breaking the tension of his lips.

  “Not at all,” Rennert said. “I still feel as if I were imposing on you.”

  Arnhardt stuffed the box (it looked to Rennert like an ordinary candy box) into a pocket of his coat and stood in the same posture as before, with a thumb hooked about his belt and an arm held out akimbo.

  “Won’t you sit down?” Rennert invited.

  Arnhardt hesitated a moment, let his arm fall and moved toward a chair. He lowered himself into it as if uncertain of its stability. It creaked beneath his weight.

  Rennert extended cigarettes.

  “No, thanks.” Arnhardt brought out a pipe and tobacco pouch. “I’d rather smoke this.”

  For an interval both were intent upon their lights. Rennert sat opposite Arnhardt and regarded him through a haze of smoke. He saw the brown protruding eyes rest for an instant questioningly upon the water bottle which he had placed on a table.

  “I suppose you know, Arnhardt, why I’m here?”

  The young man brought his attention quickly back.

  “Falter told me that you were here to look after some business for the company.”

  “Did he tell you anything more explicit?”

  “Why, no. But then I never pay much attention to the business side of the company. I let Falter and Solier attend to that. I’ve been busy lately getting this power plant in shape to supply electricity to the place.”

  “It has been installed recently?” Rennert asked with some surprise.

  “Yes, we just got it in working order last week.”

  Rennert centered his attention for a moment on his cigarette before he went on: “I was going to explain about that water bottle. I understand that someone has been making away with the drinking water here. Mr. Solier asked me to investigate.”

  “Oh, that.” Arnhardt’s eyebrows drew together so that he seemed to be staring at the tip of his pipe. “It is peculiar, isn’t it? I don’t know who could be doing it.”

  “You don’t know of anyone who might be interested in forcing you people to move?”

  “No,” accompanied by a slow negative movement of the head, “I don’t. The whole thing seems senseless. I feel sure, though, that it’s someone from outside.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, it stands to reason, doesn’t it? Those doors to the patio are never locked. It would be easy enough for someone to come in.”

  “But the kitchen is locked at night, Falter tells me.”

  “Yes,” Arnhardt thought a moment. “But Maria lost her keys not long ago. Someone might have picked them up.”

  “Is there anyone living hereabouts?”

  “Nobody at all, for miles and miles, that I know of. Of course these hills are full of caves. Someone might be hiding out there and coming in at night for water. Some spring that he had been depending on may have gone dry. That’s the only explanation I’ve been able to think of.”

  “How long has this been going on?”

  “Ever since I’ve been down here—about two weeks.

  “You came down with your stepfather, George Stahl, I understand.”

  “Yes.”

  “His death was regrettable. Sunstroke, I believe?”

  There was a hint of reserve in Arnhardt’s manner and of curtness in his voice as he said: “Yes.”

  Rennert had the feeling that he was venturing upon exceedingly thin ice that might at any moment precipitate him into unguessed depths. He persisted, however: “You were with him, I believe, after his stroke?”

  “Yes.” Arnhardt’s tone was brittle.

  “Falter tells me that he kept talking about the air being yellow.”

  “Yes. It was the effect of the sun.”

  “It conveyed no other meaning to you?”

  “No. Why should it?” Arnhardt’s face was rigid and in the dimming light looked darkly threatening.

  Rennert said quietly: “You knew that Miguel was taken sick this afternoon?”

  “No.”

  “He has been confusing the colors of the flowers in his room. They seem yellow to him.”

  Arnhardt stared straight at Rennert’s face for perhaps five seconds. He seemed to choke then and said indistinctly: “Yellow?”

  “Yes, the similarity of the two cases struck me as odd.”

  Arnhardt got slowly to his feet, one hand cramming the pipe into a pocket. His eyes went to the door, as if seeking escape.

  “God, this is terrible!” he said in an unsteady voice.
“Let me get out in the air and think, will you?”

  8

  A Lighted Candle

  Rennert walked along a narrow path between scarlet carnations and red and yellow columbines, their colors deepened by the shade.

  The rim of the sun was touching the ocherous red tiles of the roof. It had, Rennert thought, an oddly suffused glow, as if he were looking at it through cellophane. The atmosphere seemed heavier, laden with odors of the parched earth and of the many flowers. Not a breath of air stirred the little sea of petals and leaves.

  He came to the open door of the Montemayor quarters.

  Upon a cot at the opposite side of the room lay an elderly Mexican, his lined face impassive. Rennert thought at first that he was staring at the ceiling but saw in a moment that his eyes were closed. The only movement visible was in his hands, like brown talons, that kept twisting as if in pain at the bedclothes.

  On a low table beside him stood a brown pottery bowl filled with red hibiscus flowers.

  Deep in an alcove cut in the wall at the head of the bed rested a small wax image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, the hem of her skirt and her feet hidden behind a banked mass of white floripondio blossoms. In front of them a candle burned with a steady flame.

  Maria Montemayor was kneeling upon the floor, her gaze fixed upon the wax figure. For at least three minutes, as Rennert stood upon the threshold, there was no movement at all discernible in her body.

  He waited—not without a feeling of self-reproach at his intrusion.

  She rose finally, her fingers going nimbly through the movements of the cross, and turned. As she saw him her face froze into immobility and a thinly veiled look of hostility sprang into her eyes.

  She moved toward him quickly and stood barring the doorway.

  “What is it, señor?” Emotion ruffled the flat monotonous surface of her speech.

  “Is it permitted to see Miguel?”

  She shook her head and threw her shoulders back defensively.

  “No, señor, you can do nothing for him.”

  “You wanted someone to tell him that those flowers were red, not yellow. I thought I would do so.”

  With one hand she reached backward and closed the door. A vague smile touched her lips without altering the stonelike quality of her face.