Invitation to Murder

by Zenith Brown

  “I’m sorry, Doctor. I don’t blame you for being sore. But my position isn’t quite the way you stated it. Will you give me five minutes? Or can I come out and talk to you while you eat?”

  Dr. McNair sat down. “I’ll give you five minutes.”

  “Thanks. I got here this afternoon. I’d seen Mrs. de Gradoff three months ago. I was appalled today at the change in her. She told me she’d been to a doctor because she couldn’t sleep or eat. The doctor told her there was nothing wrong with her and if she was afraid of cancer she ought to go to a hospital for a checkup. She dropped the bottle of Nembutal you gave her out of her bag—that’s how I got your name. She also told me that her husband is violently opposed to the use of sleeping pills. His first wife—”

  “She told me that.”

  “She said, also, that you acted as if you thought she was lying about her symptoms.”

  “About the cause of her symptoms,” Dr. McNair said evenly. He looked steadily at Fish. “Let me ask you a question. Did Mrs. de Gradoff tell you I advised her to go into the hospital for a week, to see if her symptoms wouldn’t disappear?”

  There was no mistaking the irony in his quiet voice.

  “It was surprising how many IV-F’s with hypertension cleared into I-A’s in the course of a week’s observation during the war, Mr. Finlay.”

  He got up again. Fish stayed where he was. “You mean Benzedrine, Doctor, or—”

  “Or caffeine derivatives, or any of a number of things? I didn’t say so. Nor did I say Mrs. de Gradoff was lying when she said she never took a pill in her life. But I can’t overlook the obvious just to please Dodo Maloney. There are too many sick people for me to worry whether Dodo can sleep or not—much as I’m indebted to her father. I used to edge turf and chop poison ivy at Enniskerry after school. He loaned me the money to go to medical school. Dodo wouldn’t know about that. I signed a note payable to James V. Maloney five years from graduation. When I paid it, in full and on the exact day, Mr. Reeves sent the canceled note back with a check for the entire amount—Maloney’s way of helping people help themselves.”

  He smiled faintly. “That’s the reason I haven’t thrown you out, Mr. Finlay.”

  “Let me ask you a hypothetic question, then, Doctor,” Fish said. “Could anyone, with such symptoms, be taking something of that kind, with no knowledge of it?”

  Dr. McNair took out a pack of cigarettes and lighted one slowly.

  “I suppose you know what you’re saying.”

  “I told you my position was difficult,” Fish said.

  McNair’s eyes rested on him a moment. “It’s possible. If there’s such suspicion, the patient certainly should be in the hospital.”

  “How could that sort of thing be taken?”

  The doctor’s face was impassive. “Is the question still hypothetical?”

  “Yes.”

  “In a martini before dinner. In coffee after. A quarter grain would do it. The effects are cumulative. The nervous tension built up would keep one awake, even without additional dosage.”

  “Then let’s take Dodo Maloney. If that was happening to her, would her symptoms be what you observed today?”

  Dr. McNair nodded. “It’s possible. But aren’t you forgetting that she’s been burning the candle at both ends for twenty-five of her forty years?”

  “You’d never have guessed it in April, Doctor. She wouldn’t burn to a raddled stub in three months, would she?”

  “She’d better go to the hospital,” Dr. McNair said quietly. “I’m afraid I took for granted a lot of natural wear and tear she’d refuse to admit even to herself. With a new husband, something to boost her—”

  Fish shook his head. “She wasn’t lying. She’s too scared. But she did lie to her husband about the sleeping pills you gave her . . . knowing how opposed he is to them. So, if she takes an overdose, it’s certainly no fault of his. He didn’t even know she had them. And you’ll testify that you thought she’d been taking Benzedrine or something. The overdose will be put down to accident or fear of cancer in a distraught mind. It’d be a neat setup, Dr. McNair.”

  McNair got up. “I’ll see if I can get her in the hospital.” A profound weariness sagged his shoulders. “I can see her at the Randolphs’.” He went with Fish to the door. “There’s one thing. All the Nembutal I gave her wouldn’t hurt her.”

  “Is there something she could take with the Nembutal that would . . . and that wouldn’t be traceable—twelve hours later, say? I might as well tell you, Doctor. A rumor about the first wife’s death is what brought me up here. Nothing but barbiturates was found when they exhumed her body.”

  “We’ll get her in the hospital,” McNair said quietly.

  “Could anybody with knowledge of a substance of that sort get hold of it, Doctor?”

  McNair looked at him. “There’s nothing I know of that you can’t get if you’ve got the money,” he said bitterly.

  Fish Finlay found a place to park and followed a giddy group of the very young through open gates onto a rose-colored carpet into a fairyland of laughter and music. The carpet was a velvet gesture thrown handsomely across the paved courtyard to the crowded doorway under a Palladian window lighted by a spangled crystal chandelier like a pendant jewel. Through the lace brick wall on either side, Japanese lanterns, strung maypole fashion in undulating ribbons of flower-colored light, made the gardens into rainbow-roofed pavilions. Clusters of people moved among tables set in concave wings on the lawn. He followed the chattering group, young and buoyant—not a care in the whole bloody world, he thought—grinning as he waited behind them, abruptly startled then to hear one of them lower her voice to the careless lad beside her.

  “I hope mother’s not stinking drunk when she gets here. I’ll simply die.”

  He glanced at her. She was a lovely little thing with golden hair and wide blue eyes.

  “You help me keep her away from daddy and his bride. Oh, Miss Randolph, hello! Oh, mother’s just fine, thank you.”

  Fish saw Polly Randolph, laughing and holding her hands over her ears as the whole young crowd saw another crowd their own age and broke into delighted screams.

  “Did I shriek when I was their age?” She held out her hand. “It’s so nice to see you.” Her green eyes lighted with amusement. “You look very distinguished, Mr. Finlay, Olympian in fact. The line’s breaking up so the grandchild can dance, but come along and meet my uncle and aunt.”

  The youngsters were filing decorously past the handsome white-haired man and his handsome purple-haired wife in the receiving line.

  Polly took his arm. “I told the de Gradoffs you were coming as my guest.”

  “Nikki?”

  “No. The ladies—Emlyn, Dodo and Jenny. Uncle, dear, this is Mr. Finlay, Caxson Reeves wrote—”

  “Of course . . . how do you do? You’re at Enniskerry. Charming fellow, de Gradoff.” He turned to his purple-haired lady. “My dear, Mr. Finlay, a friend of Nikki’s.”

  “So good of you to come, Mr. Lindley. Nikki’s a delight. Dodo’s very fortunate. Darling. . . .” She turned to Polly’s cousin next to her. “Mr. Lindley. An old friend of Nikki’s.”

  “Oh, really. Why did you ever let him marry that absolute moron? Oh, darling. . . .”

  Polly drew Fish out of the way. “You see.” she said dryly. “The majority opinion. Don’t worry about Dodo’s I.Q. Dodo’s second husband belonged to my cousin, and now she’s bright bitter green on account of Dodo’s new red necklace. She’s got a perfectly good replacement around somewhere. There he is, over by the bar. The lady holding him up, or vice versa, was the D.P. in that shuffle. It’s all to the good, though. It’s making nonalcoholic monogamists out of all their kids.”

  They went out onto a broad terrace. Across it, between graceful nymphs on a marble balustrade surrounding it, was a sunken garden floored over for dancing, the filmy dresses of the girls bright as butterflies under weaving rainbows of light playing softly over them.

  “Shall
we get a table near or far? Joe Henry told me you’d tossed your dancing pumps into a rice paddy in Korea, but you might have a proprietary interest in watching the show. There’s no doubt who’s the belle of the Randolphs’ ball.” As the music stopped she added, “See the clutch of white coats? Or is it a pride . . . or merely a pack?” She laughed, nodding at the crowd of men of all ages converging on the marble steps nearest them across the terrace. “The Stag Committee doesn’t have to worry about Jenny. Do you see her?”

  Fish Finlay saw her. He’d seen her before the music stopped, her dark head radiant about her slim bare brown shoulders, swirling in a misty cloud of scarlet, as lovely as the spray of white butterfly orchids in her hair. Courtesy of Mr. Peter? He looked around for him. He was at a table at the corner of the balustrade. The lovely little golden-haired girl was with him, her eyes darting about among the older people. . . . hunting her mother, no doubt. Peter was ignoring her, watching Jennifer and the pack. Proprietary, Fish thought. Polly had put the right word to the wrong man.

  “Do you know Peter de Gradoff?” he asked her.

  “I do,” she said curtly. “And I don’t know what in heaven’s name Dodo’s thinking about. But let’s get out of everybody’s way.”

  She’d been keeping him there so Jennifer could see he’d come. And she hadn’t even turned around. “Let’s go through here.” She maneuvered him forward toward the other side of the garden. Miss Linton couldn’t help see him there.

  “Hi there, Polly! Oh, hello, Mr. Finlay!”

  The music started, she was off in a swirl of Stardust, with Polly Randolph looking after her a little blankly. Well, I’ll be damned. The little rat. Her first Newport party and she’s just making sure she had a man on tap if Peter ditched her. And I fell for it. Me . . . promoting romance. She glanced at Fish. No wonder the poor guy looks bewildered. He must think I’m bats.

  She laughed and took him by the arm, steering him toward a table at the edge of the Japanese lantern pavilion. “Mr. Finlay,” she said, “you deserve a drink. Champagne, or Scotch?”

  A small nervous waiter with a tray of highballs balanced on his hand, his eyes darting expectantly around, saw them and rushed forward.

  “Scotch,” Polly said.

  “This side, madame.” He whirled the tray around with a flourish. “And for M’sieu’ Finlay? Good evening, M’sieu’ Finlay.” He bowed with another flourish, his Gallic mustaches bristling with satisfaction.

  “Good evening.” Fish took a glass.

  “A friend?”

  “Not that I know of.” He looked around at the waiter and shook his head. “I don’t recognize—”

  “Oh, quick!” Polly exclaimed. She tried to edge past him, but it was too late. A woman in a splotched print dress, with hennaed hair and a thin ravaged face with startling patches of rouge on it, rather more than three sheets to the wind, swayed forward and caught her by the arm.

  “Polly, darling!”

  As she backed Polly Randolph into a table, knocking the glass out of her hand, Fish moved on a little, looking out at the lights of the fishing boats, lonely on the dark horizon of the ocean.

  “Such a shame the poor child has the Linton mouth.” A woman’s voice off to his side was gently sympathetic.

  “She could be cross-eyed with all that beautiful Maloney money, dear.”

  “Her mother looks simply awful. Such a pity. Just look at her over there. And she’s as high as a kite. That’s Nikki with her.”

  Fish glanced around. Polly Randolph had heard it. She was suddenly paler as she tried to free herself from the woman in the splotched print, now in the weepily earnest stage.

  “Yes, I know, darling,” Polly was saying desperately. “I know you’d be wonderful, writing my stuff. You’d be ever so much better than I am. But I don’t have an assistant, darling. Please go back to your table, dear.”

  The antiphonal voices kept coming brightly in. “That’s his cousin Mrs. Emlyn. My dear, he’s coming over . . . I knew he saw us.”

  Polly’s free hand flew out and gripped Fish’s arm. “Look, darling!” Her taut voice had risen. “You can have my job. Just the minute I’m through with it, it’s all yours. I promise you. Now please, dear . . . I’ll be more than—”

  “Oh, Mother dear!” The lovely little blond child was there at the woman’s side. “I’ve been looking for you, Mums. Let’s go sit down, shall we? I’m sorry, Miss Randolph.”

  “It’s all right, darling.”

  “Polly’s promised me her job on the paper. . . .”

  It’s like being a dress extra in a movie extravaganza, Fish Finlay was thinking . . . nobody tells you who the stars are, you haven’t read the script, you’ve no idea what’s going to happen. He shook off an uneasy sense of catastrophe that seemed to be building up inside him.

  The woman wove gently away with the little blond girl, nobody else paying any attention to her. Polly’s fingers bit into his arm. He looked around. De Gradoff was a good distance from them.

  “Take it easy,” he said. “You don’t have to be afraid of the fellow here.” He pulled out a chair for her at the nearest table and sat down facing the garden scene. “He’s coming, all right. Alla’s dropped out.”

  “They were all on the other side of the house. I’ve been trying to avoid him.”

  Polly shifted her chair to watch de Gradoff’s casual progress, and leaned toward Fish. “Joe Henry and I’ve been doing some research for you. Item One: the Western Union boy mailed the photostats of the Maloney file to Mrs. Arthur Emlyn, Enniskerry, Newport, R. I.”

  Fish nodded. “Do you know her?”

  “Somewhat. Item Two is: she was the lady at the hotel near Dijon the night Nikki’s first wife—”

  Fish put his glass down. “You said it was an affair of gallantry?”

  “I said the French police said it was. My guess is a good clean alibi, only.”

  Her green eyes moved past de Gradoff to the big crowded table, all very gay and noisy, where Dodo de Gradoff, in the center of the crowd, was gayer and noisier than any of them.

  “Dodo’s certainly tied one on tonight. She doesn’t usually drink too much. And do you see at the table with Mrs. Emlyn, behind Dodo? That’s the man from Mars I told you is staying in my uncle’s guesthouse.”

  The man was a hunchback, with a grotesquely enormous head.

  “My cousin’s guest—which means my cousin owes him money. A lot of people do.” “Does Mrs. Emlyn?”

  Polly shrugged. “She’s being terribly nice to him, isn’t she? He’s a fairy godfather to the improvident rich, tides them over when they’re strapped. Strictly on the up and up, incidentally. It’s just the way he buys his way in. He’s horrible to look at but very kind, I’m told. I don’t know him. Alla called him three times today before he got here. I thought you might be interested.”

  She glanced casually back to where Nikki was being detained by another group. “He’s watching us. You wait . . . I’m going to fix him,” she said coolly. “And where’s your friend the waiter? That wretched woman knocked my drink sky-winding.”

  Fish looked around. “Here he is.”

  The little man put fresh glasses in front of them, each time with a flourish. With which flourish he put the note down, Fish could not have told. It was there beside his glass on the table as the little man moved off.

  “Peculiar,” Polly remarked.

  “Very.”

  “It’s a piece of an order blank from my aunt’s kitchen.”

  Fish unfolded the torn slip and read the hastily scrawled message.

  “All is prepared. I will attend Monsieur at his quarters after the ball. Be silent. It is necessary to be of the discretion of the most great.”

  There was no signature.

  “Public or private?” Polly asked. “Nikki’s watching you, by the way.”

  Fish looked up, uneasiness stirring again in the back of his mind. De Gradoff was looking the other way.

  “Private, I guess. I’ll let
you know.” He put the note in his pocket, glancing around for the little man. “Who are these people . . . the waiters?”

  “The caterer brings them. He seemed familiar. But most waiters do. You run into the same ones everywhere, now that nobody can. afford a real staff. I go to so many of these routs that I recognize them quicker than I do the guests.” She shook her head. “He escapes me, though.”

  “Nobody and nothing escapes the charming Miss Randolph. It’s absolutely impossible. Our delightful friend is deceiving you, Finlay.”

  Nikki de Gradoff was at the table, urbane, handsome, more than at ease, smiling at Polly, his blue eyes lighted with amusement. “May I sit down?”

  CHAPTER : 8

  He drew a chair over from the next table.

  “If this is an interview, Finlay, I advise you to watch it.” He looked at Polly, one brow quizzically lifted. “Have you told him about our famous tête-à-tête, Miss Randolph? But it’s been a long time, hasn’t it? Are you still convinced I’m . . . what were all the things you called me?”

  He put his head back and laughed heartily. “I’d never been so flattered, Finlay. Here was a young lady of the press come to interview me. The servants were out, which I concealed from her. It’s so boorish, to have to repulse eager young women. And, bless me, I discovered Miss Randolph thought she was going to have to repulse me.”

  Polly Randolph’s cheeks were hot. Fish brought his knee sharply against hers and saw her relax a little.

  “I shouldn’t imagine Miss Randolph had any personal concern, de Gradoff,” he said coolly.

  “My dear Finlay, when a lady invites herself to my house on the pretense of an interview and attacks me, verbally of course, and then turns tail and runs as if the devil were after her, what am I to think? She’d come there prepared to be either a friend or . . . a foe. I was deficient in effort, no doubt.” He smiled at her. “I had no idea what an imaginative young lady she was. Her uncle tells me I’m not the only victim of her extraordinary gift for what he calls making things up out of whole cloth. But I do hope by now you’ve absolved me of serious . . . misdeeds, shall we say?”