The velvet hand

by Helen Reilly

  Kit rolled over, propped her elbows on a tussock, and began to pull a daisy to pieces. What was the matter with her today? Why was she so depressed? Because of a dream?—how utterly ridiculous! The sunlight faded. Kit threw the daisy down and got to her feet. The clouds, ominously piled, filled almost the whole sky. They’d better get moving before the storm hit. She looked around for Libby and frowned. Libby wasn’t anywhere in sight. The M.G. was there, drawn up beside the road, fifty yards below, but Libby wasn’t in it or near it. Kit started down the rise, and saw her.

  It was just a glimpse. A dreadful glimpse. Libby was in the front seat of a battered black sedan drawn up beyond the M.G. There was a man on the seat beside Libby and she was struggling with him. The man raised a fist, and Libby screamed. Her scream was drowned out by the roar of the engine. . . . The black sedan shot off up the road and around the bend.

  Racing through the tall grass, stumbling, falling over a hidden boulder and ripping a stocking from knee to ankle, Kit was down the slope and over the stone wall with rocks crashing behind her. She yanked open the door of the M.G. and slid behind the wheel. The little car was fast, the black sedan looked old and battered—follow the sedan until she could get help, get to a house with a phone, or meet another car. She put out her hand to the ignition switch, and let it fall. The key was gone.

  Kit sat staring hopelessly in front of her at the darkening landscape. A spot of rain hit the dust, another and another. The pines were suddenly black. All the color, the radiance, had been wiped from the woods and fields. How far back was the last house they had passed before they stopped here? A long way. How clever she and Libby had been to search for an isolated spot to lunch in! What fools they were—what fools! This was the end of it. Libby had escaped once; she wouldn’t escape again. They would demand more money, and get it—and then they would kill her. And yet, it had seemed so safe up here in New Hampshire.

  Kit jumped down into the road. Something fell in the dirt at her feet. It was her bag. She started away, letting it lie there. She had gone two or three hundred yards when she pulled up and raced back. There was another key in her bag, or there ought to be. The garage man had given her two keys, but she was so damnably careless. No, Libby had put it in her coin purse for her, calling it to her attention. “Now you’ll know where to find it if you lose the other one.” The key was there, maddeningly buried in slippery and elusive coins. Kit dug it out, slipped it into the ignition lock, turned it, and pressed the starter.

  First, second, third, high; she took the hairpin curve at forty-five. How much of a start had the black sedan? She calculated; not more than ten minutes. Ten minutes! And it was probably doing sixty or better. That meant that Libby was miles away by now. How had the black sedan managed to come so noiselessly along the road? The M.G. was parked at the foot of a grade, that was how, the sedan had coasted down with the clutch out. They hadn’t seen it because a clump of willows hid the road from where they sat under the oak, eating watercress and chicken sandwiches. Libby’s white teeth biting into the bread, her laughter. “This is nice, Kit.”

  They must have been followed from Portsmouth. But— how had they been traced there? The Inspector had said it was safe. A rabbit darted out of alder bushes almost under her wheels; Kit didn’t slow, missed him by inches. Another thought hit her with the force of a thunderclap. Hugo Cavanaugh—the man she dreamt she saw on the pavement beyond the gate in the middle of last night, just for an instant under the moon—had she dreamt it? Was it a dream?

  Trees and bushes flashed past. The rain was coming down harder. She turned on the windshield wipers. With the malevolence of chance the left one went only halfway. Taking a turn short Kit careened on the edge of a deep bank and felt nothing, except the sturdy little car return to its four wheels.

  Thunder roared. The sky was almost black. A straight stretch now. She searched it frantically. No battered sedan, no house, nothing but woods and fields and storm and emptiness. The road began to climb. Kit tried to identify landmarks, they had been along this road only yesterday. The little towns well behind; she was in the foothills. Rain coming through the open window slashed her face, her throat, threatened to blind her. She didn’t dare take her hands from the wheel. The rise grew steeper, and again she railed at herself and Libby for having been fools. The surface was bad, half dirt and half old macadam—they had deliberately picked out a small blue road on the map, not one of the big ones, because the country would be prettier.

  The wind roared in her ears. On the muddy surface the wheels were losing traction. She shoved into third. A long climb ahead; the car began to start up, but so slowly. In all that narrow climbing ribbon within view there was no black dot. And yet there had been no turn-off, so she couldn’t be going at a tangent, in the wrong direction. The black sedan must be ahead—but how far ahead? Maybe soon there would be a fork, perhaps a crossroads. Then what would she do?

  A great jagged zigzag of lightning momentarily banished the gloom. High up on a shelf of land to the right, surrounded by woods, was the site of the abandoned farm where Libby had wanted to dig up the clump of sweet william. The roof of the big barn that was all that was left of the place was sharply silhouetted for a fraction of a second, was gone. It was no good. There was no other house, no settlement, no people, no telephone.

  Despair began to overwhelm Kit. She hadn’t a chance of catching up with the sedan, of another car coming along. People would stay off the roads in a storm like this. She went on mounting hopelessly into infinity. Five minutes of steady climbing brought her out on a level bit before the road started up again. The M.G. leaped forward. The abandoned farm was there, on her left. Kit shot past it and into the thick gloom of maples arching above the road. She half turned her head and somehow, miraculously, without directly looking, she picked up a shape so buried in murk that it was all but unrecognizable. Not quite. It was the black sedan, a rounded hump at the end of an overgrown dirt track that led to the barn.

  Kit braked hard. The brakes squealed, and she was thrown forward over the wheel. She cursed the squealing, brought the little car to a stop on the grass shoulder, jumped out and began to run back. She was under the maples on the lawn now, almost in front of where the house had stood. The road to the bam was only a few yards away. Kit dropped to a walk and made herself think.

  The noise of the storm might have blanketed the squeal of the M.G.’s brakes. Whoever had seized Libby was confident of not being followed. The key had been taken, and the man who had taken it didn’t know about the other ignition key. The sedan had turned in here for a purpose. But for what purpose? Her mind groped in obscurity, among dreadful shapes. She thought of the tissue with the print of Libby’s lips on it. Get another memento, something else of Libby’s that would identify her and then, here in this lonely spot, wipe out a dangerous living cargo.

  Kit restrained an instant forward leap. That wasn’t the way. She was ice cold now. Go cautiously, and if possible keep hidden, so that she could see without being seen. The place was wildly overgrown. What had been neat flowering bushes were now great linked thickets; she moved soundlessly in under a lot of little trees, aspens, keeping them as a wall between herself and the lane to the barn. A weapon—if she had a weapon of some kind—but the grass was too high and she couldn’t find anything.

  Behind the ruined foundations of the house, she came to a halt, drenched and shivering. The rain was coming down in sheets. Her hair was plastered to her head; she pushed strands of it out of her eyes. Ought she to go back to the car and drive on in search of help? But there mightn’t be a house for miles. And in some way, now that she was here, she might have a chance of saving Libby. She moved forward from a budding flame bush to the shelter of a row of hydrangeas. Through their branches she could see the side of the bam and part of the black sedan drawn up near the big bam doors. One of the doors was open. Dashing wetness from her lashes Kit eyed the great gray towering structure. The planks were old and rotten, and there were cracks between them.
If she could reach the side of the barn she would be concealed from sight by the flange of the big door which stuck out at a right angle for a good six feet. Granting that she could get there, she might be able to see in through the cracks. But there was open space to cross, twenty feet of it, with no bushes, no trees, no screen of any sort. And someone might be inside the barn, looking out at her, a gun raised.

  The wind in the trees, drenched leaves and wet grass and falling rain; Kit closed her eyes, opened them again. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t walk out into the open. She had to. She couldn’t go away and abandon Libby. She spurred her failing courage with the reminder that the main road couldn’t be seen from inside the bam, and the man who had Libby couldn’t know she was there, wouldn’t be looking for her. He might—you couldn’t tell—be afraid of thunderstorms, might simply have taken refuge in the barn until the worst of the storm was over. If she could only make sure that Libby was safe, she could still go back to the M.G. and go for help. Yes, that was the thing to do. That made sense.

  A single reluctant step out into that open space—after the first it was easier. Crouching a little, her shoulders hunched, not going too fast for fear she might fall over something hidden in the knee-high grass, she went on and on. She was there. She was safe. On her left the open door made a concealing little extra wall. Directly in front of her was the side of the bam.

  Kit looked through one crack on darkness, through another . . . She was looking at piled hay; wisps of it stuck out. She couldn’t see in. She listened to the wind and the rain. There was no other sound. Nothing else, no voices, no cries. What was happening inside that great sagging building in which some farmer stored the hay? Was the man there with Libby, keeping Libby covered with a gun? Was she sitting on the edge of a beam, or an old box, too spent and stricken to speak? Or—another possibility, was there no one inside that gaunt shell? Had the black sedan been abandoned where it stood, and had another car, a newer, faster car been waiting here? Had Libby been taken away in it? Because, yes, the man who had grabbed her when she went to get the trowel out of the M.G. must be afraid that she, Kit, had seen the kidnap car and would be able to identify it.

  Streams of water from the overhang ran down Kit’s back, deluging her. She had to find out. She started for the big door. Once she went around the end of it she would be out in plain sight. There was nothing to be seen between the inner edge of the door and the jamb but wet earth; she moved along the planked surface, reached the end of it. If she had been careful before she was doubly careful now. Pausing, she drew air deep into her lungs and loosened her muscles. A single glance would be enough. If Libby and the man were there she would run for her life to the M.G. and help.

  Inch by careful inch she started around the door, her body poised and ready. A short ramp of broken boards, swatches of dried hay, a heap of rusty iron over against the edge of a stall on the far side. A sawhorse. An ancient bit and bridle. The tongue of a wagon. The rain fell steadily. The wind sounded like a cat crying. She could see almost to the back of the barn now, the left side of it; but the side nearest her, the right side, was still hidden. Lightning flashed brilliantly. It was fairly close. Thunder cracked with a sizzle. Kit didn’t hear the rumble of it as it rolled off.

  Feet in narrow brown cordovans were extended towards her. Black silk socks, trouser legs at a queer angle. They grew enormous. There was a man lying on the barn floor a yard or two beyond the threshold. He didn’t stir. The legs and feet were absolutely still, in contrast to the surrounding tumult. Terribly still.

  Could the man be sleeping in the middle of that inferno of sound—or was he dead? Had one confederate killed another? And Libby—what had happened to Libby? Kit went completely around the end of the door. The hayloft immediately on her right was still more than half-concealed but the rest of the bam lay open to her view.

  Libby wasn’t anywhere in sight. There was only the man on the floor, on his back, his legs twisted, his arms flung out, his sightless eyes staring up glassily into the gloom of the dusty rafters. There was a bright shine to them. The man was Samuel Pedrick, and Pedrick was dead.

  Where was Libby? That drowned everything else, even the dead man. Where was she? Gone away. They had taken her some place else. Kit moaned aloud. Make sure, she thought on a spent breath, search the hayloft, the stalls. She would have to go past that dreadful sprawling body. Kit took two steps, and no more. She heard the explosion first, blasting in her ears. Mud spattered near her feet. Someone was shooting at her. Before she could do anything she was grabbed from behind and dragged backwards.

  In a twinkling the whole scene changed. Where there had been silence and emptiness there were big men, a lot of them, and raised voices. A strange man in a milkman’s cap—it had lettering on it—was holding her and saying, “All right, Miss, all right.” The Inspector materialized out of the ground, the air. The big doors at the back of the barn were open now, letting in more light. McKee was up in the hay. He was saying to one of the men, “Catch,” and tossing a gun. He reached into the last little bit of the hayloft Kit couldn’t see and lifted out a limp figure.

  Red moccasins, dark blue pleated skirt, a pale blue cardigan over a silk shirt—it was Libby, white faced, bedraggled, bits of hay clinging to her, her eyes half-closed. The Inspector leaped lightly to the floor with Libby in his arms and set her on her feet, supporting her with his hands. She almost fell, tried to pull herself erect, stood there swaying. She looked dazed and helpless, and her eyes were immense.

  “Libby,” Kit called, and tried to go to her. The man in the milkman’s cap merely tightened his grip. McKee was looking down at Libby.

  “It’s no use, Miss Tallis.”

  Kit’s head was spinning. “No use”—what did “no use” mean? The Inspector’s tone wasn’t loud, it was narrow and grave and tired. There was something terrible here. . . . And then that familiar voice, light and pretty, with no syllable slurred.

  “I didn’t, Inspector ... I mean—I snatched that man Pedrick’s gun and the gun went off. . .”

  McKee shook his head. He said evenly, “I’m sorry, Miss Tallis. We were in this bam before you entered it. We saw and heard everything that went on since you came here.” A second’s pause was filled with the wind and the rain; then Libby screamed, terribly, tearingly, again and again and again.

  XX

  It was night. Two nights later. The lamps in the sitting room in the suite of the hotel in Portsmouth couldn’t banish the darkness except when you looked at one of them directly .The Inspector was there. Philip was in bed ill. He had collapsed when he had been told and had had another heart attack. Kit was alone with McKee. He had been talking for some time. A fact here and there was all that stood out.

  Libby had kidnapped herself.

  Words after that just wrapped around the central fact. Libby was at the bottom of everything that had happened. The scheme to get hold of twenty-five thousand dollars had been born after Philip’s inheritance had come, when Libby met and fell in love with Tony Wilder. Wilder was something less than penniless, he was deeply in debt. If they were going to marry they had to have money.

  “Your uncle had it, Miss Haven.”

  Kit put out her cigarette, fit another. The money, the terrible money. That was all of it. That was the full explanation. Money that Philip would have let slip through his fingers, thrown away. Get it while the getting was good, before there wasn’t any more.

  Wilder had driven Libby to New York in a hired car on that first night. The most modest of disguises—a change of clothing, a pair of glasses; they had actually stayed in the same hotel, the Bronson. Then the collecting of the ransom money, and Libby’s return. Wilder had driven her close to the spot where she had been found by the paper salesman. The scratches, her blood-covered face, the needle jabs and the sedative she had taken—she had staged it well. Libby’s was the whispering voice over the phone.

  Kit said, trying to be intelligent, “Then no one called Libby that afternoon, the afte
rnoon you came, the day after she got home?”

  McKee said, “Oh, yes, Tony Wilder called your cousin. What Wilder told her was that the twenty-five thousand dollars he collected from you in the subway was no longer in his possession, that Pedrick had it. Pedrick learned about the twenty-five thousand, and how payment was to be made from your aunt. Mrs. VanKreef wasn’t taking a shower when the call came, she was listening in on the upstairs phone. No, your aunt wanted no part of it, what she wanted was freedom from her brother. She had a good home in which she was comfortable and she hoped that if her brother was provided with a sizable sum in ready cash he would stop troubling her, for a while anyhow, and go away. Also, I don’t think she exactly loves your uncle—or you.”

  Libby had killed William, with a Luger Tony Wilder had provided her. They were holding him as an accessory, had had a partial statement. It didn’t cover everything. In all probability Kit’s rum Coke had been dosed with a sedative by William at Libby’s suggestion. Both glasses showed traces of the drug. “She must have poured a few drops of the remainder of yours into hers.” With the house sound asleep she had had no trouble slipping in and out. She killed William because William saw her take the tissue and the glove from the desk in the living room in the night and taxed her with it—she had realized too late that the print of her lips was too even, too perfect to have been made under duress.

  “Yes,” Kit murmured dully. “I knew there was something odd about that imprint, but I couldn’t think what.”

  He said that Wilder’s news about the loss of the money to Pedrick had sent Libby into a tailspin. “Your cousin was back where she started. With nothing. Worse than that. Pedrick knew the truth about the fake kidnapping. He had no trouble getting it. Pedrick was much the stronger of the two men and he had Wilder under his thumb. They had worked together before, Wilder the decoy, Pedrick the directing intelligence.”