Puzzled to Death

by Parnell Hall

  “Think she’ll be back?” Aaron asked.

  Sherry put up her finger, said, “Shhh.”

  Aaron snorted in exasperation. “Can I talk to you?”

  “Not in here.”

  “Then come outside.”

  Sherry and Aaron slipped out the door. There they found Cora Felton smoking a cigarette on the front steps.

  “Feeling better?” Sherry asked.

  Cora glared at her. “I feel like garbage. How many more puzzles do I have to do?”

  “Two more this morning, then they break for lunch. Relax, you’re doing great.”

  “Easy for you to say. I’m up there without a script, ad-libbing. Harvey Beerbaum just looked at me like I told him the earth was flat.”

  “Well, now that you mention it …”

  “Oh, hell!” Cora groaned. “What’d I get wrong?”

  “Nothing much, because you didn’t say much. You were supposed to mention the size of the puzzle. The one they’re doing right now is a fifteen-by-fifteen. The next is a seventeen-by-seventeen.”

  “I knew that,” Cora said. “I forgot to say it, but I knew it.”

  “You remember how the scoring works?”

  “Oh, hell, was I supposed to announce that too?”

  “It would have been nice.”

  “No wonder Harvey wasn’t happy.”

  “He’ll get over it,” Sherry said. “But you should know the scoring.”

  “I know it, I know it,” Cora grumbled. She ticked them off on her fingers. “You get a hundred and fifty points for a perfect puzzle. You get a bonus of twenty-five points for each full minute under the time limit.”

  “See how it works, Aaron?” Sherry said. “Say you finish eight minutes early. You get two hundred bonus points for that. If your puzzle’s perfect, you get another hundred and fifty points. If you have an error, you don’t. So a person who finished in slower time could be ahead.”

  Aaron looked pained. “Sherry—” he began, but before he could finish, the door banged open and Paul Thornhill came striding out.

  As usual, Paul Thornhill looked like he’d just stepped out of a fashion magazine. He was dressed in slacks and a blue sweater. His tan topcoat was draped over his shoulders like a cape.

  Cora looked at him in surprise. “Giving up so soon?”

  Paul Thornhill smiled. Up close he had very white teeth. Even Cora was impressed. “I take it you don’t go to crossword-puzzle tournaments very often?”

  In spite of herself, Cora found herself actually melting under the warmth of that winning smile. Even with Aaron and Sherry looking on, Cora positively simpered. “Well, now, Mr. Thornhill, to tell you the truth, this is my first one.”

  Paul Thornhill nodded. “I thought so. Well, don’t feel bad. I know a lot of constructors who’ve never been to a tournament. But if you had been, you’d know everybody leaves. They hand in their puzzle, get up, and walk out the door. It’s a macho thing. Finish early, get up, walk away.” He grinned. “I mean macho in a non-gender-specific way, of course. Men and women, they all do it. I imagine we’ll have company pretty soon.”

  As he predicted, the door banged open and Craig Carmichael came out. If Craig was being macho, they wouldn’t have known it, for he spoke to no one, avoided eye contact, and furtively wandered off to stand by himself on the far end of the steps.

  Ned Doowacker emerged next. He sized up Sherry and Aaron, demanded, “You’re not playing, are you?”

  “No,” Sherry told him.

  “Well, that’s a relief. Don’t wanna start off fifth. Bad enough to be behind those two.” He indicated Paul Thornhill and Craig Carmichael. “Don’t need any local amateurs messing things up.”

  Ned Doowacker moved down to the edge of the steps to bully Craig Carmichael, who cringed visibly when he saw Ned coming.

  After that, a steady stream of puzzle-solvers came banging out the door. They stood around in small clusters jabbering about the puzzle they had just solved.

  “When will they go back?” Cora Felton asked.

  Paul Thornhill looked at his watch. “A couple of minutes now. As soon as the first puzzle is over and the director announces time is up.”

  “Oh,” Cora said. Her eyes widened as she realized she was the director. “Oh!”

  Cora flipped the butt of her cigarette into the parking lot, turned, and hurried in the door.

  “We should put that out,” Aaron said.

  “Go ahead,” Sherry told him. “I’m not touching it.”

  Aaron skipped down the steps, ground the cigarette butt into the gravel. He stood in the parking lot, watched as the contestants went back inside.

  Sherry stayed at the top of the steps. As the last few stragglers trickled in, Aaron went up to her. “Sherry. About last night.”

  “What about it?”

  “About my parents.”

  “Nice people.”

  “Yes. Nice people.” Aaron frowned. “Sherry—”

  “What are you trying to say, Aaron?”

  “I felt awkward introducing you to my parents. I shouldn’t have.”

  “Well, you sure know how to make a girl feel good. Why did you feel awkward?”

  “I don’t know. I felt like a little boy. Maybe because I live at home.”

  “Uh-huh,” Sherry said. “Well, thanks for explaining.”

  Aaron looked at her, couldn’t think of what to say.

  After a moment Sherry said, “Come on, let’s go see the second puzzle.”

  But as Sherry opened the door and went inside, she couldn’t help wondering how much Aaron’s introducing her to his parents had actually been inhibited by the presence of Becky Baldwin.

  BECKY BALDWIN SHOWED UP IN A SNIT. SHE BANGED IN the back door and stood, hands on hips, chin thrust out, looking around the room. The second puzzle had just begun, and everyone was working furiously. Or at least trying to. Becky was wearing a bright red topcoat and matching beret, which was only slightly less distracting than if she’d been wearing neon.

  Sherry and Aaron, sensing trouble, moved in on her.

  “What’s the matter?” Aaron said.

  Becky waved him away, continued to scan the room. “Just a minute, just a minute,” she muttered. A moment later she snarled, “Damn it to hell!”

  It was loud enough so that several heads turned.

  Sherry put her finger to her lips, whispered, “Becky, not here. Come on outside.”

  Reluctantly, Becky allowed Sherry and Aaron to lead her onto the front steps.

  “Okay,” Sherry said. “What’s the trouble?”

  “What’s the trouble?” Becky repeated. “I got a client in jail on a drunk-and-disorderly. Supposed to be released today. Shouldn’t have been in jail in the first place. It’s bad enough the guy’s wife gets killed, then they go and blame him for getting drunk.”

  “You trying to bail out Joey Vale?” Sherry asked.

  “Damn right I am! If there ever was a guy who shouldn’t be in jail, it’s him. I understand he tried to tear the place up. Fine. He was drunk, he was rowdy, he needed to sleep it off. So you clap him in a cell till he does. No problem. Well, he’s not drunk anymore, just nursing a god-awful hangover. You don’t keep a man like that in jail, you let him go.”

  “No argument here,” Sherry said. “So what’s the problem?”

  “He was charged with drunk-and-disorderly, so the judge has to sign the release. I go to court to do that, and guess what? Judge Hobbs isn’t there.”

  “Oh, no,” Sherry said.

  “Oh, yes. He’s working on a crossword puzzle, just like everybody else in this damn town. And I can’t interrupt him, because he’s racing against a clock.”

  “Maybe he’ll finish early,” Aaron suggested mildly.

  Becky glared at him.

  “When contestants finish early they get up and come out here. It’s a macho thing.”

  Becky crinkled her nose. “I beg your pardon?”

  “According to Paul Pretty-boy
Thornhill,” Aaron explained. “People who finish early like to show off by getting up and walking out.”

  “Yeah, like Judge Hobbs is really going to be one of those,” Becky scoffed. “Anyway, no one’s out yet.”

  “They just got started. Give ’em time.”

  “How much time?”

  “It’s a twenty-five minute puzzle,” Sherry said. “But some of them will finish in ten. They’ll be coming out any minute now.”

  “And I’ll bet you a nickel,” Aaron said, “that the first one out the door is Paul Thornhill.”

  Aaron would have lost his nickel, because the first one out the door was Cora Felton. She winced at the sunlight as if it were the first time she’d been out in a month, moaned, and jerked her cigarettes from her purse.

  It was then she noticed Becky Baldwin. “Not my fault,” she said. “If Chief Harper likes Joey Vale, it’s not because of me.”

  “You’re a day late,” Becky told her.

  Cora blinked. “Huh?”

  “That’s yesterday’s problem. Today’s problem is Judge Hobbs is playing your stupid game, so I can’t bail Joey out.”

  “Judge Hobbs is here?” Cora said. Her coy look was priceless. In the past, she had flirted with the judge.

  “He’s competing,” Sherry said, “so he can’t sign off on Joey Vale. Look, Becky, the bottom line is, Ididn’t see Judge Hobbs out early on the first puzzle, and I doubt if he’ll be out early on this one. In all likelihood you won’t get to see him till they break for lunch.”

  “When’s that?”

  “About an hour. There’s one puzzle after this.”

  “Great,” Becky snapped.

  The door banged open. Paul Thornhill sized up their little group and noted the addition of Becky Baldwin. His eyes raised inquiringly as he flashed her a smile. “My dear young lady, I didn’t see you leave. Are you finished already?”

  Becky frowned. “Finished?”

  “Yes. I finished in ten minutes flat. Did you really beat my time?”

  “I’m not playing,” Becky informed him.

  “Well, I’m glad to hear it.” Paul Thornhill smiled and ducked his head in an aw-shucks manner that made his hair fall in his eyes. “Not that I wouldn’t want you in the game, I just wouldn’t want you finishing first. And who might you be?”

  “I’m Becky Baldwin. I’m the attorney for Joey Vale.”

  “And Joey Vale is …”

  “Husband of Judy Vale, the woman who got strangled.”

  “Oh, yes. There was quite a buzz about that last night.”

  “Who was talking about it?” Cora said, perking up.

  Paul Thornhill and Becky Baldwin’s conversation had seemed more and more private. Both frowned at Cora’s interruption.

  Paul Thornhill shrugged. “I don’t recall.” He turned his attention back to Becky Baldwin. “Selective memory. I could tell you every word that was in the puzzle I just solved. But I couldn’t tell you what person told me what particular thing.”

  Ned Doowacker came out the door. The tall, gawky contestant spotted Paul Thornhill and grimaced. “Beat me again. At least this time I beat Craig and Zelda. Just gotta get into the final, that’s all. Anything can happen in the final.”

  “You sure you beat Zelda?” Paul Thornhill asked. “She never comes out.”

  “No, I looked. She’s still working.”

  Craig Carmichael emerged from the building, furtively scanned the group of people for contestants, and retreated to his corner of the steps.

  Paul Thornhill didn’t notice. He only had eyes for one person. “So what’s a nice girl like you doing representing a murderer?” he asked Becky Baldwin, flashing her the high-wattage smile.

  “He’s not a murderer. He’s got an alibi for the time of the crime.” With a glance at Cora Felton, Becky added, “He couldn’t possibly have done it.”

  “And just when did he do it?” Paul Thornhill asked. “I’m sorry. I mean, just when didn’t he do it?”

  “She was killed Tuesday night. Half a dozen witnesses can place him in a local bar at the time.”

  “Well, that’s convenient.”

  The door banged open and contestants began to stream out. It appeared as if some puzzle-solving plateau had been reached, because it swiftly became a mass exodus. In the space of the next two minutes, at least half of the people in the town hall emerged.

  Judge Hobbs was not among them.

  Neither was Paul Thornhill’s wife. Further proof, if any was needed, that her winning the night before had been due largely to him. Indeed, Cora noted, Paul Thornhill continued to chat up Becky Baldwin as if there were no possibility of his wife ever showing up.

  She didn’t, but Rick Reed did. He came out, stomped up to Cora Felton, and demanded, “All right, what’s the big idea?”

  “I beg your pardon?” Cora said.

  “You get me here for this big tournament, I got a camera crew inside, and what’s for me to film? Dead silence. A bunch of people sitting at tables writing. Not only that, most of them leave. I got a camera crew in there shooting an empty room.”

  “Well, it’s not my idea. You got a problem, take it up with Harvey Beerbaum.”

  “You’re the cohost.”

  “Don’t be dumb,” Sherry butted in. “If I were you, I’d bring my crew out here and interview the first ones out the door. That’s who’s gonna win.”

  “That’s an excellent idea,” Rick Reed enthused. Sherry couldn’t tell if he was just trying to hit on her or if he was really too stupid to have thought of it himself. “Who was out first?”

  “He was,” Becky Baldwin said. She stepped in front of Paul Thornhill to introduce him to Rick Reed.

  The two men shook hands, but they were both very aware of Becky. Paul Thornhill bristled like a cat. Rick Reed, who had been practically drooling over Sherry, might have forgotten she existed. He seemed torn between whether to treat Paul Thornhill as a rival or a prospective interview.

  Becky Baldwin, who had unobtrusively managed to put herself center stage, smiled demurely, as if unaware of any tension she might be causing.

  Cora Felton, with many marriages to her credit, recognized the tactic and had to admit it was working. Even Aaron Grant was taking a keen interest in the scene. Sherry clearly wasn’t pleased, but Aaron didn’t seem to notice.

  Cora sighed at the stupidity of the world in general and men in particular, and went back inside to check on the tournament.

  Zelda Zisk was finished, as Paul Thornhill had predicted. The large woman sat at her table alone, drawing doodles on a piece of scrap paper. Without checking the time written on her puzzle, there was no way of knowing how long she’d been done.

  At the table behind her, Mrs. Thornhill was working diligently. From a distance, Cora couldn’t tell how much of her puzzle was finished, but it did not appear to be a lot.

  Cora finally spotted Judge Hobbs sitting at a table way off to the side. The white-haired jurist was working diligently, if slowly, and was clearly no threat to win. Judge Hobbs, like many of the other prominent citizens in town, was competing for the purpose of paying the entry fee to donate to charity. In addition to the judge, Cora noted banker Marcus Gelman, county prosecutor Henry Firth, and Dr. Barney Nathan. All were bent over their papers with identical frowns, as if they’d accidentally been handed a puzzle in Japanese.

  Marty Haskel, however, was no longer working on his puzzle. That caught Cora by surprise. The cranky service-station attendant sat slumped at his table, drumming his fingers impatiently. If finishing early pleased him, Cora wouldn’t have known it. Mr. Haskel, as usual, looked peeved.

  Cora got so caught up in watching him she almost missed the five-minute warning, and it took a cautionary ahem from Harvey Beerbaum to snap her out of it. Cora had missed the five-minute warning on the first puzzle, and while no contestants had complained, Harvey had acted as if it were the end of the world. Now Cora stepped to the microphone, watched the seconds tick down, said, “Five m
inutes please,” and stepped back, reminding herself that Harvey Beerbaum was an officious prig.

  Nonetheless, she was careful to keep her eye on the clock as it ticked down the last minute. “Time’s up,” she announced. “Please stop working. If you have a puzzle, raise your hand, and a volunteer will be around to collect it.”

  Within minutes the puzzles had been collected, the contestants outside had been herded back in, and the third puzzle had been passed out.

  By now Cora was on top of her game, feeling pretty cocky. “All right,” she announced, “puzzle number three is a nineteen-by-nineteen; you’ll have thirty minutes to complete it. Does everyone have a puzzle? If so, then, ready, set, go!”

  Cora pushed away from the microphone with a feeling of triumph. She had gotten through the morning. All she had to do was wait a half hour, announce time’s up, and everyone could go to lunch.

  Cora wove her way through the tables, pushed by Rick Reed and his crew, who had just filmed her announcement, and went out the door onto the steps, where Sherry, Aaron, and Becky were waiting. Cora wasn’t sure whether to be pleased Sherry had seen no need to monitor her performance or annoyed no one had bothered to watch her work. It occurred to her that Sherry hadn’t wanted to leave Aaron and Becky alone. She fired up a cigarette, took a deep drag.

  “So that’s where you went,” Iris Cooper said, coming out the door. “Do you have to smoke on the front steps?”

  “I do if I can’t smoke inside,” Cora Felton informed her blithely, and blew a perfect ring. Having gotten through the morning, she was in too good a mood to let Iris Cooper upset her.

  Cora had finished her cigarette, and was just wondering if there was any way she could get a Bloody Mary for lunch, when Chief Harper drove up with the news there’d been another murder.

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN I CAN’T GO IN THERE?” CHIEF Harper scowled.

  Iris Cooper held her ground. “I’m sorry, Chief, but that’s a fact. The third puzzle’s started, it’s being timed. There’d be hell to pay if I stopped it now.”