Murder Mistress

by Robert Colby

  “Nothing doing,” he said. “Cops was there first and that trunk wasn’t touched until she was hauled in here.”

  Whalen looked at the man steadily a moment. Something told him the guy wasn’t hiding anything. “What about the other car in the wreck — the Caddy?” he said. “Luggage in that one?”

  “You got a claim on both of ‘em?”

  Whalen shook his head. “Just curious.”

  “Empty,” said the man. “And I mean empty!” He leaned forward confidentially. “A real screwy situation. They never did find the character who was drivin’ it. Ran off somewhere.

  Then they trace the registration and they find it’s a stolen car. Unreported. Guy who owns it lives back north. Loaded. He has a bunch of cars. He leaves this one in his own garage over in Miami Beach … and someone swipes it. This is the first he hears about it.”

  Only this last was news to Whalen. He had read the rest in the late morning paper and had set out immediately, first phoning the hospital to make sure there was no mistake about Marty’s death.

  “Damn queer, all right,” he said. “You can bet your tail we’ll be looking into it. Well, thanks a lot, fella. You’ll hear from us.”

  “You wanna leave your card just in case we….”

  “Nah,” Whalen called over his shoulder at the door. “I’ll be around. S’long.”

  He went out quickly and drove off.

  As Roy Whalen reached the outskirts of Miami, darkness was settling fast. All the way he had accomplished some serious and much involved thinking. The whole deal had a very bad stink and he was going to follow his nose where it led him. It was too bad about Marty. Really, too bad. Marty had been one of the last remaining people in this world he could trust. And there had been a certain special feeling between himself and Marty Bates. Too bad.

  But in all ways, Whalen was a practical man. When a thing was done, it was done. When a man was dead, he was dead. Real dead. His usefulness was over. No point in raging or weeping around. Both made your mind sloppy when there were things to be done.

  At a stoplight, Whalen removed the keys from the ignition and opened the glove compartment. From it he took a snub-nosed .38 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver. The gun still felt strange in his hand. Until a week ago when his life had undergone some fantastic changes, he had never before carried such a weapon. Now he dropped the .38 in his pocket, returned the keys to the switch, restarted and boomed away.

  He had a sudden vision of Marty standing in the doorway the night they separated. Marty smiling and saying, “What’s the matter, Roy? You look worried. If you think I’ll skip, let me check the route out and you follow later with the dough. I’d trust you with it anytime.”

  No, Roy Whalen didn’t think Marty Bates had pulled a fast one before he was killed. The disappearance of the person or persons who were in the Cadillac made him believe it happened another way. Another way entirely.

  And who else but Clay and Valerie knew anything at all about the money?”

  * * * *

  When Clay unlocked the door, Valerie was in the living room pouring martinis into frosted glasses.

  “I heard you,” she said. “And I knew you’d want one of these.”

  Her smile was not the broad reckless thing it had once been for him. She was constantly on edge lately. Nevertheless, there was warmth in her eyes and she wore that tight pink sweater and a hip-snug skirt. He felt the instant surge of desire.

  He dropped the newspaper on a table and she handed him the glass. He couldn’t sip. He had to gulp it down.

  “There’s no race, darling,” she said. “You’re awfully late, aren’t you?”

  “Tough day,” he muttered. “I couldn’t seem to concentrate on all that routine crap. Pour me another, will you, honey?”

  She filled his glass and he walked around aimlessly, wanting to touch her but not yet unwound enough to do even that. As he expected, she picked up the paper and began to study it with frowning attention.

  “Third page,” he said. “Column four.”

  She flipped the sheet in a flurry of haste. She found it and for half a minute scanned furiously, biting down on her lip. Then she dropped the paper in a heap and looked up with a broken expression.

  “He died,” she almost whispered. “He died.”

  “I admit it’s a shock,” he said. “But we knew the risk. And there’s a certain safety….”

  “I just didn’t expect him to die,” she said in an awed tone. “I thought maybe he would be in the hospital awhile and then…. Oh, I don’t know what I thought! I wish I had never known Marty, never seen him. It’s … it’s so personal.”

  “He was nothing to you.”

  “Well, I know, but after all … Clay, what are we coming to? We should get out of here. Now! There are planes that can take you overnight to … to anywhere.”

  “Don’t get panicky, Val. Just don’t get panicky.” He finished the second drink, chewed the olive, sat down and lit a cigarette. “You know very well I can’t possibly leave. How would it look?”

  “How long, then?”

  “I told you. About three months. Sooner if it seems a completely dead issue.”

  “Three months, three months. It’s a lifetime with your nerves just screaming for relief. I won’t be able to take it.”

  “Yes you will.”

  “I ought not to stay here,” she said. “I should move back to the apartment. Suppose I was seen by someone in the neighborhood. They don’t know your wife is in Reno getting a divorce. It would cause talk. And one thing might lead to another.”

  “Just stay hidden, Val honey. That’s all.”

  “I feel like a prisoner. I’m so wretchedly lonely here all day. I want to have fun, Clay. Good times. We have this complete fortune and what good is it? Worthless!”

  “You think you wouldn’t be more lonely in that apartment? I need you, honey. I need you.”

  She was silent. Then, “What did you hear about the hold-up? Anything new? They don’t suspect a thing?”

  “Of course not. They’re running around in circles. They can’t understand how the — the culprits, as the paper likes to call them, got away. Captain Krause told me he thinks they could have slipped on a plane or a train before the terminal or the depot was put under watch. He’s sure they didn’t get away by car. All roads were screened tight. It’s a joke. What are they going to do without a description — check every human being in transit anywhere? And his luggage? Still, I’m glad we didn’t take chances. The best news is that the cops are looking for professional stick-up artists. I was counting on that. It certainly was clever enough for any professional in the country.”

  “Exceedingly clever, darling. But I’m in no mood to brag — not that one brave idea was mine. I’m thinking about Roy. He reads newspapers like anyone else. By tonight or tomorrow he’ll be burning his tires in all directions, asking questions, questions. And if the answers don’t make sense to him, he has just one more place to go.”

  “Roy will be a long time getting around to us,” Clay answered. “And if it comes to that, I can handle him with my best astonishment and innocence approach.

  “Look at it this way — he has not a thing, not a shred to accuse us with. After we split the cash we were not supposed to have an inkling of their future plans. How could Roy know you were cozy with Marty? You think Marty would have told him? Not on your life. So then, in Roy’s little brain there is left the conception that we would not know time, place, or even method of their departure. And further, I don’t believe he would even guess that we — that I was the type for such a cross.”

  “Yes, but he doesn’t think like you and I, Clay. No subtle shadings. Don’t expect him to figure us incapable of anything just because we make pretty talk and have nice manners.”

  “And further,” continued Clay, “the Cadillac doesn’t connect and never will. So he’s got to come to one of three conclusions. Either Marty crossed him and hid the money, or it was stolen from the car s
ometime after the so-called accident. Or again, and finally, the police have it and are keeping their mouths shut while they check it. Satisfied?”

  “Almost. I would be if there wasn’t a half million, seventeen hundred dollars involved. And if Roy Whalen wasn’t about the most determined animal I ever met.”

  “Even if he guessed,” said Clay, “there isn’t a chance he’ll find it where it’s hidden.”

  She stood and came to him. “Let me look at that gash,” she said, leaning over him and tilting his head into the light. “Not bad from any distance at all. The make-up covers it and the swelling’s gone down. If you didn’t have a good tan you’d be in trouble. Anyone notice it?”

  “Not a single mention.” Above him, pendulous and swollen, her breasts were a sudden demand for attention. He pulled her down.

  “Darling — aren’t you hungry? It’s going on — ”

  “Yes, I’m hungry. For you.” He reached under her sweater and with one neat wrench, undid her bra. She looked toward the windows.

  “All curtains closed,” he said.

  “Later, darling?”

  “Now!”

  “Well then, why do we stay here?”

  “I like to progress slowly from chair to couch to bed.” He chuckled. “It dates back to my days of fumbling excitement. When it never got to the bed.”

  She smiled the old reckless smile and pulled the sweater over her head. She sloped her shoulders and slipped out of the bra. “There. Do you like?”

  Her breasts were large but compact and insolently up-tilted. The areas surrounding her nipples were enormous dark circles, bull’s eye caps to the round peaks of flesh.

  Fascinated, he stared and stared. Then pulled her against him.

  “Make it so we don’t think, darling,” she murmured. “So we never have to think again.”

  But later, in the bedroom, when in silence they had both begun to think more clearly than ever, there was the startling sound of someone beating on the front door with increasing tempo and rising impatience.

  In the glow from the hall light, they looked at each other. He bounced out of bed and began to pull on trousers and shirt over his nakedness. He slipped bare feet into moccasins, then pulled open the drawer of the night table. From it he took a .45 caliber automatic, flushed a round into the chamber and stuffed the gun into his hip pocket.

  “My God, my God,” she moaned. “Like a gangster and his moll everytime someone comes to the door.”

  “Shut up and get dressed,” he said. “Hurry! But stay right here. I’ll come for you if I want you.”

  He looked and the butt of the gun was visible. He pulled his suitcoat from the chair and threw it on with his ready mask of dignified annoyance.

  Trembling, he went out to the door.

  SEVEN

  Scott and Myra Daniels sat in a booth of the little Italian restaurant around the corner from their apartment. Myra took a sip of the port wine while Scott absently twirled spaghetti around his fork.

  “Sure — I know it had to be done,” he said. “But just the same, I feel like the whole day was wasted. A big zero. I combed that entire vicinity block-by-block. I described that girl like she was my own sister. Exactly two leads, both false. But how could I know they were false? I had to check them out, didn’t I? More time shot. And did you ever search an entire phone book for Valeries? Try it sometime.” He forked the spaghetti into his mouth.

  “Were there many Valeries?” asked Myra.

  He swallowed. “A whole bunch of them. But not as many as you might imagine. It’s not such a common name. I called every last one of them because I think I might recognize her voice. It’s kind of throaty and has a … what shall I call it? … finishing school quality.”

  “And what happened?” said Myra.

  “Well, it was rather complicated. If a man answered, which wasn’t too often, thank God — I had one story. If a woman answered, I had another. Mostly I was very formal and pretended that I had the wrong Valerie Glutz, a person I understood to be in Miami but couldn’t locate. It didn’t matter what I said once I was sure the voice on the other end was not the Valerie. Four Valeries didn’t answer, probably because three of them were working girls. I called them again after business hours and got all but one. However, with the chick I couldn’t reach, someone did come to the phone to say that Valerie was her mother and was sixty-seven years old. Hardly my girl. Nor were any of the others.”

  Myra frowned, toyed with her salad. “Don’t you think she might have made the name up?”

  “Possibly. But my feeling is that she didn’t. In the first place, it doesn’t seem logical that if you were going to invent a name, one like Valerie would just pop into your head. Jane, Betty, Helen, Joan or Martha, maybe. But not Valerie. And, in the second place, she was terribly distracted. The name slipped out naturally and without hesitation. For the time being, I’m going to assume it wasn’t a phony. I have to start somewhere.”

  “So she just doesn’t have a phone,” said Myra. “Or it’s under her husband’s name.”

  “She wasn’t wearing a wedding ring,” said Scott. “Proves nothing, really. But I still don’t think she was married.”

  They became busy with their food. Myra was pensive.

  “Wasn’t it awful that poor man died in the accident,” she said.

  “Grim. Glad I didn’t get there in time for a look at him. Bates — Martin Bates. Paper said he was a watchmaker. Had his own little one-man shop downtown somewhere.” Scott picked up the folded paper beside him and ran his finger down a column. “Says here … ‘He is survived by his brother, Matthew Bates, Springfield, Illinois. An employee of the building which houses the clock shop stated that Bates was enroute to visit his brother. However, reached in Springfield, Matthew Bates expressed surprise at this explanation. Mr. Bates said he was not aware of his brother’s intention to visit with him.

  “ ‘A wide search is under way for the missing hit-run driver of the stolen Cadillac involved in the accident. Theft of the car was not learned until …’ And so on. I told you about all that.”

  “Everything connected with the accident is so odd,” said Myra. “Of course the driver of the Cadillac ran because he knew they’d catch him with a stolen car.”

  “To say nothing of a suitcase overloaded with wads of dough, probably just as stolen,” added Scott. “But why would a guy with that much cash take a chance on stealing an automobile? And in God’s name, where the hell was he going when he got in the wreck? Well, it will all come out in the wash. And that’s one bundle I want to wash personally. On top of the money-reward, it seems like something I just have to do.”

  “Please, please be careful,” said Myra, touching his hand.

  “Oh, I will, hon. If I ever get close enough again to be careful.”

  “What’s the plan for tomorrow, then?”

  “Tomorrow I’ll go to the Second National Bank. As a reporter type from WKSR-TV, I should be able to wrangle some information on just exactly what happened in the robbery. From there, we’ll see. All finished? How about some dessert? We’re really splurging tonight.”

  “No thanks, dear,” said Myra. “I can’t work up the least enthusiasm about spumoni.”

  EIGHT

  Roy Whalen sat easy in his chair across the living room from Clay. Ever since Clay had opened the door and he strode into the room, Roy had seemed deceptively relaxed, speaking of Marty and the lost money in that breezy and caustic manner which Clay knew was only skin deep. Tension hung around Whalen like gas from a leaking main.

  “I dunno,” he concluded, “guess I just don’t have your head for figures, Clay boy. It won’t add up. I come out minus three hundred seventy-five grand and Marty gets a big zero for keeps.”

  “Of course I read the newspaper account,” said Clay smoothly. “And while to me Marty was strictly a business proposition, I was pretty shaken. To say nothing of the fact that it didn’t make sense. What was he doing on Route 27 out in the Everglades and com
pletely alone? I thought you two might still be in town. Or at least that you would take off somewhere together. But then, you never seemed willing to discuss your plans. So how could I understand all this?”

  “That’s right,” said Roy reasonably, nodding his head, pursing his lips. “I remember. We never told you a thing.” His eyes in the flat features were a study in crystal-blue innocence. “Not that we didn’t trust you, Clay boy. It just seemed like a sharper operation to keep a few items to ourselves. But now that Marty’s dead and the cash is … nowhere … I can’t see any harm in giving you the rundown.”

  “Please do,” said Clay. “After all, we’ve got to stick together. It’s a dangerous situation. And maybe I can see some possibilities.”

  “That’s what I like about you executive types,” said Whalen. “Real gentlemen. Always ready to help in any little boy-scout emergency.”

  “Never mind the cute sarcasm, Roy,” said Clay in his brass-tacks, right-on-your-level voice. “I know you’re bitter about your friend and the money, but — ”

  “Especially the money — now,” said Whalen. “Three hundred seventy-five thousand simoleons — all friends — if I can find them. So we’ll can the crap and get down to the meat. Now, here’s the way it was set up.

  “We had to get rid of our cut. You can’t just leave three hundred seventy-five grand sitting around in a suitcase.” He smiled slyly. “It might get stolen. So we decided the first thing to do was to get it out of the state where it was hot. Not that they could trace old bills, but they would be watching for any large sums to show. After we got it out of the state, we figured the best place to put it was … where? Where else? Banks, of course. Lots and lots of banks.

  “So we had it mapped out to cross into the nearest state — Peachy-keenville, USA — Georgia. Then we would haul over to Atlanta, a nice big city. And there we would go down to a half dozen or more of that city’s staunchest banks and open accounts, each in his own dreamed-up name. Nothing big, you understand. That would be dangerous. Not a penny over five thousand per account. No raised eyebrows at all.