Mark of Murder llm-7

by Dell Shannon

  "Yes." Detective sergeants with families couldn't afford nice new cars. "Doesn't say much, no." Mendoza looked at his watch. "You've all had a day and so have I, but there's a little of it left. I want Art's notebook." Palliser handed it over. "I'll go see the desk clerk and check back on Mrs. Nestor. John, would you feel like checking back on the Corliss woman? O.K. The rest of you can keep trying to locate the other names in his address book." He got up.

  The Ferrari was home in the garage. He went downstairs and commandeered a patrol car, drove over to Third Street. The hotel was called the Liverpool Arms, ostentatiously. It was a fourth-class place, old and shabby: probably had more semi-permanents than transients. The block was solidly filled with parked cars; he left the squad car in front of a hydrant. It was just nine o'clock: the clerk would be here.

  Inside, the lobby was narrow: bare wooden floor, a steep flight of stairs, uncarpeted, at the back; one ancient-looking self-service elevator. The desk was no more than a long narrow counter, with a sagging old armchair behind it, a makeshift shelf of mail slots hung on the wall. A door there led into some inner room. The register, closed and dusty, was on the counter; the clerk was in the chair, leaning back with closed eyes, half asleep.

  Mendoza tapped on the counter and the clerk jerked upright. "Oh-all right, right with you," he said in a grumbling tone. He wasn't a very prepossessing specimen. About sixty, bald, with sagging jowls and a gross big paunch above his belt. His gray-white shirt and stained, wrinkled trousers had seen better days. He hadn't shaved that day or, probably, the day before, and he showed about five snaggly yellow teeth in his upper jaw, none below. He blinked at Mendoza. "You wanna room?"

  "I want to ask you a few questions," said Mendoza sharply, and showed his badge. "A Sergeant Hackett's been here to question you before?"

  "Yeah, but he wasn't here last night. I told 'em that. I ain't lyin' about it, why'd I lie about it?" The clerk's eyes shifted.

  "I could imagine reasons," said Mendoza. "Look at me! What's your name?"

  "Telfer. Adam Telfer. I got no reason-"

  "Listen to me, Telfer. I'm in no mood to go the long way round on this! Look at me, not the floor. You know the man I mean?"

  "I know him. Great big sandy feller. He's been here, but not last night. I ain't lyin'-" But his eyes kept shifting.

  Mendoza reached out, took him by one shoulder, and shook him savagely. "Look at me! I can take you in, you know, and grill you better at headquarters! The truth, now!"

  "You leave me be- Why'd I lie about it? He wasn't here.”

  "All right. You saw the other man-the one who rented the room where the body was found. Keep looking at me!" He tightened his grip.

  "Yeah. I said so. But not good, see? It was only a minute."

  "Tell me what he looked like."

  "I told 'em-them other cops-I don't know. I didn't see him good at all. Honest I never. It was only a minute-he stood sidewise to the counter and he had a hat pulled over his eyes-I didn't-"

  "He paid you two-fifty for one night and he signed the register. He was standing right here for at least three minutes, probably more, right under the overhead light. Tell me more, friend. What age was he? Dark or light? What was he wearing?"

  "I didn't-" Telfer swallowed; he looked panicky. "I-they was a couple of bulbs out o' the light, it wasn't as light as it is now-”

  "I don't want excuses, I want answers," said Mendoza very gently. He wanted suddenly, violently, to use his fists on this stupid creature obstructing him. He let go of the man's shoulder. "Begin at the beginning. It was about ten o'clock. He came in. What did he say?"

  "Said he wanted a room, I guess. I told 'em all that before."

  "You guess? Don't you remember?"

  "Sure I remember. I remember that. But, like I say, the light wasn't so good then as it is now, and I-"

  "Did you know him? Had you seen him before? Pal of yours maybe?"

  "Jesus, no! Me, knowin' one like that? I said-"

  "You saw him, God damn you, and you're going to tell me more or I'll take you in right now! Brace me, Telfer. We can help your memory down at headquarters-"

  "I told 'em," said Telfer. He was nearly in tears. "He was-sort of medium, 's all. And he kept turned sideways, and he had this hat. .. And the light--"

  "Anybody back you up about the dead bulbs?"

  Telfer looked away, cringing. "I dunno if anybody else noticed, why should anybody-"

  "Who put in new ones?"

  "Damn it, I did. I don't hafta take- I told 'em all I-"

  Mendoza looked at him, feeling very tired. He said abruptly, "You'll be seeing more of us," and turned on his heel.

  SEVEN

  The apartment building on Kenmore Avenue where the Nestors had lived was an old one but reasonably well maintained. According to the mail slots, they had the left-hand front ground-floor apartment. The small lobby was a little dusty; the whole place was very quiet.

  He pushed the door button and heard the shrill buzz from beyond the door. After an interval he pushed it again. He wondered if she'd gone away somewhere. But presently the door opened, a cautious few inches on its chain. "Who is it? What do you want at this time of night?”

  He brought out his badge. "Just a few questions, Mrs. Nestor. May I come in?"

  "Well, I must say it's a peculiar hour to come bothering at me. But I suppose if you must, you must." She unhooked the chain, stood back ungraciously to let him in. "I haven't seen you before. There were two other officers-"

  "Yes. Lieutenant Mendoza. You remember Sergeant Hackett, who questioned you on Wednesday? You saw him again?"

  "Why, yes. I expect we can sit down." She sat on the edge of the couch. She had undressed and was wrapped in an aged and ugly striped flannel bathrobe, hugging it round her primly. She had put her hair up in curlers, covered it with a pink scarf, and her sallow face was bare of either make-up or vanishing cream. She had on a pair of old run-down black mules with little pompons on the toes.

  The room said this and that. Old furniture, most of it belonging to the apartment, very little ornament-the two pictures probably had come with the apartment too. But everything very neat and clean. The one floor lamp she had switched on in the living room cast light into the visible corner of the kitchenette, and it caught reflections from newly waxed linoleum there. She was, without much doubt, one of those persnickety housekeepers. He didn't wonder that charming, easygoing Frank Nestor had sought diversion elsewhere. He had a suspicion that when she'd made up her mind that he'd married her for her expectations and nothing more she'd subtly-and maybe unconsciously-taken revenge by turning herself into the obvious martyr.

  He sat down facing her. "Where have you been all day, Mrs. Nestor? We've been trying to get in touch with you." "Oh, have you? Well, I had to go up to Forest Lawn to make the arrangements about the funeral. They had the inquest yesterday, and then that other officer told me they'd released the body, so I could make the arrangements. And then I went to buy a black dress because I didn't have one, and it will look better at the funeral."

  Her voice was quite flat, expressionless, and her shallow eyes were empty. "But I was meaning to get in touch with you too, because they told me at the bank that you'd been asking questions and they'd showed you all about Frank's account there. I shouldn't think that would be allowed. And I don't understand why I can't have that money-I'm his widow and he hadn't any other relations at all-at least I never heard of any. Do you know, he had nearly five thousand dollars in his account. I never suspected he'd saved up that much."

  And it was another interesting thing, thought Mendoza. Considering that Nestor hadn't stinted himself in any direction-his star sapphire ring, the Buick convertible, the four-hundred-a-month office-he must have been raking it in from somewhere, all right. Just the marked-up vitamins?

  "Did Sergeant Hackett come to see you last night, Mrs. Nestor?"

  "Why, yes, he did. Just for a short time. Mr. Marlowe was here. Why?"

  "Mr. Marlowe
?"

  "Mr. William Marlowe, he's a very fine man, he was an old friend of my father's."

  "What time was Sergeant Hackett here?" He was watching her. She answered him readily, without hesitation, but without interest either.

  "Why, let's see, it was early. About eight o'clock, I think. He asked me a lot of questions all over again, things he'd asked before. I must say it seemed very inefficient to me. And about Miss Corliss too. I don't know much about her, I never interfered in Frank's business. Come to think, it'd've been a little before eight, because I happened to notice the clock when Mr. Marlowe left and that was ten past."

  "Mr. Marlowe was here when the sergeant came?"

  "That's right. It was nice of him, he came to see if I might need a loan to pay for the funeral, you see. He's a very wealthy man." And all the while her expressionless eyes stayed fixed on him as if she was memorizing him.

  "He left before Sergeant Hackett?"

  "Oh yes. Mr. Marlowe said he knew I was tired and didn't want company, and he left, and Sergeant-whatever the name was-he took the hint finally and left too, about half an hour later."

  "And that was the last you saw of either of them?"

  "Well, yes," she said. She dabbed at her mouth with a wadded-up handkerchief. "Why do you want to know all that? I'm sure, you all ask the oddest questions-I should think you'd be out looking for whatever burglar it was shot Frank, instead of bothering me."

  "We're wondering whether it was a burglar, Mrs. Nestor," he said casually. "Whether it wasn't someone your husband knew. Or someone you knew."

  "I?" she said blankly. "Why on earth should you think that? I don't know any burglars, for heaven's sake. Of all the ridiculous ideas. And to come asking questions at this hour of night, when I'd already gone to bed-"

  Essentially an ignorant woman? Concerned with the practical matters only? The self-made martyr so wrapped up in herself she was oblivious to anything outside? Or something a lot deeper?

  The tiredness was catching up to him now. The long, long day, most of it spent in enforced inactivity in the planes, with the frantic worry gnawing at his mind.

  Art… He got up, and he had to haul himself up by the arm of the chair.

  "All right, thanks very much, Mrs. Nestor," he said. "We'll be in touch with you." He pulled the door open.

  "I'm sure I don't know why," she said. "That's the queerest thing I've heard yet, thinking I might know the burglar. I don't know why you have to come bothering me.”

  "Don't you?" said Mendoza, swinging around on her suddenly. "Was there a burglar at all? We don't think so, you know. Have you ever owned a gun, Mrs. Nestor?" She stepped back, but there wasn't any shock or fear in the shallow eyes. "Well, for heaven's sake," she said flatly.

  "I should think anybody could see how Frank came to get murdered. Of course l've never owned a gun. I must say I don't see the point of all this. That sergeant getting me down there for some kind of test, now I think it over, it's nothing more or less than an insuIt. I'm a good Christian woman and-"

  The cordite test. Negative, but it wasn't always reliable by any means.

  "We'll be in touch with you," said Mendoza wearily, and went out. It was ten o'clock. He got into the car and drove back downtown to drop it at the garage. He called a cab and had himself driven home, to the house on Rayo Grande Avenue.

  There were lights in the living room. It seemed years since he had last walked up this flagstoned path, opened the wide oak door to the square entry hall.

  "You shouldn't have stayed up, amada," he said as he kissed Alison. Bast and her daughter Nefertite ran to meet him, talking loudly, and he bent to pick them up, stroking the sleek heads. He sat down heavily in the nearest chair.

  "You'll not sleep without you have a bit of whiskey in you," said Mairi MacTaggart. "Wait up indeed. Would we be going off to bed and you not in, as long a day as we've all had even so? I'll fetch it." Her kind, wise blue eyes smiled a little; she trotted out.

  "Luis-"

  "Well, they're not saying one way or the other," said Mendoza. "The longer he hangs on, of course, the better his chances-I suppose. He could stay in a coma for days." He roused himself to tell her the details, briefly, and what they thought about it.

  "Oh, God," said Alison tiredly. She had, probably, had a bath and was wearing her newest housecoat; she had probably also had a meal, if he knew Mrs. MacTaggart.

  "We got Angel to bed-she'd been sitting there since three this morning, you know-and Mairi coaxed some hot broth and toast into her, and I got her to take three aspirins, I hadn't anything stronger. But if it's going to be that long before we know-" She wandered around the room distractedly, sat down on the couch to stroke Sheba, who was diligently applying herself to the last bath of the day. Bast and Nefertite purred on Mendoza's lap; dimly he realized that it was nice to be home again, with the cats, and presumably the twins safely asleep in their own beds.

  Mrs. MacTaggart came trotting back, looking like a plump little lamb in her woolly white dressing gown, gray hair standing out in little curls; she handed him an overgenerous supply of rye in a juice glass.

  "Get that down you, man," she said in her soft Scots burr. "You're doing nobody any good getting yourself fagged to death so you can't think proper. It's a caution, imagine you two traveling more than three thousand miles since this morning.

  You'll get that down and you'll both be going to bed.

  And," she added to Alison severely, "you will not be up at the crack of dawn worrying about that poor young thing in there, her man at death's door and her carrying. She'll sleep in, all the pills you gave her, and I'll see to her when she wakes."

  Alison smiled at her wanly and said, "You're a tower of strength, Mairi. I don't know what we'd do without you. She even remembered Silver Boy, Luis-”

  "Somebody's needed to keep a little common sense. Why wouldn't I? When Mrs. Dunne fetched the wee boy here and told me of it, of course I would think of Mrs. Hackett's cat. And that Bertha was here by then, so I just ran over in Miss Alison's car-knowing you wouldn't mind it, mo croidhe -and took him to Dr. Stocking's where he'll be safe until we can sort matters out. And you'd best take the man and put him into his bed, achara, or he'll fall to sleep where he sits."

  It had been a long, long day. But he wouldn't sleep, not with Art

  …

  He shook his head muzzily. The rye had hit his empty stomach like a small bomb. He thought vaguely, Passing the love of women… He hauled himself up to his feet. "What would we do without you, Mairi? I haven't even said hello to you… The twins O.K.? That's good… Dejelo paras manana… It's got to be all right, hasn't it? Alison-"

  "Come on, darling, bed. You look like death. Mairi-"

  "You'll not be fussing. I'll see to everything. The wee boy's snug asleep in his cot by my own bed. You see to your man. They're troublesome creatures to love," said Mrs. MacTaggart, "and often enough bringing sorrow on us, but nought to do about that but the best we can."

  In the big master bedroom Mendoza flung off his clothes carelessly. The whiskey-damn the whiskey-had turned his mind numb; he couldn't think.

  El Senor, the miniature lion, had officially retired on the foot of the bed hours ago, and gave them a very cold green glare for disturbing him at this hour. "Senor Malevolencia!" said Mendoza sleepily. "Alison-"

  "Here, let me help you."

  "Don't be silly. Quite all right. Alison, you talk to Angel, tomorrow. Find out what he said before he left-anything he told her about those cases. Explain-"

  "Yes, Luis. All right"

  He wouldn't sleep, because there was Art… Passing the love of women… But he slept, his last conscious thought that it was good to be home, to feel Alison's warmth close, and to feel the warm heavy weight of four cats at the foot of the bed.

  ***

  He was in his office at eight o'clock Sunday morning, shaved and tidy in gray Italian silk with the newest discreet dark tie, mustache newly trimmed, back to civilization and the job.


  The hospital said, No change.

  He had read Hackett's notes, and he had read Traffic's official report on the Ford. He was now listening to Palliser, who had found Margaret Corliss in her apartment last night.

  "… said she'd been out shopping and visiting friends, and hunting a new job. Maybe natural. But there's something offbeat there, I can't put a finger on it but-"

  "You haven't interpreted Art's notes. Maybe we can, with a little cerebration," said Mendoza. "I want to see that office. She said he hadn't been to see her?"

  "That's right. She was home alone all that evening, nobody came to see her."

  "Really. Poor girl. And she ought to be home alone at this hour too. Jimmy." He got up and went to the door. "Call that Corliss woman, tell her to be home at one-thirty, I'll drop by to see her then… Here's one thing," he added to Palliser. "His wife told Art that about the time Nestor graduated from his chiropractic course he had a legacy. Which he used to fit out his very classy new office. She said to me last night he hadn't any relatives. Suppose you check that out-where'd the legacy come from? Fond godfather maybe? I'd just like to know. I'd also like to know something about Andrea Nestor's background. And the background of that Telfer at the hotel."

  "Well, all right," said Palliser. He sounded a little surprised. "My own thought was, if we can find out something definite about who Hackett did see Friday night-"

  Mendoza stabbed out a cigarette, his tenth this morning, and laughed sharply. " Eso cae de su peso. Sure. But how do we pin it down for sure? Margaret Corliss says he didn't call on her-so if she's lying, how do we know? Ask the neighbors if they heard her doorbell ring? If they saw a 1957 Ford parked on the block?"

  "Well, hell, I know, but-"

  "We've committed ourselves," said Mendoza, "to the premise that he got something very definite on somebody-real evidence. Enough for an arrest right then, maybe. On the Slasher, or on the Nestor thing. And that X knew it and took steps right then to stop him passing it on. All right. Nobody involved is going to hand us the information for the asking. Anybody who says right away, ‘Why, yes, he was here'-like Mrs. Nestor-ten to one hadn't a thing to do with it. But we don't know how many places he'd been, because we don't know for certain what time he went over the cliff-or how long he'd been tied up before. ?Como no? The only definite thing we're going to get is by following both of these up hard and heavy-get the Slasher, find out all about Nestor's taking off-and then we can put the finger on who sent Art over that cliff and why. And don't tell me it's the long way round. We'll be looking everywhere, but that's how it looks to me right now."