There had been no report yet, but I thought I knew who would be up there in the room ahead of me. It didn't make any difference whether or not I had it all figured out before the showdown. We'd be face to face in another minute. But there was one way every odd part of this seemed to fit together and make sense.
Inside the big lobby I looked around and then walked to the elevator, moving in a great pool of silence. A few feet ahead of me an extremely fat man was arguing with another man. The fat man's cheeks wiggled and his fleshy lips twisted violently, but no sound reached me.
I felt almost disembodied, floating, and I could see other people talking now; the clerk at the desk, a laughing young woman with her mouth stretched wide. I couldn't help thinking how strange and different the world would be if everyone were totally deaf: faces without animation, no shouting, distorted faces with snarling lips and staring eyes. And how carefully every word would be weighed before it was spelled out on hands or paper, or even in books; no whispered words of endearment caressing the darkness of a room; no music, no sound of wind or rain. How strange and silent a world this must be for the deaf. I had never thought of it before.
I grinned wryly to myself. Hell of a thing to be thinking about now. I poked the elevator button and shook my head. Get with it, Scott. Look alive. Won't be long now. Start thinking about what's up there.
The elevator stopped and the door opened soundlessly. Nobody else got in and we started up. The elevator girl looked at me and her mouth moved, blah, blah, blah. I could almost distinguish the words by watching her lips, but the sound was only a slight pressure against my ears.
I said, "Five," hearing the word rumble inside my head.
At my floor I stepped into the hall and waited till the elevator started down, then walked to the door of Room 524 and stopped. At the end of the hall, another forty feet beyond me, a man in a dark blue suit rested his foot on a tall, sand-filled cigarette receptacle, fumbling with the lace on his shoe.
I knocked.
Nothing happened. Nothing at all.
I got a tight, strained feeling in my chest. My heart pounded louder, blood drumming liquidly against my ears. When I'd knocked, my arm had felt slightly numb, moving clumsily. I'd have to watch that. My fingers felt stiff and unmanageable, like the wooden digits of a puppet.
I started to knock again—then swore silently to myself. The last time I'd been told to come in. I'd been waiting for the door to open, but naturally I wouldn't have heard a voice from inside. One mistake so far. I couldn't afford any more. I grabbed the doorknob, twisted it and stepped into the room.
There he was, towering over me. "Hello, Mr. Hannibal," I said, trying to make my voice sound surprised.
He was smiling pleasantly, his large white teeth gleaming. I thought again of even, rectangular sugar cubes. He had inhaled a cigarette and smoke drifted lazily out of his mouth as he raised his right arm, the smile still on his face, and pointed a long index at me.
Now! Now, Scott! This was the moment all the planning had been for. Don't mess it up.
For a moment I was frozen in a kind of fascination, then I forced my eyes up toward the ceiling, not looking at the lawyer, clearing my throat while I pushed words, thoughts, anything through my mind. Words, titles of books, obscenities, anything, anything, Ann, Ayla, Jay, bastardly bastard, kill you and cut out your heart Mary had a little lamb ...
I closed my eyes, tilted my head back slightly, forced my features to relax, and barely cracked my eyelids. I had to see him, had to see what he was doing and try to figure out what he was saying to me. I couldn't hear him and this was the worst spot; if I got over this I might be all right.
Was I over it? How was I supposed to feel? I felt all right, felt normal. I could see Hannibal dimly, blurred, as if there were a film between us. I was afraid to open my eyes wider for fear he'd become suspicious—if he wasn't already. I saw his hand move; he was stepping toward me now, his lips moving. Then he gripped my arm gently and led me toward a deep chair. I walked to it, saw his lips move, felt the slight pressure against my eardrums. I sat down, holding my breath.
Hannibal turned and walked away from me toward the door. His back was turned and I yanked at the fine wire attached to the plug in my ear, yanked again with no result. I reached up in desperation and dug at the plugs in both ears, watching Hannibal and hoping he wouldn't turn and look at me, ripping with my fingernails, and pain swelled in my head as suddenly I could hear again.
The door slammed and I dropped the little plugs into the seat and tried to hide the wire thread, watching Hannibal from the corner of my eye as he turned a key in the lock. Then I forced my hands to lie still in my lap, my head resting on the cushion of the chair behind me as Hannibal turned and walked back in front of me. My eyes were slitted and I could dimly see him pull up a straight-backed chair close to me and sit down in it, crossing his long legs.
He leaned forward and began to speak softly in his deep, rich voice. "You are sound asleep, sound asleep, going deeper and deeper into a pleasant, comfortable sleep, a deep, sound, hypnotic sleep."
He spoke very slowly, his words whispering against my ears. I tried not to listen, kept telling myself, you're okay, Scott. You're in. This guy's a jerk. Be Happy, Go Lucky. I forced my mind away from his words, tried to fill my mind with other thoughts, a part of my mind registering the words he was saying.
"Sound asleep, going deeper and deeper now ..."
Hallelujah I'm a bum again you are my sunshine you are my sunshine clap clap clap clap vo do de oh do ...
"... everything that I tell you to do. Do you understand? Say 'Yes' if you understand."
"Yes." Yes we have no bananas we have no bananas ...
"... no pain in your right arm ..."
Ain't no pain, Novocain, Vivian Blaine, Old MacDonald had a farm, eeyi eeyi ...
Hannibal had a long needle in his right hand now. Apparently he wasn't being as careless as I'd hoped.
"Roll up your sleeve."
My coat was still on. I pulled the sleeve up, unbuttoned my shirt and pulled it halfway up my arm. Hannibal grabbed my wrist in his big hand and placed my arm on the arm of the chair. I could feel his fingers tight on my wrist.
Christ, I wasn't going to like this. I knew I was all right now, in complete possession of my faculties, my sight, hearing, mind, everything. But I wondered what would happen if I jumped. What would happen if he were startled and suddenly looked at me—now that I could hear—and said, "Sleep! Fast asleep!"
I forced myself to relax, concentrated on a stained spot on the carpet. I thought of the needle buried in Bruce's arm last night, forced my mind away from it, strained to make my mind blank. I felt the needle, felt it as it went in, but it was like the touch of a thick finger, though there was pain, and I made myself hold still. Then I felt the touch again, sharper pain this time.
Hannibal leaned back, looking pleased. I watched him from the tiny space under my lids as he started talking to me. He was satisfied. I was pretty well satisfied, myself. If I played it smart now, I'd have the bastard where I wanted him.
He said, "You will remain sound asleep and listen only to my voice. You will be able to speak normally and answer all my questions. Do you understand?"
"Yes." You're gonna get a surprise, you bastard.
"Describe your movements and activities today. Tell me everything you did. Tell me the people you talked to and what you have learned."
He repeated it all, then sat back and waited for me.
I started in, speaking in a dull, flat voice, keeping my face immobile. I told him of getting up in the morning, and I lied like a trooper while he drank it all in. Suddenly I started enjoying this, feeling a kind of power over Hannibal replacing the power he'd had over me, and I was seized with an insane desire to laugh.
I fought against it, keeping my voice expressionless, but it was like suddenly remembering the tag line to a funny story during a solemn service in church. I fought down the impulse and continued talking.
Finally I said, "This afternoon I thought a lot about all the people in the case, and the funny angles, and who would gain what when Jay was dead. I thought a lot about Jay's two wills—and about the most recent one leaving everything to Ann. It looked bad for Ann then, but I knew Jay must have had good reason to change his will—probably when he finally realized Gladys was only after his money and when he was sure she was cheating on him. He must have at least suspected her of cheating, because even Ann seemed to know it. Gladys was only half Jay's age and she was playing around plenty. Probably with several people ... including you."
Hannibal wasn't smiling now. His long face was stony and he licked his lips. He lit a cigarette while I watched him with my eyelids quivering a little. I kept it going, speaking in the dull, flat voice.
"But Ann got farther in the clear when I realized that a man who saw invisible parrots might well be judged insane. And such proof of insanity would be enough to have the later will declared invalid. Gladys started looking very important to me then—and so did Jay's parrot. Gladys got even more important when I remembered that Jay had told me if anything happened to him I was to see to it that Ann got his business. Ann, not Gladys. And then I realized that a lawyer—especially Jay's lawyer—should know all these things. It started making sense."
Hannibal suddenly got up, and my throat muscles constricted as I tried to think where I'd slipped up in my story. But he merely turned and opened a suitcase on the floor behind him. He ignored me, as if I were only a piece of furniture, reached inside the suitcase, and I saw the bright flash of light on a hypodermic syringe. It was like the one Bruce had used on me earlier this evening, but Hannibal was filling the syringe with fluid from a small vial capped with brown rubber, and I had an idea it wasn't Novocain.
Then all at once I realized this was something he must have planned all along, and one part of my mind kept me talking steadily while with another part I tried to figure out what he was up to. Until this moment I probably hadn't seemed dangerous to him. Now I was. And he obviously felt sure he was getting the truth from me, so it wouldn't be Amytal or any other of the so-called truth serums. I didn't like the other idea scuttling through my brain.
I kept pushing the words out. "When it all fit," I said, "I realized that the party at Jay's last Saturday night was the turning point, though the motive went back farther. Murder for a fat inheritance is common enough, and the party was given right after Jay had drawn up his second will. Murder may not have been planned till later, but that party was what started the ball rolling. The important things were Jay's money and business. If they could be gotten without killing Jay, all the better. Enter hypnotism. It looked as if Borden did the hypnotizing at the party, then got Jay alone—mixing drinks about midnight as the result of a posthypnotic suggestion Borden gave him earlier—and then told Jay that hypnotic control was transferred to you or to Gladys. It wasn't till about half an hour later, when everybody was ready to leave, that Borden removed all suggestions—and by that time Jay was under your control."
Hannibal had come back and was seated in the chair again, the hypodermic almost lost in his big hand, the long, thin needle projecting out toward me. His face was hard and his mouth was twisted a little as he looked at me.
I went on, "You took Miss Stewart home, then returned to the Weathers'. You couldn't be sure that someone might not have seen you return to the house so you played it smart. You didn't even try to keep it secret that you'd returned. You could always explain that Jay had asked you to come back—and he was already under your hypnotic control. Now you had plenty of time to work on Jay, and give him all the suggestions and posthypnotic suggestions you wanted to, and you saddled Jay with the parrot that was to plant the insanity angle, or maybe actually force him into a sanitarium."
I was having trouble keeping my voice flat and expressionless, and maybe I was going too far with my spiel, but Hannibal still seemed secure in the belief that I was giving him exactly what I thought was true. He held the hypodermic in front of his eyes and gently squeezed the plunger. A little drop of colorless fluid oozed from the slanted, hollow point of the needle.
I said, "Then trouble started. Besides saddling Jay with the parrot, you'd given him the suggestion that he'd sell out. You sent a couple of goons named Lucian and Potter around to buy the business from him for next to nothing. They'd probably have got it for you in time—except that Jay sold it to me. Jay must already have been leery of Gladys and you—I realized that much when I remembered he had consulted Cohen and Fisk about the sale instead of you, his regular lawyer—and, too, it seemed to me he must have been suspicious of Gladys because he didn't want to tell her anything about his hallucinations.
"And there were a few other things that seemed screwy to me. Jay gave me a check that was far too big for the little I was apparently to do for him, and it seemed strange that two goons would single out Weather's, of all the spots in L.A., for a strong-arm play.
"Anyway, when your two musclemen stole the bill of sale from me and took it to you and Gladys, you must have felt that I was really getting in your hair, messing up the deal, getting dangerous. And right then I popped in on Gladys and started asking questions about Jay and hypnosis. She hadn't expected any investigation, certainly not so soon, and, off guard, she tried to cover up by saying that she remembered nothing about the party. She must have phoned you right after I left her to talk with the party guests, and that's where the violence started—kill Jay; make Shell Scott the patsy. It must have looked beautiful. With Jay dead the last will would appear valid and apparently Ann would inherit, so even if I squirmed out from under, suspicion would probably progress to Ann. If Ann should happen to pull a rap, then the wife, as the other heir, would collect Ann's share. Even if Ann were cleared and the hubbub died down, you still had the insanity angle to pull. Neat."
Hannibal didn't look at me, just listened, his eyes fixed on the hypodermic in his hand. I said, "So, with Jay already giving you a fish eye, and with visions of more than a quarter of a million dollars flying away, you started in. Later that night, Thursday, you got into my apartment and waited for me, drugged me, hypnotized me, worked on me and gave me the suggestion that I'd remember none of it. Then, with my gun, you killed Jay.
"It must have looked to you as if you were killing two birds with one stone—you'd get rid of Jay, setting up the inheritance play, and you'd get rid of me at the same time. I wouldn't have an alibi, and my gun was used as the murder weapon. If I got stuck in jail, fine—you'd be clean. But if I got out some way you'd want to know why, and you'd want to know everything I knew, especially what I'd learned from the cops themselves. That was simple, too. Another posthypnotic suggestion for me to visit you here at this hotel. Pick my brain; get rid of me if I got too close, too dangerous."
Now I was really going too far. In another moment I'd have him wondering and the element of surprise would be lost. This seemed as good a time as any, so I finished it off.
I said, still in the same flat voice of the hypnotized man I was pretending to be, "That was all I'd managed to figure out when I had to come here. But it's all about the way it happened, isn't it, Hannibal?"
He wasn't looking at me. He was still staring fixedly at the hypodermic, and I opened my eyes wide.
He'd been sitting quietly, listening all this time, and now he answered slowly, unconsciously, without even thinking about it.
"Not quite," he said dully. "Borden thought we wanted to play a practical joke on Weather. He got panicky after Jay's death and after you talked to him. He phoned me and went to pieces, and I—" he looked at his big hands— "had to take care of him." Hannibal shook his head. "God, I didn't start out to kill Weather, much less Borden. I wouldn't have if Gladys hadn't badgered me, and if it hadn't looked so perfect, and if the old fool hadn't gone to see ... you ..."
His voice faltered as, all of a sudden, it hit him. I wasn't supposed to ask questions—I couldn't! Fear stained his face and he jerked his head up to stare a
t me. He couldn't have been more surprised and shocked if I were a corpse that had suddenly risen from its casket.
His mouth dropped open and he gasped aloud.
I grinned at him.
"Yes, Hannibal," I said softly. "There are cops in the rooms on both sides of us taking all this down, and cops outside in the hall, and you're through."
He couldn't grasp it. It was too sudden, too unnerving. He'd been living with the memory of murder and hadn't liked that digging into him. And now this—all his carefully laid plans crumbling.
His face was blank for a long moment, his fists clenched; then he felt the solidity of the hypodermic in his hand and glanced at it. Footsteps pounded in the hall outside. Hannibal's face twisted and he got his legs under him and lunged toward me, bent far over with the point of that needle driving at me, and I grabbed the arms of the chair I sat in, jerked my legs up and planted both hard leather heels in the middle of his pretty face.
I slammed my feet solidly into him and the shock coursed up my legs and into my spine, but it stopped him and sent him staggering backward. The great, handsome length of him slipped to the floor, his face twisted and streaming blood, and as he crumpled to the carpet he still gripped the gleaming hypodermic he'd been ready to inject me with.
I never knew for sure whether he did it on purpose, or if he was just stunned, or if it was an accident in the way he fell, but he slammed the needle into the flesh at the side of his stomach and shoved the plunger home.
The door burst open, its lock splintered by heavy shoulders. Two plainclothes officers stumbled into the room, guns in their hands. Another officer was right behind them.
They took in everything with one quick glance and I yelled, "Get the bastard! He jabbed himself with that hypo."
From there on in, it was a walk.
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