by Basil Copper
I ran down between trashcans and iron bins at the side of the wax museum. A car gunned suddenly. I saw a scarlet Olds pass the end of the alley, going westwards among the traffic. The big guy was at the wheel. Van Rieten was just closing the passenger door. I sighed, dusted myself off and went back into the museum. I closed the door behind me, wrapped the knife in my handkerchief and put it away in my pocket. Then I went down the big model room. Presently I found what I was looking for.
I picked up the hammer and took it down towards the furnace area. I pounded the mask of my face until it was reduced to fragments; then I found the cast from which it had been made and tipped it into the furnace. When the whole thing had been completely destroyed, I threw down the hammer on the bench, dusted myself and took a last look around. I straightened my tie in a dusty-looking glass screwed above a sink fixed to the side wall, grimaced at my appearance and went on out.
I closed the outer door behind me, walked down the alley and found my car on the parking lot. I had a deal to think about as I drove back to the office.
Chapter Nine - Two For The Ice Box
Merna Freeman listened in silence as I gave her my report. Her voice sounded far away over the phone. Stella sat watching me from her desk. She had the extension to her ear, but she wasn’t taking any notes. I heard a long puff of breath at the other end of the phone when I finished.
‘Well, thank you, Mr Faraday,’ Merna Freeman said at length. ‘I can see you haven’t been wasting your time. We must get together again soon.’
‘I’ll see you get a proper report in due course,’ I said. ‘Keep in touch.’
She thanked me and hung up.
‘So much for that,’ said Stella. ‘Now, what’s the real story?’
She put down the extension and leaned forward. I stared out of the window down across the boulevard to where beams of sunlight were beginning to make people think that the ads about Sunny California might have something to them.
‘How about some coffee first,’ I said. ‘Then the conversation.’
She smiled but got up to do the necessary. I heard her switch on the electric stove in the alcove. She came back presently and put down the steaming cup at my elbow. Then she went and sat over from me again. ‘Well?’ she said.
‘It’s like this,’ I told her, stirring my coffee. ‘I was right about Eternity Inc. There’s a fantastic operation going on there. Some bits won’t fit but the picture’s beginning to gel.’
I took my first sip of the coffee. Nobody makes it like Stella. She smiled at the expression on my face. I saw she had gotten out her scratch pad. Her pencil started moving across the paper as I talked on.
‘Part of the Sunset operation’s genuine,’ I said. ‘The rest a gigantic racket. My guess is that old people, the gullible and the plain simple are being conned into parting with large sums of money. A terrific down payment that no genuine freezer plant would impose, and a rent that lasts a lifetime. That’s one aspect. There’s two banks of proper freezers. They’re for the big shots, the celebrities, film actors and what have you. They require the genuine body for that so those banks are the real thing, the showpiece that makes a front for the rest. These are what the important visitors are shown. That’s what Stan Alloway was called in for.’
I paused to take another sip of coffee. Stella’s pencil stopped for a moment.
‘The ordinary run-of-the-mill customers are fobbed off with the second best. This is where the domestic freezers come in. The remainder of the banks are phoneys good for storing milk and vegetables for short periods, but useless for resurrection purposes. They’ve got fake dials on the front which are calibrated with the temperatures showing on the real ones.’
Stella lifted her face from the scratch pad. She wrinkled her forehead.
‘But why?’ she asked. ‘Or am I being obtuse?’
‘A good question,’ I said. ‘Cost mainly. The cryogenic interment banks of freezers are enormously expensive and also cost a lot to maintain. Krug and his chums had to have some real ones as a front. So they get Alloway in. He hadn’t been paid, incidentally. So now he won’t be. The other freezers are handled by out of town contractors, who don’t know what they’re working on. This is the situation when the Whipfuddle will row blows up. Merna Freeman calls me in to investigate the set-up. This causes a near panic in some party close to Krug, who mistakes my intentions. He’s afraid of the whole Sunset racket being exposed so starts in on the principal contractors. He steals their plans and specification copies so no-one will find out the game being played up there.’
‘I still don’t see why,’ Stella said.
I added a mite more sugar to my coffee. ‘I’m coming to that,’ I said patiently. ‘So here we have Krug, Rex Beale and their cronies and the biggest money-spinner since mints were introduced. Two banks of genuine freezers for the celebrities. Other banks of quite useless ones, installed at much less expense, but still owed for. And corpses piling up. This is where Van Rieten’s wax museum comes in.’
I got up and walked about as I went on talking. Stella’s pencil was going so fast it seemed just a blur over the paper.
‘How’s this for cunning?’ I said. ‘Krug’s master stroke. The domestic freezers — which are normally locked, incidentally — are filled with dummy bodies. The heads — wax, of course — are interchangeable. Relatives have to give so many weeks’ notice when they’re coming to greet the dear departed. So what do Eternity Inc. do? They’ve got weeks to prepare and a full dossier on each client. A suitable wax dummy is dressed in the loved one’s clothes which are presumably stored and indexed somewhere in the Gardens. Meantime Van Rieten prepares a dummy head from the detailed photographs in their files. The wax body is then put into the domestic type refrigerator and frosted over in time for the visit. Then the corpse is broken down again, the head stored and the process repeated for the next batch of visitors.’
‘What a perfectly hideous idea,’ Stella burst in. It was the nearest I’d heard her get to indignation. ‘You sure you got this right, Mike?’
‘Well,’ I said, sitting down and finishing off my coffee, ‘some of it’s theorising but these are the only facts which fit the pattern so far. Alloway and Janssen knew too much about the set-up. Others may be in danger for all I know. I wish I’d had a complete list of the contractors who worked on the installations.’
Stella came over and picked up my empty cup. She went quietly back to the alcove and refilled it for me. ‘A lot of it still doesn’t fit, Mike,’ she said.
‘You can’t have everything,’ I said.
‘What about the bodies?’ she asked patiently.
‘Sunset Gardens is a big place,’ I told her. ‘Covers acres. My bet is that the bodies of the grade two customers are either buried somewhere quietly on the back lot or perhaps disposed of with quicklime or acid. They wouldn’t risk incineration.’
Stella shook her head in disbelief. ‘It still sounds fantastic,’ she said. ‘Surely the relatives of the celebrities would get wise? They must have a lot of lawyers and other sharp characters nosing about?’
‘That’s where Dr Krug’s being real clever,’ I said. ‘It wouldn’t matter at all. That part of the operation’s genuine. They won’t run into any problems there until the bona fide banks are full up with the famous. By that time they’ll probably have enough money to build some more real ones.’
‘But why do they have to cheat?’ Stella went on stubbornly. ‘They could make enough money by running the operation legitimately.’
‘How would I know?’ I said. ‘Crooks are never satisfied. They always want more. Besides, you’re forgetting the will angle.’
‘There is that,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t fit at all.’
‘It could have come up later,’ I said. ‘Supposing Beale and Krug got together on this racket and then the Whipfuddle will deal materialized. That would be too good to miss. Don’t forget that though Sunset Gardens may be minting money, there will be a lot of people to pay; sweetening
up in many quarters; and big bills still outstanding for the initial outlay.’
I drained my second cup and sat staring down at the blotter in front of me like I could see the answers to a tangle of questions.
‘There’s a more sinister side still to all this, Stella,’ I said. ‘Supposing relatives or clients were being pressured, even done away with to get their money. This is all out of the top of my head, of course. I haven’t got the ghost of a chance of proving it. But we’ve got the two doctors linked, plus a lot of none too scrupulous helpers. Dr Hauser in Knoxtown could give an injection with no-one being the wiser. The patient arrives at Sunset and Krug counter-signs the death certificate. Or vice versa. The two of them sending each other customers. Might be nothing in it, but for this money anything goes.’
I picked up my cup and carried it over to the alcove. The slight clatter as I set it down seemed to scrape the nerves. I saw Stella’s shoulders shiver as she went on with her note-taking.
‘I saw a fellow up at the Gardens called Morey Wilson. He’s an expert forger. Just the sort of character who would come in useful for putting signatures on multi-billion dollar wills.’
Stella was silent as I finished speaking. I sat down at my desk again.
‘Add together everything I’ve told you,’ I said. ‘Then get this. The character who killed Alloway and Janssen was a short way ahead of me on both occasions. When this case began I was warned off in a somewhat crude and unconvincing way. I had reason to believe the caller drove a scarlet Olds. The same car or one very like it was up at Merna Freeman’s the other night. There was a man sitting in the library. I only saw his feet but they wore blue velvet shoes. I saw the same shoes this morning when a party wearing them tried to stick me from behind a curtain at the Wax Museum. He got away in a scarlet Olds. And a similar auto passed me on the way back from Knoxtown.’
Stella gave me a long, significant look. ‘Rex Beale?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, being cautious for once. ‘But for sure it wasn’t Aimee Semple McPherson.’
I picked up the brown cardboard folder from my blotter. I was beginning to feel hoarse from all this talking.
‘I see Beale was a Major in the Intelligence Corps. Went out to Germany in the spring of 1945 to interrogate the staffs of Nazi extermination camps after the Allies liberated them. Might be a link with Krug here.’ I tapped the passage I’d put an inked cross against a day or so earlier. ‘I’ve got Kathy Gowan checking on these.’
‘Who’s Kathy Gowan?’ said Stella.
‘A little girl I ran into up at the Gardens,’ I said. ‘She works for the Examiner. They’re running a probe on the Eternity business too. I promised her an exclusive.’
‘As long as that’s all you promised,’ said Stella in a deceptively mild voice. I grinned. I picked up the cardboard folder again.
‘Question is, where do we go from here?’
Stella leaned back in her chair and put her beautifully manicured fingertips together. She flicked an imaginary speck of grit off one of her finger-nails, then polished it with a white lace handkerchief about the size of a round of confetti.
‘Of course, you haven’t considered the help Captain Tucker might give?’
‘What have I got to go on?’ I said defensively. ‘I haven’t a single fact to back up these theories. I’ll just have to play it alone until I get something a whole lot better.’
‘Or until Merna Freeman gets it,’ said Stella. ‘Have you considered that if her cousin is behind all these things she may be in deadly danger?’
I swivelled in my chair to face her.
‘I guess you never even gave it a thought,’ said Stella disbelievingly.
‘It’s a good point, honey,’ I said. ‘I must admit, one that had completely eluded my mind until this moment.’
‘Well, what are you going to do about it, Mike?’ she asked, folding her arms across the desk in front of her.
‘I’ll think of something,’ I promised her. ‘I know one thing. The sooner I go over the wall after dark the better.’
Stella went on frowning at her fingertips.
‘I don’t feel we need worry about the Freeman girl for the moment,’ I said. ‘Looks like I was next on the list. Judging by the death mask at the museum. But a fatal illness will be more difficult to arrange with the subject melted down in the furnace.’
Stella looked across at me soberly. She had gone pale.
‘That means Krug’s on to you, Mike. Better take care.’
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘What are they wearing in shrouds this year?’
Stella shook her head and closed the notebook with a snap. ‘Some people,’ she said.
*
Kathy Gowan drove the Spitfire fast but with controlled precision, I sat back in my bucket seat and hoped nothing would come out of an intersection without stopping. I could see her profile against the red and green neon that blurred past. I thought there was a half-smile on her face. The night was dark but dry; the conditions suited me nicely. The big hand pressed into my back again as Kathy drifted the glistening scarlet two-seater round a U-bend. I thought we were going to slip off the road but the little sport-job seemed glued to the tarmac. I glanced back at Kathy; this time she was really smiling in the light cast from the instrument dash.
It was nearly eight o’clock; quite dark now, except for a faint smudge of scarlet in the western sky. We had arranged the drill; she was to come back for me at eleven. If I hadn’t showed she would contact Tucker. It was nearly fifteen minutes past eight and completely dark when she whispered the little car off the road and in under the shadow of the trees about a quarter of a mile down from Sunset Gardens. She switched off the engine and we sat quietly listening to the far-off thrashing of branches in the night wind.
‘Well, this is it,’ she said lightly. ‘Take care.’ Her lips brushed my face gently.
‘Sure,’ I said, not certain now whether I wanted to go over the wall after all. I sighed and stretched myself in the small bucket seat. ‘You’d better take this,’ I told her. I got my Smith-Wesson out of the nylon holster under my armpit and handed it over to her, butt first. She took the gun from me. Her fingertips felt warm from being inside her driving gloves.
‘Won’t you need it?’ she said.
I shook my head. ‘It might make things more difficult and it won’t sit with my role of bereaved relative if I’m caught. I don’t bank on anything more than a roughhouse if there’s trouble.’
She examined the gun dubiously before she shut off the dash lights, then grinned in the faint light from the sky.
‘You know what to do?’ I asked.
‘Give you a couple of hours and then use my brains,’ she said.
‘Right,’ I said. ‘You keep a watch on the entrance first. See who comes and goes. Then get round the back at eleven in case I need some covering fire.’
I wasn’t serious about the last, but I felt sure she was. Kathy Gowan was the sort of girl who was at her best when the chips were down. I’d found that out already.
‘What will your car do?’ I asked.
‘Something over ninety with my toe down,’ Kathy Gowan said. ‘And she’s economical on gas.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘Thanks again, Kathy. I’ll look for you in about two hours.’
‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Just make certain that you do.’
I went to open the door of the car on my side. She put her arms round me and held me close. She kissed me full on the lips. Her hands moved warmly over my face and hair, following the contours of flesh and bone as if she were memorizing everything with her fingertips.
‘There’s more where that came from,’ she breathed in my ear. ‘After. Just make sure you get back safe, you big goon.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Keep that stuff hot for me.’
I slid out of the car, closed the door softly behind me and melted into the shadow of the trees.
*
I was a long way from the main building but I wasn�
��t sure whether Krug would have guard dogs or night watchmen. The grass was tall and wet at the spot I had chosen so I moved on round the perimeter. The wind sighed among the treetops; it was a lonely place and Krug and his chums couldn’t have chosen a better one for their purposes. There were tall iron railings that looked wet and difficult to climb at this point, so I went on, hoping to find somewhere more suitable.
Presently the railings and brick pillars of Sunset Gardens moved away from the road; there was now an orchard and a spile fence surrounding it. I found a loose section of paling and bent the split wood down low enough to enable me to get over. I landed heavily and tore the edge of my trench coat on one of the spiles. It was muddy underfoot but there was enough moonlight to enable me to see the terrain and to prevent me running into low-hanging tree branches. The orchard was a big place and it was some while before I picked up the boundaries of Sunset again. Then I ran into a high bank; at the top of this was a low thorn hedge which I got over without too much trouble. The torn hem of my coat caught in the hedge so I tore the strip right off and put it in my pocket. There was a board fence at this point and I prowled along it, looking for a loose one. It was already nearly a quarter after nine. I found a board eventually which wasn’t as securely fastened as the others. I put my shoulder to it and felt it crack; it seemed to make a hell of a lot of noise.
It broke at the bottom in the end, with a tearing sound which set my teeth on edge. I pivoted the board next to it upwards and found I could just squeeze through at the bottom. By this time it was half-past nine. By the dim light coming from the sky I picked my way across a no-man’s land of wet clay. There were piles of fresh soil here, among which I stumbled; spades were stuck in the heaps. There was a strange, sour smell on the air too. Metal drums were stacked on the edge of the dug area; I put my hand cautiously on the top of a drum and scraped its surface with my finger.
I tested the tip of my finger with my tongue; the taste was bitter, sickly. I didn’t know the chemical. I wiped my tongue with my handkerchief and then did the same for my fingers. I started off uphill, keeping down into the bushes that studded the low sky-line. A pin-point of light in the far distance showed where the main buildings of Sunset Gardens reared above the trees. Presently I got up on to a small metalled road that traversed the Gardens, and stopped. The road seemed to spiral in circles around the base of the hill.