by Basil Copper
Kathy picked up her fork again and put a segment of steak into her pink mouth. She shook her head and some of the creases went out of her forehead.
‘When it got to midnight and you hadn’t showed I knew something was badly wrong.’
‘So you drove back here,’ I said.
She nodded. ‘I couldn’t get any reply, of course. I didn’t know whether to ring the police or not, as you might have come out already. In the end I went back to Sunset again and explored along the fence. I had just got back here when I heard someone coming up the path. I figured it might be one of Krug’s people.’
‘End of chapter,’ I said.
‘All right, chum,’ said Kathy, ‘so I fell flat on my face. Now let’s hear your end.’
I told her. Leastways, the milder bits. Her eyes clouded and she put her hand on the side of my face. It rested there softly and seemed to soothe the throbbing away. I could see she was itching to get to a telephone.
‘I’m going to have to sit on this one, honey,’ I said. ‘Definitely not for publication.’
I could see the disappointment in her face.
‘There’s something far bigger in this for you,’ I said, ‘when the time’s ripe. Beale and Krug won’t know for sure what happened to me. They’ll go to ground anyway after tonight. I want this treated as an ordinary motor accident. If I can get to Dan Tucker in the morning the middays will play it like that. It isn’t likely the police will be able to piece anything together tonight. All they’ve got is a burned-out automobile, two bodies and no witnesses. So far as I could see Beale escaped unhurt. And he won’t have hung around. And he won’t know whether I got it for sure or not. Too much was happening.’
That’s bad,’ Kathy said. ‘It would have been a nice story.’
‘You’ll get plenty of nice stories,’ I said.
Kathy grinned. ‘That sort I can’t print.’
She took my head in her two hands and kissed me. ‘We’ll talk about that in the morning.’
‘I didn’t know you were staying,’ I said.
She nodded gravely. Her eyes were very bright in the dim light. ‘I’m staying,’ she said. She kissed me again.
*
Kathy lay against me in the warm darkness, her dark hair soft and perfumed against my face. She wore only a suspender belt and stockings and her slim thighs were hard and muscular against me as she stretched like a cat. The bed felt like all the world as I cradled her; there was nothing else but the two of us in the darkness and the night.
I reached my hand out in the friendly dark and explored the line of her breast; I ran a finger along her flank and she shivered and shrugged in closer if that were possible.
‘Do that again,’ she said, nipping my ear with small, darting teeth.
‘Don’t you think we’ve done enough for one night?’ I said.
She chuckled huskily, her voice indistinct in the pillow. ‘It’s early yet, chum.’
‘It’s all of three a.m.,’ I said, ‘and I have to get you home. What would your mother think?’
She chuckled again. ‘She lives in Tulsa. I don’t believe I’m expected tonight. I room in L.A. with two other girls. They go about their business and I do the same. Not that I make a habit of it.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ I said. ‘I don’t like to see too much interference with the freedom of the Press.’
Kathy bit my ear again and amusement gurgled in her voice. ‘The Press has been a little too free tonight,’ she admitted. ‘It must have been the wine. And you are a nice guy.’
She coiled her legs about me and tightened her arms around my chest. ‘About time I got this harness off,’ she said. ‘Then I really can be your girl.’
She crouched down in the bed and I felt and heard the shirr of nylon as she took her stockings off; her hands busied themselves at the front of her body. I heard the suspender belt land with a soft plop on the carpet. Then her naked young body was along me.
‘Why didn’t you ever get married, Mike?’ she asked.
‘Never met the right girl yet,’ I said.
‘What about the girl in your office?’ she said.
‘Stella?’ I said casually. ‘She’s fine.’
‘But you don’t feel that way?’ Kathy Gowan persisted. ‘She’s got it real bad for you.’
‘How come you know so much about it?’ I said. ‘Girlish intuition,’ she said. ‘Besides, you can’t conceal anything from the Press.’
‘Was I trying to?’ I said.
She chuckled again and held me close. I reached out to my bedside table and felt for my package of cigarettes. I lit a match; the yellow glare of the light made dark shadows under Kathy’s eyes. I kissed them and then found the match had gone out. I struck another, stuck two cigarettes in my mouth and lit up. I blew out the smoke. I put one cigarette in the corner of Kathy’s mouth. We lay smoking quietly, saying nothing, but I could feel her watching me as her image came and receded in the tiny glow cast by the burning ends of the cigarettes.
We finished and I crushed out the two butts in the ashtray at the side of the bed. She put her hands each side of my head and held me to her. She drank greedily at my mouth. We were suspended in a cave of darkness a long way above the world.
‘All right, chum,’ she said at last, taking her mouth away from mine. ‘Time to go to work.’
I slid my hands under her firm body.
‘I’ll do my best,’ I said.
Chapter Thirteen - Small Calibre Stuff
I was awakened by the insistent shrilling of the phone. I surfaced through layers of plum jam. I thought the noise of the phone was going to drill right through my jaw. I rolled over and put out my hand for the phone. Waves of pain went through my bruised face.
‘Shall I answer it?’ said Kathy, her small, dark head close to mine.
‘You dare,’ I said. ‘I thought you left hours ago.’
‘Beast,’ said Kathy Gowan. ‘After all we went through last night.’
I leaned over and kissed the soft flesh at the base of her neck, where it met her shoulder.
‘Hadn’t you better answer the phone?’ she said.
‘You leave me alone,’ I said. ‘I know my own business best.’
She smiled and put her head under the bedclothes. I struggled up on my side and looked at my wristwatch. There should be a law against such times. My chest was aching and the dull throb in my jaws went on. I lifted the receiver. I guess I knew who it was before I heard the voice.
‘This is Merna. Can you come over right away?’
‘What’s up?’ I said. ‘I realize it’s all of a quarter of six, but it’s my morning for lying in.’
There was no answering humour in her voice. It sounded tired and dead. ‘It’s something bad, Mike,’ she said. ‘It’s about Rex.’
‘Don’t talk any more over the phone,’ I said. ‘You at home? I’ll be over within half an hour.’
I hung up and started to get my legs out of the bed.
‘Trouble?’ said Kathy.
‘Sounds like it,’ I said. I fumbled around in the gloom, throwing on some clothes.
‘Can you find your way out okay?’ I asked her.
‘I found my way in, didn’t I?’ she said.
I buckled up my belt and went over and put my shoulder holster on; like always, the bulk of the Smith-Wesson in the webbing seemed to smooth the pain in my ribs away.
‘You want any coffee before you go?’ said Kathy.
‘Haven’t got time,’ I said. ‘This is as bad as being married.’
‘Worse,’ she said. ‘I shan’t be between the sheets when you come back.’
‘That is bad,’ I said. I went to the bed and kissed her gently on the side of her face. Her hand came up and caressed my head, her fingers tracing the dents and hollows.
‘Sleep on, honey,’ I said. ‘Leave when you like. This is a discreet neighbourhood. I’ll ring you.’
‘At the office,’ she said.
I tip-toed over to the bath
room and ran a warm tap on my head. Then I did what I could for my face, shaved and cleaned my teeth. When I had combed my hair and knotted my tie I almost passed for human. That is if you discounted the multi-coloured bruises and cuts that were beginning to show up a treat. I walked softly back through the bedroom. It was already five past six. I heard the sheets stir as I went out. The dawn air struck cold and damp and the windshield of the Buick was beaded with mist. I sponged it off and then ran the car back down the slope. It took five pulls before the motor turned. Then I drove off across town as quickly as I could.
*
A weak sun was striking points of light from the dew glistening on the laurel hedges as I tooled the car along Poinsettia and up the winding drive to Merna Freeman’s place. The house looked empty and withdrawn behind its shutters and the fringe of heavy trees. Merna Freeman’s car stood at the foot of the steps. Alongside it was the familiar shape of a scarlet Olds. I felt the bonnet of the Olds. It was cold and damp with that night-long dampness. It hadn’t been used for at least eight hours.
The front door was opening as I got up the steps. The negro houseboy’s face looked ash-grey above his blue coat and brass buttons. He led me through the hall and up the stairs in silence. He left me in the room with the grand piano and the two-hundred feet divan.
Merna Freeman seemed to float into the room. She wore outdoor things; a raincoat and a dark beret that sat on her shining blonde hair. Her eyes looked black against the whiteness of her face. Her lips trembled as she put her hand on my shoulder. I could feel the shaking of her body against my hands.
‘What’s the trouble?’ I said gently.
‘In here,’ she said in a low voice. I followed her through into that well-remembered library. She led the way up the long room to the desk where we’d sat before. Paperback books were scattered about the carpet. A chair was turned over. Something was lying behind the desk. I knew who it was before I saw the blue velvet shoe sticking out beyond the legs of the chair. I turned back to Merna Freeman. Her face looked drained of all feeling.
‘I found him here early this morning,’ she said in a dead voice.
‘Don’t talk any more,’ I said. I took her over to an easy chair and sat her down with her back to the thing on the floor.
I went back round the desk. Beale was lying with his ugly face into the carpet. A small hole was drilled into the back of the skull and tiny driblets of blood splashed the carpet for yards around. There were scorch marks around the wound and the hair had been burned away by the flash. The bullet had made a biggish hole when it came through the front. It had come out via the mouth and taken the upper teeth with it. I didn’t touch him. The small revolver was clutched in his right hand. The smell of stale powder smoke still hung heavily on the air. I looked around the desk for the bullet but I didn’t find it.
I went back down the room. Presently I found what I was looking for. I came round to Merna Freeman. I poured a stiff peg of bourbon into the long glass. I had to force the edge of the glass into her mouth. I held the back of her head and made her drink. She gagged once or twice and then gave a long shuddering cry. She took the glass herself and drank most of it, spilling some down the front of her raincoat. Her face was beginning to look less grey.
I poured her another peg and she took it and lay back in the chair. She sipped slowly and sanity came back into her eyes. I poured myself a shot and put the decanter down on the desk. I pulled the chair round to hide what was on the floor.
‘Tell it slowly, but tell it straight,’ I said.
She swallowed once or twice and caught hold of my hand. ‘I came in around four a.m.’ she said in that low voice. ‘I’d been to a party. I saw Rex’s car outside. The lights were still burning in the house. I guessed Hector had left him here to wait for me. The staff live in a cottage in the grounds.’
I waited for her to go on. Her hand was no longer trembling in mine.
She sipped again at her glass. ‘I came in here and found him like this.’
‘You called the police?’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I was stunned. I sat in a chair for what must have been hours. Then I saw it was getting light. All I could think of was to phone you.’
I nodded. She still looked in a state of shock.
‘Did I do wrong?’ she asked.
‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘I don’t know. My guess is a few hours won’t make much difference.’
I got up and stood frowning down at Merna Freeman. The ticking of the clock was very loud in the silence.
‘What about the staff?’ I asked.
‘They’re devoted to me,’ she said. ‘Only Hector knows about this.’
I figured she meant the negro. She shook her head and started to get up. I pushed her gently back in the chair.
‘Take it easy,’ I said. ‘You’ve had a bad shock.’
I brushed aside her questions. ‘There isn’t time. Things are moving too fast.’
I looked at my watch. It was already nearly half-past seven.
‘Have you got the key of Salamanca Heights?’
She fumbled around in a handbag she took off the arm of the chair. She handed me the small chromed piece of metal.
‘There’s a paid staff at the Heights.’
‘Did your uncle have a library up there, too?’ I said.
Merna Freeman looked at me with a glint of returning normality in her eyes.
‘A bigger one than here,’ she said. ‘Mostly paperbacks, of course. He was never a one for culture, as I told you. Why on earth do you ask?’
‘Just a hunch,’ I said. ‘Something that might tie in with the will. Dr Krug will go to ground after tonight. And I’ve got an idea that might provide him with the right bait.’
I went over and looked down again at what remained of Beale. I fingered the bruises on my cheek. My head was full of thoughts that wouldn’t fit together properly. I went over to the desk and picked up the telephone.
‘Time we got some law in,’ I said.
*
It had been a stormy session. Dan Tucker’s face still looked thundery. Three apple cores were turning brown in the ashtray in front of him. Heavy police footsteps sounded in the library beyond the room where we sat. A police sergeant went by carrying sheets of blotting paper. The negro houseboy hovered attentively behind Merna Freeman’s chair. Even Dan Tucker’s vast bulk looked lost in the open spaces of the divan. He blew his cheeks in and out a few times and looked at me helplessly.
I’d filled Dan in on nearly everything I knew. I kept back one or two small points. I didn’t want to spill everything in front of Merna Freeman. I had to think of her feelings. Dan snorted again as I finished speaking.
‘I ought to throw the book at you,’ he said moodily. ‘Two in the car last night. On top of Alloway and the kill in Knoxtown I could put you away so long they wouldn’t be using locks any more by the time you got out.’
‘Knoxtown’s outside your jurisdiction,’ I reminded him.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘As though that would make any difference.’
He opened his mouth, thought better of it and shut it with a snap. He got out an apple from a brown paper bag beside him on the divan and bit into it with a crisp noise. His strong teeth demolished it in about fifteen seconds flat. He put the core delicately with the others, holding it fastidiously between his thick, spatulate fingers. Another car stopped outside and a door slammed. MacNamara came in with his meticulous walk, head held high. He took one look at me and made a low clucking noise down in his throat.
‘You want to take something for that catarrh of yours,’ I told him.
‘In there,’ Tucker told MacNamara. He jerked his thumb towards the library door. ‘Small calibre stuff.’
MacNamara sniffed at me and went on out.
‘We might have made progress if you’d come clean before this,’ said Dan Tucker bitterly. ‘We got two more reports of deep-freeze men knocked off in out of town locations. They don’t concern
this force, but we got a rundown for information.’
‘Ten to one Beale’s your man,’ I said. ‘They’ll be able to put them on their solved file.’
‘That’s one way of looking at it,’ said Tucker.
He scratched his head and wrinkled up his face in what would have passed for a smile in anyone else.
‘We’ll go into the legal aspects later,’ he said. ‘You did pretty good at that, Mike.’
‘Where do we go from here?’ I asked.
Tucker got up and stretched his bulky form. ‘You really think Beale shot himself?’ he asked, glancing back towards the library.
‘What’s your theory?’ I asked.
‘Not saying right now,’ he said, reaching in his pocket for the bag of apples. ‘Now we take Sunset Gardens apart.’
‘It won’t do any good,’ I said for the third or fourth time that morning.
‘Look, Mike,’ said Tucker, ‘maybe or maybe not the birds will have flown. Maybe or maybe not there’ll be evidence up there. And maybe or maybe not we’ll make some arrests. You get in over the fence, slap a few people around, get your facts a different way. This is police business, you know that. We got to do things by the book.’
Tucker’s eyes were frosty.
‘You want to come along or not?’
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘I’ll come along. This won’t take long and the drive will do me good.’
Chapter Fourteen – Death’s Head Division
The big prowl car took the intersection with a scrunching of tyres and smoothly accelerated into the centre lane. The rugged-looking cop driving didn’t use his siren but the revolving light on the top of the roof was giving the Sunday drivers the message and traffic melted away in front of him at a flattering rate. I sat on the leather upholstery in back and pasted my thoughts together. Dan Tucker sat next to me and studied his fingernails from under the tilted-down brim of a green pork-pie hat. There were two more car-loads of police behind us.
We swept through the entrance of Sunset Gardens and pulled up in the parking lot at the bottom of the steps. Dan Tucker got out and I followed him up to the main entrance. Car doors slammed in the lot behind us: blue uniforms fanned out impressively across the lawns. Orders snapped. Three or four patrolmen went unobtrusively and blocked the entry where the ambulance and trade vans came from. It was all done very efficiently and with a minimum of fuss.