by Dell Shannon
He thought again, unwillingly, about that ridiculously unwelcome hunch of his about the girl… He wondered how Mendoza was getting on.
TWELVE
Mendoza was in a very bad mood with himself. It seemed that from the beginning in this thing he had, like some thickheaded ex-patrolman working his first case in plain clothes, been overlooking little niggling details that were, on analysis, of the first importance. The only thing he could figure, and it was a depressing thought, was that he must be getting old.
Mendoza, who had made a little reputation for himself as one of the bright boys at headquarters! Maybe he needed glasses; maybe he needed to take one of those memory courses.
He'd stood outside this damned Temple, on Saturday night, and read the sign, and among other things it had said in black and white, Ceremony of the Inner Chamber (whatever in God's name that was), 8 P.M. Fridays. So? So he'd gone along building up this beautiful story about how the Kingmans had committed the murder beginning at about seven-thirty and ending after midnight on a Friday night. When, by their never-enough-to-be-cursed schedule, they were expected to be at the Temple. And it appeared that was just exactly where they had been on Friday the thirtieth. Because Mr. Martin Kingman wasn't the hypnotist to get twelve members of his flock to swear to a lie on his behalf.
"… And Mr. Lester J. Derwent," concluded Kingman, and looked up from the list in his hand. "I hope that's satisfactory, Lieutenant? I cannot help feeling you are wasting time here, on ourselves-but I repeat, of course we are willing and eager to help you however we can, we have no secrets, indeed your search warrant was quite unnecessary. I'm sure I speak for my wife too in saying that you would have been welcome to search anywhere without it."
"Oh, of course," she agreed immediately, using her eye-widening trick on him. "Anything that will help in this dreadful thing, though I do agree that it's a waste of time to suspect us. We thought the world of Brooke-"
Of course, of course. One of these twelve people (those who had progressed to some higher Temple rank and were admitted to that particular ritual) was a respected stockbroker-another was a wealthy art patron whose name appeared frequently on the social pages. And there were, in any case, definitely no flies on Kingman, when he sat there so confidently welcoming the cops to pry into his cupboards, the cupboards would be bare.
Mendoza looked at them with a dislike he concealed with difficulty. At paunchy, respectable, plum-voiced Kingman, bald head shining with honesty, as it were; at Madame Cara gracefully arranged on her by couch, draperies trailing, silver-nailed hands gesturing, looking rather like an earnest horse. Damned the pair of them.
And he was going senile. Now he was wishing they didn't have all that suggestive evidence to say it had been that Friday night. Not that it would make any difference; the Kingmans couldn't have done it on Saturday night either, on account of their damned Sabbath ritual.
They sat there beaming innocence and integrity at him, this pair of slick fraud artists, and he shut his teeth on some impolite remarks.
"Thanks very much," he said. "It's more or less a formality, you know we have to look everywhere."
"Oh, yes, I see that," said Kingman. "You can't be sure, of course, until you do. Yours must be an interesting job, Lieutenant. Of course you can regard these sad affairs-um-impersonally. I fear we who are involved in them cannot. I still find it quite incredible that the poor boy-ah, well, we must not take up your time with irrelevancies."
"By the way, another little matter, while I'm here. Do both of you have drivers' licenses?"
"Dear me, how mysterious," exclaimed Madame Cara. "What can that possibly have to do with-? As a matter of fact, no, Lieutenant, we don't. Poor Martin has some visual defect, they never would-"
"Er-technically I believe it is called ‘tunnel vision,' " said Kingman seriously, adjusting his glasses. "In our home state, it prevented me from obtaining a license, and I have never, consequently, learned to operate a car."
"I see." That could be checked; but it would without a doubt prove true. And there was the answer, the reason the woman had had to dispose of the Porsche alone. And what the hell good was it to him when they had an alibi for that night?
"I am afraid I'm not a very good driver," said Madame Cara with a sudden nervous giggle. "The traffic quite terrifies me. But one must have faith to accept-it's a little exercise I practise every time I get into the car-whatsoever the great All-Parent intends, I say to myself, I must not fear or rebel against. It's really a great pity that Martin can't drive, I'm sure he would be much more competent than I am-being an Earth person, you know-he is a Virgoan-of course it's not to be wondered at that an Air person like myself isn't good at dealing with these mechanical things. I expect you find that true yourself as a Piscean, Lieutenant-a Water sign, of course you are governed by Neptune-"
"My dear," said her husband gently, "we must not-um-proselytize at the lieutenant. I fear he is not much in sympathy with our views."
"Oh, do forgive me," she picked up the cue at once. "Nothing must be forced-understanding must come of itself, when the spirit is open to receive."
Mendoza eyed her with exasperation and asked (in the rather vague hope of frightening them a little with how much he knew) whether she had ever possessed a light-colored coat with dark trimming down the front and dark cuffs. He did not, of course, have any hope at all that his men had found such a thing in her wardrobe.
No, she could not remember ever having a coat like that and certainly had none now; it sounded quite attractive, very smart.
Mendoza thanked them, listened again to reassurances that they were eager to help however possible, and came away. Downstairs, Piggott and Landers were just finishing an expert going-over of the Temple; nothing of any interest had showed up. No weapons, no incriminating documents, nothing unusual among personal possessions or down here: that is, said Piggott disapprovingly, if you didn't count all the funny-looking robes and them heathen statues standing around. Looking downright wicked to him-Piggott was a pillar of the Free Methodist Church-would it be, he asked (dropping his tone discreetly) one of these cults, like, where they had orgies?
Mendoza said he doubted it, unfortunately, or they might be able to turn the damned pair over to Vice. He sent the men back to headquarters, and most unusual for him sought out a bar and had a drink before going back downtown himself.
There he met Hackett, and confessed his sins with bad grace. Hackett looked gloomier than ever, and passed on the gist of what Morris had said. He was going to take a couple of men and set out on a hunt for all these show people, in the hope that one of them would remember something more about the gun: Morris had said he had to come into town late this afternoon, he'd stop by and take a look at it.
Nothing had come in from Pennsylvania. "What the hell are they doing back there," said Mendoza irritably, "pawing through all their records by hand? Damn it, and what good will it be if they hand us our motive? You know, I do wonder why Twelvetrees was so set up that Wednesday night?"
"Does it matter?" asked Hackett.
"It might. It might tie in somewhere.” He wondered harder about it an hour later. Hackett took off on his hunt, and Mendoza annoyed Sergeant Lake by wandering around the sergeants' office and the anteroom, asking every three minutes whether Pennsylvania had communicated. The patient recheck with all those agencies hadn't turned up a smell of Marian Marner. Then, about four o'clock, a trio of nervous men came in together and said they had something to say about this guy who'd been buried under a house, and who should they say it to?
They were, it appeared, respectively, the owner, cashier, and waiter i of a small restaurant on La Brea Avenue, and what they had to say was that Brooke Twelvetrees had been in the place about five o'clock on that Friday afternoon. It wasn't the first time he'd been in; he wasn't a regular, but every now and then he came in early like that, and once when he'd been talking with Charlie here-that was the waiter-he'd happened to mention that it wasn't far from his doctor's office, s
o maybe it was the days he saw this doctor he stopped in at the restaurant.
And, deduced Mendoza, the times he wasn't going out with anyone later; by these men, the restaurant would be the kind of place without it much tone, a cheap place Twelvetrees would go to alone to pick up a casual meal.
Well, early like that, there weren't many other customers, and this guy did a little talking to the waiter and cashier. They'd gathered he was hoping to get in the movies, and he sure had the looks for it, didn't he? That Friday, he'd come in (some confused, anxious calculations of time here) about ten to five, and left about half past. Charlie, specifically asked about his order, came up with nothing more definite than that it might have been beef stew and so on. They could try to pin it down by the waiter's checks, but of course the name wouldn't be there, it would be a question of the time the check was filed, and not definite. Anyway, both the waiter and cashier got the impression the guy wasn't feeling so hot-like he'd, oh, just lost his job or got slapped down by his girl or something. He was usually kind of friendly and cheerful, but that time he hadn't much to say. And when the cashier had remarked it sure was good to see all this rain, they needed it bad and he'd bet the farmers were celebrating today, well, the guy had said-with various profane adjectives-that it was nice somebody was happy. And he'd paid his check and walked out. And it was always nice to have additional information, but Mendoza wished he had some idea of what this meant. It might be quite unimportant as far as the murder was concerned. But it looked as if something had happened to spoil some hopeful plan the man had had. On Wednesday night he was on top of the world, hinting mysteriously at surprises; on Friday he was in a bad temper, and packing up to clear out.
Mendoza swore to himself, called the Kingmans, and put the question. After fractional hesitation, he thought, Kingman said, really, the exchange he'd had with Twelvetrees that Friday afternoon had been so casual, he couldn't say what mood the boy had been in. Mendoza was slightly encouraged to detect this as a lie; but what did that mean, why should Kingman lie about it?
About then, Dwyer, who'd been out seeing various people, came in and said that if it meant anything, it looked like those Kingmans had been on the hunt for Twelvetrees as early as that Saturday morning. Four people so far, Miss Webster among them, had said that Mr. Kingman had phoned them that morning asking if they'd seen Twelvetrees or knew where he was. Giving as excuse some unspecified business suddenly arisen.
" Oye, para que? ” said Mendoza vexedly. "What's the use-this I don't see head or tail of! I'm getting old, Bert. Old and decrepit."
Dwyer said sympathetically that sometimes a thing got stuck, that was all, until all of a sudden you got hold of something that explained the whole thing. Mendoza said morosely that when and if it came along probably somebody would have to point it out to him, the elementary mistakes he'd been making-premature senility, without a doubt. He told Dwyer about Morris coming in to see the gun, left a note on the sergeant's desk of a few places where he might be between now and midnight, added an injunction to call him immediatamente if anything came in from Pennsylvania, took up his hat, and left the office.
***
He walked into Alison's apartment at seven o'clock and found her contemplating a small canvas propped on an easel in front of the window. She operated a moderately successful charm school through the week, in her spare time was a painter-and a ruthlessly self-critical one. She said now despondently, "I've missed it-it's no good at all, is it? Looks like a postcard."
Mendoza looked briefly at a pleasant, if undistinguished, painted view over the immediate rooftops, and said it looked all right to him.
"All right!" said Alison crossly. "I don't know what you mean by that! It's hopeless, that's all."
" Claro que si, it's hopeless. Ambos tu y yo mismo, you and me both. Stop worrying over that, come and soothe me. I need soothing like the very devil. I need to have my hand held by a sympathetic female and be told what a big strong smart masterful fellow I really am. I might even find it helpful to lie down quiet with my head in your lap, of all ridiculous conventional poses, and listen to the same theme at infinite length."
" Pobrecito, que paso? " asked Alison, sufficiently alarmed by this unprecedented behavior to forget her art. "Come and sit down, tell Mother who's been mean to you."
He pulled her down beside him on the couch. "That's the damned awful thing, mi vida, it's nobody else but me-I've been a stupid, thickheaded, imbecilic dunce. I don't know any more of importance about this thing than I did before we found the corpse-and because I am-tell me, tell me!-because I am a brilliant and gifted detective, quite unused to failure, I'm out of sorts with myself."
"You are," said Alison obediently, "a brilliant and gifted detective, un macho muy valoroso, un hombre intelligente, y agraciado, y amiable, y de aspecto bravo y bello, y attractivo, y importante, y-y cancuntador, y concienzudo, y-y elegante, y honorable, y un jefe muy justamente, y-y-y magminimo, y absolutamente un caballero muy satisgfactorio y maravilloso. Do you feel any better now?"
"A little, a little. This I like to hear. So I am, I know-"
" Y un egotiste! " said Alison.
"That I know too." The kitten Sheba, who resembled her mother in being brown, sleek, and affectionate, leaped up beside him, walked onto his stomach, and settled down to purr as he stroked her. "Ah, I do begin to feel better-I am being duly appreciated… Even I think my mind begins to work with its usual acuteness… Damn it, I can still be right! Friday night-Friday night. That ritual or whatever it is, it was over at nine. All right. Say they got away by a quarter or twenty past, they could be out at 267th by ten o'clock. I'd give myself an hour at least, that drive, but they could have done it."
"Undoubtedly," said Alison.
"You know nothing about it, silencio."
"I'm only soothing you. Whatever you say is so must be so, naturalmente.”
" Muy bien, soothe me in silence.” He slid down comfortably, cradling the kitten, stretched out and put his head in her lap. "They could have. Now, Bainbridge says two to six hours before death for that beef stew and so on. Seven to eleven. That's all right, that can fit. Say he's raised his demands, and-of course, claro esta! -because whatever plan he was counting on that Wednesday had fallen through. Yes. They want to see him. They chase right out there after their damned service, and get there about ten, say even ten-thirty. And-and there's an argument. But, a fight? This namby-pamby blackmailer and a smooth con man? Why? Can we say maybe Twelvetrees insulted Mrs. Kingman, and Kingman was protecting her honor?"
" Oye, la drama magnifico! " said Alison. "Next week East Lynne."
" Chiton, I'm thinking! Well, anyway, there's a struggle, Kingman snatches up the gun lying there on the bureau-Twelvetrees' gun-and hits him a little too hard. O.K. Then, just as I built it up befor-the dither, the inspiration of the trap, etcetera. Only Bartlett had nothing to do with it, it all happened at least an hour after he'd been killed-that was the kids after all. And because Kingman doesn't drive, the woman went off to do that part of it while he buried the body and so on. It'd have taken that long easily, the time it took her to drive in with the Porsche-after they'd made the plan, too-that took some time-to put her on the spot to be the lady in the serape."
The kitten got up, stretched, yawned to show him a pink mouth and needle-sharp white teeth, turned around and settled down again.
" Perfecto! " said Alison. " Obvio, that's how it was."
"You are no help whatever," said Mendoza. "And this is a most uncomfortable position, regardless of all the movies and the award-winning photographs of couples in parks. If it wasn't for disturbing the cat, I'd move… Obviously it is not how it was-not exactly, anyway. I can see them finding the trap by accident, or just possibly Twelvetrees had called their attention to it on some former visit. As confidence workers, they're used to making slick plans on the spur of the moment. But how the hell did they know where to lind that trowel? They-" He stopped abruptly.
"These are the people from tha
t Temple? Well, she's psychic, isn't she? She divined it."
" Aguarda, un momento! Si, como no? Yo caigo en ello! -yes, of course, of course!" He swung his legs off the couch and stood up abruptly, holding the kitten. "Why didn't I see that before? I tell you, I'm going senile!"
"But you get it now, or so you just said. Better late than never. You've solved the whole case-and under my helpful feminine soothing."
"Well, not exactly. But look. Is it likely-I ask you-that this brash young fellow with his movie ambitions, his record as a pimp's apprentice-a city man, an apartment liver-is it likely that he was remotely interested in gardening? Not by any stretch of the imagination! Then why did he go to the trouble of convincing Mrs. Bragg he was, buying that plant food for her damned Tree of Heaven and so forth? Why else?-because it gave him an excuse for fooling around it, and probably when he undertook the care of the thing she wouldn't bother with it any more. I'll bet on any odds you name that was his safety deposit box. I'll swear it, he had something concrete on them-and he wouldn't leave it tucked in the toe of a shoe or in a drawer, he wouldn't carry it on him-not that cautious, canny, ladylike boy-to be stolen so easy or maybe involve him in a roughhouse, not that one! He found a safe place to stash it away, where nobody would think of looking-buried with that Tree of Heaven-and he'd just brought the trowel from Mrs. Bragg's carport to dig it up with, to take with him, and that's why the trowel was there in his kitchen. And-"
The phone rang and Alison went to answer it. The kitten scrambled up on his shoulder and began to lick his ear thoughtfully. "For you," said Alison.
Mendoza took the receiver, listened, began to smile, and finally fired rapid orders. "Get hold of Hackett-oh, beautiful, beautiful, just how I'd figured it!-who's in the office? O.K., I want Boyce, one man'll be enough, and a blank warrant-jump to it! I'll be there in twenty minutes, I want it waiting! I felt all along that was the answer- Tell Hackett to step on it. I'll meet him at the Temple in forty-five minutes… O.K., thanks, get busy!" He slammed the phone down, handed the kitten to Alison, kissed her, and snatched up his hat. "I'm vindicated-not so senile after all! Pennsylvania has come through and I think we'll tie up this case tonight- se buena, hasta mas ver," and he was gone.