The Wrong Murder

by Craig Rice

  “The question is,” he began, slamming the drawer shut. A ring on the telephone interrupted him.

  Malone answered it, said, “Yes he is,” handed the telephone to Jake, and said, “For you. A woman.”

  Jake carried on a brief conversation consisting mostly on his side of, “Yes,” and, “Yes, we’d be delighted.” He ended with, “In fifteen minutes.” He put the receiver down and said, “We’re joining Mona McClane in a drink at the Drake bar in fifteen minutes.”

  They stared at him. “What’s the idea?” Malone asked.

  “You know as much as I do,” Jake said.

  The lawyer shook his head. “Maybe she’s just lonesome.” He repacked the muff in its box with loving care, retied it in the brown-paper wrapping, put it in the bottom left-hand drawer, and locked the drawer. He looked thoughtfully at the gun that had been inside it, finally slipped it into his own coat pocket.

  “Why take that along?” Jake asked.

  “I don’t know. I might want to use it for a paperweight. Come on, get your coats on.”

  “Malone,” Helene demanded sternly, “what are you going to do with that gun?”

  He looked at her irritably. “If you must know, I’m going to give it to Von Flanagan. Now stop badgering me, and come on.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “So nice to see you,” Mona McClane said. She stretched her shoulders, slid a great mass of pale beige furs onto the leather seat next to her, curled her fingers around the slender stem of her cocktail glass, and closed her eyes for just one instant. “So nice to be here, after shopping all day in the snow and the slush and the horrid weather.”

  “Shopping?” Jake inquired politely.

  She nodded. “For Christmas. It’s just a few days away. Remember?”

  “Oh yes,” Jake said, as though he had forgotten it. “I’ve had one Christmas present already. It came this afternoon.”

  “Have you?” she said, lifting her brows ever so little. “How wonderful!”

  Conversation lagged. Jake sat looking at Helene and thinking that she was easily the most alluring female within the corporate limits of the city of Chicago. He wondered when he’d ever be able to do anything about it. Her skin, delicately pale from lack of sleep, seemed fragile and soft as a moth’s wing. Her eyes were very large and luminous. Two or three snowflakes were still clinging audaciously to the pale gold of her hair, sparkling there like crystal.

  “Too bad about Fleurette, wasn’t it?” Mona McClane said unexpectedly. There was nothing even remotely like regret in her voice, her little pointed face was bland and unconcerned.

  “Yes indeed,” Jake said calmly.

  “I wonder how Willis is taking it?”

  “Probably very well,” Malone said.

  She nodded and said, “I would imagine so. I always rather suspected she either bullied or blackmailed him into marrying her.”

  “So?” Helene said, raising one eyebrow.

  “He must feel rather relieved,” Mona said, twirling her cocktail glass in her small hands, liking the coolness of its touch.

  “Possibly he does,” Malone agreed, “unless of course he should be arrested for the murder.”

  She set the glass down sharply. “Surely there’s no danger of that.”

  “You never can tell. When it’s publicly assumed that a man feels rather relieved when his wife is killed, the police are apt to jump to conclusions and make no end of silly mistakes. Especially when he’s already had one wife killed under highly suspicious circumstances.”

  With only the faintest shadow of a frown she said, “That would be tragic, wouldn’t it?”

  Malone said, “It could be.”

  There was a little pause before Mona McClane said, “Did you hear that absurd story about her body arriving at the morgue without its clothes?”

  “I did,” Jake said, nodding. “Absurd or not, it’s undoubtedly true.”

  She laughed. “Even if it’s true, I don’t believe it. Things like that just can’t happen.”

  Jake shrugged his shoulders. “Things like that just do happen. The true things are usually the unbelievable ones.”

  “But”—she frowned again—“unless the policemen are lying, or having hallucinations—”

  “A lot of policemen are liars,” Jake told her, “but very few of them ever have hallucinations. And there would be no reason for the police to lie about this.”

  She shook her head, signaled to the bartender, and said, “The police don’t always need a reason.”

  Helene asked, “Did you know the first Mrs. Sanders?”

  “Not very well. No, not well at all. Oh, of course I’d met her a number of times. But I was away so much during the years Willis was married to her that we really never got acquainted. She was a Boston girl, rather dull, I understand. I don’t think he was happy with her.” She added, “Willis and I were next-door neighbors when we were children. I’m very fond of him. That’s why I put up with Fleurette myself and encouraged other people to do the same thing.”

  “You lunched with her only today, didn’t you?” Malone asked in an offhand, unconcerned manner.

  “Yes, I did. Just before it—happened.” She gave the faintest little gesture of displeasure, nothing more than that. “She and Ellen Ogletree. Daphne Sanders has left home, you know.”

  “She has?” Jake said, giving an almost perfect imitation of wide-eyed innocence. “When did that happen?”

  “After last night’s row. Really, publicly accusing your stepmother of murder is bound to bring on a family upheaval of some sort. Mrs. Ogletree told me about it at lunch. She always knows all the gossip, true and untrue.”

  “Don’t tell me she told you about it in front of Fleurette!”

  “Oh no. Molly Ogletree is tactless, but not that tactless. Fleurette had gone to make a phone call. Ellen had left the table—gone to the washroom, I guess. The minute they were out of hearing, Mrs. Ogletree told me all about it.” She laughed, a tinkling, silvery little laugh. “It would have broken Mrs. Ogletree’s heart if I’d told her I’d known it all the time.”

  Jake murmured, “Do you train little birds, or are you psychic?”

  “Neither. Daphne stayed at my house last night.” She laughed again. “I run a house of refuge for fugitives from family rows. Ellen had a quarrel with her father Friday night and spent the night with me. Last night, I had Daphne.” She paused to light a cigarette, and said, “You can’t possibly be interested in all that.”

  Jake assured her, “The impossible is my specialty.”

  Helene held his hand tight under the table and said very lightly, “What have you been doing all day, Mona?”

  Mona McClane shrugged her shoulders wearily. “Oh—shopping and running around. After lunch I felt terribly tired of stores and crowds and Christmas decorations and I thought I’d go to the Art Institute. We all separated after lunch. I walked down to the Institute, but when I got there I didn’t feel like going in, so I walked about on the avenue and went back to Field’s. Mrs. Ogletree went off to some dull lecture, Ellen went off somewhere—shopping, I guess—and Fleurette—” she paused delicately for just an instant and said, “went to her death.”

  “Don’t!” Helene said. It was almost a gasp.

  Mona McClane looked at her quickly. “My dear! I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.” She smiled thoughtfully, put her head on one side, and said, “Yet after all—if Daphne Sanders’ accusation was correct, and Fleurette did have something to do with the death of the first Mrs. Sanders, this could be called a kind of divine retribution, couldn’t it?”

  “It could,” Malone said gravely, “but the police have a peculiar habit of calling that murder in the first degree.”

  “I suppose that’s true,” she said gravely. “Let’s have one more drink before we go, and talk of pleasanter things.”

  They finished the drink to an accompaniment of talk about the current ballet season. Then Mona McClane fastened her caramel-colored fur
s about her throat.

  “I wish I didn’t have to go, but I must.” She smiled at Jake. “How are you getting on with your bet?”

  “I’m working on it,” Jake assured her gravely. He felt Helene’s fingers stiffen in his own.

  Malone said unexpectedly, “Are you going to be at home this evening?”

  She nodded. “Yes, all evening. Why?”

  “I just wanted to know where to reach you,” the lawyer said. “It’s just remotely possible Jake may have something to tell you before the night’s over.”

  She tossed her head and laughed. “I’ll expect you with a pair of handcuffs in your hand.” Suddenly her smooth, calm voice took on an intent, electric quality. “Yes, I’ll be at home all evening. Good luck, Mr. Justus, and good hunting.” She waved a farewell.

  The little lawyer stood staring after her as though he had been stricken with paralysis. Helene shivered. Jake put on his hat, shoved it on the back of his head, and looked thoughtful. Suddenly he said, almost to himself, “Now why the hell did she say that?”

  “I don’t know,” Malone said grimly, “but I do know that she meant it.” He tucked an arm through Helene’s. “Let’s go deliver her pretty little gun to Von Flanagan.”

  Jake glared at the lawyer. “What the hell’s the idea? Are you trying to do me out of a bet?”

  “I’m trying to help, you idiot. Isn’t that what you wanted me to do?”

  “It’s no help if you tip off the cops before I have a chance to prove this thing myself.”

  Malone sighed. “We’re not tipping off the cops,” he said wearily, “if you’ll keep your mouth shut and let me do the talking. We’re just going to find out one very important thing that we can’t find out for ourselves. And it may be the one thing that you need to know.”

  Chapter Thirty

  “I’m an honest cop, and I do my duty,” Daniel Von Flanagan growled. He caught Malone’s eye, looked away quickly, and added, “Maybe I’ve made a few mistakes in my life, but show me a guy who hasn’t. I never wanted to be a cop. I never should of been a cop. But I do the best I can, and why people should go out of their way just to make life hard for me, I don’t know.”

  He glared at his three visitors as though they, personally, were responsible for all his troubles.

  “That woman came up here from the South just to kill Joshua Gumbril,” he roared. “She came up here to kill him and he got killed and she was starting back home when the FBI men got her. I ask you, did it look like she done it? Now this Sanders dame goes to work and gets herself killed in the same way with exactly the same gun, so now it looks like it was somebody else killed Gumbril too. The Lord only knows who’ll get killed next. It’s getting so it’s not safe for citizens to walk around on the public streets.”

  He paused, reached in his desk drawer, and pulled out the pamphlets advertising the joys of Georgia pecan-raising, looked at them wistfully for a moment, thrust the papers back in the drawer, and slammed it shut.

  “State and Madison Streets, of all places,” he muttered in disgust. His voice rose to an angry bellow. “And who took her clothes off, that’s what I want to know. Who took her clothes off?”

  “Don’t look at me,” Malone said mildly, “I didn’t do it.” He lighted a cigar, looked at it thoughtfully for a moment, and said, “Personally, I think you boys cooked up that story.”

  “You do, huh,” said the police officer, his face slowly turning purple. “You think it’s a fake, huh!” Suddenly he pounded violently at a buzzer on his desk and bawled, “Garrity!” at the top of his voice.

  Malone said, “There’s a limit to what I believe, that’s all.”

  Von Flanagan glared at him. It seemed entirely possible that he was beyond speech.

  The door opened and a tall, thin policeman walked in. There was a puzzled look on his face. It seemed to have been there for a long time.

  “Garrity,” Von Flanagan said a shade more quietly, “what was the condition of Mrs. Sander’s body when you put it in the police ambulance?”

  “It was dead,” the policeman said promptly.

  “No, no, no,” Von Flanagan shouted. He drew a quick breath and asked, “What was the condition of the body as regards its clothing?”

  “Oh,” said Garrity. “It had it on. What I mean to say is, the body was dressed.” He looked at Malone almost plaintively.

  “Was anyone in the ambulance besides Lally and yourself up in the front seat?”

  “No. Except the corpse.”

  “Did you make any stops between State and Madison Streets and the morgue?”

  “No. We didn’t stop no place.”

  Von Flanagan drew another, slower breath, looked fixedly at the unhappy policeman, and snapped, “What happened when you got to the morgue?”

  Garrity looked up with a puzzled frown. “We stops the ambulance and me and Lally goes around to the back of the ambulance, and he opens the door and looks in and hollers, ‘My God, Garrity, she ain’t got no clothes on.’” He paused and added, “She hadn’t, neither. Not a stitch on her.” He looked appealingly at Malone. “I don’t see how it could of happened. I don’t believe it could of happened. I been on the force for twenty years, and I never heard of no corpse undressing itself on the way to the morgue.” He paused again, scowled, and said, “I tell you, it ain’t my fault.”

  “All right, Garrity,” Von Flanagan said wearily. “You’ve said that before. Now beat it.”

  Policeman Garrity strode to the door, opened it, paused for a moment there, finally roared, “It ain’t my fault!” and slammed the door by way of emphasis.

  “There you are,” Von Flanagan said. “That’s the way it was. You explain it.”

  “Sure,” Malone said easily. “The body was robbed.”

  The officer stared at him. “Sure. The body was robbed. Just like that. Somebody liked the clothes, I suppose. You wouldn’t like to suggest how the body was robbed, would you?” His face was slowly turning purple again. “This is the sort of thing that makes me mad. Why people should go out of their way to make life hard for me—” He stopped, suddenly looked at his visitors as though he had just noticed they were there. “And now what the hell do you want?”

  “I came up here to do you a favor,” Malone said coldly. “If you don’t want to be bothered, forget it.”

  Von Flanagan looked at him gloomily. “All right, damn you, I’m sorry. What is it?”

  Malone slipped his right hand in his pocket, kept it there. “It isn’t exactly a favor, it’s a trade.” He cleared his throat and spoke in his most persuasive tone. “Von Flanagan, if I. could locate a certain gun and turn it over to you, would you have it tested to find out if it’s the one that shot both Gumbril and the woman, and let me know the results of the test?”

  “Sure,” Von Flanagan said quickly, “sure, sure, sure. Where’s the gun?”

  “Hold on a minute. Will you agree not to ask me where I got the gun for a period of twenty-four hours?”

  Von Flanagan stared at him sourly. “I can’t do that. It’s allowing you to withhold evidence.”

  Malone shrugged his shoulders. “O. K. Forget I mentioned it.” He began fastening his overcoat.

  “Wait a minute,” the police officer said. “Don’t be in such a rush.” He scowled and said, “Twenty-four hours. I might do it. Yes, maybe I might do that.” He looked up at Malone. “Where is this here gun?”

  Malone drew the gun from his pocket and laid it on Von Flanagan’s desk. “There you are.”

  Von Flanagan stared at the gun, at Malone, and back at the gun. Then he picked it up gingerly. “It could be the one,” he said almost grudgingly. “Yes, it could be. It won’t be hard to find out.” He looked at the lawyer with a sudden expression of gleeful triumph. “You didn’t say anything about not having the ownership traced.”

  Malone said, “Go as far as you like. And let me know what you find out, will you? I don’t know myself who owns it.”

  Von Flanagan grinned. “I will,
before your twenty-four hours are up.” He looked at the gun again and then at his watch. “Better than that, I’ll bet you two quarts of gin that if it was bought in Chicago, I’ll have it traced before midnight.”

  “Done,” Malone said coldly. “I’ll take you on that. Not because I doubt you can do it, but because I know you’ll do it quicker if there’s two quarts of gin in it for you.”

  Jake started to speak, stopped himself. What in blazes was Malone doing?

  Von Flanagan was still regarding the gun very thoughtfully. “Malone, who’s your client?”

  “I have none in connection with this case,” the lawyer said promptly.

  The police officer sighed. “I won’t call you a liar, but by God, I don’t believe you. Listen here,” he said suddenly, a suspicious note creeping into his voice. “You told me you didn’t know who this gun belongs to.”

  “I don’t,” Malone said.

  “Then how,” Von Flanagan asked, his voice again rising steadily toward a roar, “how did you get hold of it if you don’t know who it belongs to?” He reached the climax of the roar as he demanded, “Where did you get it?”

  Malone said, “From Santa Claus.”

  The harassed police officer leaned back in his chair and delivered a tirade in which he described John J. Malone as a prevaricator of the most disreputable nature and habits, with an origin that was not only illegal and immoral but otherwise highly irregular. He ended it with a colorful blush and an apology to Helene.

  Helene said, “Don’t apologize. It’s not only interesting, but it’s probably accurate.”

  Von Flanagan gave her the grateful smile of an artist whose talents are appreciated, turned to glare again at Malone, and said patiently, “If you don’t know who the gun belongs to, where did you get it from?”

  “Damn it,” Malone said in an exasperated tone, “I don’t know.”

  The police officer drew a long breath and began, even more patiently, “If you don’t know who—”