Dangerous Legacy

by George Harmon Coxe

  “If that’s what you want. Do you know where John Richards’s place is on Santa Mesa?” she said to Charlie.

  Charlie said he did and they started off, arriving twenty minutes later at a blue-gray bungalow-type house placed well back from the street and screened by acacia trees. Inside there was a small bar in one room, a second room with a tiny dance floor and a piano, and a third at the front, decorated at the ceiling and walls with dyed parachute cloth but otherwise quite plain, where John Richards took them to a corner table.

  Rankin ordered Scotch and soda for two. “Good Scotch,” he said.

  John Richards was a tall broad Negro with graying hair. He had greeted Lynn with deference when they entered and now he glanced at her, and Rankin saw her nod slightly and smile, as though to reassure Richards that everything was all right.

  The waiter came with the bottle and let Rankin examine it before he poured the drinks. Rankin said, “Ahh,” appreciatively. “Cheer’o,” he said, and she lifted her glass to his, her eyes amused but speculative.

  “What happened to you?” she asked.

  Rankin shook his head slowly. “Leave us not go into that. On account of it might lead to forbidden topics. I like it this way,” he said. “I was afraid you’d crossed me off your list.”

  She moved her shoulders. “It isn’t often that I have the chance to drink good Scotch.”

  “Oh? Doesn’t Howard Austin approve?”

  “He approves but he can’t always afford it.”

  Rankin watched her with one eye, detecting a certain archness in her manner. When he found no explanation for this he finished his drink and ordered another. Lynn refused a second and he said:

  “Well, at least I guess this proves you don’t think I killed your half brother.”

  “Yes. I might have thought so at first—for a little while—until I remembered how much Ulio always thought of you.”

  Rankin started to continue with this process of elimination but caught himself in time, knowing that once he got on the subject of Pascual Sanchez the evening would be spoiled. He asked her about her work and how she happened to get the job with Jerry Walsh.

  She smiled then. “I asked him for it,” she said. “I knew him in ’41. I’d see him at the Manila Hotel and the Jai Alai Club and polo games and he knew Dad quite well. I think I always thought I’d like to write, or try to,” she added. “So when I found out Jerry was here I looked him up.”

  She said there was nothing for her until the correspondents were taken off the Army standard and resumed civilian status. “There must have been two or three hundred of them at one time,” she said. “But afterward there were hardly any. Jerry had the Bureau and Ed Kelly and a Filipino boy to help him, and he needed someone else.”

  She had more to say, elaborating, speaking of various assignments she had handled. She said it would be a good foundation should she want to keep on writing as a free lance. She would have continued if the waiter had not appeared and coughed gently.

  When Rankin glanced up the fellow said he was going off duty and would Rankin mind taking care of the check. “It will be twenty-seven pesos,” he said.

  Rankin peered up at him, his brow twisted. “For three drinks?” he said in his astonishment. “Thirteen fifty for three ounces of Scotch?” he said, and then he heard Lynn’s quick laugh and looked at her, knowing why she had been secretly pleased when he ordered.

  “I see what you mean,” he said when he paid the check. “No wonder Austin can’t afford it often.” He smiled at her, liking the deep violet of her eyes and their lingering amusement. “How do they sell steak, by the gram? Is it good?”

  He did not care, nor wait for her reply but asked the waiter to send the new man over. Lynn made no protest, accepting now the idea that they would have dinner here, and when he could, Rankin got back on the subject of her job because it was the safest thing to do and kept her from thinking too much about him.

  The lamplight was soft upon her young face and there was a sweet mobility about it now that reflected the nuances of her mood and made him forget how angry he had been with her stubbornness. He tried not to think of her loyalty to Sanchez, accepting it as some form of self-hypnotism or mesmerism, and if her manner lacked some of the quick warmth of their first night together, he did not greatly mind.

  There was, he knew, some reserve inside her that had not been there before but she was pleasantly agreeable and the happy effervescence bubbling in his chest was very comforting to feel. He watched her toy with the ash tray and the softness of her hand tempted him to cover it with his own, but he resisted the desire and when they left at ten o’clock they were still on the same easy relationship.

  It might have continued that way had Rankin not noticed the man lurking in the shadows of the veranda as he signaled to Charlie Love, who had eaten elsewhere and driven back to park near by. As the car rolled up, Rankin handed Lynn in; then closed the door and turned toward the man, certain now that he was the fellow in the neat khaki suit and wide-brimmed hat who had followed him before.

  He was close before the other could move away from the building, reaching out for him, intent on holding him while he spoke his piece. He reached for a shoulder and it was not in his mind to throw a punch, for the fellow was shorter than he was though solidly built.

  “You’ve been tailing me all day,” Rankin said. “Now lay off—”

  Apparently the other mistook his intentions, believing Rankin’s reaching hand a form of blow, for his own hand came up swiftly, the hard edge of it smacking Rankin on the side of the neck.

  Rankin’s counterblow was a reflex. In that first instant of shock he thought his neck was broken. Pain streaked to the top of his head and his throat was numb, and hardly knowing what he did, he swung hard with his right.

  It was not a workmanlike punch. It was wild rather than well-timed, but it landed solidly and the man went down, the wide-brimmed hat skating to one side. When he did not bounce up Rankin got in the car and told Charlie Love to get going.

  “I suppose you had to do that,” Lynn Kane said when they were half a mile away.

  Rankin was massaging the numbness out of his neck, his mood still black. “The guy’d been following me all day,” he groused, not bothering to explain that he had not intended to hit him.

  Lynn let another half mile roll by in silence. She sat close to her side of the car, staring out the window. “Ulio once said you had more brains in your fists than you had in your head,” she remarked, her tone brittle. “I can believe that now.”

  Rankin started to bristle, but a little of his good humor remained and he summoned all of it in one last try. He held up his palm in mock dismay.

  “Please,” he said. “If you must quote you should, as a working newspaper woman, keep it accurate. What Ulio said was that he sometimes thought I did most of my thinking with my fists.”

  He waited, hoping, but it was no good. Her voice was just the same.

  “Practicing mostly, I imagine, on those smaller than yourself.”

  He turned then, glaring in the darkness and feeling the ache in his neck. “Okay,” he said. “So the guy was a little shorter than I am. So I bopped him. He was following me, wasn’t he? And who do you think told him to? I’ll tell you,” he added. “Porky.”

  “Packy!” she corrected icily.

  “I like Porky better. It fits him.” And then, driven by his exasperation and this impulse he could not explain, he reached for her.

  He took her arms in his hands, and in her amazement she did not resist, and pulled her close and kissed her soundly, not thinking, only knowing that it was a thing he had wanted to do for quite a while.

  She did not struggle. She was soft and warm against him, and he wondered if in that moment before he released her, her lips moved under his own. Then her hands were pushing at his chest and he let go, a little stunned by what he had done and feeling this strange new happiness churning inside him. When he lit a cigarette he found his hands were trembling
.

  Charlie Love parked near the Lingayen Gulf Café shortly before eleven and asked Rankin if he wanted the car any longer. Rankin said he did not think so and Charlie said he guessed he’d go in for a beer or two and if Rankin changed his mind he’d be around for a while.

  Rankin went up the narrow stairs as though walking on air. He was still keyed up by what had happened and regretted not a single moment of the evening. There was somehow a confidence in him now that had not been there before. He thought it augured well for what was to come and remembered again the kiss and the ride back.

  They had not spoken until Lynn left the car. He had not worried about what she thought or was going to say because he knew that in the end he could show her how wrong she had been; meanwhile it seemed to him that in spite of the things he did there remained in her some small liking for him, or at least no feeling of revulsion.

  Her good night bore this out, for it was cool but not resentful. She said she enjoyed her dinner and turned to go and he caught her hand.

  “That first kiss was on me,” he said, feeling too high to care how it sounded. “But you’ll have to ask for the next one.”

  She looked at him then. She took her time and it was too dark to see her face clearly, but he chuckled as he remembered her reply. She started up the stairs, then stopped halfway to the top, a mild irony in her voice that left it challenging rather than hostile. “That will be the day,” she said, and continued on across the porch.

  Now, remembering with pleasure these things, Spence Rankin opened the door of his room and did not even wonder why it was not locked until two seconds later.

  There was no convenient electric switch by the door and it took him that long to step to the single bulb that dangled unshaded from the center of the room. Then, in the darkness, his arm outstretched, the intuitive equipment that he often ignored asserted itself and he stopped, nerve ends groping and every muscle tense, the conviction solid and unshakable that someone was waiting in the room.

  12

  IT WAS PROBABLY NOT MORE THAN A SECOND that Spence Rankin waited there in the darkness of his room, his hand touching the light bulb, his scalp tight. The memory of two other nights like this was real and frightening now and he did not argue with instinct, but stood deliberately still, thinking fast, his leg muscles stiff, and the pressure expanding in his chest.

  He had no doubt now about the danger and he did not scoff at his imagination nor question the miracle that had so unaccountably stopped, him. Someone was waiting. He did not know where, for there had been no sound but the pounding of his heart, and he did not know why. All he knew in that interminable second while he waited for a gun to hammer at him, was that it would be silly to move blindly, to try to fight something he could not see.

  Finally in his desperation, it dawned on him what he must do, and not knowing what was coming, he took the switch in his fingers. He said, “Hello,” in what he hoped was a conversational tone. He paused a split instant, the perspiration coming fast now, and said, “How about a little more light?” And then he turned the switch and the room was bright.

  Slowly then he let his hand come down finding nothing in front of him but the chest and a chair and part of the bed. With the same unhurried manner he turned; then he knew how right his instincts had been.

  For sitting in one corner, a gun in her lap and her hand on the gun, was Marie Dizon. She wore a cheap cotton dress and on the floor beside her was the straw handbag he had seen before. That she had to blink away the brightness told him she had been here quite awhile and when he saw how pale and drawn her face was, when the dark elongated eyes focused on him and he saw the pain and fear in them, he knew why she had come.

  He did not say so but covered his concern quickly as he moved toward her. He was casually surprised, or hoped he was, when he said, “Why—hello, Marie. How did you get here? Is anything wrong?”

  Marie Dizon took her time answering. Her small breasts rose as she took a breath and she said, with all the weariness in the world in her voice, “I found a man downstairs who had a key. I told him you asked me to wait for you.”

  She glanced up, her eyes holding his and nothing changing in her voice. “I came to kill you,” she said.

  Rankin was way ahead of her, thinking of how openly she’d got the key, without ever caring who knew she had come. Then he saw that not only had she come to kill him but that she was perfectly willing, having done so, to pay the penalty.

  “Why didn’t you?” he asked gently.

  “I don’t know.” She sighed again and her head moved tiredly from side to side. “I—I just couldn’t. I had it all planned. Maybe I waited too long, but when you finally came it didn’t seem to matter any more and I was too tired.”

  Rankin waited patiently, making no attempt to take the gun. “Because you thought I killed Ulio?” he asked. “Why should you think that?”

  “Because today someone stole the copy of the will I had.”

  “Oh?” Rankin said, not understanding.

  “Lynn said you lost the copy you had and without it you had no claim and so—” She broke off, her eyes widening. “Didn’t you?” she whispered. “Steal it, I mean? But who would?” she said, seeing the answer in his face.

  “Put that thing away,” he said, indicating the gun. “Come on downstairs with me and I’ll tell you what I think.” He waited, seeing now the confusion his invitation had caused. “It’s time we had a talk. It’ll be a little noisy down there but it’s better than here. We can have a beer,” he said. “Come on.”

  She put the gun in her bag. She stood up and he saw again how small and frail she was. There was no resiliency here to soften her grief and when he realized how terribly she had been hurt his throat hardened and he had to swallow before he could speak.

  “Just one thing more,” he said, and took the original of Ulio’s will from his inside pocket. “I’d rather show you here than downstairs.”

  A glance was enough to tell her what he had. “But,” she said in slow astonishment, “you told Lynn—”

  “I know.” Rankin put the will away and opened the door. “I’ll tell you about it when we get downstairs.”

  Charlie Love was leaning against the bar, a half-full beer glass in front of him, and though he had seen Rankin and the girl come in he gave no sign and did not turn his head. He was still there, watching the room in the mirror with eyes that looked sleepy and weren’t, when Rankin came up to him after getting a table for Marie.

  “Sure I’ll stick around,” Charlie said. “As long as you like, Mr. Rankin.”

  Rankin sat down with Marie at a table along the wall. She refused a drink but said she would have a beer so he ordered for them and for Charlie. He brought out cigarettes, glad that Marie was interested enough to look about, and they sat watching the antics of the five-piece band and the gyrations of the dancers until the beer came.

  “Now,” she said when she had tasted hers, “can you tell me?”

  “About why I said the will was stolen? Call it a hunch.” He said his room had been searched one day and he thought it might be searched again unless the word got around that the will was already missing. “Also,” he said, “it might give Sanchez something to think about; maybe worry him some because he couldn’t figure it.” He leaned forward. “Who do you think stole your copy—assuming I didn’t?”

  He hesitated, seeing the puzzlement in her gaze, and said, “Who would be interested enough to give a damn? Lynn? Possibly, because her inheritance would be cut in half.”

  “She wouldn’t,” Marie said simply. “Not Lynn.”

  “Okay. What about Austin? Another possibility but a remote one,” he added when she shook her head again. “He sort of expects to marry her and the will would cut down what he might get—but not when you consider the mine.”

  He told her of his conversation with Austin and what he had learned about the potentialities of the mine. “With me out of the picture Sanchez has the mine; with me in maybe Lynn would get
a half interest in spite of herself and that alone would be worth far more than anything else she could cash in on. So it’s not Austin—Austin wants the same thing I do—and who does that leave?”

  “Sanchez?” It was a question more than an answer. “Is that what you really think?”

  She was leaning across the table now just as he was. There was no more than a foot between their faces and neither of them heard the band now or the chatter of voices or anything else in the room.

  “Sanchez knows I’ll make trouble if I can,” Rankin said. “The only way he can laugh me off is to catch me without that will. I told Lynn it was gone. She told him. If he stole your copy and I had none where would I be?”

  “Yes,” Marie said. “I see now.”

  “He killed Ulio Kane,” Rankin said, and related again the things that had happened in San Francisco and what had happened the night of the murder. “I think I can prove he doesn’t own the mine before I get through, but that isn’t enough, is it?”

  There was a silence then, but the effect of his words lingered on, for Rankin had a certain personal magnetism that became both confident and persuasive once he became enthusiastic about something, and when he put his mind to it he could be a very convincing guy. It was this quality of selling himself that had always made it easy to get jobs—which he later lost when he forgot about the enthusiasm—and now Marie began to feel the infection of the arguments.

  Her dark gaze was intent, though Rankin did not think she really saw him. Using as a springboard the things he had said, she seemed instead to have some image of her own to comfort her and there were traces of color in her cheeks and interest in her voice.

  “No,” she said, very calm and determined about it. “Not nearly enough.”

  “Yeah,” Rankin said and then, thinking of how little he had accomplished, he sighed and his thoughts bogged down in a welter of depression. “All we have to do is prove Sanchez killed him—or ordered it done.”