Heather was looking, not at Ross, but straight ahead through the windshield into the darkness. He was gazing at her profile. He told it:
“That’s a fine, noble, generous thing to say. Me telling the police. You have no right to say a thing like that, even to me.”
“You can tell them if you want to.”
“Thanks. I don’t want to. Anyway, I can’t, because I won’t be seeing them. I’ll be going to New York with you and Hicks.”
“You will not!”
“I will. But I’ll settle that with Hicks. You said you won’t talk about all this awful business, and I don’t expect you to, but I’ve got to ask you one question and I hope you’ll answer it. About that sonograph plate. Do you mean the one that was in with those other unmarked plates?”
“Yes.”
“Then you did keep those plates.”
“No, I didn’t. I kept only one. I kept that one because it was my sister’s voice and I didn’t understand how you got it.”
“It wasn’t your sister’s voice.”
“It was!”
“It wasn’t. It was my mother’s voice. Where is it?”
A car came around a curve and was there on the road, its lights full on them, dazzling in their faces. It roared on by and was gone.
“They saw us,” Heather said. “Whoever it was. That’s the kind of a nitwit I am. This is ridiculous. I’m not going to talk about that plate or anything else.”
She opened the door and got out, opened the rear door and climbed in, and lay down on the back seat. It required an acrobatic disposal of her long legs, and even so was not an eminently comfortable position, but it served the double purpose of concealing her from the beams of another car’s lights and of isolating her from her unwelcome companion. She heard the sound of movement in the front seat but didn’t open her eyes. If he said anything, no matter what, she wouldn’t reply; but he didn’t say anything. She shut her eyes tight, but that only made them sting, so she opened them and stared at the dark. After a while she closed them again. She wished Hicks would come. Not that his coming, or anything else, would ever make things clear again and bring life back. Nothing would ever do that. Only she couldn’t go on forever having nightmares … not sleeping … not sleeping.…
Whenever the lights of a car showed in either direction, Ross ducked out of sight. Frequently, at brief intervals, he looked over the back of the seat into the tonneau. From the sound of the breathing, surely she was asleep, but that was hard to believe. He wanted her to be asleep. If she was asleep, he was there guarding and protecting her, which exactly fitted his idea of the matter to begin with. He sat as quietly as possible, not to awaken her. He wanted to turn on the dash light to see what time it was, but refrained from clicking the switch. Not that he was impatient; it would suit him all right if Hicks never came.
Footsteps on the grassy roadside. He cocked his head; from the right—no, the left. Hicks from that direction? Then he saw it wasn’t Hicks, from the size of the moving perpendicular blob, just as a squeaky voice came out of the darkness:
“That you, Miss Gladd?”
Ross spoke in a low voice: “Tim? It’s Ross.”
But there was movement in the back seat, and Heather had the door open by the time the boy got there, and was asking, “What is it? Who is it?”
“It’s Tim Darby, Miss Gladd. I’ve got a message for you. Gee, it’s exciting. Only he said you’d be alone. Only of course Ross is all right.”
“A message?”
“Yeah, on the telephone. He said you’d be here in the car. Here, Mom wrote it down. It says you’re to meet him.…”
Heather took the slip of paper, turned on the ceiling light, and peered at the penciled scrawl:
“Don’t drive past Dundee entrance. Go around by Route 11 to Crescent Road. Am in a car parked half mile beyond Crescent Farm. License JV 28. ABC.”
“Thank you, Tim,” Heather said, hardly aware that Ross’s fingers, reaching over from the front seat, were removing the paper from hers. “Thank you very much.”
“You’re welcome, Miss Gladd. Gee, it’s exciting. We’re not going to squeal. Mom says she won’t. I’ll wait here till you’re gone. If the cops come I won’t tell ’em where you went, no matter what they do. No matter if they torture me.”
“Attaboy, Tim,” Ross said. “We know we can count on you. It might be better if you’d go right back home and lay low. Then the cops won’t know anything about it. When did the message come?”
“Just now. Just a minute ago.”
Heather was back in the front seat, behind the steering wheel. She got a key from her coat pocket, inserted and turned it, and pushed the starter button. The engine roared and subsided. She turned her head to Ross:
“Give me that paper and get out. If you have the slightest remnant of manners … I can’t put you out. Will you get out?”
“Certainly not. You don’t even know who that message is from. Do you think it’s from Hicks?”
“Of course it is. It’s signed ABC. His name is Alphabet Hicks.”
“How did he get over to Crescent Road in a car? If he’s loose in a car, why didn’t he drive here?”
“I don’t know. Because it’s so close to the house. Will you get out?”
“I should say not. How did he know Darbys live there? How did he know to phone Darbys?”
“Because I told him their name.”
“When?”
“This evening. Before I left the house. Will you—”
“You said you were waiting for him here. Was this phone message prearranged?”
Heather pulled the gear lever to low. “I’m not going to sit here and argue,” she declared fiercely. “I’m going to remind you of something that I certainly didn’t think I would ever be forced to mention. You said you loved me. You know all the things you said. If you love me so darned much, prove it. Get out of this car!”
“That would be a fine way to prove it. A fine way!”
“You won’t?”
“No!”
Heather switched on the driving lights, let the clutch in, and rolled onto the road, turning left toward Katonah.
It was not a sociable ride, since not a word was spoken. From the Dundee entrance to Crescent Farm on Crescent Road it was only three miles by the direct route, but going around by Route 11 doubled the distance. Ordinarily Heather was a good driver, neither a crawler nor a crowder, but now she stammered and staggered along, slithering to the perimeter on curves, jerking the gas in, and when she met a car a little short of the turn onto Route 11 she went so wide she nearly slid into the ditch. She twisted her neck for a swift glance at her companion, but he didn’t even grunt. Two miles farther on came another right turn onto Crescent Road, which was little more than a lane as modern roads go. After a long rise over a hill and a gradual descent beyond, it wound through a wood, was in open country again for a stretch as it passed Crescent Farm, and then dipped into another wood, becoming so narrow that the branches of the trees made an overhead canopy for it.…
Heather stamped on the brake so energetically that the car shivered in protest and dug its rubber into the dirt, then shifted to low and cautiously sidled over onto the bumpy roadside. Barely twenty feet ahead, also off the road, stood a large black sedan. Its lights were off, but Heather’s lights were bright on the license plate, JV 28. She pushed a knob on the dash, and everything was pitch dark, but Ross reached over and pulled the knob out again.
“Let there be light,” he muttered. “You wait here.”
He climbed out and started for the other car, from which there had been no sign of life, and Heather opened her door and slipped out and followed him. She was at his elbow as he glanced through the window and saw that the driver’s seat was empty; and so was the rear. As his head turned to her for a comment, she seized his arm convulsively, and, seeing her stare, he wheeled around. A man who had been concealed at the front of the car, presumably crouching there at the bumper, was now erect; and in
the glare of the lights of their car his narrowed eyes, above his broad nose and thin mouth, were amazing like the eyes of a wary malevolent pig. A pistol in his hand was leveled straight at them.
Nineteen
Hicks stood in the upper hall frowning at space.
The conference with Dundee and his lawyer in Ross Dundee’s room, where he had just left them, had made no inroads upon the world’s available supply of cordiality. Dundee had been splenetic, the lawyer croaky and coldly suspicious, and Hicks himself somewhat trying. The result had been conspicuously negative. Hicks would have walked out on them much sooner, only he wanted to allow plenty of time for Heather to get out of the house and to the car before moving to join her.
Now it was desirable to make sure that she had left the house, and inadvisable to make any inquiries. He went to the door of her room and entered, glanced around, went out again, and proceeded downstairs. Strolling about, he found that most of the rooms below were populated, but exclusively by males. Having covered all the rest of the territory, he asked a man outside the side door to the living room:
“Who’s in there?”
“There are several people in there.”
“I mean of us victims. Brager?”
“No. He’s upstairs. Mrs. Powell is with the district attorney.”
“When he’s through with her I’d like to speak to him. I’ll be out on the terrace.”
Hicks moved toward the outer door, but because he moved with no particular haste and the other man did, he didn’t reach it. The man was there facing him, his back to the door, in an attitude that was unmistakable.
“You can wait right here,” the man said. “There’s a chair.”
“I prefer the terrace. I can manage, thanks. I’ve been opening doors alone all my life.”
The man shook his head. “Orders. You’re not to leave the house.”
“Whose orders?”
“Chief Beck’s.”
“A general order? Or does it apply only to me?”
“You I guess. That’s the way I got it.”
“And if I assert my constitutional right to locomotion in any desired direction?”
“If you mean go outdoors, you don’t. You get taken for a charge.”
“I see.” Hicks pursed his lips and stood a moment. “As you were.”
He turned and went back through the dining room to the kitchen. The man in the Palm Beach suit and battered Panama hat was seated by the table reading a magazine. Without speaking to him Hicks headed for the back door and was halfway there when the man spoke:
“Hold it, son. Not an exit.”
Hicks stopped. “Meaning?”
“You stay in the house.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah.”
“For a nickel I’d test it.”
The man shook his head gloomily. “It wouldn’t do you any good. There’s a bellboy out there. This time they brought everything but the bearded lady. Listen, I hate to bother you so often, but I’ve got a kid in high school—”
Hicks got out his wallet and extracted a card and handed it over.
“How would you like,” Hicks asked, “to have a job slicing skunk cabbage? I think I can get you one.”
“That is not a friendly remark,” the man declared sadly.
“The hell it isn’t. It’s positively indulgent. Compared with taking orders from Manny Beck, slicing skunk cabbage would be paradise.”
The man arose and stepped over to Hicks and shook hands, and went back and sat down again, without saying anything, either with his tongue or with his face.
Hicks left, mounted the back stairs, went to Heather’s room, and sat down.
It was now, of course, not only necessary to leave the house, it was imperative. The two other outside doors he had not tried would unquestionably be guarded, and besides, they could be reached only through the living room. There were plenty of windows, but if troopers were stationed without, that was not feasible. Doubtless he could rush it, but in the hue and cry he might and he might not be able to get to the car in time to get away with Heather. He could go across the hall and poke Dundee’s lawyer in the snoot, which would be a satisfaction and a pleasure, and force him to change clothes, but there was no way of changing faces.
A stratagem was needed.
He sat for ten minutes, muttered, “It’ll have to do, I haven’t got all night,” arose and went downstairs to the side hall, confronted the man there and asked:
“Where’s Miss Gladd? She’s not upstairs. I want to see her if I’ve still got the right of free speech.”
“She went outdoors.”
Hicks looked startled. “She went where?”
“Outdoors.”
“When?”
“Oh, an hour ago.”
“Yeah. She said to call her if she was wanted. Do you want me to call her?”
“If you please.”
The man went to the open window and spoke through it to the terrace:
“Al, call Miss Gladd. She’s wanted.”
There was a bellow outside: “Miss Gladd!” A pause. “Miss Gladd!” After a long pause the bellow swelled in volume. “Miss Gladd!”
Another wait, and the bellow was down to a rumble. “She don’t answer. Shall I keep it up?”
“After a minute. She probably—hey!”
But Hicks was through the door and inside the living room, and across to the table, his eyes blazing down angrily at Corbett’s pudgy face.
“Haven’t you,” he demanded furiously, “had enough corpses around here? You and your damn army?”
“What—”
“What what what! They ought to put it on your tombstone! What! That super-simp ordering me arrested if I try to leave the house, and letting that girl out alone unprotected! Now find her! Try and find her! When you do, remember you mustn’t move the body until the police arrive!”
“What girl?” Corbett’s face had lost some color. “What the devil are you talking about?”
The man from the hall said, “Miss Gladd went outdoors, sir. About an hour ago, maybe a little more. There were no orders to confine anyone but Hicks. She said she’d be around close and to call if she was wanted. Hicks said he wanted to see her and Al called her.”
“Was that the yelling I heard just now?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did she answer?”
“No, sir.”
“Find her,” Hicks said witheringly, “and maybe you’ll understand why she didn’t answer. You ought to be up to that.”
Corbett stood up. “Why are you so certain she has been attacked?”
“I’m not certain. I didn’t do it. I’ve been in the house. But there have been two people killed here in two days, and one was her sister and the other her brother-in-law, and out she goes to wander around alone in the dark, and is that dumb? Will you kindly give me permission to borrow a flashlight and go out through a door? Or lock me in a closet and go yourself?”
“Shut your trap!” Manny Beck barked, striding across to the door to the hall. As he opened it the bellow came through from the terrace, “Miss Gla-a-a-dd!” Others followed him, including the district attorney. Mrs. Powell elbowed her way through them, muttering unintelligibly, and disappeared into the dining room. A man entered from the terrace and told Beck:
“She don’t answer. Do you want me—”
“Phone to White Plains for a basket,” Hicks said savagely.
“This is a hell of a note,” Beck snarled.
Corbett said curtly, “Get everybody here. Get Lieutenant Baker. Damn it, call them in here! If something has happened to that girl, with the whole damn barracks and the whole damn county …”
Men moved, including Hicks, but he did not join the general steam toward the terrace. Having noticed that the card collector, attracted by the commotion, had shuffled morosely in, Hicks went to the dining room and through to the kitchen. However, it was not empty. Mrs. Powell sat on the edge of a chair putting on rubbers. On the
table beside her was a flashlight.
“You going out, Mrs. Powell?”
“I am,” she said resolutely. “This is the biggest set of tomfools—”
“What are the rubbers for?”
“They’re for dew.”
“It’s cloudy.” Hicks was directly behind her, and, since she was bent over tugging at a rubber, she was quite unaware that he was acquiring the flashlight. “There isn’t any dew.” Four steps took him to the door, it opened with its creak, and he was outside.
He swung the beam of the light to right and left and picked up no one. Shouted commands from around the corner of the house made it evident that all forces were converging upon the side terrace to be organized into a searching party. Without even bothering to deploy to the rear of the garage, he struck off to the right, made his way through the collection of cars parked on the graveled space, found a gap in the hedge, and a little farther on ran smack into a patch of briars. He got around it without using the light, found himself among white birches which had not been trimmed to head height, and in another two minutes emerged from that into what he took to be an orchard, since round things that he stepped on proved to be apples. The shouts from the direction of the house were now much fainter, barely audible. He bore right, going at a good pace, with a hand guarding his face after he got a twig in the eye, and when he stumbled onto the stone fence which bordered the road he turned left and followed the fence. In a hundred paces suddenly there was no fence, and his hands found the bars that were the gate to the lane. He slipped through, went cautiously not to bump into the car …
But there was no car.
He stepped down the little incline to the road and back up again. This was a let-down. Could this be the wrong lane? From up the road he could hear voices raised; since they were at the Dundee house, the distance seemed about right. He proceeded to settle the point by switching on the light and flashing it around—yes, there was the curve, there was the bush at the right—and there, perched on the stone fence, was a man—no, a boy, gazing into the light.
Rex Stout Page 17