Murder in Luxury

by Hugh Pentecost

  Pierre Well, I'll try to keep him entertained while you get things ready, Pierre.... Oh, my dear, don't be concerned. I'm having a ball!"

  She handed the phone to Keegan and he put it back on the table.

  "You're in for a big surprise, Mrs. Haven, if you think this is some kind of game," Keegan said.

  "There are games and games," Mrs. Haven said, turning the scarlet sock and starting along a new row of knit one, purl one—or whatever. "There are games you play for fun, and games you play for high stakes, and games you play because you're sick and self-destructive." She gave him an interested look, like a parent dealing with an erratic child. "Making a game of punishing Mrs. Summers for what she did to you is completely self-destructive. You'll never be able to take a step out into the daylight again, out into the civilized world. Is it really worth it?"

  "Damn you, you old bag!" Keegan said, under his breath.

  "Now, now, Keegan. Sticks and stone, sticks and stones," she said.

  "What have I done to him?" Val cried out. She was sitting up in her chair, her eyes wide. "I never saw him before in my life till the other night—in my apartment—when he came to investigate.''

  "Fascinating, isn't it?" Mrs. Haven said. "He wants to punish you for something you don't know you did. Let me make a rather grim suggestion to you, Valerie. It might be the better choice to die here than to let him take you somewhere else and drag it out, slowly, painfully."

  Val slumped back in her chair, hands raised to her face again. I had to go to her, gun or no gun. I moved around to her chair, knelt down beside her, and took both her hands in mine. I looked at Keegan's dark angry face. I didn't say anything but he knew I was suggesting he get it over with if that's what he wanted.

  "You're really quite amazing, Keegan," the old woman said, needles clicking. "You really don't want to know how Chambrun got to know? You don't want to know what mistake you made? If I were you I just couldn't stand not knowing, whatever I planned to do later. Incidentally, is a good, brutal rape a part of your scheme for Mrs. Summers? I confess it puzzles me how a man so full of hate could perform sexually. I suppose it's a special kind of sickness."

  "I've had it from you, lady," Keegan said. "Just keep still if you want to stay in one piece." He glanced at his wristwatch. "Fourteen minutes. Can you keep still that long?"

  "Talking is a compulsion with me," Mrs. Haven said, "like violence is a compulsion with you. You've left one question unanswered, but I suppose you must have been a good lover or Eleanor Payson wouldn't have stayed with you for so long."

  "Eleanor!" I heard Val whisper.

  "You didn't know, did you, my dear?" Mrs. Haven chattered on. "Neither did anyone else until just a little while ago. Keegan was your friend Eleanor's married lover. He was the father of her son. He must have been quite an exceptional lover. She stayed with him— what was it, Keegan, six, seven years?"

  Keegan took a step toward the old woman. He wasn't aiming his gun at her now, but had it drawn back as though he meant to slash her across the face with it. She sat perfectly still, even the steel needles stopped clicking. Her bright old eyes gave him a steady stare, as much as to say "I dare you!" He didn't strike her and the needles started clicking again.

  She looked at me and I must have been white as a ghost. "I mentioned earlier, Mark, that coincidence could upset the best-laid plans. A press photographer took a picture of Mr. Keegan with reporters crowding around him in the lobby sometime yesterday. Either you didn't get a message that Derek Newton had called you, or you thought the call wasn't important."

  "Derek?" I said, through lips that didn't want to work. "I didn't get any message."

  "A bad mischance, or things might be different. For years Derek tried to find out who Eleanor Payson's lover was. He saw the man once, leaving Eleanor's apartment—sometime before the terrible beating that put him out of circulation." The bright, pale eyes flickered Keegan's way and then came back to me. "Derek lost the man that time in the crowded city traffic, but the fact was etched on his memory. This afternoon he saw that picture, printed in the evening Post, The caption under the picture indicated that the face he'd looked for so long belonged to Lieutenant

  Keegan of Homicide. He called you because he thought it must be a mistake. He thought you could tell him which person in the picture was really Lieutenant Keegan, and to ask if you knew the man who had, he thought, been wrongly identified in the Post picture. When you didn't call back he phoned Pierre. There was no mistake in the picture. It was you, Mr. Keegan, and Derek knew at last who had crippled him for life. Pierre, of course, realized he was no longer looking for a mysterious Mr. X. It was too late, however, to stop you from getting control here. If Pierre had any doubts, Mr. Keegan, you resolved them by blowing your own ball game."

  A nerve twitched high up on Keegan's dark cheek. Holding Valerie's cold hands in mine, I tried to make other pieces of the puzzle fit together. What did Carl Rogers, a drug pusher, and Willie Bloomfield, a sex and pornography peddler, have to do with Eleanor Payson, Val's dead friend? Why had Keegan blasted them and planted them on Val? He had meant to make trouble for Val, the biggest trouble he could, but why had he chosen those two particular men? He had called them blackmailers when he'd been wrangling with Val. Could he, Keegan, have been a victim?

  Val was taking deep, almost gasping breaths. I slipped an arm around her and held her close. She turned to look at me, and spoke as though no one else was there.

  "Eleanor's lover!" she whispered. "But what has that got to do with me, Mark?"

  "A sick mind comes up with sick reasons," Mrs. Haven said in a casual, conversational tone. I wanted to warn her. If she kept needling Keegan he might give her his full attention for just long enough to squeeze the trigger on his police special. And then I thought, for God's sake, that was exactly what she was trying to do! She wanted to turn him off Val! Sixty years ago she had been in love with VaPs father. Was she trying to pay some kind of debt she imagined she owed? Was she thinking that Val had a full life to live and that she was at the end of the line anyway? A romantic kind of guts, I thought. Did she think I might have the brains to do something for Val in the confusion she might create? I looked around, searching for an escape hatch that didn't exist. Keegan could get off a half-dozen shots before we could move ten feet. I didn't want to die trying to be a white knight.

  "Why, Mr. Keegan? Why?" I heard Valerie say. Her whole body was trembling like someone with a drill.

  The Black Irishman's face was dark with a kind of rage I don't think I'd ever seen anyone feel before. "You meddled in my business, Mrs. Summers. You helped Eleanor get away from me. You helped her steal my son. My son, do you understand? What you did resulted in the death of my son, do you understand? You and your money put an end to everything I cared for in the whole world!"

  "She didn't pilot the plane, Mr. Keegan," Mrs. Haven said, needles clicking away.

  "God damn you, shut up" Keegan shouted at her.

  "How was it, Valerie?" Mrs. Haven asked. "Did you advise your friend what to do, or did you just give her the help she asked for? I heard this whole story long ago from Derek Newton. He is my friend as well as Pierre's and Mark's. When he first came out of the hospital, mutilated by you, Mr. Keegan, paralyzed so that he couldn't ever walk again, he used to let me sit with him. I was too old for it to matter to him that I saw him the way he was. I used to think that if I could ever find out whoever did that awful thing to Derek I would be capable of murder.''

  "If you ever had that chance you've lost it." Keegan said. "Eleanor didn't love Derek Newton. If she had she would have left me long before she settled for me, bore my son. He kept trying to get at her, to steal her—like this meddling bitch! I fixed him, and I'll fix you, Mrs. Summers!"

  "It would be fascinating to know what Eleanor saw in you, Mr. Keegan," Mrs. Haven said. "Were you such a marvelous lover that you could turn to beating her, beating her son, depriving her of any decent kind of life of her own? That you could hold her prison
er until at the end she found the means to escape?"

  "Eleanor did love him," Valerie said, "but he had changed. He wasn't the same man she had given years to."

  "He was sick," Mrs. Haven said. "Killer sick."

  I thought that was it; she'd gone beyond that point where he was going to take any more from her. He took a stride toward her, and the little spaniel was up on its cushion, snarling.

  Then there was a miracle. A great, booming voice called out his name from the roof outside.

  "Keegan!'

  I realized it was someone calling out through a police bullhorn. Keegan was so quick I couldn't get out of his way, let alone interfere. He grabbed Valerie, wrenched her out of the chair, and stomped over me as though I wasn't there. I rolled over, trying to get my bearings, and saw that he'd dragged Valerie to the left of the French windows, out of sight of anyone on the roof. His left arm was around her throat from where he stood behind her, and his gun was being held against the side of her head.

  "Keegan!" the booming voice sounded again. "It's Walter Hardy, Homicide. I want to talk to you."

  None of us spoke or moved, except Toto, who permitted himself a threatening growl. Keegan glanced at me. Have you ever seen a madman in action?

  "Open that French door so he can hear me," he said.

  I got to my feet, somehow, and walked over to the door. The roof was dark. If Hardy was out there I couldn't see him. I could open the door and run for my life, I thought. However deep-rooted my cowardice was I couldn't leave the two women to Keegan, no matter how useless I was. I opened the door and moved back into the room. I stood where Hardy could see me—if he was on that side of the roof. The bullhorn made it impossible to locate him accurately.

  "Can you hear me, Hardy?" Keegan called out.

  "Clear as a bell," Hardy said, off the horn. He couldn't be more than twenty feet away, I thought. I could hear the distant sound of traffic, the foghorn noise of a ship on the East River. The real world was out there. "We have to talk," Hardy called out.

  "No point," Keegan shouted back at him. "I'm holding the girl against the inside wall. My gun is stuck in her ear. Don't try anything, Hardy."

  "Is Mrs. Haven all right?"

  "I'm fine, Lieutenant," Mrs. Haven called out cheerfully.

  "Mark?"

  "Okay—so far," I managed to say.

  "Cut the chatter!" Keegan said.

  "You have to know what the situation is out here, Keegan," Hardy said.

  "I don't need to know anything except that the elevator is ready to take me and Mrs. Summers down to the basement garage, and that there's a car there waiting for us," Keegan said.

  "That's only a part of the situation out here," Hardy said. He sounded so casual, like an old friend having an unimportant conversation with an old friend.

  "There's nothing to understand, Hardy. That elevator will be up here in twelve minutes now. If it isn't—"

  "It's not all that simple, Matt," Hardy said.

  "Nothing in the whole goddamn world is simple!" Keegan shouted.

  He was holding Val so tightly around the neck that I could see the veins standing out on her forehead.

  "Ease up on her, Keegan," I said. "She can't breathe."

  He must have relaxed his hold a little because I heard a little choking sob come from Val.

  "Chambrun can arrange the elevator for you, Matt," Hardy said. "He can arrange the car for you. But he can't set anything in motion because the police are in charge."

  "So tell them, Hardy. Tell them to move. If they don't let me get this woman out of here they'll be responsible for her death, and maybe two others."

  "Three others, Matt," Hardy said, in that completely unemotional voice. "Once you start killing you're dead yourself, you know. We've got an army in this hotel."

  "I don't matter!" Keegan said.

  "That's why we need your help in deciding what to do," Hardy said. "You're not going to get away in the long run, Matt, no matter what we do about right now. You're not asking for money to get away, or a plane, or free passage to someplace from which you can't be extradited. You just want time to torture and punish a helpless woman. All you have to do, Matt, is fire a shot, or make the lady scream, and we'll be all over you. In the long run that may be the kindest thing we can do for the people you're holding. I can see Mark where he's standing, frozen. I can see Mrs. Haven. They can't do anything because you will just pull the trigger. But you are going to do that anyway, sooner or later, aren't you, Matt? So why should we simplify things for you?"

  Keegan didn't reply or change his position, except to lean his head against the wall. As though the cool feel of the plaster might relax his tensions a little.

  "There are two people out here with me who'd like to talk to you, Matt," Hardy said, unhurried, although Keegan's silence must have concerned him.

  "I told you, talk is a waste of time, Hardy," Keegan said. "You've got nine minutes to get that elevator up here. That's all—nine minutes!"

  "Don't set time limits, Matt," Hardy said. "Just convince me that it makes sense to turn you loose. Just convince me that Mrs. Summers has a better chance if we turn you loose than if we don't. We think if you take her somewhere else it will put off her dying for a while, but that in the end you will kill her. We don't propose to let you put her through that agony. Make us believe, Matt, that there is some way you will let her survive. Two minutes after you've convinced us the elevator will be there. Until you do, there's no chance it will come at all."

  "You bastard!" Keegan said.

  "I'm not making the decisions, Matt," Hardy said. "The man in charge didn't feel he could talk to you without it becoming too personal."

  "Malone?" Keegan asked.

  Patrick Malone, the deputy commissioner, was, I remembered, Keegan's father-in-law. Malone was supposed to have been Keegan's way to the top.

  "Captain Carmody, Matt," Hardy said. "It would naturally be the precinct captain in this area. You remember he used to be Joe Polansky's partner before he was promoted? He feels pretty badly about Joe, Matt. He feels he couldn't talk to you without his personal bitterness interfering. He stood up for Po-lansky at his wedding, is godfather to his three kids." Hardy waited for a moment or two for Keegan to respond. Watching, I could see Keegan tighten his grip around Valerie's neck, forcing her to bend back against him to keep from strangling. His gun never wavered from its position against her head. I could imagine how Hardy was thinking. How far could he go? How long could he stall? He was flirting with the danger that something he said could drive Keegan to squeezing the trigger of his gun, and that would be that. From out there on the dark roof Hardy could probably see us all in this lighted room. If there was some way to persuade Keegan to move away from Valerie, turn his attention somewhere else, they might be able to take charge. Play it wrong and Valerie was dead.

  "There is someone out here who wants to talk to you, Matt," Hardy said.

  "Who?" Keegan said.

  "Your wife."

  "Oh, Jesus!" I heard Keegan whisper.

  "Matthew? Matthew, it's Polly." The woman's voice sounded on the very edge of hysteria.

  "Go away!" Keegan cried out.

  "Please talk to me, Matthew," Polly Keegan said. * There's so much I ... I don't understand. Twenty-four years and it comes to this and I... I don't understand. Dad says to tell you if you'll just stop running, just stop—stop what you're doing—he'll get you the best lawyer, the best care, the best help."

  "It's too late for lawyers or help," Keegan said. "Just go away, Polly, and forget you ever knew me."

  I thought he sounded genuinely distressed for her. It was the first glimmer of anything human he'd shown up to now.

  "They've told me so many things in the last hour that I never dreamed of," Polly Keegan said. "There's a man down in the office—in a wheelchair. They say you put him there, Matthew."

  "I put him there," Keegan said. "I didn't mean to. I meant to kill him. I thought I had."

  ' 'Matthe
w!"

  "Go away, Polly!"

  "I never dreamed there was another woman, Matthew. I never had the faintest notion that there was someone else. Your job kept you away often—I thought. I grew up with policemen. I thought I knew how it was."

  "I stopped making love to you eight years ago. Did you think I'd taken a vow? Turned into a monk?"

  "I thought you knew I was afraid. I thought you were being kind to me."

  "Oh, God!" Keegan said.

  "Was—was the little boy who died in the plane crash your son, Matthew?"

  "Yes, he was!" Keegan shouted. "He was, was, wasV y

  In that moment I thought he was either going to break away from Valerie—or kill her. It was a physical thing with him. What he did was to drag her down onto the floor, his gun still at her head as he knelt beside her.

  "You could have told me," Polly Keegan said. "I would have understood. I'd have let you go. Anything but this, Matthew."

  "Hardy!" Keegan called out.

  "I'm here," Hardy said, sounding ghoulishly cheerful.

  "Get her away," Keegan said. "It's too late to explain, to make anything make sense to her. I'm sorry, Polly, but what the hell good is that. Hardy! You've got six minutes to get that elevator up here!"

  There was silence. I strained to hear the sound of footsteps on the tarred gravel of the roof. Watching Keegan, I thought he was trying to hear some sound he could understand. After a bit he couldn't take it.

  "Hardy!" he called out at the top of his lungs.

  "It's all right, Matt," Hardy said. "She's gone. Your wife has gone." He was so close, just a few feet away, I thought.

  "What has Carmody decided?" Keegan demanded. "Does he get me out, or do I start spattering brains on the rug here."

  "You still haven't convinced us that Mrs. Summers has a chance if we let you go, Matt," Hardy said.

  "Why don't you give up, Mr. Keegan?" Victoria Haven asked from the couch. Her needles were working steadily again. "You could just let Valerie walk out onto the roof where Lieutenant Hardy could get her to safety. Mark could make us a drink while we wait for them to come for you. It would be so much easier than bloodying up the scenery."