Strip for Murder
Page 20
A lot of what he did get out was disjointed, but it was more than enough. He said that Poupelle had come out to the castle near the end of May with Vera Redstone and he'd recognized her. One of his boys told him about Poupelle and Poupelle's “love” racket, and Norman had started getting the germ of his idea. While he talked, one of the officers scribbled in a notebook. It seemed unreal to watch him writing while that twisted voice spoke, faltered, went on again.
“All of it was my idea,” Norman said. “Whole thing. Hooks in Poupelle, had him where he'd do anything ... even get married. He was smooth enough to work it. I needed money bad, knew I could get it from Poupelle once he had it. All I had to do was make sure he got it.” He was talking fast, leaving out big parts of it, but they were easy to fill in. “Hooked him first with a rigged roulette wheel. Then Bender helped. Yates ... had to be killed. He'd told me the girl was at Fairview.”
He stopped for long seconds, then went on: “I hadn't known about the girl, just meant to kill the old lady, but that changed it. Made it ... better, would look more like the old gal really banged herself. Be rid of both of them. Yates ... he'd have known, afterward. Couldn't afford what he'd do. He'd double-crossed her already.”
I said, “Who killed Yates?”
“Mike Hawkins. At the camp. Day after Yates's report about the daughter, I sent Mike there. Him and his wife. Saturday night I phoned Yates, had him take his own rifle out to Mike. Mike used it on him right there, that night. Oh, Jesus.”
His face twitched. His eyes closed, then opened slowly. He said, his voice faint, “Scott?”
“Yeah.”
“Scott, I sent Garlic out to your car, to blast you after you left the Redstone place. Mike was in camp right then, supposed to kill the girl that night, the gas ... I hadn't heard from him. Knew the old gal must have hired you. Couldn't have you around messing things up, it was too close. I was jumpy. Mike had already missed getting the girl once. If I heard from him she was dead, I meant to kill the old lady that night.”
He paused, blinking slowly, his mouth open, then went on. “Mike messed up both tries on the girl and I gave up on her—you were in it by then. Next night when you came out to the club I'd already given the story about the girl, and the pictures, to the Clarion reporter. After that I couldn't wait, had to do it later that night when the papers hit the street. I kept Poupelle and his wife, some other people, in the club. Andon stayed in my office while I went out the back way. He waited till I got back, then he told everybody we'd been together in the office. I went into town, got one of the newspapers and took it along, killed the old lady.”
His voice was fainter now, but I could still hear him. “Andon had told me where her gun was. She knew I was going to kill her. Didn't try anything, just sat there. She just sat there. Didn't say a word. I ... almost didn't do it.”
He was silent then for what seemed a long time. When he looked at me his eyes were blank, dead-looking. His voice was a whisper. “Sorry I killed the old lady.”
“That helps a lot, Norman.”
Those were the last words he heard before he went out. He settled down on his elbow, then went the rest of the way to the ground. His hands fell slowly away from his stomach.
Laurel and I lay on the warm sand, hot sun burning our bodies an even deeper brown.
It was long after Norman had died. When his body had been hauled away I'd gone with Samson and the police to Fairview. Two of the hoods had been there, not quite knowing where to go without clothing. At least I'd burned up their clothes, even if I hadn't meant to do it. Foo, Babe, and one of the other brown-hooded couples had taken off for the hills, but they hadn't been hard to find. Not clad as they were in leaves and twigs.
Mr. and Mrs. Bob Brown—actually Mr. and Mrs. Mike Hawkins—had finally been picked up and were in the can. A large number of other criminal types were out of circulation. And Sergeant Billings had told me I didn't have to shoot anybody to make us even—I'd introduced him to Peggy. The last time I saw him, he was almost as tanned as she was. He could still blush, though. Carlos, I presumed, was still dancing with Juanita.
Andon Poupelle, not the strongest character I'd ever met, cracked during his first night in the poky and admitted he'd known about Norman's plans to murder Mrs. Redstone. Consequently he was an accessory before the fact, after the fact, and smack in the middle of the fact—smack in the middle of San Quentin, too, now.
Vera was in Las Vegas getting a divorce—since, among other things, the knowledge that Poupelle's proposal had been Norman's idea had annoyed her quite a bit—and simultaneously appearing in the show at the Sahara for $10,000 a week, which she didn't need. Everybody even remotely connected with the case was famous.
Except me. I was infamous. But my sentence had been suspended and I was with Laurel, and life was good. I'd never been so bronzed and healthy in my life. Or so full of yeast and wheat germ. Besides, I'd never had my own nudist camp, total membership two people. It had to be my own. I had been banned from every nudist camp in the United States.
There had, of course, been quite a hullabaloo. I had been charged with everything from ballooning without a license to invading the planet, and other things too horrible to mention. One waggish idiot even had the gall to accuse me of being a press agent for the American Sunbathing Association. Arson, I think, was another charge. Oh, they got a lot of charges out of me. Anyway, Fairview had been insured. But that was all behind me now.
Laurel rolled over close to me, picked up a handful of white sand, and let it trickle onto my chest. Then she leaned even closer and whispered in my ear.
“No,” I said. “Thank you, no. Not that the thought doesn't appeal to me. It's just impossible. Ha-ha.”
“Oh, you can do anything.”
“No. Some things I can't do. Really I can't.”
Sunlight glinted on that soft hair, hair like copper and brass melted together, and her bright blue eyes were merry. “I'll give you a million dollars.”
I stifled an imaginary yawn. It was a little gag of hers.
“Oh, all right,” I said pettishly. “You and your damned money.”
Quite a while later I said in a weak voice, “Well, I guess you're about broke by now. I hope to hell you're broke. We'll figure it up later. What will you do when you're a pauper?”
Laurel smiled beautifully, sleepily. “Oh, I'll think of something.”
I knew she would. She always did. But naturally I wouldn't really take any of her money. It was enough that we were together, enjoying today and looking forward to tomorrow. It was enough that we were here, on a secluded beach in Hawaii.
Hell, yes. Hawaii.
THE END
of a Gold Medal Original by
Richard S. Prather
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1983 by Richard Scott Prather
Cover design by Open Road Integrated Media
ISBN 978-1-4804-9842-6
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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