by Craig Rice
“Don’t pay any attention to him,” Malone said. “He’s just bluffing.” He wished he could put more conviction into his voice.
“Am I?” von Flanagan snarled. “You said the police department was inefficient. Well, we get around and ask questions too. Motive and opportunity. Her fingerprints on the gun. Her phony story about the birds … We’re holding her for murder, Malone.”
There was another long silence. Then Leonora Cartwright said, “Mr. Malone—this is a rather new experience to me. But there must be certain formalities—I mean—about your retainer—” She had been fumbling in her purse, and finally brought out a checkbook and a fountain pen.
“Forget it,” Malone said magnificently. “I’ll discuss it with your husband.”
“No,” she said, in that strangely musical voice. “Because you see, it’s all my money. Paul doesn’t have any.” She finished writing a check, handed it to Malone. “Will this be enough, for now?”
“Of course,” Malone said, not looking at the check. He folded it and slipped it in his vest pocket. He said to himself—not the sort of people to keep waiting in an anteroom, or to discuss money with. “And now, von Flanagan, may I have a word with my client?”
Von Flanagan growled, “Five minutes.”
“I’ll need only two,” Malone said smoothly, as von Flanagan left the room. He waited a moment, and said, “Mrs. Cartwright, in a minute or so, you’re going to have to walk through that door, with a police matron on one side and your lawyer on the other. There will be a bunch of newspaper reporters and photographers waiting for that moment. Think of something to say. And for the love of Mike, don’t collapse—it looks like the devil in a picture. What I’m trying to say is, make with the dignity.”
She smiled at him and said, “I think you can trust me, Mr. Malone.”
Looking at her, and thinking of the photographers, Malone began to wish he was wearing the necktie a famous actor had sent him from Hollywood last Christmas.
Luckily, the police matron turned out to be tall and stocky, with a broad, fat face, making Leonora Cartwright seem all the more delicate. She faced the barrage of questions and cameras with that very sad, very sweet little smile, chin up, and standing very straight.
“Yes,” she said, “I did kill Mona Trent. But it was an accident.” She waited for another set of flash bulbs to pop, and added, “I’m very fortunate in having Mr. John J. Malone to defend me.”
For the first time, Malone hoped the case would go before a jury. He could use the publicity. And he could wear that hand-painted necktie.
Malone tossed the thousand-dollar check on Maggie’s desk and said, “Deposit this fast. Draw some checks. Pay the office rent, your back salary, the liquor store on Clark Street, my hotel bill, save a hundred for me, and get Rico di Angelo on the phone, fast.”
Maggie looked at the check, picked up the phone, dialed, and began singing, “I wish I had died in my cradle—before I grew up to meet you.” Pause. “Mr. Rico di Angelo, please. Mr. Malone calling.” She put her hand over the mouthpiece and said, “Eddie Carter’s in the office. I know I should have made him wait out here, but he seemed to be in such a state—Thank you. Just a minute, please.”
Malone whispered, “What does Carter want?”
“He either wants to kiss you or kill you,” Maggie said, “but you’ll soon know. Here is Mr. Malone. Thank you for waiting.”
“Rico,” Malone said, “How many flowers for a fine funeral can I get for thirty-two bucks—”
Eddie Carter looked about as unhappy as a man can get, and still live. He lifted his face from his hands as Malone walked in. The face, Malone decided, was an interesting combination of drawn and haggard. The word for it might be draggard. Or, maybe, hawn.
“Look here, Malone,” the gambler said, “I ain’t a guy which apologizes easy, but I gotta apologize to you, see. So here I am.”
“Apologize to me?” Malone said easily. “For what? Have you insulted me when I wasn’t looking?” Draggard was the word, he decided. “Eddie, I think you can use a drink.” He pulled open the filing cabinet drawer marked EMERGENCY and pulled out an almost-full pint of gin. He found an almost-clean glass, filled it halfway to the top, and handed it over.
“T’anks,” Eddie Carter said. The gin went down fast “And what’s more, Malone, I ain’t a guy what says t’anks easy, either.” He lit a cigarette on the second try, and said, “Okay, I’ve apologized, and here’s the check back. I shouldn’t a’acted that way but I guess I was upset, kind of.”
Malone said, “Forget it, Eddie.” He tore the check into sixteen pieces and dropped it into the wastebasket. “Now we’re even.” He poured another five inches of gin into Eddie Carter’s glass and said, “Tell me about Mona Trent.”
“She’s dead,” the gambler said tonelessly. He downed his drink and said, “When a person’s dead, a person’s dead, and there’s nothing another person can do but send flowers, see?”
Malone nodded, and wondered if Eddie Carter’s floral offering would outdo the blanket of orchids he had managed for thirty-two dollars.
“What I mean is,” Eddie Carter said, “I wasn’t sore at Mona, see? She figgered she could do better, that’s okay by me. Only, unnerstan’, I wanna make sure this society bum is treatin’ her right, and that’s how come I had Louie keep’n eye on her. I guess he must of been, or Louie would of told me.”
Malone found another glass and expertly divided the remaining gin. The two men were silent for a moment. It was, after all, a very private and personal wake.
“But jealous!” Eddie said suddenly. “Jeez. Everybody was jealous. This society bum, he’s so jealous of Mona, he lives right across the alley from her so’s he can watch t’rough d’windows and make sure she don’t have no boy frien’s. N’ d’society bum’s wife, she’s so jealous of d’bum, he don’t dare take no chance on visitin’ Mona till d’wife goes to sleep.” He grinned at Malone. “Louie, he gets around.”
The unhappy mood dropped from him abruptly. “Say, Malone, d’pictures come out swell.” He began unfolding the collection he had under his arm.
The pictures had, indeed, come out swell. Eddie Carter, bereaved lover, was the very image of tragedy. The interviews had turned out even better. An inspired Buddy McHugh had translated Eddie’s last line into “Even if I’d wanted to kill her, something would have stopped me at the last minute. Because I always loved her.”
Eddie Carter rose, tucked the newspapers under his arm, and said, “I a’ready ordered twenty copies a’ everyt’ing. Malone, I’m sorry you wouldn’ take d’check.”
Malone was sorry too. He made a fast mental resolution about momentary impulses and generous gestures.
At the door, Eddie Carter paused and said, “Say, come up to d’joint some night, Malone.”
Malone sat brooding for a long time after Eddie had gone. He was still brooding when Maggie came in with the last editions.
“A nice day’s work,” she commented. “All in twenty-four hours you get three clients. One’s dead, one’s free and one’s in jail. Here’s your hundred bucks, and I must say, Mrs. Cartwright looks very nice.”
The papers had done even better by Leonora Cartwright than they had by Eddie Carter. The sad, sweet smile had come through beautifully. And the News, the Times and the Herald-American had used her line, “I’m very fortunate in having John J. Malone for a lawyer.”
“One more like that,” Malone said, “and the world will be bringing mousetraps to our door.” He scowled. “There’s something wrong, Maggie. It must have happened that way, but—” He paused, reached for a cigar, and said, “Blast it, there’s just one thing that’s important, and I’ve forgotten what it is.”
“Maybe,” Maggie snapped, “it’s to get a shave and change your shirt.” Her eyes softened. “Or get a good night’s sleep.”
Malone ignored her. He rose, stuffed the ten ten dollar bills in his pocket, and headed for the door.
“Maggie, where can I find an Alma
nac?”
“Try the public library,” Maggie said.
“Thanks,” Malone said. “You can close up the office and go home. I’m going to the library, and then to see Paul Cartwright.”
The Cartwright apartment was an interior decorator’s dream of Paradise. It had been so obviously designed around Paul Cartwright’s personality that Malone expected a maddened leopard to come charging through the underbrush at any moment.
“Nice, isn’t it,” Paul Cartwright said. “That’s an elephant gun on the wall, just to your left. Scotch?”
Malone winced, glanced over his left shoulder, and said, “Yes, thanks.” He wondered how the scotch was going to co-ordinate with the bourbon, beer, and gin he’d been using for the past twenty-four hours. He looked across the room and what he assumed was the head of a sabre-toothed tiger leered at him.
“Got that one in India,” Paul Cartwright said. “Water or soda? Right. Village natives asked me to get him. Killer, he was.”
Malone deliberately avoided looking around the room. He expected any minute to see the carefully mounted head of a Tibetan Lama.
“Don’t misunderstand me,” Paul Cartwright said. “I am not a hunter by trade. I shot that tiger because it had killed twenty-two natives in less than a month. I do not condone the killing of any living thing for sport. Only from necessity. Our trips—Mrs. Cartwright always came with me—were not big-game hunting expeditions; they were scientific explorations, made possible through the generosity of Leonora’s father. Naturally, one does not take chances.”
“Just as your wife—” Malone began. He stopped suddenly.
Paul Cartwright hid his face in his hands for a moment, then he looked up and met Malone’s eyes. “It was an accident. You will be able to—get her off?
Malone said, for the third time, “I’ve never lost a client yet.”
The answering smile was forced, and a little grim. “I’ll never forgive myself. Another scotch? Good. Mr. Malone, I’m going to tell you the truth. I was mad about Mona. You can understand something like that.”
“You’re damned right I can,” Malone said fervently, thinking of the blanket of orchids. He tinkled the ice in his glass. It made a lovely sound. He wondered why some great composer didn’t write it into a symphony. “How long were you married to her?”
“Oh. Oh, of course, you know that, too. It was less than a month. We were both poor. I had a chance to go along on an expedition to Upper Mongolia. She had a chance to go into the chorus of a Broadway show. We parted friends.” He grimaced. “I don’t need to tell you how lovely she was then—and always.”
“You don’t,” Malone said.
“It isn’t true that she ever tried to blackmail me. It turned out that the Mexican divorce she got wasn’t valid. But that wasn’t what mattered. The minute I saw her again—”
Paul Cartwright paused, gulped down his scotch, and said, “It’s true, I insisted on our taking this apartment because it was near hers. It’s true that I was insanely jealous, that I watched her through the windows to make sure there wasn’t another man in her life. And somehow, Leonora—well, Leonora is a jealous person too. But she wouldn’t have—it was an accident, Mr. Malone, wasn’t it? Besides, Leonora is a very bad shot.”
Malone rose, strolled over to the windows. The two apartments were separated by the average-sized alley. Through the window, he could see the chair where Mona Trent had been found dead.
“Accidents happen in the best of murders,” he told Paul Cartwright consolingly. “And thanks for the scotch.”
He wasn’t quite sure why he wanted to see Mona Trent’s apartment again. It was that something—the something he couldn’t quite remember. He hoped that the imitation French maid would be there to let him in. She was.
This time, she didn’t even bother with the accent.
“Hello, Mr. Malone. They told me I could come in and clean up the place. I still have three days’ pay coming, so I thought I’d earn it.”
“Give me a towel and I’ll help wipe the dishes,” Malone said. “Where did you get that phony French accent, and is your name really Yvette?”
“The dishes are wiped,” she told him. “I got the French accent at a dramatic school in Hollywood, my name is really Gertrude Hutchins, I want to be an actress, and do you drink anything?”
“Yes,” Malone said, “anything.”
While she went into the kitchen, Malone prowled around the room. There was something wrong, and he didn’t know just what it was.
The drinks were wonderful. Cool and frosted, and long.
“You’re going to go far in this world,” Malone said. “Now tell me the story of your life.”
Five minutes later she said, coyly, “Hadn’t we better pull down the window shades?”
Malone murmured, “Um-hm.”
Shades! That was it! He looked at them, sprang to his feet. “Yvette. Gertie. Trudy. Whatever your name is. What time did you leave here last night?”
She stared at him. “Just after Miss Trent came home.”
“Were the shades drawn?”
“No. Mr. Cartwright—I guess you know all that. She said she was going to sit at the open windows and watch for the signal he always makes when he’s on his way over. Mr. Malone, what was the name of that Hollywood producer you mentioned?”
“Never mind,” Malone said, “I’ll get in touch with him.”
“I know what I’m doing,” Malone said hoarsely into the telephone. “Just pick him up on suspicion of murder. Confront him with all the details I’ve given you. You’ll get a confession. No, I’m not out of my mind! Okay, I’ll meet you later in Joe the Angel’s.”
“It was the window shades,” Malone said to von Flanagan, hours later.
Von Flanagan sighed, and said, “Okay, Cartwright confessed. But what’s all this about window shades?”
“According to Cartwright’s story,” Malone said, “he waited until Mrs. Cartwright was in a drugged sleep. Then he went to visit Mona. Naturally, they pulled down the shades. Some time later, he went home. Mrs. Cartwright was suffering from the kind of insomnia that follows a heavy dose of sleeping pills. She shot at a bird, and killed a pigeon.”
The little lawyer went on, wearily, “Except, there should have been a bullet hole in the window shade. There was a neat little hole in the window glass, but none in the shade.”
“Now, Cartwright’s confession,” von Flanagan muttered. He waved at Joe the Angel for another beer. “He says he waited until there was a noisy party next door, and took advantage of it to shoot Mona Trent. The noise would cover the sound of the shot. After he’d killed her, he went next door and pulled down the shades, so that curious neighbors wouldn’t look in the window and see the dead body. At dawn, he encouraged his wife to shoot at birds.”
“It’s a nice confession,” Malone said. “Now go back to your office and dictate it, and get Paul Cartwright to sign it. As his lawyer, I’ll repudiate it in court and swear it was signed under duress.”
Von Flanagan muttered something unpleasant, and left. Malone sat at the bar, humming, “I wish I had died in my cradle.”
After a while he walked out into the rain and hailed a cab.
“It was very kind of you to bring me home,” Leonora Cartwright said. “But I just don’t think I can stay here overnight. If you’ll wait until I pack a few things—”
“I’ll wait,” Malone said, “until you pack whatever you’ll need in jail. You’ve got to confess sooner or later, you know. And you can’t let your husband sit in a damp little cell overnight, when it was really you who killed Mona Trent—and not by accident.”
His skin felt as cold as the skin of a recently caught fish. He was bluffing, and he didn’t think he was going to get away with it.
She flew at him in a fury.
“It was pure jealousy,” Malone said, between her outbursts. He wondered where nice women learned such words. “The word ‘jealousy’ is the theme song of this act, and I should have caught o
n to it much earlier. Paul married you because your father was a multi-millionaire, and would finance his expeditions. You knew that, but you didn’t know that he was genuinely fond of you, and would have protected you with his life—as he’s doing now.”
He paused long enough to light a cigar and said, “Shut up, dear, I’m talking. You hated Mona Trent, perhaps with good reason, and you decided to kill her. Now don’t tell me a woman who has traveled round the world with Paul Cartwright on hunting expeditions doesn’t know how to handle a .22 caliber rifle. And there’s nothing wrong with your eye-sight, and frankly, I don’t believe you take sleeping pills. You shot Mona Trent, and your husband knew it, and being the kind of guy he is, he tried to cover up for you.”
He looked at her. The smile was there, the faint, sad, wistful little smile. “How did you know?”
Malone paused, relit his cigar, and said, “Something kept bothering me. Presumably this ‘accident’ took place at dawn, or shortly thereafter, according to your statement. But when Mona Trent was found dead, the lights were on, full blast, in her apartment. People don’t usually leave the lights on with a sunrise coming through the window, unless they happen to be dead.”
Malone tossed away his match and reflected, that was a nice line.
“But really,” Malone said, “the birds told me. Not because they sang, but because they didn’t sing.”
“Go on,” Leonora Cartwright whispered.
“You see,” he went on, wishing with all his heart it weren’t true, “you overlooked something. You said that the birds sang at dawn. But Mona Trent was killed at five in the morning, and according to the Almanac, the sun rose at exactly seven-twelve A.M. No self-respecting bird would be yelping when it was still as dark as the floor of a coal cellar.” He added, “If it did, it deserved to be shot at.”
“That was stupid of me, wasn’t it?” Leonora Cartwright said.