If there had been nothing but a vanishing truck, and a murder that could have been the hallucination of a half unconscious young man who wanted to be rid of his wife, then you could have accepted it. But when you tied it to another murder, and to the suspicion of blackmail, it became just a little too much to swallow.
He pushed back the flickering gleam of hope that had come into his mind, and examined the theory gingerly, half afraid to look at it closely for fear it would come apart and show him that he was only, once more, trying to escape from the knowledge of his own guilt. After all, he was simply doing what Chris had done. He was constructing a murder that might have happened because somebody might have wanted it to happen, without regard to the facts.
He could hear the wind blowing outside, rustling the leaves of a tree at the window at the end of the room with a steady sound, almost like rain. The fireplace made small popping, sputtering sounds. The clock on the brick mantelpiece read a quarter of twelve, but time did not mean anything any longer. Time had stopped quite a while ago, when Chris accused him of murder.
He saw Shirley watching him uncertainly, puzzled and a little afraid.
He said, “I want you to think about what happened that night.”
She opened her mouth to ask a question, caught herself, and clasped her skirt over her knees, studying her hands.
“I don’t know what I can tell you, Hugh.” Her voice said that she did not understand, but that she was willing to try to help him. “I was driving about forty, I guess, and then I saw this truck…”
“No,” he said. “Back further. Did you see anything before that?”
She looked up abruptly. “No, should I have?” She frowned. “Well, just before, I met a big car, it must have been doing eighty, but that was before…”
He felt his hands close tightly, and tried not to let elation show on his face. He remembered Janice’s anger when the big car passed them.
“Yes,” he said, “yes, that’s one thing.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I’ll tell you in a minute,” he said. “I don’t want to put ideas into your head. Think about the truck. Was it moving?”
She shook her head. “No.” Then she said carefully, “That is, of course I thought it was when I saw the lights, and I slowed down because the bridge at the bottom is rather narrow and I didn’t want to meet anybody on it. I wanted to let them get over it first; but then I saw it was just standing there on the hill…”
“Are you quite sure it wasn’t moving?”
She closed her eyes and he could see her trying to visualize the way the lights had been on the road that night. With her eyes closed she looked extremely young; it was as if her eyes were a little older than the rest of her face. She opened them again and looked at him.
“I’m sorry, Hugh. I really can’t remember. It might have been when I first saw it.”
He leaned forward in the big chair and asked, “Could it have been going backward?”
She stared at him. Her small square face looked quite shocked at the idea. “Oh, no! No, I would have noticed that!” After a long silence she said, “I’m sorry. Did I say something wrong?”
He did not answer at once. Then he said, “No, it’s all right. It doesn’t have to be backward.” He leaned forward again, speaking eagerly. “Look, Shirley, I think Jan was murdered. Can you just accept that for a moment? Don’t think about it, just accept it. Now think of the way that truck was standing there, just below the curve, so that anybody coming down the hill fast would burst around the curve and not have time to do anything about it. Well, they couldn’t leave the truck there indefinitely. Anybody might have piled into it. It must have been waiting either above the curve or well below it. If it had been waiting below, then it would have had to back into position. You might have seen it from the other side, as you came down toward the bridge…”
She shook her head minutely. “No.” Her mouth was strained. “And the big car, Hugh?”
“Somebody had to pass the word that we were coming, so that the truck could move into place.”
She had put her cup and plate aside. Now she stood up quickly, with a movement that was almost a shudder. She stood looking down into his face.
“No,” she whispered. “No. You mustn’t start thinking things like that, Hugh. It’s… that’s the way people go crazy.” She brushed sharply at the folds of her skirt and looked at him again. “I know it was awful,” she said softly, “but you mustn’t let yourself… Don’t you see what you’re saying?” she cried. “You have a truck and a driver and a big car and somebody driving that… all just to kill your wife, Hugh, it’s…”
“Crazy,” he said, rising.
She caught his arms, holding him tightly, almost shaking him. “Yes,” she said, “it’s crazy.”
They stood for a long moment like that; then she let her hands fall.
“Hugh,” she said, “haven’t you forgotten something?”
He frowned.
“Me?” she whispered. “You’ve forgotten me, haven’t you, Hugh? Or have you? Is that why you came here? I was the cork in the bottle, wasn’t I? It was my stupidity that didn’t give you a chance. If it hadn’t been for me coming up the hill and stopping my car just there…”
He said sharply, “No. Now you’re being…”
“That’s really why you came here, isn’t it?” she gasped. “That’s why…” She swallowed. “That’s why you thought I was going to push you, out there. You think I’m…”
“Stop it!” he said, taking her by the shoulders.
“I won’t!” She tried to push his hands away. “Don’t you see, Hugh? Either I’m in it or it doesn’t make sense! Whoever you think is doing these insane things, they couldn’t afford to leave a hole like that; they couldn’t count on your going so fast that you couldn’t turn. And certainly they couldn’t count on bright little Shirley parking her car just where it would do the most good; I’ve got to be in it, Hugh, if what you’re saying is…” She caught her breath sharply. The sound was very close to a sob. “Hugh, I was there,” she whispered. “Can’t you see how it sounds when you tell me it was murder?”
He licked his lips, looking down at her. “Aren’t you taking an awful chance, Shirley?”
She watched him steadily.
He said, “Suppose I believed you. Suppose you convinced me that you… Here you are alone in the house and it’s past midnight…”
She smiled very suddenly. “It is pretty late, isn’t it? You’d better kill me quick or my reputation will be hopelessly compromised.”
Then her smile changed quality and he knew that he was going to kiss her, and that she knew it, and he did.
X
He could not put away the feeling that at any moment Janice would walk in and find them there. He knew exactly the way her mouth would twitch into a small contemptuous smile, and he knew what she would say: something hard and bright and not particularly original. She would probably begin by apologizing for interrupting them…
“What’s the matter?”
Shirley’s face looked very young and almost beautiful in the soft fight from the lamp on the table at the far end of the davenport. He was very much aware of her presence very close to him; the fragile stuff of her blouse was faintly harsh under his hand on her shoulder. He kissed the top of her head absently.
“I’m sorry. I guess it hasn’t been long enough to… I can’t help feeling that she’s going to walk in.”
He felt her shiver a little. She sat up beside him and touched her hair, but did not move out of the circle of his arm. He found a pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket and offered it to her.
“No, I don’t smoke,” she said.
There was always a tone of moral superiority in the voices of people who told you that they did not smoke. He was sure that she had not meant it; and then he was not so certain. It was possible that she felt ashamed of herself for allowing a man who was almost a stranger to kiss her, and for allowing hers
elf to respond to his kiss. It was possible that she was trying to make it perfectly clear that she was a nice girl.
He put a cigarette between his lips and lit it clumsily, one-handed, and listened to the wind. When you wanted to go sailing on a bright afternoon there was always a flat calm; but when you were afraid at night there was always a wind blowing, so that you could not hear anything but the wind and the leaves of the trees rustling in the dark around you. He did not know what he was afraid of. He knew that he felt guilty and disloyal, and that he and the girl beside him had shared something for a moment, but it had gone away.
“Hadn’t you better tell me, darling?” Shirley said. “Maybe if you talked about it …”
He glanced at her. It reassured him to look at her face. “All right,” he said. “There was a picture…” He told her about the picture and the bank book and Chris’s story. Shirley listened thoughtfully, without moving.
“And you think,” she said at last, “that your wife gave this man an alibi and then got afraid of him and ran away…”
He nodded.
She went on, “And after she’d married you she began to feel secure enough to ask the man for money… Hugh, have you any proof that there was another murder aside from…”
“Aside from what Chris said? No, but why should she…?” He stopped and looked at her quickly.
Shirley moved a little. “I don’t know anything about it, darling, but… is Christine rich?”
Phillips said stiffly, “They’ve got plenty of money. Her father’s a captain in the Navy and I think he’s got a private income; I know Mrs. Wells has some money of her own. But…”
“Please let me talk, Hugh.” She caught his hand. “Let me just say it. I know you don’t want to hear it, but I’ve been listening to what you told me, and it’s all Christine, darling. She’s the one who got… jilted. She’s the one your wife made a scene about. She’s the one who saw your wife on the West Coast… Doesn’t that seem like a coincidence to you? Suppose your wife, Janice, had learned something about Christine out there instead of the other way around. Suppose Janice came east and deliberately married you so that she could be near…”
“No,” he said, but it was just the sort of thing that Janice would delight in doing. To steal the fiancé of the girl she was blackmailing… Shirley’s voice went on.
“Doesn’t it seem strange to you that Christine should ‘recognize’ Janice almost a year after—”
“No,” he said.
He felt his hand released. “You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
“I’ve known her all my life. Mrs. Wells and the Captain are both swell people.”
“You are,” Shirley whispered. “You want to prove that your wife was murdered, but the minute I suggest…” She sat up straight, away from contact with his arm. “I think… I think you really came here with some crazy notion that I—”
He paid no attention to her. “Listen,” he said. “Listen, she wouldn’t have accused me if…”
Shirley was silent; and he found his own answer. If Chris could make him believe that she thought him guilty, she could be sure there was no question in his mind of her own innocence.
He shook his head abruptly. “No. No, I don’t buy that, Shirley.”
He could feel her eyes regarding him. “No, I didn’t think you would… But I had to say it.” He heard her breath catch momentarily. “After all, it doesn’t have to be murder, darling…”
He pushed Chris out of his mind with an effort. He wondered if the boat were chafing against the pier below the cottage, but it was not a matter of great importance. He wondered if there was still moonlight on the bay. He thought the wind was dying a little.
“You don’t know,” Shirley said insistently. “Darling, you don’t know it was murder.”
“You don’t understand,” he said slowly, almost absently. “I saw it.”
“Of course,” she said, startled. “Of course, darling. So did I.”
“No,” he said, “you don’t understand, Shirley.” He could not call her darling. There had been a moment, but it was gone, and it seemed to him that Janice was listening. “You don’t understand. I was lying there afterward, pinned in the car, and I saw it. You must have been on the way to the police station by then.”
He saw the color leave her face. There were small freckles on the bridge of her upturned nose. He wondered why she should be frightened. He wished he had met her some other time, when whatever had gone wrong with them need not have happened.
“You mean…” Shirley licked her pale lips. “You mean… she wasn’t dead?”
He frowned, not quite understanding the intensity with which she was watching him; then everything that had passed between them unreeled through his mind in a crazy patchwork of words and phrases and shades of expression. He remembered that he had caught her in a lie the very first time they talked together alone. She had claimed that, although she had not seen who was driving the car, nevertheless she had told Mr. Holt that it had been Janice, because she had been so sorry for him, Hugh Phillips, and had not wanted him to have any more trouble. No nice girl just driving past would have risked it for an unconscious man she did not know. She could not have been sure that, waking up, he would not confess and make a liar of her. No, but Shirley Carlson had known who was driving, even though she had not seen it, because her accomplice, the truck-driver, had told her.
And then, not quite sure how much he knew, she had picked him up after the inquest to find out. He could not believe what he was thinking and he did not dare to look at her. He heard himself speaking quietly.
“No, she wasn’t dead, darling,” he said, and the word came very easily now. “She was frightened, hysterical; she was hurt; she ran to the man for help and he struck her down with the wrench as you would swat a fly. And even then he wasn’t sure so he knelt beside her and deliberately hit her again. I’ll remember the sound of it all my—”
“No!”
The word had no more volume than a whisper, but it had the quality of a scream.
Everything in the room was very sharp and clear, with the fine wiry clarity of a good photograph, but when he looked at it, the girl’s face looked blurred. It had the blunt, inhuman look that he had seen on it once before. He closed his fingers on her shoulder with abrupt brutality, holding her beside him.
“No!” she gasped. “No! You’re lying! It wasn’t like that. He didn’t…!”
He wanted to take her throat in his hands and shake her until the smooth brown hair was a tangled mop and the small head flopped loose on the slender neck. He wanted to kill her. She saw it in his face.
“I mean,” she panted, “I mean… it’s so horrible… I can’t believe… Let me go!”
She rose and plunged away from him and he felt the thin blouse come tearing away and, instinctively, released her at the embarrassing sensation of the frail material ripping under his fingers. She snatched the gun from the chair, and the chair fell over on the hearth with a loud crash as she turned.
The gun was large and lethal in her small hand. The blouse had fallen off her shoulders. It was strange, he thought, that a garment that had hidden so little should look so indecent when it was torn away. She ran her fingers abruptly through her hair, pushing it back from her face, irretrievably shattering the smooth cap of it into undisciplined strands. Her fingers moved stiffly down the side of her head, over her ear, and down the line of her jaw. She pressed them tightly against her mouth for a moment and pulled them away.
“Don’t move,” she gasped. “Don’t move, you —!”
He did not catch the name she called him, but he did not think he had ever heard it before.
“You kissed me,” she whispered. “What kind of a louse are you? I thought you knew. I couldn’t figure your bringing a gun unless you knew. And then, by God, you kissed me!”
He licked his lips. “Why didn’t you push me on the stairs?” he asked, watching the gun.
“I thought it was a g
ag. I thought you wanted to see if I’d…”
“I didn’t know, Shirley,” he said. “I didn’t know until just now.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?”
Suddenly she was crying. She pressed her hand against her mouth but she could not stop the choking sobs; her whole body was trembling, and she went to her knees on the threadbare rug and buried her face in her hands. He looked at her and wished that she did not look so very much like a small disheveled child crying because a larger child had beat her up.
He found himself ridiculously wanting to go to her and comfort her. He could not help a feeling of admiration as he realized the game she had played with him, he not once suspecting that it was a game: accusing herself recklessly, telling him the truth and making him laugh at it, accusing Christine. But she had been just a little too good. She had made herself such a nice girl that he had kissed her; and she had not been able to stand the inhuman strain of being made love to by a man she was not at all sure had not come there to kill her. He had felt her withdrawal but had not understood it.
He told himself that she had helped to kill Janice, even though apparently she had not been told everything that had happened. She had driven her car there, and had lied to the police… But he could not bring back the momentary hate he had felt for her. He could only feel tremendously sorry for her and, a little, for himself; and grateful to her for finally dispelling the doubts he had had of himself.
The gun slid down her skirt to the floor. He rose to pick it up. Then the bedroom door closed gently but quite definitely and a tall man with gray hair was standing there, wearing a gray suit, white shoes, and holding a Colt .380 automatic.
Murder Twice Told Page 16