by Todd Downing
“That’s why I’m worried, Kent. Because it is so hard to believe.”
They approached the Jester Hotel in silence.
“Mr. Rennert,” Kent spoke up, “there’s something I want to ask you. Janell and I were talking to-night about Mexican food and places in Matamoros. She wanted to try them some time. So I asked her to go across with me to-morrow night to dinner. Dr. Lincoln’s going to some kind of a medical affair. I suggested this night club they advertise so much. The Triumph of the Emotions. I thought I’d better ask you, though, if it was all right. You know what I mean.”
“Well, Kent, I hate to throw a damper on your plans but …”
Rennert felt uncomfortably old and paternal as he slowed down at the signpost of the Jester Hotel.
The sign, small, with unobtrusive lettering and diminutive cap and bells, was the only indication of commercialism about the hostelry. This was a huge and ungainly old farmhouse, white with green shutters, which had been remodeled into small apartments designed to meet the needs of elderly people who were wintering in the Magic Valley. At this hour most of its windows were dark.
Rennert let Distant out in front, then drove to the garage on the north side.
Instinctively, he walked on tiptoe when he went into the lobby. A living-room it was, rather, with Mission furniture, bookcases and flowers. Potted palms discreetly screened the desk. A single lamp was burning by a table on which lay current newspapers and magazines.
One of the papers caught Rennert’s eyes as he passed. He picked it up, carried it over to a chair, and sat down. It was the late evening edition of the Brownsville Sun.
On the front page, under the signature of Juan Canard, was an account of the death of Carlos Campos in the bull-ring at Matarnoros. Rennert read, turned to the inside and smiled grimly at the conclusion:
The authorities who operate the Matamoros arena express profound regret that the dedication ceremonies should have been marred by such an unfortunate incident. They state that in the future precautions will be taken against the malicious use of mirrors by spectators.
Yes, the reporter had done a good enough job of translating into English the sonorous and hollow phrases with which some Mexican official had dismissed the tragedy. They had been accompanied, doubtless, by a shrug deprecatory and at the same time expressive of the futility of further investigation.
There were four photographs: Campos standing in front of the mayor’s box; a striking exhibition of his capework; a glimpse of the intent faces of the spectators; a grisly view of the matador being lifted from his feet by the horns.
Rennert studied the third of these. The section of the amphitheatre was the one in which he had been sitting. Only the faces in the first few rows, including those of Radisson and Bettis, were very clear. He located himself and Dr. Lincoln without difficulty, but doubted whether an acquaintance would have recognized them. A careful inspection revealed no one else whom he knew. Approximately two-thirds of the crowd, he calculated, were Mexicans. Most of the men had their hats upon their laps.
The camera must have been snapped within two or three minutes of the fatality. Rennert recalled lighting a cigarette about that time. And there it was, in his mouth.
It was an intriguing problem. Here before him was the face of a murderer….
It was bed-time.
Rennert yawned as he went up the stairs and along thickly carpeted halls to his rooms on the third floor. The hotel served its purpose as a haven of rest. Night lights were dim and the heaviness of sleep lay upon the silent corridors. Snoring was stertorous in more than one of the rooms which he passed.
He reached his destination and took out his key. The passage in which he stood was a narrow one, at the rear of the building. At its end a short flight of steps led up to a door which gave, he surmised, on the attic.
This door opened now and a man backed out, pulling the knob toward him with his right hand. The automatic lock clicked sharply. The man started to turn.
“Good evening, Bettis,” Rennert said.
Matt Bettis whirled, almost losing his balance, and his hand slid swiftly under his unbuttoned coat.
It came out almost immediately; he cleared his throat and descended the steps. He was carrying an empty china plate and, caught by his thumb, a water pitcher of white enamel. “I didn’t hear you, Rennert,” his voice was unsteady. “You startled me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That’s all right.” The light was reflected from the blank panes of the spectacles. “These maids are careless. They leave things lying about everywhere, don’t they?”
“I hadn’t noticed it.”
“Well, they do. Good night.”
“Good night.”
As Bettis hurried by he held his left arm close to his side. But Rennert’s eyes detected the bulge in his coat, a bulge which could have been made only by a pistol in a holster.
Rennert wasn’t as surprised by that as by the look which had been on Bettis’s face in the instant that preceded recognition-panic.
5
Lotus-Eater
I
Comfortably torpid from sound sleep, breakfast, and communion with sunshine, Rennert sat on the wide verandah of the Jester Hotel and eyed aloofly the cars which were passing with such speed and purposiveness along the highway. How thoroughly, he reflected, this sun could conquer a man’s scruples against indolence, deepgrained though they had been by tradition and by years of machine-like adherence to schedule.
At the beginning of the construction of his house, he had been on hand, dutifully, each morning when the workmen put in their appearance. It hadn’t taken him long to realize that his presence was not only unnecessary but hindering. He had no knowledge of carpentry, and soon saw the futility of standing about with his hands in his pockets, dodging ladders and betraying his ignorance by foolish questions. Now he was content to sit in a basket-chair, repress yawns, and listen to interminable life-histories of retired business-men. Only when he took stock of his expanding waistline….
He sat up as a long steel-grey roadster slid smoothly to the kerb.
Jarl Angerman, immaculate again in white, got out and strode up the walk. He paused at the top of the steps and directed his bleak blue eyes upon Rennert.
The latter rose. “Mr. Angerman?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Mr. Rennert.”
Angerman moved forward and extended a hand. “I am glad to know you, Mr. Rennert.” He spoke with little movement of the lips, so that his voice was almost without inflection and marked by gutturalness.
“Will you sit down, or are you ready to go to work?”
“I will sit down for three minutes. Then it will be nine and we will make the affidavits.”
He lowered himself into a chair with a crinkling of stiffly starched cloth. He removed his straw hat, adjusted carefully the sharp-edged creases in his trousers, and rested the hat upon his knees. He looked at Rennert in calm and unhurried appraisal.
Rennert reciprocated. Angerman’s head was of a harmonic Nordic type: long for its breadth, with narrow nose and slightly prognathous jaw. His close-cropped hair was tow-coloured and showed a faint wave. The sun had given his skin an even patina of bronze, which glowed as if it had just been subjected to diligent scrubbing. Rennert had carried away from the dusty sunlight of Matamoros a decidedly unfavourable impression of the man’s face. He had thought of it as stolid, with a great deal of inherent brutishness. Now he found himself revising that opinion. A passive and stoical countenance, rather; one which, if animated, might become likeable. He speculated as to Angerman’s age. Thirty. Thirty-five. He couldn’t be sure.
“I have come”—Angerman spoke ponderously—“from Dr. Paul Torday. I am to get affidavits from six men. Mr. Jester, Mr. Bettis, Dr. Lincoln, Mr. Radisson, Mr. Wyllys, and Mr. Distant. You will attest them. I have them here.” He drew from his pocket six folded sheets of legal-sized paper and passed them to Rennert.
Each bore a typewritten state
ment to the effect that at 2.13 P.M. on June 20, 193–, the man named had been present at a flag-stop on the Monterrey-Victoria section of the National Railways of Mexico and had witnessed there a collision between a Pullman and a passenger train belonging to that line. There was a space for a signature, and at the foot the familiar lines:
State of Texas, County of Cameron. I, Hugh Rennert, a notary public for and within said county, in the State aforesaid, do hereby certify …
Rennert looked up. “Dr. Torday has saved me all possible trouble. I’m acquainted with all these men except Mr. Distant and Mr. Wyllys. Wyllys is Dr. Torday’s brother-in-law, I believe?”
“Yes. He is at Tonatiuh. I will take you there when we have finished with the others.”
“Wyllys is a patient there?” Rennert asked casually, as he returned the documents.
“Yes, he is a patient.” Angerman consulted his watch and rose. “It is nine. We meet Mr. Bettis in his room. Mr. Jester will come there. You have your seal?”
“Yes.” Rennert picked up the pasteboard box which had reposed beside him in the chair.
They went inside and down a corridor in the left wing. Matt Bettis opened his door at Angerman’s knock and ushered them into a large, plainly furnished sitting-room with wide windows open upon the north.
He didn’t present a very prepossessing appearance. The puffiness of sleep was still upon his face, and his watery blue-green eyes blinked behind the thick lenses of his spectacles. He was in his shirt sleeves and the white cloth clung damply to his torso. He greeted Rennert with a faint air of surprise, and said to Angerman, “You’re sure prompt. It’s barely nine o’clock.”
“I said I would be here at nine. Mr. Rennert will witness your affidavit.”
“Sure. Sit down.” Bettis removed a coat from the back of a chair and put it on. It was tight for him, and fully half an inch of white cuff showed at each wrist. He took the sheet of paper which Angerman tendered him, read it through laboriously, then said: “O.K. Got a pen?”
Angerman, who had remained standing with military stiffness, held out an uncapped fountain-pen. Bettis grasped it in his short pudgy fingers, laid the sheet upon a table, and scrawled his name upon the proper line.
Rennert affixed his signature and seal, folded the paper, and handed it to Angerman, who said simply: “Thank you.”
“When does this case come up?” Bettis asked.
“The first Monday of the New Year.”
“Getting things ready away ahead of time, aren’t you?” Bettis commented, as he went to the door in response to a rap.
It was Rolf Jester, wearing what Rennert was wont to call his Chamber of Commerce manner. He bade the three of them brisk good mornings, his eyes twinkled in friendly fashion as they met Rennert’s.
“Well, Hugh, glad to see you routed out of bed once before the middle of the morning. You’ll know how we working men feel. Got that affidavit ready, Angerman?”
“Yes, it is ready.”
Angerman gave him a sheet, and, as Jester studied it, inquired of Bettis: “Is Mr. Distant here?”
The manager of the hotel shook his head. “He hasn’t showed up. His son’s expecting him, though. He ought to be here to-day.”
Jester finished his perusal, carried the paper to the table, and signed his name in large, firm letters.
“How’s the death of Carlos Campos going to affect Torday’s case?” he asked.
“I do not think,” Angerman replied, “that it will make any difference.”
“You mean his testimony wouldn’t have been needed?”
“No.”
“Doesn’t that apply to all of us? As I understand it, the Mexican National has already admitted their liability in the wreck. They did that when they paid indemnity to Torday and Lincoln and the relatives of that New Orleans couple. All they’re doing now is to seek relief from the court as to the amount of the indemnity. That right?”
“That is right.”
“Then these affidavits are just a matter of form. The chances are that none of us will be called on to testify.”
Angerman took the second document from Rennert, folded it with care, and consigned it to his pocket.
“I am sure,” he said, “that not one of you will ever testify.”
Rennert had been attentive to this interchange. It seemed to remove the foundation entirely from the menace which he had seen taking shape since he had listened to Juan Canard’s hints.
Angerman picked up his hat. “Are you ready to go, Mr. Rennert? We must see Dr. Lincoln and Mr. Radisson at nine-twenty. Then we must go to Tonatiuh.”
Jester looked at him quickly. “Oh, you’re going to Tonatiuh, are you?”
“Yes, we are going to get the signature of Mr. Wyllys.”
Jester followed them into the hall. “Will you excuse us a moment, Angerman? I want to talk to Rennert.”
“I will wait on the porch.”
Jester caught Rennert’s arm and drew him towards the rear. “I want you to do something for me, Hugh. When you get down to Tonatiuh, call Wyllys aside and tell him I’ve got the papers he wants. He’ll understand. Tell him I’ll be in my office at eight o’clock to-night. He can get them then. It’ll save me putting in a call across the border. And be sure not to say anything to Angerman about this.”
Rennert regarded his friend in some surprise. This was the first intimation he had had that Jester was involved in any dealing with Wyllys. Christine must have had this in mind last night.
“Sure,” he said. “I’ll be glad to do it, Rolf. By the way, have you heard about the shooting last night?”
“The shooting?”
Rennert told him of his experience on the way home.
Jester’s full plain face became serious as he listened. “Well, I’ll be damned!” was his soft comment. “I’m sorry to hear that. I’ll have to stop and see Radisson. There was no way of finding out who did it?”
“Evidently not. I wondered what your theory might be.”
“My theory? Good Lord, Hugh! I haven’t any theory. It was probably just an accident. Somebody lit up and celebrating Christmas.”
Rennert saw that Jester shared none of his suspicions. “That explanation satisfies you?” he asked.
“Why, sure. Why not?”
“Perhaps you can tell me then why Matt Bettis carries a gun at night? Why he’s panic-stricken when he sees me in a dark hall?”
“Hugh, what in heaven’s name are you talking about?”
Rennert continued his story of the previous night. “Do you know what he keeps up in that attic, Rolf? Almost every morning I’m awakened by someone—I suppose it’s Bettis—walking about up there.”
Jester laughed and laid a firm hand on his arm. “See here, old man, I’m going to tell you the same thing I told Christine. You’ve been reading too many mystery stories. You don’t want to pay any attention to what she said before dinner last night. In her condition she’s apt to brood and worry, you know. Let’s go in and ask Matt what he’s got upstairs.”
Rennert shook his head. “Don’t say anything to him about it, Rolf. I’d prefer you didn’t. He and I aren’t any too friendly, anyway, and I want my remaining days here in the hotel to be tranquil ones.”
“You don’t like him, do you?”
“Frankly, I don’t, Rolf.”
“I see. Therefore he’s engaged in some devilment.” Jester thrust a finger against Rennert’s ribs. “Forget it.”
This was the most forthright and guileless man, Rennert believed, that it had been his good fortune to meet. Intelligent and experienced, likewise, if a little too trustful.
Rennert left him with the feeling that there couldn’t be anything wrong with their little world after all.
II
When he emerged upon the verandah Angerman was standing by the railing on one side of the steps, Kent Distant on the other.
The latter came forward, smiling. “Good mornin’ Mr. Rennert. I thought you might eat breakfast with me.”
“I ate long ago. Unusually energetic this morning.” Rennert lowered his voice. “Did you call your father last night?”
The smile faded.
“I tried to. I called our home in Oklahoma but couldn’t get an answer. I talked to one of Dad’s friends. He said Dad left on the train last Wednesday. Three days ago. That should have put him in Brownsville Thursday night or yesterday morning. Of course,” Kent added hastily, “he’s all right. He stopped off somewhere to visit or he missed connections. He’s always doing that. Do you think I ought to do anything more?”
Rennert almost regretted then that he had spoken as he had the night before. The morning was so bright and clean and peaceful. “It’s easy to miss trains,” he said. “He’ll be here to-day, I feel sure.”
“I’m sure he will, too.”
Rennert joined Angerman, and the two of them went to the latter’s car.
“Do you know,” Rennert asked conversationally as they drove southward, “that Professor Radisson was shot last night?”
Angerman turned his head and for an instant his eyes rested on Rennert’s—clear, cold-blue, searching. “Tell me.”
He looked straight ahead as Rennert talked. His body was bent slightly forward to accommodate itself to the constricted space, so that any expression which his face may have had was hidden. But Rennert saw his hands tighten about the wheel. They were muscular hands, immensely strong, but well shaped and well cared for, even sensitive.
“That is bad. That is very bad.”
Angerman made no further comment but turned into Dr. Lincoln’s drive and stopped by the side of the house.
Both Lincoln and Radisson were sitting on the porch, evidently waiting for them.
The former got up to open the door. “Good morning,” he said, to Rennert rather than to Angerman. “Come in.”
Radisson, whose left hand was in a bandage, did not rise. Rennert judged that he was feverish, for a hectic flush was discernible beneath his tan, and his eyes were bright as oiled marbles.