“Yes.”
“Well, I’ll talk to her.”
“Let me have a copy of the p.m. report,” Maddox said as he started for the door. He paused abruptly to look at me. “You’ll be needed as a witness for us, Mr Regan. Thanks for what you’ve done so far.”
He and Harmas went down to the Packard and drove away.
That left Boos and myself alone.
Boos stared after the departing Packard.
“That guy!” There was a note of admiration in his voice. “What a police officer he would have made! He can smell murder a hundred miles away, and I’ve never known him to be wrong. Well, I’d better seal this joint up. You got the key?”
I handed him the key.
“Okay, Regan, be seeing you at the trial,” and he started down the passage to the back door, humming under his breath.
I left the cabin and got into my truck.
It wasn’t until I was back in my cabin and had drunk two fingers of straight Scotch that I began to recover my nerve.
Could they prove a case against Gilda?
I knew Delaney had died by an electric shock. How could they hope to prove that Gilda had been responsible?
I would be crazy to give myself up until I knew for certain that she was in danger. I must wait and see what happened. Then, if it looked bad for her, I would tell Boos the truth.
The following afternoon I drove down to Glyn Camp. I left the truck in the parking lot and walked over to Jefferson’s office.
I found him sitting at his desk, a bewildered, brooding expression in his eyes.
“Hello, son,” he said. “Come on in and sit down.”
I sat down and watched him lift the jar of apple jack into sight from behind his desk. He poured two shots into glasses and pushed one of the glasses over to me.
“Well, the thing’s happened I didn’t want to happen,” he said. “I had at the back of my mind that Delaney’s death wasn’t all that straightforward. If I had known he had signed that insurance policy, I would have made a much closer investigation.”
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“They’re holding the p.m. now. They’ve got Allison, the Medical Officer from LA, to handle it. They exhumed the poor fella last night.”
“You know Maddox thinks Mrs Delaney did it?” I said.
Jefferson nodded.
“There’s a man I could never get along with. That girl wouldn’t hurt a fly. I haven’t been dealing with people for sixty years without learning who is a bad “un and who isn’t. I’m willing to bet she didn’t do it.”
“Me too.”
“I don’t think it’s murder,” Jefferson went on. “I think it was suicide. She got tired of living with him and she left him. He was down to his last buck, and with her leaving him, it was too much for him. Somehow he managed to get the back off the TV set. Don’t ask me how, but a desperate man can do things that most people think impossible.”
“Have they talked to her yet?” I asked.
“They can’t find her. She’s vanished.”
I stiffened, slopping my drink.
“Vanished ? Doesn’t Macklin know where she is ?”
“No. He had a letter from her saying she was moving from the room she rented and was looking for somewhere else to stay. When she found something, she would let him know. That was three days ago. He hasn’t heard from her, and Boos is hinting she’s got in a panic and bolted.”
“Can’t they trace her by her car?”
“She’s sold it.”
The sound of heavy steps coming along the passage made both of us look sharply towards the door which jerked open.
Lieutenant Boos stood in the doorway. There was a smirking look of truimph in his close-set eyes. He came in, kicking the door shut.
“How do you like it?” he said, addressing Jefferson. “The guy wasn’t electrocuted at all!”
I sat forward, staring at him, scarcely believing I had heard aright.
Jefferson too was staring.
“If he wasn’t electrocuted, then how did he die?” he asked, a croak in his voice.
“He was poisoned,” Boos said. He put two big, red hairy hands on Jefferson’s desk, and leaning forward, went on, “He was murdered! Someone fed him enough cyanide to wipe out half this goddam town!”
III
The big moon floated serenely in the night sky, casting a brilliant white light over my cabin and garden.
I sat on the verandah, smoking. The time was a little after ten o’clock.
I was still stunned by the news Boos had shot into our laps. I could scarcely believe that Delaney had died of poisoning and that I hadn’t after all killed him. I was beginning now to savour the realization with an overwhelming feeling of relief that by a trick of fate I was not after all a murderer. The knowledge that I could now no longer be arrested, tried, found guilty and put in the gas chamber gave me a buoyant feeling of freedom.
But if it was good news for me, it was serious news for Gilda.
Not for one moment did I believe she had poisoned Delaney. I was sure Jefferson was right when he had said the thought of losing her and knowing he had no money left had been too much for Delaney. He had taken the easy way out — he had killed himself.
If I hadn’t planned to kill him, if I hadn’t gone to the cabin and set the stage so that it would look as if he had been electrocuted, Gilda would not be in the perilous position she was in now.
To save her, I might still have to tell the police what I had done. Attempted murder was a serious charge. I could get a twenty-year sentence. The thought turned me cold.
The sound of a car coming up the road brought me to my feet. I went to the verandah rail and watched Jefferson’s old Ford bump up my drive-in.
He came slowly up the verandah steps.
“Come in and have a drink,” I said, wondering what he was doing up here.
He sat down while I made a couple of highballs. I looked at him. He was pulling,at his moustache, a brooding expression in his eyes. I saw, with surprise, he wasn’t wearing his sheriff’s star. This was the first time since I had known him that he hadn’t worn it.
He saw me staring and he smiled ruefully.
“I turned it in this afternoon. It’s always better to walk out than to be kicked out.”
“You mean you have resigned office?”
“That’s it. It’s time I did. I’ve got beyond the job.” He took the highball. -*Truth to tell, now I’ve taken the plunge, it’s a relief. I can sit on the fence and watch the other fella do the work. I’m sorry it finished this way. It’s my own fault. I should have resigned years ago.”
“I’m sorry,” I said and I meant it.
“I didn’t come up here to talk about myself. Have you heard about Mrs Delaney?”
A cold creepy sensation crawled over me.
“No, I haven’t heard a thing.”
“They arrested her this afternoon in Los Angeles.”
I sat down abruptly.
“For God’s sake!”
“She’s being charged with the murder of her husband and attempted fraud. Maddox is pressing the charge: she’s in a bad jam, Regan.”
I scarcely noticed that he called me by my surname and not my Christian name as he usually did.
“But she didn’t kill him!”
“I don’t think she did, but Boos has got quite a case against her. She admits buying the cyanide.”
That gave me a hell of a shock.
“She bought it?”
“Yes. She says she went to the pharmacist in Glyn Camp. There was a wasps’ nest in the roof of the cabin, and she asked the pharmacist if he could give her something to kill the wasps. He gave her the cyanide. She signed the poison book. When she got home, she told Delaney she had bought the stuff. She put the poison in the desk drawer, meaning to fix the nest the next day, but she was busy and forgot about it. Boos has checked. The wasps’ nest is there all right, but that doesn’t alter the fact that she bought the p
oison. She’s admitted quarrelling with Delaney the night before his death, and that he hit her. She admits making up her mind to leave him. She told Boos she had told Delaney that she intended to leave him. When she did leave him, he was very disturbed. On her way down to Glyn Camp, she had a flat. She took some time to fix it, then she went on to Glyn Camp. While she was fixing the flat, she had a change of mind about leaving her husband. By the time she got down to Glyn Camp, she had decided she couldn’t leave a cripple to fend for himself, so she came back. On the way back, she met you with the news he was dead. That’s her story. I was there when she told it, and I believe it, but Boos doesn’t.”
I drew in a long slow breath.
“Why doesn’t he?”
“His theory is that when she found out Delaney hadn’t any money left, she decided to kill him and grab the five thousand from the insurance. Maddox thinks so too. She denies knowing that Delaney was insured until after the funeral, when you gave her the letters you had been carrying around with you. Maddox says she is lying. He claims soon after her marriage with Delaney, she tried to persuade him to insure his life . . .”
“I know. I’ve heard that one,” I broke in. “No jury would believe that once they looked at her.”
“Maybe you’re right, but there’s this TV setup. Both Maddox and Boos swear Delaney couldn’t have taken the back off the set. I think he might have if he had been desperate enough, but that will be for the jury to decide. But the one damning thing even I can’t explain away is if Delaney took poison, how did he get rid of the glass containing the poison?”
I stiffened to attention, staring at him.
“What do you mean?”
“The pharmacist sold the cyanide to Mrs Delaney in block form. To have used it as a poison it would have had to have been dissolved in water or whisky. Cyanide kills instantly. As soon as it got into his mouth, he’d die. There was no glass found beside him where you’d expect to find one. That must rule out suicide. It makes things pretty difficult for Mrs Delaney. Boos thinks she doped his whisky with the poison, then not thinking she removed the glass when he was dead. Boos says that is the kind of slip most killers could make.”
It was then, and only then, that I remembered the glass lying by Delaney’s side when I had found him.
I had been afraid that the Coroner might have become suspicious if he had thought Delaney had been drinking and I had washed out the glass and put it away.
“There was a glass,” I said. “I found it by his side. I washed it out and put it in the kitchen cupboard.”
Jefferson sat upright, staring at me.
“Is this true?”
“Yes, of course. I wouldn’t lie about a thing like that. I can’t think why I did it. Maybe subconsciously I didn’t want it to come out at the inquest for Mrs Delaney’s sake that her husband was a drunk. Anyway, that’s what I did.”
Jefferson relaxed back in his chair. He began to pull at his moustache.
“I’m not a law officer any longer,” he said, “so what I say doesn’t matter, but I don’t think Boos will accept that story. I don’t think a jury would either.”
“But I tell you — it’s true!” I said, my voice shooting up. “I’m willing to go into court and swear to it!”
He stared up at the moon for some moments, frowning, then he said, “As I said just now, Regan, I’m no longer a law officer. So what I say doesn’t matter. But if I was still Sheriff I’d begin to wonder about you. I’d begin to wonder about you and Mrs Delaney.”
“What the hell do you mean?” I said, turning hot and then cold.
“Never mind. This is what you do: go down to Los Angeles first thing in the morning and talk to her attorney, Macklin. He’s a smart fellow. He’ll know how to handle it. Will you do that?”
“Yes. But, look, I don’t understand . . .”
“Better not say anything to Boos about finding the glass,” Jefferson went on, not looking at me. “If he asks you, you’ll have to tell him, but don’t volunteer any information. You talk to Macklin first.” He suddenly stared hard at me. “Whatever you say to him will be treated in confidence.”
I couldn’t meet his searching, steady stare.
“I’ll see him tomorrow.”
He got to his feet.
“I don’t think she killed him,” he said. “She’s a nice girl. She wouldn’t have poisoned him. All the same there’s something badly wrong with the setup. If Delaney didn’t take the back off the set, someone did, and that someone would be a man. No woman would think up a stunt like that. I’m glad I’m sitting on the fence, Regan. I’m glad I don’t have to handle this investigation.”
He nodded, then walked down the steps and got into his Ford.
It wasn’t until he had driven away that I realized he hadn’t shaken hands with me.
This was the first time since I had known him that he had failed to do that.
CHAPTER VIII
I
THE next morning I went down to Los Angeles and saw George Macklin.
He listened in silence to my story about finding the glass by Delaney’s side.
When I was through, I said, “This should put her in the clear, Mr Macklin, shouldn’t it?”
“I wouldn’t go as far as that,” Macklin said. “It will help. It was a great pity you didn’t remember it sooner. It would have carried a lot more weight if you had told Boos as soon as he knew Delaney had been poisoned. I want you to go over to police headquarters right away and tell him what you’ve told me. It’s important you get it in first before you are asked.”
“I’ll go now,” I said and started to get to my feet.
“Just a moment, Mr Regan.” His alert, shrewd eyes looked fixedly at me. “I must warn you that evidence of this kind has value only if it is given by a disinterested witness. Are you disinterested?”
I found my eyes shifting away from his.
“If you mean do I want Mrs Delaney to go free, then of course I’m interested,” I said.
“I don’t mean that at all.” His voice was sharp. “When you tell Boos about finding the glass, you’ll put yourself under a spotlight. This is evidence that could upset the case they have against Mrs Delaney. It’s belated evidence and you have no proof to support your evidence. Boos will immediately wonder if you are lying to get her off. He’ll wonder if there has been an association between Mrs Delaney and yourself. It would suit him very well if he could discover there was such an association. He’ll check. Is there any chance at all that he may find evidence that you are an interested party?”
I thought bleakly of the Italian restaurant. What a fool I had been to have taken her there!
“I have been friendly with Mrs Delaney,” I said. “Her husband knew it, of course. I took her to a restaurant one evening, but that was the only occasion we have been out together.”
“Did you meet anyone you knew?”
“No. It was an out-of-the-way place. I’m sure no one saw us who knew us.”
He thought for a long moment, then shrugged his shoulders.
“We’ll have to take the risk. If he asks you if you have been friendly with Mrs Delaney, you had better tell him that .you once met her out and you had dinner with her. It would be quite fatal for her if he found out you two had been to this restaurant and you had already told him you hadn’t ever taken her out. You see, Mr Regan, Mrs Delaney’s position is very uncertain. I am relying on the fact that there’s not the slightest suspicion of scandal in her life. I intend to present her to the jury as a loyal, faithful wife who, in spite of the treatment she received from her husband, stuck to him for four years, and even when she was assaulted and had left him, she hadn’t the heart to make a final break, and she returned to him. That is a picture that will make an impression on the jury. On the other hand, if the District Attorney can prove that she was unfaithful to Delaney during his lifetime, then I very much doubt if anything can save her.”
“Do you think you’ll get her off?” I asked anxiously.
“I don’t know. If she had some money, I would get Lowson Hunt to defend her. I think this case needs a man like Hunt.”
“What would it cost?”
Macklin shrugged his shoulders.
“I’d say around five thousand.”
“You think he could get her off?”
“If he can’t, then no one can.”
I didn’t hesitate.
“Okay: go ahead and hire him.”
Macklin laid down the letter opener and stared at me.
“What do you mean?”
“I said go ahead and hire him. I’ll foot the bill.”
“Am I to understand you are offering to pay for Mrs Delaney’s defence?” The words had a cold, clipped ring.
“That’s right,” I said. “I can go up to five thousand, but no more.”
I would have to sell pretty well everything to meet the bill, but I didn’t care. I had got Gilda into this mess, and I was determined to get her out of it.
“You realize of course that it would be fatal to Mrs Delaney’s interests if it was known you were financing her defence?”
“I’m not so stupid as to talk about it. You get Hunt; and I’ll pay.”
“I’ll see him. How can I get into touch with you?”
I gave him my telephone number.
After he had written it down, he said, “Now if you’ll go over to police headquarters . . .”
“Sure.”
I was aware he was looking oddly at me, but I didn’t care. I left him and drove over to police headquarters.
I was feeling pretty nervous when I asked for Lieutenant Boos, and I was still more nervous when I was taken to his office.
Boos was smoking his pipe and standing by the window, staring down at the traffic. He turned when I came in.
“Hello, Regan. What can I do for you?”
“It’s about Delaney’s death,” I said. “There’s something I forgot to tell you. When I found him, there was an empty glass lying by his side. I washed it out and put it in the kitchen cupboard.”
Boos stood stock-still, staring at me; his small eyes flinty.
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