by Deaver Brown
The lawyer shrugged. “Oh, about how this was a pretty nice spot. And how the whole setup sounded pretty good. You know, just passing a few minutes until my wife got dressed. Oh, and maybe they should lay off the hard sell a little . . .”
This ingenuous disclosure broke the ice of reticence; it did not loose torrents of relevant information.
Between Friday night and Saturday evening, when the body was discovered, Lester had exchanged desultory comments with many people. To a man, they agreed that there had been nothing significant about them.
“Except,” said one middle-aged matron in pink, “when it turned out that Eunice Lester—”
She broke off delicately. Thatcher should have been warned by the gleam of interest in Henry’s eyes. This, it subsequently developed, was the point of no return.
“We know all about that,” Frewen said curtly. “What we want from you, now, is a picture of how Lester spent his time, and how you did too.”
In other words, the most interesting police interrogation was taking place elsewhere. And the account of that particular twenty-four hours, pieced together by nearly forty-five persons, was as garbled as might be expected.
According to Burt, the salesman, Stephen Lester had attended the morning talk about land values at Fiord Haven aimed at the husbands.
“He was real interested,” said Burt. “He saw the possibilities all right . . .” Burt continued in this vein for several minutes, momentarily forgetting that this was no occasion for a sales effort.
Then Lester, with the rest of the party, toured the construction site, inspecting not only available lots but the skeleton of James Joel Finley’s lodge.
Frewen looked inquiringly at the architect. James Joel Finley did not object to being the focus of any number of eyes. Drawing dramatic brows together, he thought deeply.
“No,” he said finally. “I’m afraid that I can’t place Mr. Lester particularly. Possibly I did speak to him. I did talk to several people about my design for the lodge which is a radical departure from conventional forms. But no, I do not particularly recall Lester.”
Like Burt, James Joel Finley found it difficult to suspend operations.
Lunch at the White Mountains Motel had brought together the Lesters and the Davidsons who had shared the table with them.
“. . . yes . . . what did we talk about? . . . Well, that’s hard to say. Mr. Lester was telling us about New Hampshire. He knew a lot, didn’t he, Sukey? Then he was explaining how careful you had to be about building to stand up to the New Hampshire winter . . .”
After lunch, Lester had dropped by Eddie Quinlan’s office. Then, he set forth on a long, solitary walk, successfully evading an intensive session with Burt O’Neil. He returned to his motel unit, told his wife he was skipping the second tour, then set off alone again.
And no one knew where he had gone.
“Frewen will have his work cut out for him trying to check all that out,” Thatcher summarized. “After the second tour, people were either sitting in their motel rooms, or drifting aimlesly around—like the Davidsons. Most of the Fiord Haven staff, including Quinlan and Valenti, were double-checking plans for the evening program. The only hard-core alibis are for guests trapped by salesmen.”
Henry was up and away.
“Two women,” he said significantly. “Eunice and Amanda.”
“Henry,” said Thatcher firmly. “No doubt the police are concentrating on any possible sexual improprieties.”
“Naturally,” said Henry. “It’s the one strong lead there is.”
“Leave it to them.”
“What? Oh, of course, of course,” said Henry.
With cause, Thatcher was filled with deep foreboding.
Chapter 6
FAMILY TREE
WHEN THATCHER emerged from his room the next morning the lawn was deserted except for the motel owner, hovering around the sprinkler system. He surveyed Thatcher without enthusiasm.
“Your friend’s around someplace,” he said bitterly. “Stirring things up.”
Thatcher was taken aback. Coolness he could understand. But why naked hostility?
The owner was now addressing a whirling jet of water. “They tell us tourism is the state’s biggest industry. But how do they expect us to attract tourists if people won’t keep their mouths shut. Nobody wants to come someplace where they have murders. Hell, that’s what they’re trying to get away from.”
“Nonsense,” said Thatcher crisply. “This is not a local secret. Since the eleven o’clock news last night, half of New Hampshire must be talking about it.”
Brute facts do not sway motel owners. This one said that, here at the White Mountains Motel—where they normally attracted a good class of customer—everyone just wanted to forget about it. He would have said a good deal more, but Thatcher resolutely marched off to the dining room. At the door he encountered the Davidsons, on their way out.
“Hello, Mr. Thatcher. Mr. Morland’s already had breakfast,” Sukey greeted him.
“He stopped by our table. He said he doesn’t see any reason why the police should suspect us,” Alan repeated faithfully. “Not now, when they know there are a lot of people here who had a real reason to kill Mr. Lester.”
Henry must have been making himself popular in the dining room, Thatcher thought as he exchanged reassuring words with the young couple and passed inside. No doubt everyone within earshot had visualized Henry compiling a list of suspects.
On the threshold he paused. The tables were set up to accommodate parties of five. At each table were two couples—and a salesman. Incredibly the murder seemed to have made no difference. Blueprints, brochures and sales contracts were again in evidence everywhere. Thatcher had no intention of exposing himself to yet another spiel about Fiord Haven. As he was edging toward a deserted table in the far corner, he was hailed.
“Mr. Thatcher!” boomed a mellifluous voice. “Won’t you join us?”
James Joel Finley had risen to his feet and was indicating a chair. Resignedly Thatcher strode forward and acknowledged an introduction to Burt O’Neil. Finley beckoned a waiter with lordly assurance.
Yesterday evening the distinguished architect had had no time for two strangers in dusty boots and flannel shirts. Since then his intelligence system had been at work. James Joel Finley was not the man to dissimulate.
“Mr. Morland was telling us that you are a senior vice president at the Sloan Guaranty Trust. Now I find that truly interesting.”
Thatcher maintained a prudent silence and attacked his melon. The architect flowed smoothly on. “Many people might be surprised to find you in these surroundings, but not I. It is a very good example of what I was explaining to our guests only the other night. As a man rises to the pinnacle of his profession, as his responsibilities and his material rewards increase, he feels a need to return to fundamentals. Can it be that our modern urban environment cuts him off from a life-sustaining force? I refer, of course, to the nourishment derived from the organic union of man, habitat, and nature. This, I shall always maintain, must be the prime goal of modern architecture.”
“Just so,” Thatcher murmured, watching his melon rind disappear, to be replaced by a steaming platter of ham and eggs.
“Ah! You understand. I understand. But how many do not understand?” Finley grieved. “Too often, far too often, those who do not understand—one might even say those who will not understand—are in a position to frustrate the dreams of those who do.”
Burt O’Neil was puzzled. John Thatcher was not. He was familiar with Finley’s attempts to obtain financial backing for a revolutionary housing development in California. The whole colony, green belts and all, was to have been suspended on pilings over the Pacific Ocean. The reaction of the building inspector to this vision climaxed the favorite after-dinner story of many West Coast bankers. No one denied that the view would have been incomparable.
“Indeed,” Thatcher said sedately, pouring himself more coffee.
“A
nd that is why it is doubly satisfactory to meet a man in your position, who obviously values the integration of man and situs.”
Thatcher was tempted and fell. “Of course, such integration does not present much of a problem in a shelter on the Appalachian Trail.”
Belatedly Finley realized that the union of man and nature could be pressed too far—to the point where residential housing was dispensed with entirely. While he was regrouping his forces, Burt O’Neil made his first contribution to the conversation.
“There are the police.” He gestured toward the driveway beyond the window. “They’re bringing back Mrs. Lester.”
James Joel Finley became avuncular. “Poor, poor child.” He shook his white mane sadly. “So young for so much sorrow. Who would have thought, seeing her full of high spirits yesterday, that fate had this blow in store for her?”
Curious, Thatcher turned to look out the window. A state trooper was helping a woman alight from the car. As she stepped into full sunlight, she was revealed as little more than a girl, tall, slim and auburn-haired.
Meanwhile, Burt took issue with Finley. “You’re thinking of Friday, when she came, Mr. Finley. That was before she found out about Eunice. Yesterday, Amanda was mad as hell.”
Thatcher did not normally pursue leads like this. But after all, he thought, by now Henry certainly knew about Lester’s women. It might be only prudent if he did, too.
“Is that Mrs. Lester? That girl?” he asked. “Then who was the Mrs. Lester having cocktails last night?”
“It is difficult, extremely difficult—” Finley’s displeasure was Augustan—“to counsel a recreation colony whose sales force does not display elementary competence.”
O’Neil was more responsive. “Amanda is the one who’s married to Lester now. Or, anyway, she was until yesterday. The blond woman, that’s Eunice, is his ex-wife. Didn’t Mr. Morland tell you? He couldn’t talk about anything else at breakfast.”
All was clear now. No wonder the Davidsons had mentioned other suspects. Whom else had Henry been chatting with?
“I haven’t seen Morland this morning,” Thatcher remarked.
“It was a big surprise to him. Hell, it was a big surprise to us, too,” O’Neil replied with conviction. “Nobody knew anything about it until dinner, Friday night. Then Eunice Lester and Steve Lester saw each other, and the fat was in the fire.”
Finley folded his napkin with mathematical precision. “I should have thought that anyone compiling the list for this weekend would have noticed the presence of two Mrs. Stephen Lesters.”
“I don’t know about lists,” said O’Neil heatedly, “but I do know it put me in a helluva spot. The minute they cottoned on, Eunice said she wouldn’t buy if the Lesters did, and Amanda said they wouldn’t buy if Eunice did. And management expects me to sell prospects like that!”
Thatcher reached for his final piece of toast. “Your problem seems to have solved itself,” he pointed out. “With Stephen Lester dead, there is only one candidate left in the field.”
Burt O’Neil was not sidetracked. High-pressure salesmen seldom are. Instead he produced further evidence that Henry was spreading sunshine with fine impartiality.
“That’s what Mr. Morland said. He thought the police might even consider it a motive for murder. But it’s not true. I don’t have one candidate left. I’ve got none!”
“How does that follow?” Thatcher asked. He did not suppose that O’Neil considered the murder of an ex-husband enough to diminish the attraction of a choice lot.
O’Neil lowered his voice before continuing. “Well, last night when the cops pulled up, you know they wanted to keep things quiet at first. They got Amanda out to the office and broke the news to her. Then they asked if anybody else was connected with Lester. So Mr. Quinlan told them about Eunice. She was in here having cocktails with the rest of us, so the troopers went over to her room. You know what they found?”
James Joel Finley was not above human curiosity. “What?” he breathed softly.
“Her things were all packed up. She’d been planning to hightail it out of here without anyone knowing. You can see how that looks.”
Under the circumstances Thatcher was not surprised to find, half an hour later, two figures deep in conversation by the deserted swimming pool. One was the blond woman of yesterday evening. The other, naturally, was Henry Morland.
“John, come on over.” Henry’s face lighted with innocent pleasure. “We’re talking about the murder. Eunice, this is John Thatcher, who’s hiking with me. John, this is Mrs. . . .”
For once, sheer gusto was not enough to take Henry over the top of social difficulty. Eunice Lester smiled ruefully.
“I’m the first Mrs. Lester, Mr. Thatcher,” she said, shaking hands. “Not the Number-One widow.”
“How do you do?” Thatcher seated himself on a redwood chair.
Eunice shook a cigarette out of a small gold case and accepted a light. “Henry and I have been talking about Steve.”
This was exactly what Thatcher had feared. Did Eunice realize that Henry was busy compiling a list of murder suspects? Or didn’t she care? Perhaps she was so distraught she was saying things she would later regret.
“I told Eunice that I’d met Steve at the club,” Henry explained, “and that took her back.” He at least was at ease in his double role as confidant and detective.
“Way back,” Eunice said, meditatively watching cigarette smoke. “When Steve and I were married, he was a student and he was always going off to the Trail with the Outing Club. But that was over ten years ago. And now look”—she gestured hopelessly—“Steve is dead and I’m a murder suspect.”
“For that matter, so am I,” said Henry. “But you’ll see, things will straighten themselves out. You’ve already explained that business about being packed up and ready to leave.”
Eunice shook her head. “There’s no point being foolishly optimistic. I’ve explained to them that, as soon as I found out Steve had bought a lot, I was through. It wasn’t a surprise to Eddie Quinlan. All along I’d told him that the minute Steve bought, I was going back to Boston.”
“That sounds reasonable,” Thatcher said.
Eunice Lester smiled humorlessly. “Sure—until Amanda claimed I was lying. She did her best to make me look suspicious by saying that Steve hadn’t bought a lot. She claims I made up an excuse on the spur of the moment.”
Henry’s good cheer diminished. “I didn’t realize she was denying it. Then it’s just your word against hers?”
Eunice laughed bitterly. “Oh, no. For once luck was on my side. The police talked to Eddie Quinlan before Amanda was through with her hysterics. He told them Steve had agreed to buy lot seventy-three yesterday afternoon—which is exactly what I told them. So all Amanda’s little game accomplished was to make the police think twice about believing a word that little bitch says.”
“Now, now.” Henry was pained by this reference to the youthful widow. “After all, she was upset last night. Either she didn’t know what she was saying, or Steve hadn’t told her about the sale yet. There’s no need to think she was deliberately trying to get you into trouble.”
“You can afford to be charitable. I can’t.” Eunice’s jaw hardened. “When the police check back, they’ll find out that you had nothing to do with Steve, no reason to murder him. When they check back on me, they’ll find plenty. And most of it is Amanda’s fault.”
Thatcher was torn between courtesy and curiosity. Happily Henry was always more alive to the second.
“Eunice and Steve were having a custody dispute,” he explained tactfully. “About their son.”
“My son,” Eunice corrected him shortly. “Steve’s connection with Tommy was a biological accident.”
Thatcher reviewed the various altercations which could arise between ex-spouses. In his experience nothing approached the viciousness of a savagely-contested custody battle. Divorces, property settlements, claims of adultery and physical abuse paled in comparis
on.
“Is the suit in progress now?” he asked.
“It started last winter. And do you know why?” Eunice was deriving satisfaction from her recital. “Because Amanda can’t have children, that’s why! Steve has been playing the gay man-about-town since he walked out on me. Having himself a ball in San Francisco, while I brought up Tommy. Then, a couple of years ago, he decided it was time to settle down. So he married Amanda and they had a great time being a swinging young couple. Finally they decided to come back East and start family life. They built themselves a house in a fancy suburb, and Steve got to be in charge of the New England territory for his company. Everything was going along as if they were color advertisements in a magazine. Then the blow fell. No children. So what does Steve do? After ten years, he suddenly remembers he has a son and decides to take him away from me. And poor little Amanda thinks that’s a wonderful idea.”
The outburst came to a sudden halt. Eunice was breathing hard and her face had gone white. She looked years older. Henry was quick with his sympathy.
“That must have been a terrible shock for you. And I can understand why you don’t see much good in Amanda. But, after all, could Steve have gotten away with it? No court would give him custody, not after you’d had to bring up the boy alone.”
A bleak smile of gratitude appeared on Eunice’s face. Impulsively she leaned forward and squeezed Henry’s hand. “You’re a nice man, Henry. Too nice to realize the tricks that a Steve Lester could get up to.”
Like most men, Henry did not welcome the view that he was too wholesome to comprehend the depravities which were an open book to his female companion
“I admit that I didn’t know Steve well. I didn’t know anything about him, except his ideas on trail maintenance. But he didn’t strike me as up to anything special. I don’t mean his morals. I mean his intelligence.”
Eunice took him up instantly.
“It didn’t take intelligence. Just a single-minded idea of what he wanted and no compunction about how he got it. He found out I am getting married this fall. So, he hired detectives to dig into my past. I’ve been divorced for over ten years. He didn’t have to be a genius to figure out that there would be something he could use. In his own simple way Steve thought if he threatened a really nasty fight over my morals, I’d be scared out of court.”