by Craig Rice
And didn’t find anything, Malone added to himself.
He let himself into the now familiar living room and glanced around. Everything was exactly the same as it had been earlier in the day. Even to the feel, the cold, lonely feel that it had taken on after the death of Myrdell Harris. He decided he didn’t want to do any further exploring until the rest were there.
They came along in a rush. “All right, Malone. Now that we’re up here—”
Silently he led the way into the bedroom. He had to have guessed right about this, he told himself he absolutely had to. There wasn’t any other way.
Maybelle Bragg was there all right, very quiet and still, in the exact center of the beruffled bed where Myrdell Harris had died so short a time before. For just one fraction of a second, his heart stopped. Had he been wrong, was he too late? Then he bent down and felt her pulse.
He straightened up and said to Charlie Swackhammer, “See? I told you not to worry. She’s perfectly all right. Or she will be, as soon as whatever dope she’s been given wears off”
Then he sat down, hard, on the nearest chair.
Chapter Thirty-three
“If you say, ‘I told you so,’ just once more,” Helene said between clenched teeth, “I shall shriek, Malone.”
He smiled at her, but it was a wan smile. “I can’t seem to think of anything else to say, right at this minute.” He took out a cigar and began unwrapping it very carefully.
Maybelle Bragg, her lovely hair loose on the pillow, still slept the heavy sleep of the drugged in the next room. Malone had sunk into the most comfortable chair in the living room to catch his breath. The day was not anywhere near over yet.
A doctor had been sent for. Not, Malone had specified. Dr. Alonzo Stonecypher. Charlie Swackhammer sat on the divan, his head resting on his hands. Helene was prowling restlessly around the room, and Jake had thoughtfully raided the pantry, declaring that everybody present needed a drink, especially himself Helene had commented, after one taste, that the drink Jake had made would probably wake up Maybelle without the help of a doctor, and stopped just short of the unfortunate comment that it would undoubtedly even wake the dead.
“But how did you know, Malone?” Charlie Swackhammer said at last. “How did you know she was here?”
The little lawyer toyed with the idea of claiming either inside information or second sight, and decided to tell the truth.
“It was a lucky guess,” he admitted. “Because this seemed the most logical place. There had to be some connection between this and the—the Delora Deanne business. Just as there had to be some connection between this and the Myrdell Harris—death.”
He turned to Charlie Swackhammer. “Whoever shoved you into that tree, did it with one intention, kidnaping May-belle. When she comes out of it, she’ll be able to tell who it was. Too bad you didn’t get a good look at the car or the driver.”
“It was snowing,” Charlie Swackhammer mumbled, shaking his head. “And it all happened too fast.”
“But why, Malone?” Helene demanded. “And why bring her here?” She added, “Of all places.”
“Of all places,” Malone told her, “this was the safest. Because no one was going to come here, and the kidnaper knew it. Myrdell Harris’ body had been removed. The police had been through here. The manager wasn’t going to let just anybody in here, not even the maids. That’s why it was the one really safe place and, to me,” he went on, “the one really obvious place.” He lighted his cigar and tried to look modest.
Helene said, “But who else would know about this place?”
“Anybody and everybody connected with Delora Deanne,” Malone told her.
“I still don’t understand,” Swackhammer said. “Why kidnap Maybelle?”
“To murder her,” Malone said, “at a convenient time and place.”
“Malone,” Helene said very softly, “there’s still another and very important Why. Why murder Maybelle?”
Malone knew, and he didn’t even like to think about it. “I’m damned if I’ll tell you,” he said. “At least, not right now.” He added, “And anyway, she’s safe.” He looked at his watch. “I’m going on over to the Delora Deanne building,” he announced. “You three stay right here until the doctor gets here and takes over.”
Helene objected. She’d be very happy to drive Malone to where he was going. Jake didn’t object out loud, but he looked definitely wistful.
“You two stay right here,” the little lawyer said, and he said it sternly.
He paused at the telephone booth in the lobby and made two telephone calls. One of them was to von Flanagan. Would the police officer meet him at the Delora Deanne offices in, say, half an hour? If he did, everything would be cleared up once and for all. He hung up on von Flanagan’s burst of agitated questions, and hoped he’d been telling the truth.
Then he made a second call on impulse. If it succeeded, it was going to be interesting. If it didn’t—not much would be lost.
He thanked his luck that a taxi was waiting, in spite of the snow. He relit his cigar, looked out the window, and tried to admire the snow and the trees, but without success. What had Dennis Dennis written? Sweet silver dreams, Delora! Snow will not harm your soft smooth skin—
Well, nothing was going to harm Maybelle Bragg now. Thinking about it made him feel a little better. But there was still much to be accounted for. Including the matter of Myrdell Harris, which still didn’t entirely fit into the picture he had drawn in his mind.
He paused a moment at the top of the marble steps that led to the cream-and-rose doorway just off Michigan Boulevard, crossed his fingers once for luck, and went on in.
Tamia Tabet smiled at him pertly from behind the gilt-and-ivory desk. “Malone! How wonderful!”
He gave her the best smile he could muster, apologized profusely for being so suddenly called away on business the night before, made another date, this one for tonight, and asked for Hazel Swackhammer. Hazel Swackhammer was in Dennis Dennis’ office. Tamia Tabet showed Malone the dimple in her left cheek again.
He looked at her admiringly, but right now his heart wasn’t in it. There was no sign of von Flanagan so far. He looked at his watch. Ought to be here fairly soon now.
Then he went up the lovely little stairs to the second floor and back to Dennis Dennis’ unadorned and business-like office. Hazel Swackhammer was there, staring thoughtfully at the empty desk.
“I’m very sorry—” he began a little hesitantly.
“Naturally,” she said. “So am I.” If she was, she didn’t show it, or anything else. “It was unexpected.”
All of that and more, Malone agreed inwardly. Unexpected, perhaps unnecessary.
He tried another tack. “If there’s anything I can do—”
“No,” she said. “Everything has been done.”
He looked at her carefully. Yesterday she had seemed tired and just a little anxious. Today she seemed tired and, somehow, just a little relieved. He wondered.
In what seemed like an amazing burst of complete confidence she went on. “I’ve made the necessary arrangements—” there was that word again, he thought—“for after the police are through. There didn’t seem to be anyone else.”
“His ex-wife?” Malone asked cautiously.
Hazel Swackhammer indicated Dennis Dennis’ desk. “No one seems able to find out anything about her.” The expression on her face would have been a grin on anyone else. “Frankly, I don’t believe there was one.”
Malone did grin. “Neither do I. Especially as he wasn’t using the money to pay alimony.”
This time a long, silent look passed between them. Nothing needed to be said, and Hazel Swackhammer didn’t like to use up unnecessary words.
“Frankly,” she said, “I was in no position to—buy him out. I needed to raise money myself, to pull Delora Deanne out of a temporary slump. And when it came right down to it, he wasn’t as interested in money as he was in helping run Delora Deanne.”
&nbs
p; And, Malone thought silently, having every copywriter’s dream of a completely free hand.
“He seemed to be confident he could raise it,” she told Malone. “So, you see—?”
Malone shook his head.
“Well,” she said, “yesterday I reached an agreement with Mr. Dennis, whereby he became a partner in Delora Deanne.” That was that, and intended to cover everything.
“And—now?” Malone asked delicately.
“In the agreement we signed,” she told him, “the surviving partner would inherit.”
He refrained from remarking that Dennis Dennis’ murder, coming on the heels of the agreement, was a little too tidy.
At last she said, in her flat, ordinary voice, “We might as well go down to my office.”
There was nothing to worry about, Malone told himself firmly. Maybelle Bragg was safe. Jake and Helene were there, and so would be a good reliable doctor in a few minutes.
All the Deloras were alive and all in one piece and safe, except that none of them were Deloras any more and quite possibly never would be again, unless Jake’s persuasive powers were all that he claimed them to be.
And so there was nothing to be unhappy about any longer, no reason for this unaccountable weariness and depression.
Hazel Swackhammer opened her office door and ushered Malone inside.
There was a box on the desk.
It was a gay little box, a bright, yet pale, blue, tied with rosy ribbons that matched the simple lettering Nelle’s. It was a hatbox.
Malone gripped the edge of the desk and looked at Hazel Swackhammer. He saw her homely—no, not homely, ordinary—face turn pale, slowly and horribly, saw her mouth sag loosely, saw her eyes stare and then begin to close. He thrust out a hand to catch her as she fell, eased her into a chair, and stood looking at her closed eyes and slackened jaw.
Finally he untied the ribbon, slowly and very carefully. He smoothed it out and laid it on the desk. Then he lifted the blue lid with its rosy lettering, even more slowly.
There was nothing in the box but a hat.
After a little while Malone lifted it out gently and looked at it admiringly. It was a very merry and minxy little hat, with a wreath of small, smiling flowers, a bit of ribbon, and a tiny wisp of a just slightly playful veil.
Suddenly there were heavy footsteps behind him, and he turned around in time to see von Flanagan in the doorway, Klutchetsky at his side.
“There was a hat in the box,” Malone said.
“What the hell did you expect to find?” von Flanagan growled. “A nest of bunny rabbits? Season passes to the hockey meets? It’s a hatbox, isn’t it?” He snorted indignantly. “And what’s the matter with her?”
“A faint,” Malone told him, “a real one. Probably her first. ” He picked up the hat. “The finger of fate,” he said. “The fine finger of fate. The clutch of circumstances. Something. Not,” he added reflectively, “that I wouldn’t have managed as well without it.”
“Malone,” von Flanagan said, “sit down. Don’t you faint.”
The little lawyer sat down gratefully. Right now he needed to stall for time, just a small bit of time.
Hazel Swackhammer had opened her eyes again. Now she sat absolutely still in her chair, her hands gripping its arms tightly, a little color—but not much—slowly creeping back into her gray, expressionless face. Her whole body seemed to be frozen into complete rigidity, her eyes were like balls of ice.
There was a sound at the door and Malone looked up to see Charlie Swackhammer standing there, a little breathless.
“I got here as soon as I could.” He looked around, stared at the desk, and said, “What’s that? What’s going on here?”
“A hatbox,” Malone said calmly. “And everything’s going on here. How’s Maybelle?”
“The doctor’s staying with her,” Charlie Swackhammer said. “She’ll be all right in an hour or so, when she wakes up.” He added, “The Justuses stopped in the lobby, to talk to that Furlong fellow.”
Malone nodded as though none of it were important, picked up the hat, turned to Hazel Swackhammer and said, “You see? There’s nothing to worry about. In fact, there never was.”
The look she gave him was such that he hoped frantically the iron wasn’t all going to melt and give way at once. Tears began to slide down her face, probably her first in a very long time.
“Please,” von Flanagan said, breathing hard, his broad face red, “will somebody—Malone—explain something?” He nodded toward Hazel Swackhammer. “And what’s the matter with her now?”
“She’s happy,” Malone said, taking out a cigar. “You don’t have to believe me, and I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t believe me. But it’s because there was a hat in the box.”
Chapter Thirty-four
Malone sat with his eyes closed for a few moments. He was terribly tired now, more than he had ever been before or ever wanted to be again. And the whole thing wasn’t over with yet, not anywhere near over with.
At last he looked at von Flanagan. “You’ll find the hands and the feet,” he said in a toneless voice, “right here, in the top left-hand drawer of the desk.” He took out a dusty and crumpled handkerchief and wiped his face.
Von Flanagan stared at him, at Hazel Swackhammer, at the desk, at Charlie Swackhammer, back at Malone again, and barked a couple of orders to Klutchetsky, who took the boxes out very gingerly, carried them away as though they contained the very latest in thermal bombs, and came back a few minutes later, still a little pale.
“There won’t need to be any commotion about this, of any kind, von Flanagan,” Malone said. “The Cahill girl’s people still won’t ever need to know. Nor will the newspapers. No one needs to know, not ever.”
Hazel Swackhammer had been given a sip of brandy that Jake had providentially found somewhere. Now she sat in her chair, not moving nor speaking, but with her eyes, brighter now, watching everything, and the marks of tears still on her face.
Von Flanagan looked around the room, rubbed his left ear, and said, “But what’s with the hatbox?”
“Only had a hat in it,” Malone said, “because Charlie didn’t have the chance he expected to provide the head. Did you, Charlie?”
Charlie Swackhammer stared at him stupidly.
“And May belle won’t be able to tell what happened to her, will she?” Malone went on ruthlessly and fast.
“No,” Charlie Swackhammer said, taken by surprise. “She—” He caught himself and said inadequately, “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Never mind,” Malone said. “I do. And von Flanagan does, too. And Hazel. She knew it all along.”
Von Flanagan had the face of a man who’d been just about to speak, and had caught himself just in time.
But Helene who, with Jake, had arrived in the doorway, said, “Knew what, Malone?”
“Why,” Malone said easily, “that Charlie Swackhammer had planned to murder Maybelle, and sending those little— offerings—to Hazel was a kind of reverse build-up.”
In the silence that followed, Charlie Swackhammer turned white, then red, then white again. Finally he said weakly, “Prove it.”
“I can, and I will,” Malone said in a serene and confident voice he didn’t feel at all. “From the way the whole thing was planned and carried out, it had to be either Charlie or Hazel. I thought it was Hazel, setting herself to destroy the business she’d built so that no one else could have it. Sending all the Deloras away, making it appear that they’d been murdered— or worse. Planning to murder Maybelle, the real Delora, so that Charlie Swackhammer couldn’t have her too, and setting the stage for it just as it was set.”
He took time out, a long time out, to light his cigar.
“Or,” he said, “it could have been Charlie. First, trying to scare Hazel out of business. Second, building up to Maybelle’s murder in advance. Figuring that other people were bound to think just as I did at first, and pin it on Hazel.”
Charlie Swackhammer m
uttered something that sounded like “Perfectly ridiculous.” Malone ignored him.
“He never intended to marry Maybelle, or he’d have done it before,” Malone said. “So Ned McKoen’s column guess wasn’t far off at all. She was blackmailing him. Blackmailing him into matrimony.”
Charlie Swackhammer said, “Now look here, Malone.” The big, round-faced man laughed a little hoarsely and said, “It’s ridiculous, I said, perfectly ridiculous. If I didn’t want to marry Maybelle, I didn’t need to. In this day and age, who’s afraid of a breach-of-promise suit? Besides, I could have afforded to buy her off.”
“Leave Maybelle out of this for a minute,” Malone said. “The presents Hazel got through the mail and by messenger. You can’t deny that, because I have proof. Any more than you can deny you paid Myrdell to impersonate Hazel over the phone and send all the Deloras packing. I know all about that, too.”
“I suppose Myrdell—” Charlie Swackhammer stopped, glared at Malone and said angrily, “All right. I admit it was a pretty shabby practical joke. But it wasn’t murder.” He glanced involuntarily at von Flanagan.
“You’re right,” Malone said in a soft voice. “It isn’t in his department.”
Von Flanagan cleared his throat and said, “Transporting a body or any part thereof without a permit.” He paused. “But I suppose you have a permit.”
“There!” Charlie Swackhammer said triumphantly. He added, “And Maybelle hasn’t been murdered, and I hadn’t any reason for murdering her. Furthermore,” he said, even more triumphantly, “I certainly wouldn’t murder her when she’s my alibi for the murder of Dennis Dennis!”
“Oh,” Malone said. He looked at the other man long and thoughtfully. “So you know Dennis Dennis was murdered?” He paused a moment. “Second sight, no doubt?” he added pleasantly.
Von Flanagan moved a step closer.
“You were seen there, you know,” Malone said, daring everything, and waiting breathlessly.
“I went there to see about poor Myrdell’s funeral,” Charlie Swackhammer said.