My Kingdom for a Hearse
Page 22
“Oh,” Malone said again. “You even know where the murder took place. It must be second sight.” He paused. “Who suggested meeting there, you or Dennis Dennis?”
Charlie Swackhammer opened his mouth to speak, and shut it again, but his mouth had formed the word, “Neither—”
“For that matter,” von Flanagan growled, “why did this guy go to Rico’s place?”
“I told you—” Charlie Swackhammer began.
Malone said quickly, “Following Dennis Dennis.”
“But why did Dennis Dennis go there?” von Flanagan roared.
There was another silence until Hazel Swackhammer said, “I told him to. I got to thinking things over. It seemed to me there had been something strange about Myrdell’s death. Something—too opportune. I didn’t want to be involved myself, and I knew he knew his way around morticians. I thought he could nose around and perhaps find out something.”
It was, Malone reflected, the most he’d ever heard her say. He noted and approved her choice of the word “mortician.”
“There you are, von Flanagan.”
He drew a long, deep breath and plunged in, hoping he was going to reach land. “I’ll give you all of it. From the beginning.”
Von Flanangan regarded him coldly and said nothing. “Actually,” the little lawyer said slowly, “the murder of Dennis Dennis wasn’t in the original plan at all. Actually, I don’t think any murder was.” He beamed winsomely at Charlie Swackhammer and said, “You can stop me, of course, if I’m too wrong.”
Charlie Swackhammer scowled at him silently.
“But Dennis Dennis owned ten per cent of Delora Deanne—enough to make a big difference considering that the rest was divided two ways. He was dickering both ways, with Hazel and with Charlie.” He’d almost said “Cuddles.” He brushed a cigar ash off his vest and went on. “Meantime, Charlie started a campaign to scare Hazel out of business. It might even have been successful if she hadn’t been very smart,” he said modestly, “and called me in. But—as long as the face of Delora Deanne was safe, the rest could be replaced by other models. And Hazel knew Maybelle would never come back to being Delora Deanne. So—there was a definite threat—” He glanced at Hazel Swackhammer.
“This morning,” she said. There seemed to be more life in her voice now. “I should have told you. But by that time I’d made an arrangement—as you know. Dennis Dennis said he could handle the threat and—everything else.”
Malone nodded. “He was going to handle it,” he said grimly. “He was going to raise money to put into Delora Deanne by blackmailing Charlie Swackhammer. A very good idea, too. But Charlie Swackhammer paid him off with a premature shot of embalming fluid.”
He looked happily at von Flanagan who looked right back at him unhappily.
“I don’t get it,” the big police officer said. “Mind you, I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying I don’t get it. Like why, for instance?”
Malone sighed and said slowly and very patiently, “Because Dennis Dennis was blackmailing him, that’s why.”
“With what?” von Flanagan said, scowling. “All right, so he did pull those stunts on the little lady here. I’ll go along with you that it wasn’t very gentlemanly, and a very objectionable thing to do, I’ll admit, but he wasn’t breaking any law. You heard him say so yourself, he had a permit for—” he drew a long breath—“transporting a dead body or any part thereof—”
“Von Flanagan,” Malone said gently. “Are you forgetting what business this man is in?”
After a moment von Flanagan said, “Well—”
“Suppose you were the Cahill girl’s parents?” the little lawyer went on. “Suppose this whole thing came out in the papers? Even if what he did isn’t illegal, it certainly isn’t going to do the Swackhammer Brothers Undertaking Parlors any good.”
“They’d be ruined,” von Flanagan said, nodding. “Ruined.”
“You chose a mild word for it,” Malone told him. “And remember, Charlie Swackhammer is Swackhammer Brothers. And it’s a million-dollar business, too.”
Hazel Swackhammer said, “That’s right. He always looked on Delora Deanne as—pretty small potatoes. Something between a hobby and a sideline.”
“Profitable enough that he’d want to get hold of it, after it had been built up,” Malone said. “But Swackhammer Brothers is the big tree—even if it does have some biggish branches— and Charlie here didn’t want to see it cut down in its prime.” He glanced at Charlie Swackhammer and observed, with a certain approval, that here was a client who wasn’t going to have to be told to shut up and let a lawyer do the talking.
“And not only because of the profits,” Malone pointed out. “Charlie here is a man who takes pride in his profession.” He turned to Jake. “Remember the way he talked about formulas he’d developed, and all that sort of thing?”
Jake nodded, started to go into detail, and changed his mind fast. If Delora Deanne cosmetics were based on those formulas, the less said the better. This was no time for him, or anyone, to cast a shadow on Delora Deanne.
“As a matter of fact,” Malone said, “that was what really convinced me it was Charlie, and not Hazel. Dennis Dennis’ means for blackmail was all that hanky-panky with a beautiful anonymous body. It wouldn’t have been nice for Hazel, if she’d been the one, and the facts had come out. But it wouldn’t have gotten her into any serious trouble, and it certainly wouldn’t have put her out of business. But Charlie, here—” He paused.
“There simply wouldn’t have been any Swackhammer Brothers business any more,” Helene said softly. “Not any more, ever.”
“And there won’t be now,” Malone said. “And that’s what Dennis Dennis realized the minute he found out what Charlie Swackhammer had been up to. It was just the biggest and best hold anyone could have. It wasn’t too hard for Charlie Swackhammer to trail him this morning. And Rico di Angelo’s undertaking parlor looked like a good, quiet place—and appealed to the kind of whimsical mind that would send Hazel those gruesome little gifts.”
He paused to relight his cigar and Helene said, “May-belle—”
“Maybelle told me over the telephone that he’d been with her every single minute,” Malone said. “He was right at her elbow when she did. Obviously, he gave her some simple little excuse for saying it—and just as simple a little excuse for having been away an hour or so. But he had to make sure that she wouldn’t trip him up later, and he was glad to get rid of her anyway.”
Helene shivered.
At last Charlie Swackhammer spoke. He said, “Now look, Malone!”
The little lawyer paid no attention. He had to reach that other shore now. “He took Maybelle to the apartment on some pretext, had a drink with her, doped hers of course, and left her there to finish off when the right opportunity came along. She’ll confirm that when she comes to. Then he faked the accident to set up another alibi. He didn’t realize,” he added, “that I’d figure out right away where she was.”
He abandoned his cigar in the nearest ash tray and began unwrapping a new one with relaxed, loving care. “It was all beautifully planned,” he said admiringly.
At that moment a change came over von Flanagan’s face. It wasn’t a pleasant change.
“All this is very fine,” he said coldly, “all this is a very fine explanation and I don’t doubt it’s true. Only it doesn’t even begin to explain what happened to Myrdell Harris.
“Furthermore,” the big police officer growled, “it doesn’t even begin to explain who stole her body out of Rico di Angelo’s hearse and then parked it sitting against a tree in Lincoln Park with a magazine on its lap.”
There was no emotion on anyone’s face except von Flanagan’s.
“And it was a beautifully planned murder too,” von Flanagan said, his voice beginning to rise. “Even to having the babe’s doctor be a respectable old coot who could just about see the end of his own nose and maybe hear a cannon go off if it was right beside his ear.”
“And I imagine you can prove it,” Malone said smoothly.
Von Flanagan glared at both of them. “Okay, maybe he didn’t murder her. Only somebody did, and somebody moved the body.”
All Malone could think of to say was, “Yes.”
“I think,” von Flanagan said, with the air of a man who has come all the way to the end of his patience and started back, “I’ll take you down to headquarters for questioning. All of you.”
“Why bother?” Malone said. “Why not settle everything right here and now? Assuming, of course, that anyone here had anything to do with it.”
Von Flanagan thought that over. “Okay with me, Malone, if it can be done.”
Malone slid the wrapping from his fresh cigar, blew the wrapping accurately toward the wastebasket, and lighted the cigar slowly and lovingly. Everybody watched him as though they expected him to turn it into a rabbit.
“In the first place,” Malone said, “why was Myrdell Harris murdered?”
Von Flanagan said, “I don’t answer the questions, I ask them. You tell me.” He thought it over. “All right, Malone, who did murder Myrdell Harris and hijack her body, and why?”
“I don’t know,” Malone said cheerfully.
Von Flanagan raised his eyes to heaven, opened his mouth, and remembered just in time that there were ladies present.
“Well,” he said, “who else was around this babe before she died, near enough to of slipped her poison?”
Malone thought for a moment. There was, he decided, no reason to conceal anything. “She was at the broadcasting studio,” he said. “There were any number of people around— musicians, actors, technicians, and so forth. After the show went to Rickett’s with two people from the studio—the writer and the producer.”
He flicked an ash from his cigar and went on. “Otis Furlong, the photographer, and I joined them at Ricketts. We went on to another place from there, but she didn’t go with us. She had an appointment at her apartment.” He hesitated just a moment, then went on, “The appointment was with Jake.” Von Flanagan looked at Jake, and then back at Malone. He didn’t say anything.
“Jake went to keep the appointment—”
“Let him talk for himself,” von Flanagan growled.
“Okay,” Jake said. “I went there. On business. Business about a television show, in case you care. Mrs. Swackhammer and Myrdell Harris were both there when I arrived. She suddenly collapsed and died after I got there.”
“And any number of people,” Helene put in, “could have been there before Jake arrived.”
“Yes, and what’s more,” Jake said, “she could have stopped anywhere along the way between Rickett’s and her apartment, and been with practically anybody.”
Von Flanagan seemed to be trying to look in three or four directions at once.
“You forget another thing,” Malone said, very smoothly. “Jake doesn’t know exactly when she died. She collapsed, and Jake carried her into the bedroom while Mrs. Swackhammer sent for Dr. Stonecypher. But she might only have fainted.” There was a little silence while everybody considered that new idea.
“Jeez!” Klutchetsky said unexpectedly, making everyone jump. “Maybe the old doc done it himself!”
Von Flanagan gave him a very cold and very silent look. “You see?” Malone said.
“No,” von Flanagan said somberly. “I don’t see a damn thing. Except that any one of a couple hundred people, maybe, could of give her poison. That’s what I mean about everybody tries to make it hard for the police department.”
“It seems to me,” Hazel Swackhammer said, “that you can’t tell very much until you know just what kind of poison it was, and how long it would take to work.”
“Now there,” von Flanagan said to Malone, “is the first thing said that makes any sense. There is a smart lady, Malone.” He added, “If by any chance Doc Flynn’s finished by now—”
He picked up the phone and called. Everybody waited, half-breathless. His end of the conversation consisted mainly of “yes,” “no,” and “what,” but his face changed slowly to bewilderment and then to incredulity. At last he hung up.
“Well,” he said at last, “Doc Flynn says it wasn’t any kind of poison. No poison at all. Turns out she died of exactly what it was the old doc said she died of.”
Helene gasped. Jake mumbled something about eighty-two not being so old after all. Charlie Swackhammer looked relieved; Klutchetsky looked puzzled. Hazel Swackhammer didn’t move a muscle.
“So,” Malone said, “you haven’t a thing more to worry about, von Flanagan. None of this business about Myrdell has gotten out to the papers, luckily. You can just send her body back to Rico di Angelo and forget the whole thing ever happened.”
For one moment it looked as though von Flanagan was going to hug everybody in reach. He drew a long, happy breath. Then suddenly he looked at Malone.
“But wait a minute,” he said. “What about the body being stolen and turning up in the park? What about that?”
Malone shrugged his shoulders. “Why worry?” he said. “That didn’t get in the papers either. It can stay a secret between the bunch of us. After all, von Flanagan, it isn’t in your department.”
“Just the same,” von Flanagan said, “who did it?”
Malone’s gaze met the big police officer’s in a long, understanding look.
“That, von Flanagan,” he said very solemnly, “is one thing I suspect we’ll never, never know.”
Chapter Thirty-five
Now that it was over, Malone felt the weariness and the utter melancholy coming back. He’d watched von Flanagan escort a glowering and silent Charlie Swackhammer off to jail. He’d managed to congratulate Hazel Swackhammer on the solution of all her problems, and had heard her say something about seeing him later, that first she had to look after Maybelle Bragg.
He’d reminded Tamia Tabet of their date for the evening, and even that failed to lift his enthusiasm more than a little. Now he waited dismally in the little blue-and-gilt reception room while Jake and Helene had one last word with Otis Furlong.
“I didn’t get a chance to really talk with you before,” the handsome photographer said to Jake. “Everything was in such an uproar.” He looked a little anxious. “I hope this won’t affect Delora Deanne in any way.”
“It won’t,” Malone said reassuringly. “I don’t think anything could.”
Otis Furlong nodded. “I suppose you’re right. And anyway, other people need photographers, and heaven knows, she didn’t pay much. But Jake, about that process—”
The three of them looked at him hopefully.
“It’ll work all right,” he said. “No question about it. I added a few simple ideas of my own, of course.”
“Of course,” Jake echoed.
“And the cost,” Otis Furlong said. “I figured that all out too. It’ll run to, roughly, around $196,500 for a half-hour program. That,” he added, “is just for the technical work, you understand. You’ll have to add the talent and so forth on top of that, of course.”
“Of course,” Jake said again.
Out in the car Helene said, “Just the same, I bet it’s a wonderful process, and I bet it would work just fine, and now where are we going next?”
“After that,” Jake said, “Joe the Angel’s. And don’t say a word to me until we get there.”
Nobody said a word until they were comfortably settled, with three rye-and-sodas lined up in front of them.
“Now, Malone,” Helene began.
He tu
rned to her. “You first. Just what did you say to Gus Madrid that made him get so noble about his money? Not,” he added, “that I’m not going to send him back what’s left of it anyway. Not only as a matter of ethics, but because he’s a good man to have on your side.”
Helene looked straight up in the air and said, “No dice, Malone. I promised him I wouldn’t tell.” She added a remark of her own about ethics.
The little lawyer said, “All right, then I’ll tell you.” He paused, looked at her, and said, “You promised not to tell me, or anyone, that he’d held up Rico di Angelo, stolen Myrdell Harris’ body, and put it against a tree in Lincoln Park.”
Helene lit a cigarette very airily and went on saying absolutely nothing.
Jake stared at Malone and said, “For the love of Mike, Malone. What made you think she did it?” He paused. “Or rather, had Gus Madrid do it?”
“Because,” Malone told both of them, “I’ve known Helene for a long time, and I know the fine way her mind works. Because when she left me at the door of Myrdell Harris’ apartment house the night of her death, she was in a tearing hurry.” He drew a long breath. “And because,” he finished, “she turned up much later in the Rogers’ Park police station, where she’d conveniently provided herself with the alibi she’d inevitably need when embarrassing questions began to be asked later.”
“You taught me that alibi dodge yourself,” she said accusingly. “Remember your telling me about that time you had a client of yours get himself arrested for speeding and—?”
“Never mind,” Malone said hastily. He sipped his drink, relit his cigar and said, “The only thing I want to know is, just why did you do it?”
She sniffed. “Because I had sense enough to remember right away that Dr. Alonzo Stonecypher was nearsighted, deaf and at least eighty-two years old.”
“Well, you were basically right,” Malone said, “even though you were absolutely wrong.”
The little lawyer looked into his half-empty glass and sighed deeply. True, the whole Delora Deanne situation and the murder of Dennis Dennis were cleared up to everyone’s satisfaction, including even his own. True, he had another date with Tamia Tabet for tonight, and there was no reason he could foresee why this one should be interrupted so unhappily. He was going to send Gus Madrid back the rest of his money, with a note for the balance, but his credit with Joe the Angel was on a firm footing again and would undoubtedly cover tonight’s expenses.