The April Robin Murders

by Craig Rice

  There was no answer. He called again, louder. Handsome went to look, came back and reported, “She’s gone.”

  “Gone?”

  “There’s a door out of that pink marble library,” Handsome said. “She must’ve slipped out that way.”

  Bingo scowled. “Maybe she just wanted to go home.” He brightened. “Oh well, we found out where that writing paper and the receipt came from.”

  “And we got some nice pictures,” Handsome said. “She photographs fine, Bingo. I can tell even without printing them. Bingo, maybe she’s a property.”

  Bingo stared at him. “A few days in Hollywood, and already you’re learning the language.” He relaxed, loosened his tie and undid his shoes. It had indeed been a long day.

  “Only, Bingo,” Handsome said, “do you think we ought to tell the police we know about the writing paper now? And about him murdering Miss Pearl Durzy?”

  “Tomorrow, maybe,” Bingo said. He yawned. “Handsome, we don’t know for sure he murdered Pearl Durzy. And also, if we tell about the paper we could maybe get Janesse in trouble, and like you say, maybe she’s a property.” He smiled wearily. “We don’t call them, they’ll call us.” He yawned again.

  Handsome went into the improvised darkroom. Bingo stretched out on the davenport to think everything over. He thought it over for roughly thirty seconds, and then closed his eyes.

  He woke some time later from a complicated dream involving April Robin (looking very much like a combined Janesse Budlong and Mariposa DeLee), the Brown Derby, his Uncle Herman, a swimming pool, and food. Mostly food. The dream seemed to persist as he half opened his eyes, and he realized simultaneously that he was hungry and that there was a maddening and wonderful smell of food in the air.

  “I remembered we didn’t have any dinner,” Handsome was saying. “So I took two dollars and went up to Goody-Goody’s and got a sack of hamburgers. And some milk. I hope I did okay, Bingo.”

  “Handsome,” Bingo said fervently, “you never did better in your life.”

  Two hamburgers later he sighed happily, leaned back, lighted a cigarette and said, “Handsome, I just thought of something. For so long we talked about coming to Hollywood. Now we’re in Hollywood. In a mansion that used to belong to a movie star. And we’re only a few minutes’ drive from the restaurants we always talked about. Romanoff’s. The Brown Derby. Chasen’s. Don the Beachcomber. All the rest. And what happens? For three meals in a row we eat hamburgers, from Goody-Goody’s.”

  Handsome said seriously, “They’re swell hamburgers, though. And, Bingo. Those pictures. Janesse Budlong.”

  Bingo looked up with quick interest. “Well?”

  Handsome just said, “Gosh!”

  He produced them. Bingo looked at them for a long moment. Then he said, “Gosh!”

  “Only,” Handsome said, “nobody has done anything about it. Girls come from all over the world and get to be movie stars. And here’s a girl lives right here, probably all her life, and looks like this, and never gets anywhere. Bingo, why is that?”

  Bingo didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to say so. “Maybe she can’t act.”

  Handsome looked skeptical. Then he said, “She was acting most of the time she was here, and she was good.”

  Bingo had to concede that. “Maybe she never knew the right people before.”

  “Her pa does,” Handsome said stubbornly. “Her pa must know everybody, a big important man like him.”

  “Maybe that’s why,” Bingo said. “Maybe everybody got sort of used to seeing her around, and just kept thinking she was just Mr. Victor Budlong’s little girl, and never thought of her as audience-bait.” He liked that last phrase and rolled it around his tongue. “Audience-bait. Well, she knows us now.”

  There was someone at the door. Bingo said quickly, “If that’s Perroni and Hendenfelder, don’t tell them about Chester Baxter and—” It was not Perroni and Hendenfelder. It was Adelle Lattimer.

  She came in majestically, walking with a panther-like rhythm. She was wearing a pearl-colored slack suit that sparkled where the light touched it; a string of what Bingo decided had to be rhinestones coiled through her sleek dark hair and matched another string wrapped around her wrist. She looked beautiful and more than beautiful, Bingo thought, wondering how long it would be before he saw a woman wearing skirts in public again.

  “Sorry for the late visit, boys,” she said cheerfully, sitting gracefully on the arm of the davenport across from Bingo. “But your light was on. And I have to protect my interests. Also, I have something to ask you about. Is there any beer in the house?”

  There was. The late Pearl Durzy had left the refrigerator well stocked.

  “Thanks, boys,” she said. “Now listen. Do you know a cute, funny little confidence man named Chester Baxter?”

  Bingo and Handsome looked at each other. Then Bingo said, “Well—well, yes. But what makes you think”—he’d almost said, “How do you know?”—“he’s a confidence man?”

  “Written all over him,” Adelle Lattimer said. “Besides which, he came to me with a very confidence man type proposition. He also said he was working for you, which is mostly why I am here.” She finished off a glass of beer and poured another. “Amazing, how I keep my figure. Must be my metabolism. Anyway, is he working for you, or is he working for you?”

  “Well,” Bingo said uncomfortably, “you might say that, in a way, he is.”

  “That’s what I wanted to know,” she said cheerfully. “Because he tells me he’s going to find some buzzard you guys are looking for in some connection with this house-buying deal. He didn’t tell me in just what kind of connection.”

  Chester Baxter, Bingo decided, was, in his way, a man of honor.

  “Anyway,” she went on, “he tells me this character he is going to locate knows where Julien Lattimer is, and that you know about it. Am I right or am I wrong?”

  “You’re right,” Bingo said. “I mean, according to what this man Chester Baxter says.” He was beginning to feel very unhappy about the whole thing.

  “Fine,” she said, even more cheerfully. “That’s exactly what I wanted to know. Because if Julien Lattimer is alive, and this little con man finds him, then the chances are that I collect my back alimony.” She looked at Bingo and Handsome sympathetically. “Too bad you won’t get to collect for finding his corpse. Thanks for the beer.” She rose to leave.

  “Just a minute,” Bingo said. It was late, and in spite of the nap and the hamburgers, he was cross. “Chester Baxter is working for us. If through him Julien Lattimer is located, any deal has to be made through us. Chester Baxter is also a friend of ours. What cut of the alimony are you ready to offer?”

  “Why, you damned New York high-binders!” she said. She sat down and called them worse than that. Then she lit a cigarette and said, “All right, we’ll talk business.” After fifteen minutes of bickering, they decided on the same agreement as for finding Julien Lattimer’s body. Ten percent. At that point, Bingo decided that the whole arrangement should be put in writing. Fifteen minutes later she’d agreed to that too, and written a brief note.

  “This is probably illegal,” she said, “and hard as hell to explain if the cops ever find it, but you’ve got the note, and you’ll have to do the explaining. When do you expect to hear from this little guy?”

  “Tonight,” Bingo said, and immediately bit his tongue.

  She nodded. “Maybe I’d better stay here tonight.”

  “There are only these two davenports,” Bingo said stiffly. “And my partner and I have done a long day’s work. Unless,” he added, with a faint touch of malice, “you’d like to sleep in what was Pearl Durzy’s room.”

  Adelle Lattimer didn’t flinch, but she said, “Maybe I’d better not stay. It wouldn’t look good, if the wrong people came in. I guess I just have to trust you to call me.”

  “We’ll call you, all right,” Bingo said. There wasn’t any doubt of that. Living or dead, Julien Lattimer was going to mean mon
ey to them now.

  After she had gone, he thought the whole thing over again. She was right, of course. The deal probably was illegal. Furthermore, it was definitely immoral.

  On the other hand, he told himself, if Julien Lattimer was dead, he’d probably want to have his body found, and wouldn’t mind two young businessmen getting a small reward. Whereas if he was alive and hiding out so he wouldn’t need to pay alimony, he deserved to be found.

  But Julien Lattimer, if alive, was a rich man. There was all that money that Herbert Reddy was looking after so tidily. He didn’t have any reason to hide out to avoid paying alimony.

  The whole train of thought, he realized, was getting him right back to nowhere on every trip.

  “Bingo,” Handsome said, a little anxiously, “Chester Baxter said he was going to find our Mr. Courtney Budlong tonight. Which means we’ll hear from him tonight—”

  “I know,” Bingo said. “I don’t like to sleep in my clothes either. But I guess we’d better be ready to move fast.” The herringbone worsted suit needed pressing by now anyway, he consoled himself, and the natty brown pin-stripe was ready on its hanger for tomorrow.

  He took off his tie, slipped out of his shoes, loosened his belt, and made himself as comfortable as he could, pulling the blankets up to his chin. Handsome turned off the lights.

  Lying there in the darkness of the enormous room, he became aware of the faint perfume in the air, a light, delicate perfume. It could have been Janesse Budlong’s. It could have been Adelle Lattimer’s. He hoped with all his heart it belonged to one of them. He hoped it belonged to some living woman—

  Nonsense, he told himself sternly, there were no ghosts. He closed his eyes and tried to think of something else. Inevitably, his thoughts went to April Robin.

  It was some time later when Handsome whispered, “Bingo, are you still awake?”

  It would have been so easy to pretend he was asleep, but he whispered back, “Yes,” and then said out loud, “What am I whispering about? There’s nobody here but us.” He opened his eyes and said, “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing, Bingo,” Handsome said in the darkness. “Only I was thinking. Wouldn’t it be funny if it turned out Pearl Durzy was, I mean had been, really, April Robin?”

  “That’s funny,” Bingo said sleepily. “I was just thinking the same thing.”

  Neither of them spoke after that. This time, when Bingo finally slept, he didn’t dream.

  He had no idea what time it was when Handsome shook him very gently by the shoulder and whispered, “Bingo! Psst!” He sat up, wide awake.

  “Bingo,” Handsome whispered, very low, “I think we’ve got a prowler. I think someone’s trying to get in our house.”

  seventeen

  “Don’t get excited,” Bingo hissed. “Don’t turn the lights on. Don’t make any noise.” He wondered if Handsome could hear his teeth chattering.

  “Should I call the police?” Handsome whispered.

  “No!” Bingo told him. “We’ll handle this ourselves.” He stood up, thanking his stars he had his clothes on. “It can’t be Chester Baxter,” he whispered, “he’d ring the bell. It can’t be Courtney Budlong, he probably still has keys.” He drew a long breath. “Never mind who it is. We’d better look!”

  The faint but definite sounds of someone in the garden had ceased momentarily. Now they began again, soft and stealthy. Someone seemed to be looking for someone.

  Bingo caught himself about to say, “You look outside, and I’ll watch inside in case he tries to open a window.” That was no way for the president and senior partner of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America to behave. He slipped on his jacket and said, “Be careful, now.”

  There was the unmistakable sound of a window being tried at the rear of the house.

  As they slipped outside, Bingo realized that it must be near morning, there was a faint, grayish light. He wondered a little wildly if here in Southern California daylight came in with a rush the same way the dark came down. If it did, it should be bright as noon any minute now.

  They stole around the corner of the big house, keeping to the shadows of the wall through the rose garden, and then they saw him, a tall, attenuated figure, cautiously trying a window.

  Bingo saw Handsome brace himself for a flying tackle, put out a quick restraining hand, thrust his right hand into the pocket of his jacket and said in a voice that, to him at least, sounded strong and steady, “Stand still, or I’ll shoot!”

  The man turned around, slowly.

  “Keep your hands where I can see them,” Bingo barked, using a line from a long-remembered movie, “and walk over here.”

  The dark figure moved closer, empty hands in sight. As the dim gray light struck his face, Bingo recognized the ice-eyed man who had been in the crowd the afternoon before. He didn’t look ice-eyed now. He looked a little frantic.

  “Well,” Bingo said, “you pick a funny time to go collecting souvenirs. Or are you looking for a new place to train birds and keep rentable reptiles?”

  “I got about as much right to be here as you have,” the man said sullenly. “I’m William Willis.”

  “You told us that already,” Bingo said. “That doesn’t explain why you’re trying to break in our house.”

  “If it is your house,” William Willis said. He pulled back his shoulders and said, “I’m Mrs. Lois Lattimer’s brother.”

  “Well,” Bingo said. “That makes things different.” He added quickly, “But not very different.”

  William Willis said, “Mister, I don’t have anything against you, and I don’t think you have anything against me. I hope. Can we sit down some place and talk this over?”

  “Sure,” Bingo said. “Let’s go inside out of the cold.” He remembered just in time to add, “But don’t forget, I’ve got you covered.”

  William Willis marched obediently into the house and sat down on one of the davenports. Handsome switched on the lights and vanished into the kitchen to make coffee.

  Seen now at this hour, the tall, thin man seemed about as formidable as an abandoned kitten. Bingo relaxed, took his right hand out of his jacket pocket, and lit a cigarette. It pleased him to observe that his hand was not shaking.

  “All right,” Bingo said, sounding as stern as he could, “go on and explain.”

  William Willis cleared his throat and said, “The question seems to be, who explains first.”

  “We have nothing to explain,” Bingo said coldly. “We own this house and we live in it.”

  “So you told me this afternoon,” William Willis said. “You’ll pardon me if I sound a little skeptical.”

  Bingo thought things over for a moment. No, he was damned if he was going to explain the whole situation to this intruder, who, for all he might be Lois Lattimer’s brother, was still a stranger. “There are still some formalities to go through,” he said, using up all the dignity he had in the world, “but our lawyer, Mr. Arthur Schlee, assured us that our letter of sale and our receipt are sufficient for the present.” He stressed the “Mr. Arthur Schlee” just a trifle.

  William Willis made no comment.

  “Now,” Bingo said, “you explain what you’re doing trespassing on—prowling around—our property in the middle of the night.”

  “I—” William Willis paused.

  Bingo looked at him with a sudden rush of sympathy. Their visitor looked pale, extremely tired, and more than a little disturbed. Bingo had a lot of questions to ask, but he decided to let them go until Handsome came back with the coffee. William Willis, he thought, didn’t look like the brother of a woman who had murdered her husband. If Julien Lattimer had been murdered. He looked right now like a weary man, approaching old age, who trained birds for a living and rented out reptiles of all kinds.

  A cup of coffee later, everybody felt better. There was even a little color in William Willis’ sallow face. He put down his coffee cup and accepted a cigarette.

  “Those
papers you mentioned,” he said, scowling. “Was Julien’s signature on them?”

  “Yes. But he’s supposed to be dead,” Bingo said, feeling his way with care.

  “If he isn’t,” William Willis said, a twisted smile on his thin mouth, “he will be in two more years.”

  It took a minute or so for Bingo to figure that one out. Sure. Seven years. Julien Lattimer would be legally dead. “Your sister—” he began.

  “My sister,” William Willis said, “will at that time inherit everything. And, it is considerable, I assure you.”

  “But your sister can’t inherit if—” Bingo paused again.

  Again there was the wry, crooked smile. “My sister can’t inherit the estate if she murdered Julien. But you forget, that remains to be proved.”

  Bingo thought that over. True, if Julien Lattimer or his body stayed lost until the seven years were up, it would be a damned difficult thing to prove that his wife had murdered him.

  Handsome said earnestly, “I remember a story in a Sunday supplement about a wealthy millionaire and his wife. It was June 5, 1949, the day before prohibition was repealed in Kansas after sixty-nine years. There was a story in the main news section about that, too.”

  “Were this wealthy millionaire and his wife in Kansas?” William Willis said, looking a little bewildered.

  “Uh-uh,” Handsome said. “Long Island. It was on a right-hand page and there were pictures of both of them and their house. Neither of them was very good-looking, and I didn’t think much of the house.” He added, “Right across was an article about why people walk in circles when they get lost. Do you know it’s because practically everybody has one leg longer than the other?”

  By now William Willis looked thoroughly confused and a little apprehensive. He looked anxiously at Bingo.

  “It’s all right,” Bingo assured him. “My partner remembers everything. And that’s the way he remembers it.” He gave Handsome a stern look and said, “What about these millionaires?”