CHAPTER 18
Dave Ritter, driving his small coupe, kept his eye on the white StatePolice car ahead. Rand, who had come away from the Fleming home in thewhite car, had called Ritter from the office of the Justice of the Peacewhile waiting for Walters to put up bail, after his hearing. Now, enroute to Gwinnett's, he was briefing his assistant on what had happened.
"So everything's set," he concluded. "Mrs. Fleming jumped at it; sheknows you're coming in your own car, which you may keep in the garagethere. You've left New Belfast about now; if you show up around three,you'll be safe on the driving time. Your name is Davies; I decided onthat in case I suffer a _lapsus linguae_ and call you Dave in front ofsomebody."
"Yeah. I'll have to watch and not call you Jeff, Colonel Rand, sir." Henodded toward the glove-box. "That Leech & Rigdon's in there; you'dbetter get it out before I go to the Flemings'. The guy at the drive-inmade a positive identification; it's the one he sold Fleming. I saw therest of the pistols he has there; don't waste time looking him up aboutthem. They stink. And I saw Tip this morning. He got young Jarrett sprungon a writ." He thought for a moment. "What does this do to the Rivers andFleming murders?"
"We can look for one man for both jobs, now," Rand said. "Probably themotive for Fleming was that merger he was so violently opposed to, andthe Rivers killing must have been a security measure of some sort. There;that must be Gwinnett's, now."
The State Police car had pulled up in front of a large three-story framehouse with faded and discolored paint and jigsaw scrollwork around thecornices, standing among a clump of trees beside the road. McKenna andKavaalen got out, with Walters between them, and started up the path tothe front steps. Ritter stopped behind the white sedan, and he and Randgot out. By that time, Walters and the two policemen were on the frontporch.
Suddenly Ritter turned and sprinted around the right side of the house.Rand stood looking after him for a moment, then started to follow moreslowly; as he did, a shot slammed in the rear. Jerking out the changeling.38-special, he whirled and ran around the left side of the house,arriving at the rear in time to see Gwinnett standing on a boardwalkbetween the house and the stable-garage behind, with his hands raised.There was a fresh bullet-scar on the boardwalk at his feet. Ritter wascovering him from the corner of the house with the .380 Beretta.
Rand strolled over to Gwinnett, frisked him, and told him to put hishands down.
"Nice, Dave," he complimented. "I thought of that, too, about a minutetoo late. As soon as he saw Walters coming up the walk with the police,he knew what had happened. Come on, Gwinnett; we'll go through the houseand let them in."
Gwinnett's eyes darted from side to side, like the eyes of a trappedanimal. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said, stiff-lipped."What is this, a stick-up?"
Nobody bothered to tell him to stop kidding. They marched him through thekitchen, where a Negro girl, her arms white with flour, was dithering infright, and into the front hall. A woman in a faded housedress had justadmitted the two officers and the former Fleming butler.
"You goddam rat!" Gwinnett yelled at Walters, as soon as he saw him.
"For God's sake, Carl," the woman begged. "Don't make things any worsethan they are. Keep quiet!"
"All right, Gwinnett," McKenna said. "We're arresting you: receivingstolen goods, and accessory to larceny. We have a search warrant. Want tosee it?"
"So you have a search warrant," Gwinnett said. "So go ahead and search;if you don't find anything, you'll plant something. I want to call mylawyer."
"That's your right," McKenna told him. "Aarvo, take him to a phone; lethim call the White House if he wants to." He turned to Walters. "Now,where would he have this stuff stashed?"
"In the garret, sir. I know the way."
As Kavaalen accompanied Gwinnett to the phone, Walters started upstairs.Rand and McKenna followed, with Mrs. Gwinnett bringing up the rear.During the search of the attic, she stood to one side, watching theex-butler dig into a pile of pistols.
"This is one, gentlemen," Walters said, producing a Springfield 1818Model flintlock. "And here is the Walker Colt, and the .40-caliber ColtPaterson, and the Hall...."
Eventually, he had them all assembled, including the five cased sets.Rand found a couple of empty bushel baskets and laid the pistols in them,between layers of old newspapers. He picked up one, and McKenna took theother, while Walters piled the five flat hardwood cases into his armslike cordwood. Still saying nothing, her eyes stony with hatred, thewoman followed them downstairs.
The rest of the afternoon was consumed with formalities. Gwinnett wasgiven a hearing, at which he was represented by a lawyer straight outof a B-grade gangster picture. Rand had a heated argument with anover-zealous Justice of the Peace, who wanted to impound the pistols andjackknife-mark them for identification, but after hurling bloodthirstythreats of a damage suit for an astronomical figure, he managed to retainpossession of the recovered weapons.
Ritter left at a little past three, to report for duty in the Fleminghousehold. Rand rode with McKenna and Kavaalen to the State Policesubstation, where the pistols were transferred to McKenna's personal car,in which they and Rand were to be transported back to the Fleming place.
It was five o'clock before Rand had finished telling the sergeant and thecorporal everything he felt they ought to know.
"When we get to the Flemings', I'll give you that revolver I got from thecoroner," he finished. "One of your boys can take it to this fellowUmholtz, and get him to identify it. You might also show it to youngGillis, and see what he knows about it. Gillis might even give you a namefor who got it from Rivers. I'm not building any hopes on that, and thereason I'm not is that Gillis is still alive. If he knew, I don't thinkhe would be."
"Yeah. I can see that," McKenna nodded. "Fact is, I can see everything,now, except one thing. This pistol-switch somebody gave you; what's theidea of that?"
"Why, that's because I'm on the spot," Rand told him. "I'm to be killed,and somebody else is to be killed along with me. The .25 automatic willbe used on me, and the .38 will be used on the other fellow, and we'll befound dead about five feet apart, and I'll be holding my own gun, and theother fellow will be holding the .25, and it will look as though we shotit out and scored a double knockout. That way, my mouth will be shutabout what I've learned since I came here, and the man who's supposed tohave killed me will take the rap for Fleming and Rivers both. Nothing tostop an investigation like a couple of corpses who can't tell their ownstory and can take the blame for everything."
"_Zhee-zus!_" Kavaalen's eyes widened. "That must be just it!"
"Well, you got your nerve about you, I'll say that," McKenna commented."You sit there and talk about it like it was something that was going tohappen to Joe Doakes and Oscar Zilch." He looked at Rand intently. "Youwant us to keep an eye on you?"
Rand leaned over and spat into the brass cuspidor, a gesture ofbraggadocio he had picked up among the French maquis.
"Hell, no! That's the last thing I do want!" he said. "I want him to tryit. You realize, don't you, that all this is pure assumption and theory?We don't have a single fact, as it stands, that proves anything. We couldgo and pick this fellow up, and he's one of three men, so we could graball three of them, and even if we found the .25 Webley & Scott and my .38in his pockets, we couldn't charge him with anything. Fact is, right nowwe can't even prove that Lane Fleming's death was anything but theaccident it's on the books as being. But let him take a shot at me...."
"And then you'll have another nice, clear case of self-defense." McKennafrowned. "Goddammit, Jeff, you've had to defend yourself too many times,already. This'll be--well, how many will it be?"
"Counting Germans?" Rand grinned. "Hell, I don't know; I can't rememberall of them."
"One thing," Kavaalen said solemnly, "you never hear of any lawyersspringing people out of cemeteries on writs."
"Look, Jeff," McKenna said, at length. "If it's the way you think, thisguy won't dare kill you instantly, will he? Seems to me, th
e way thescript reads, this other guy shoots you, and you shoot back and kill him,and then you die. Isn't that it?"
Rand nodded. "I'm banking on that. He'll try to give me a fatal but notinstantly fatal wound, and that means he'll have to take time to pick hisspot. The reason I've managed to survive these people against whom I'vehad to defend myself has been that I just don't give a damn where I shoota man. A lot of good police officers have gotten themselves killedbecause they tried to wing somebody and took a second or so longer aboutshooting than they should have."
"Something in that, too," McKenna agreed. "But what I'm getting at isthis: I think I know a way to give you a little more percentage." Herose. "Wait a minute; I'll be right back."
Murder in the Gunroom Page 18