Westlake, Donald E - SSC 02 Read online

  * * *

  I was zipping Edgarson into the Valpack when the doorbell rang.

  I looked up. The digital clock on my desk read 3:02; Staples, or possibly his wife.

  I finished zipping, then ran into the bathroom, turned off the water, dried the hammer, put it away. As I was coming out of the bathroom the doorbell rang again. To stall any longer would be suspicious, so I buzzed my visitor in and then dragged the Valpack into the bedroom, where with great difficulty I managed to hang it in the closet.

  Trotting back to the living room, I scooped into a desk drawer the former contents of Edgarson's pockets, and then just had time to double-check that the bloodstain on the floor was completely cleaned up. Then there came the knock at the hall door, and I opened it to admit Patricia Staples, bundled up like Anna Karenina. "Mrs. Staples. Come in."

  She came in, and we transferred a series of hats, coats, scarves and gloves from her person to the hall closet, during which I told her of her husband's most recent phone call and she agreed that yes, Fred had told her he might be late, but she was used to that. It was hard to keep to a schedule if you were a policeman's wife.

  While agreeing with all that, I took a few seconds to frown at my breached chainlock. It looked no different from before, it appeared not to have been damaged in any way, and yet Edgarson had come through it as though it were made of grass. How had he done it?

  "What a nice place you have here," Mrs. Staples was saying, moving on into the living room.

  So we had a few minutes of chit-chat of the normal type, ending with her deciding to have a bourbon and water if that's what I was having. It was.

  I went off to the kitchenette to mix the drinks, and she made me very nervous by roaming around the living room, looking at this and that. Was there anything left to be noticed?

  I brought the drinks out as quickly as possible, and she smiled at me and said, "You know, bachelors aren't supposed to be good housekeepers, but you keep this place just spick and span."

  "Well," I said, "I just shove everything out of sight."

  I induced her to sit on the sofa, and sat down beside her. She raised her glass. "Cheers."

  I agreed, and we drank, and I said, "Of course, I'm not really a bachelor."

  She raised mildly interested eyebrows. "You're married?"

  "Separated. My wife is in Boston, getting a divorce."

  "How sad." She leaned toward me slightly. "Do you have children?"

  "Two. A boy and a girl."

  "Do you get to see them?"

  What a thought. "Sometimes," I said. "Not as much as I'd like, of course."

  "Of course." She sipped at her drink, ruminating. "Divorce is such a terrible thing."

  I could do this conversation from across the street: "And yet, sometimes it's the only answer."

  She sighed, and sipped, and sighed again, and said, "Did you read that article in last month's Readers Digest?"

  "'New Hope For Dead People'?"

  Big blue eyes blinked slowly. "What?"

  "Sorry," I said. "Which article did you mean?"

  "The one by the Monsignor about divorce."

  "No, I missed that one."

  "He felt it was a very serious step."

  "I feel that way, too."

  "Particularly for the children."

  Enough about the damn children. I said, "Well, the grownups feel it too, of course."

  "Oh, of course." She paused, thinking her goldfish thoughts, sipping away at her bourbon, looking as beautiful and as intelligent as a sunset. Gazing away across the room, she said, "Fred can't have children."

  "Ah," I said.

  "Not on a Sergeant's salary."

  "Oh," I said.

  Another sigh, another sip. "It's difficult to bring a child into the world these days."

  "Sometimes it's difficult not to."

  Those eyes beamed at me again. "Beg pardon?"

  "Nothing. I was just agreeing with you," I explained, and the sound of the telephone saved me.

  It was Fred: "Listen, Carey, I'm terribly sorry, but I'm just not going to get there at all. Al Bray and I are up to our asses in this thing, it looks as though it might be the break we were looking for."

  My back was to Patricia. I closed my eyes and said, "The anonymous letter?"

  "It just might do it. Wish us luck."

  "Oh, I do."

  "The problem is, we aren't going to be able to get away, not for hours."

  I looked at Patricia Staples, sitting on my couch. I would have to go on talking with her, and there would be no search parties to rescue me. "That's a shame," I said.

  "Well anyway, Patricia's there, isn't she?"

  "Right here," I said brightly.

  "And the whole point was for her to see the picture. Would you mind? I mean, as long as she's there."

  "You're sure you wouldn't like me to wait?"

  "We'll be hours, Carey. Thanks for the thought, but you and Patricia go ahead, okay?"

  "If you say so."

  "Could I talk to her?"

  "Of course."

  I turned the phone over to Patricia, and noted that both glasses seemed to be empty. While husband and wife spoke together, I carried the glasses into the kitchen, built new drinks, and fretted over Edgardson's anonymous damn letter. Was he coming from beyond the grave —or the Valpack—to even the score? Had he revealed more than he'd realized in that first anonymous letter?

  And yet, it seemed unlikely Fred Staples would have talked to me the way he had if the trail were leading in my direction. Or that he would cheerfully leave me alone with his wife.

  Encouraged by those thoughts, I carried the drinks back to the living room to discover that Patricia was off the phone now and looking at my movie posters. She accepted the new drink with thanks, downed some of it, and said, "Well, I guess we're supposed to go ahead and see the movie."

  "Right," I said, and while I got out the print and threaded the first reel into the projector I said, "I want you to know I feel proud that Fred trusts me alone with you."

  "Oh, it's me he trusts," she said carelessly. "He thinks if you made a pass at me I'd push you away."

  Was there something ambivalent in that remark? I frowned at her, but her expression was as blank as ever. I went back to threading the film. (I would have had everything set up ahead of time, except for Edgarson dropping in.) With the film ready, I placed the projector, turned the sofa at right angles to the wall, and switched on my telephone machine so we wouldn't be disturbed. "There we are," I said. "All set. If you'll just sit where vou were . . ."

  She did. I switched off the lights and on the projector, waited to be sure the focus and frame were right, and then sat down next to her. Gaslight began.

  The first time Ingrid Bergman became frightened, Patricia clutched my hand. She held it tight, while all the time gazing at the screen, and the second time Ingrid Bergman became frightened Patricia drew my hand into her lap and held it there with both of hers.

  What a warm lap. The backs of my knuckles were being pressed downward into the cleft, and heat radiated up like rose petals from that crotch. On-screen, Joseph Cot-ten suspected something was wrong, but smooth Charles Boyer had command of the situation. And the third time Ingrid Bergman became frightened Patricia did some complex rubbing movement involving hands and body and knuckles, and at that point enough was enough. So I reached across with my free hand, and drew her face to mine, and drank deeply the nectar of her lips.

  She did not struggle. Nor, on the other hand, did she particularly enter into the proceedings, though both her hands did continue to press my hand deeply into her lap. Generally I would say that she took this kiss the way she had taken the conversation that had preceded it; with mild polite interest.

  All kisses must end, and at the finish of this one Patricia drew back her face just far enough so we could see one another's eyes in the flickering reflected light from the screen. Solemnly we looked at one another. Solemnly she said, "We shouldn't."
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  Okay, kid, I know all about that line. "Right," I said, and rolled her off onto the floor.

  * * *

  "I love your pubic hair," I said.

  She gazed down at herself. "It is nice, isn't it? All furry and soft. But boy, in the summertime I just have to shave and shave and shave. Because of the bathing suits."

  "You must look fantastic in a bikini."

  She smiled at me. I was learning that she loved compliments above all other things. "You'll have to see me sometime."

  "I intend to."

  We were in the bedroom now. The first reel of Gaslight had been running itself out as we'd finished our first encounter, so I'd quickly shut down the projector and hustled this incredible woman in here onto the bed, where we could vary our approaches without danger of skinning our elbows or knees.

  It was the first time I'd ever made love to a woman in a bedroom with a murder victim hanging in the closet, particularly a victim of my own, and I must say it made absolutely no difference at all. I was neither turned off nor were my responses heightened. Possibly I'm abnormal.

  My reaction, however, was completely normal when Patricia got off the bed and crossed the room to open the closet door. "Ummm," I said. "Ummm, unnn, ungg."

  "Do you have a robe? Oh, here it is. Terrycloth, I love terrycloth, it feels so nice against my skin."

  Beyond her the pole sagged from the weight of the Valpack. She closed the door, slipped into my robe, gave me a smile and a bye-bye finger waggle, and went off to the bathroom.

  Christ. Since the Valium supply was temporarily cut off, I padded barefoot out to the living room, switched on the smallest dimmest light, found my glass, and made myself a fresh bourbon on the rocks. When I carried it back to the bedroom Patricia was there, getting dressed. "It's terribly late," she told me.

  "Don't worry about it. Want a drink?"

  "No, Td better go on home. Fred worries."

  Fred was entitled, though I didn't say so. "Listen," I said. "You just saw Gaslight, remember?"

  "Of course," she said, and gave me a surprisingly lewd smile.

  "I mean you have to be able to talk about the movie," I pointed out, and while she dressed and did her face and fussed with her hair and generally cared for herself like a conscientious gardener I gave her the plot and principal incidents of Gaslight. By then she was ready to leave, so still naked I walked her to the door. "Now, remember," I said, helping her to bundle into her coats and hats and gloves and scarves, "Charles Boyer was doing it, and the jewels were the decoration in the dress."

  She nodded. "The jewels were in the dress."

  "See you soon," I said.

  "Oh, yes," she said, sparkly-eyed, and kissed my nose, and left. I watched her down the first flight of stairs, then shut the door, turned, and stepped smack on a thumbtack.

  "Ow!" I said, naturally, and hopped around on one foot till I got the thumbtack out. Then I limped around on one and a half feet, cursing, until it occurred to me to wonder where that damn thumbtack had come from.

  Surely not from my desk, way over at the other end of the room.

  I turned on more lights, bewildered, and at first I found nothing at all. Then, also on the floor, I came across a smallish rubber band. Where had these things come from?

  Edgarson. The chainlock.

  Yes. When I closely studied the chainlock, there was a tiny puncture in the wood of the door just past the metal plate with the slot. Now I saw what Edgarson had done. He had looped the rubber band around the chain, then with the thumbtack had fastened both ends of the rubber band to the door. With the door open, the rubber band was stretched out across the metal plate with the slot in it. When Edgarson closed the door, the rubber band naturally contracted, pulling the chain with it sliding the ball through the slot to the wide opening. When he thumped the door, the ball fell out.

  Another illusion shattered.

  SEVEN

  The Riddle of the Other Woman

  The phone had rung three times while Patricia was here, so I listened to my messages while going through the drawerful of Edgarson's possessions, the things formerly in his pockets.

  Only two messages; one caller had hung up without saying anything. The first of the verbal callers was Jack Freelander, umming and stuttering his way through another

  request to pick my brains for his damn porno article that Esquire would never publish anyway, and the other was Kit: "Hi, baby. I'm feeling a lot better all at once. I was mean yesterday, wasn't I? Drove you out into the storm. Come on back, and I'll make it up to you?"

  Any other time, honey, but just at the moment I am (a) rather drained of my vital fluids, and (b) occupied with an unexpected guest who just keeps hanging around.

  Edgarson's effects: One wallet, containing thirty-seven dollars, four credit cards, a Tobin-Global laminated ID card with his photograph on it, a New York driver's license, about twenty assorted business cards, a few crumpled old newspaper clippings that made no sense to me, and several pieces of paper scribbled over with notes to himself; phone numbers and the like. Three key rings, loaded with keys. A claim check for a parking garage over on First Avenue. A Boy Scout knife, with enough doohickeys and thingamabobs to dismantle a tank. A plastic pouch with a little pocket screwdriver set. A circuit tester. Various envelopes containing official-looking documents concerning bail-bond jumpers and repossessable automobiles. A small address book—I wasn't in it. A half-used checkbook, with all the stubs blank. A little metal box containing thumbtacks, paper clips, rubber bands, washers and so on. A small roll of black electric tape. A tattered paperback copy of One Of Our Agents Is Missing, by E. Howard Hunt. A dollar and thirty-seven cents in change.

  I pocketed the wallet and claim check and change, stuffed the key rings and knife and screwdriver set and circuit tester and little metal box and roll of electric tape back into the drawer, and shredded the envelopes, checkbook and address book into the wastebasket, on top of the paperback. Then I bundled into my overcoat and left the apartment.

  It was now shortly after eight in the evening, and the neighborhood was full of cars from Queens, which is the normal weekend cross we have to bear in this part of the city. The air was very cold, the sky was still leaden and low, and while the main avenues had been cleared of snow the side streets were still rather clogged.

  I found the parking garage on First Avenue, and Edgarson's claim check got me the same dirty blue Plymouth Fury he'd been following me around in. I paid the tab out of Edgarson's wallet, tipped the boy an Edgarson quarter, and drove on back to my place, where I parked next to Staples' favorite fire hydrant.

  Lugging that Valpack down the stairs was the hardest and least appetizing part of the whole job. Thump, thump, thump all the way down. I couldn't lift the thing, so I also had to drag it through the snow on the sidewalk and then heave and push and cram it up over the rear bumper and into the trunk. Finally it arranged itself in there, and I slammed the lid and drove out to Kennedy Airport, where a TWA skycap said, "You can't park here, sir.

  "I just want to leave my luggage. It's too heavy for me to carry."

  He gave me a superior smile, but when I opened the trunk and he tried to lift the Valpack by the handle his expression suggested he'd just found a hernia. "My my," he said. "That is heavy."

  Should I do a joke about there being a body in it? No, I should not.

  The skycap struggled the Valpack onto his cart and said, "Do you have your ticket, sir?"

  "Not yet."

  "And where will you be going?"

  Feeling a cool climate was best under the circumstances, I said, "Seattle."

  "Fine, sir. You'll find your bag at the ticket counter."

  I thanked him, gave him one of Edgarsons dollars, and he wheeled Edgarson away.

  Driving out to the long-term parking lot, I considered leaving it at that, but time and confusion were my allies here, so I took the inter-airport bus back to TWA, and used one of Edgarsons credit cards to buy him a nonstop round trip ticket
to Seattle, first class. My Valpack was tagged, two clerks wrestled it onto the conveyer belt, and Edgarson rolled away on the start of his journey westward. My clerk compared the quickly-scrawled signature Td just perpetrated with Edgarson's quickly-scrawled signature on the credit card, was satisfied, gave me the card and the ticket, and wished me a pleasant journey. "Thank you very much," I said. "I love Seattle this time of year/'

  For only fifteen more of Edgarsons dollars, a taxi took me to my general neighborhood in Manhattan. I had emptied his wallet en route, keeping the money and stuffing the cards and papers into my overcoat pockets, and in the course of a six-block stroll I distributed the wallet and its former contents into twenty-five or thirty trash receptacles. Then I returned home, to find that more people had been in conversation with my answering machine.

  Two of them; the Staples family. Patricia's message was first, and was both brief and evocative. What an astonishing way for that woman to talk. When Fred's voice came on immediately after I felt a certain brief discomfort, which was not at all eased by what he had to say:

  "More developments in the Laura Penney case, Carey. I think maybe you could be a big help after all. Call me at the office." And he gave his number.

  I phoned Patricia first, and we said warm things back and forth, about how much we hud enjoyed and how much we would enjoy and so on, and then she said she'd be in Manhattan tomorrow afternoon and would I be home between two and three? Oddly enough, I would.

  Next, I said, "Sweetheart, I hate to mention this, but

  Fred does come here sometimes. I'd hate to have him accidentally recognize any voices on my answering machine, if you follow me/'

  "You mean you don't want me to tell you those things any more?"

  "Don't talk to some cold machine," I explained. "Talk to my warm ear."

  So she did, at some length and in some detail concerning the morrow, and when at last I managed to end the conversation I was feeling a bit humid. I went and washed my face in cold water before phoning her husband.