Figure Away

by Phoebe Atwood Taylor

  Mrs. Brinley pattered futilely around from Slade to Eloise, fuming at the former and giving advice as to the latter, and at intervals she stopped to embrace J. Arthur and sob on his shoulder. He was still nervously dabbing at his lower lip with the spotted handkerchief; it happened to be his upper lip which had really suffered, but he was beyond the stage of caring much about details.

  After the first flurry, Kay had disappeared with Bertha in the vicinity of the kitchen. Madame Meaux had followed them, and then drifted back to the most comfortable arm chair she could find. She sat there, surveying things with interest, and occasionally grinning.

  “Where’ve you been?” she asked Asey after he made a third trip to the hall. “What’s going on out there?”

  “You ain’t missin’ a thing,” Asey said. “I’m tryin’ to get Cummings on the phone. He’s out on a call, an’ they’re tryin’ to locate him for me. Eloise is in too much of a state to be handled by amateurs. What are you havin’ such a lot of fun over?”

  “‘Billingsgate Beautiful,”’ Madame Meaux said. “Look at Sister Brinley. She makes me think of a turtle, I don’t know why.”

  “She looks,” Asey said critically, “like a full ash can the day after Christmas. Wouldn’t it be charitable to r’mind her of that cold cream?”

  The soprano lighted a cigarette. “What an outfit,” she said sadly. “My God, what an outfit. No wonder J. Arthur is a discouraged man – after all!”

  She herself was no more fully clothed than any of the other women, but somehow she seemed dressed for the occasion. She wore no curlers like Eloise, or cap like Sara, nor was her hair mussed like Jane’s. A hairdresser might have just finished with her. Her satin negligee was a rather too vivid shade of orange, but it was unwrinkled and shining.

  “One thing about my business,” she said, “it teaches you to be smart about emergencies. Now if this had been a fire, Sister Brinley would clutch the pillows in her arms and take them carefully downstairs, and then toss the glassware out closed windows. I know. I’ve often wished that thirty-six weeks on the Chautauqua circuit was compulsory for all women – look, don’t you want that note?”

  She passed over a crumpled piece of paper.

  “ ‘Mail me all the money you’ve got to the Weesit P.O. General Deliv. There’s been a murder and I’m in a spot. Mike. P.S. Don’t say anything. You’ll get your money back.’ ” Asey frowned. “The fool – no wonder – look, how’d Bessie Brinley get hold of this? What happened?”

  “As far as I can make out,” Madame Meaux said, “the Brinleys moved out of their bedroom and turned it over to me, and then they moved to their guest room. Mike climbed up outside and flipped this in the top of the window. It hit toots there in the face. He didn’t know about the room switching. She blew into my room and blew up. I got her into the car and over here to you. I thought it was a job for you to handle. Besides, at the rate she was going, all the town would have been up in a few more minutes, and I got the impression that whatever was going on, you wanted to keep it quiet.”

  “Thank God you did,” Asey said. “What a mess, what a mess!”

  “You may think so,” the soprano said, “but you haven’t been driven by Bessie in a sweat, and I have, and it has aged me horribly. She wouldn’t let me touch the car, because Arthur never lets strangers drive it. The angels nearly had the wheel, the last mile. Look, let’s stop this din, what do you say? I’ll cope with Eloise. That isn’t hysterics now. It’s temperament. I know all about temperament.”

  “Go to it,” Asey said. “I’ll fix Slade. In fact, I just got the wherewithal out in the kitchen—”

  He pulled a piece of laundry soap from his pocket and strolled over to the still shouting Mike.

  “Gimme your handkerchief, Zeb. Got one? Fine.”

  As Slade opened his mouth for a good bit of oratory, Asey inserted the soap, and then tied the handkerchief so that the soap would stay in place.

  “There. That’s the old-fashioned treatment for small boys, Slade, an’ you d’serve it. How – wheee!”

  Madame Meaux had crossed over to the couch; she watched Eloise dispassionately for a moment, and then leaned over and slapped her face. It was a resounding slap, and it made Eloise blink.

  “Another peep out of you, and you get another,” Madame Meaux announced. “And then some. No wonder you lead a single life if you act like this very often.” She returned to her arm chair and lighted another cigarette. The silence was electric, bristling with undercurrents.

  “Well really,” Mrs. Brinley said, “I never saw anything quite so brutal—”

  “But how effective,” Asey said, “how effective! Kay, is that coffee? Sara, feed your guests, an’ – ah, there’s the doc.” They got Eloise upstairs.

  “I’ll look after her,” Cummings said. “I don’t know what’s going on down there, but it looks as though you were needed, Asey. Why must some women be like this? Her digestion’ll be shot to hell for a week, and it’s none too good anyway. I’ve told her a thousand times to lay off that medicated hay and straw. What she stuffs into her stomach in the guise of food would leave anyone itching for hysterics, just for sheer relief.” Asey went back to the living room. He had a task before him, and he didn’t look forward to it.

  He went straight to the point.

  “Mrs. Brinley,” he tried to make his voice solemn, “you an’ your husband have been the victims of a plot.”

  Mrs. Brinley squealed and looked around her anxiously, as though something on the order of an octopus was about to pounce on her from a corner.

  “Slade.” Asey pointed to the figure on the floor. “I was telling your husband about it when you came. Slade wanted to get you two all worked up, for the publicity. That’s why Weston asked me to come over here. To forestall anything like this. Now,” he turned to the trooper, “do you know anything about any murder? You don’t, do you?”

  “No, sir!”

  “Zeb? No. Jeff, if there had been a murder, you’d know about it, wouldn’t you?”

  “Good gracious,” Jeff said in his best McGuffey’s statesman manner, “who brought the matter up? It’s preposterous! Murders, indeed! Was that what Slade has been saying? Why, the idea!”

  Aunt Sara swallowed hard.

  “Now, Miss Thayer, you’re a reporter. Have you heard of any reports about a murder?”

  “If I had a whole fat murder story staring me in the face,” Kay said with utter truthfulness, “I should not be here. I promise you that.”

  “There,” Asey said, “see? It’s a horrible thing, Mrs. Brinley, but you see, you an’ your husband is influential, an’ Slade knew if he could start a story through you, people would believe it. It’s – uh – exploitin’. The – uh – rich, I mean, the influential folks always gets this sort of thing in any community. You was bein’ exploited by a ruthless publicity seeker, that’s what.”

  “Ruthless?” Jeff Leach said. “It’s dastardly!”

  “Just so. Now, for the best interests of everything, Mrs. Brinley, Zeb’lltake you home. You an’ your guest. I want you to leave the rest to me. I,” he added meaningly, “will fix this. I will—”

  “Nip it in the bud,” Sara helped him out.

  “I want justice!” Mrs. Brinley began to lapse into her Women’s Club manner. “I want justice, and justice will be done! Justice, or—”

  “There’s only one thing,” Asey said, “an’ Jeff’ll agree with me. If there’s any scandal now, with the Old Home Week goin’ on – well, I certainly would hate to think of the effect.”

  He talked on until he was tired, and then Sara came to his rescue. She had never in the past been very cordial to Mrs. Brinley, but she made up for it.

  At last the Brinleys gave in. To save Billingsgate, to leave unmarred the escutcheon of Billingsgate and Old Home Week, they would forget their personal feelings. They would leave everything to Asey. They would never mention the affair. Never whisper about it.

  Zeb drove them home in Asey’s roadster. M
adame Meaux, who had also allowed herself to be persuaded to save the town, winked at Asey as she left.

  “What an M.C.,” she said, “show business lost in you! I’ll lay it on some more for you when they get back.”

  Finally Cummings got Eloise to sleep, and Asey got the rest of the household to bed.

  “What are you going to do with him?” the doctor pointed to Slade.

  “Him an’ me is goin’ to have a little seance out in the barn. Help us take him out, doc. There’s been enough to-do in this house for one night.”

  After Slade had been deposited on the barn floor, Asey turned to the trooper.

  “Go on back an’ see none of them folks decide to come help us after all,” he said. “If they don’t get to sleep right away, they’ll probably decide to lumber out an’ assist.”

  He removed the handkerchief and the piece of soap from Slade’s mouth and stood back to await the torrent of abuse he fully expected would issue forth.

  But Slade just lay there sullenly and never uttered a word.

  Asey looked at him thoughtfully. He could see how someone like Jane would fall for a fellow like that. Slade was no moving picture idol; his nose was too long and his mouth too wide, but his dark hair had the sort of crinkly wave in it that women seemed to like, and his black eyes had probably made any number of conquests. About thirty-five, Asey decided. Younger than he had at first thought. And even bound hand and foot, there was a tremendous vigor about him.

  “Huh,” he said. “I can see where you would make Zeb Chase look like skim milk. An’ I see why Sara give you a chance. Slade, what’s the big idea?”

  “Go to hell.”

  “Now you know,” Dr. Cummings sat down on an overturned lobster pot, “the trouble with Slade, Asey, he never made enough to live as an artist, and on the rare occasions when he did make anything, he never bought proper food. Now he has this town job, his disposition’s improved some. He doesn’t rant quite so much. You know, Asey, I’ve always thought communism is a sort of religion, and the people who get any religion really violently, they always have some quirk somewhere, and usually it’s the digestive system. A well fed person doesn’t care two cents for causes. They accept things. But you take a digestion—”

  “Ain’t you,” Asey said, “sort of harpin’ on the digestive system tonight?”

  “Well,” Cummings said defensively, “I read a book about it last night. Tonight – anyway, before I got into bed a while ago. The fellow goes too far, of course, they all do, but – oh, go on!”

  Asey didn’t remind him that he hadn’t been given any chance to begin, let alone to continue.

  “Slade,” he said, “I’m tired. Let’s get this over with. How’d you know about the murder? Man alive, I don’t like this nonsense any more than you do! But if you smash up furniture and act in general like a fool kid, what can we do? Now, come on. Who told you about the murder? How’d you know?”

  “Jane wrote me a note. I got it this evening. She’s frightened to death, and why shouldn’t she be, with all of you bullying her—”

  “No one’s bullied her, Slade. Don’t be foolish. Why did you want all the money Emily Slade could give you?”

  “Oh, to get away, you fool! To get Jane away – that’s why I came here tonight. To take her away from all of you, and all of this before it’s too late!”

  “But—”

  “And I would have taken her, too, if that damned Eloise hadn’t gummed it up!”

  “What’s he talking about?” Cummings asked curiously. “He doesn’t smell drunk—”

  “Drunk? I’m not drunk! But I know what I’m talking about!” Slade yelled. “It’s a conspiracy! It’s all a conspiracy! The dirty Chase money they’ve piled up out of their filthy baked beans—”

  He went on at some length about the dirty Chase money.

  “I’m wrong about the digestive system,” Cummings said while Slade paused for breath. “I don’t think it’s the digestive system at all, Asey. It’s glandular. On the other hand – say, Mike, do you have many headaches? Does it ever seem to you that your hands, or arms, or head – or any part of you – just floated in space? Because—”

  Slade got his breath and began again.

  Asey listened to the tirade, trying to piece together some sort of story from it.

  Slade had made up his mind that Asey and the rest, with the consent of the police and the town officers, had decided to shield the real murderer of Mary Randall. He was very set on that point, and he illustrated his ideas with any number of cases from Czarist Russia, Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. But because eventually the murder would have to come to light and be made public, Slade felt that Jane Warren had been picked as the official scapegoat.

  “And while you’re bullying her, and getting your fake case made as water tight as you can, you withhold all the story from the public. From the people. From everyone who has any right to know. All to save your lousy town, and its moneymaking schemes! It’s a conspiracy.”

  “It’s indigestion, that’s what it is,” Cummings said. “What did you have for supper?”

  “Baked beans.” Slade was caught off guard by the doctor’s professional tones.

  “No wonder,” Asey said, “why, in your situation, I think Chase’s Baked Beans would upset me. Let’s get this idea of yours about Jane and Zeb again. You wandered off and mixed me up when you footnoted on Spain.”

  It was simple, Slade said. Jane would be arrested for the murder. If she promised to marry Zeb, then the dirty Chase money would get her off. Obviously, to get off, it would take the dirty Chase money, and she couldn’t get the dirty Chase money without taking dirty Chase’s Zeb along with it.

  Asey laughed when he finished. “I can’t help it,” he said. “You’ve gone all around Robin Hood’s barn – honest, you couldn’t be more wrong. Did Jane write you in this note that anything like that had been suggested?”

  “No, but she said Eloise had suggested and hinted at it. But I know. You can’t pull the wool over my eyes. I—”

  “Slade, listen. Jane bought a shotgun. Where is it?”

  “She bought the gun for me, for a present! She knew I wanted a new one—”

  “Fine. Is that the gun you was brandishin’ the other night up to the midway?”

  “No, that was my old one. But shotguns don’t make any difference—”

  “They do,” Asey said. “Where’s your new gun now?”

  “Oh, it’s been stolen! It was stolen from my studio the night of the fire. Don’t you see,” Slade demanded hotly, “it’s a conspiracy? Someone steals the gun that Jane gave me, that night, and kills Mary Randall with it. Then you find it, and then—”

  “Now,” Asey said, “we’re gettin’ some place. Jane bought a gun, give it to you, someone steals it from you on Monday night. Was that what made you run off an’ hide, after shootin’ your mouth off all over town, an’ gettin’ Brinley’s goat, an’ workin’ up the Old Settlers?”

  “No, you fool!” Slade said. “Of course it wasn’t! My God, and you’re supposed to be a detective! Can’t you get anything straight at all?”

  “With a mite of cooperation,” Asey said, “I might pick out the gist of this, but right now you put me in mind of Mrs. J. Arthur Brinley. Well, we’ll go to it again. Maybe we’ll get it by degrees. I saw you Monday night at a brush fire near your studio. You was burned, an’ worried about your paintings. Next thing, I hear you’re rampin’ around town with a shotgun. Why, exactly?”

  “Because the fire was set, don’t you see? Someone intended to burn down my studio! I found places later where kerosene had been poured around! And someone had stolen my gun, too. And I was mad. So I took my old gun and went up to town to show people that they couldn’t intimidate me! I’m no—”

  “You’re no kulak,” Asey said. “We know. Doc, your wife was caught on the ferris wheel when it stuck, wasn’t she?”

  “And,” Cummings said feelingly, “and how! She and Bessie Brinley both. What they t
old the man who runs it isn’t fit to print. She’ll never get over that. It was better than the time she got stuck in an elevator in Boston, for eight hours, and they threw ham sandwiches in at her from the fourth floor. She seems to have a bad effect on elevating machinery, somehow. Hexes it, I shouldn’t wonder.”

  “Doc, you was there at the midway, wasn’t you, at the time?”

  “My, yes, I gave moral support until Nellie sent someone to tell me that you wanted me. My wife—”

  “How long, now,” Asey said, “were you there before Nellie sent someone?”

  “Half an hour or more. They were up there an hour and a half, all told. And, by George, all told, too!”

  The doctor laughed heartily at his own joke.

  “Uh-huh. Now, did you see Slade?”

  “Man alive, everyone saw Slade. Couldn’t miss him. He and the stuck ferris wheel were major attractions. Lots of people thought he was some sort of clown connected with the midway. He made quite a sensational appearance—”

  “Doc,” Asey said patiently, “I’m gettin’ at something. Was Slade there when you came?”

  “Oh, yes. He was practically the first person I saw, and I was going to offer some helpful suggestions about bed and the necessity for relaxing – that’s another trouble with you, Mike. You don’t relax enough. You’re getting along in your thirties now, and you’ve got to realize that you can’t keep up your youthful pace forever—”

  “Doc!” Asey said. “Listen to me, will you? Slade was there when you came, an’ that was half an hour before you was called to the phone. Now, is that right?”