by M. K. Wren
Reub spluttered, “Damn you, Flagg, what the hell—Sheba, get away—”
“Under the bed, Reub!” Then, when that was finally accomplished, Conan thrust the .38 into his belt and grabbed one of the chairs. As he went out the door he said, “I’ll leave the Jeep and your rifle at the hotel, Reub.”
An explosion of profanity and barking answered that. Conan hurriedly shut the door, left the chair on its side in front of it, then sprinted for the Jeep. The keys were in the ignition, and to his relief the motor responded immediately. He had lurched a good hundred yards down the road when he looked back and saw Reub burst out of his door and fall headlong over the chair. A moment later he was up again, shouting and waving his arms, while Sheba hurtled after the Jeep in noisy pursuit, but Conan was out of sight around the first curve in the road.
Chapter 13
Conan parked the Jeep at the south end of the Idaho Hotel’s long porch near Mrs. Bonnet’s white Cadillac, laid the rifle out of sight on the floorboards, then pulled his shirt down over the .38 in his belt, hoping to at least disguise the obvious bulge.
John Kulik and his friend Bill Cobb were lounging on one of the old church pews near the hotel door. They smiled, but John’s eyes went immediately to the Jeep. He observed casually, “That’s Reub Sickle’s Jeep.”
Conan nodded. “He’ll be down to pick it up soon. Is your father inside?”
“Yes, in the dining room, or he may be back in the kitchen. Just holler for him.”
“Thanks.” Conan started for the door, but paused there. “By the way, have you seen Mrs. Bonnet lately?”
John frowned questioningly, and it was Bill who asked bluntly, “Why?”
“I just wanted to talk to her. She promised me a print of one of her pictures of the Starbuck house.”
That seemed to assuage their curiosity. John replied unconcernedly, “She left a little while ago. Said she was going over to the Potosi mill site on Long Gulch.”
“I’ll catch her later.” Conan went into the hotel, his entrance heralded by the tinkling of the bells mounted on the door. A young couple—tourists, apparently—looked up from their perusal of a display case, smiled, then returned to their study. Otherwise, the lobby, which now did multiple duty as a museum and antique shop, was unoccupied. Conan crossed to the double doors opening into the dining room.
That Jake Kulik had been working under the most adverse of circumstances was obvious. The marbled green wallpaper was faded and peeling, the ceiling and wood floor sagging, and there was a hint of mustiness in the cool air that reminded Conan of the draft expelled from the mine tunnel. Yet Kulik had, as Delia put it, done wonders. Eight large, vintage tables, polished surfaces gleaming, stood ready to serve diners, as they had a century ago, while lamps with delicately painted shades stood ready to light their evenings. The tall, narrow windows on the far wall looked east over Jordan Creek, and their light enhanced the display of glass bottles crowding the shelves inserted between the frames. On the right wall, occupying half the length of the room, was a mahogany bar complete with brass railing, and behind it a magnificent mirrored back bar, its numerous niches and shelves filled with more bottles. The bottles were not themselves filled, and most bore price marks. The bar no longer served as a dispensary for liquor, but for nostalgia.
Conan wandered around the room, eyes ranging over china cabinets and sideboards, an oak ice box, an upright piano with copper reliefs representing—probably—Beethoven and Mozart, a coin-operated match-vending machine, and a wheel of fortune gambling machine, also coin-operated. But the pièce de résistance was an oil painting on the wall between the door and the bar: the inevitable barroom nude. An odalisque, no less, remotely reminiscent of Ingres, depicting a reclining nude with rather unlikely anatomy. Two equally unlikely cherubs impended above her.
“Mr. Flagg? Didn’t hear you come in.” Jake Kulik pushed through the swinging doors on the north wall, boots thumping as he crossed to Conan, offering a hand and a broad smile. “Well, now, what can I do for you? Want a menu? Don’t have much on it ’cept soup and sandwiches, but they’re not bad, if I do say so.”
Conan smiled. “I don’t doubt it, but I’m afraid I’ll have to explore your cuisine some other time, Jake.”
“Hey, I know what’s the matter with you. You figger I can’t come up to Delia’s cookin’. Well, you’re right about that. Cup of coffee, maybe?”
“Thanks, but I’ll have to put that off, too.” He paused, turning sober and lowering his voice slightly. “Jake, you know Delia hired me to investigate Lee Langtry’s murder, don’t you?”
Kulik crossed well-muscled arms while he gave Conan his intent attention. “Yep, I know. You havin’ any luck?”
Conan was aware of the headache that still pounded dully. “Of a sort. I’m going to ask some questions and ask a favor of you that may seem out of line, but I can only give you my word they’re important.”
At that Kulik frowned, one hand going to his beard. “Well, y’know, I’ll do anything I can to help Delia out, but…well, what is it you want to ask?”
“What can you tell me about Mimi Bonnet?”
Kulik stared at him, then started to laugh, but seeing Conan’s steadfast soberness, simply shrugged. “Mrs. Bonnet? What’s she got to do with Lee Langtry?”
“Possibly nothing. I just think there’s more to her than meets the eye. When did she arrive in Silver?”
“Oh…I guess it was last Tuesday. This is Saturday, isn’t it? Right. It was five days ago. I know because she told me this mornin’ she was leavin’ day after tomorrow, and she wanted to pay up her bill for seven days.”
Conan frowned, distracted by the bells on the front door, but it was only the young couple making their exit. “She’s leaving Monday morning? Did she pay by check?”
“No. Cash. Look, Conan, all I know about her is she’s from Los Angeles and she’s a photographer.” Then with a wry grin he added, “And she made a hundred-dollar contribution to the Silver preservation fund.”
“In cash again? Jake, are your guest rooms equipped with locks?”
Kulik needed a moment to digest the implications in that, and they didn’t go down well. His dark brows met in a frown. “Course they have locks. Why?”
“I want to find out more about Mrs. Bonnet, and before you call Sheriff Newbolt, I’ll tell you again, I think it may be important.”
“Damn it, I can’t let people just walk into my guests’ rooms! What d’you—I mean, I…damn it, Conan—”
“All right, you can’t knowingly let people just walk in, but you’re a busy man, and no one expects you to waste your time sitting in the lobby watching who comes and goes. Jake, I’m working for Delia.”
It took some further convincing, but at length an agreement was reached: Kulik would simply return to work in the kitchen, and if Conan happened to find the extra keys to the rooms, which were kept behind the counter in the lobby, Kulik would be innocent of complicity. And if Conan was caught, he was entirely on his own.
The lobby was still empty when Conan purloined the key to No. 1. He learned Mimi Bonnet’s room number from the register, as well as the fact that only four rooms were restored fully enough to be rented. Betty Potter was in No. 3. He frowned at that, but considered it highly unlikely that Mrs. Potter would be in her room now or in the near future. On this glorious day she was undoubtedly still at large committing painting on the landmarks of Silver City. He crossed to the front door and looked out through the lace curtains. John and Bill were still on the porch, the young couple were taking snapshots of the hotel, but no one else was in sight. He went to the door on the north wall, leaving it open when he passed into the hall behind it and climbed the stairs to the second floor.
The upper reaches of the hotel were a maze of halls and rooms, but the rental rooms were down a corridor striking north at the head of the stairs. The first on his left was No. 1, which put it at the front of the building. He unlocked the door and left it open, too; he had to be able t
o hear the warning of the bells on the front door downstairs.
It was a small room, and although the walnut bedstead and matching dresser would command a high price at an antique shop, the room was in all likelihood far from the standards someone of Mrs. Bonnet’s apparent affluence was accustomed to in lodgings. Still, in this setting the water-spotted, flowered wallpaper, the unfinished wood floor, and the limp curtains could charitably be called charming, and at any rate, Mrs. Bonnet didn’t have much choice in Silver, unless she wanted to pitch a tent in the campground.
She didn’t seem to be the camping type. Her possessions showed a consistent bias toward luxury, prestigious names, and costliness. The minuscule closet was packed with clothing, the labels a virtual catalog of exclusive shops from Los Angeles to Paris. She seemed to have a penchant for high, wedge-soled shoes; there were four pairs. One was caked with mud. He recognized the ripple-patterned sole from the track he’d found behind Reub’s cabin.
That was only confirmation of an assumption and didn’t surprise him. Neither did the revelation that Mrs. Bonnet was not a natural blonde, that she wore a wig. One of the three pieces of matched leather luggage was a wig box. The hairs caught in the brush on the dresser were red. However, close examination disclosed that she wasn’t a natural redhead, either; the roots were gray. But Conan was quite sure she had been a natural redhead.
A dresser drawer served as a storage place for three purses, and in one of them he found a driver’s license, which informed him that she was 5 feet, 3 inches tall, weighed 114 pounds, had brown eyes, and was sixty years old, but still—as the photograph attested—steadfastly redhaired.
The purse contained another interesting item: a small .22 automatic, the type known as a Saturday night special. It was fully loaded, but hadn’t been cleaned since it was last fired.
A leather folder of business cards offered enlightenment about her name. Mimi Bonnet was president of Dwight Bonnet Real Estate, Inc.—“Established 1936”—in Los Angeles. Apparently, Dwight was, or perhaps—since Mimi was now president—had been the Mr. that went with Mrs. Bonnet.
Conan checked the luggage and found nothing startling except a box of .22 cartridges for the gun. It occurred to him that she might have the one object for which he was searching with her; she always carried a large camera bag on her photographic sojourns. Interesting, he thought absently, that there was not one roll of film, exposed or otherwise, nor any informational notes in this room. Did she keep that in the camera bag, too? Or had she even bothered to load the camera?
He went to the window to look out into the street; he’d been in the room ten minutes and felt his time running out. Then he stood looking around the room, his frustration mounting until his gaze stopped at the small table by the bed on which a kerosene lamp, an ashtray, and a Gideon Bible rested. He hesitated, then with a faint smile reached for the Bible. Two pieces of paper were inserted in it as if marking a place. It was Exodus 20. One of the sheets was a clipping of a newspaper article that had appeared in the Los Angeles Times the day after the Owyhee County coroner’s jury reached its verdict on the death of Lee Langtry. Obviously, the AP correspondent who picked up the story thought the discovery of a skeleton in a ghost-town mine tunnel quaint.
The other sheet was folded double, and Conan handled it with care; the paper was fragile with age. One corner was missing. The tiny scrap in Reub’s box would fit nicely there, and the faint impressions in the paper would also make a nice fit with the .38, proof that this paper had lain under that gun for a long time. That he could test, and did.
Satisfied with the results, he unfolded the sheet, which was about half the size of regulation typewriter paper and had probably come from a memo pad. The Lang-Star Mining Company logo was printed at the top, and the message was written in a large, sharply angled hand.
Amanda—
There has been a HITCH. We’ll have to change our plans.
The keys are in the car—take it and get out of here now.
I’ll meet you in Reno.
Lee
Conan frowned, wondering about the terse, nearly formal tone—no terms of endearment, no “Mimi”—and about the capitalization of the word “hitch.”
Then with a glance at his watch, he folded the note and slipped it into his shirt pocket. He didn’t usually sink to larceny when conducting an unlawful search, but if this needed rationalization, he could assure himself that he was simply recovering stolen property. Of course, it was very doubtful that he would ever return it to Reub. And he wondered how it had come into Reub’s possession.
As he descended the stairs, he heard the ringing of the front door bells, but to his relief they only heralded the arrival of a family of sightseers. When he passed through the lobby, he nodded to them, then set the bells ringing again as he stepped out onto the porch. John and Bill were gone, he noted, and so was Reub Sickle’s Jeep.
Conan walked south, pausing as he passed the white Cadillac to look behind him, and he saw Mimi Bonnet approaching the hotel down the road from the north. She was a long way from Long Gulch, which wasn’t odd in itself, but he wondered where she had been. To the old powder houses, perhaps. Or the cemetery. The latter seemed more likely.
Chapter 14
The generator was off for the night, and the fireplace, where Delia was busy rearranging a crackling blaze, offered a warm light augmented by the fainter fires of two kerosene lamps.
“Delia, you’re a born mother hen,” Conan said from the comfortable depths of the wing chair where he was ensconced with an ice pack to comfort his aching head and a glass of straight Waterfill & Frazier. Another delectable meal was behind him—or rather, within him—and the silent mountain night held sway beyond the windows.
Delia laughed as she put aside the poker and sat down on the couch. “Good thing I have some chicks to mother-hen occasionally. How are you feeling, Conan? I mean honestly.”
“There you go—mother-henning again. Do you consider Clare one of your chicks?”
She glanced unconsciously upward toward Clare’s bedroom. “Yes, I suppose so, but it’s not a one-way street, you know. I need Clare as much as she needs me, although most folks don’t understand that. My daughter, Kathleen—she’s the one who lives down near Nyssa; her husband has a farm there—she keeps telling me Clare should be in a nursing home where somebody could keep an eye on her all the time.” Delia smiled tolerantly, her clear gray eyes delving into the flames. “What Kathy doesn’t understand is that if they put Clare in a nursing home, they’ll have to put me in one, too.”
Conan frowned and sipped at his bourbon. “I hope it never comes to that. You don’t belong in a nursing home.”
She studied him, still smiling. “Who does? Nobody goes to a place like that because they want to. But it may come to that. Old age is as much a part of life as death is.”
She made that statement casually but not lightly, and Conan was silenced by it. After a moment, she turned again to the fire, its amber light burnishing the lined planes of her face. “Everything has its seasons; beginnings and endings, and there’s no way around them. I guess maybe there shouldn’t be. There’s a reason for all of it, even if we can’t understand it.” Then she took a long breath as she looked around at Conan. “And that’s enough of that subject. Conan, what about… I mean—”
“Am I any closer to finding out who killed Lee? Well, I suppose I am in a way. At least, I have a great deal more information than I did three days ago.”
“Does all that information add up to anything?”
He hesitated, frowning into the fire. “If it does, I haven’t been able to make sense of the total. All I can offer now is speculation.”
She crossed her arms, shoulders hunched as if she felt a chill. “Do you have any speculations about what’s been happening to Clare? Why would anybody want to frighten her like that? She won’t even go to her grove now unless I go with her. And searching her room—I just don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. Not e
ntirely. It is related to the murder, though. Delia, is this investigation turning out to be more than you bargained for?”
She smiled crookedly. “Quite a bit more, but I’m not ready to call it quits, if that’s what you mean.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” He put his glass on the side table and rose. “There’s something I’d like to ask you about. It’s up in my room. I’ll get it.”
Delia only watched him curiously as he left the parlor, and when he returned a few minutes later, she apparently hadn’t moved. He handed her the gun he’d found in Reub’s cabin, pointing out the scratched initials. “I think this probably belonged to Lee. Do you know anything about it?”
She turned the weapon over in her hands and asked absently, “Where did you find this thing?”
“Is it Lee’s?”
“Yes.” She returned it to Conan. “I think so, anyway. I remember he had a gun like this he kept at home. He said he was away so much, and that meant Clare was alone a lot. He thought she should have a gun handy.” Then with a bitter laugh, “That was when they were first married. Later on, he didn’t seem to care whether she was alone or not.”
Conan nodded as he sank into his chair and put the gun on the side table. “Have you any idea where it might have been at the time of the murder?”
“Oh, Lord, no idea at all. I can ask Clare if she remembers.”
There was a questioning inflection in that, and after a moment Conan nodded. “Ask her, if the opportunity arises. Delia, have you talked to her at all about the murder?”
A sigh escaped her. “I tried, and so did Andy Newbolt, but she won’t even believe Lee’s dead half the time, and the rest of the time…well, she can’t talk about it.”
“And Dex Adler? Would he talk about it to you?”
She eyed Conan sharply. “What would he say about it? I mean, that he hadn’t already said forty years ago?”
