The Hammett Hex

by Victoria Abbott

  Sierra twittered, “I always use Uber. Don’t you have the app?”

  “No time.”

  “Right. Of course. What could it be?”

  “Exactly. What indeed? I’ll let you know. Call me if they leave again,” I launched myself into the backseat and gave the address to the bored-looking driver. “I’ll be there soon.”

  “Oh, this is exciting,” Sierra said as I hung up. I practiced deep breathing all the way up the nearly vertical hill to California Street.

  Hats and umbrellas and raincoats, I kept repeating to myself. Hats and umbrellas and raincoats. Of course it’s not nothing. Naturally. I also kept repeating, Smiley, where the hell are you? With shaking hands, I called him. It went straight to voice mail. Perhaps he was in one of those meetings? My message was clear: Get to Gram’s now. Strangers in the house.

  I thrust the fare into the cabbie’s outstretched hand and exited. I took the steps to Gram’s house two at a time. The front door was not quite closed and it wouldn’t take a detective first grade to figure out it had been jimmied.

  Jimmying front doors in broad daylight is not the behavior of medical professionals, sincere relatives, government officials or anyone else with good intentions. It meant that whoever was inside wasn’t to be trusted and was most likely dangerous.

  I made another call to Smiley. I had to leave another message. It went like this—although in a quiet voice: I am at Gram’s place. Someone has jimmied the door. Sierra saw two people enter about twenty minutes ago. Wherever you are, you’d better just come back now.

  I called 911, gave the address, and stated there was a possible break-in where a vulnerable senior lived and I was just about to go into the house. I hung up as the dispatcher said, “Ma’am, I need you to stay outside. Do not enter the dwelling.”

  I called Sierra and asked her to keep an eye on anyone who left the building. She squeaked with excitement and promised to do it.

  I finished our conversation with, “Make sure the police know you called me and I entered and that the door had been forced.”

  I figured I could count on Sierra if for no other reason than she welcomed the drama.

  But I had a few other things going for me: I knew that there were two people in the house, that they had entered illegally, and that they did not know that I was coming.

  I nudged open the door and eased through it, making sure as little of me as possible was visible to anyone on the inside. The massive foyer chandelier was not even turned on. With just the light from the bay and the turret windows in the parlor, I could barely see, but I did remember the large silver bowl on the hall console. It was still there. Odd for a burglar to miss that. Touching the wall with my right, I scrunched down and felt my way along in the dim foyer. I was grateful for the soft soles of my desert boots. Not a squeak. The cushiony Persian runner muffled my steps. I stopped and listened for voices. Nothing. Where would Gram be at this time? In the sunroom with her birds? That seemed a good enough place to start. Or was it nap time again? And where was Zoya? I’d been very suspicious of her, but the signs of break-in suggested that she was not complicit in the strangers’ arrival. Unless the break-in was intended to divert suspicion from her. That kind of thinking was probably linked to reading a bit too much Hammett in too short a time. Still, I was glad to have the tool that reading provided: Don’t trust anyone.

  I continued to grope along the corridor toward the rear of the house, where I could see a bit of light. A sound? My heart rate shot up. Was that a moan? I paused. Got my breathing under control, tried to be able to hear. The image of Gram, terrified or injured, flashed through my brain. I inched farther along the hallway. Another groan came from nearby. Was it coming from the dining room? I felt for the opening of the wide pocket doors and followed the low moaning. It seemed to be coming from the floor.

  Zoya was curled up moaning softly on the rug, partly hidden by the lacquered Chinese screen. A tea tray lay beside her, its contents scattered: a broken cup, cookies, a napkin. Her eyes were closed and her hands and feet tied. A telephone rested by her side, and it had clearly been severed from the jack, the cord cut. The sterling candelabra from the table had been dropped behind her, probably by her attacker. I reached down and touched her head, whispering “shhh” as I did. Her eyelids seemed to flicker. My hand came away sticky. I stared at it and gasped at the sight of blood. I backed up against the wall, needing desperately to wipe that blood away.

  I bent over again and tried to undo the ties that bound her, without luck. I said, “Try to be quiet. Help is on the way. I will go to check on Gram.” I patted Zoya’s shoulder. I wasn’t sure whether that would do any good, but she must have been terrified and in pain. The candelabra would have made a good weapon, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch it. Then I raced to find Gram. Smiley, where are you?

  CHAPTER TEN

  Almost anything can be used as a weapon.

  —The Kelly Rules

  I FOUND NOTHING and no one in the sunroom. Birds screeched, flapped and fluttered nervously. I exhaled, partly in relief. But the relief didn’t last long. The place had been trashed. Puzzles were scattered, papers tossed. Cups broken. It looked like the intruders had taken their time. Books had been flung from the bookshelves onto the floor. What had they been looking for if not the silver? I did locate the wooden cane with the metal bird’s head handle and took it with me.

  Never mind. I needed to find Gram before they did. The first responders would be on their way. The cops could figure out the motive. I needed to act. Gram must have been upstairs. I would be a sitting duck on the main staircase. But would the invaders—whoever they were—know about the back staircase?

  I scrambled toward the back staircase. Once again, I gave thanks for my upbringing. I went up the stairs on hands and knees.

  I bumped my head on the door at the top. Could they have heard that? Again, I held my breath, stood up wielding the cane, ready to bean the first villain to open the door.

  The door squeaked as I opened it. It seemed very loud to my ears, even louder than the thundering of my heart. I slipped through it and left it open in case the next squeak attracted their attention.

  But no one came. Might I add that “no one” included the police, who should be showing up. What was going on?

  Gram would almost certainly be in her bedroom. I was more than a bit disoriented. Which way was Gram’s bedroom from this staircase? Right? Left? Right seemed to be the answer. I edged out into the hallway. A murmur of voices drifted from down the hallway.

  I heard a man’s muffled voice. “What room is she in?”

  “I thought it was the front, but it must be this one.” It wouldn’t take them long.

  I tried to keep in the shadows and crept toward Gram’s room. This floor was less dim, perhaps because the curtains weren’t drawn.

  A small dog yipped. Fear? Pain? I heard it scamper down the front staircase. I felt a flash of anger that overwhelmed my fear. Forget that, invaders. You’ll be dealing with fight not flight from me. I wasn’t sure the cane would do the trick. But what else could I use? There were flowers, cushions, books, ladylike chairs on this level. A thought flickered in the back of my mind. Something useful.

  I dove toward through the door to what I hoped was Gram’s dimly lit bedroom, encountered the round bed and whispered, “It’s me, Jordan,” in her ear. “Someone’s in the house. Can you hide in the closet?” Why not use every cliché in the world? But never mind. There are very good reasons why people hide in closets. I have no objections to hiding in closets myself.

  “I can see you, my dear. No closet for me,” Gram said in her normal speaking voice. She snatched the cane from me. It was hers after all.

  I heard the intruders whispering and the whispers appeared to be getting closer. I pressed myself against the bedroom wall and ducked down on the far side of Gram’s dresser. That was it. That’s what Uncle Mick a
nd Uncle Kev would do. But it wasn’t enough.

  Sometimes it’s good to have been raised by people who often needed to know how to be soundless in the night. Soundlessly, I bounced up, moving quickly and switched off the light, a tactic I’d picked up from the Continental Op. Of course, I wasn’t packing a gun so the rest of that scene would have to play out differently, but I had another stunt up my vintage sleeve. As the intruders came through the door, I felt on the dresser top for Smiley’s marble collection. Next I hurled the giant glass jar of marbles to the floor.

  There was shrieking then silence and then fresh yelling.

  The light snapped on and I found myself facing two faceless faces. I screamed. Couldn’t quite stop myself in time. Uncle Mick would say that’s the oldest trick in the book, putting a stocking over your face, but I had to say it was also the creepiest. He also always used to say, “Don’t scream like a girl,” and I just had. Never mind, they were intruders and their lack of features sent shivers down my spine. The fedoras on their heads should have been funny, but they weren’t. No one would ever be able to identify them. You couldn’t see their hair, and with those black leather gloves, there would be no prints anywhere. The plastic booties they wore over their shoes didn’t bear thinking about.

  One of the faceless ones was sitting on the floor rubbing his head. He was surrounded by twinkling marbles and jagged glass from the broken apothecary jar and there was blood on his trench coat and hands. His weapon had fallen out of his reach and slid under the bed. Unfortunately, that didn’t make him any less scary. The other one had some kind of serious-looking gun. It was now aimed at me in a way that meant business. I’d used my one weapon, the jar full of marbles. Gram had the cane out of my reach and there wasn’t much in this room that could be used to protect us against a gun fired at close range.

  I’d tried to save Gram and now I’d probably get both of us killed. They wouldn’t let Zoya live either if they killed us. Where were the cops?

  “Where is it?” the standing one said.

  “Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Gram snapped.

  I shook my head. I really didn’t know what they were talking about.

  “I guess we’ll just have to encourage you to remember then,” he said in that eerie stocking-covered voice.

  “We won’t remember much if we’re dead,” I said.

  “You won’t be dead. You’ll just wish you were. Look, Ma, no safety.”

  Gram clutched her heart. She uttered a rattling gasp. “I need my humidifier. I can’t breathe.” She pointed at me. “This girl doesn’t know anything. But if I die, you’ll be out of luck.” She managed another strangled rattling gasp and pointed at the tabletop humidifier.

  The muffled voice instructed, “Plug it in. Hurry up.”

  Bleating pitifully, Gram leaned over the bedside table, fumbling with the plug of the humidifier. Then the room went black again. Of course! The overloaded circuits. After losing a second to stunned surprise, I scrunched down and hurled myself forward toward the standing figure. He screamed and toppled. I figured he must have encountered a shard of glass. The room echoed as the gun went off. The smell of cordite filled the air. The bullet must have hit the ceiling because what seemed like bits of plaster rained down. I heard a soft thunk as the gun hit the floor.

  The intruders were still shrieking from meeting the glass. Thank you, glass shards. The only way to keep from getting cut or rolling on marbles was to keep perfectly still. They weren’t doing that.

  “Good one, Gram,” I said, feeling around for the gun near where I thought I’d heard it fall. If and when one of them reached the hallway and found a light source, the odds would be somewhat different. Speaking of odds, what did it take to get a cop car in this hip burg?

  The sound of sirens getting closer helped ease my fear. I thought I heard Gram getting out of bed and then a flash of light as the door to the bedroom opened. One of the intruders had managed that. I found the gun and gripped it. I told myself I was just going to have to fire it if it came down to that.

  I said in my deepest voice, “Hear those sirens? I did take the time to call 911 before coming up the stairs. They could have been faster but looks like they’re here now.”

  A whoop of a siren outside confirmed that.

  “Good luck explaining your presence here wearing stockings over your faces and those idiot getups.” Stall. Stall. Stall. “Remember, I have the weapon and you don’t. I’ll get you before you get me. Don’t think I don’t know how to use it either.” This was not strictly speaking the absolute truth, but the moment called for it.

  I heard a few colorful swear words and some scrambling, more swearing as the marbles and glass did their work. Would I have to shoot? The first one said, “Let’s get out of here. There must be a back way out.”

  I weighed my options: Holding them at gunpoint would mean that one of them could launch himself at me to get the gun. I had no idea if I could actually hit either one of them if I needed to. The second one yelped and swore again and scrambled after the first one through the door.

  “Here’s the staircase,” one of them yelled and I listened as they thundered down it. Damn. Why hadn’t I closed that door to the stairs?

  “You okay, Gram?”

  “Never better. They sure are making a lot of racket.”

  I ran into the hallway heading for the stairs, still holding the gun. It was unpleasantly heavy. I called back to Gram, “I’ll try to figure out where they’re going so I can tell the police. I don’t want them to run into Zoya again.” I didn’t get far before a firm female voice said, “Drop your weapon and get on the floor.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Always make friends.

  —The Kelly Rules

  I KNEW BETTER than to argue with the officer. My uncles had drilled me on how to behave before I went to school. If you are carrying anything that might be interpreted as a weapon, say a comb or a pencil or a loaf of bread, drop it and get on the floor. That won’t kill you. Resistance might.

  I was carrying a gun.

  I bent down immediately and put it on the floor. The cop kicked it out of my reach.

  I couldn’t help but worry about my chiffon snagging as I lay on the floor. Would I get blood on this outfit? Not that it was important in the scheme of things.

  I thought I might try explaining to the cop. “Mrs. Huddy is my fiancé’s grandmother. She was attacked by two male intruders who escaped down the back stairs. By all means, keep an eye on me. I’d do the same in your situation, but please get your colleagues after them. They’ll be on the run. Stockings over their faces, fedoras and trench coats.”

  “Don’t even try yanking my chain.”

  “Believe me, I know how idiotic it sounds, but those would have been intended to terrify a helpless senior citizen.”

  A reedy and not in the least helpless voice escaped from the darkened bedroom. “It didn’t work the way they thought it would, but you’d better hustle after them.”

  I called out, “She has to watch me, Gram. It’s standard procedure. I might not be who I say I am.”

  Gram said, “Is she alone? How can she—”

  The officer bent down and snapped a pair of cuffs on my wrists. Her name was Jennifer Martinez. “Don’t worry. My partner’s downstairs and there’s backup on the way.” She spoke into her radio and gave a word-for-word description of the intruders. I could have gotten out of those handcuffs in two seconds flat—that had been a Kelly family parlor game when I was growing up—but I wasn’t foolish enough to try it.

  I added, “They seemed like males, one about six feet and the other over six feet. Heavyset. No way to tell race or ethnicity. From their movements I’d put them both in their thirties, give or take. One or both will be bleeding.”

  “Bleeding? Why bleeding?”

  “They experienced a snag in their plans,” I said
. “We had to fight back and we used what we had, which was a massive collection of marbles in a very big glass jar.”

  She glanced around, gun still trained. “Who’s ‘we’?”

  “Told you. Me and Gram, that’s Mrs. Huddy. When the lights were out, I dropped the marbles. She managed to trick them and blow the fuse. That’s how we got the gun. Gram was pretty brave.”

  “I’m in here and I knew you were the right girl for my Tyler. We put the boots to those two SOBs, didn’t we, Jordan!”

  “We sure did, Gram.” I tried to lower my voice. “Officer, there’s an injured woman downstairs. Zoya is Mrs. Huddy’s housekeeper and she appeared to have been hit on the head, I assume by the intruders, who were looking for something. I found her when I came home and I called 911.”

  “Is Zoya all right?” Gram said with a shake in her voice for the first time. There was nothing wrong with her hearing.

  “I hope so,” I said. “She seemed to have been knocked out but she was still breathing.”

  “Why would they hurt Zoya and try to scare us? What were they looking for? Not much chance they’d get anything here,” Gram said weakly.

  I thought it would be very interesting to find out exactly what they had been looking for, and I wasn’t alone.

  “So what were they looking for?” Martinez said.

  “I have no idea. But they didn’t find it, whatever it was.”

  “What they found was some glass in their keisters. Check the hospitals.” Gram’s voice was getting weaker, but she managed a wheezy chuckle.

  “She’s eighty-five and she’s had a shock. She needs medical help and so does Zoya,” I said. “I’m okay, though.”

  “Maybe not. Your hands are bleeding,” the cop said.

  Again. Just a bit of new damage to my palms. At least the knees hadn’t met any glass shards.