Darkest Hour

by Nielsen, Helen

  Bonnie was standing in the driveway too scared to cry when Simon emerged from the shed. Her mouth worked hard and came out with a few words.

  “I have to tell Buddy—”

  “You have to tell Buddy nothing!” Simon ordered. “He’s in no danger. It’s me they want. Christ, I’ve got blood all over me! Where’s Buddy’s cabin? I’ve got to wash.”

  “C-C Wing,” she stammered. “Next to the first pool. I’ve got the key.”

  “Let’s go!”

  There was no time to go back to the Jaguar. Bonnie started to sprint across the grass and Simon followed as fast as his now throbbing leg permitted. Beyond the utility plant a labyrinth of driveways combed through the huge motel complex. Once in the guest area, they weren’t likely to be seen by the driver of the Cougar, should he return. Bonnie ran directly to Buddy’s cabin and had the door open by the time Simon limped inside. He slammed the door behind him and looked down at his leg. It was streaming blood all over the expensive broadloom.

  “You’ve been hit,” Bonnie said. “Can you make it to the bathroom?”

  Simon’s answer was to move. In the bathroom he got out of his trousers. The dying man had been lucky. His one shot had grazed Simon’s left thigh. A tiny but messy wound. Bonnie, poking into the medicine chest, announced that Buddy had a box of Band-Aids and some sleeping tablets but had no gauze or iodine.

  “I’ll clean it with mouthwash,” Simon said.

  “There’s a drugstore in the registration lobby. Maybe it’s still open.”

  “Forget it. Whitey’s got as cheap a grade washcloth in his motel as any other setup. They rip easy—see?” He tore the cloth in strips and knotted them together. With the product he made a makeshift tourniquet and stopped the flow of blood. Later, after a hurried shower, he covered the wound with the widest Band-Aid and made a protective bandage from another washcloth. By that time Bonnie had found a pair of old flannels in Buddy’s closet that were just barely wide enough to fit over Simon’s legs, and a soft Italian sweater that made him look like a refugee from the Via Veneto.

  “If the wound doesn’t open you’re all set,” she said. “I found some brandy in the bar. I don’t know if you need a drink as bad as I do—”

  “Worse,” Simon said.

  Bonnie poured two fingers of brandy in two water glasses and the bracing effect began to clear Simon’s head. He found his jacket and got the gun and his personal effects out of the pockets. There was one special envelope in an inner pocket that fitted into the hip pocket of Buddy’s flannels. The gunshot hole in the jacket made it too conspicuous for further wear and all of Buddy’s suits were too narrow across the shoulders, but he did find a corduroy car coat with raglan sleeves roomy enough to be worn over a ski sweater. The complete effect took ten years off his age and made his hair look too short, but the winter tourist season was beginning and he would never draw a second glance on the street.

  Bonnie watched him check the cartridge clip of the gun and poured herself a second brandy. “Do you realize,” she said hollowly, “that you killed a man with that thing just a few minutes ago?”

  “And a good shot, too,” Simon said. “Otherwise you might not be meeting Buddy after his performance just as if nothing had happened. Is it really Buddy, Miss bright and shining Bonnie Penny? Or is it the boss you’re after via the old tried-and-true jealousy route?”

  She blushed. It looked nice after the ashen horror of the last half hour. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

  “I wonder. I’m a strong one for first impressions. I had you tabbed as a company girl the first day I saw you, but I didn’t know then that Whitey Sanders was the company. You don’t look like one of Whitey’s girls. Could it be that you’re really Tess Truelove in disguise? That you’re biding time until the winds of autumn convince Whitey that he needs something of more substance than a quick ambulatory pep pill to see him through the winter? I won’t ask to see your driver’s license, but I’ll bet he has at least twenty years on you. Probably more.”

  Through the shock, Bonnie was beginning to be her crisp, efficient self again. “There’s a dead man in the cooling plant,” she said. “You aren’t talking like this just because you want to know me better.”

  “But I do,” Simon said. “I want to know if you’re the kind of hotel receptionist who might double at the switchboard on the late shift. Who might hear a guest put through a call to the Gateway Bar and ask for Whitey Sanders, and then identify himself as Monte Monterey.”

  “Would I listen to a guest’s call—is that what you mean?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Is it important?”

  “Very. If you handled that call of Montgomery’s and then mentioned his identity to someone in the hotel, I’m still a long way from home. But if you did take the call and said nothing to anyone about the new guest on the fourth floor then I know who is responsible for what just happened.”

  “All right,” Bonnie said. “I handled the call and I heard the guest ask for Mr. Sanders. That bugged me a little. The name Monterey didn’t register until I read about his suicide in the newspapers, but I did talk to Mr. Sanders the next day and told him about the call. I didn’t tell another soul. The only reason I told him was because I thought he should know the dead man was trying to reach him. Mr. Sanders thanked me and said that I wasn’t to worry about anything.”

  “Did he mention that he brought Max Berlin in from Tucson with him?”

  She hesitated. “Yes,” she said, finally. “That was because he thought I might have seen Mr. Berlin on the premises. I hadn’t but I was given to understand that he was Mr. Sanders’ house guest at the ranch and that he intended to visit the hotel—it’s a historic landmark, you know—incognito. We’re always very careful to protect the privacy of our guests and visitors.”

  “When did this conversation take place?”

  “On the morning the suicide was discovered. Mr. Sanders came to my apartment. He wasn’t aware that I had heard about the trouble. Now that’s all I can tell you, Mr. Drake, except that the men who tried to kidnap us in the driveway came to Buddy’s dressing room about ten minutes before he went on and asked when he was expecting you. Buddy told them he wasn’t expecting you at all and the one who drove the car tried to hit him. I got in the way. Buddy finally convinced them that he was telling the truth, so they forced me to stay on the floor during his performance and watch for you. The one you shot stayed with me. When we saw you come in, he told me to get you out to the service area or he would turn Otto loose on Buddy. You know the rest…. What’s this all about? Why did you call Buddy and tell him that you had the rest of Monterey’s estate? It didn’t make any sense to him.”

  “So he told you.”

  “I was with him when you called. He had to tell me.”

  “Did either of you tell anyone else?”

  “No. The message was to be delivered to Mr. Sanders and he hasn’t been around today.”

  “Good. If you’re certain that neither you nor Buddy mentioned my call to anyone, then part of the mystery is solved.”

  “Part—? Oh, I see what you mean. Other people listen to telephone calls, too.”

  “You’re a smart girl. Now, if you’re as smart as I think you are, you’ll get back to Buddy and stick with him like a split personality. And don’t mention the body in the utility house. That’s important. Just remember, it was self-defense. If it’s any balm to your conscience, the dead man is a murderer many times over. He would have shot both of us just for the fun of it if he hadn’t been given orders to bring me in alive. Get out of here now.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Watch you leave. Make sure you aren’t followed and then get lost. I won’t tell you where I’m going because I think you and Buddy can make beautiful music together as soon as you forget about Whitey’s millions. I want you to have a long and wonderful life.”

  The second brandy had given Bonnie a shot of Dutch courage. Simon tossed
his suit in the bottom of Buddy’s closet, turned out the lights and opened the outside door. A station wagon with an Arizona license had pulled up to the adjacent unit and a highly vocal couple with five road-weary children were in the process of moving in for the night. No more sinister form of life being visible, Bonnie struck out in the direction of the Gateway Bar. Simon watched until she was out of sight and then limped toward the registration lobby. He wasn’t afraid of being apprehended by the police. He had checked out of the Santa Monica airport without causing any stir and landed in La Verde without question. What was big news in Marina Beach was of less importance than the local tax fight in the next county. What he did fear was the return of the big green sedan driven by a man who had been ordered to pick up Simon Drake and who might not retain his robust health if he failed the mission.

  The registration lobby was brightly lighted and virtually empty. The color TV was playing for the benefit of no one at all, and Simon, in search of a public telephone, glanced at it in passing. The handsome young newscaster wearing too much make-up interested him not at all, but when the scene changed to a beautiful blonde wearing dark glasses and a mini-skirt and boots he was fascinated. The beautiful blonde was being more or less chased through an airport by half a dozen reporters. She smiled, waved, ducked her head and said not one word while the newscast announcer explained that Wanda Call, star of the soon-to-open Broadway production The Soft Touch, had been apprehended by reporters at Kennedy airport. “Miss Call, the fiancée of socialite lawyer Simon Drake, who is being sought by the police for questioning in the brutal slaying of a California coastal city playgirl, refused to comment on speculation that she was on her way to join Drake. Although she succeeded in eluding the press at plane time, it is believed that she caught a Los Angeles-bound flight.” Wanda faded from the screen and the handsome young man turned to other matters. Simon turned to the nearest exit. He was pushing his luck too far in approaching the desk after that exposure.

  He returned to the cover of darkness. The reception desk faced an off-ramp leading to the freeway. It was the main entrance to the motel complex. Simon paused to get reoriented. He had left the Jaguar in the kitchen service area of the Gateway Bar. Following the driveway that led back into the complex would take him to his car. He walked slowly—no longer to avoid attention but because the wound in his thigh was painful. He had gone about a hundred feet when he sighted a public phone booth standing in isolation at an intersection of traffic lanes. This seemed far preferable to the lighted lobby where he might be recognized. He hobbled forward and got himself cozily inside. He put in a call to The Mansion and was answered by Chester’s strong baritone.

  “Chester,” he said, “the phone at the house may be bugged but it’s okay. I’m calling from a public booth.”

  “Where are you?” Chester demanded.

  “Never mind that. What about that chemical analysis?”

  “You wouldn’t believe!” Chester said.

  “Oh, yes I would! Take care of it. Now let me talk to Wanda.”

  “But don’t you want to hear the report?”

  “No! Not over the telephone. I want to talk to my girl.”

  “Your girl isn’t here.”

  “Where is she?”

  Simon heard a clicking on the wire. It might have been one of Duane Thompson’s spies but it wasn’t. It was Hannah on the extension.

  “That’s what we’ve been trying to find out,” Hannah said. “I caught that newscast at an earlier hour and sent Chester to International in the Rolls. It was delivered this afternoon. They did a lovely repair job—”

  “Never mind the Rolls,” Simon said. “What happened at the airport?”

  “Nothing. Chester couldn’t find Wanda. She was on the passenger list of an American Airlines flight that was due in at five-fifty this evening. But she wasn’t on the plane and nobody remembered seeing her board the plane in New York.”

  “Maybe the reporters scared her off,” Simon said.

  “You underestimate an actress’s talent,” Hannah huffed. “She probably staged the whole incident as a red-herring tactic to draw the police off your scent.”

  “Or to get publicity for herself,” Chester muttered.

  “That’s ridiculous!” Hannah said. “If she wanted publicity she would have completed the flight and got a second round at International. Besides, the girl loves you, Simon.”

  “I’ve heard that song before,” Chester said.

  “Don’t listen to him!” Hannah roared. “Ever since he started going to college he’s had no sentiment in his soul. Wanda is absolutely loyal…. Simon, why on earth did you hit that nice Lieutenant Franzen last night? Don’t you realize that he wears glasses?”

  “Hannah, get off the line!” Simon ordered. “I want to talk to Chester … Chester, get in touch with Jack Keith. Tell him to run a check on Alex Lacey, who works for Whitey Sanders at the Gateway Bar in La Verde. Everything right back to his birth certificate if he has one. Then call Franzen and tell him to call the La Verde Police Department. Have them look in the utility plant across from the Gateway Bar. If they hurry, they’ll find a dead man in it with a gun in his hand that belonged to Sam Goddard. Franzen might have fun learning how the dead man got it, although I’m not quite sure how he’s going to do that without a Ouija board.”

  “A dead man!” Hannah cried. “Anybody I know?”

  “I hope not—and get off the line! Did you get everything I said, Chester?”

  “I got it,” Chester answered. “But, Simon, about that analysis—”

  “I told you to let that wait. I’m hanging up now. I can’t stay here any longer. Call Franzen first. I want him to get that gun.”

  “How did the dead man get dead?” Chester asked.

  “I refuse to answer any more questions without benefit of counsel,” Simon said. “Get busy.”

  He broke the connection and started to leave the telephone booth, but the picture of Wanda on the television screen was too vivid. Hannah might be right. The whole maneuver could have been a red-herring operation and Wanda might be tucked safely in her bed in New York at this moment. The thought was intriguing enough to inspire a second call. He got the operator and placed the call to New York. He heard Wanda’s telephone begin to ring and then, as he shifted position in the narrow booth, became aware of a sedan crawling to a stop at the curbing about ten feet away. A dark green Cougar. Simon instinctively kicked open the door of the booth to turn off the light. The Cougar stopped and the driver stepped out. A huge, thick-featured man wearing a turtleneck sweater. He was fumbling in his pocket for change when Simon slammed the telephone back on the hook. With luck there might be enough time to step out of the booth and slip into the shadows before the man looked up. But Simon’s luck had run out half an hour earlier when a dying man’s final shot took a bite out of his leg. He moved too quickly. A red poker of pain tore through his thigh and he pitched forward. His hands reached out to break his fall and came to rest on the huge shoulders, and when he looked up the thick, ugly features of Max Berlin’s sadistic hatchet man were twisted with surprised recognition. They stood together for an instant like a pair of grotesque dancers waiting for the music to begin, and then Turtleneck’s right fist came up and smashed against Simon’s jaw. The dance was over.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  There is an encouraging thing about awakening with pain; it is the splendid knowledge that one is still alive. Simon was first aware of the hot poker in his thigh; then, regaining consciousness, as it were, from his feet upward, his senses acknowledged one scuffed elbow, a lame shoulder above it, and finally, the vise of soreness about his jaw. Furthermore, his mouth tasted strongly of ether and he felt slightly nauseated. He opened his eyes and stared at his body. He was lying flat on his back on a large bed with a massive carved wood headboard. He was clothed in fine white silk pajamas. Someone had expertly bandaged the wound on his thigh, but the room he now occupied was definitely not in a hospital. True, the walls and the high va
ulted ceiling were white. The furnishings were handsomely carved Spanish mahogany, and the light streaming into the room came from a wide glass door that opened on a red tile patio landscaped with semitropical plants. Hearing the sound of splashing water, he drew himself up to a sitting position and peered beyond the patio. The view was unexpected and enthralling. The sounds were coming from a large, azure swimming pool that seemed to have been carved from the native rock surrounding it, and in and about the pool were eleven (by actual, studied count) beautiful bikini-clad young females in various poses of uninhibited relaxation. Simon deliberately rubbed his sensitive jaw to bring back the reassuring pain. He was too young for Valhalla.

  He examined his wrist. His watch was there and the hands stood at ten minutes past nine. The daylight told him that this was A.M., and the vegetation on the patio told him he was somewhere in the Tropic of Cancer. So much for a beginning. He turned his attention back to the room. It contained a huge, hand-carved chest over which hung an ornately framed mirror. On the chest was a blue ceramic ashtray and a handset telephone. The telephone suggested contact with the outer world, and so he swung one foot over the side of the bed and prepared to test his strength. He was weaker than he thought. Grabbing at the headboard for support, he discovered the bell cord. He pushed the bell and waited. In addition to the patio access there were two doors in the room. One, partially open, led into the bathroom; the other, a handsomely carved mahogany masterpiece, was the one Simon watched. After a few moments he heard the smart click of booted heels on the tile. The door opened and Max Berlin stepped into the room.