Lay On, Mac Duff!

by Charlotte Armstrong

  J.J. cleared his throat, and Hugh turned and stared at him.

  “Don’t take it amiss, old thing,” J J. said lightly, “but weren’t you tapping at Bessie’s door at two o’clock?”

  “And had been for some time,” Hugh answered, sounding very tired.

  “You couldn’t have known, of course,” Duff said, “exactly when she’d wake.”

  “No.” Hugh turned his head toward him with quick gratitude, I thought.

  J.J. said, “Hm, that’s so. Well, Uncle has no alibi at two. Maxon has no alibi at two. You couldn’t have been sure you’d have a good stout alibi at two. Seems as though the clock’s evidence is O.K. In which case we’ll accept the fact that the killing was done after two. Is that logical or isn’t it?”

  He cocked an eye at Mac Duff to see how this reasoning was going down. Duff was balancing a clean teaspoon on the tip of one finger. “It’s logical,” he said rather drily. But Hugh turned to him with sudden passion.

  “What are we going to do? I left it to the police. I mean, they have that red man. I just left it there this time. And they know it’s Winberry’s knife. I told them so. But hadn’t I better confess that there was a first red man to link the cases. Hadn’t I better tell them what the red men are and where they came from? Hadn’t we better put it all in their hands?”

  “Yeah,” J.J. chimed in, “hadn’t we?”

  “It doesn’t make a case yet,” Duff said. “Tell me about that knife. You mean Cathcart had an opportunity to get hold of it, don’t you?”

  “Of course he did. And so had I, of course. Even better. But why should I?”

  “Motive,” Duff said. “Yes. Same as before?”

  We were all silent. I was hanging onto J.J.’s sleeve.

  “But what,” Duff said gently, “brought old hatred to a boiling point this time?”

  J.J. muttered, “Oh, I don’t know. Once he got started, figured he might as well wipe them both out. Sheep as a lamb.”

  “There is something in what you are saying,” Duff admitted.

  But I was waiting for Hugh to say something, and he didn’t. It didn’t seem to spring to his mind as it did to mine.

  I said timidly, “It might be … Lina. He took her out last night, Gaskell did. It would have made anyone jealous.”

  “Jealous! Of that old …!” J.J. was incredulous.

  “Oh, I don’t think so,” Hugh said, shifting in his chair. “I think you’re wrong, Bessie. If it had been Guy Maxon …” He stopped as if he wished he hadn’t said as much as that.

  “Cathcart might be jealous of Maxon, then?” Duff said, speaking as if jealousy were a simple fact that either existed or didn’t exist. And, of course, it is, when you stop to think.

  “Yes,” I answered for Hugh. “Oh, it’s true. She’s so much younger and so lovely. And he’s younger, Maxon, I mean. And they do … Why, Mr. Maxon was furious, last night.”

  “Motive for Maxon,” Duff said, “eh?”

  “Alibi for Maxon,” J.J. objected. “He couldn’t have got home at 2:08, having stabbed Gaskell at 2. That’s if the thermostat clock is kosher. He didn’t get him an alibi for two o’clock if it’s a plant.”

  “How about the Eighth Avenue subway?” Duff said.

  “That’s it. With luck,” J.J. said. “Yes. Darn it.”

  “Hell of a lot of luck,” Hugh muttered almost inaudibly.

  “Nevertheless,” J.J. said, gathering steam, “let me tell you that I don’t believe Maxon had a thing to do with it. I don’t believe that dame across the street saw him go back in there. I don’t believe he went back in there. I think he’s a red herring or whatever it is. And I want Bessie out of Cathcart’s house. I don’t like all this prowling around at night.” He glared at Hugh. “And I won’t have it. Suppose he knows what you were up to last night? Suppose he does? And he might.”

  “I know,” Hugh said whitely.

  “Bessie, I haven’t got any maiden aunts to park you with, but, by God, if I don’t find somebody’s maiden aunt or her equivalent and get you out of there …”

  “I can’t!” I gasped. “How can I?”

  “You’ll see if you can’t.”

  “I hardly think—” Hugh began.

  “All right, I’ll marry the girl.” J.J. blazed. “Or sleep across her doorstep. I’ll buy six ferocious dogs and surround her. By God, I’ll have her put in jail. Listen, Mac, if we could fix it to get Cathcart put where he can’t—”

  Mac Duff said, “Garnett can’t act without a case. And he won’t.”

  “But there is a case. That’s what I’m saying. I’m not interested in fine legal points. I’m not even interested in logic. He’s guilty, as far as I’m concerned, right now, until somebody shows me he isn’t. All right. All right. But I’m talking about my girl!”

  “Oh, hush,” I said. Hugh looked very startled indeed.

  Duff said, “Now, calm down, J.J. There isn’t enough to go to Garnett—”

  “There’s enough to make me good and nervous,” J.J. said, not calmed down a bit. “All right. You tell me what you’re going to do!”

  Duff said, “We don’t know enough. There are so many points to check, so much work to be done. Yet, I wonder if there’s time …” He fell very quiet, that deep brooding quiet, and the word “time” rang and sang in our ears.

  “It’s a question of protecting Bessie,” J.J. said at last, “that’s what it is, and that’s all it is.”

  “Logic’s logic,” Duff told him, “but we’ve got to do better. We’ve got to understand and know.”

  “You don’t think,” Hugh said as if he’d never seriously considered the idea before, “that anyone wants to hurt Bessie?”

  “Nobody’s going to hurt Bessie,” J.J. said. “That’s why she won’t be there in the same house with a man who may be a killer. I say may be, and it’s enough for me.”

  “Do you really think there’s danger?”

  “Danger?” Duff said. “Yes, there’s danger. If only on the sheep as a lamb principle. You see, we don’t know.” He shoved the dishes away from him suddenly, clearing a place on the table for his hands. “I want to meet Charles Cathcart.”

  “The way to meet him is go find him,” J.J. said.

  “That’s one way. I want to be called in on this case.”

  “From Garnett’s angle?”

  “From Bessie’s.”

  “That puts her in too much of a spot.”

  Mac Duff said, “But I have been called in on the case for Bessie. All I want to do now is say so. And talk to people.”

  “Will that help?” J.J. said soberly.

  “There’s no time for all the digging I’d like done. Oh, I’ll get MacGuire now and charge it.” He smiled at me. “There isn’t time because the untangling of what really happened by long, painstaking, and exhaustive search for clues and witnesses over a cold trail takes too much time. If it’s quick protection we’re after we shall have to do with the evidence we’ve got, and brains and imagination and intuition. What we’ve got, you see. There’s the afternoon for what digging can be done. But before night I must see Cathcart.”

  “O. K.,” said J.J. “Just the same, that settles it. If you’re coming out in the Open where Cathcart can see you, Bessie leaves. Come on, honey. You and I are going over there right now before it’s too late and pack up a few suitcases for you.”

  “But I can’t do that.”

  “Yes you can, too. We’ll get your things out of there and have them ready. Just in case. Just in suitcase. Joke. Laugh, damn it. Now, listen, Bessie, I’ve got red hair and have had my own way since I was a child, and there’s little you can do about it now. Want that toast? Then I’ll eat it. Come on. Mac, you going to sit here and brood?”

  “And wait for MacGuire,” Duff said.

  “Where you headed, Miller?”

  “Back to my room,” Hugh said. “I don’t seem to have anywhere else to go.”

  “You can have two-thirds of our taxi,” J.J. said. �
��Allez oop!”

  We went away, leaving Mac Duff among the dirty dishes, staring at them with blank eyes as if he were already miles deep in thought, sorting and arranging and, in a funny way, kind of listening to the problem.

  Chapter Thirteen

  J.J. and I squabbled all the way in the taxi, holding hands and enjoying every minute of it. Anyhow, I enjoyed it, and I think he did, too. Hugh didn’t open his mouth to say a word. Of course he really had no chance. I felt sorry for him, so somber and withdrawn in his corner, worried and quiet. J.J. was such a lively and open-hearted kind of person, he made Hugh seem stiff and humorless, sitting there, gnawing at fear like a bone instead of exploding at it. Of course, I felt that J.J. was just spluttering sparks and that I certainly wasn’t going to run away from the house and hide and be safe and miss everything, too, just for the sake of his nerves. He said it was a question of my nerves. We had it back and forth and got to my uncle’s house with nothing settled.

  Hugh stood a little away from us while we waited for Effans to open the door. When he came and we filed in, J.J. and I were suddenly speechless as if entering this house were enough to knock the happy quarreling out of us … and we were all three somber. We came in so quietly, indeed, that we all heard perfectly clearly what a voice just inside the drawing room was saying.

  “Lina … lovely …” it said, pleading, “don’t you know he’s no good?”

  Lina answered, sounding very tired, “Don’t do that, Guy. What’s the use when—”

  Effans cleared his throat like thunder. “Miss Elizabeth!” he cried with false joy, loud and loyal, “Miss Lina’s been asking for you! And for Mr. Hugh, too!” None of us said anything.

  Lina’s voice in the drawing room broke its delicate hesitation and finished her sentence. “When I don’t believe you at all,” she said.

  We heard her quick footstep, and then she stood in the doorway, wearing a little print dress with soft clear greens in it and a big white collar, the kind of thing you just know somebody runs up on a sewing machine for about a hundred and twenty-five dollars. She looked about seventeen until you noticed her wicked little wrought-gold earrings and the devilish art of that innocent dress. Her eyes went straight to J.J. and she said, “Oh, Mr. Jones! I’m so glad you’re here.”

  “That so?” J.J. said with a funny little squeak.

  “Yes. Come in, all of you. Guy, this is Mr. Jones.” She swung around and stopped their mumbling the right phrases. “Guy says another of Charles’ parcheesi men was found where Mr. Gaskell died. Which of you can tell me if that’s true?”

  “That’s right,” J.J. said, in his normal voice, I was glad to hear. “At least—”

  Hugh said, “It’s true. I saw it.”

  Lina set her teeth over her lower lip.

  “I wouldn’t lie to you, Lina,” Guy said with the faintest accent on the second pronoun. “Well?”

  “Mr. Jones,” Lina said with decision, “can you reach MacDougal Duff?”

  “I guess so.” J.J. waited.

  “Then please do. Ask him to come here.”

  “What for, Lina?” Guy said. “How can you …?”

  “Because, as ought to be perfectly obvious,” Lina said coolly, staring us all down, “Charles is being framed.”

  “Framed!” It was Hugh who cried out in surprise.

  Maxon said with derision, “That’s rather unlikely, Charles being what he is.”

  Lina turned to him and said imperiously, “There is no other explanation. Do you understand?”

  Whether he did or not, I did. I thought: She knows, she wonders, she’s afraid, too. She must do something. She’s going to pretend she’s afraid for him. She wouldn’t dare turn to Mac Duff otherwise. But she’ll trust Mac Duff to find out the truth, the real truth. How clever, how pitifully clever!

  “I’d better call him then before he gets away from Max’s,” J.J. said. I realized that this solved our problem. “If you’re sure about this?”

  “Please call him,” Lina said coldly. “There’s a telephone here.”

  J.J. went down the long room to the phone, and Lina said, “As a matter of fact, there are more things than the parcheesi men, are there not? Bessie, why was Mac Duff here yesterday if not … if not for that?” She faltered.

  “Oh, Lina,” I said, ready to bawl, “I was so frightened. Hugh … we … J.J.… everybody … Mac Duff knows.”

  “I wish you’d told me,” she said with gentle reproach. “Tell me now, please.”

  “What shall Bessie tell, my dear?”

  There he was himself, in person, the camel’s hair coat, the dent along the chin, my uncle’s eyes. Lina lifted her head sharply and defiantly. “We are talking about these murders, Charles. Has it occurred to you that you will be suspected?”

  “Naturally,” my uncle said. He looked enormous and immovable in the door.

  “I won’t have it,” Lina said quite wildly. “I’m asking MacDougal Duff to come here.” My uncle’s crooked eyebrow descended a trifle. “Bessie—this young man—one of them knows him. Charles, you need help! It mustn’t be … let go like this!”

  My uncle said mildly, “I’ve managed to help myself, you know.”

  “Not now,” Lina cried, “not any more. Not after two men are dead, and you …”

  “Do the corpses fall too thick and fast?” He might have been roaring with mirth inside. “Well”—he shrugged his big shoulders—“if you like, Lina. Ask him to come in later, please.”

  Lina said, “Thank you, Charles,” and spoke to J.J., who was poised at the phone, the mouthpiece in his hand, interrupted and waiting. “After dinner,” she said.

  “Ah, yes, we are to have the pleasure.” My uncle bowed ever so slightly to my aunt. “Say nine o’clock, will you? I am going to my office until seven.”

  “Very well.” Lina’s eyes were fixed on his face.

  “I shall be quite safe in the meantime,” my uncle said in his soft tones, and the shivers ran down my spine. “Please don’t worry.”

  The word “worry”! There he stood in his handsome coat, big and strong and hard and well assured of himself, the last person on earth whose safety you’d worry about, and he knew it, too. “You won’t, will you?” he purred. “Until seven, my dear.”

  Lina said, “Until seven,” in a dull voice with all the excitement gone. He bowed and went away. Lina sat down in a big chair and put her fists to her eyes. Maxon growled in his throat and paced over to the mantel. Hugh looked down at his hands. J.J. said, “Make it nine o’clock, can you, Mac? Cathcart said so. Yeah, he’s gone … to his office. If you say it’s all right. O. K., O. K.”

  He came right over to me. “All set,” he flung at Lina over his shoulder, although she didn’t move. “Look, honey, Mac wants me.” His green eyes were clear and anxious to read mine.

  I said, “I’m going up to my room and st-stay.”

  He said, almost in a whisper, “Things are in the open now, all right, but it’s different. Just you lock your door. Promise? And pack that suitcase.” I nodded. “I’m coming back.”

  “With Mac Duff?”

  “Before that.” He leaned over me. “So long, Bessie. Take it easy.” Then he kissed my cheek very lightly, close to my ear. “After seven, I’ll be hanging about. Look out your back window sometime.”

  After he’d gone I think Hugh wanted to go upstairs, too, but Lina kept him. She would have kept me, but I’d had enough. I flew up to the third floor, and I did my best to lock the door, with two chairs this time, and I locked all my windows, put cold cream on my face, took my shoes off, and fell asleep in my dress.

  I woke in the gray dark. I don’t know what woke me. It was half-past six, only half an hour before my Uncles Charles would be back in his room if he were not back already. I wondered why we both, J.J. and I, had accepted his word as if he couldn’t come back to his own house any time he chose and who was to say he couldn’t or wouldn’t. I slipped off the bed and leaned out the back window. I couldn’t se
e whether the light was on or off in the room directly under mine. I couldn’t tell. I couldn’t hear anything either. Lights were on in the dining room, however. Two pale shafts struck vaguely across the bricks from far below. I shivered in the dark and reached for my lamp.

  The moment I snapped it on, something moved in the courtyard. I could be seen. I must be very plain. I was on my knees on the floor, and I thought, I can roll flat under the sill, but I kept watching.

  He moved into the pale light in his floppety overcoat with the raglan sleeves and the collar that I knew already was bound to be half up and half down. He took off his hat and threw it into the dark and waved at me. Uncle isn’t home yet, I thought, waving like mad, or J.J. wouldn’t stand there and wave like that.

  All of a sudden he held both arms up as if for attention. He was going to try to tell me something. I sat quiet. He patted his thighs. He held a whole leg up from the hips and pointed at it.

  Legs, I thought, legwork for Mac Duff. I nodded up and down as hard as I could.

  Then he folded as if he were sitting down and began to steer an imaginary steering wheel. He steered and steered. He pulled at his head as if he were pulling a hat to one side. He spat. He steered some more.

  In a car, I thought. Something about a car. I nodded but not so hard.

  J.J. straightened up and looked around in despair. Then he folded up and steered some more, making strange motions with one hand. I couldn’t understand, so I shook my head. He shrugged a big wide-open I-give-up kind of shrug and then suddenly pointed to his hand. To the little finger on it, I saw at last. He held it up and wiggled it and pointed and then shook his head violently and made gestures of negation.

  Uncle, I thought. Not Uncle. Uncle isn’t. Uncle didn’t. Uncle wasn’t. Something about Uncle and no.

  But I shrugged.

  Then he took both hands and made circles with them, a circle out of each, and held them up to his eyes like binoculars and stared at the dining-room windows. He pointed at the dining-room windows and stared again and then pointed vigorously at his own chest. Then he made eating motions and did it all over again.

  I clapped my hands, not really on account of the noise, but in pantomine. He would be watching while we dined, and I was glad.