by Jack Murray
‘Mint green, in case you’re wondering my dear,’ said Alastair pointing at the paint on the wooden walls of the house.
‘The colour is just too perfect, Uncle Alastair. You don’t mind if I call you...?
‘I should be insulted if you didn’t,’ replied Alastair in mock alarm to Mary, before grinning with delight. They climbed up onto the front porch together. The door opened just as Alastair was about to open it.
‘I do wish you’d let me do that sometimes. I’m not a child,’ snarled Alastair at Ella-Mae.
‘You could’ve fooled me,’ responded Ella-Mae, scepticism sculpted into every syllable.
Mary looked at this exchange initially with alarm and then had to cover her mouth to stifle a giggle. She glanced at Kit who was smiling affectionately at his uncle and housekeeper.
Agatha made a sound that resembled a tut to Kit. She repeated it thereby confirming Kit’s initial hypothesis. She stepped forward, past Alastair towards the elderly housekeeper.
‘Lady Frost’, said Ella-Mae warmly, taking Agatha’s coat from her, ‘It’s a pleasure to see you again.’
‘Ella-Mae,’ said Agatha regarding the housekeeper, ‘I’m glad there’s at least one person in this house with some sense. You’ve hardly changed.’ Which was hardly true, but she grinned her thanks anyway.
Alastair introduced Mary and then turned to Kit, ‘You’ll remember my nephew.’
‘I do and my haven’t you grown to become such a handsome young man,’ said Ella-Mae regarding Kit happily.
Kit bent down and kissed Ella-Mae on the cheek, ‘It’s good to see you again, Ella-Mae and thank you for looking after my uncle so well. He’s mellowed thanks to you.’
Ella-Mae rolled her eyes at this. Then she saw Natalie. The French woman was last to leave the automobile, arriving at the door a minute after the others. Her appearance prompted a remarkable transformation in Ella-Mae. The smile immediately left her face and she glared at Alastair, who avoided her eyes. Mary observed all before Kit took her elbow and led her into the main entrance hall. Meanwhile, Ella-Mae nodded a greeting to Natalie and took the remaining coats before silently leaving the group.
Mary twirled around the enormous entrance hall. It was not as large as Cavendish Hall, but it was impressive. It was certainly more tastefully decorated inside. Even more exciting was the collection of paintings dotted around the hallway and on the staircase leading up to the first floor. On first glance, Mary counted three Sargent watercolours, a Whistler pastel of Venice and a number of landscapes of the Hudson River school.
‘My wife,’ said Alastair, unable to hide the sadness in his voice. ‘She loved art and collected many of these pieces. I’ll take you around later. Let me show you the rooms. Kit, Agatha, you’ll have your usual rooms. Mary, come with me.’
‘Be careful, Mary,’ warned Kit, ‘He may be old....’
Mary laughed and followed Kit’s uncle up the staircase, occasionally stopping as Alastair pointed out a notable painting or photograph. They stopped at a painting of a beautiful Hispanic woman. Mary heard the catch in Alastair’s voice.
‘She was beautiful,’ said Mary simply.
‘Yes, in every way.’ Desolation was etched on Alastair’s face. Then he collected himself and said, ‘But we push on. We must.’
-
Mary looked out across the bay from her window. The view was undeniably beautiful. Sunlight glistened on the water like tiny jewels cast over a cobalt-coloured silk.
‘My word, Uncle Alastair, I can see the reason why the house is called Bellavista.’
‘Not my choice,’ confessed Alastair, ‘Christina’s idea. I went along with it. Happily, I might add. But the view is remarkable, certainly. Now, I won’t get in your way. I’ll see you downstairs for tea.’
A few minutes after Alastair had departed, there was a knock on the door. Mary heard Kit say, ‘Special delivery.’
She smiled and replied, ‘I’m hardly dressed.’ Which was not true.
The door practically burst off its hinges.
‘Well, Lord Aston, I thought you were a gentleman.’
Kit joined her at the window, and they gazed across the bay. In such circumstances there is only one thing for a gentleman to do when in the presence of a young lady of his liking. This duty lasted several minutes before the noise in the corridor suggested the imminent arrival of a septuagenarian bodyguard. They returned to their previous pose just in time as the door opened.
‘Ahh, there you are,’ said Agatha obliviously. ‘Tea is being served downstairs. When you’ve stopped all this romantic nonsense, you should join us.’ The door closed when she finished.
Kit glanced down at Mary, ‘Come on then.’ They turned from the window and walked towards the door. ‘Is the room to your liking?’
‘Everything is to my liking. Your uncle is adorable, and I think we’ll get on famously.’
‘I thought you might. Don’t take any notice of him and Ella-Mae. I should’ve mentioned that, on first sight, they can seem to have a fairly abrasive relationship. He’d be lost without her. I rather think she’d be lost without him.’
Mary laughed, ‘I think it’s rather sweet. By the way did you...?’
Kit looked at Mary and replied, ‘Yes, I did notice her reaction to Natalie. What did you think?’
Mary frowned as they stepped into the corridor. In a more serious tone she said, ‘Well, I have a feeling that your aunt and uncle are up to something.’
‘My thought also,’ agreed Kit. ‘Algy is rather prone to marriage proposals and then being ditched or ditching the poor girl. This one has reached a more advance stage in a shorter space of time than normal for my dear cousin.’
‘Do you think Aunt Agatha and Uncle Alastair are testing him?’
‘They’re certainly testing him,’ said Kit seriously before seeing Mary’s reaction which had much of Aunt Agatha’s disapproval albeit in younger and prettier form. He added quickly, and sheepishly, ‘If you like that sort of young woman.’
‘I can see you do,’ said Mary with a straight face but the raised eyebrow suggested amusement rather than jealousy. ‘She’s certainly striking.’
Kit moved the subject on from Natalie’s obvious attractiveness to the more pertinent issue raised by her arrival on the scene. He had a good idea of what his elderly relatives were planning.
‘If this has been cooked up by the pair of them, it suggests there’s no question that Algy wants to marry this girl.’
‘Did you really doubt it?’
‘You don’t know Algy, darling,’ replied Kit. ‘I mean, it’s possible Uncle Alastair disapproves. Hence the recruitment of our new maid by Aunt Agatha. Incidentally, Uncle Alastair mentioned he wanted to speak to me about why Algy hadn’t come to meet us. I wonder if there’s a problem.’
Mary tilted her head, ‘Aside from Uncle Alastair trying to split them up?’
Kit smiled and then his face became more serious. He paused for a moment before saying, ‘Something else. I’m sure of it. Anyway, we’ll find out soon enough.’
-
The library in Bellavista reminded Mary, once again, of Cavendish Hall. It was large, well-stocked with beautiful, leather-bound volumes of the classics. Two leather chesterfield sofas and armchairs surrounded a low coffee table made from oak. A couple of Winslow Homer watercolours adorned the walls. Two differences were notable: the view from the large windows provided another opportunity to enjoy the bay, and then there was the bookcase near the entrance of the room. Agatha lifted one book and showed it to Alastair.
‘Worth reading?’ she asked hopefully.
‘Let me see, which book is that?’ replied Alastair putting on a pair of round tortoiseshell spectacles. ‘Ahh, “The Case of The Wrong Corpse”. Enjoyable but a mere trifle for you, my dear. You’ll have the killer by page forty-five. No, let me find you one more devilishly clever.’ He walked over to the bookcase and scanned the contents.
Mary glanced at Kit archly. He smiled back an
d whispered, ‘We’re in the presence of highly skilled sleuths.’
‘So I see. It’s certainly an impressive collection of...’
‘Training manuals?’ suggested Kit.
They listened to Alastair pronounce “Flash Fraser and the Love Nest Murder” a light read but promises several twists of interest. Agatha looked sceptically at the rather lurid cover which showed a somewhat underclad young lady standing before a man in a suit and a fedora that cast a shadow over his eyes.
‘Very much of the American school, I see,’ said Agatha, clearly an expert in the genre.
‘Oh very,’ chuckled Alastair, ‘but unusually intelligent nonetheless, given its provenance.’ This high recommendation of both the literary tome and the country that gave it birth, seemed to set the seal on the matter. Agatha took the book from Alastair before joining Kit and Mary at the table. Ella-Mae had entered stealthily as ever to serve some sandwiches and tea from a silver pot. Agatha noted with satisfaction there was not a lemon to be seen and Ella-Mae stirred the tea pot well before pouring and adding milk.
Once the tea was poured, all eyes turned to Alastair. For a few moments he looked non-plussed and then he remembered something important he’d meant to share with his family. He giggled nervously at his forgetfulness.
‘Ahh, yes, we’ve had something of a hitch develop in the smooth-running course of true love, and all that.’
‘The hitch being?’ asked Agatha.
‘Dain, Algy’s fiancée, was arrested yesterday for murder. She spent the night in a cell.’
The sound of a cucumber sandwich being eaten would have felt like a scream in the middle of the night, such was the silence that greeted this announcement. All eyes turned to Kit. Realising, the ball was in his court, he pressed for more details on what had happened.
‘Perhaps you could expand’ said Kit for wont of anything better to say about such an extraordinary statement.
Alastair, somewhat oblivious to the shock he’d caused, happily explained all that he knew of the case: the murder of the Pinkerton man and the subsequent arrest of Dain Collins due to her refusal to answer questions on her past. All throughout his relaying of the story, both Kit and Mary had the distinct impression that the news was neither as surprising nor as alarming to Alastair as a prospective father-in-law might, otherwise, be feeling. More surprisingly was Agatha’s less-than-worried reaction.
‘I’m sure the matter will soon be sorted out satisfactorily,’ she offered before biting into a sandwich which, as she held it up and nodded, clearly met with her approval. ‘Ella-Mae has lost none of her facility, I see.’
‘No,’ agreed Alastair, ‘She does at least one thing right.’
Kit noted they were veering alarmingly off topic and tried to steer matters back to what one might reasonably have concluded was the important issue of the moment.
‘But this is madness. Surely, she can’t be guilty? Shouldn’t we be trying to get her out of jail?’
‘We are,’ said Alastair, finishing off another sandwich. ‘I have Saul dealing with it.’
‘Saul Finkelstein? Is he still alive and kicking?’ exclaimed Agatha.
‘Alive and certainly kicking, particularly when his opposite number is rolling around the ground,’ replied Alastair with a titter. He dabbed his chin with a napkin.
‘Who is Saul Finkelstein?’ asked Mary.
16
Saul Finkelstein rose to his full five-foot and half an inch height. He leaned forward onto the desk thereby looming over Lieutenant Mulroney, insofar as it was possible for someone with a deficit in altitudinally-directed inches. The impact on the good lieutenant would have been amusing had they not been in the second hour of the interrogation in a room that might easily have doubled as one of the increasingly popular saunas in the city.
Finkelstein was seventy if he was a day, and that day was a wet, windy Tuesday in February. His heavily-lined, jowly face wore the permanent scowl of someone who disliked people he disagreed with. That he disagreed with most everyone, practically as a matter of principle, meant that a smile was a rare commodity on the face of the little lawyer unless he had succeeded in winning a case.
He thrust his hands in his waistcoat and took a deep, deliberate breath which had Mulroney’s heart sinking as quickly as the air entered the lungs of the lawyer. Without removing the cigar which, like Mulroney’s, was permanently wedged in the side of his mouth, pointing like a revolver towards the unfortunate object of his ire, he addressed the detective in an accent that hailed somewhere between New York and the Bronx.
‘Look, Mulroney, enough is enough. Either charge my client or release her. You’ve nothing, admit it.’
Mulroney didn’t even have that much but was reluctant to be browbeaten by an old nemesis. The interrogation of Dain Collins was failing on all fronts. She was a distant spectator to the verbal tennis between the detective and the lawyer. Her occasional answers were inaudible mostly, and monosyllabic when she was allowed to speak by Finkelstein, which was rarely.
Sweat rolled down Mulroney’s head and he envied, for a moment, the ability of the little lawyer to wear a three-piece suit and not suffer heat stroke. Even Dain Collins looked unnaturally cool. Ice seemed to inhabit her veins. Meanwhile, Mulroney drummed his fingers on the table before the weakness of his position forced him to acknowledge defeat for the moment.
‘Blow,’ he said finally. ‘Don’t leave town though. We’re not through with you Miss Collins, or whatever you’re called.’
A smile, of sorts, creased the features of Finkelstein. He’d won. He usually did. Anger, perseverance and smarts. He’d made a career based on these three qualities of which he had an abundance. A fourth quality he never considered but which was appreciated by his clients, and hated by his opponents, was his gargantuan insensitivity to what people thought of him. He genuinely, profoundly even, did not care. Making enemies was a badge of honour. The more enemies he made, the more successful he became.
And, wealthier.
-
There was silence for a minute while Phil Geauque digested the information from Hammett. They looked at one another. It was difficult to read his boss’s mood. The blue eyes were friendly but distant. Hammett doubted he would ever understand the man before him. There always seemed to be wheels within wheels. The arrest of Dain Collins had been reported to their client earlier that day. The brief had not changed, however.
Find out who she is.
‘Does he want us to find out before the cops?’
‘I don’t think he’s too worried,’ answered Geauque. ‘So, as long as he pays us, we stay on the job. Any leads?’
‘Possibly. I had a call from Joe Cusack. He’s arranged for me to meet someone down at the gym later. He says this guy may know Dain Collins. Just a question, but is our client in any way interested whether or not she’s guilty?’
‘I didn’t ask. Why are you asking?’
Hammett leaned forward, ‘I didn’t like Cowan much. Nor did you, but he was one of ours. It doesn’t look so good if we can’t look after our own.’
‘I agree. We keep on this until we find out who’s responsible. At the moment, the Collins girl is our only lead. Some of the other guys are working other angles. You stay with this one.’
This was Geauque’s way of ending a meeting. Nothing else needed to be said. Hammett stood up and offered his boss a half-hearted salute. He made it out of the office before the coughing started again.
A car ride to Joe’s Gym took ten minutes longer than Hammett’s good fellowship was ever likely to last in the summer heat. By the time he emerged from his car, he was sweating like Custer facing the Sioux with a broken sword and an empty gun. He strode into the gym. It was full of young men battering bags with a violent intensity. Hammett heard Joe before he saw him.
‘Dash,’ yelled a voice. It came from the doorway of an office.
Hammett wandered over. Inside, Joe was standing beside a nervous-looking Italian dressed as a waiter. At least H
ammett deduced he was a waiter. The two men nodded to one another. Joe took the photostat of Dain Collins out of his pocket and put it on his desk.
‘Do you know her?’ asked Hammett.
The Italian looked up at Joe, greed in his eyes. Fear, also.
‘I promised him ten bucks if the information was good. Five now, five later and a broken arm if he was messing with us.’
Hammett nodded and took out his wallet. The Italian grabbed the five dollars.
‘I don’t know her name, but she called herself Danielle in the club. Pretty sure it’s her. Different hair. She was blonde but it’s her, I’m sure of it.’
‘Where?’ pressed Hammett.
The Italian looked nervously at Hammett and then at Joe. He said, ‘Look, they can’t know I told you alright? I work at a place just outside the City. Rich men go there. They show films. There are girls, dancing. You know the sort.’
Hammett did.
‘Name?’
‘Lehane’s, d’you know it? Redwood City.’ said the Italian.
Hammett nodded, ‘Yes, I’ve heard of it. Nice place,’ he said sardonically. The Italian looked either hurt or guilty, the look of a man who had to make a buck. For a moment Hammett felt remorse. Who was he to be so pious? ‘Tell me more. Was she on the game?’ he asked.
‘No, I don’t think so,’ replied the Italian. ‘Some are just escorts. Hostesses. The ones who speak nice. She was one of them. They don’t wear much, mind you.’ The Italian half-smiled at this. Clearly the guilt he felt at working in such a place was mitigated by some non-financial benefits.
‘Anything else you can tell me? Did she have any friends?’ pressed Hammett.
‘No, she kept herself to herself. Didn’t get involved with any of the guys working there. I think she’s a bit strange.’
Hammett didn’t disagree with the Italian on that one. Dain Collins was strange. He waited for a moment then said, ‘There was no one special then?’
The Italian thought for a moment. Then a light appeared in his eyes as he remembered something that might be important.
