This Way for a Shroud

by James Hadley Chase

III

  Close by the forty-foot-high diving-board, Doc Holmes, the two interns, a photographer and four policemen stood on the edge of the swimming-pool, looking down at the water. That section of the water was dyed crimson, the rest of the water was a vivid blue.

  As Bardin and Conrad came through the cocktail lounge on to the blue-tiled surround of the pool, Bardin said, “I’ve had one look at this, and I can’t say I’m looking forward to seeing it again.”

  They joined the group under the diving-board.

  “Well, there she is,” Bardin went on, and waved his hand to the water.

  Paul looked at the headless, naked body that lay on the floor of the shallow end of the pool. The savage way it had been mutilated made his stomach suddenly contract.

  “Where’s the head?” he asked, turning away.

  “I left it where I found it. It was on a table in one of the changing-rooms. Want to look at it?”

  “No, thank you. You’re sure it’s June Arnot?”

  “No doubt about it.”

  Conrad turned to Doc Holmes.

  “Okay, Doc, I’ve seen all I want to are. You can get busy now. You’ll let me have a copy of your report?”

  Doc Holmes nodded.

  Bardin said, “Okay, boys, get her out. Careful how you handle her.”

  Three of the policemen moved forward reluctantly. One of them pushed a long boat-hook into the water and groped for the body.

  “Let’s talk to Fedor while this is going on,” Conrad said. “Have him up to the house, will you?”

  Bardin sent one of the policemen to fetch Fedor.

  As he and Conrad mounted the steps on their way back to the house, he asked, “Well, what do you make of it so far?”

  “Looks to me as if it was done by someone who is a fairly frequent visitor to the house. The fact he was admitted by the guard puts him out of the stranger class, and the fact he wiped out the whole of the staff who probably could have identified him, points to it too.”

  “Unless some maniac got in and ran amok.”

  “The guard wouldn’t have opened the gates to him.”

  “He might have. Depends on the story the guy told him.”

  As they reached the house two policemen came through the front entrance, carrying a stretcher on which was a covered body.

  That’s the lot, Lieutenant,” one of them said. The house is clear now.”

  Bardin grunted and walked up the steps and down into the patio.

  “Do you think Fedor’s in the clear?” Conrad asked as he sat down in a basket chair.

  “He’s not the type to cut loose like this. Besides, if he did do it, he’d have to have a damned strong motive. She was his only client, and he made a small fortune out of her.”

  “A woman like her would have a lot of enemies,” Conrad said, stretching out his long legs. “Whoever did it certainly hated her guts.”

  “She seems to have had some pretty horrible acquaintances,” Bardin said, rubbing his hand across his eyes. “From the hints I’ve picked up from time to time, there was nothing too bad for her to dabble in. Did you know she was supposed to be a special friend of Jack Maurer?”

  Conrad stiffened to attention.

  “No. How special?”

  Bardin grinned. Thought that would make you sit up. I can’t swear to it, but I’ve heard plenty of rumours. She kept it very quiet, but the story has it they were lovers.”

  “I wish I could believe that. This is the kind of job Maurer might pull. He’s ruthless enough. Remember that gang massacre he engineered a couple of years back? Seven men machine-gunned against a wall?”

  “We don’t know for certain Maurer did pull that one,” Bardin said cautiously.

  “Who else did, then? Those men were muscling in on his territory. He had everything to gain by getting rid of them.”

  “The Captain wasn’t convinced. He thought it was Jacobi’s mob trying to hang something on Maurer.”

  “He knows what I think of that cockeyed theory. It was Maurer, and this killing could fit Maurer too.”

  “You’ve got a bug about Maurer,” Bardin said, shrugging. “I believe you’d sell your soul to get him behind bars.”

  “I don’t want him behind bars,” Conrad said, a sudden savage note in his voice. “I want him in the chair. He’s been in the world a damned sight too long.”

  A policeman came to the patio door, coughed and jerked his thumb expressively.

  “Here’s Mr. Fedor, sir.”

  Conrad and Bardin got to their feet.

  Harrison Fedor, June Arnot’s publicity manager, came across the mosaicpaved floor with a bouncing little rush. He was a small thin man with steady hard eyes, a rat-trap of a mouth and lantern jaws. He grabbed Conrad’s hand and shook it violently.

  “Nice to see you here. What’s been happening? Is June all right?”

  “Far from it,” Conrad said quietly. “She’s been murdered: she and the whole staff.”

  Fedor gulped and his face sagged, then he got hold of himself and sat down in one of the basket chairs.

  “You mean she’s dead?”

  “She’s dead all right.”

  “For God’s sake!” Fedor took off his hat and ran his fingers through his thinning locks. “Dead, eh? Well, goddamn it! I can’t believe it.”

  He stared first at Bardin, then at Paul. Neither of the men said anything. They waited.

  “Murdered!” Fedor went on after a pause. “What a sensation this is going to be! Phew! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.”

  “What does that mean?” Bardin growled, his face heavy with disapproval.

  Fedor grinned wryly.

  “As you didn’t have to work for her for five interminable years you couldn’t know what it means.” He leaned forward and jabbed his forefinger in Bardin’s direction. “I’ll be damned if I’ll cry. Maybe I’ve lost my meal ticket, but I’ve also lost a goddamned pain in the neck. That bitch has been riding me to death. It was either her or me in the long run. I’ve got an ulcer because of her. You don’t know what I’ve had to put up with from that woman!”

  “Someone hacked her head off,” Conrad said quietly. “Not content with that, he ripped her as well. Can you think of anyone who would do that to her?”

  Fedor’s eyes popped.

  “Good grief! Hacked her head off! For God’s sake! Why did he do that?”

  “For the same reason he ripped her: he didn’t like her. Know anyone who’d dive off the deep end like that?”

  Fedor’s eyes suddenly shifted.

  “Can’t say I do. Hell! Have the press got this yet?”

  “No, and they won’t get it until I have some more facts to work on,” Bardin said grimly. “Now look, if you do know someone who might fit, you’d better spill it. The quicker we shut this case down, the better for everyone, including you.”

  Fedor hesitated, then shrugged."I guess that’s right. Ralph Jordan was her current lover. They have been having some mighty awful quarrels recently. This picture he’s making with June is his last. Pacific Pictures have torn up his contract. They’ve had more than enough of him.”

  “Why?” Conrad asked, lighting a cigarette.

  “He’s been living on a diet of reefers for the past six months, and boy! does that guy hit the roof after a reefer session!”

  “In what way?”

  “He runs amok.” Fedor took out his handkerchief and blotted his face with it. “He set fire to one of the studios the week before last. Then last week, at Maurice Laird’s swim party, he started something that took Laird everything he had to hush up. Jordan had some kind of acid he went around splashing on the girl’s swim-suits. The stuff started burning, and Bingo! there were no swim-suits. You’ve never seen anything like it. Some thirty of our best-known stars were running around without a stitch on. Okay, it was pretty funny for us guys, and we appreciated the joke until we found the stuff hadn’t only taken off the swimsuits. It took off a few yards of skin as well. Five girls had to g
o to hospital. They were in a terrible state. If Laird hadn’t paid up handsomely Jordan would have been prosecuted. Next morning Laird tore up his contract.”

  Conrad and Bardin exchanged glances.

  “Sounds as if we might go along and talk to this guy,” Bardin said.

  “For the love of mike don’t tell him I said anything about him,” Fedor said feverishly. “I’ve enough on my hands without having to cope with him.”

  “Apart from Jordan,” Conrad said, “does anyone else come to your mind who might have done this?”

  Fedor shook his head.

  “No. Most of June’s friends were pretty rotten, but not all that rotten.”

  “Is there anything in the story that she and Jack Maurer were lovers?”

  Fedor suddenly looked down at his hands. A cold, remote expression came over his face.

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “You could make a guess. Did she ever mention Maurer to you?”

  “No.”

  “Did you ever hear his name coupled with her?”

  “I guess not.”

  “Did you ever see him with her?”

  “No.”

  Conrad looked across at Bardin.

  “Isn’t it wonderful that as soon as Maurer’s name is mentioned everyone clams up? You’d think the guy didn’t exist.”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” Fedor said hastily. “If I knew anything I’d tell you. I don’t know a thing about Maurer except what I’ve read in the papers.”

  “The same old song and dance,” Conrad said in disgust. “One of those days, with any luck, I’ll come across someone with a little guts who isn’t scared of Maurer, and who knows something : one of these days but, God knows when.”

  “Take it easy,” Bardin said. “If the guy doesn’t know he doesn’t know.”

  Sergeant O’Brien came down .the steps of the patio.

  “Can I have a word, Lieutenant?”

  Bardin took his arm and walked with him into the lounge.

  “Stick around,” Paul said to Fedor, and went after them.

  “He’s found the gun,” Bardin said, his heavy face more cheerful. He held out a .45 Colt automatic. “Look at this.”

  Conrad took the gun and examined it. Engraved on the butt were the initials R.J.

  “Where did you find it?” he asked O’Brien.

  “In the shrubbery about thirty yards from the main gate. I’ll bet a dollar it’s the gun. It’s empty; it’s been fired very recently, and it’s a .45.”

  “Better get it checked, Sam.”

  Bardin nodded. He handed the gun to O’Brien.

  “Take it down to headquarters and have it checked against the slug you’ve found.” He turned to Conrad. “R.J. That’s easy, isn’t it? Looks like I’ve got me an open and shut case. Looks like Jordan’s got some talking to do. Coming?”

  IV

  According to Fedor, Ralph Jordan had a penthouse apartment on Roosevelt Boulevard. He had taken the apartment soon after June Arnot had got rid of her Hollywood home, and although he had kept on his own luxurious home in Beverly Hills, he seldom lived there.

  Conrad swung the car up the circular drive leading to Jordan’s apartment block and pulled up in the shadows. Near by was a row of garage lock-ups. A big black Cadillac, parked half in and half out of one of the lock-ups attracted his attention.

  “Someone wasn’t looking where he was driving,” he said as he got out of the car. He walked over to the lock-up. Bardin followed him.

  The Cadillac’s off-side wing had crashed against the side of the lock-up, splintering the wood. The wing was pushed in and the off-side headlamp was smashed.

  Bardin opened the car door and inspected the registration tag.

  “Might have guessed it,” he said. “Jordan’s car. Who said he wasn’t hopped to the eyebrows?”

  “Well, at least he’s home,” Conrad returned, and walked over to the entrance to the apartment block. He pushed through the revolving doors into the lobby, followed by Bardin.

  A stout pink-and-white reception clerk in a faultlessly fitting tuxedo rested two small white hands on the polished top of the reception desk and raised his pale eyebrows at Conrad with a touch of hauteur.

  “Is there something I can do?”

  Bardin pushed his bulk forward. He flashed his buzzer and scowled. When he wanted to, he could look tough and ferocious, and he was looking tough and ferocious now.

  “Lieutenant Bardin, City police,” he said in a grating voice. “Jordan in?”

  The reception clerk stiffened. His small hands fluttered.

  “If you mean Mr. Ralph Jordan; yes, he is in. Did you wish to see him?”

  “When did he get in?”

  “Just after eight o’clock.”

  “Was he drunk?”

  “I’m afraid I didn’t notice.” The shocked expression on the clerk’s face made Conrad grin.

  “What time did he go out?”

  “Just after six.”

  “He’s on the top floor, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. We’re going up. Keep your hands off the telephone if you know what’s good for you. This is a surprise visit. Anyone up there with him?”

  “Not as far as I know.”

  Bardin grunted, then tramped across the pile carpet that covered the halfacre of lobby to the elevator.

  “So he went out just after six and got back at eight. That would have given him plenty of time to get to Dead End, do the job and get back again,” he said as the elevator took them swiftly and silently to the top floor.

  “Keep your eye on him,” Conrad cautioned as the elevator doors slid back. “If he’s still hopped up he may be dangerous.”

  “He won’t be the first hop-head I’ve had to handle, and I bet he won’t be the last — worse luck.”

  Bardin paused outside the front door to the apartment.

  “Hello: the door’s open.”

  He thumbed the bell-push. Somewhere in the apartment a bell rang sharply. Bardin waited a moment then shoved the front door wide open with his foot and looked into the small lobby.

  A door facing them stood ajar.

  They waited another moment or so, then Bardin walked into the lobby and pushed open the inner door.

  They looked into a big, airy lounge, ablaze with lights. Wine-coloured curtains covered the windows. The walls were grey. There were armchairs, settees, a table or two and a well-equipped cocktail-bar. A television set and a radiogram stood side by side, and on the mantelpiece were glass ornaments, beautifully fashioned and blatantly obscene. Bardin stood looking round, breathing heavily through his nostrils.

  “Isn’t it wonderful how these punks live?” he said savagely. “The guy who said virtue is its own reward should take a look at this joint.”

  “Your time will come when you get to heaven,” Conrad said with a grin. “You’ll be given a gold-plated revolver and diamonds on your badge. Doesn’t seem to be anyone around.”

  “Hey! Anyone here?” Bardin bawled in a voice that rattled the windows.

  The silence that greeted his shout was as solid and as engulfing as a snowdrift, and as cold.

  They exchanged glances.

  “Now what?” Bardin said. “Think he’s hiding up some place?”

  “Maybe he went out again.”

  “That queen would have seen him go.”

  “Then let’s take a look.”

  Conrad crossed the room, rapped on a door to the left, turned the handle and looked into a big airy bedroom. The only furniture except for a white pile carpet was a twelve-foot-wide bed that stood on a two-foot-high dais and looked as lonely as a lighthouse.

  “No one here,” Conrad said as he walked into the room.

  “Try the bathroom,” Bardin said, his voice sharpening.

  They crossed the room to the bathroom door and opened it. They looked into the most elaborately equipped bathroom they had ever seen, but their eyes had no interest for the luxury nor the
glittering plumbing. Their attention became riveted on the sunken bath.

  Ralph Jordan lay in the waterless bath, his head sunk on his chest. He was wearing a wine-coloured dressing-gown over a pair of pale blue lounging pyjamas. The walls of the bath and the front of his dressing-gown were stained red. He held in his right hand an old-fashioned cut-throat razor. The blood on the thin blade looked like scarlet paint.

  Bardin pushed past Conrad and touched Jordan’s hand.

  “Deader than a joint of beef: chilled beef at that.”

  He took hold of a long lock of Jordan’s hair and lifted his head.

  Conrad grimaced as he caught sight of the deep gash across Jordan’s throat: so deep it had severed the wind-pipe.

  “Well, that’s that,” Bardin said, stepping back. “Like I said: an open and shut case. He went out there, knocked her off, then came back here and cut his throat. Very considerate of him. It makes a nice tidy job — for me, anyway.” He groped for a cigarette, lit it and blew a cloud of smoke into the dead man’s face. “Looks like Doc Holmes is going to have a busy night.”

  Conrad was moving around the bathroom. He discovered an electric razor on the wall.

  “Odd he should have a cut-throat razor. You’d have to go to a good many homes these days to find one, and you wouldn’t have thought Jordan would have kept one so handy.”

  Bardin groand.

  “Now don’t start lousing up the issue. Maybe the guy cut his corns with it: people do.” He pushed open a door by the head of the bath and looked into an elaborately equipped dressing-room. On a chair was a suit, shirt and silk underwear. A pair of brogue shoes and socks lay near by.

  Conrad walked into the room, then came to a sudden standstill.

  “Now this will make you really happy, Sam,” he said, and waved to a bloodstained object on the floor.

  Bardin joined him.

  “Well, I’ll be damned! A machete!” He knelt beside the razor-sharp knife. “I bet it’s the murder weapon. It’s just the thing to cut someone’s head off with, and it would lay a belly open like you open a door.”

  “It wouldn’t interest you to wonder why a guy like Jordan should have a South American jungle knife in his possession?”

  Bardin sat back on his heels. His grin made him look like a wolf.