"I wouldn't know," Margot said and yawned widely. "So if it wasn't Earl Harvey, then who was it? Or do you
think they aren't dead at all—Paul was just kidding and Tybolt's decapitation was all done by mirrors?"
I walked up and down beside the bed, beating my brains into a souffle. Three suspects, Chase had said, only three with no alibi at all for Tybolt's murder. So if I eliminated Harvey, I had a choice between Kasplin and Helen Mills, and there wasn't much to choose between them. A couple of weirdos with enough neuroses to keep a private sanitarium working a double shift for the next twenty years. Neither of them would need a logical motive to murder even—so maybe I should stop looking for one.
Better, I should go back to the beginning and start over, look at it from their viewpoint. It started with the Pekingese, Niki, who was stolen, killed, and returned to Donna Alberta in a gift-wrapped package, then— The sudden horrible realization of what I was doing hit me right between the eyes. Danny Boyd—the profile—the guy no dame can resist, was pacing up and down the floor muttering to himself while right beside him a beautiful, non-resisting dame patiently waited.
I turned toward the bed, tilting my head a little so she'd get the profile kind of head on and full impact; then I smiled with all the warmth and appreciation of a guy who feels honored by the nonresistance of a beautiful doll Hke her.
"Honey," I said tenderly, "I must have been out of my mind—^forgive me?"
Margot lay with her head averted from me and didn't answer. I leaned closer and said, "Margot—honey?" There was still no answer. I leaned closer still until my lips were touching her small, shell-pink ear. "Margot, darling, I know I was crazy, but give me the chance to make up for it?"
If she wanted to play it cute I didn't really mind—I put my hand under her chin and turned her head gently toward me. Her face was completely relaxed, the eyes closed, her lips parted in a tender smile.
A couple of seconds later I switched out the light and went out to the lonely couch in the Uving room. You can get around most any objection a girl can offer except one —a snore is final.
Chapter Eleven
I WAS IN THE KITCHEN, THE FORTIFIED
vitamin mixture already made and the coffee about right, when Margot appeared in the doorway. She wore my silk robe and it looked better on her than me, Uke it does with all the girls.
"Good morning," she smiled sleepily. "Did the Great Brain solve the mystery last night?"
"You snore," I said coldly.
"I was stood up." Her smile retrogressed rapidly to a giggle. "It served you right!"
She saw the vitaminized mixture and poured herself a glass, with a hungry glint in her eyes. "I die without orange-juice in the mornings," she said, then drank it down in one gulp.
I watched the sequence of reactions flit across her face, starting with doubt and finishing with horror.
"What did you put into it?" she asked finally in a strangled voice.
"It's not orange juice," I said reproachfully. "It's the stuff I use to clean the silver."
For a moment she paled, then the mixture hit the spot and an appreciative look came into her eyes. "I think I could use another one," she said casually. Her hand grabbed the jug a full second ahead of mine.
I tried to get along with a cup of coffee and was making out by the time she'd emptied the whole damn
jug.
"That's terrific, Danny-boy!" she said brightly. "You'll
have to give me the formula!" She lifted her arms above her head and stretched luxuriantly. "I feel great!"
"You need food," I said tersely. "There's some in the icebox, I think."
"Coffee will be fine," she said.
My second cup tasted better and I figured I could maybe survive without the vitamins after all, and Ht a cigarette to keep the coffee company. Then I got that uneasy feeling of being closely watched by something outside the barriers of the normal world. I Ufted my head sharply and found Margot's eyes staring into mine with a glittering intensity.
"Danny," she said throatily, "I've got so many vitamins, they're going to waste!"
"Don't brag!" I snarled.
Her smile was much too brilliant for nine-thirty in the morning. "Don't be a piker, Danny-boy, Danny-the-Brain—the slowpoke ole lover! Let's go put them cute little vitamins to work, huh, Danny?"
"Stop kidding yourself," I told her. "You're mistaking a large slug of gin for vitamins. All you've got is calories— lots of energy but no staying power. Drink some coffee!"
"You're real romantic in the mornings!" she said acidly.
"I got work to do," I explained. "That thinking last night lost me a thousand clams of your money—I have to get it back."
"That's why you're all dressed and everything?" she asked cleverly.
"Check," I said patiently. "You just sit and drink coffee for a while."
I went out to the living room and called the office. Fran answered in her cool, drawling voice that always tones up my vertebrae.
"Somewhere," I said solemnly, "in this vast city a lonely woman lies in a hospital bed—"
"Pardon me, Mr. Boyd," Fran interrupted efficiently, "but don't you mean *lay'—the generic term for most of your female friends?"
"Not this time," I said honestly. "This one's name is Marge Harvey and my guess is she's the older sister of Mack the Knife. She's been hospitalized the last twenty-four, thirty-six hours with suspected pneumonia."
"You left her out in the cold?" Fran said sadly. "Mr. Boyd—I'm surprised!"
"I left her in the tunnel of love," I said happily, "but you wouldn't beheve that."
"If I can believe what happened at the opera last night, I guess I can believe that," Fran said. "It must have been some night."
"I'll tell you all about it, honey, but not now," I said impatiently. "This Marge Harvey is important, Fran—I want you to find out where she is. Then ask the hospital if I can see her sometime around noon. If they make it tough say I'm her lawyer and it's vital she sign some document—you know, make it up as you go along but make it sound real good."
"Will do," Fran said crisply. "Where do I find you?"
"Don't bother," I said, "I'll be in the office around eleven-thirty."
I got the .38 Masterpiece and its harness out of the bureau and strapped it under my coat not that I figured I'd need the gun; it was a precaution in case Earl Harvey should get real stupid. On my way out of the apartment, I looked in on the kitchen again.
Margot was drinking coffee, a morose look on her face.
"How about my protection?" she asked icily.
"Lock the door after I'm gone," I said. "Don't open it to anyone—I've got a key."
"Your trouble is you don't have a soul," she said in a brooding voice. "What's wrong with calories?"
Helen Mills opened the door of the Towers suite a half-hour later and her eyes frosted over when she saw me.
"Miss Alberta can see no one today," she said in her prim, schoolmarmish voice. "She's still prostrate with nervous shock. I would have thought that even you, Mr. Boyd, would have shown some feeling after the dreadful thing that happened to her last night!"
"Did it happen after she got back here?" I asked with keen interest. "Or in the cab maybe?"
Her mouth was suddenly ugly as she pushed the door shut—I leaned my shoulder against it and pushed it open again.
"It's you I want to see, Helen," I told her. "It's about time we had a confidential chat."
"I've nothing to say to you!" she said wildly. "If you don't go away I'll—"
I walked past her into the living room and sat down on the couch. She fumbled uselessly with the doorknob for a few moments, then shut the door quietly and came toward me with an uncertain look in her magnified eyes.
"If this is some excuse to try and see Donna—after your bestial behavior the last time—I'll—"
"Sit down and relax," I said harshly. "I'm visiting with you, Helen!"
"Ssh!" She held a finger against her lips wa
rningly. "Not so loud—Donna's resting now and I don't want her disturbed."
"O.K." I said softly. "Maybe Lieutenant Chase didn't tell you last night, but he narrowed down the suspects to three—all the others had unshakable alibis for the time of Rex Tybolt's death."
"No," she whispered. "He didn't."
"Earl Harvey, Kasplin, and yourself," I added.
"Me?" Her sallow cheeks flushed faintly. "But that's ridiculous, I was in Donna's dressing room the whole time —I told him so."
"Alone," I said. "He's only got your word for it."
She shrugged her shoulders under the large collar of the sensible, modest overblouse of her tweedy suit.
"Two murders," I said apologetically. "So much happening so fast, I'd almost forgotten the dog."
"Little Niki," she whispered with a faint sigh of regret in back of her voice.
"It shows how stupid I can get," I went on in a pleasant, low-pitched monotone. "Just because I had no reason to think you could possibly have a motive for inflicting pain on Donna Alberta, I didn't even question that wild story you told about how the dog was stolen!"
She sank slowly to the edge of the nearest chair, her body bent toward me, and her hands held neatly in her lap with the fingers interlocked.
"I don't understand you, Mr. Boyd," she whispered nervously. "What do you mean?"
"You must remember it," I chuckled. "All that way-
out jazz about the guy calling you—^for Miss Alberta and from the theater—she wanted Niki down there right away and they'd send a messenger over to collect him. The messenger bit was even better—some man in a uniform—you didn't remember the company or what kind of uniform. You didn't even remember what the guy looked like, if he was tall, short, thin, fat, old, young —^because he never existed outside your own imagination!"
"It was the truth," she said in a ragged voice. "What are you trying to do to me, Mr. Boyd?"
"I didn't know then what kind of a woman Donna Alberta really is," I said coldly. "She's a temperamental sadist—the savage Salome who wants everybody's head on a silver platter! She knew the way you felt about her and she delighted in having you around her the whole time—close but still a million light years away from the relationship you desired. My guess is she'd taunt you with continual stories of her love affairs—the men in her life. Donna had you hopping crazy, and when she couldn't resist taking Paul Kendall away from Margot Lynn, it was the last straw. You couldn't take it any more. You had to stop her before Kendall was visiting with her in the afternoons and you were banished from the suite—and afterwards you'd have to listen to her graphic detailed description of their love-making."
"Stop it!" she said hysterically. "I won't listen! I won't hear any more of your foul, filthy—" She pressed the palms of her hands against her burning cheeks and shook her head in a frenzied denial.
"You have to listen, Helen," I said easily, "because it's the truth."
"Lies," she sobbed. "Nothing but filthy lies. I won't listen—you can't make me—I won't, I won't, I won't!"
"All right," I agreed. "If you won't listen—maybe Donna Alberta will."
She lifted her head suddenly and stared at me fixedly, the naked terror in her eyes rubbed to a shining brightness.
"Tell Donna that I—" The apple in her throat leaped convulsively. "You couldn't do that, Mr. Boyd. You wouldn't—for my sake?"
The tweedy skirt murmured impatiently as she sank
slowly to her knees in front of me. I saw the look in her eyes and heard the infinite horror in back of her softly pleading voice—I felt like a monster, a child-eater, a parricide. Her hands moved in quick, darting gestures, pleading more eloquently than her voice.
"I don't have to tell Donna Alberta anything," I said desperately, "if you'll tell me the truth."
Her hands dropped slowly to her side, then she lifted herself painfully back onto the edge of the chair.
"All right," she said dully. "I made up the story— all of it. There was no phone call and no messenger. But I didn't know he was going to harm little Niki—^you must believe that! I swear it's the truth, he said he'd just keep him for a few days until Donna lost interest in Paul Kendall, then he'd return the dog."
"He?" I queried.
"Rex Tybolt." She made a painful grimace. "I guess that's almost funny in a way—^both of us had the same problem—we both loved Donna and she knew it. So she enjoyed tormenting Rex almost as much as she enjoyed tormenting me!"
"What happened after the dead dog was returned?"
She shook her head wearily. "I thought I'd go out of my mind! Rex deliberately wouldn't come near me for the first two days—he ran whenever he saw me coming. Then I finally cornered him at a rehearsal and he swore he hadn't killed Niki—^it was someone else. I didn't believe him, naturally, and I got a little hysterical about it. So then he told me to keep my mouth shut because I was just as deeply involved as he was—he was right, there was nothing I could do!"
There was a harsh, rattling sound from somewhere in back of me. Helen's face was a tight mask of fear as her pupils dilated rapidly. Her lips moved slowly framing the one word over and over again—"No, no, no—" in a soundless prayer beyond hope.
I stood up quickly and turned around, my nerve ends prickling for a moment while I wondered what in hell was making that rattling sound.
Donna Alberta was halfway across the room, walking with a slow, deliberate tread. The silver-blonde hair hung down below her shoulders, and she wore a white satin
bra that looked ridiculous in its attempt to confine the massive swell of her breasts—almost as ridiculous as the delicately woven panties in their pathetic attempt to gird her Junoesque loins.
Her eyes were wide open in a fixed, trancelike stare, and she seemed unconscious of the gurgling, rattling sounds she made in her throat. A dog leash of finely plaited leather, with a nickel buckle at the end, dangled loosely from her right hand. I didn't need to be psychic to figure out it once belonged to Niki.
"She knows!" Helen Mills's voice came back to her in a squeaking treble. "She was listening the whole time—she'll km me!"
"Donna!" I said sharply as she drew level with me. "Donna—listen!"
She brushed past without giving any sign she'd heard my voice—or even seen me. Helen Mills got up from her chair as the prima donna got close to her, then bowed her shoulders submissively.
"You filth!" Donna Alberta spat the word at her thickly, then her right arm lifted and the leash flailed through the air.
I figured it was a situation beyond tact, one that called for direct action. My old man always told me never hit a lady—leastwise while she's looking. Once in a long time he made sense; I slammed my fist down onto the nape of her neck and for a moment nothing happened.
Her right arm continued through its arc so the plaited leather made a sharp, explosive noise as it curled around Helen's shoulders. Her face twisted with the pain while her lips shaped a mute scream. I raised my fist again, then stopped it in mid-air.
The leash dropped from Donna's hand as she swayed on her feet for a moment before she toppled slowly forward onto the carpet, and lay motionless in an untidy arrangement of gleaming planes and wanton spheres.
Helen stared down at her for a long moment, then lifted her head inquiringly.
"She'll be O.K.," I said briskly. "You'd better get out of here before she wakes up."
"I'll get my things," she whispered. "Go to another hotel."
"Sure," I said. "You're all right for money?"
"Oh, yes," she nodded vaguely. "Plenty."
"Then start moving!" I rasped.
It took her a couple of minutes to pack a bag, then I walked with her to the door.
"I'll send for the rest of my things," she said in a dutiful voice. "I've got enough with me to last a few days."
"Sure," I said, then let her out the door first real polite, taking a last look at Donna before I shut the door tight.
I caught up with Helen Mills at the elevator. He
r eyes were mildly reproachful under the heavy lenses when she saw me beside her again.
"I didn't know you were leaving now, Mr. Boyd. Are you sure Donna will be all right?"
"I'm sure," I said tersely. "She's got the stamina of a water buffalo—a team of water buffalo yet!"
"I don't mean to be rude," she said plaintively, "but I hoped you'd wait until she woke up—^just to be sure."
"You're kidding," I said, gaping at her. "She'd tear me into little pieces!"
The elevator door opened smoothly and I followed Helen inside. She smiled politely at the operator as we dropped toward the first floor, her fingers absently tweaking the large collar of her overblouse into its proper shape. She walked out of the elevator two paces ahead of me and kept the same distance between us aU the way to the Fiftieth Street exit. Then she stopped and turned around, holding out her hand politely.
"Goodbye, Mr. Boyd," she said in a formal voice. "I don't expect we'll see one another again."
"You sure you're O.K.?" I asked limply.
"Oh, perfectly!" She smiled tolerantly. "I can look after myself, I assure you, Mr. Boyd." Then the smile faded slowly as she spoke almost to herself. "Somehow it always seems to end up the same way, but it's a pity, a great pity!"
"Sure," I muttered.
"Donna will miss me, you know?" The smile flashed back on her face. "She's such a baby in so many things.
But there—I always said no good comes of keeping an animal in an apartment." She leaned forward suddenly, her lips close to my ear.
"It's unhygenic!" she confided in a modest whisper.
Chapter Twelve
"you can have five minutes, MR. BOYD,"
the nurse said with professional briskness. "Miss Harvey isn't really up to visitors at all, but we made an exception in your case because of the urgent need. Your secretary explained the legal complications involved."
"She's a very intelligent girl," I said truthfully.
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