1979 - A Can of Worms

by James Hadley Chase

  “I can’t just drop in.” I explained to her about the security of Paradise Largo.

  “Man! What it is to be rich!” Bertha sighed.

  “Sure is. So I’ll have to wait for the dust to settle, then I’ll try getting him on the phone. I’m not going to write . . . that’s evidence if it turns sour.”

  She continued to eat, but I could see by her frown she was thinking. When she laid down her fork, after making sure there wasn’t a morsel left, she said, “Attend the funeral.”

  “What the hell should I be doing attending Penny Highbee’s funeral?”

  “Didn’t your Agency ever do work for Highbee?”

  “Come to think of it, a good dozen jobs.”

  “So . . . showing the Agency’s respects.”

  “What makes you think Hamel will be there?”

  “Bart! If he isn’t, it doesn’t matter. If he is, you tell him you need to see him urgently. He’ll fix a date. Anyway, it’s worth a try, isn’t it?”

  I didn’t dig the idea, but decided it would be better than trying to get through on the telephone. .

  “I don’t know where the funeral is to be or where.”

  “God give me strength!” Bertha moaned. “You’re a goddamn detective, aren’t you? Find out!”

  * * *

  Glenda Kerry looked up from the mail spread out on her desk and gave me her cool, impersonal stare.

  “Hi, delicious,” I said. “Here I am: all ready for work. What’s cooking?”

  “You have the Solly Herschenheimer stint, starting at midday today.”

  I stared at her.

  “You wouldn’t be kidding?”

  “They asked for you. Why, I can’t imagine. I was going to give it to Chick, but they wanted you.”

  “Is this good news! Naturally, they wanted me: I’m educated and handsome. Okay, I’ll be there dead on the nail.”

  The Solly Herschenheimer stint, as it was known in the Agency, came around every year. It was the softest job the Agency had ever landed. I never found out what Herschenheimer had to pay, but I was sure it was plenty.

  That didn’t worry me: the job was a pushover and the food out of this world.

  Solly Herschenheimer was an enormously wealthy eccentric with a rooted idea that he was in constant danger of being assassinated. No one, including Chief of Police Terrell, was able to convince him otherwise. He refused to name his enemies, and the general opinion was that he was a harmless nut case. He lived like a recluse and employed two bodyguards who were supposed to be on constant watch against an attack. When the time came for one of the bodyguards to take his vacation, the Parnell Agency was called in to supply a substitute. I had been lucky the previous year to get the job, and now, I was getting it again.

  The job was a vacation in itself. There was nothing to do except wander around the grounds of the big house, watch T. V. in the evenings and eat enormous luxury meals Herschenheimer’s butler, Jarvis, provided. The only drawback to the job was the old nut frowned on liquor, but the guards supplied their own, and no bones were broken.

  At the end of two weeks, when the guard returned, the substitute received a $200 took which alone made the job the ambition of all operators working for the Agency. To land this plum twice running was indeed a gift from the gods.

  “You know Mr. Herschenheimer has moved residence?” Glenda asked.

  “I didn’t. Where’s he now?”

  “Paradise Largo. He’s been there for the past three months. That’s where you are to report.”

  I wondered immediately if his new place was near Hamel’s residence. With a feeling of excitement, I realized, working on the Largo, could give me the chance of calling on Hamel without attracting attention.

  The cards seemed to be falling my way.

  “Okay, lovely,” I said. “I’ll get moving.”

  I had learned from Fanny Battley that the Highbee funeral was taking place at 10.30. I would have time to attend, and still get to my new job by midday.

  As soon as I arrived at the cemetery, I saw that Bertha’s idea of contacting Hamel was a non-starter. At a rough guess, there were some three hundred mourners milling around. I waited, trying to look sorrowful, my eyes searching for Hamel. It was only after the burial that I did see him. He was with Nancy who was in total black. He had his arm around her as if supporting her.

  I edged my way through the crowd until I was close enough to get a good look at her. What I saw shocked me.

  She looked like a ghost: white, her eyes sunken, her lips trembling, and tears made her face glisten.

  I saw this was no time to ask Hamel for a date. As I began to move away, Nancy suddenly collapsed. Hamel caught her up in his arms and carried her down the pathway between the graves and to a waiting car.

  There was a movement in the crowd and a few hushed voices. I watched the car drive away.

  “Mr. Anderson . . .”

  I turned to find Mel Palmer regarding me.

  “A sad occasion, Mr. Anderson.” He looked as sad as a man who has picked up a $100 bill. “We all have but a short time to live . . . sad.”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’m afraid it has upset Mr. Hamel, but fortunately, his book is now finished.” Palmer positively beamed. “The book is a major triumph! The best he has ever written!”

  “Right now, he seems to have a problem with Mrs. Hamel. She seemed also upset.”

  “Yes . . . yes.” He was obviously not interested in Nancy. “But time is a great healer. She will make new friends.”

  Spotting someone he knew, he nodded to me and hurried away.

  I walked thoughtfully back to where I had parked the Maser. I was puzzled. I was certain Nancy was Lucia Pofferi: a vicious, two-time murderess, and yet I was sure her show of grief wasn’t faked. The answer to this oddity could be that Pofferi had given her no inkling he was going to kill the woman who had befriended her, but when the faked accident had happened, Nancy had guessed the truth. This could prove interesting. Would this ruthless act of murder turn her against Pofferi?

  I paused as I approached the Maser. I had reason to: Detective Tom Lepski was sitting in the passenger’s seat, his hat tipped over his eyes, a cigarette smouldering in his thin lips.

  Trouble? I wondered, and braced myself. I put on my well-what-do-you-know expression and reached the car.

  “Hi, Tom.”

  He pushed his hat to the back of his head and nodded.

  “You should always lock your car,” he said. “What’s the idea attending funerals?”

  To give myself time, I walked around the car and slid into the driving seat.

  “Highbee’s one of our clients,” I said as I settled. “The Colonel wanted to show respect. I bought it. What are you doing here?”

  “Looking.” Lepski scowled. “Between you and me, we don’t like this set up. We don’t think this guy was so drunk. There is a smell.”

  “Of what?”

  “We are not sure, but it could have been murder. We have a new witness: Ernie Thresher. He lives in an apartment in the highrise Mrs. Highbee was visiting.” He paused and looked sharply at me. “This is strictly off the record, Bart. We’re keeping Thresher under the wraps until we dig more. He swears this wasn’t a drunken accident. He was looking out of his window and saw the killer’s car parked at the end of the street. He wondered what the car was doing there. As soon as Mrs. Highbee came out, this car started up and drove like crazy; straight at her. She didn’t stand a chance.”

  I tried to look calmer than I felt.

  “Who would want to kill her?” I said.

  “That’s the problem. All the same, we like Thresher’s evidence. The other two witnesses contradict each other.

  Thresher has given us a description of the car and the number. We’ve checked. The car was stolen from Harry Dellish, the court reporter, from his garage on the night of this so-called accident. We’ve found the car, and it has a dented fender. Another interesting thing Thresher claims: the
driver was coloured.”

  Josh Jones! I thought, but kept my face deadpan.

  “So?”

  “So nothing so far.” Lepski looked disgusted. “It’s just a smell, but we’re working on it. Maybe, we’ll turn up something if we knew why anyone wanted to knock off a nice girl like Penny Highbee.”

  I felt a cold qualm. I could have told him. I could have told him who had done the job, but I knew, once I started giving information, I would be in trouble.

  “Maybe someone getting even with Highbee. As an attorney, he must have enemies.”

  “We thought of that, but Highbee is sure no coloured man had it in for him.” Lepski shrugged. “Well, we’re working on it.” He flicked his cigarette away, then asked, “And you, Bart? Did you have a good vacation?”

  “I’ll say. My girlfriend has a rich fink who lent her his yacht. Can you imagine: all for free.”

  He grinned sourly.

  “You have a way with women.” He brooded, then went on, “Did you hear about this second Indian boy who’s been knocked off?”

  I put on my for-God’s-sake expression.

  “I’ve been out of touch. A second Indian boy?”

  “Yeah. Tommy Osceola’s brother, Jimbo. Remember? Tommy was shot along with Pete.”

  “What happened?”

  “He was bashed over the head and tossed into the harbour. No one saw a thing.” He stared thoughtfully at me. “Something’s going on around here, Bart. Ever since Coldwell started this scare about Pofferi, we have had three murders and a suspect murder. I keep wondering if Pofferi is behind it all, but then I ask myself why a goddamn Italian terrorist should want to knock off an old drunk, two Indian kids, and Penny Highbee.”

  “You have a problem.” I looked at my watch. “I’ve got to go, Tom. Guess what? I’ve landed the Herschenheimer job again. Can I drive you any place?”

  “I’ve got my car.” Lepski slid out of the Maser.

  “The Herschenheimer job? Is that old nut still needing guards?”

  “He sure is: a sweet softie.”

  “See you, and Bart, if you get any ideas about this setup, pass them on. We need help.”

  He left me and walked to where he had parked his car.

  I wiped my face with my handkerchief. I didn’t have to spell it out to myself. If I had alerted Coldwell where Pofferi had been hiding, four people would still be alive, but by keeping my mouth shut, I had picked up $50,000.

  The thought gave me a qualm, then I thought that by still keeping my mouth shut, I stood a sweet chance of picking up a million dollars.

  Bart, baby, I said to myself, this isn’t the time to develop a conscience. You don’t pick up a million if you start considering other people. Remember what your old man used to say: A shut mouth is a wise mouth.

  So be wise, Bart, baby, be wise.

  I started the engine and drove away from the smell of funeral flowers and headed for Paradise Largo.

  Mike O’Flagherty welcomed me at the guardhouse.

  “You got the job?” he said, grinning. “I was told an operator from Parnell’s was coming. Brother! Have you picked a sweet one!”

  “Do I know it! Where do I find the old nut’s place?”

  “Right opposite Mr. Hamel’s residence.” Mike leaned against the Maser. “I’m real sorry for Mrs. Hamel. She lost her best friend in a car smash. She’s just back from the funeral: in a bad way. Dr. Hirsch was called. He arrived just five minutes ago. I like that lady. She’s real nice.”

  “Yeah,” I said, and wondered how he would react if I told him who Nancy really was. “I’ve got to get on, Mike. I don’t want to be late.”

  “Sure.” He raised the pole and I drove under it and to Hamel’s place. Right opposite was another set of high gates. I rang the bell and the gates swung back.

  Carl Smith, one of the guards who I had met the last time I had been on the job, shook hands.

  “Glad to see you, Bart,” he said. He was a big, fair, youngish man with freckles and a wide smile. “I was hoping they would send you.”

  “How’s the old nut?”

  “Just the same. Not causing any trouble. You eaten yet?”

  “I was betting on lunch here.”

  “You’ve won. Lunch will be in ten minutes.”

  “Jarvis still with you?”

  “You bet, and the chef’s as good as ever.”

  Leaving the car under the shade of the trees, we walked together to a cottage type of building. Beyond it, I could see the main residence. It was big: at least a sixteen bedroom house.

  “We work here,” Carl said, indicating the cottage. “No problem. We just sit and enjoy ourselves. No one can get on the Largo without authorization. The old nut doesn’t realize that otherwise we’d lose our jobs. No one is going to tell him.” He laughed. “Your hours, Bart, are from midday to midnight, then midnight to midday on alternate days. Okay?”

  “Suits me.”

  We went into the cottage. It consisted of one big room.

  Upstairs were two bedrooms and a bathroom. The sitting room was equipped with lounging chairs, a desk, and a T.V. set.

  “The one thing missing is the bar,” I said, looking around.

  Carl winked. He went to the desk and produced a bottle of Scotch. Going to a cupboard, he disclosed a small refrigerator.

  “We have to look after ourselves, Bart,” he said. “Have a drink?”

  While he was fixing the drinks, I went over to the window and looked across at the shut gates. I could just make out the top of Hamel’s roof. There was a big tree with spreading branches near the entrance to the Herschenheimer residence. I reckoned if I got up in those Branches I would be able to look directly into Hamel’s garden and house.

  Turning, I took the glass Carl offered me.

  Yes, I told myself, the cards are certainly falling my way.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  As soon as we had eaten an excellent lunch, Carl took himself off. I sat under the trees where I could see the house and the entrance gates, and made myself comfortable. I had Hamel on my mind. I now knew he had finished his book, and I remembered Palmer saying Hamel would pick up over eleven million dollars when the book was finished. So Hamel couldn’t plead poverty when I put on the bite. My thought now was when to bite him. Nancy had collapsed. Maybe this wasn’t the right time to approach Hamel. Maybe I had better wait. At the back of my mind, I knew I was kidding myself. It wasn’t because Hamel was having trouble with his wife that I was going to wait, it was because I was uneasy about putting pressure on him. He was nobody’s push-over. He was a toughie. He could tell me to go to hell, or even worse, call the cops, or do something desperate. I had an uneasy feeling he wouldn’t dig blackmail.

  My mind shifted to Bertha, and I grimaced. I then went into my usual technicolour dream of owning a million dollars. This time, I swore to myself, when I got the money, I wouldn’t spend like crazy. I would buy stock for my old age, and live on the income, but even as I swore, I knew the million would vanish as quickly as Diaz’s fifty thousand had vanished. Money just wouldn’t stay with me.

  Getting bored with my thoughts, I took a walk around the big garden. The flowers, the lawns, the shrubs were immaculate. A Chinese gardener, who looked like Judge Dee, was wagging his long beard over a bed of begonias.

  He gave me a squinting look of disinterest and returned to his beard wagging.

  The big swimming pool looked inviting, but lonely. I wondered if Herschenheimer ever used it. I doubted it. He would probably think someone might jump out of the bushes and drown him.

  I saw Jarvis, Herschenheimer’s butler, coming down the path towards me. Jarvis could have stepped out of the pages of Gone with the Wind. He was the most dignified old negro I have ever seen: tall, very thin, with crinkly white hair, large black eyes and heavy white eyebrows. He would have gladdened the heart of Scarlett O’Hara and the rest of her ilk. I had come to know him well when I last did this job, and I had found that he had an insatiable thirst fo
r crime stories. He would sit for hours, listening to my lies, believing every yarn I dreamed up, with me the central, daring hero, to be true. In return, he provided me with splendid food, and often a box of cigars he had filched from his master.

  His old face lit up with a wide smile when he saw me.

  “What a pleasure, Mr. Anderson,” he said, shaking hands. “I asked for you, but Miss Kerry wasn’t sure you would be back from your vacation. I’m so glad. Did you have an enjoyable time?”

  As we walked back to the cottage, I told him about the yacht, and about Bertha. He had heard from me about Bertha on my previous stint. I told him Bertha worked for the CIA, so anything I even hinted at about her, he absorbed with wide eyed interest.

  When I ran out of telling him lies about my own adventures, I switched to Bertha who, according to me, made Mata Hari look like a convent novice.

  We settled in the shade outside the cottage, and he began questioning me about what I had been doing.

  Having just read a Hadley Chase thriller, I outlined the plot to him, with me as a central character. When I had concluded, an hour later, he got reluctantly to his feet.

  “You live a most remarkable life, Mr. Anderson,” he said. “I must now attend to Mr. Herschenheimer’s tea. I have invited Mr. Washington Smith to have dinner with me at seven. Perhaps you would join us? Mr. Smith is Mr. Hamel’s butler. He comes over here during his hours off. He is a pleasant, well-spoken man.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Glad to.”

  “I’ll arrange to have the meal served in the cottage. It will be more convenient for you to keep an eye on possible intruders,” and he gave me a bass laugh to show he was joking.

  When he returned to the house, I walked down to the big tree by the entrance gates. It was screened from the house by other trees. I had no trouble swinging myself up to the lower branches, and from there, climbed up and up, until I was overlooking the high hedge that surrounded the Hamel residence.

  Sitting astride a branch with my back to the tree trunk, I looked down into the Hamel garden and the ranch style house.

  The Ferrari and the Ford wagon stood on the tarmac before the house. There was no sign of life. I sat there for the next two hours, but no one appeared. The house might have been empty.