Something the Cat Dragged In

by Charlotte MacLeod

  And this was the oaf who was clamoring to address the student body at Balaclava. In a way, Shandy thought it mightn’t be a bad idea. For one thing, there was the doctrine of free speech to consider. Claude was as entitled to spout his slimy rhetoric as anybody else. What they really ought to do was set up a debate with Sam Peters and invite the public. It would be interesting to see what happened.

  Claude would make mincemeat of Peters, that was what would happen. He’d flash that come-hither smile and toss his curls and finger his fancy tie and talk a lot of garbage that people who couldn’t listen and think at the same time would swallow hook, line, and sinker. On election day, there’d be good old Sam flat on his unhandsome face and Bertie packing his bags for Washington. Sam’s best and maybe his only hope was for the college to come out swinging on his side as they’d always done before. And how could they, with that silo ready to explode in their faces?

  Shandy was trying to recall precisely how the Silo Supporters’ idea had got started in the first place. The college had needed the silo, no question about that. There’d been money enough in the coffers at the time to build a new one, and the plans were already drawn up. The builders were ready to roll when, for some reason not even the bankers could explain, farmers around Balaclava County began having a hard time borrowing money. Families that had been managing nicely found themselves caught in a squeeze with sound credit but no cash to finance their spring plantings. Naturally they appealed to the college’s Endowment Fund, and naturally they got the help they needed.

  Shelling out so much so unexpectedly left the college pinched for cash, too. Svenson and the Board of Trustees had decided it would be foolhardy to embark on any new major expenditure until after the fall harvest when, God and the elements willing, the farmers would be solvent again and the loans paid back. By then, however, it would be too late to build the silo in time for it to house that year’s crop of ensilage. That raised the question of how the flaming hell they were going to winter over their newly augmented herds and flocks without putting the college in hock.

  Everybody in Balaclava County knew what was happening. Those who hadn’t been required to nick Svenson for a loan knew somebody who had, and those who’d been hoping to get short-term jobs working on the building of the new silo were loud in their disappointment. The trustees hadn’t even thought of appealing to the citizenry for help because it was a fundamental tenet laid down by Balaclava Buggins himself on that long-ago founding day that Balaclava Agricultural College wasn’t never going to ask nothing from nobody, but that didn’t prevent the aforesaid citizens themselves from volunteering.

  And volunteer they had. As soon as the word got around, a group of concerned neighbors, or so they’d described themselves, had clubbed together to form the Silo Supporters. Since the college was doing so much for the farmers, they clamored, it was no more than right the county should do something for the college. They’d seemed a well-meaning though somewhat bumble-headed lot. Even so, Shandy remembered, Thorkjeld Svenson had demurred until the Board of Trustees had decided what the hell, this bunch would never raise the price of a binful of concrete anyway and they might as well be given free rein.

  So the Silo Supporters, spearheaded by fluffy little Ruth Smuth, had started holding bake sales, barn sales, plant sales, book sales, all the different kinds of sales by which well-meaning volunteers raise a few hundred dollars, if they’re lucky, for a worthy cause.

  At first it had been rather touching and mildly amusing to watch the self-appointed do-gooders out on the lawns and commons peddling their homemade zucchini bread and hand-embroidered needle books. Shandy himself had contributed flats of seedlings and pots of geraniums to the plant sale. Every faculty family had cleaned out its attic, donated an armload of books, done something or other to further the cause, merely to show appreciation and not because they really expected anything to come of the project.

  But then, by George, the money had started piling up. Those amateurish little fund-raising events were bringing in sums that left everybody gasping, notably Ruth Smuth and the Silo Supporters. Serendipity ran rampant. For instance, some family moving out of town contributed a pile of stuff to a rummage sale. Most of it was junk, but among the heap were a pair of genuine Chippendale side tables. The donors had left no forwarding address and in the general confusion nobody could exactly recall who they were. There really hadn’t been a thing the sellers could do except regard the tables as manna from heaven and price them accordingly.

  That was no doubt the time somebody should have begun to smell a rat. Instead, the alleged windfall had served to turn enthusiasm into euphoria. After that, all Balaclava County was silo-happy. Ruth Smuth was everywhere, getting her picture plastered all over the Fane and Pennon as she tacked up yet another poster, sold yet another loaf of zucchini bread, or paid yet another tribute to the marvelous, fabulous, just too utterly darling folk of Balaclava.

  Jemima Ames had, to be sure, taken a dark view. Along with everybody else, Shandy had at the time put her waspish utterances down to pique at the fact that she herself hadn’t been quick enough to grasp the reins of command. To make a long story short, the college had got its money, got its silo, and was now getting the shaft. And how in thunderation was Peter Shandy going to bail out Thorkjeld Svenson and defuse Ruth Smuth?

  Chapter Seven

  THEY FINISHED THEIR MEAL and dispersed; Helen to observe developments with regard to Dr. Porble’s stiff upper lip, Peter to keep his appointment with Harry Goulson. He phoned down first to make sure Ottermole and Melchett would be on deck as scheduled, found they were even then closing in on the funeral parlor, and turned to Svenson.

  “Care to come to the private viewing?”

  “Ungh,” said Svenson, so they went. On the way down, Shandy filled the president in on what he and Mrs. Lomax had found out so far. Svenson listened without so much as a grunt until he’d run out of things to tell, then nodded.

  “Files. Had ’em.”

  Shandy was used to interpreting his superior’s gnomic utterances. “You mean you know for a definite fact Ungley kept things in that filing cabinet of his. How?”

  “Saw ’em.”

  Svenson took a few more giant steps, then condescended to utter. “Happened along the day Ungley was moving out of those old flats. Last one to leave, naturally. Demolition people standing around waiting. Movers bringing stuff out. Couldn’t manage that filing cabinet. Bunch of panty-waists. Took out the drawers and carried ’em one by one. Ungley having fits because it was raining a few drops and his blasted archives were getting wet. I went in and got the cabinet, shoved the drawers back in, and carried the damn thing down to Mrs. Lomax’s over my shoulder.”

  “The very model of a modern college president,” Shandy murmured. “All four of the drawers were more or less filled, would you say?”

  “Ungh.”

  “Old papers and stuff, I suppose?”

  “Don’t know. Didn’t notice. Wasn’t interested. Too damn glad to get rid of the old bastard. Pest. Bore. Expensive.”

  “Expensive?” That surprised Shandy. Svenson wasn’t one to toss words around lightly, if at all. Nor was he a skinflint about paying decent wages to his faculty members, much less coughing up a respectable pension for a superannuated professor. “What do you mean, expensive?”

  “Highest-paid man on the staff, God knows why. Wasn’t worth a plugged nickel. Squawked like hell at the size of his pension, too. Told him to take it or leave it. He took it. Too damn much as it was, damn it. What did Ungley need with all that money? No family, no house to keep up, not even a blasted goldfish to feed. No travel, no hobbies, no goddamn anything. Wouldn’t even buy his own books. Pinched ’em from the library till Porble got after him.”

  “M’yes, so Helen told us. Surely Ungley hadn’t really held a grudge against Porble all these years?”

  “Why not? Held everything else he could get his grabby mitts on. Still be holding on to his job if I hadn’t kicked him out. Did y
ou know not one single student had enrolled in his course for three solid years before I retired him?”

  “Er—no, I didn’t. Ungley was out before I ever got here, you know.”

  “Show you in the records.”

  “I’ll take your word for it. Yet you say Ungley was the highest-paid teacher on the faculty. That doesn’t make any sense, President.”

  “No. Damn it. Engberg was no fool.”

  Dr. Engberg had been Thorkjeld Svenson’s predecessor, though not for long. He’d been killed in an accident of some sort only a short time after he’d taken office. Shandy wasn’t sure of the details, since that, too, had occurred before he’d come to Balaclava. So it must have been the president before Engberg, old Dr. Trunk, who’d hired Ungley in the first place.

  “Was it Engberg or Trunk who gave Ungley so much money?” he asked.

  “Trunk. Signed a crazy yearly increment contract. Couldn’t be broken. Engberg tried. No go. Hodger.”

  “Do you mean Henry Hodger couldn’t break the contract, or that he drew it up?”

  “Drew. Tighter’n a bull’s crupper in fly time.”

  “That’s interesting. Hodger’s also a member of the Balaclavian Society, which appears to have been the only—er—meaningful relationship Ungley ever formed around these parts. So it’s dollars to doughnuts Hodger also drew up Ungley’s will, if he ever got around to making one. I think we’d better go and call on him, President.”

  “Now?”

  Svenson began veering leftward, toward the tomblike edifice of red brick and gray Quincy granite in which Hodger had maintained both his office and his living quarters since the beginning of recorded time. Shandy managed to head him off.

  “Not yet. There’s Melchett’s car pulling into Goulson’s driveway. No doubt he’s in a swivet to get back to his giblets and gallstones, so let’s not keep him waiting. Besides, I’m curious to see how he weasels out of his original willingness to pretend Ungley’s death was accidental.”

  They were almost to the funeral home when Fred Ottermole clanked up in the village’s only police cruiser, practicing his tough-cop expression en route. Catching sight of President Svenson, he came to a rubber-burning halt. His features contorted into those of one who has just caught sight of some unnameable horror in a lonely graveyard at the final stroke of midnight.

  But Ottermole was no poltroon. Drawing on hidden resources of valor, he managed to get his jaw under control and accompany them more or less unflinchingly into the handsome white clapboard house to which Harry Goulson’s grandfather had added the wing not long after the great influenza epidemic of 1919. Harry’s own son and heir, who’d been hastily summoned home from morticians’ school for this history-making event, greeted the party in hushed tones appropriate to his destined calling.

  “I’m not sure if I should ask you to sign the book or not,” he confessed artlessly. “I’ve never before assisted at a—at this kind of viewing.”

  “I’m not clear on the etiquette myself,” Shandy told him, “so why don’t we just—er—get on with it?”

  Having given the boy his moment of glory, Goulson himself now appeared to take the party in tow. He was wearing his very best black coat now.

  “This way, gentlemen, if you please. We’re honored to have you along, President Svenson. Of course, Professor Ungley was one of your own, so to speak.”

  “Ur,” said Svenson.

  Shandy decided they’d better get off that topic fast. “Ottermole, Melchett, good of you to come. I want you to understand that I have no quarrel with the—er—preliminary findings you made this morning,” he began diplomatically. “However, certain facts have since come to light that I thought you should be apprised of before you arrive at any—er—final decision.”

  “Huh?” Ottermole was clearly under the impression they’d already made a final decision. Then he took a reflective look at the set of Thorkjeld Svenson’s jaw and appeared to remember they hadn’t.

  “To begin with,” Shandy went on, “you were no doubt struck by the—er—disproportionately small amount of blood you found on the harrow peg, in contrast with the copious bleeding from the victim’s head wound.”

  Dr. Melchett averred that he’d called it to Ottermole’s attention at the time of discovery. Ottermole said he had the fact down in his notebook for further study.

  “Since then,” Shandy went on, “I’ve had additional testimony from Mrs. Elizabeth Lomax. She was, as you know, Ungley’s landlady.”

  “How come she gave it to you instead of me?” Ottermole demanded.

  “Perhaps because she’s been keeping house for me ever since I came to Balaclava. Mrs. Lomax is somewhat—er—feudal in her ways as you may have noticed.”

  “I’ll say she is.” Ottermole wasn’t sure what feudal meant, but he knew Betsy Lomax. “Okay, so what did she tell you?”

  “That Ungley’s flat had been searched. She took me in there and showed me various indications of disturbance that would have been imperceptible to the—er—untrained eye. Being myself so familiar with Mrs. Lomax’s housekeeping methods, I had no doubt she knew whereof she spoke. Furthermore, we found evidence that Professor Ungley’s filing cabinet had been cleaned out last night, presumably by the person or persons who burgled the flat.”

  He explained about the missing plastic bags. “Lastly, President Svenson has some information, which I’ll let him give you himself.”

  Svenson could be articulate enough when he had to be. He imparted what he knew so forcefully that Ottermole was left insisting he’d known all along there was something fishy about Ungley’s death. Melchett was calling attention to the fact that he hadn’t yet signed the certificate; mainly because he hadn’t got around to it, but that was beside the point. And Goulson was feeling a parental glow, knowing he hadn’t hauled his son so abruptly out of Embalming II in vain. Here, not in some stuffy classroom with an articulated plastic figure stretched out on the table, was the real nitty-gritty of undertaking. He could see the heir apparent to the Goulson dynasty gazing at him with reverence, seeing Dad as a true mover and shaker, a veritable Batman among morticians. And the boy, he thought indulgently, would be picturing himself as a valiant young Robin, and not so far out at that.

  “About that hole in the skull.” Dr. Melchett must have decided Shandy had been hogging the floor long enough. “Ottermole, you remember I said it was an unusual wound to have been made by a harrow peg.”

  There was in fact no reason why Ottermole should remember since Melchett hadn’t actually said so; but he’d been on the verge of thinking so. He avoided the chief’s eyes and cleared his throat.

  “I also remarked that the head of Ungley’s cane was surprisingly heavy and might be filled with lead. On reflection, I think we ought to get that cane tested for possible traces of human blood.”

  “I couldn’t agree with you more, Doctor,” Shandy replied, since he was already having it done anyway. “Why don’t we have the tests run in the college’s Chemistry Department so that if the finding is negative there won’t be any—er—”

  “Great idea,” Ottermole interrupted. “You go right ahead and do that, Professor. How soon can you get me a report?”

  “Quite soon, I should think. It’s a simple enough test.”

  “Good. We’ll handle this one ourselves. No calling in the state police, huh?”

  Ottermole’s tone was jocular, but his glare was baleful. Shandy looked at Svenson. Svenson looked at Melchett. Melchett looked at his watch and said he must get back to his patients. Goulson asked if they’d be wanting any more photographs of the deceased.

  “Why don’t you take one of Chief Ottermole with the corpse?” Shandy suggested to restore the atmosphere of bonhomie. “Covered, of course. I expect the Fane and Pennon will ask for it when he holds his press conference. Though that will have to wait on the results of our findings. There’s still plenty of time to catch next week’s edition,” he added when Ottermole’s face began to fall.

  Gouls
on was only too happy to oblige. He took one of President Svenson and Shandy with the corpse, the chief, and the boy for good measure, because this was a day he wanted his son to remember. When the film was all used up, they thanked him profusely, granted permission for him and the boy to start their customary duties to the deceased, and left.

  Once outside, Melchett immediately got into his car and sped officeward. Ottermole said briskly, “Well, I better get on with the investigation,” then sneaked a hopeful glance at Shandy, who nodded.

  “Strike while the iron’s hot. President Svenson and I were saying on the way down here that somebody ought to pay a call on Henry Hodger the lawyer. He’d be most apt to have Ungle’s will, if there is one. That might give us a lead.”

  “Worth trying,” Ottermole agreed. “I’ve been thinking about that, myself.”

  Which was a lie, or he’d already have been over to hound the lawyer, but Shandy didn’t mind about that. What counted was having Ottermole along. The chief’s presence might make Hodger less unwilling to disgorge any information he might have. They went.

  Hodger was in his office. In fact, he gave the impression of haying taken root to his desk chair. That wasn’t strange, considering how many years he must have spent sitting in it. He didn’t rise when they entered.

  “Figured you’d be around sooner or later, Ottermole. I know about Ungley, if that’s what you’re here to tell me.”

  He didn’t appear to notice either Shandy or the president, and overlooking Thorkjeld Svenson was quite a feat. Shandy became more interested in the lawyer than he’d expected to be, although Hodger was by no means an intriguing man to look at.

  He had a strangely blank face for a man of his years, as though he’d trained himself so rigorously in the discretion required by his profession that he’d ended by shutting out expression entirely. Yet he wasn’t beyond feeling. He was being deliberately rude to Svenson and Shandy, unless he was either blind or close to it. Even Ottermole noticed the slight, and did his clumsy best to smooth it over.