McNally's Alibi

by Lawrence Sanders

  “With an open mind,” he added.

  “My mind is so open you can see through it. Okay, kid, have your say, but remember, my time is money.”

  The sparring seemed to put him at ease. When he spoke, it was with a great deal of sincerity and much less fervor. He might be a fruitcake, but he sure was a likable one. I imagine women doted on this guy, and not just because of his bank account. Not being of the opposite sex, I will own up to listening to his nonsense only because of his money. Is that crass of me? Well, I beg your pardon, but could you honestly resist being taken into the confidence of Tyler Beaumont, descendant of presidents, scion of wealth on par with the Mellons and Du Ponts, whose folks, as we spoke, were perusing scratch sheets with England’s royals? Really!

  Besides which, the man in the executive office next door would give me the boot without misgivings should I show young Ty the door before I heard him out. And where would I go? Back to Yale?

  All things considered, I heard him out and will say this audience of one was moved by his story. As he watched his brother take that fatal and harrowing fall, Tyler was literally struck dumb. He couldn’t scream or cry or utter a word, and remained silent for almost a week after the accident. Doctors advised his parents to remove him from the scene as quickly as possible. The Beaumonts, themselves eager to escape from the scene of the tragedy, were quick to return to New York, leaving staff to close the house.

  It also struck me as uncanny that the setting of Mrs. Beaumont’s theatrical entrances was to become the horrendous cause of her beloved son’s demise. The gods are not to be upstaged.

  “The blood soaked into the marble,” Tyler said. “I remember the servants scrubbing the stairs, but, like Lady Macbeth’s bloody hands, they couldn’t scrub out the dark stains. They may still be there.”

  What a fanciful simile and, as would be borne out in time, a very apt one.

  The family left Palm Beach two days after the accident. What Tyler did not know was that young Maddy’s body was flown to New York, where a service was held before interment in the family plot.

  “You see, I thought we had left him there, on the hall floor, and ran away. I imagined him alone, crying, unable to get up.”

  For a moment I thought he was going to go off the deep end once more, but he rallied and continued.

  “As you can see, I regained my voice and went into therapy with a much-acclaimed child psychiatrist. I didn’t like him very much, because all he wanted from me was to forget Maddy, which I refused to do. In fact, I think the daily session with the shrink only served to keep my brother’s memory alive. Alone, in bed, I used to talk to Maddy the way we did before he left us.

  “That was my parent’s expression, ‘Maddy left us.’ I believed we left him. One night I told Maddy how much I hated the doctor and how nice it would be if I didn’t have to see him ever again. The next day the doctor was killed. Run over by a taxi while crossing Madison Avenue.”

  Tyler was very lucid, very matter-of-fact, which made the macabre tale remarkably believable. There were other incidents where he beseeched his brother’s help and the request was granted. Answered prayers? Now who was being capricious?

  “Coincidences,” I said. “They do happen, Ty.” No sooner were the words out of my mouth than I realized I had put my foot in it, and judging from the coy expression on Tyler’s face, he too recalled my censorious opinion of coincidences not ten minutes ago.

  Relenting, I said, “Okay, I goofed.”

  He leaped on that like the proverbial drowning man and the straw. “No, you didn’t,” he pointed out. “You said what you believed, and now you’re ready to disbelieve it. So why can’t you give me the benefit of now believing what you were ready to disbelieve when I started talking?”

  I did get the point, however obtusely stated. The very rich are different from you and me. They can spare the time for idle chatter. Alas, I cannot. “Ty,” I said, trying not to show my exasperation, “what do you want from me?”

  “Friends told me you were the best investigator in Palm Beach and you know how to keep your mouth shut.”

  I took that as a compliment, although I was a little dubious about his being so keen on my ability to keep a secret. Who didn’t he want to know about his visit here? His parents?

  “Do you want me to go into the house and search for...” I really didn’t have the heart, or the nerve, to finish the thought. Nor did I care to think about the stains on those marble steps.

  “No, they’ve done that. It proves nothing. I mean, such things don’t hang around waiting for company. Why and when they manifest is a mystery.”

  Such things? I really liked that. “So, once again, what do you want?”

  “I want you to set up some sort of surveillance. Watch and wait till it happens again. The light, I mean. Then determine if it’s a fact or an optical illusion. I have to know, Mr. McNally.”

  He was pleading, and I didn’t have the heart to bid him farewell. I wish he wasn’t such a charismatic young man. Also, I didn’t have the time or the staff for such an operation. I was up to my chin with “A Voice from the Grave” and had no inclination to go looking for a body to match.

  “Mr. McNally,” he expounded, “people have seen something coming from that window, and now even a policeman admits to seeing it. No matter what you think of my theory, you have to grant me that it’s worthy of investigating.”

  Put that way, he was right. People had surely seen something emanating from an upstairs window of the Beaumont mansion. I would like to know what it was only to prove this young man wrong and perhaps lay the tragedy of twenty years ago, along with his brother, to rest. I knew I would hate myself in the morning, but I said it anyway. “I’ll think about it.”

  His charming smile now had the warmth it lacked earlier. “I’m at the Colony. You can get me there. And maybe you’d like to have dinner with me one evening, or a drink in the lounge. With your wife if you like.”

  “I don’t have a wife.”

  He came right back with, “Do you have a girl?”

  “That, Ty, is more profound than the enigma of the light in the nursery window.”

  16

  MY RESPITE IN THE eye of the storm was short-lived. After Tyler Beaumont left, dazzling Mrs. Trelawney with his megawatt smile, I was plunged into the tumult.

  “What a lovely boy,” she commented when the elevator door closed on his radiance.

  What old women don’t know about pretty boys could fill volumes better left unwritten. “I have several things to impart, Mrs. Trelawney, if you can get your mind off thoughts unseemly for a business office.”

  As intended, she smarted at that one. “And I have several dozen items for you, Mr. Celebrity. You’ve had umpteen calls this morning from the local press, the wire services, an auction house, a New York publisher, Officer O’Hara twice, Decimus Fortesque three times and Lolly Spindrift ad nauseam. I’ve taken the liberty of ordering an answering machine installed in your office.”

  “If it’s bigger than a safety pin, it won’t fit,” I answered, thinking that had she truly ordered such a nefarious gadget I would pull its plug. After my session with Tyler Beaumont, the last thing I contemplated doing was listening to disembodied voices.

  My sudden popularity was no doubt a result of the police having finally made a statement regarding the murder at the Crescent Motel, naming people, places and things. Given the Capote angle, the statement was surely taken up by all the wire services and radio and TV yack shows, and perhaps even given the stature of a breaking story on CNN.

  I took the list she had compiled, thanking her for her assistance, then asked if father had seen the afternoon papers.

  “He has, as has everyone in the building, and he isn’t exactly overjoyed. It’s not the kind of thing he likes to see associated with the firm’s name.”

  Now I smarted. “I don’t pick my cases. I take them as they come, and sometimes they come with a lot of baggage. Is he free at the moment?”

&n
bsp; The question was pure rhetoric, for if the boss were free he would have buzzed Mrs. Trelawney the moment he heard me outside his door. Besides the current hoopla, he would want to know what Tyler Beaumont wanted with me. And wait till he heard that story.

  Unable to resist, she asked, “Did you read the manuscript, Archy?”

  I assured her I did not and felt the back of my head. The bump was gone but not my ire. “I will take care of the calls,” I said, “but I did want to mention a rather large dinner item that will soon appear on my expense report. Circumstances necessitated my picking up two rather large tabs at the club last night. Circumstances in the line of duty, of course.”

  “Has it got anything to do with the Capote book?”

  “In a way, yes,” I said.

  “Has it got more to do with the green-eyed blonde you wined and dined last night?”

  “I suppose Binky has told you all,” I charged.

  Unperturbed, she said he had.

  “Then why do you ask?”

  “To watch you squirm,” she said with great satisfaction. “And please include an itemized account of the dubious expenditure.”

  “I will, along with a dubious good day to you, Mrs. Trelawney.”

  The phone was jangling as I entered my warren, and from the urgency of the ring I would guess our resident snoop was once again trying his luck. I picked up, because now seemed as good a time as any to deal with the inevitable and because Mrs. Trelawney would kill me if I didn’t.

  “Finally.” Lolly Spindrift exhaled. “I’ve been trying to get you all day. I’m on my cell phone outside Bunny Weaver’s place, so if I cut off suddenly you’ll know why.”

  No, I wouldn’t know why, and foolishly asked what he was doing staking out Bunny Weaver’s place.

  “I’m on duty,” he confided. “The telephone repairman went in an hour ago and he’s still there.”

  “Maybe he’s having a hard time making a connection,” I said, thinking it rather clever.

  “Oh, he’s made his connection, all right. He’s been there more than once this week, and there’s nothing wrong with Bunny’s phone. If you saw the repairman, you’d know what I mean. I’ve put in a service call a dozen times and haven’t hit the jackpot. I don’t know how Bunny does.”

  “Her sex might have something to do with it,” I reminded him.

  “Don’t be such a smart-ass, Archy, and if you insist on talking about sex, what were you doing drinking negronis with that policewoman last night at your odious club? Were you surprised to see Connie there? I hear you couldn’t care less.”

  Lolly had a spy at the Pelican and, it seemed, at every restaurant, bar and dinner table in PB. Like all gossip columnists, he was also fed by those who hoped for a mention in return for ratting on their best friends. Sic transit gloria brotherhood.

  “How do you know she’s a policewoman, Lolly?”

  His rag’s crime hack went to the briefing in Juno this morning that was given by Officer O’Hara. He told Lolly about my role in the case as reported by the curvaceous blonde trooper. “When I heard about your date last night, I put two and two together and came up with Archy McNally. I have more questions for you than a Senate investigating committee looking into reports of copulation in the cloakroom. That naughty Capote book, Deci Fortesque, a classy auction house in New York, a murder...” He paused either to inhale or because the repairman cometh. Then he was back, good as new. “And who should alight on your crowded doorstep but Tyler Beaumont. Archy, you are a fountain of trash gab—so come fill my cup.”

  “I don’t have time right now, Lol, but when I do you’ll be the first to know what little I know.” I didn’t want to offend Lolly, as he was a valuable source for me, our working relationship being one of give-and-take. Lolly gave and I took him to expensive dinners. He was a little guy with the appetite of a horse and the tastes of a gourmet, but he had his ear to our sandy ground and a foot in all the right doors. To be sure, he could be a bitch, as poor Bunny Weaver would soon learn. You see, Bunny was on all the A lists and had forgotten to include Lolly in several major social events last season, and, if she was indulging in banal liaisons, she would soon pay for her transgressions.

  When Lolly called to ask if her telephones were now in working order, Bunny would giggle and invite Lol to lunch at the Club Colette, which, in PB, is on par with being knighted by Her Majesty. All would be forgiven and sic transit gloria scruples.

  “Oh,” Lolly moaned, “just give me a crumb for the late editions to upset the news editor. Did you read the manuscript?”

  The police briefing had told the press all they needed to know, but did they really want the scoop on this mess or did they just want to know what other carnal secrets Capote had revealed? Decimus Fortesque’s alter egos were legion. And did anyone give a hoot who killed Lawrence Swensen and why? I did. And so did Georgy girl, whom I had resolved not to think about until time and distance had cooled my fevered brow. “Just give me a quote,” Lolly urged. “I can jazz it up.”

  Lolly was very good at jazzing up quotes. His expertise bordered on libel. “Lawrence Swensen hoped to make a fortune from his former employer’s labors and learned, too late, that more tears are shed over answered prayers than unanswered ones.”

  “I love that,” Lol squealed, already plotting to change “former employer” to “ex-lover.”

  “It’s not exactly original,” I warned him.

  “Dear heart, there is nothing original on this earth except the sin of the same name. Now tell me quick, are you and Connie history? I mean, first she is seen all over town with that dreamy toreador and then you are seen at your lowlife hangout in the company of a gun-toting blonde with Connie practically at the next table. Mon Dieu, there’s not been so much talk since Binnie and Barry Rabinowitz discovered they were both committing adultery with the same woman. So what’s the story, morning glory?”

  “Connie and I have always had an open relationship, unquote,” I told him.

  “The only thing that was constantly open was your...” A pause pregnant with innuendo. “No, I won’t say it. I write for a family newspaper. All the news that’s fit for the dustbin. And if Connie is trading you in for Alejandro Gomez y Zapata, who could blame her? I’d dump you for the toreador in a trice.”

  “Sorry to hear that, Lol. I was near succumbing to your tiresome advances.”

  “Really?” he cried. “I could change my mind.”

  “Too late, Lol, your loss is the world’s gain.”

  “The world?” he said. “Or the lovely state trooper’s?”

  “No comment,” I commented.

  “May I quote you?”

  “Be my guest. Now I have to run.”

  “Not so fast, Archy. What’s with the Beaumont boy? Is it true he came here explicitly to see you?”

  “It’s true, but I can’t tell you any more at this time. We spoke in confidence.”

  “Has it anything to do with the item that appeared in our local the other morning? You know, Sergeant Rogoff and those vulgar youths?”

  Never sell a snoop short. Lolly had picked up the connection, as I’m sure others had. Ursi had spread the word, and now I was a tad sorry I had started the ball rolling. There’s nothing like a haunted house story to attract the crackpots, and Ty Beaumont needed them like Deci Fortesque needed a murder investigation. Now it appeared my poor clients had only Archy to defend them from both. I didn’t need a break, I needed passage on the next liner to Zanzibar.

  “What do you hear about the Beaumont family?” I asked the man who was sure to know.

  “Not fair, dear heart. Give and take. Give me a nibble and take back a reliable answer.”

  “Okay.” I sighed. “He’s here in connection with that news item. He’s worried about trespassers. The house wasn’t emptied of all its furnishings.” The latter was pure hoke, but it made sense.

  “I’ll buy that, but with reservations,” Lolly said. “Is the boy here alone?”

  “Why do you
ask?”

  “Because I hear he has a constant companion—or valet, or secretary, or bodyguard, or a nanny by any other name is still a nanny. Tyler Beaumont is rumored to be a teensy unstable. Among the common folks it’s called off one’s rocker.”

  This wasn’t totally unexpected, but still I didn’t like hearing it. And hadn’t I, perhaps instinctively, asked Tyler if he was here alone? Both cases seemed to be going down the tube in leaps and bounds, dragging me with them.

  Before letting Lolly go I insisted on asking him a question.

  “Fire away,” he agreed.

  “What are you going to do when the repairman leaves Bunny’s house?”

  “Take him home to inspect my instrument.”

  Ask a foolish question...

  I rang off and stared at the list Mrs. Trelawney had given me. Procrastinating, I put a check mark next to Lolly’s name. I didn’t want to talk to Fortesque just now, as I could neither assure him that the police were finished with him nor be optimistic regarding the return of his cash or the manuscript.

  I didn’t want to talk to the wire services or the Miami papers, because I had nothing to add to what they learned at the police briefing. If I gave them the quote I had just given Lolly, they would crucify me in print. Too, I thought it best to heed Mrs. Trelawney’s warning and keep my name, and thus the firm’s name, out of the tabloids.

  I wouldn’t talk to Capote’s ex-publisher or the New York auction house without a lawyer present.

  Last, but far from least, I did want to talk to Georgy girl but didn’t know what I would say when I got her on the line. Had she enjoyed our supposed business meeting? I would be happy if she did and happy if she didn’t. My love life was sitting atop a net and I didn’t know whose court it would fall on. Nor did I know who would rush to claim it. Could I play on both courts, hopping the net at will? There was a time when I could, but that time has been and gone. It was now decision time, and given my current emotional state, I doubted I could make the right one.

  R. Chandler said, “When in doubt have a man walk in the room holding a gun.” What I got was Binky Watrous, pushing his cart.