Dead of Night

by Stewart Sterling

  “She’s great.”

  “Bet she is! She can do stunts Ev Chandler and Idi Papez can’t—an’ they’re tops, not countin’ Aunt Tildy.” He dismounted. “’Course in the summer I can’t practice, an’ Mamma says it takes an awful lot of practice. But Aunt Tildy’s goin’ to take me to New York when I pass my class-one test. I can do a Mohawk and a rocker pretty good, already.”

  “That’ll be swell. You come stop at the hotel, when you get there.” That, I thought, was one invitation that might not be taken up for some time.

  Nikky came out on the porch. She carried a small, cloth-covered suitcase.

  Tony wailed, “You aren’t goin’ away again, Nikky!”

  “I have to, Tony. I don’t want to. But I have to go back with this gentleman.” Her resentment hadn’t decreased a bit.

  “You bring Aunt Tildy back with you, huh?” He could tell there was something disturbing going on.

  “I hope so.” She ruffled his hair. “I hope I can bring her back. I’ll tell her how well you’re getting along with your riding. Let me see you gallop.”

  He mounted, went pounding down the lane of oaks. Mrs. Marino came out. We got in her car, passed Tony almost at the gate. I waved good-by.

  Nothing but polite chitchat on the way to the airport. Even winging north to Cincinnati, Nikky wasn’t inclined to conversation.

  What did she know about “Seven for a secret”? She gave me an inscrutable Syrian stare. I even started her off with “One for sorrow, two for mirth.” She remained a sphinx.

  When we’d changed planes, were kiting along at ten thousand over the Alleghenys, I did get one scrap of information. I wanted to know who might have been hunting her through Little Syria down on Washington Street.

  She didn’t know. Couldn’t conjecture.

  After she thought about it awhile, she said, “That Scotsman in the advertising agency. Jeff MacGregory. He was asking me, week or so ago, if I’d ever eaten in the Syrian restaurants. I told him once in a while I went there to get some shish kibbab or mehche with rice. He said perhaps he would see me there sometime.”

  That was all. She didn’t elaborate. I didn’t comment. She went to sleep, or pretended to. I tried not to think of all the various kinds of trouble I could be in when we got to Manhattan.

  There are always a brace of plain-clothes men on eagle-eye duty at the LaGuardia ramps; I thought we might be picked up on orders from Hacklin, as we came in. But nobody paid any attention to us. I was content not to have any loud huzzahs or dancing in the streets.

  It was half past one when we climbed into a cab and headed for the city, nearly two when I left Nikky in the taxi with the meter clicking, while I descended to the broiling basement of the Finnish Baths.

  Pud registered tremendous relief. “Am I glad you come back! I been havin’ one hell of a time with that tizzy you dump in my lap.”

  “You have to tie him down with wet sheets?”

  “Nah. No violence, whatsoever. It’s only this here is a healtherie,” Pud said, “not a nut house.”

  I braced myself. “Cutting out paper dolls? Or what?”

  “Nothin’ like that. He’s no trouble, akshally. But he’s blacked out. He can’t remember a thing. His name. His home. How he got here. Where he come by that shiner. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

  “That’s great,” I said. “All we need is a nice case of amnesia. That’ll goof it up good!”

  If it was on the level, my case was out the window in a high wind.

  Chapter Thirty-Three: ACCUSATION

  THERE IS SUCH A THING as amnesia. It’s not invariably a convenient lapse dreamed up by some guy who can’t think of any other way to explain a three-day absence from home and hearth. Almost always, in those cooked-up instances, there’s a sudden, complete recovery. Maybe it’d be that way with Yaker.

  I told Pud to show the pollster how to use a zipper, case he’d forgotten. While Yaker was dressing, I tried Mr. Bell’s system. Ruth Moore wasn’t at her apartment. Mrs. Lanerd wasn’t at home. Jeff MacGregory, so some bright babe at Lanerd, Kenson & Fullbright informed me, was downtown in the Criminal Courts building. With the Grand Jury.

  If the producer was there, the others would probably be testifying, too, I thought. When Pud came back presently with Crew Cut fully arrayed in all Walch’s glory, I said, “Le’s go play charades with Mister D.A. Right with you?”

  Yaker stared blankly. Of Pud he asked, “Who’s this?”

  Pud grunted, “Gil Vine, bud. He brought you here. You hadda fight somewhere. You were stinko. Remember?”

  Yaker waggled his head dazedly. “No. I wish I could. Why does he want me to go with him?”

  I paid Pud off, took Yaker’s arm. “Maybe it’ll come back to you, when you get down there.”

  Pud came up to the sidewalk with us. “If he’s in that kind of trouble, I don’t want anybody to say I’ve been hiding him out here.”

  “You’re in the clear, Pud. I’ll take the blame.” I pushed Yaker in the cab ahead of me. I sat between him and the Syrian. We got rolling.

  Nikky had a queer expression as she watched Yaker. He gazed at her with the same puzzled air he’d used on me.

  I asked him a couple of questions about Edie and Ruth Moore, elicited nothing except: “I don’t remember those people—do I know them?” I said he’d had dealings with them, let it go at that.

  There are several waiting-rooms outside the grand jury chamber where the DAides present their evidence to the twenty-three good men and true. A cop on the third floor wanted to know who I was looking for. “Mister Hacklin—the Lanerd business.”

  “Oh. Yuh. Room three-one-four.”

  It could have been the anteroom outside a dentist’s office, minus the old magazines. A dozen hard, straight-backed chairs, half a dozen people, and Charley Schneider. Jeff MacGregory was next to Marge, Keith Walch sat beside Tildy, in the chair pulled close beside Ruth Moore’s was Dr. Elm. Their heads swiveled around like spectators at a tennis match, when I shepherded my two witnesses in.

  The only person who didn’t come up on his feet was the physician with the pointed beard. Nikky flew to Tildy. Walch growled, “It’s about time,” at Yaker; Ruth shrank as far away from Yaker as she could.

  Schneider roared, “Siddown. All of y’, siddown.” He swaggered to me with that familiar belligerence. “Comin’ in of y’r own accord ain’t goin’ t’do you a mite of good, Smart Stuff. We got a list of charges against you, would choke a whale.”

  “I’ll cherish ’em to remind me of you.” I boosted Yaker at him. “Meantime, charge this lad. He’s the one you want.”

  “Yeah?” Schneider squinted at Yaker. “Who’re you?”

  Yaker shook his head helplessly. “I don’t know.”

  “What?” Schneider bellowed so loudly the cop on duty in the Grand Jury room opened the door, saw there was no unseemly violence, and withdrew.

  Yaker repeated. “I don’t know who I am.” His eyes roved from Marge to MacGregory, Tildy to Walch, came to rest on Ruth as if some vague stirring of recollection was beginning to assert itself. “I can’t seem to remember anything—”

  Schneider’s face got hamburg-red. He stuck out his jaw at me. “Whatsa big gag, Smart Stuff?”

  “I’ll tell you.” I patted Yaker’s shoulder. “You’ve been bulling ahead on the assumption Lanerd knifed Roffis and then killed himself to avoid disgrace. He didn’t. The killer was a gent who knew Lanerd, knew of his interest in Miss Millett, had his own reasons for wanting to break it up.”

  Yaker listened as if I’d been giving a recipe for spaghetti sauce.

  “He was in a room on the floor below Lanerd’s suite; he’d been up on the twenty-first to familiarize himself with the layout of the rooms. He made careful preparations for what he meant to do. Covered his finger tips with melted wax from a candle; the floor maid found the bedspread spattered with it.”

  They were all standing again and, probably unconsciously, backing away from Yaker a little
. He wet his lips.

  “It’s all Greek to me—what he’s saying. I can’t remember—”

  I kept pouring. “Mister Lanerd’s secretary had been in his suite around five-thirty. She stepped out in the hall to listen to a squabble in Miss Millett’s suite; that’s when the murderer slipped into Lanerd’s rooms unnoticed. He hid there awhile, expecting Lanerd to come in. But the adman didn’t show up.”

  Yaker squeezed his forehead as if to force his memory to behave.

  “Miss Moore came back into Lanerd’s living-room. From some phone conversation she had then, the murderer must’ve discovered Lanerd was going directly to Miss Millett’s, instead of coming to his own rooms. So the murderer decided to get in her suite, force her to conceal him until Lanerd’s arrival. He knew Lanerd was often admitted to Miss Millett’s bedroom after tapping a pre-arranged signal on her door. He’d heard the signal, could reproduce it. But he was afraid that, after opening the door, she’d slam it in his face before he could push in, unless he could somehow convince her it was Lanerd seeking admission. So he changed his coat for a jacket he found in Lanerd’s closet.”

  Ruth goggled at Yaker, as if her eyes were about to pop right out of their sockets. I hurried on before Schneider gave way to his inclination to shut me up.

  “He slipped into Lanerd’s coat, went to the corridor, rat-tatted the signal on Miss Millett’s door. Her maid pulled aside the bureau they’d shoved against the door as a protection from gunboy Gowriss. When the door opened a little, the murderer let them see the sleeve and shoulder of Lanerd’s jacket, so they hauled the bureau completely away, let him in.”

  Tildy and Nikky fixed their eyes on me in utter consternation.

  “When Miss Millett saw who it was, of course, she was horrified—particularly since the murderer’d snatched a steak knife off one of the serving-tables in the hall. She ran into the living-room to call Roffis. Probably the maid grappled with the intruder. Right, Miss Narian?”

  The maid rattled off something in Arabic to Tildy. I couldn’t understand it. But I could tell it wasn’t a testimony to my sweet disposition.

  “Maybe Miss Narian ran into the living-room, too. Anyhow, Roffis dashed in, was stabbed as he came through the door to the bedroom. Likely the murderer thought he was knifing Lanerd. When he found it was only the guard he’d killed, he slammed the connecting door shut, that’s how blood-prints got on the bedroom door, rifled the guard’s pockets. Took his room key which also unlocked the closets, dragged the body to the closet, threw it in. Went out through the same door by which he’d come in, bumping into Auguste as he did and getting blood on Auguste’s sleeve.

  Yaker groaned, “No! No, no!” Then he caught himself. “I don’t remember a thing—but I know I could never have done anything like that!”

  I tried to sneer. It’s not my forte, but I did my best. “One door to the Lanerd suite would have been left unlocked, of course, so it was no trouble to get back in there after Auguste had returned to the Millett living-room for the last of the serving-tables. The steak knife went in towel hamper, the blood was scrubbed off guilty hands, the jacket exchanged for the killer’s own coat. Then it was merely a matter of waiting, probably right there in the bathroom, for Dow Lanerd to return to his own suite—take his gun from him, kill him with it, make it look like—”

  “Frame-up!” Yaker shouted. “You’re all—”

  Schneider commanded, “Shaddup, all ’f yuh!”

  “Ask Miss Millett.” I held out a hand to her for confirmation. “She described the man who killed Herb Roffis. Big, tall, husky, florid face—”

  “By God!” Yaker howled, “I see it all now! You’re all in it together to get me. I won’t stand—”

  Schneider grabbed his elbows from behind, pinned him.

  “The clincher,” I had to raise my voice over the scuffling, “was when he gave a key to a kind of glorified madam, so she could send a couple of her hot-pant cuties up to his room. He gave her the wrong key by mistake. The key to 21MM!”

  “Not me!” Yaker shrieked. “I did not. I never even saw the woman. It was Keith!”

  I said, “It took long enough for you to admit it.”

  Keith Walch didn’t say anything, except with a stubby-nosed, nickel-plated 38.

  It spoke louder than words.

  Chapter Thirty-Four: CORNERED KILLER

  IT HAPPENED faster than “Hands Up!”

  He stalked for the door. I was in his way. So were Schneider and Yaker. But I was nearest. I grabbed a straight-back chair, swung it legs-first.

  He angled the snout of the gun at my eyes. I jabbed the chair at him. Chair’s a disconcerting weapon; if you don’t believe it, ask a circus lion.

  He fired. Over my head. That’s why expert man-handlers never aim as high as the eyes. The lift of the barrel in the recoil always throws a shot high.

  The chair’s upper leg caught him in the wishbone. It’s opposite, where you’d expect. He made a keening sound; half squeal, half screech. The gun went off again as he folded.

  For a minute, we had a junior-model pandemonium. One blue busting in from the Grand Jury room. Hacklin and a dozen middle-aged men crowding behind him. Another cop rushing in from the hall with drawn revolver. Schneider trying to roar himself into command of the situation. Yaker having a paroxysm of hiccups. All the females, except Tildy, making their own special sort of noises appropriate to the occasion. I got Walch’s gun and wallet, gave the gun to the Grand Jury room cop.

  When the commotion had subsided and the cuffs were on Walch, Schneider returned to hectoring me. “What’s the idea, Smart Stuff? Makin’ like this dummy was the murderer?” He thumbed a thumb at a still hiccuping Yaker.

  “Everything I said was on the up and up about Walch. He managed it the way I said. He did have the strongest reasons for wanting Lanerd out of the way. He’d lose his principal piece of talent; Miss Millett wouldn’t have stayed in show biz long. Probably her reason for wanting to be married was so she could have children?” I asked it indirectly.

  Nikky answered tartly, “Anything wrong with that?”

  “Nothing at all,” I said. “I’m in favor of it. Mentioned it to show why Walch didn’t mind her having an affair, but was willing to murder to keep her from marrying. Even that wasn’t the main motive that powered him into murder.”

  Hacklin’s turn. “What was?”

  I glanced at Tildy.

  “No.” She seized my arm, pleading.

  Marge urged me to leave her alone.

  Nikky joined in. “Isn’t it terrible enough?”

  I opened Walch’s wallet. “I’d say not. We have to put Walch where he can’t do any more damage.” I took out the snapshot of the kid in the polar-bear suit. “Who’s this, Miss Millett?”

  She shook her head, weeping.

  “Her son.” I handed the snap to Hacklin. “Saw Tony down in Kentucky. Swell youngster. Even if he does look a little like his father, there.”

  Walch was doubled over in pain, didn’t retort. Tildy stopped crying.

  “How’d you find out?”

  “When I was over at the Icequadrille rehearsal yesterday, I happened to see this picture. So I recognized the boy soon’s I saw him down in Lexington. He resembles you more than he does your sister, too. Seemed funny Walch’d have the boy’s photograph in his wallet—and yet none of the mother, who’s his main source of income. Thought it was queer, too, that Walch hadn’t been in your suite at the hotel more. Why he hadn’t gone to the Stack O’ Jack show with you. Agent getting ten percent of your salary ought to have been around to smooth things out for you.”

  MacGregory grunted, “I’d wondered about that, myself. Even in spite of Nikky’s crack about his making Tildy nervous.”

  “The principal thing”—I watched Hacklin and Schneider trying to find likenesses between Tony’s picture and the man in manacles; there weren’t too many; he really resembled Tildy more than Walch—“was the emphasis on Lexington. That farewell note Miss Millett sen
t to Lanerd—it said she couldn’t elope with him because of ‘the way things are.’ Since she’d been doing a lot of long-distancing to Lexington, and Lanerd told Hacklin she might be on her way there, I thought probably it might be the way things were, down in Kentucky, which caused her to change her mind about eloping.”

  Nikky snapped, “So you had to hound her all the way to Kentucky, even when she wasn’t there!”

  “Wouldn’t have had to, if I could’ve doped out the cryptic note someone, I presumed it was the murderer, sent her right after Roffis was found dead. The note was signed ‘Lx’ or Lexington. Miss Moore thought Lanerd had sent it. Actually Walch wrote it in Lanerd’s suite after murdering the guard.”

  Hacklin stuck fists on hips. “You didn’t show us any note!”

  “Always respect the confidence of the guest, golden rule of the business.” I appealed to Tildy. “‘Seven for a secret’—what was that?”

  She looked away. “It doesn’t matter now.”

  “No. Well. ‘Never forget four’ was the one I made a blind guess at. When Fran Lane stayed with you at the Brulard Saturday night, she heard you mumbling in your sleep, ‘One for sorrow, two for mirth.’ Sounded to me like a toast, one sup of the cup for each. Only thing I could work out was ‘One for sorrow, two for mirth, three for da-da, four for—’ only thing anyone would be likely to want to drink to, which rhymes with mirth—”

  “Birth,” said Doctor Elm softly. “It’s an Olde English Pub motto; how does it go, now?

  “One for sorrow

  Two for mirth

  Three for a wedding

  Four for a birth

  Five for silver

  Six for gold

  Seven for a secret

  Never to be told.”

  “Four was as much as I could wrangle,” I said. “Of course, I wasn’t sure about that. But if there’d been a birth which might have stood in Lanerd’s way, question was—whose child? And—had there been a wedding and a divorce? Or neither?”