A Match Made for Murder

by Iona Whishaw

  Ames stood up. “Thank you, Mr. Van Eyck. I’ll have you sit downstairs while Constable Terrell types up your statement.”

  Frowning, Van Eyck said, “Aren’t you going to lock me up?”

  “Mr. Van Eyck, unless you’ve been parading around town in a blond wig, then probably not.”

  Having deposited Marcus Van Eyck, protesting volubly about not being locked up, onto a chair in the waiting area before the front desk, Terrell returned. “Well, well. What was all that about?”

  “It could only be that he thinks Tina did it, and he’s trying to protect her. It’s certainly what Darling would call a cliché. He’s got exactly enough details from the newspaper to put together his story, but he clearly does not know how Watts really died,” Ames said.

  “You’re most certainly right. What I wonder is why he thinks Tina did it? Wasn’t she in the garage with him at the time it must have happened? She must have done something that aroused his fear. He claims they’ve never talked about the assault, but he obviously saw her in action giving Watts what-for when he came in. And we have our question answered about whether this is the first time since before the war that he came to the garage. But something must have convinced him that she did it. I guess I’d best go type this up.”

  It was only after Ames, left alone in his office, had put his feet on his desk, a position that usually expressed nonchalance and a relaxed view of the world, but now gave no pleasure at all, that he thought, “Oh, my God! That’s it!”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Lane was quietly grateful when she finally began to feel sleep steal over her. The dark was not as absolute as she thought it might be, as somewhere out of her view from the window, the moon was waxing and throwing a cool luminescence across the landscape. It obliterated colour, and the parts of the hilly folds that caught the light highlighted the inky sinister blackness of what lay in shadow. What was absolute was the cold. She had taken her sandwich to bed, praying it was only what appeared to be roast beef and not laced with something lethal—if they’d wanted to kill her they could have done it outright any number of times, she reasoned—and piled the covers around her while she ate, contemplating who “they” could be.

  It was ridiculous to try to sleep when it was only eight thirty at night, but she lay, trying to hold all the warmth she could until—perhaps from the tension of trying desperately to imagine which of her provocations, as outlined by Darling, had got her into this mess—she began to feel exhaustion replace the alert trepidation she’d been in the grip of. She settled on the mob boss because of the men who kidnapped her. They seemed like mob henchmen from fiction. But knowing about Meg Holden’s movements seemed the least of her sins. Surely this reaction was more in keeping with a man whose wife has been helped to escape. She discounted her involvement with the Renwicks in any way. The law had dealt with both of them. It was with these thoughts becoming more entangled and fantastical in her head that she finally drifted off.

  When the noise penetrated, she woke slowly into complete blackness. The moon had disappeared somewhere, and now only darkness prevailed. She lay stock still, waiting to understand what had woken her. She pulled her hand out from under the covers and tried to see the time, but it was impossible. There was more noise. A door closing. Something being dumped on the floor. She sat up now, alert, reluctant to move from the warmth of her covers, but looking desperately around in the darkness to find a defensive weapon. The glass was beside her on the bedside table. A good solid model with a heavy base. If need be, she could use it. She drank down the rest of the water and waited. Again more noise and then from under the door an intermittent light. Someone with a flashlight.

  Lane nearly jumped out of her own skin when whoever it was tried to open the bedroom door, rattling it angrily. And then through the pounding of her own fear, she heard an oath, loudly uttered by a woman’s voice.

  “Who’s there?” Lane called loudly.

  “What?” The woman on the other side of the door sounded irritated.

  “I’m locked in here! Can you open the door?” Lane called. If the woman, whoever she was, attacked her, she felt more comfortable about being able to fend her off with the water glass.

  “Who the hell are you?” The door handle rattled again. “Just wait.” Lane could see the light of the flashlight dancing away from where it had shone through the crack at the bottom of the door. More noise. Drawers, cupboards. Finally, the sound of a skeleton key going into a lock, and a flashlight shining full on her face, causing her to throw her arms across her eyes.

  “Hey, are you that lady from the hotel? Number 26?”

  “Yes,” Lane offered. “Could you turn the flashlight so it’s not in my eyes?”

  “Oh. Sorry. I didn’t expect no one to be here.”

  “Mrs. Holden?” Lane ventured. Once her initial panic died down, she recognized the voice. She threw the covers off, sat on the bed, shivering, and pulled the blanket around her. Her head throbbed with a dull pain. The aspirin had only taken care of the sharper pounding.

  “What in the hell are you doing here?” Meg Holden asked. She stood the flashlight on its end so the light shone toward the roof and threw a faint light around the room. “All the damn kerosene lamps are gone for some reason.”

  “I feel I should ask the same question. Is this cabin yours, Mrs. Holden, or your husband’s?” She struggled to imagine why the benign Mr. Holden should want to imprison her on the side of a mountain.

  “Lord, no! It belongs to that idiot, the assistant chief of police. My husband and I get to use it for little holidays. As is only right. We practically paid for the thing. Not that I love a vacation in the middle of nowhere.”

  Lane shook her head, trying to clear it. “So Mr. Holden had me kidnapped? I don’t understand. Is he a friend of Galloway’s?” What on earth could any of this mean in the context of what she thought she knew?

  “Rex? He wouldn’t hurt a flea.” Meg was smiling, almost sadly, Lane thought. “He’s not like any of the others. But we got bigger problems. I had to get away ’cause of that Renwick. Artie thinks I know, and he won’t stop at nothin’ to stop me talking if he thinks I’ve tried to run away, which I have.” She sat down next to Lane and clenched her hands on her lap. “I bet he’s down there thinking, oh, she’ll come back. She always does. Not this time, buddy!”

  Lane momentarily gave up trying to make any sense at all of this bewildering speech. Who was Artie? “How did you get here? I didn’t hear a car.” Of course, she’d been asleep, but hope bloomed at the thought of a car. They could drive away from this place.

  “I had the cab drop me at the top of the hill, just in case someone was here. It’s coming back in the morning for me. It’s a horrible hike in these shoes!” She held her foot out away from the bed, and Lane saw she was wearing very pretty red and white Oxford high heels. Most unsuitable for a nighttime hike. No car, then. She looked at her watch. It was quarter after four. She groaned silently, resisting the urge to throw herself back on the bed. She had often been in untoward places at this time of night in France during the war, after all.

  “Why come here?” Lane asked. “It seems an out-of-the-way place to run off to.”

  “Because, dearie, no one is supposed to be here! This place sits empty from October to May. I figured I had time to collect what is mine, have a good sleep, and really get away, all the way back to Chicago. My luggage is stowed at the bus station. Finding you here sure doesn’t help! It means someone is coming back for you, or to do something to you, I don’t know. Who brought you here?” She looked at Lane, frowning.

  “I’ve no idea. I must confess, I thought it must have something to do with James Griffin, because the man seemed sort of like a henchman, if you see what I mean.”

  “That’s Artie’s style, all right,” Meg agreed. “He’s not going to leave well enough alone, I can see that now.” She stood up and bustled tow
ard the door and then turned abruptly and came back. “Did you see something? Is that what happened? You saw his man shooting? No, wait. You didn’t see nothing. Did the man who brought you here have a gun? Big tall guy, cowboy boots and moustache?”

  Something about what Meg had just said bothered Lane. But she couldn’t put her finger on it. The pain in her head wasn’t helping.

  “Well?” said Meg.

  “Sorry. Yes, a cowboy. That sounds like him. Who is he? How worried should I be?”

  “We should both be very worried, honey. We gotta skedaddle. He’s probably the one who shot that Mr. Renwick.”

  Galloway downed his neat whisky and clunked his glass onto the tiled counter. By the time they’d arrived at the home of Tucson’s assistant chief of police after futile hours driving around the city, Darling had known the man wasn’t right. Galloway wasn’t just drunk; he’d come unhinged somehow. Unmoored. As though that one act of defiance by his wife had dislodged something deep inside him. He had been silent and unresponsive in the car, but Darling guessed that the whiskey would change that soon enough. That he was somehow involved in Lane’s disappearance seemed certain. But what to do about it?

  Galloway poured himself another whiskey. Then he smiled and looked at Darling. “You wanting me to help find your wife. I can’t get over the irony of it all.” He offered the bottle to Darling. “As it happens, I want help finding my wife too. Isn’t that a coincidence? And I expect when I know where mine is, you’ll find the lovely Mrs. Darling as well.”

  “What are you saying?” Darling asked.

  Galloway had not picked up his glass. He now leaned across the counter bringing his face close to Darling’s. “I’m saying that I want to know where my bloody wife is. I’m saying that I know damn well your wife had something to do with getting her away from the hospital—the advantages of being a policeman—and I’m saying that if you don’t tell me, I will get it from her.” He picked up his drink and swirled it around. “This is going to seem a bit crude to you, Darling, gentleman police inspector that you are, but I’m finished with subtleties.” He reached into his jacket and pulled a revolver out of the holster he had strapped onto his upper body. “I mean business, you see.”

  Darling looked at him steadily, stilling the flutter of panic that felt like it could overwhelm him. “Where have you taken her?”

  “Oh, marvellous. We could play at this all night. That’s my question, though, isn’t it?”

  “The thing is, Galloway, whatever you’ve done, it’s pointless. She actually has no idea where your wife is. It’s possible Priscilla expected a response like this and wanted to make sure no one knew, so you see, neither I nor my wife can be of any help.”

  “You’re lying. But that’s all right. Your wife won’t be so reluctant when we go see her. Trust me. She’ll have had time to think about her answer.”

  “You’ve used one of your men to kidnap my wife?” Darling, not of a religious persuasion, prayed the hotel concierge had done what he asked.

  “One of my men? Don’t be an ass! I didn’t get where I am today without some more biddable, let’s say, connections.” He took up his glass again, draining the contents.

  “You might as well have a drink, Darling, and sit down. It’s a waiting game now. I’ve got someone picking us up before dawn.” He looked at his watch in an exaggerated manner, like an actor trying to reach the back of the house with this gesture, and then collapsed onto the bar stool.

  Lane’s head was full of questions, but Meg was focused on the business of the moment: getting out before the cowboy came back.

  “I stashed a little money and a change of clothes here a couple of times ago. Things were a little rough between me and Artie, and I thought I might have to make tracks.” Meg took the flashlight and went toward the kitchen, leaving Lane in the dark.

  How apt, Lane thought. In the dark. Why should things have been “a little rough” between Meg Holden and Artie? Hurriedly she put her shoes on and tied the laces. Also not appropriate for a hike, she realized, but sturdier than what Meg was wearing. She felt her way through the sitting room toward the kitchen and could see the flashlight bobbing around inside a cupboard.

  “Here, hold this thing. I need all my hands.”

  Lane took the flashlight and pointed it toward where Meg was kneeling, pulling a board out of the back of what appeared to be some sort of larder.

  “Take this. I put some boots back here somewhere.” She handed Lane a cloth bag that smelled primarily of mildew, and even in the dark Lane could feel the layer of dust. “Got ’em!”

  Emptying the bag onto the sofa, Meg shone the flashlight on its contents. Lane could see blue jeans and some sort of brown slacks and at least two plaid shirts. “These might be a little big, but better than that dress you got.” She held up the pair of the jeans. “Damn!” she exclaimed suddenly. “The flashlight’s going. Okay, I’ve got the cash.”

  The flashlight was indeed going. Lane could see the light was wavering, fading in and out. This whole thing would be more difficult to accomplish in the dark. Meg flicked it off and continued changing, chucking her dress onto the floor and pulling her cardigan over the plaid shirt.

  Lane followed suit, and like Meg, pulled the trousers over her stockings. They’d need every layer in this cold. She tucked her silk slip into the jeans. “Too bad you didn’t have the foresight to put away two pairs of boots,” she said.

  Meg had collapsed onto the sofa and seemed to be doing something in her handbag. Lane sat next to her and waited, praying that Meg knew what she was doing.

  “I put a little money away, and with the money I took from Rex, I should be able to get as far away as I need to. Now, I need to think.” Meg had snapped the bag shut and sat looking straight ahead.

  The sofa was facing the window, and the open curtains only compounded the sense of darkness, though Lane was beginning to become accustomed to it and could see Meg’s outline, sitting very still in a way she had not imagined possible for Meg, staring as if she could see something outside.

  Fearful that her rescuer had lost her nerve, Lane said, “What is your plan?”

  “We’re gonna have to hike back to town. I don’t know what you’re doing, but I’m catching a bus outta here.”

  Lane wished she could remember how far they had driven to get up here. It had taken well over an hour. They’d be hiking in the dark and not, she realized, on the road. They would have to cut across the countryside, steeply down and westward in the hopes of meeting the main road. Walking back along the arterial road that got them here would be a dangerous waste of time and take them far in the wrong direction. The whole thing would take hours. Hours when they could be exposed once the sun rose and they reconnected with the main road. She tried to see her watch but saw only the outline of it on her wrist. She guessed that it was about four thirty in the morning. She tried to imagine what sort of cover there’d be if whoever it was came back early in the morning and found them gone and guessed which direction they were going. They’d have a bit of time once the kidnappers showed up, discovered she was gone, tried to assess the situation of the clothes on the floor, and decided how to track them. They needed to put as much distance as possible between them and the cabin before then.

  “Look, get rid of this stuff. We don’t want them to know you’ve been here,” she commanded, picking up the clothes Meg had dropped on the floor. “We have to move quickly if we are going to make any headway before dawn.”

  Meg took the clothes she was handed and felt her way to the kitchen. Lane hurried to the bedroom and dumped everything out of her handbag and took up her passport, her wallet, all the change she had, and her room key and distributed them into her pockets. She didn’t want to be hampered by a handbag. About to turn away, she snatched up her handkerchief. Almost smiling, she remembered her German governess telling her a well-brought-up girl never left the house wi
thout a handkerchief. They were good for all kinds of emergencies. She was sure her governess had never anticipated a night flight from armed men in cowboy country. As a quick afterthought, she opened the wardrobe and felt inside. With a cry of triumph, she called out, “I’ve found a couple of jackets!”

  She pulled them off the hangers. One was a man’s flight jacket with a thick shearling lining, and the other was some sort of fur jacket.

  Meg was at the door. She had switched on the flashlight, which momentarily beamed with its old intensity and then began to flicker again. She reached for the fur. “I think this will fit just fine. I’ll need it when I get to back east.”

  Happy at Meg’s choice, Lane put on the flight jacket, and though she fairly swam in it, zipped it up, and counted herself lucky. “Do you have those keys? We should lock this room. They might as well imagine I’m still in there. Maybe they’ll stop and make some coffee while they think of what to do with me.”

  Meg found the keys, locked the room after some messing about with the wrong keys, took them to a cupboard by the fireplace, and then thought better of it. She pushed the keys into the lock of the front door, locked it, and then left the keys, trying to turn the main key past the lock position to jam the lock.

  “No,” said Lane. “That will alert them something is wrong. Let’s lock the door as we leave, like he did.”

  Meg shrugged and Lane could see her nodding in the dark. “Good point.” She started for the door.

  “That handbag might get in the way. I shoved everything I have in my pockets,” Lane suggested.

  Meg stopped and then shook her head. “I love this purse. Rex gave it to me. And it’s real expensive.”

  The cold smacked them cleanly as they stepped outside. The sky was reeling with stars in the space above the forest, a great alien canopy that took Lane’s breath away. While it was dark, the night had a kind of luminescence that seemed to shimmer. It was easier to see the outlines of things as they looked out toward where the city lay below. The trees, the road, the boulders.