Bring Back Her Body Page 10

  Cain said, “You were ordered to tag me from Pepe’s?”

  “One way or another,” she admitted. “You created an incident and made it easier.”

  “And you were supposed to find some way to keep tab on me and report my actions. Was that eviction notice set up in advance?”

  “Yes.” Her voice was low.

  Cain said, “And you were supposed to maneuver me to Toby’s farm last night. When did you get that order?”

  “When I went for a walk so you could talk alone to Honor.” She was silent a moment. Then she said, “I’m sorry as hell, Cain. That’s the way it was.” She put the motor into gear, and Cain watched her chug off, picking up speed, and then sweep wide around the point and disappear.

  • • •

  Cain was having iced tea, his feet on the rail, his face turned to admire the sunset when the police came. He heard the car, turned his head, and saw them, and turned away again. When they hailed him, he asked them aboard.

  There were just two and Cain knew them both. The tall, graying man almost as thin as Cain himself was Lieutenant Wilson. The other, in uniform, was Bergen. He came aboard gingerly because of his bulk, clutching his inevitable shorthand notebook. They took chairs and refused Cain’s offer of tea.

  “I read where Toby Patton was killed,” Cain said. “I’ve been expecting you.”

  “You could have checked with us,” Wilson said. He lit his pipe.

  “This is nicer than the city. You got a ride out here, didn’t you?”

  “Nice place,” Bergen agreed. “How’s fishing?”

  “I was going out later but you came,” Cain said.

  “Eat canned tuna,” Wilson told him.

  Cain said quickly, “Kitsap isn’t within your jurisdiction.”

  “Let’s say we were asked to come in because Patton’s interests were primarily in the city,” Wilson said. “How long did you know him?”

  Cain told him. Wilson asked, “What were you doing at a place like Pepe’s?”

  “I’m a philosopher,” Cain said. “I like to observe people now and then so I can come back here and be happier.”

  “Did you take Honor Ryerson along for observation?”

  “She’s an astronomer. She’s trained in observation.”

  Wilson smiled without much humor. He never seemed to have much humor. He said, “She’s under twenty-one.”

  “So I get taken in for contributing to the delinquency of a minor?”

  “It’s one way, Cain.”

  Cain had an idea that Wilson was walking on eggs about now. Ryerson was wealthy and so subject to more respect than the average person — even in a homicide. The papers, he had noted, said nothing of Honor’s being at Pepe’s with him.

  “Officially she wasn’t there, Wilson. I won’t admit she was.”

  “What do you care about the Ryersons?”

  “I like the girl; she’s intelligent. She has a good career ahead of her. She wasn’t involved. Why drag her in?”

  “I won’t unless I have to.”

  Cain had found out. He sipped his tea. Wilson said, “Why did you hit Patton?”

  “He was making nasty remarks. I didn’t like his face.”

  “Were you drunk?”

  “No. I’d probably have killed him if I had been.”

  “Cain don’t drink,” Bergen said. “Often,” he added.

  “That’s why,” Cain told him.

  “I understand that Miss Simms gave you a hand.”

  “Honor was upset,” Cain said. “She isn’t used to brawls. Lisa Simms helped her.”

  Wilson had apparently tired of fencing. “To the point where all three of you took off, after working Anse over. But you still ended up with Patton later.”

  “Lisa — Mrs. Simms — suggested it,” Cain said. “I wanted to see what one of Toby’s parties really was like. We took Honor home first.”

  “And went there to hit him again?”

  “No, just to observe. The hitting was incidental…. He was drunk. He started it.”

  “And his friends pitched in to help him.”

  “Naturally. I spoiled their party.” Cain wondered how much Wilson knew, how much Curtin and the others had told the police. He decided it was about time he saw them himself.

  “So you put him in a coffin. That was an odd thing to do.”

  So he knew that much. “Well,” Cain said, “you don’t run across a coffin every day. It was handy, and I put him in it.”

  “Did you stick a knife in him first?”

  “I don’t like knives,” Cain said.

  “Maybe Lisa Simms does.”

  “She was busy cleaning up the odds and ends — Curtin and the others.”

  “Patton was found dead — in a coffin. The same coffin.”

  “A good deal later,” Cain said. “I put him in night before last. He was alive then.”

  “He was killed sometime between then and early yesterday morning,” Wilson said. “He’d been dead a number of hours when he was found. The closest we can come is about eighteen hours.”

  “Uhm,” Cain said. That made a lot of things different. “Is that public news?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Then why tell me?”

  “To get your alibi.”

  What Wilson had told him was new and interesting. Cain tried to think back but Wilson was talking again and he listened.

  “Out of six people, Cain, I got enough of a story to know why you were at Pepe’s with Honor Ryerson, why you hit Patton, and why you went to his place on the island — and why you hit him there. I talked with Ryerson a few moments ago, too.”

  “Then why badger me?” Cain demanded. “Or do you want to make the whole thing public?”

  “Not unless we have to. Money has its privileges but sometimes they stop when it’s homicide.”

  “Patton wasn’t worth stewing about.”

  “Your opinion. Where did you go after you stuffed him into the coffin?”

  Cain hesitated. He didn’t want Lisa dragged in at this point. Their apparent relationship would be duck soup for police and reporters. “Back for something to eat. We were hungry. I drove Mrs. Simms home and we ate there.”

  “Where did she go after she was evicted?”

  Cain shrugged. Wilson asked, “What did you do yesterday — last night, particularly?”

  “Thought about things. I’m still looking for Paula Ryerson.”

  “All day and evening?”

  “Why not? I think slowly.”

  “And you don’t know where Mrs. Simms is?”

  Cain hesitated. He saw that he was working himself and Lisa into a trap. He said, “How confidential is what I tell you, Wilson?”

  “Not at all if it leads to murder.”

  “And if it doesn’t?”

  “I’m capable of keeping quiet.”

  “I can provide an alibi for Lisa, if that’s what you want. But it’s a bit compromising.”

  “That’s better. Go ahead.”

  Cain had a hunch that Wilson had talked to Lisa and he tried to think how she would have done it. Her reputation would be regarded less by the lady than her neck, he was sure. He said, “All right, we stayed together after the party and all day yesterday and last night.”

  “All the time?”

  “There were a few moments when she wanted to be alone — people are funny that way.”

  Wilson was not amused. “You were together all night before last, last night, yesterday and today?”

  “Most of today. The rest is right.”

  “That’s no alibi, Cain. You had to sleep some of the time.”

  Cain grinned evilly. “Have you met Lisa Simms?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you have slept, Wilson?”

  Wilson tugged at his pipe. “According to her, you slept most of the time.”

  “You know how women are,” Cain said. “Modest. Besides, if she could claim that she must have been there to watch me.”

>   “Why are you protecting her, Cain?”

  Cain raised his eyebrows. “I’m telling you the truth, damn it. If it protects her, fine. If not …” He shrugged.

  “You disliked him, too.”

  Cain said slowly, “Meaning we could have killed him together?”

  “It’s a possibility, Cain. I’m a policeman, remember. Even if I thought it absurd, I couldn’t overlook it.”

  “And do you think it’s absurd?”

  “No,” Wilson said. “Not in the least.” He got up, nodded to Bergen who closed his notebook and stood, and they walked away together. Wilson turned and called back:

  “Don’t go away, Cain.”

  He wouldn’t, Cain thought, not unless they came and took him away.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CAIN ate a sandwich and drank a glass of milk and headed for town. He thought of calling Lisa for information and decided against it. The idea of what she had done still bothered him. In a way he did not blame her, knowing as he did now that Toby had been blackmailing her. But he thought of the easy way she had euchered him into taking her to the farm instead of letting him go to Munger’s, and his pride was hurt.

  He was ambling along at a conservative thirty-five when the realization hit him. He slowed the car, causing horns to honk from behind. Cain signaled and then pulled onto the wide gravel shoulder of the road and stopped.

  Lisa had told him that she had received an order to get him to the farm last night and that she had got that order when she had gone for a walk in the afternoon. But Wilson had pointed out to Cain that Toby had been killed sometime the night before. Which meant, Cain thought, that she had either called Toby via a spirit telephone or had taken the order from someone else.

  The whole thing made Cain a little ill. He didn’t like any of it. He liked it less because when he thought of Lisa, he remembered the nice things about her. But the more he thought of it, the madder he became. He drove on again and by the time he reached town he was ready to bid for a box seat at her hanging.

  He thought, Who else could have given her an order like that? And there was only one sensible answer: Karl Munger.

  But why? What good did it do Munger to have Cain go out to the farm?

  Cain pushed it aside temporarily. Stopping at a drugstore, he copied the addresses of Curtin and Smathers from the phone book. He was surprised to find Curtin at home, sober, and looking the worse for wear. Cain suspected the police had given him a psychological working over as rough as the physical one he had had the night before. He did not look happy to see Cain.

  He stood in the doorway, blocking the entry way. “I don’t want to see you.”

  “You’re going to,” Cain said. He saw Curtin’s eyes become ugly. Reaching out a hand, Cain tapped Curtin on the chest and, as Curtin recoiled, Cain stepped forward, slapping Curtin aside with his shoulder and kicking the door shut with his foot.

  “Don’t get excited,” he said. “This isn’t my idea of fun.”

  “Now look here, Cain …”

  “Stow it!”

  Curtin went sulkily into his living room and Cain followed. The place was untidy but beneath the litter Cain could see the signs of wealth in the furnishings, in the bric-a-brac about. There was also an expensive-looking bar at one side of the room and Curtin made a bee-line for it. He gulped a drink straight, then mixed one and sat down with it.

  “I’ve told the police all I know, Cain.”

  “I’m not the police. I’m just a poor boy trying to get out of a murder charge. Between you and the others, Lisa and I are being crucified. I think it’s deliberate. I want to know why.”

  “I haven’t anything against you.”

  Cain lit a cigarette. “Maybe not. But you might have something for me. Information, perhaps. What was Toby blackmailing you about?”

  Curtin didn’t blink. “My business, sorry.”

  “The police will find the stuff,” Cain said. He didn’t know what he was talking about but he knew that if he acted that way to Curtin, he would get nowhere.

  Curtin said, as if Cain knew all about it, “Wilson thinks he can hush it as long as I can’t be prosecuted.”

  “If Toby was foolish enough to let you get your hands on the stuff,” Cain said, “you’d have a good motive for killing him. You, or the doctor, or Smathers, or the women.”

  Curtin looked less pallid with liquor working on him. He lit a cigarette with fairly steady hands. “Toby wasn’t that foolish,” Curtin said. “And why should I kill him anyway? I worked for him. It was good money.”

  “You didn’t need it.”

  “Sometimes,” Curtin said. He seemed easier now, more amenable. “And not what you’re thinking. None of us paid Toby money. That’s the truth, Cain. We did a lot of things for him for free but we never gave him money. Toby liked the power his knowledge gave him, I suppose. And he always had money enough.”

  He blurted it out. As if, Cain thought, it would get things over and he, Cain, would go away. Cain accepted what Curtin said but he didn’t like it. Too many things were left unexplained, and some were left even more hopeless of explanation than before.

  Cain said, “I want to hear about the night Paula disappeared.”

  Curtin looked almost eager. He said, “We were on the farm. Paula was pretty drunk and she kept saying something about Munger cheating her. Toby kept trying to shut her up and finally he slapped her. She got vicious then and said she was going to see Munger and walked out. Toby took after her. He came back alone and the party went on.”

  “Then what?”

  “That’s all. I suppose I went home. At least I woke up here. I didn’t even hear from Toby for five or six days.”

  “And when you did?” Cain prompted.

  “He called and told me to fly to San Francisco and get some stuff for him. I did. Then he called me day before yesterday and said we were having a party. We met at Pepe’s.”

  “Why Pepe’s?”

  “I suppose because it’s one of Munger’s places. Toby gets what he wants there.”

  “And you didn’t see Paula in all this time?”

  “No,” Curtin said.

  “Or wonder where she was?”

  “If I thought about it at all, I imagine I figured she was at her place on Whidby.”

  Cain said, “Now what happened after I left the farm with Lisa?”

  Curtin smiled ruefully. “I was pretty groggy but I remember somebody bringing me a drink — and that’s all until daylight.”

  “Who was up and around enough to give you a drink?”

  “One of the girls. Larson said, ‘Ah, Hebe, the cupbearer to the gods!’ I remember. Then I passed out.”

  “Who is Larson?”

  “The doctor,” Curtin said.

  “Which girl?” Cain asked.

  “How would I know? She had one of those crazy masks over her face.”

  “And what happened after you woke up?”

  “It was early daylight,” Curtin said. “I staggered back to the house to go to bed. Only Toby’s door was open and I could see and hear him asleep in there so I sneaked out and went home.”

  “Sneaked?”

  “Toby wakes easily and in the morning he’s mean,” Curtin said. He grimaced. “And after what happened to him, he would have been vicious. I went home.”

  “You were alone?”

  “When I woke up no one was there. The coffin was gone and I thought everyone had left. I guess they had since my car and Toby’s were the only ones there.”

  “Have you heard anything from the others since? What happened to them?”

  Curtin looked weary of answering questions but he said, “I know that Annie was out for two days. Whatever was in those flasks was murder. Everyone was in bad shape for a while.”

  “I see,” Cain murmured. He said, “Give me Larson’s address and I’ll take off.”

  He got it and drove next to the Smathers’ as it was closer. There was no one in. He tried the doctor’s place and a
maid said that he had gone out. He had walked. So Cain walked too, and he found Larson seated alone in a small neighborhood bar getting himself thoroughly drunk. Cain sat down and started talking. He got substantially the same story Curtin had given up to the point where the doctor had wakened.

  “It was dark when I woke up,” he said. “Just turning gray. I stumbled around for a while and everyone was lying on the ground out. It was a hell of a mess. I looked for the coffin but it was gone so I figured Toby had got out.”

  “What about the wax dummy of Paula?”

  “Gone, too, I suppose. I didn’t think about it to tell the truth.” He smiled ruefully, the smile slightly sideways. “But the police haven’t found it, I understand.”

  “So?”

  “So I felt my way to the house and by then it was day-lightish. I saw Toby asleep in his bed and decided to go back and warn the others. If we woke him after what you did to him, there would have been hell to pay.”

  “He was alive at daylight?”

  “I guess he was. He breathed. I was wishing I couldn’t.”

  “Then?”

  “I went downstairs and got some buckets and lugged them back. I woke Norene and Anne and then Smathers started coming around. He got his wife up, but he couldn’t wake Curtin so we left him. We all went home, that’s all.”

  Cain said, “What happens if the police find the blackmail stuff Toby had on you?”

  “Blackmail?”

  “Don’t tell me a respectable physician is going to hell this way without a reason.”

  Larson tried to look belligerent and then gulped his drink and ordered another. “I’m done, that’s all.”

  “Abortion?”

  “Yes.”

  “She die?”

  “No. Toby took care of her by flying her to California to a hospital.”

  “Then what happened?”

  The doctor laughed mirthlessly. “He sold her to Munger.”

  “For God’s sake, man!”

  “No. She was attractive to men. She still is. Munger uses her as a come-on.” Cain looked at him. The man was miserable for more reasons than one.

  “Anne?”

  Larson nodded and reached for the drink as it was brought to him. “Anne.”

  “Messy,” Cain said. “So she keeps tabs on you for them — and you’ve fallen for her. You’re sweating in two ways.”