Give Up the Body (2 page)

Mr. Willow wriggled around in the seat. Bosco tested my skirt again to see what made it tight in that particular place. I smacked her paws and she went amiably back to sleep. Mr. Willow said, “Well?”

I gave my skirt a slight tug and half turned toward him. “I’m on the staff of the Teneskium Pioneer,” I said. “I came out to interview you.” I smiled hopefully and trustingly. “It’s so seldom we have a celebrity out here in the country, Mr. Willow,” I burbled.

“I’m happy to help you.”

I had had no worry about getting a story from Willow, providing I could contact him. I knew he would give out—I had heard he was a glory hunter. He was politely known as a professional philanthropist. As such, his business depended a good deal on publicity.

“You aren’t a bit like your pictures,” I said. “They don’t do you justice.”

And he ate it up! I gave him some more along the same line and then, feeling he was sufficiently softened, started asking the routine questions: What was he doing here? What were his future plans? Was it true he was going to handle a large charity donation for Mr. Delhart? How did he like our countryside? What did he think of the government?

He answered mechanically. After a while, he said, “Where is your notebook, Miss O’Hara?”

I tapped the place where my red hair blossomed from under my green suede skullcap. “I have one of those funny memories,” I said. “I can go back to the office and write this down word for word.”

“Amazing,” he said. “Such extraordinary talent seems wasted in a small town.”

Now it was his turn to give me the business. I put on my small town look. “I hope to do better some day,” I said confidently.

Mr. Willow edged closer. I tried frantically to think of a way to get back to the interview; I wanted more information on the rumored donation Delhart might give to charity. But Mr. Willow was giving me no chance. His pink features were moist and he kept wriggling toward me. I began to wish I had made arrangements for a third party at this interview.

I used my first line of defense. I kept my eyes on his face and at the same time surreptitiously turned Bosco around. She awoke and looked up. His plus fours were fascinating and irresistible. Bosco reacted.

Mr. Willow’s progress came to an abrupt halt. I said, “Bosco!” I picked her up and smiled sweetly. “She’s awfully naughty. Now, Mr. Willow, is it true that Mr. Delhart’s charity donation will be to a boy’s home?” His answer to my first tentative question had been the usual, “I am not at liberty to say.”

Mr. Willow was rubbing himself on the leg. “Ah—er, perhaps Miss O’Hara, we could discuss it some other time. I really should get back to the house.” He brightened suddenly. “I may have some real information later. Say at your office tomorrow evening?”

Bosco had stalled him and the interview as well. I did not relish the way he said “evening” but I could only agree.

“It would help me so,” I murmured.

He reached out and patted my hand. He kept patting it. “I am always glad to help someone get a start.”

His hand stiffened halfway down toward mine. There was a crashing in the underbrush near us. A man’s voice yelled:

“Damn your black soul to hell!”

M
R.
W
ILLOW’S
R
EACTION
to the violent curse was even more startling than it had been to my casual remark that Nellie died.

His pink face went pallid again. He opened and shut his little red mouth and made no sound beyond a slight choking noise. At first I thought he would faint and then I was sure he would strangle. He put out a trembling hand, opened the car door, and stumbled out. I could only sit rigidly, watching him.

Titus Willow turned in the direction of the voice and then a woman shrieked, “No, Arthur!” There was a lot of fear in her tone. The kind of fear that makes little jarring shocks run up and down your spine like electric currents in a wire.

“My God!” Titus Willow gasped. He turned a tortured, panting face over his shoulder and looked appealingly at me. Then he pushed his pudgy body into the underbrush and crackled out of sight.

I simply stared at the dent Willow had made in the flowering scotch broom. It had all come too suddenly for me to absorb. And not until a faintly familiar, deep voice said, “Don’t be a fool, young man,” did I come out of it. I recognized the timbre and the complete coolness of that voice in the midst of all this hysteria. Here was a story and I sat as motionless as Nellie.

I left her and Bosco, throwing open the door on my side and jumping to the roadbed. I remember feeling pleased because I had worn my stout brogans and irked because I had turned up my nose at a slack suit in favor of a deliberately tight green skirt.

I dashed through the slight opening Titus Willow had made in the scotch broom. I stumbled and went head first over an embankment. A salmon berry bush stopped my progress very suddenly, and I lay so completely wrong side up I could feel a steady draft where my skirt should have been. Worse, my breath was jarred out of me and I could not even make observations on the character of the Oregon forest growth.

But I found my breath and footing soon enough when that familiar, deep voice said sarcastically, “Women seem bent on exhibitionism today.”

I could feel my face flaming as I got up and jerked my skirt into place. The first voice said, “You aren’t funny,” in a tone more sullen than wildly angry now.

I took my bearings. I had rolled right into a wow of a scene. It was a little sandy beach, one of the few that are scattered along the usually precipitate banks of the Teneskium. It was encircled by trees and more trees and the old covered bridge hid it effectively from the road. It had always been one of my favorite swimming holes. And someone had evidently come here for the same purpose.

Of the group of four, three were dressed and on the beach. The fourth was neck deep in crystal clear water. I saw that the owner of the sullen voice was a violent-looking young man who had struck an outraged pose. He was a stranger to me. And I saw our local celebrity, Carson Delhart, as cool and immaculate and severe looking as ever. Mr. Willow stood between the two men, pink again but still not calm.

Added to that was a puddle of brightly colored feminine garments with a pair of adorable pink scanties uppermost, and a blushing but defiant young lady in the river. She was obviously the cause of the ruckus. And despite the fact that she stood up to her neck in the water, it was equally obvious that she had gone in
au natural
. The glass-like clarity of the water made the section of her beneath the surface shimmer whitely. It was a picture that would have appealed greatly to a painter or a photographer, but it affected the young man quite differently.

While I was trying to digest this, the scene froze. There was a complete lack of animation. Only the river sounds came through the quiet.

Carson Delhart shattered it. He moved away from the others. He left the strange young man still in his outraged pose, one arm extended; and Titus Willow pale, his mouth open to gasp, though he seemed to be holding his breath. In the river the girl still stood, the only movement the lapping of the water around her rigid white body.

Delhart took my arm firmly.

“Miss O’Hara, isn’t it?”

He flashed his patent leather smile for me. He had a smooth, bronzed face, high of cheekbone and forehead, with a straight, thin mouth and nose. His chin was craggy and well set. When you looked into his eyes you knew that here was a strong will. I saw it rise now as he propelled me away from the scene and toward the road. There was no arguing with Delhart. Both his manner and his grip on my arm were too firm for me to handle. I let him lead me up the embankment and through the scotch broom hedge. In a silence as complete as the one below, but deadly now like the honed edge of a razor, he helped me beneath the steering wheel of the car. The noise of the car door closing broke the silence, making a sound of complete finality.

I settled in my seat and absently rubbed my arm where he had gripped me. Panting and confused, I was half angry at what I had seen. As I regained my breath and my wits my anger transferred itself wholly to Delhart. I did not care for the way he stood now, one foot on the running board, his cold smile turned down on me.

“I’m sure I can trust your discretion, Miss O’Hara,” he said in that smooth voice. He offered me a cigaret from an opulent silver case.

“The bribe,” I said, taking a cigaret. I inclined my head as he struck a match for me. The smoke tasted good. “Just what am I supposed to be discreet about, Mr. Delhart?”

I was regaining the rest of my wits and I felt that here I had a lever to use in bargaining with Carson Delhart. He was notoriously aloof and reticent about his affairs, both public and private. That was an inevitable challenge to a newspaperman. Delhart wanted my discretion; I wanted his statement. It seemed to be a fair trade.

He was getting a cigaret for himself out of the case. He raised his cold dark eyes to mine. “It was a misunderstanding, I assure you, Miss O’Hara. Young Frew is a quixotic idiot.” He shifted his smile a notch warmer. “Shall we forget it?”

I smiled in return and tapped my cigaret against the steering post in my most sophisticated manner. “It was a rather strange situation, wasn’t it?”

He stopped smiling. He said, “It was a purely personal matter. Miss Willow chose an unfortunate time to bathe.”

“And Mr. Frew an unfortunate time to come along,” I said.

Delhart took his foot off Nellie’s running board and drew away a little. I’m sure he was flushing as much as it is possible for him to. “I don’t think we need discuss this further,” he said in that chilled voice.

“Of course,” I said. “Could you possibly drop into the Pioneer office tomorrow, then, Mr. Delhart?”

His lips thinned out. He said, “For what reason?”

“You just might want to renew your subscription to the paper,” I said. I turned on the ignition key and slipped the brake and let Nellie roll coyly forward. Delhart stepped back, out of the way, and I had a last glimpse of his face. He did not look pleased.

Nellie started on the downgrade and by the time I had her turned around and back to the bridge Delhart was gone. I went slowly across the bridge, hoping to hear something, but Nellie’s motor and the loose planking under her wheels made far too much noise. I made the turn and picked up speed.

I was nearly back to town before I realized I had one of those untouchable stories. I really had nothing to use on Mr. Delhart to pry an interview from him. Even if I had been willing to use a little discreet blackmail there was nothing I could think of that would upset him for very long. He was, like most wealthy men, far too adept at handling scandal.

I itemized: (a) Young Frew, whoever he might be, had stumbled onto a neat scene composed of Delhart and Miss Willow. Miss Willow was, I presumed, Daisy Willow, Titus’ daughter. And then Frew, whom she had called “Arthur”, either (b) saw her in the water or (c) saw her before she went into the water. I conceded that it was wholly possible for Mr. Delhart to be the innocent victim of circumstances, but Arthur Frew obviously had no such ideas. His attitude had suggested whole hog or nothing.

I could write the story and possibly get it past the boss, but I would be inviting a libel suit backed by Carson Delhart’s considerable capital. Or I could do as I knew I must and write nothing, hoping that Delhart would give me an interview before he realized how weak my position was.

I wasn’t overly surprised when I reached the office and Jud Argyle, the boss and the rest of the Pioneer staff, handed me a message. “Phone call, Addy.”

I took the message, a folded slip of paper, and glanced at it.

It read, “Call 662-J.” I crumpled the paper. That was Delhart’s number.

“Any luck, Addy?”

I made a face at Jud. He is bald and lean, a wrinkled fiftyish. I could make faces or say anything to him and he never took it amiss. Which was a good thing because Jud owned the paper, wrote half of it, set the type, and ran the press. My job, which I needed, was as much courtesy to a wounded WAC veteran as anything. Jud could have put out his weekly without my assistance.

“I have an interview from Mr. Titus Willow,” I said. “You can get the same stuff from any old publicity release. Also, I have a date.”

Jud grinned at me and reached in his desk. He brought out a full bottle of whiskey. He uncorked it, took a big sniff, sighed and replaced the cork. He put the bottle back in the drawer. It was a frequent routine with him. He never tasted the whiskey, nor any kind of liquor. Five years ago he had sworn off drinking. To remind himself of it he kept a full bottle of fine old bourbon handy. At least three times a day he would take it out and sniff with his big nose. And every time he would say, as he did now:

“That’s will power, Addy. Date with who?”

“Date with whom,” I corrected. “With Willow. Pink, pudgy, and passionate. Tomorrow night. I may get a story out of it. That charity donation rumor business.”

“Maybe,” Jud said. “Call 662-J and see what you get.”

I sat down at the telephone and gave Jenny Nellis, the day operator, the number. While she was putting through the call I leaned back and sniffed appreciatively at the familiar smells of the dusty little office. After more than two years away it was nice to be back. I had never worked any place else, nor did I have any desire to. I had worked off and on for Jud in practically every capacity since I broke his front window at the age of ten. My first job had been helping mail papers and my earnings went to pay for the window. Later, I was High School correspondent. At college I sent him items about the home town kids who were with me. After I came home from the WAC he put me on full time and landed me the job of local correspondent with the Portland Press as well.

It seemed to me that every memorable incident of my life was in some way wrapped in this tiny office and in Jud Argyle. Even when I was overseas Jud had seen to it that I got my quota of letters and gifts. He took it on himself to be a full complement of relatives to an orphan.

I said into the phone, “Keep on ringing, Jenny.”