Murder within Murder (27 page)

“In all directions,” Pam pointed out. “In too many directions. All of us—including you, Bill.”

Bill agreed. He said they always did. They pried in all directions; eventually they got a break. Or, as in this instance, two breaks—Purdy's fear that Pam had picked up his mistake of knowing too much; Mullins's identification of his photograph. One had solved the case; the other had, undoubtedly, saved the lives of Purdy's wife and Pam North.

“For which,” Pam said, “we are properly appreciative. Very. Why did Purdy think somebody wouldn't recognize him?”

“He thought he had changed enough,” Weigand told her. “His hair had gone entirely gray; he had taken to wearing glasses. He had changed a good deal—enough so that I didn't recognize him, although I'd seen his pictures. And there was a psychological twist to it—he had had a stammer which he was conscious of—which was, he realized, an identifying characteristic no one could forget. When he wanted to change himself he concentrated on that—and he concentrated successfully. And I suppose it loomed so large—in his mind—that when he had finally eliminated that one tremendous thing he underestimated the things that still remained—the things Mullins spotted—the set of the eyes—the shape of the face—all the things which, if you have a memory for faces, you don't forget. Mullins has a memory for faces.”

“Still,” Pam said, “it was risky.”

Bill Weigand agreed. It was risky. Purdy had realized that. He had, he had told them when he began to talk, tried to avoid coming back to New York. But his wife had insisted—insisted so strongly that he was afraid if he did not agree, he would make her suspicious. Under the circumstances, he was, naturally, very anxious not to do anything which would alienate her. And—always—he thought he was changed enough. Bill finished with that and returned to his drink.

Pam spoke reflectively after a moment. She said they had certainly picked up a lot of miscellaneous information in their prying. Bill agreed again.

“Nora's secret,” Pam said, “which Jerry and I aren't supposed to know about. The fact that Nora's brother needs money. All those things about poor Mr. Spencer.”

Bill nodded. He said you couldn't tell what was important unless you went to the trouble of finding out about it. Nora did have a secret; her brother did need money.

“Which,” Jerry said, “he'll now get. And the result, I suppose, will be another gadget for the home. A newer gadget.”

Bill Weigand supposed so.

“And the perfume,” Pam said. “That was another wrong direction. Who did visit her, Bill? Who smelled?”

Bill Weigand looked surprised.

“Oh,” he said, “that was Burt, all right. Purdy. He took a little atomizer in his pocket with some of the perfume his wife uses. He sprayed it around the apartment when he went to switch the packet of medicine for one of poison. He thought we'd decide it had been his wife—I suppose he thought there was a chance we—the law—might kill her and save him the trouble. He was a fool, of course. He always was, apparently. And so he thought we'd all be. He thought that, even if we didn't look at once for his wife, we would certainly look only for a woman. He's explained the whole thing to us very proudly, on the whole.”

“I don't know,” Pam said. “It seems sort of clever to me. Like a good dodge.”

Bill Weigand said it was, in one way, very clever. Very subtle.

“And,” he said, “very unlikely to mislead a cop. Because a cop would either not notice it at all, or not pay any attention to it if he did. Because cops can't bother with things which are merely—anomalous. They haven't time. They have to keep the pressure on.”

“Why did Amelia Gipson get a job in Jerry's office, when she didn't need to?” Pam asked.

Weigand shrugged. He said he hadn't the faintest idea. He said probably because she was bored doing nothing.

“Or,” Jerry amplified, “thought it was immoral not to be working. I suspect she would have thought that.”

“The poor thing,” Pam said. “So—so sure—and upright—and anxious to have things orderly and right. Whether it was really any of her business or not.”

She lifted the cat down and held it on her lap, stroking gently. The little cat began to purr. It had a very loud purr.

“It ought to be a lesson to us,” Pam said, as much to the cat as to anybody. “To keep our paws out of things, Martini. Not to think the worst of people. Not to be—too inquisitive. And not to go to people you think are murderers and tell them what we think. It will really be a lesson to us, won't it, Martini?”

“I doubt it,” Jerry said. He went over and sat down on the edge of the sofa by Pam. He put his hand out toward one of hers. Martini leaped at the new hand. She bit it.

Turn the page to continue reading from the Mr. and Mrs. North Mysteries

1

FRIDAY, JUNE 15TH

12:25 P.M. TO 2:15 P.M.

People always looked at Dorian Hunt when she walked. They did not always know that they looked at her because her grace gave them pleasure and, perhaps, a kind of reassurance. So long as one young woman could move so well, so seemingly without intent and because it was the natural way to move, there was hope that the human animal might yet improve. Dorian, who was otherwise cat-like only in the just perceptible greenness of her eyes, moved almost as fluently as a cat. Other women noticed this as quickly as men did and they were, ordinarily, a little puzzled as well as subconsciously pleased. Afterward, the more optimistic of them occasionally practiced in front of mirrors and the most analytical decided that it was, somehow, a matter of balance.

The young woman who now watched Dorian Hunt cross the reception office of
Esprit
looked at Dorian and, without planning it, smiled. Then she smiled because she had planned it, and this altered smile was professional in welcome and enquiry. She was a pretty girl, Dorian noticed; a softly pretty girl. She had the high, rounded forehead of a baby; in her whole face there was that suggestion of immaturity which has to do with bone structure rather than with age. When she was seventy this girl, who was now probably not much over twenty, would look still rather like a pretty baby. Men, who often seemed to be oddly attracted by women who retained the babyish contours of the skull—which was no doubt why so many show-girls looked like very large and sometimes rather frightening babies—would be offering protection to this young woman long after it became absurd to call her young.

Dorian Hunt noticed the girl, thought these things fleetingly about her, using that kind of mental shorthand which is suitable for unimportant thoughts, and by that time was in front of the girl's desk.

“Good morning,” the girl said, in the voice of a receptionist.

“I'm Dorian Hunt,” Dorian said. “I've an appointment with Mr. Wilming. I'm afraid I'm a few minutes late.”

“Oh, Miss Hunt,” the girl said. “Of course. Mr. Wilming wants you to come right in. You have the sketches?”

There was no sense in answering that. Obviously, she had the sketches. It could hardly be the first time the receptionist at
Esprit
had seen an artist's hard-covered portfolio. Obviously, she would not have wasted Wilming's time and her own by coming without the sketches. So Dorian merely smiled instead of answering.

“If you'll go right on in, then?” the girl said. “Mr. Wilming said whenever you got here.”

Dorian looked around the room. In one wall there was a sliding glass window placed so the telephone operator behind it could, if necessary, relieve the receptionist. On either side of the sliding window there was a door. At one end of the oblong room there were two doors and at the other, behind the receptionist's desk, there was still another.

“I'm so sorry,” the girl at the desk said. “You haven't been here before, have you?”

“Once,” Dorian said. “I'm afraid I don't remember.”

“Of course not,” the girl said. “It's terribly confusing. And Mr. Stanton keeps having things changed because he keeps getting tired of them. He—”

She stopped suddenly. One of the doors at the far end of the room opened inward, violently. A tall man with glasses on his forehead, with bright red hair in wild disorder on his head, emerged into the reception room and the door crashed to behind him. Dorian jumped. The girl at the desk did not seem to jump; the girl at the telephone switchboard behind the partly opened sliding window did not seem to jump. The tall man moved across the room and his progress, while actually silent, seemed somehow like a stampede. He looked at the floor, but he did not seem to see the floor. Instinctively, although he was not actually headed for her, Dorian moved a little, making way for a force clearly irresistible, probably blind.

But the force was not blind. The big man stopped in front of her and ran his right hand desperately through his red hair. He looked at her out of bright blue and very startled eyes.

“Who are you?” he said. His tone was somehow not abrupt; the intentness of his regard was not rude. He wanted to know who she was. He asked. It was, in spite of everything, ridiculously reasonable.

“Dorian Hunt,” she said.

“All right,” the man said. “Taking care of you?”

“Yes,” Dorian said.

The man went on, then. At one moment he was standing still; at the next he was midway in what seemed to be a charge. He advanced to the door beyond the receptionist's desk and smashed at it with the heel of his hand. The door was almost nervously submissive. The man went through it and it crashed behind him.

“Mr. Stanton,” the receptionist said.

“I know,” Dorian said.

“He didn't know you,” the girl told her.

“It would have to be Mr. Stanton, wouldn't it?” Dorian said. “Besides, somebody once pointed him out to me.”

“He's terrific, isn't he?” the girl said. “Amazing.”

She sounded amazed; there was amazement in her voice. She had half turned and was looking at the closed door. “Dominant,” she said reflectively, picking the word.

She was a pretty thing, standing as she was now, looking at the closed door. There was Brooklyn in her speech, but it was a softly pleasant Brooklyn. It occurred to Dorian that the girl found it exciting to be in a place through which Buford Stanton, editor of
Esprit,
might at any moment pass like a meteor. Probably, Dorian thought, it would be exciting.

“If he was in Mr. Wilming's office it's just as well you were a few minutes late,” the girl said to Dorian.

“I might have got run over,” Dorian said.

“Oh no,” the girl said, “he never really runs over anybody. It just seems like he does. I mean—as if he would.” She was formal again, on the instant. “Will you come this way, Miss Hunt?” she asked politely, and started off toward the door through which Buford Stanton had exploded into the room. As they passed the sliding window, the girl made a gesture toward her desk, and the girl at the switchboard nodded.

The girl with the baby's face, and the quite uninfantile figure, led Dorian through the door into a narrow hall. There were several doors on the right of the hall and one of them was open. It opened into a small room furnished only with a maroon sofa. A young man was lying on it, his back to the door, his hands pillowing his head on one of the arms. He did not move when the girl and Dorian went past, their heels clicking faintly on the linoleum-covered floor.

“One of the editors,” the girl said, with no surprise in her voice. “They work very hard.”

It was not clear whether this was irony. Dorian thought it was not. They went on down the corridor, encountering no further editors, and turned right. The hall ended there, in a door. The girl knocked on it, did not wait for an answer and opened it. It was a corner room, very bright after the comparative dimness of the corridor. A breeze met them when she opened the door. The big window they faced was open, both steel casements pushed back. Light curtains on either side of the window tossed softly in the breeze. There was a desk, with its back to another big window. The desk was empty. The whole room was empty.

The girl, leading the way, seemed to Dorian to hesitate a moment, but it was only for a moment.

“He's in with Mr. Helms,” she said, speaking back over her shoulder. “If you'll just wait a minute, Miss Hunt.”

She went to a door in the wall on their left, as they faced the open window. She knocked, again did not wait for an answer, and went through the door, closing it behind her. Dorian did not move for a moment, expecting her to return at once. But when she did not return at once, Dorian walked across to the open window. It drew her irresistibly, as windows high up in New York office buildings always drew her. The roofs, the shadows on the roofs, the unexpected gaiety of awnings where they were not to be expected—of these things you could never see enough if you were always trying, in line and color, to capture what you saw, even while you made a living sketching improbably long young women in clothes which were all line. It was not, of course, any longer true that she really made her living at it, but it was all right to feel that she did, because for quite a few years she had.