1971 - Want to Stay Alive (5 page)

“This target rifle reported stolen from Danvaz . . . could this be the murder weapon?”

Beigler shrugged his shoulders.

“Your guess is as good as mine. We’re investigating that possibility.”

“When will you have something for me?”

“About a couple of hours. We’ll have a press conference at midday at headquarters.”

Hamilton regarded Beigler, his expression deadpan.

“Okay. . . that’s the best you can do?”

“Sure is.”

Hamilton ran down the steps to his car. Beigler watched him go, then went into the house to see how Terrell was progressing. He stood around, listening to Toko talking. When Toko had run out of steam, Terrell got rid of him. When Beigler and he were alone, Terrell showed him the note Toko had given to him.

Beigler examined it, then swore under his breath.

“A nut.”

“Could be or a cover.”

Both men knew a nut with a gun was about the trickiest killer of all killers to corner.

Beigler slid the note into a plastic envelope. “I’ll get this to the lab boys.”

As he started towards his car, he paused. “Hamilton’s as hostile as ever. He’s onto the stolen rifle. We’re in for a lot of publicity.”

“Yes.”

Terrell made for his car.

They hadn’t been gone five minutes before Pete Hamilton Pulled up outside the house again. He talked to Toko, had his Photographer take pictures and was driving away before the two other rival newsmen came storming up the drive.

Hamilton caught the 11.00 TV news programme. Photos of the stolen gun.

McCuen’s house, the distant apartment block were flashed on the screen.

Hamilton told his watching audience about the note from the Executioner.

“Who is this man?” he asked. “Is he going to strike again?”

***

The Welcome Motel stood back from Highway 4 on a dirt road, three miles outside Paradise City. Its fifteen shabby cabins, each with its own garage, was presided over by Mrs. Bertha Harris whose husband had died during the Korean war.

Bertha, large and floppily built, was now in her late fifties. The Motel provided her with a living: eating money as she called it, and since Bertha scarcely did anything else but eat, the Motel could be regarded as a success.

Usually she only expected one night stands so she was gratified and surprised when a dusty Buick had driven up the previous evening and a respectably, quiet-spoken Indian had told her he and his friends were on vacation and could they rent two cabins for a week: possibly longer?

Bertha was still more gratified when there was no haggling about the price. The Indian had agreed so readily to her terms that she wished she had asked for more. She was also gratified that the Indian had paid a week in advance for both cabins, but she was a little puzzled to see his friends were white: a young man and a girl, but then she told herself that was their affair and not hers.

The Indian signed the register as Harry Lukon and had signed the other two in as Mr. and Mrs. Jack Allen.

They had gone to the restaurant, run by Bertha’s coloured help, a woolly haired negro called Sam who at the age of eighty-five still managed to keep the cabins reasonably clean and produce depressing meals when asked, which was seldom. After eating limp hamburgers and a flabby apple pie washed down with root beer, the three had gone to their cabins and Bertha forgot about them.

At 22.00 Bertha’s other three guests - elderly travelling salesmen - had gone to bed. The Motel was quiet. Poke Toholo had tapped on Chuck’s cabin door and the two men had whispered together while Meg tried to hear what they were saying. Then Chuck told Meg to go to bed and he and Poke went off in Buick, heading for Paradise City.

By the confident way he drove once they reached the City, Chuck could tell Poke knew the place like the back of his hand. It was only after they had driven around one of the shopping blocks a couple of times that Poke explained what they were about to do.

He had everything organised. Under the back seat of the car was a steel hook and a length of steel cable. It had been child’s play to rip off the grille that protected the stock room window of the gunsmith’s store.

While Chuck, sweating slightly and nervous, had kept watch in the dark alley, Poke had slid through the window. A minute or so later, he had handed out a target rifle, a telescopic sight and a box containing a silencer.

Chuck took these articles from him and put the m under the seat of the car.

They had driven back to the Motel.

“Go to bed,” Poke said as he pulled up outside Chuck’s cabin. “Don’t tell her a thing. . . understand?”

Chuck got out of the car.

“What are you going to do?”

“You’ll know,” Poke said quietly and drove away into the darkness.

Chuck found Meg in bed, awake and waiting for him anxiously.

“Where have you been?” she asked, watching him undress.

He slid into the big bed beside her and reached for her.

“Where have you been?” she repeated, wrestling with him. “Don’t mess me around. You haven’t washed, you pig! You haven’t even cleaned your teeth!”

“Who cares?” Chuck said and forced her on her back.

They slept until 09.50. As Meg was heating coffee, she saw through the window, Poke drive up and put the car in the garage.

“Has he been out all night?” she asked, pouring the coffee into cups.

“Why don’t you ask him?” Chuck said.

That silenced her.

Later, Chuck shaved and took a shower while Meg watched the commercials on TV.

As Chuck was soaping himself he wondered about Poke. He thought of the gun. Poke had been out all night. There were to be three killings, he had said. Uneasily, Chuck wondered if Poke had used the gun already.

It was while he was combing his hair that Pete Hamilton came on the screen to tell about McCuen’s murder. He was talking about the note that McCuen had received as Chuck came out of the shower room.

“Listen to this,” Meg said excitedly.

“So there’s a killer in our midst . . . possibly a lunatic killer,” Hamilton was saying. “A man who calls himself The Executioner. What is his motive? Will he kill again? Last night, a high powered target rifle was stolen from the well-known gunsmith’s store . . . Danvaz Guns. Was the stolen rifle the weapon that killed McCuen? Here is the photograph of the gun which is fitted with a telescopic sight and a silencer.” The picture changed to show the rifle and Chuck flinched.

Hamilton went on, “Look carefully at this picture. If you have seen this gun before, if you have seen anyone with such a gun, then call Police Headquarters immediately. Dean K. McCuen was one of our best known citizens. He . . .”

Chuck turned off the set.

“Who cares?” he said, trying to make his voice sound casual. “Let’s go look at the town.”

Meg was staring at him. He had lost colour and there were sweat beads on his forehead and his eyes were shifty. She felt a chill run up her spine.

“What’s the matter?”

Chuck put on his shirt.

“Matter? Nothing’s the matter! Don’t you want to take a look at the town?”

“This murder . . . this man . . . The Executioner . . . it’s nothing to do with us, is it, Chuck?”

Chuck pulled on his trousers.

“You nuts or something? To do with us?”

He didn’t meet her eyes.

“Then why are you looking like that? It is something to do with us!” Meg retreated away from him. “Why was he out all night? Where’s all this money he’s promising coming from?”

Chuck knew this was a moment of crisis. This was a now or never situation.

“Okay!” he said, his voice savage. “Pack your things! You were warned! You were told not to ask questions . . . now, you’re out! Go on! Pack your goddamn things! You’re out!”

Meg cringed and waved her hands helplessly at him.

“No! Come with me, Chuck: He’s bad! I know it! Come with me!”

“You heard what I said! Pack! You’re out!”

She sat on the unmade bed, her head in her hands.

“I can’t be alone, Chuck . . . all right . . . forget it. I won’t ask questions. I don’t want to go.”

With his ear pressed against the flimsy wooden wall of his cabin, Poke Toholo listened.

Chuck knew he had won but this was the time to drive it home to her.

“I’m getting sick of you,” he said. “There are plenty of girls I can find. You’d better clear out. Go on . . . pack!”

She was now almost grovelling.

“Please, Chuck . . . I don’t care. I won’t ask any more questions. I just have to stay with you!”

He walked around the room, as if in doubt.

“I’ll talk to Poke. He’ll have to hear about this. I think you should get the hell out of here.”

Meg jumped up and caught hold of his arm.

“No, don’t tell him. I promise! I swear I won’t ask any more questions! I’ll do what you tell me! I promise!”

Chuck made as if he was hesitating, then he nodded.

“Okay, so I’ll forget it. Let’s go look at the town, huh?”

“Yes.” She looked gratefully at him. “Yes, please.”

“I’ll ask Poke if we can take the car.”

Immediately she was in a panic again.

“You won’t tell him . . . you won’t say anything to him?”

His grin was gloating. It was a sop to his ego that she should grovel before him.

“I won’t tell him.” He caught hold of her chin between his short, sweaty fingers and pinched it, making her wince. “But remember, baby, this is your last chance.”

He left the cabin and tapped on Poke’s door. Poke let him in. The two men looked at each other as Poke closed the door.

“I heard it all,” he said softly. “You handled it right. Take her in the car to the beach. Keep her occupied. I’m going to sleep.” He took from his hip pocket a twenty-dollar bill. “Take this . . . get her quieted down.” He paused.

His black glittering eyes searched Chuck’s face. “I’ll need you tonight. We leave here at 11 o’clock.”

Chuck stiffened and his mouth turned dry.

“The second one?”

Poke nodded.

Chuck looked away as he said, “You handled the first one by yourself. Why do you want me?”

“I need you this time,” Poke said. “Take her to the beach and give her a good time.”

Chuck nodded, hesitated, then left the cabin.

Poke closed the door after him and shot the bolt. He waited until Chuck and Meg had driven away in the Buick, then he went to his bed, lifted the mattress and took from its hiding place the target rifle.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, he began to clean it.

***

It was a little after 14.00 before Terrell had read through all the reports that had been coming to his desk during the morning. He had left Beigler to cope with the incoming calls. Hamilton’s television story had sparked off an explosion in the City that kept the telephone bells at headquarters continually ringing. The rich of the City were spoilt people and they were highly nervous. They regarded the police force as their servants: a force created entirely for their protection. What were the police doing about this lunatic? they demanded angrily, shrilly and even tearfully. Didn’t the police realise this man could kill again? What was being done?

Beigler coped with these calls in his stolid, reassuring way: a cigarette never out of his mouth and a carton of coffee at his side.

Listening to the various voices hammering against his ear drum he thought Hamilton had really started something and his foot itched to connect with Hamilton’s backside.

Lawson Hedley, the Mayor of the City, was a man of sense. He had already talked to Terrell.

“Could be a nut,” Terrell had said. “Could be a blind. Until I get more information, I can’t give you a picture. I’ll have my reports sorted out around 15.00. If you want to sit in on it, Lawson, I’ll be glad to have you.”

“I’ll be there, Frank. It’s too bad this goddam Hamilton has started this scare before we know what it’s all about. I’ll be around.”

At 15.00 Terrell, Hedley and Beigler sat down around Terrell’s desk.

“The killer’s gun was stolen from Danvaz’s store last night,” Terrell said. “The ballistic report confirms this. The killer fired the shot from the Connaught apartment block, from the penthouse terrace. As you know, the penthouse is owned by Tom Davis and as you know, he is somewhere on vacation in Europe. He’s been away now for three months and it looks like the killer knew this. The elevator goes from the basement garage right into the apartment. With the right tool, it’s not so hard to take the elevator up there. It was an easy job. The killer drove into the garage, got into Davis’s apartment, went out onto the terrace and waited for McCuen to show. The janitor of the Connaught is up and around at 06.00. I’d say the killer arrived sometime in the night and waited. The janitor had breakfast at 09.30. The place is unguarded from 09.30 until 10.15. That’s when the killer left.”

Hedley ran his hand over his thinning hair.

“Sounds to me as if this man had this carefully planned and planned a long time ago.”

“Maybe or he was familiar with the routine. I’m inclined to think he knew just when to shoot and when to leave and he must have known that Davis was away.”

“So he’s a local man?”

“Looks like it.”

Hedley moved restlessly.

“What else have you got?”

There’s this note . . . an odd thing. It’s a warning. It was posted last night. I don’t understand it. He’s warning McCuen he’ll be killed. Why?”

“Publicity,” Beigler said. “He’s certainly got it.”

“Maybe. Well, as you say, he’s got it. The lab boys have worked the note over. No finger prints, written with a ball pen, the paper you can find in any cheap store. This gives us nothing but the message.” Terrell produced the note and handed it to Hedley. “The writing is printed as you see and badly formed. The important thing is the time on the note, 09.03. The killer had inside information about McCuen’s habits. He must have known McCuen was a crank about time. He must have known McCuen always left his house at 09.03. As far as I can find out the only people who would know this exact time are McCuen’s secretary, his chauffeur and his servant. They’re not involved. I’m sure of that. It’s possible McCuen boasted to his friends about his exactness of time. That I’m going to check. It’s reasonable to assume the killer lives here or has lived here and he knows a lot about the habits of the people who do live here: the fact he knew Davis was on vacation, what time the janitor has breakfast and McCuen always left his house at exactly 09.03. That helps us a little, but not much. I don’t have to tell you about McCuen. He wasn’t particularly liked and he had a lot of business enemies. I’m damned if I can believe any of his business associates would go gunning for him, but I could be wrong. This note could be a smoke screen, but I have a feeling it’s not. My hunch is we are dealing with a nut with a grudge: someone who lives here and someone we’re going to hear from again.”