Death in Donegal Bay (19 page)

The name Delilah Kent had engendered in me a vision of one of those languid, tawny British lovelies you see in their films. But this Delilah was not one of those. Her coal-black hair hung down in two long, tight braids. Her face was faintly Oriental, suggesting some American Indian ancestors. She was slim and tall, and she stood as erect as a Marine drill sergeant.

“Miss Kent?” I asked.

She nodded.

“My name is Brock Callahan,” I said. “I’m working with the San Valdesto Police Department on the murder of Lucy Barnum’s cousin. I came here to talk with her.”

There was the sound of hurried movement in the house behind her and then the slam of a door.

“I doubt if Lucy will talk with you,” she said. “She wouldn’t talk about it with me, and we’ve been friends for a long time.”

“Is she still working for the Allinghams?”

“No. She quit. She was secretive about her reasons for that, too.”

“She’s going to have to talk with the police eventually,” I pointed out. “I am not a police officer—more of a consultant to them. If you would phone Lieutenant Vogel in San Valdesto, he will confirm that.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary,” she said. “Come in, Mr. Callahan.”

S
PARTAN WOULD BE THE
word for the Kent cottage. We walked through a sparsely but adequately furnished living room to a combination small breakfast room and large kitchen.

“Have you had lunch?” she asked me.

“No. But don’t bother.”

“It’s no bother. I have to keep busy! I’m worried about Lucy. I never could understand why she would work for a malignant cretin like Cyrus Reed Allingham. And I never thought the day would come when she wouldn’t confide in me.”

I sat on a bench in the breakfast nook. “I think she’s scared and running,” I said. “I didn’t come here to harass her. I’m a retired private investigator and not being paid. Trying to learn who killed her uncle is mostly an a vocation with me.”

“Why?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Maybe it’s vindictive. I hate killers.”

“That’s one of the better hates,” she said. “All we seem to have in the house are eggs and leftover ham and rolls. How about a ham omelet?”

“Perfect,” I said.

“But first,” she decided, “I am going to get Lucy out here. Luther was our best friend in this town. This is nonsense!” She left the kitchen.

I heard her say, “Lucy, unlock this door right now! Our visitor is not working for Mr. Allingham. He’s looking for Luther’s killer. Isn’t that important to you?”

Half a minute later, they both came into the kitchen. This was the woman Baker had tried to make time with, and the kind he could con. She was fairly short and her figure was all woman. Her big, trusting brown eyes were wet with tears.

She said defiantly, “I don’t know who killed Luther. All I know is that a man named Joseph Farini was trying to blackmail Mr. Allingham. Why can’t you leave me alone?”

“His murder could be connected with the blackmail,” I said. “I’m not investigating that—only the murder. The police have given up on it. Please believe that I’m not here to harass you.”

She slid onto the bench across from me. “Some of the men Mr. Allingham had working for him—” She took a breath. “Any one of them could have done it.”

“Yes. Alan Baker told me the same thing. But they have been questioned, I’m sure, by the police. At least I know that a thug hired by Farini has.”

“How about Alan Baker? Did they question him?”

“I don’t know. I have reason to dislike Alan Baker, but I can’t see him as a killer. Mr. Allingham would be a more likely choice. But don’t you see—first we have to have a reason, we have to learn what the blackmail was about.”

“Alan Baker would be the man to ask that.”

“I did. He refused to tell me. He said that now that Mr. Allingham’s counterthreat had failed, he was no longer interested in him. Mr. Allingham admitted to me that he was going to fight fire with fire, as he put it. That means he had learned something about Mr. Baker, too.”

She said, “He would. I don’t know how Joan can bear to live with that man. Did you see her when you were up there? How is she?”

From the corner of my eye, I saw Delilah turn quickly from the sink to look our way. What I saw in her eyes confirmed the hunch that had started me along this final line of inquiry.

“They’re not at all alike, Joan and her father,” Lucy said. “Joan is thoughtful and charitable and—”

“Lucy, for heaven’s sake!” Delilah said.

Lucy glared at her, and tears welled again in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Delilah said softly. “I’m as overwrought as you are. It’s going to be all right, Lucy. You’re home now, where you belong. Please don’t cry.”

She started to make the omelet. Lucy stared at the top of the table. I was silent; enough had been said. The picture was complete. I knew, now. But what did I have that would stand up in court?

The omelet was tasty, the rolls crisp, the talk over the table was general. So long as I was sitting with a librarian, I mentioned the trouble I was having trying to understand William Faulkner.

Delilah tried to explain that complicated genius to me, and failed, as the other literate friends of mine had. We went from there to the weather, and then I bid them good-bye and headed for the station and my soul-food brother.

I laid it all out for Bernie, all the bits and pieces that pointed a finger.

“An interesting pattern of Gaelic hunches and Celtic intuitions,” he admitted. “But what if the judge isn’t Irish?”

“Don’t give me that schtick! It’s a case!”

“Completely circumstantial,” he pointed out. “Do you have any solid evidence?”

I looked at him coolly. “You forgot the unidentified fingerprint, Hawkshaw.”

“By God, I did!” he said. “Hell, yes, we’ve got that for the clincher.” He chewed his lip and frowned. “But do we have enough here to give us reasonable cause to bring a suspect in?”

“I don’t know. That’s your department.”

“The sheriff up there,” he explained, “has never been cooperative with us, particularly when it involves one of his socialite citizens. I don’t have any clout with him at all.”

“How about Chief Harris?” I suggested. “He’s a socialite type.”

Bernie nodded. “He’s our best bet, if he’ll go along with it. He’s at a Rotary luncheon now. I’ll ask him when he gets back and phone you. Will you be home?”

“I’ll be home. I’ll dream up some excuse for our visit while I’m waiting. You could call up there to see if Allingham will be home. Do you have his unlisted number?”

Bernie nodded. “He gave it to one of the officers who went up to question him. But what’s my excuse for calling him?”

“Tell him you have some information on the death of Luther Barnum that you hope he can verify. Tell him you have been maintaining a surveillance on Joe Farini and hint that he’s your prime suspect.”

He frowned. “Why that bit?”

“So we can get in. It will put the old sourpuss off guard.”

He sighed. “Gad, the way you work!”

“There’s a word for the way I work,” I told him.

“Deviously?”

“No. Successfully.”

“Go!” he said. “Take your arrogance with you.”

I went. It had been a nasty case full of tawdry people. I wasn’t looking forward to that night. But the background on Luther Barnum that I had picked up in Florian bolstered my conviction that his murderer shouldn’t get away with it.

Bernie phoned around four o’clock. “Chief Harris,” he told me, “is not friendly with the sheriff up there. But he is with the watch commander who will be in charge tonight. Harris phoned him at home. The commander will send a deputy along with us.”

Jan came home from Donegal Bay with the best news of the day. The district attorney had finally decided he didn’t have a strong case; Duane would not be prosecuted.

I told her where I was going and why.

“Is this the third act?” she asked. “Does the curtain come down tonight?”

“Maybe.”

“I’d like to wish you luck,” she said, “but it only means that tomorrow you’ll be restless again, fretting for something that will keep you occupied.”

“Not anymore,” I told her. “I can always deliver samples.”

Bernie picked me up at seven o’clock. “This could be a wild goose chase,” he complained, “and I’m not even going to get regular or overtime pay for it.”

“How come?”

“I explained your theory to the chief and he was doubtful about it. So I am not
officially
on the trip. But, he assured me, if I wanted to accompany my good friend, he would understand.”

“What a compassionate man he is! If we luck it out, we can issue a joint press release. It could go: ‘Despite the protestations of Chief Chandler Harris of the San Valdesto Police Department, Lieutenant Bernard Vogel and his astute associate—’”

“Oh, shut up!” he said.

T
HE SHERIFF’S STATION WAS
located about midway between Donegal Bay and Veronica Village. We picked up the plainclothes deputy there. His name was Harold Pointer. He was a middle-aged, middle-sized man with prematurely gray hair.

“Haven’t I seen you somewhere?” he asked as he climbed into the car.

“At the Detterwald house,” I said. “I was there when you and Duane’s attorney came to the house.”

“That’s it,” he agreed. “Were you involved in that, too?”

“There could be a connection,” I said. “I understand Duane isn’t going to be prosecuted.”

“He isn’t, and I’m glad. Anthony has been nothing but trouble since he moved in. We don’t need his kind up here.”

I didn’t ask him if they needed the Cyrus Allingham kind. The area was probably loaded with the breed.

“Ye gods!” Bernie said when the castle came into view. “Is that for real?”

“It’s our San Simeon,” Pointer said. He stepped out of the car. “I’ll phone.” He went to the phone booth.

“We can get in,” Bernie said, “but can we get out?”

“If you and Pointer are armed, we might escape. But watch out for the moat. Allingham told me it’s mined.”

“Is the man crazy?”

“Only to us,” I said. “We’re the immoral minority.”

Down went the drawbridge, up went the portcullis. The door was open when we walked toward the house. The tall figure of Cyrus Allingham was outlined by the light from the entry hall behind him.

“Good evening, Harold,” he said to Pointer. And then he saw me. “What are you doing here? I’ve heard some disturbing things about you since last we talked, Mr. Callahan.”

I didn’t answer.

Pointer said, “We’re not here to harass you, Mr. Allingham. This is Lieutenant Vogel of the San Valdesto Police Department. He assured me that we are here only for any helpful information you might have about the death of Luther Barnum.”

Allingham said stiffly, “I have no information that could help. Our maid might have, but she’s in Hawaii.”

“No, she isn’t,” I said. “I talked with her this morning.”

He glared at me, scowled at Pointer, and said, “Come in.”

Joan was sitting at the far end of the living room. She didn’t get up as we entered. “Good evening, Harold,” she said.

I was getting the uneasy feeling that Harold wasn’t on our side. I said, “Good evening, Joan.”

She ignored me. She asked Harold, “What is he doing here?”

Bernie said, “You could call it a citizen’s complaint. If we are intruding, we will leave. But I think you would be better served if we stayed. Mr. Callahan is not a scandalmonger.”

“Scandal?” Allingham asked. “Did I hear you correctly, sir?”

“You did,” Bernie said evenly. “One of those scandal-sheet reporters interviewed Lucy Barnum’s cousin at his hotel.”

Joan glanced worriedly at her father, and then at me.

“Luther told him nothing,” I said. “Luther’s secret died with him.”

Allingham looked at Pointer. Pointer shrugged. Allingham said, “I don’t like this.”

“Perhaps,” Pointer said, “it would be wise to have your attorney here.”

Allingham shook his head. “Let’s sit down.”

We sat at the other end of the room from Joan. Allingham looked coldly at me. “Speak your piece, Mr. Callahan.”

“Luther,” I opened, “was probably killed by a person who was familiar with the rear-door entrance to the second floor of his hotel. The prostitutes who live on that floor do their soliciting near that doorway. Only their customers can get to the second floor by that staircase. Luther probably told Lucy about it.”

“Did she tell you that,” Allingham asked, “when you talked with her this morning?”

“No. Because I didn’t ask her. I didn’t pry. She was so troubled, so close to panic, I thought it would be cruel. And I doubt if she would have told me if I had asked.”

“Good!” he said.

“About the customer who came to that door the night Luther was killed, the girl told me she thought he was a mute. He didn’t talk. He paid her and went to her room. Then, while she was getting undressed, he suddenly walked out.”

“I’m not following you,” Pointer said. “Is that the man you think Mr. Allingham might know about?”

“It might not be a man,” I said. “That’s why he didn’t talk. A woman posing as a man wouldn’t risk talking.”

Pointer’s smile was cynical. “You’re really far out, aren’t you? Is that all you have, these kookie theories?”

“Let’s hear the rest,” Allingham said.

“The customer,” I went on, “had a bulge under the field jacket he, or she, was wearing. It might have been a bottle of cognac. The killer might have taken that poisoned liquor down to Luther’s room on the same floor. He, or she, might have been somebody Luther knew, or knew of. Most tenants in that hotel don’t open their doors to strangers that late at night.”

“Might, might, might,” Pointer said scornfully. “All maybes, no meat, no case.”

“Why don’t you shut up?” Bernie said. “Why don’t you keep your brown nose out of this?”

“Don’t tell me to shut up,” Pointer said. “I’ll—”

“Be quiet, Harold,” Allingham said. “Go on, Mr. Callahan.”

“When I talked with Joan,” I said, “she kept insisting that the information Alan Baker was threatening you with was probably some financial manipulation she didn’t understand. She was trying to throw me off the trail. What Baker knew had nothing to do with finance. And she told me Lucy was in Hawaii. That, we now know, was a lie.”