“And then cross the tracks and hope no car came while you were in the open,” Constance added. “It doesn’t work very well, does it?”
He made a grunting noise and started the car again, put it in reverse and backed into the parking lot, where he surveyed the length of the fence. There was no other gate in it, just the two entrances at this corner. He drove out of the lot and very slowly along the frontage of the condominium property. The fence was unbroken after they left that first corner.
“Okay,” he said then and pressed the accelerator.
The village of Maryville had a population of twelve thousand two hundred residents; there were three motels within a few minutes of downtown, and a hotel in the center of town, but there was no vacancy in any of them.
“Tourists,” Charlie said with resignation, joining Constance at the car. She had gone in with him the first two times, before accepting defeat.
When they got back to Tootles’s place, all the police cars were gone. Paul Volte was standing on the back porch, his arms crossed over his chest, a deep frown on his face.
He watched Constance and Charlie without speaking until they were within touching distance, and then he said in a low voice, “I think that idiotic lieutenant plans to arrest Marion!”
“What’s been happening?” Charlie asked.
“The questions he asked me all kept leading back to
Marion. How did Victoria know about the party? Was she interested in Marion for literary reasons? Planning a book or something about her. Like that.”
Charlie nodded in sympathy. “Way it works,” he said. “You find a good likely suspect and work and work with it, just to see how long it takes to shake it apart. If it doesn’t come apart, you begin to think you’ve got the answer. So far, everyone keeps coming apart, except for Tootles. They’ll keep at her until they make a case, or she falls apart before their eyes like everyone else is doing.”
“Christ!” Paul said. “It’s the most ridiculous thing I can imagine!”
“Paul, exactly when did Victoria tell you she wanted to come to the party?” Constance asked. “Could there have been a news item about it?”
He shook his head. “What for? Marion’s not really a hot news item, you know. Victoria called me on the fifteenth, one week before we actually came. She said she understood there would be a party for Marion, and that I was invited, and would I mind if she tagged along. Would I give Marion a call and make sure it was all right? I said why didn’t she call for herself, and she said she didn’t even know Marion Olsen, who might not accept a call from a stranger, and a party crasher. So I made the call, and a week later we got together and came by plane and rented a car at the airport to drive the rest of the way.” He had said all this so often it now was singsong. He ran his hand over his face and closed his eyes wearily.
“Would you have considered an article about Marion’s touring show?” Constance asked.
He looked at her in surprise and shook his head. “No.
Seven Kinds of Death
is the best thing she’s ever done, and it’s eighteen or nineteen years old. I wouldn’t have written about her, and she didn’t think for a second I would. I wouldn’t have written about the condominiums, either,” he added. “The International Style passed through the corridors of the Chicago School, interpreted by Le Corbusier, diluted by Howe and then translated into binary by a hacker, who invariably selected the worst features he could find to produce a CAD program. For fifty dollars extra you can get variations.”
His contempt was so blatant that for a time no one spoke. Constance gazed at a willow tree fluttering gently, and finally Charlie said, “We have no authority to ask questions, no reason to expect anyone to answer them, but for what it’s worth, I don’t believe Tootles killed Victoria Leeds. I’ve known her for more than twenty-five years, and I just can’t see her doing it. For what it’s worth. And I could be wrong, natch.”
“What do you want to know?” Paul Volte asked. The animation that his scorn had enlivened vanished and weariness settled over him again like a miasma.
Constance had already told Charlie about Paul’s relationship with Victoria, and with Toni; there seemed little point in rehashing any of it now. “You asked Tootles to invite Victoria Leeds?” Charlie asked, and Paul said not exactly. When he called, Max had answered, not Tootles. Charlie sat down on the top step of the porch; Paul left the rail he was leaning against to sit down also. Constance pulled a lounge chair closer and stretched out on it.
“This is all meaningless,” Paul said. He sounded dispirited and despairing; his voice was monotone. “I called here and got Max,” he said in a flat voice. “I said I’d like to bring a friend, Victoria Leeds, and would that be convenient. And he said he would be delighted to meet Ms. Leeds. That was all.”
He said he had not paid much attention the day he and Victoria arrived and Johnny Buell joined them for a few minutes. Janet and Victoria had been laughing at something, but he didn’t know what; he had not heard the joke. He had, he admitted, taken a dislike to Johnny Buell when he realized that he was the one who had been responsible for his, Paul’s, invitation. Just two weeks before the party, he had received the invitation, and he would not have come if Victoria had not called him. Inviting him was obviously an afterthought, he said bitterly. Johnny had read his book, had been flattering about it, but it was obvious that he was looking for a free lunch.
“Did you notice what time it was when you realized you hadn’t seen Victoria at the party?” Charlie asked.
“I came back down a little after five thirty, and I sort of looked around for her, but there was a crush already. It must have been close to six thirty before I started to worry about it.” He described the half-hearted search at first and then the real search, and finally calling the police. A little after seven when the party was officially over, they finally had crossed the road to search the barn. He had not paid any attention to the crates. “It probably wouldn’t have meant anything to me even if I had seen the loosened screws. I hadn’t seen them before and hadn’t worked on crating up, so I doubt I would have noticed anything out of ordinary there. We were looking for a woman, remember.”
“That was near seven?” Charlie asked.
“A little after. Johnny and his friends had left already; most of the guests had left, I think. Seven fifteen, something like that.”
“And as far as you can say, the crates had been opened by then?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I just don’t know.”
Charlie glanced at him unhappily. “Can you think of anyone who might have wanted to kill Victoria Leeds? Or a reason?”
Paul shook his head. “There isn’t anyone, and there isn’t a reason in the world. I’ve tried and tried to come up with anything, and there’s nothing.” He caught his breath in sharply, closed his eyes, and then added, “She was one of the kindest, gentlest, most understanding people I’ve ever known. No one could have had a reason.” His eyes gleamed with unshed tears.
There was a silence following this. Paul gazed blindly past Charlie, who felt almost embarrassed. Constance broke the silence.
“I understand that you recommended Toni to Tootles,” she said. “Is that something you do often? Recommend young artists to study here?”
He shrugged. “This was the first time. Victoria asked me to do something for her, and when I saw the relief Toni did of Victoria, I agreed that she would benefit.”
“Is she exceptionally talented?” Constance asked.
He shrugged, but now he looked more alive than he had only a moment earlier. “She’s good. There’s talent. We’ll have to wait and see.”
Charlie stood up and stretched. “You leaving today?” he asked.
“I don’t know, but in any case not until I’ve had a chance to talk to Max and Marion. I can’t believe that policeman intends to saddle Marion with this. It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard of!” His respite from grief, guilt, whatever it was, had been short-lived; he looked miserable again. He had got to his feet as he spoke, and now he started to walk toward the door of the house. He hesitated before opening it. “What about you? Are you leaving?”
“Haven’t decided,” Charlie said.
“Hang around if you can,” Paul said suddenly. “Are you free to take on an investigation now? Would you be interested? I have to talk to Max and Marion first, but if they agree, would you be interested?”
“Mr. Volte,” Charlie said softly, “do you know anything about me, about us?”
Paul nodded. “I called my lawyer yesterday and briefed him about what was going on here. Your name came up because of her.” He nodded toward Constance. “I believe my lawyer would approve if we hired you. And if that lieutenant really tries to hang this on Marion, we’ll want to hire you, I’m certain.”
He reached for the handle of the screen door but stopped again when Constance asked, “Paul, why do Toni and Janet think you had something to do with Victoria’s death?”
He hunched his shoulders for a second as if to ward off a blow, then he said, “Because I’m responsible. Not for the act itself. I didn’t do it, or hire anyone to do it. But I’m responsible. If it weren’t for me, she’d be alive now.” Abruptly he yanked the door open and hurried inside.
NINE
Whatever Charlie had
intended to say next, he forgot because Spence Dwyers came shambling around the corner of the house. He spotted Charlie and Constance on the back porch and headed toward them, straightening his back, raising his head, as if his awareness that he was being watched had pushed a button. Charlie had sparred with Spence once many years ago, and had been trounced, but not hurt. He remembered how careful Spence had been not to hurt him.
“Charlie!” Spence said as he drew near them. “Thank God you’re here! Has Paul spoken to you? Or Max? We want to hire you to get to the bottom of this mess. My God, I can’t stand seeing Marion like this!”
“What happened?” Charlie demanded. “Is Belmont giving her a hard time? Doesn’t she know she doesn’t have to say a word without a lawyer at her elbow?”
“No. No. It isn’t anything like that. They haven’t come down hard yet. But she’s… I think she’s shrinking right in front of our eyes! It’s awful, the way she looks.”
“Are they through with you?”
“Yes, they told me I could leave. But who could leave now? With her like that? We have to talk, make plans.”
“Sit down,” Charlie said, indicating the top step. He waited until Spence sat down, and then sat beside him. “Did you know Victoria Leeds before she showed up here?”
Spence shook his head. “I never even met her. I got here after the party started, and she never put in an appearance. I don’t think any of us knew her, except for Paul and Toni. You know about that? How they met and all?”
“Yes, we know,” Charlie said morosely. “Spence,” he went on, gazing out through the trees, “if we take this on, we’re going to need all the help we can get. You understand? I mean no holding out, no half truths. It’s not going to be a snap, and we may not be able to take the heat off Tootles, but I’ll try.”
Spence nodded. “Yeah, Charlie, goes without saying.”
Charlie became aware that Constance wanted to ask something. There was nothing he could have pointed to; he was certain she had not cleared her throat, or shifted her position, or touched him. But he knew just as surely as if she had run her hand down his back.
And she knew he was pausing to allow her question. She asked, “Why did you arrange a touring show for Tootles at this late date in her career?”
Charlie continued to look out over the trees, but he was fully aware of the rigidity that had come over Spence Dwyers; the man hardly seemed to breathe for what seemed much too long a time. Charlie waited, mulling over the question.
“It’s never too late,” Spence said finally. “She has some very good pieces, after all. A lot of them I’ve had in my gallery over the years. Nice work. She can use a little appreciation, we all can, no matter what stage we’re at.”
Constance said, “Hm,” and Charlie said, “Knock it off. Whose idea was the traveling circus? Yours or hers?”
Again the silence stretched too long. Pay dirt, Charlie thought then, and he hadn’t even known what they were scratching for this time. He got up and brushed off his trousers. Very slowly Spence stood up; he didn’t look at Charlie or Constance. “Damn it,” he said finally, “her work, the show, it’s got nothing to do with the Leeds woman. She was just someone Paul knew. Let’s let it go at that.”
“Can’t,” Charlie said with regret. “We’ll come back to it.”
For a second or two Spence hesitated with a curious look on his face, partly embarrassment, partly surprise. “Jesus,” he said in a low voice, “the way we’re talking about her, Victoria Leeds, as if she didn’t matter. Me, I mean. The way I was talking about her. Jesus. It’s just that I didn’t know her, and I do know Tootles.”
“Paul’s certainly taking it hard,” Constance murmured.
“Yeah. I know he is.”
“Too hard?” Constance asked in a low voice. “I understand Victoria Leeds wanted to marry and he wouldn’t do it. She left him months ago apparently.”
Spence nodded. “That’s what I heard, too. So now he’s having all the guilt in the world settle down around his shoulders. Way it goes. Anyway, I don’t know anything about their private lives, you understand. I only met him a few times over the years, not like a bosom buddy, you know.”
Constance nodded and said
of course
, and now Charlie asked, “You know of a place where we can get a room, an apartment, anything for a day or two?”
“Out here, or in town?”
“Here.”
“Not offhand. Let me give it a little thought. I’ll ask Max. There’s got to be something.”
Constance now asked, “Spence, is Toni any good? Is she going to make it?”
He looked surprised, then shrugged. “Who knows? She’s clever, smart, good with her hands. More than that? Not yet. But she’s pretty young. Give her a few years, see what develops.”
He grinned lopsidedly, “Tootles wouldn’t have invited her to stay if she hadn’t thought the kid will make it eventually.” Shaking his head, he repeated, “Tootles. I haven’t called her that in thirty years. Tootles. Still fits, doesn’t it?” He sobered again quickly. He glanced at his watch, then started to move toward the door. “I’ll make some calls, see if I can find you a place to stay. And, Charlie, later, this evening, let’s get together again with that other question. Okay? Just need a little time first, that’s all.” “Sure,” Charlie said. “Sure, Spence.”
One by one the others drifted out to wander around in confusion; no one seemed in a hurry to leave now, not even Ba Ba. She appeared, hesitated, turned and reentered the house. Spence came back and handed Charlie a piece of paper with the name of a motel and directions—ten minutes away, he said, no more than that. Then Toni appeared and said there was a phone call for Charlie. “I think it’s the sheriff,” she said, leading them to the telephone in the office. She watched Charlie as he lifted the receiver. He returned her gaze pointedly and did not speak until she flushed crimson, turned, and walked away with her head very high, her back very stiff. She pulled the door closed behind her unnecessarily hard.
“Meiklejohn,” he said then, grinning at Constance.
“Mr. Buell said they might hire you,” Gruenwald said. “You working now?”
“Not yet.”
“Want to go with me to talk to the guy who was crating up the artwork? He’s due back around nine. Thought we might like a word with him.”
“I’d like that,” Charlie said. “We’ll be staying at…” He glanced at the paper Spence had given him, “Lakeside Inn.”
“Know where it is,” Gruenwald said. “Pick you up around eight forty-five. Okay?”
Charlie said okay and added, “You understand that I might be working by then,” he said.
“I know. See you later.”
Constance was watching him with a slight frown as he told her about the invitation. “But if the state police are handling the investigation, why is he doing this? And why ask us to go with him?”
“Good questions,” Charlie said. “Let’s ask him.”
He looked past her at the hall door, and then went to open it to listen to voices raised somewhere around the front of the house. He motioned, and they walked quietly down the hallway toward the foyer.
“I don’t give a shit!” Tootles was yelling. “That pipsqueak can’t come and go like that, give orders to stay put like that. Who does he think he is?”
“He’s the law,” Spence said.
Paul’s voice was lower. “Marion, just don’t let him get to you. Talk to your lawyer first thing in the morning.”
Max said, “He isn’t after you, Marion. I’m sure he isn’t.”
“And you’re wrong,” Ba Ba cried. “Of course, he’s after her. I knew it would happen! I read the cards and they were full of death omens, catastrophes…”
A strange voice said, “Mrs. Buell, you want lunch in the dining room? I can put out sandwich stuff, and salad. I wasn’t sure what to do, what with all those men hanging around…”
Max said, “The dining room’s fine. Fine. We need coffee, and something to eat. Sandwiches are fine, aren’t they, Marion?”
“You’re hungry? How can you be?” Tootles cried. “I can’t stand this! Food. Coffee. Let’s all pretend nothing’s happened, nothing’s going to happen. That man plans to arrest me, for chrissake!”
Charlie took the next step or two into the foyer and Tootles ran to him, caught his arm. “You will help, won’t you? You can find out who killed Victoria Leeds. Charlie, someone has to help me!”
He looked at her in wonder. She could still do it, he realized. The hormones, the appeal was still there in this coarse, not at all handsome woman with unkempt graying hair, unkempt, not-very-clean clothes, dirty feet… He pried her fingers loose from his arm, and took her by the shoulders, moved her back a foot or two. “Let’s make one thing clear,” he said. “If I take this on, you don’t lie to me. Is that a deal?”
She looked bewildered. “Of course. Why would I lie to you?”
He sighed and looked past her to where Constance was standing, watching all this with a very bright look. Probably no one else would recognize it as amusement, but he knew that expression. He scowled at her.
“I thought he was a fireman,” Ba Ba said.
“And you’ll all cooperate,” Charlie said to them all generally.
“What difference does it make, if he’s a fireman?” Ba Ba asked. “We haven’t had any fire, thank heavens. At least, we’ve been spared—”
“Babar, shut up,” Charlie said. Count the small blessings, he thought with relief; when you told her to shut up, she did. For a few minutes. And she didn’t seem to hold a grudge. She assumed a pout now and pointedly looked out the window as if she had suddenly gone deaf. “I’ll want to ask you as a group about the night of the party. I’ll want to ask some of you questions not in a group. And I’ll want to have a look at that condo. Can we get in yet?” he asked Max.
Max glanced at Johnny who shrugged and said, “The lieutenant said they’d clear out by four at the latest.”
Charlie nodded. “Four it is. And right now, I want a sandwich.” They all followed him meekly enough into the dining room. It was nearly three already.
Asking questions of the group was a bust, he decided later. Nothing turned up that he had not already heard. Constance went upstairs to gather the few things she had unpacked, and now it was going on four, and they were ready to leave.
Johnny Buell met them at the door. Although he looked serious, there was also an underlying eagerness in his expression, his attitude, like a Boy Scout after another merit badge. “Now what?”
“Exactly the same as it was the other night. You said good-bye to everyone, and your group went outside. Where were you parked?”
“Across the road,” Johnny said. “I knew we’d want to leave promptly at seven and I didn’t want to get blocked. I had moved the car over there already. Dad’s car,” he added. “Mine’s a Corvette, a two-seater.”
“Good,” Charlie said. He looked at his watch. “Let’s pretend it’s about three minutes after seven. We’ve said good-bye, and it’s time to leave. Let’s go.”
Johnny would have hurried them through the yard, but Constance did not permit it. “I noticed Debra’s shoes,” she explained. “High heels, sandals. And this is rough ground.”
They reached Max’s Continental, and got in. Johnny drove fast, but not dangerously so, and probably at his usual speed, to the condominium fence. No one spoke until he stopped. “I had to get out and open the gate,” he said, opening his door. He unlocked the gate and swung it back, returned to the car and drove on through, to the first of the buildings. An iron-grille gate closed the driveway outside the building itself. He touched a signal button on a box on the dashboard and the gate swung up; he drove in and down a long ramp. “Basement,” he said. “This will all be parking space for the occupants.” They drove past some elevators and stairs. The parking spaces were marked by pale green lines painted on the floor. He drove slowly to the far end of the basement and made a partial turn, touched the signal button again, and the second grillwork gate opened.
“We got out here,” he said.
“You opened the gate there before you left the car and went upstairs?”
Johnny nodded with a crestfallen look. “I don’t know why, no reason. I just did. I know. Someone could have entered the building while we were upstairs.”
Charlie nodded and opened the car door. The wall to his right housed many elevators, a staircase, and two or three unmarked doors that he assumed were maintenance closets. All the doors were the same dark green as the walls. Stenciled on panels on the elevator doors were oversized numbers on one side and the letter A on the other in the same pale green as the floor stripes. The numbers and the stripes seemed to glow against the dark green; easy to spot late at night, after a hard day, Charlie thought. Johnny went to Six A and pushed the button. He had to use a computer lock card to open the elevator door; they entered the small foyer that looked almost exactly as it had when Constance had ridden it up before. Now the roses on the shelf were dying and their fragrance had turned to a musty odor.
No one spoke until they reached the sixth-floor apartment and entered. Charlie said, “Seven ten. Was the timing about the same as the other night?”
Johnny moistened his lips and nodded. His subdued eagerness had vanished; he looked apprehensive and seemed reluctant to leave the foyer and advance into the apartment until Charlie realized the cause of his nervousness. “She’s gone,” he said kindly. “Believe me, it’s all right.”
They walked through the hall into the spacious living room where even the chalked outline of Victoria Leeds had been cleaned up. The tarps were back on the furniture.
“Now what?” Charlie asked.
“I went on through to the dining room. I had left my briefcase in there. The others didn’t move from the doorway. No one wanted to get paint on their clothes. It smelled pretty strong, you know, wet paint. The walls, the door facings…”He hurried across the room to the dining room, went in, came back out and rejoined Charlie and Constance at the door. “Then we went down.”
They reentered the foyer/elevator and rode to the basement, where they got back in the car, and Johnny drove out of the building and touched the button to close the gate after him. “I stopped here,” he said, pulling on the hand brake. The iron gate had already closed. “I began to wonder if there were tarps, the heavy odor of paint in the other units, and I knew I wouldn’t rest unless I checked them out. This was a big weekend,” he added. “You know about the two tours through the buildings we had planned?”