Verdict Suspended (18 page)

“You what?”

“I didn’t know about the choke on his car. I wanted everybody to think Jaime drowned, that’s what he wanted. Haven’t enough people been hurt by Sheilah’s death? Doesn’t the damage stop somewhere?”

“It stops,” Lennard said coldly, “when the story’s completed … and it’s not completed yet. Let’s try to fill in the gaps, Mr. Quentin. You went to Sheilah’s house this evening when you saw the lights were on. You went armed with a gun. You found Jaime in the house … but a different Jaime. A man who knew everything that happened the day Sheilah died … and everything that happened in the hospital the day he was questioned by Dr. Curry. You wanted to help him. You got him out in the car and started driving…. Where did you intend to go, Mr. Quentin?”

“To Dr. Curry’s house,” Steve said. “But we were both tense after Jaime’s ordeal. I decided to drive awhile first.”

“Just drive—with no particular destination?”

“Yes.”

“And while you were driving, Jaime suddenly announced that he was going to commit suicide and put you out of the car. Is that right?”

“Yes.”

“And then he wrecked the car and hid in the brush until you came and found him. There was a struggle for the possession of your gun. Two shots were fired … one hit you. What happened then?”

“I didn’t know I was hit until much later,” Steve said. “I heard a police siren. A truck had passed me on the highway when I was still on my way to the scene of the wreck. The driver spotted it and went for help.”

“And so the police came and took over,” Lennard concluded, “but Jaime got away.”

“It was getting dark … I couldn’t hold him.”

“But you didn’t want to hold him, did you? You wanted him to get away so we would all think he was dead. I wonder that you used your gun at all!”

It was a direct challenge. Captain Lennard was like a robot who spoke only what had been fed into him by a police officer’s manual—and then suddenly switched to another cycle and left Steve stunned by the implication.

“He jumped me!” Steve said. “I had to fire!”

“But why did he jump you? So you would know he wasn’t dead? He’d gone to so much trouble to fake suicide. Why did he give it away?”

Steve’s face was damp with perspiration. He still held the telephone in his hands, now completely forgotten. He made no attempt to answer Lennard.

“I’m looking for motive, Mr. Quentin,” Lennard continued. “I wonder why Jaime had to fight you for the car. It was his car, wasn’t it? I wonder why he told you he was going to kill himself. He could have kept his mouth shut and done it quietly some other time…. I wonder if he didn’t jump you because he knew you had no intention of taking him to Dr. Curry—or to anyone else.”

“And why not?” Steve demanded.

“That’s the motive I’m looking for, Mr. Quentin.”

Lennard left it that way … dangling. There was a slight, choking sound from Greta. She stepped forward and faced Steve. She had no more fear.

“Steve,” she said, “why are you so anxious to sell Sheilah’s house?”

Steve was in trouble. There were too many challenges from too many directions. “I’m not anxious,” he said. “I’m thinking of you.”

“I don’t believe you!” Greta said. “You can’t even wait for Jaime’s body to be found! You had to start talking about a power of attorney and disposing of Sheilah’s property. Ask him why, Captain Lennard.”

“I told you why,” Steve said. “I wanted to get your mind off Jaime. I wanted to help. You don’t understand business.”

“I understand that you wanted Jaime to leave Cypress Point and turn everything over to you … and now you want me to do what he wouldn’t do! I understand that you killed Jaime! You did kill him, didn’t you? You made up the other story so everybody will think it’s suicide when they recover Jaime’s body…. Where is he, Steve? Where is my husband?”

Greta stopped shouting and they all stood in a small hollow of silence, strange and strained. Greta’s face was a white oval of anger. Lennard was a big palm with a gun laid in it. Dr. Curry was a shadow with two intense eyes. And Steve was a straw man with the stuffing coming out. He swung toward Curry.

“You know I saved Jaime’s life!” he said. “You were with me in the hospital when he confessed. Make them understand what happened, Dr. Curry!”

Curry stepped quietly forward and took the telephone from Steve’s hand. He dropped it onto the divan. “Perhaps I can … now,” he said.

Their eyes met, and there was no mystery between them.

“There’s a flaw in every science, Mr. Quentin,” Curry said. “We leave the absolute to a higher stratum of thought…. When a patient is put under the influence of a drug or under hypnosis, he becomes extremely susceptible to suggestion. I warned you of that before our experiment with Jaime Dodson … but I don’t think my warning was necessary. You knew what you were doing when you called me to Cypress Point.”

Steve’s mouth was dry. He tongued his lips, hurriedly. “Curry,” he said, “I’m a lawyer.”

“I know that,” Dr. Curry said, “and you’ll sue me if I damage your character. But I’m a doctor, and I told you the day we met at Cypress Point Hospital that I have a conscience. You asked me to make Mrs. Dodson and Captain Lennard understand what happened that day. I intend to do just that. From the start, the procedure was very strange. By the time I reached the hospital the patient was already prepared. He was alone in the room with one person. Not a doctor; not a nurse. He was with you, Mr. Quentin.

“Now I’ll explain the state in which I found him. He was agitated … excited … as if his drugged mind had been forced to labor with some problem. Symptoms, Mr. Quentin. I’m a doctor. I’m willing to go on a witness stand in a court of law and swear that Jaime Dodson displayed all the symptoms of having been coached before I questioned him.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Steve said. “It’s impossible!”

“But it’s not impossible at all, Mr. Quentin. Freud himself abandoned hypnosis when he realized a patient was confessing things he’d never done! You had ample time to indoctrinate Jaime with the confession you wanted him to make. What you didn’t know—and you admitted this to me later—was that he might not recall that confession once he was no longer under the influence of the drug.”

Steve stood very still. He might have been made of wax except for the moisture on his face. “Dr. Curry, I warn you again. Don’t say too much. You can’t prove a thing.”

“But I can repeat the treatment,” Curry said, “with witnesses present. Where is Jaime, Mr. Quentin? There’s a way of learning whether or not that confession was genuine.”

“I don’t know!” Steve yelled. “I told you—”

And then the fine thread of control snapped. His nerves were too tight. The bombardment of questions was too hard. Directly ahead stood Captain Lennard with a gun in his hand. Curry’s exposition had drawn his attention; he was off guard. Steve leaped forward and grabbed the gun from his hand. He backed to the door.

“I don’t know where Jaime is!” he repeated. “Maybe he’s dead … but if he is, he killed himself!”

He whirled about, clawed the door open, and ran out into the night. It was late. The sky was beginning to pale above the treetops. The surf had the soft sound of morning. Steve didn’t see or hear. He ran toward the driveway, where a pair of headlights sliced a bright path through the shadows. Behind him, Lennard was becoming vocal. Ahead of him was a sound of running footsteps. He ducked into the shrubbery until the footsteps passed, and then ran on toward the lights. The police car was empty. He crawled in behind the wheel and shifted to driving gear.

At Hanson’s Pier the dawn slid quietly over the sea, turning a black restlessness into a nodding sheath of silver gray. Out of the mist a canopy appeared above the old merry-go-round, and prancing, wild-eyed ponies of white and black and brown were created from shadow and wisps of fleeing fog. Jaime, curled tightly in one of the wooden seats, opened his eyes and stared fixedly at the vision before him. It was a blue horse. A very bright blue horse. He unwound his legs and came to a sitting position. The morning was like a curtain being slowly raised. Beyond the blue horse now appeared the wet metal roof of Herb Catcher’s garage on the far side of the highway. Jaime read the sign, forming each letter distinctly in his mind, until he remembered what it was he had to do. He came to his feet, swayed, and steadied himself with a handful of brass bar. Instant pain knifed his shoulder, cutting away the last of the fog. Steve’s first shot had gone wild and barely grazed him. The tweed was raveled on his coat and there wasn’t enough blood to wet a Band-Aid … but the intent had been murder, simple and sweet. He let go of the brass bar and stepped down on the earth. He walked like a man taking a sobriety test … walked to the highway, looked both ways, crossed the highway, and proceeded to the garage.

It was too early. The doors were locked. He walked around to the rear and peeked through the wire-mesh fence at the clutter of Herb Catcher’s parts yard. The red sports car was still there. It didn’t interest Jaime. What did interest him was a couple of ten-year-old sedans with “For Sale” chalked on the windows. If the motor turned over in either of them, Herb had a sale.

Jaime circled the yard. There was a double gate in the rear with a rusted lock that fell apart at the touch. It might be hours before Herb Catcher parted with his bed; but the keys for the jalopies were probably in the shop. He could leave a blank check. Catcher was an honest man. He wouldn’t fill it in for more than twice what the heap was worth. Jaime pulled the gates open and went inside the yard. Entering the shop was easy. The rear window was unlocked. He slid open the sash and crawled inside. He lowered himself into a cluttered darkness, scared up a yellow-eyed cat, and finally located the keys hanging on a peg near Catcher’s roll-top desk. One was tagged “‘50 Chevvy.” That was the sedan with the four good tires. He took the key down from the pegs and crawled back through the window. He walked back to the Chevvy and then came to a full stop. It was a mistake to leave the gates open in full view of the highway. They were now blocked by a police car.

Jaime saw the door on the driver’s side open, and he watched Steve, with the gun in his hand, climb out of the car and come toward him.

“I had a feeling you might come here,” Steve said. “You never had much imagination.”

Steve was going to kill him. He didn’t need imagination to know that.

“If you did,” Steve added, “you wouldn’t be in this mess. I got you off once.”

“But I didn’t kill Sheilah,” Jaime said.

“That’s unimportant now. Nobody cares who killed Sheilah. They just like to gossip. Talk doesn’t hurt if you don’t listen.”

“I care who killed Sheilah,” Jaime said. “Why did you do it, Steve?”

“She had no gratitude. I did a great deal for Sheilah. We were very close once. She didn’t remember that when I needed her.”

“You were bleeding the estate.”

“Not bleeding. I borrowed a little—fifty thousand dollars, to be exact. The market was going up … it went down instead. I wasn’t worried. I could have repaid the loan. But Sheilah decided to cut you out of the business, and that meant a full accounting.”

“And no forgiveness for past services rendered.”

Steve tightened his grip on the gun. “You knew Sheilah. You saw what she did to you with that sign on the building site. My humiliation was worse. A full public airing. The end of a career.

“I asked for time to make up my losses. She laughed at me. She showed me the fresh cut on her face where the glass hit her. ‘Jaime’s farewell kiss,’ she said. ‘That’s what I get for rearing him like my own son! And now you come begging.’ … Begging! I never begged for anything in my life, but she threw the word at me the way you threw the glass at her. It was too much. I picked up the poker and killed her. I knew everybody would think you were guilty.”

“That was generous of you,” Jaime said.

“It was—because I saved you, in spite of them. But it’s too late now.”

There was nothing between Jaime and Steve’s gun but six feet of air. Steve couldn’t have missed. But he was curious.

“What gave me away?” he asked. “I said something last night in Sheilah’s house and you knew that I’d killed her. What was it, Jaime?”

He waited for an answer. What he received was the key ring flung into his eyes at the same instant Jaime dived for his feet. There was no time to shoot. Jaime kicked the gun away and rolled free of Steve’s threshing arms. His hand clawed the earth until it found the gun, and then he scrambled to his feet to face Steve with retribution in his hands.

He never used the gun. The sound of police sirens was in the air again, and it was music sweeter than the calliope of Domingo Alvarez.

Jaime didn’t have time to answer Steve’s question for several hours. He was at the Cypress Point Hospital by that time, seated on the edge of an examining table with his shirt off and a newly applied dressing on his shoulder. He was surrounded by a small, intense audience. Captain Lennard, Dr. Curry, the young doctor who had been practicing basic first aid on his flesh wound, and Greta. Greta was the only one he resented. She heard him groan when the doctor dressed his wound. They hadn’t been married long enough for her to have that kind of advantage.

Captain Lennard’s eyes were rimmed with the evidence of a sleepless night, but his spirits were soaring. “I should have given Steve the gun instead of letting him jump me for it,” he said. “He set out looking for you, and a police car’s the easiest thing on wheels to follow.”

“Why didn’t you take out the cartridge clip?” Jaime suggested.

Lennard grinned. “That’s the funny thing, Jaime. We did. You two were rolling on the ground for the possession of an empty gun…. But it wasn’t empty when Steve took it up to Sheilah’s house last night, was it? He meant to kill you.”

Jaime located his shirt and started to put it on. Greta was suddenly beside him, helping to fit it over the tender shoulder. The groan, he decided, wasn’t too badly timed.

“He had to kill me,” he said. “He realized—when we were in the house together—that I knew he killed Sheilah. He didn’t know why I knew, but it was simple. Before Steve came on the scene, Greta reminded me that forty-five minutes elapsed from the time I threw a glass at Sheilah and the time she saw me run out of the house. She said we wouldn’t have quarreled that long—and she was right. Sheilah had a way of cutting people down to the size she wanted them much faster than that.