Blow Hot, Blow Cold

11

“Oh!” said Nancy. “Oh, by God!”

She was not aware that this was an echo of Lieutenant Masters, several hours delayed; and neither, of course, was David. They were sprawled on their terrace, David trying to finish reading a chapter in the fading light, which was something Nancy had told him and told him not to do. He looked up, startled.

“What’s the matter?”

“I have just this minute thought of something,” said Nancy.

“Thought of what?”

“It’s just incredible.”

“In that case don’t tell me.”

“I mean it’s incredible that I haven’t thought of it before.”

David was properly titillated. “Oh? Yes? Well?”

“Because it was obvious to anyone with half a brain, and it has been all along.”

“Damn it, will you kindly tell me what you’re talking about?”

“Why, the light.”

“Well, you may see the light, but I’m completely in the dark.”

“That’s because you weren’t outside the house, as I was.”

“When?”

“The night Lila was killed. You remember I talked with Larry out front and later with Stanley out back, and some time during that period I saw the light on in Lila’s bedroom? I definitely remember seeing it. Well, the next day, when you and Jack and I went up and found Lila dead in the bedroom, no light was burning. Don’t you see what it means, David? It means that Lila must have been alive after Larry left! Dead people can’t turn off lights!”

The chapter would clearly remain unfinished. David dogeared a page to mark his place and closed the book.

“You’re sure Lila’s light was on after Larry drove off?”

“I’m positive.”

“Hmm!” David cogitated. Nancy waited anxiously for his verdict. After all, the man was her lord and master. David’s face smoothed. “No mystery,” he said cheerfully. “The bulb burned out.”

“Darn, that didn’t occur to me.” Nancy brightened. “But we can check that. Let’s run over there and look at the bulb.”

“We can’t, dear heart. Remember? House locked? Police?”

Nancy was silent. Then she said, “The police do have a talent for getting in the way, don’t they? I suppose I’ll have to call Lieutenant Masters to open the house. Don’t you agree, David?”

“To anything,” said David cravenly, “as long as you leave me out of it. Anyway, it occurs to me that the answer to the doused bedroom light may be very simple. Larry may have come back later and turned it off.”

“No,” said Nancy firmly.

“Why not?”

“Because.”

“Because why?”

“Just because.”

“Oh.” David squirmed uneasily. “Damn it, I’m not fond of any of this! It makes Masters’s nonsense suddenly seem to make sense. That stuff he told you today. Do you suppose he can be right? That one of our neighbors is a murderer?”

“I don’t know... It makes me feel like a kind of traitor... Anyway, aside from who — why?”

“There could have been an unknown reason.”

Nancy sniffed. “In a neighborhood like this everything is known.”

“Is it?” asked David dryly. “Did you know, for instance, that Lila and Jack Richmond had a thing going for a while?”

“Oh, come off it, David!”

“It’s a fact. It lasted for about six months. Jack broke it off.”

“Dave Howell,” exclaimed Nancy, “I simply can’t believe that something like that went on right under our noses without my knowing it!”

“It didn’t go on right under our noses. It went on at a considerable distance from our noses. They were careful to see to that.”

“Then how do you know so much about it?”

“I don’t. I know only the little Jack chose to confide in me. We were at the club drinking, and it suddenly spilled out. I think Jack was in need of a confessor. I gathered the thing got pretty torrid before it cooled off.”

“Isn’t that just like a man? Has an affair with his neighbor’s wife and blabs about it in a bar! That Jack is far too handsome for his own good, if you ask me. Why the hell didn’t you tell me about this before?”

“All men don’t blab,” said David loftily.

“You’re blabbing now, aren’t you?”

“This is different. We were trying to think of a possible motive for a neighbor. I just cited it as a theoretical possibility—”

“David Howell, how can you play golf and drink beer with someone you suspect of murder?”

“Damn it, I don’t suspect Jack! Of course it’s ridiculous.”

“You may think it’s ridiculous, but I can assure you Lieutenant Masters wouldn’t. That man could suspect anyone, including you and me. Did Larry know about this thing between Jack and Lila?”

“I doubt it. I never noticed any change in his attitude toward Jack.”

“Did Vera?”

“Jack didn’t actually say, but I suspect she did. Vera’s pretty sharp. She’d be hard to two-time indefinitely, and I rather imagine this wasn’t the first time Jack grazed in another pasture.”

“Do you have to express it so disgustingly?” Nancy asked absently, but her mind was busy with the problem. “If Vera knew, she certainly didn’t let on. She always treated Lila quite well — well enough to fool me, if she knew about Lila and Jack. Treated Lila well and didn’t like her, all at the same time.”

“Well, Vera’s a remarkable gal. Even if she found out about Jack and Lila, she’d be quite capable of adjusting — once Jack had got out of the affair.”

“This isn’t getting us anywhere,” Nancy decided. “David. Do you know who sticks in my mind? I mean as a possible murderer?”

“Me?”

“Besides you.”

“I give up.”

“Stanley.”

“Old Stanley?”

“Yes, old Stanley.”

“That’s just downright idiotic.”

“Is it? I keep remembering that Stanley remained in the alley when I went into the house. I happened to glance back, and he was staring up at Lila’s lighted window in the most peculiar way. How seriously, I wonder, did he take Lila’s passes? She only tried to tease him, of course — a kind of ridicule — but Stanley has no sense at all where women are concerned. On top of that, he’s thin-skinned. I wonder what he’d do if, after being teased into a compromising act, he found himself laughed at and made to feel a fool?”

“I certainly can’t see Stanley going berserk with a knife under any provocation.”

“Can’t you? Men are so obtuse about such things.”

“But it wasn’t only Lila who was killed. By Masters’s theory, so was Larry. Are you seriously contending that old Stanley, after stabbing Lila in a rage, was capable of devising an elaborate scheme to kill Larry and make him seem a murderer-suicide? Even if Stanley had the time that night, he lacks the imagination. The fact is, lovey, I’m not convinced Larry was killed by anyone but himself. I think he committed suicide, as the evidence indicates.”

“Wouldn’t that be accommodating of him! Quite a coincidence! Larry killed himself just in time to be blamed for the murder of Lila, who was really murdered by Stanley. No, thank you.”

“We have three theories,” said David. “Murder and suicide by Larry. Or two murders by a party unknown. Or a suicide and a coincidental murder by a party unknown. Well, regardless of lights and keys and air-conditioners and whatever Masters can make of them, I still plump for Number One. It’s too bad, but it’s simple and indicated, and that’s enough for me.”

“And that light in Lila’s room?” demanded Nancy. “It had to be turned off by someone, if it didn’t burn out.”

“Maybe Stanley turned it off.”

“Speaking of Stanley, here he comes.”

Stanley Walters had been in his backyard watching them furtively for some time. Now he came down to the alley and crossed it and waddled up to the Howells’ terrace. He looked nervous and worried and not at all like a scheming killer, let alone a principal in a crime of passion.

“Hello, Stanley,” David said.

“Hello, Stanley,” Nancy said. “How’s Mae?”

“Mae’s not so well,” Stanley said. “She’s lying down. Headache.”

“Oh,” Nancy said. “Will you have a beer or something?”

“No, thanks.” Stanley sat down and clasped his hands and inspected them as if for stains. Then he closed his knees upon them. “I’d... like to talk to you folks. I mean there’s something on my mind that I can’t, well, get off it.”

“Telling somebody about it,” said Nancy warmly, “is the best kind of therapy, Stanley. Thanks for thinking of us as confidants.”

“Yes,” said David. “What’s on your mind, old boy?”

“It happened the night Lila was killed.” Stanley looked up toward the bedroom window of the house next door; he kept looking at it as he went on. “I know Larry is supposed to have killed Lila before he left home. It isn’t true. Because I was over there after he left, and Lila was still alive.”

“You saw Lila?” Nancy cried. “See, David?”

“He didn’t say he saw Lila,” said David. “He said she was still alive.”

“Of course he saw her! How else would he know whether she was alive or not?”

“Because he could have just heard her voice.”

“That’s ridiculous. Stanley, you did see Lila, didn’t you?”

“Yes. I saw her and talked with her,” Stanley said miserably. “And I don’t mind telling you I wish to hell I hadn’t.”

“There, David, I hope you’re satisfied. Now stop interrupting, will you? Go on, Stanley. Why did you go over to Lila’s?”

It was apparent from Stanley’s instant flush that this was the $64,000 question. It was also apparent — from his tone of voice — that on this particular point his need for unburdening his soul was not so great as to demand the entirely naked truth.

“Well... I was down there at the alley, see... as you know, Nancy... and I couldn’t help, well, thinking about Lila — I mean, kind of worrying and wondering if she was all right, being all alone in the house and all — so I finally went over to find out.”

You finally went over to try to earn a few extramarital credits, David thought; but he did not vocalize it.

“You actually went into the house?” Nancy asked, with a sharp look at her husband. That woman, David thought, is a telepath.

“Nnnno... she wouldn’t let me in. I mean, Lila seemed to think I was coming over for, well, ulterior reasons.” Stanley began to sweat. He took out a handkerchief and blotted himself.

“And exactly what happened, Stanley? This could be very important. Don’t leave out a thing. Well?”

“Well, I went over there to the back door and rang the bell, and Lila opened her bedroom window upstairs and poked her head out and asked me what the devil I wanted. I told her I just wanted to see if she was all right. She laughed and said something like, ‘No sale tonight, buster,’ and told me to go away, so I did.” Stanley had to blot again. “And that’s it. There wouldn’t have been that much if I’d had the sense I was born with.”

“You say she opened her window?” Nancy muttered. “Did she shut it again?”

“Yes, Nancy.”

Nancy whirled on David. “Jack told Lieutenant Masters that Lila and Larry were probably going to open windows, to explain why we found the air-conditioning turned off. Jack said they probably just didn’t get to it. That’s not true, obviously, because Lila opened the window to Stanley and then closed it again. Why didn’t she simply leave it open if the air-conditioning was already off?”

“She may have closed it without thinking,” David said. “You know? Habit?”

“Think that if you choose,” Nancy said coldly. “I don’t.”

“Anyway,” said Stanley, “that’s what I’ve had on my mind. I’m wondering what to do about it.”

“That’s no problem, Stanley,” Nancy said. “You must tell Lieutenant Masters. It’s your civic duty.”

“I suppose I must.” Stanley glanced uneasily in the direction of his house. “I was hoping I wouldn’t have to. Mae will never believe I just went over to see if Lila was all right.”

“As for that,” Nancy said cheerily, “I’m not so sure I believe it myself. However! The police are discreet about such matters, Stanley. They won’t tell Mae unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

“Just the same,” mumbled Stanley, “I wish I didn’t have to tell them at all.”

“Would you like me to tell Lieutenant Masters for you? I have to talk to him in the morning, anyhow—”

“Would you, Nancy?” Stanley looked abjectly grateful. “Thanks! Not that it will help much, I guess. Lieutenant Masters will probably be around to talk to me anyway.”

“That,” David said, “is as sure as zeroes in September.”

Stanley sighed; he seemed for an appalling moment to be on the verge of tears. Then, without another word, he trudged back across the alley and through the backyard to his house.

“Poor old Stanley,” David said. “Why do you suppose he confessed?”

“Because he thought he might be found out,” Nancy said. “It’s often smart tactics to volunteer a story before it’s flung in your teeth. That way you establish a reputation for truth. So you can lie about or leave out something damaging and maybe get away with it.”

“Darned,” exclaimed her husband, “if you aren’t getting to sound more like Masters every minute!”

“That,” said Nancy, “is because I’m beginning to think like him.”