Death Likes It Hot

1

BREXTON was arrested and taken to jail at two a.m. Tuesday morning. The Special Court was scheduled for Friday. This gave me two days to track down the actual murderer for the greater glory of self and the blind lady with the scales. Forty-eight hours in which I was apt as not to find that Brexton was indeed the killer.

I got up the next morning at nine o’clock. I was barely dressed when the managing editor of the Globe was on the phone.

“Listen, you son of a bloodhound, what d’you mean by slanting those damned stories to make it sound like this Brexton wasn’t the murderer?”

“Because I don’t think he is." I held the receiver off at arm’s length while my one-time employer and occasional source of revenue raved on. When the instrument quieted down, I put it to my ear just in time to hear him say, “Well, I’m sending Elmer out there to look into this. He’s been aching to cover it but no, I said, we got Sargeant there: you remember Sargeant? bright-eyed, wet-eared Sargeant, I said, he’ll tell us all about it he’ll solve the god-damned case and what if the police do think Brexton killed his wife Sargeant knows best, I tell him, he’ll work this thing out. Ha! You got us out on a sawed-off limb. Elmer’s going to get us off.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere,” I said austerely. "Neither will Elmer. Anyway what would you say if I got you the real murderer, exclusively, and by Friday?”

“Why don't you...”

I told him his suggestion was impractical. Then I told him what he could do with Elmer, if he was in the mood. I hung up first.

This was discouraging, Elmer Bush, author of the syndicated column “America’s New York” which, on television, became the popular weekly resume of news “New York’s America” was my oldest rival and enemy. He had been a renowned columnist when I was only assistant drama editor on the Globe. But, later, our paths had crossed and I had managed twice to get the beat on him news-wise, as we say. This was going to be a real trial, I decided gloomily.

I called Liz who sounded wide-awake even though Î was positive she’d only just opened her eyes.

“They arrested Brexton last night.”

“No!” She made my eardrum vibrate. “Then you were wrong. I thought he did it. Of course that’s just woman’s intuition but even so it means something. Look at all the mediums.”

“Medium what’s?”

“The people who talk to the dead . . . they’re almost always women.”

“Well, I wish you'd put in a call to Mildred Brexton and...”

“Oh, don’t tease. Isn’t it exciting! Can I come over?”

“No, but I’ll see you this afternoon if it’s all right.”

“Perfect. I’ll be at the Club after lunch.”

“What happened to you last night?”

“Oh, I was at the Wilson’s dance. I was going to call you but Dick said you’d gone to bed early.”

Randan? Was he there?”

“Oh yes. He’s sweet, you know. I don’t know why you don’t like him. He was only there for a while but we had a nice chat about everything. He wanted to take me up to Montauk for a moonlight ride in his car but I thought that was going too far...”

“I’m glad you have limits.”

“Don't be stuffy.” After a few more cheery remarks, I hung up. This was apparently going to be one of those days, I decided. Elmer Bush was arriving. Randan was closing in on Liz. Brexton was in jail and my own theories were temporarily discredited.

Whistling a dirge, I went down to breakfast.

The sight of Randan eating heartily didn’t make me feel any better. No one else was down. “See the papers?” He was beaming with excitement. “Made the front pages too.”

He pushed a pile toward me. All the late editions had got the story “Painter Arrested for Murder of Wife and Friend" was the mildest headline. By the time they finished with the relationships, it sounded like something out of Sodom by way of Gomorrah.

I didn’t do more than glance at the stories. From my own newspaper experience I’ve learned that newspaper stories, outside of the heads and the first paragraph, are nothing but words more or less hopelessly arranged.

“Very interesting,” I said, confining myself to dry toast and coffee . . . just plain masochism. I enjoyed making the day worse than it already was.

“I guess neither one of us got it,” said Randan, ignoring my gloom. “I suppose the obvious one is usually the right one but I could’ve sworn Brexton didn’t do it.”

“You always thought he did, didn’t you?”

Randan smiled a superior smile. “That was to mislead you while I made my case against the real murderer, or what I thought was the real murderer. But I didn’t get anywhere.” “Neither did I.”

“That business of the key clinched it, I suppose,” said Randan with a sigh, picking up the Daily News which proclaimed: “Famous Cubist Indicted: Murders Wife, Cubes Friend.”

I only grunted. I had my own ideas about the key. I don’t like neatness. I also respect the intelligence of others, even abstract painters: Brexton would not have left that key in his pillow any more than he would have left his palette knife beside the body of Claypoole. In my conversations with him he had struck me as being not only intelligent but careful. He would not have made either mistake if he’d been the killer.

I kept all this to myself. Accepting without comment Randan’s assumption (and everybody else's) that justice was done and murder had out.

Mrs. Veering and Miss Lung came down to breakfast together. Both seemed controlled and brisk.

“Ah, the gentlemen are up with the birds!” exclaimed the penwoman brightly, fully recovered from her dramatic collapse of some hours before.

“I’m afraid it’s been something of an ordeal, Peter.” Mrs. Veering smiled at me. She was pale but her movements were steady. Apparently she had, if only briefly, gone on the wagon: she was quite a different person sober than half-lit.

I mumbled something inane about: well, things could’ve been worse.

“And I’m afraid we won’t be able to carry through our original project either.”

I had already given it up but I pretended to be thoughtful, a bit disappointed. “Yes, I think you’re right under the circumstances,” I said, nodding gravely. “It might not be the wise thing to do...”

“I knew you’d understand. I’m only sorry you’ve wasted nearly a week like this. . .

“Not all wasted.”

She smiled. “That’s right. You got several stories out of it, didn’t you?”

Miss Lung chimed in. “Thrillingly presented, Mr. Sargeant! I can’t wait to see what your account of the murderer at bay will be like.”

“Tense,” I said, “very tense.”

“I can hardly wait! Though Heaven knows any reminders of what we've just gone through will be unpleasant, to say the least. Rose, we have been tested, all of us, in the furnace of experience.”

“And emerged bloodied but unbowed,” said Mrs. Veering who could scramble a saw with the best best of them. I asked to be excused, pleading work.

“Certainly.” Mrs. Veering was amiable. “By the way, Mr. Graves or whatever his name is, called me this morning to say he’d like us all to stay together, in Easthampton, that is, until after the Special Court. I hope it won’t inconvenience you; you’re welcome to stay here of course til! then.”

I said that was fine by me.

I went to my room and telephoned my secretary, Miss Flynn.

“The Case has broken Wide Open,” she said in the tone of one who follows crime at a careful distance.

“Looks like it." I had no intention of saying anything over that phone which would give anyone listening in an idea of my private doubts. ‘Til be back Friday afternoon. Any news?"

She gave me a precise summary of what had happened in my absence. I told her what should be done for the various clients. I then asked her to check a few things for me

Though they sounded odd she was, as usual, reticent; she made no comment.

“I shall, as you know, exert every effort to comply with these Requests,” she said formally. “Incidentally, a Mr. Wheen has been calling you every day. Has he attempted to Contact you yet?"

I said no and she said he hadn’t stated his business so that was that.

My next move, after hanging up, was strategic.

In the room next to me, Miss Lung’s, I could hear a mild vacuuming. The entire second floor was empty, except for the one maid. Stealthily, I left my own room, crossed the hall, and entered Dick Randan’s room.

It was a fair duplicate of my own. He hadn’t bothered to unpack and his suitcase lay open and full of rumpled clothes. I went through everything quickly. Aside from the fact that he wore Argyle socks with large holes in them, there was nothing unusual to be found. I was looking for nothing in particular, which naturally made my search all 95

the more difficult. I did want to get the layout of the rooms clear in my mind though.

I cased the bathroom and found the usual shaving things: I also found a woman’s handkerchief with the initials R.V. It was wadded up and stuck in a glass on the second shelf of the medicine cabinet. R.V. was Rose Veering but why Randan had her handkerchief in his bathroom was a mystery. It was unmarked ... no blood stains or anything interesting, just a lace-type handkerchief, as they say in bargain basements. Puzzled, I put it back. Could he be a kleptomaniac? Or a fetishist? Or had Mrs. Veering made love to him in the night, leaving this handkerchief as a token of her affection? Or had he just happened to find it and picked it up and stuffed it in the nearest receptacle which was, in this case, a drinking glass? I decided I was going out of my mind, ascribing significance to everything.

I went back into his bedroom and looked at the two windows, both of which were open. Being a corner room he had two views: one of the dunes to the north with a half glimpse of beach, the other of the terrace directly below and the umbrellas; the sea was calm, I saw. On this side, directly beneath the window, the roof of the first-floor porch sloped. The window screens, I noticed, were the permanent, all-year-round kind.

Then I opened the door between Randan’s room and the next bedroom, Mrs. Veering’s. This was the largest of all the rooms with three windows overlooking the ocean. It was expensively furnished, very pink and silken and lacy. It was also full of bric-a-brac, clothes . . . too much stuff to do more than glance at.

I did find something fairly interesting in her bathroom. On a metal table was a small autoclave on which was placed several hypodermic needles and vials of medicine, all neatly labeled with her name and the contents. Two of the vials contained strychnine which, I knew vaguely, was the stuff to be given a failing heart in an emergency. Obviously Mrs. Veering was prepared for anything...

The door to what had been Allie Claypoole’s room was unlocked. It smelled like a hospital. Her clothes were still there, all neatly arranged in the closet and in the drawers of the bureau. If there was anything remotely like a clue the police had doubtless found it by now. I skimmed hurriedly through everything and then went on to Brexton’s room. It was a mess with the mattress on the floor and the sheet and pillows scattered around on the floor. Someone had come for his clothes apparently; and there was no longer any sign of his residence. I found nothing . . . except that the window to his room, the windw which looked east on the ocean, was directly above the metal swing beneath which I’d found the body of Fletcher Claypoole. Since there had been a full moon that night. Brexton could have seen the murderer if he had looked out that window . . . his view was the only one from the second floor which allowed an unobstructed view of the swing; the others had their view of it blocked by umbrellas and awnings.

Not much to go on but still a possibility . . . and it might explain Brexton’s seeming confidence: he had actually witnessed the murder of Claypoole. Yet, if he had, why had he kept silent? It was a puzzle. I had no idea the solution was already at hand.

2

I waited around until eleven thirty for Greaves to show up but it developed that he was about the state's business in Riverhead, and wallowing in a sea of official approbation. The legal machinery was now being set in motion by the District Attorney’s office and the doughty Greaves could, rest on his laurels.

When I was sure that he wasn’t going to pay us a visit. I asked Randan if I could borrow his car. He was gracious

about it, only asking me if I was sure I had a driver’s li

cense. I said I was and I took the car.

The day was crisp and clear, more autumn than summer.

Along the main street of Eastharnpton the elms had begun to

yellow a bit at the edges. Winter was near.

I drove straight to the Hospital of St. Agatha where I knew Allie Claypoole had been taken.

With an air of confidence which I didn’t feel, I walked into the gloomy Victorian brick building, told the receptionist that I was Dick Randan, Miss Claypoole’s nephew, and that I wanted very much to see her.

To my surprise, after a few minutes of whispering into telephones, I was told that I could see her, for ten minutes but that I must not in any way excite her. She had been, it developed, conscious and collected for some hours.

She lay propped up in a hospital bed, her face white as paper but her eyes clear and bright. She was completely rational. She was startled to see me. “I thought Dick . . .” she began.

I interrupted her quickly. “Wanted to come but sent me instead. I wondered if I could talk to you alone." I glanced at the nurse who was fumbling efficiently with various sedatives on a tray.

“Against doctor’s orders. And police's orders,” said the nurse firmly. “Don’t worry; I won’t listen.”

Allie smiled wanly. “I'm afraid we’ll have to obey orders. Why do you want to see me, Mr. Sargeant?”

I sat down close to her bedside, pitching my voice low.

“I wanted to see how you were, for one thing.”

“Nearly recovered. It seems the strychnine, instead of killing me, provided just the jolt I needed. They tell me I was in some danger of losing my mind." She said all this matter-of-factly. She was in complete control of herself.

“You don’t remember anything? I mean about the strychnine. . .

She shook her head. “I didn’t come to until the ambulance.” “You were with Brexton when your brother was killed?” She nodded. “I’ve already told the police that, this morning when that awful little man came to see me.”

"They didn’t want to believe you, did they?"

“No, they didn’t. I can't think why.”

“Did you know they’ve arrested Brexton?”

Her eyes grew wide; she skipped a breath; then she exhaled slowly and shut here eyes. "I should have known,” she whispered. “No, they didn’t tell me but that explains why they seemed to disappointed when I told them. I think they wanted to cross-question me but the doctor told them to go. Paul couldn’t have done it. He had no reason to do it. He was with me."

“We haven’t much time, I spoke rapidly. “I don’t think Brexton did it either but the police do and they've got a good deal of evidence, or what they think is evidence. Now you must help me. I think this thing can be solved but I’ve got to know more about the people involved, about past history. Please tell me the truth. If you do, I think we can get the charges against Brexton dismissed."

“What do you want to know?"

“Who had any reason to kill your brother?"

She looked away. “It’s hard to say. I mean, what exactly is enough reason. There are people who have grievances but that doesn't mean they would kill...”

“Like Miss Lung?”

“Well, yes, like her. How did you know about that?"

“Never mind. What actually happened between her and your brother?”

“Nothing. That was the trouble. She was in love with him. He was not in love with her. We all lived in Boston then, as you know. We saw a great deal of each other. I suppose you know she wasn’t fat in those days . . . she was rather good-looking. It nearly killed her when he took up with Mildred. About that time she began to get fat ... I don’t think it was glandular, just neurotic reaction. She never went with another man, as far as I know, and she never stopped loving Fletcher...”

“Could she have drugged Mildred do you think?”

“I . . . I’ve wondered that all along. She hated Mildred. I think she hated Mildred even more when she turned down Fletcher . . . one of those crazy things: hates her for being a rival and then hates her even more for rejecting the man she herself loves. Yes, I think she might’ve drugged Mildred but it seems odd she should wait fifteen years to do it.”

"Perhaps this was her first opportunity in all that time.”

“Perhaps. I don’t know. Even if she did, why would she then kill Fletcher?”

“Revenge? for his having turned her down.”

“I wonder. At first I thought it was an accident, that Mildred had just taken an overdose of pills and gone in swimming but then, when the police got involved, why, it occurred to me that Mary Western Lung gave Mildred those sleeping pills if only because no one else there really hated poor Mildred...”

“Not even her husband?”

Allie shrugged. “He was used to her. Besides, he had plenty of better opportunities: he wouldn’t pick a week-end party to kill his wife.”

“You disliked Mildred, didn’t you?”

“She was not a friend of mine. I disliked the way she tried to hold on to Fletcher after she'd married Brexton. We quarreled whenever we met, usually about my keeping him in Cambridge when she thought he should live in New York where she could get her claws into him.”

“Did you keep him in Cambridge?”

She smiled sadly. “There was no keeping him anywhere except where he wanted to be. He was never interested in Mildred after she married. In fact, she bored the life out of him.”

“Yet she went right on . . . flirting with him.”

“If that’s the word. She was possessive certainly.”

“Would your brother have wanted her dead?”

Allie looked at me with startled eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I’m just trying to cover all the motives, that’s all. I wondered if for any reason he might’ve had a motive.”

“I can’t think why. Of course not. You don’t kill old girl friends just because they bore you.”

“I suppose not. Now for your nephew. Would he have had any reason to want to kill Mildred?”

She shook her head. “I don’t think he ever met her more than once or twice. Besides, he was in Boston. I happened to talk to him the night before she died, long distance.”

“Family business?”

“In a way. I also invited him to come down here. Rose had said it would be all right.”

“Then that rules him out as far as Mildred goes. Did he have any reason to want your brother dead?”

She shook her head, slowly. “No, not really. They weren’t very sympathetic. Two different types. Fletcher was his guardian you know. I don’t think they ever openly quarreled though last winter there was some kind of flare-up, over money. Fletcher controls Dick’s estate and Dick wanted to get it all in his own name. But Fletcher was firm and that was the end of that. They’ve seen very little of each other since."

“Then I gather Randan wasn’t eager to come down here.”

She smiled. “He refused when I telephoned him. He was nice about it but I could tell he didn’t want to see Fletcher. I thought he should . . . I’m the peacemaker, you know.”

“I suppose curiosity about Mildred brought him?”

She nodded. “He’s fascinated with crime.”

I had to work fast. “And Mrs. Veering?” Across the room I could already see the nurse growing restive.

“We met her about the same time we met Mildred ... we had mutual friends. Rose and I have always been close; Rose was more upset than anyone when Mildred didn’t marry Fletcher."

“Would she have any motive, do you think? for either murder?”

Allie shook her head. “None that I know of. Mildred was a trial but then she didn’t have to see her if she didn’t want to. For the last year, she hadn’t wanted to ... I was surprised when Rose asked us down and told us the Brextons would also be in the house. I thought she’d stopped seeing her. It seemed odd , . . Fletcher and I weren't sure we wanted to come. Oh, God, how I wish we hadn’t!” This was the first sign of emotion she’d displayed during our talk. The nurse looked disapprovingly at me. Allie bit her lower lip.

I was relentless; there was little time. “Mrs. Veering was friendly with your brother?”

“Of course. No, there’s no motive there. I can’t think of any possible reason for Rose to want to...”

“Then you’d rule her out altogether as the murderer?”

Allie only shook her head, confusedly. “I don’t know what to think. It’s all so horrible.”

The nurse said. “Time for you to go, sir.”

I asked my last question. “Are you in love with Brexton?”

She flushed at this. “No, I’m not.”

“Is he with you?”

“I . . . you’d better ask him, Mr. Sargeant.”

3

I found Liz on the terrace of the Club guzzling contentedly in the company of several distinguished members of the international set, including Alma the Marchioness of Edderdale, a raddled, bewildered creature with dark blue hair who had inherited a Chicago meat fortune with which she'd bought a string of husbands among whom the most glamorous had been the late Marquess. She wandered sadly about the world, from center to center, set to set, in a manner reminiscent of a homing pigeon brought up in a trialer.

She looked at me with vague eyes when we were introduced: I’ve known her for years. “Charmed,” she sighed, her face milk-pale beneath the wide hat she wore to protect herself from the sun. On her arms elbow-length gloves, circled at the wrist by emeralds, hid the signs of age. Her face had been lifted so many times that she now resembles an early Sung Chinese idol.

Liz quickly pulled me away. She was delighted with the news. “It’s all just as I said, isn’t it?” Only the fact she looked wonderful in red kept me from shoving her face in.

“Just as you said, dear.”

“Well, aren’t you glad? You’re out of that awful house and the thing’s finished.”

“I’m holding up as well as possible.”

“Oh, you’re just being professional! Forget about it. People make mistakes. Everybody makes mistakes. I read your pieces in the Globe faithfully ... of course it was perfectly clear you thought Brexton didn’t do it but I’m sure the Globe won’t be mad at a little thing like that. I mean, look at Truman that time.”

“Truman who? at what time?”

“Truman the President the time when he got elected and they said he couldn’t. Nobody minded everybody being wrong.”

I maintained her innocence. Heads had fallen that dark year. One head might fall this year. Of course I could live without the Globe, but even so an old alliance would be forever gone if I didn’t dish up something sensational.

At that moment my nemesis, Elmer Bush, wearing canary yellow slacks, a maroon sports jacket, alligator shoes and a smile such as only the millions who watch him on television ever get from his usually flint-like face, moved resolutely toward me, hand outstretched, booming, “Long time no see, Brother Sargeant!”

I forced down a wave of nausea and introduced him to the table; everyone seemed more pleased than not to have this celebrated apparition among them,

“Quite a little to-do you been having in these parts,” said the columnist, slapping me on the back in the hopes I had a sunburn. I didn’t. I punched his arm fraternally, a quick judo-type rabbit punch calculated to paralyze the nerves for some seconds. But either he was made of foam rubber or I’ve lost the old magic. He didn’t bat an eye.

“Globe felt I ought to come down for a look-see.”

“A what?” I still kept my old buddy smile as a possible cover-up for another friendly jab in his arm (I’d figured I’d missed by an inch the nerve center) but he moved out of range.

“A look-around . . . always the kidder, Pete. Ha! Ha! Been reading those pieces you wrote. Some mighty good on-the-spot coverage, if I say so myself.”

“Thanks." I waited for the blow to fall: it did.

“Of course you backed the wrong horse. Got them sort of peeved at the city desk. You know how sensitive they are. Course I never figure anything you say in the papers makes a damned bit of difference since everybody’s forgot it by the next edition but you can’t tell an editor that.” This was the columnist’s credo, I knew. I had often wondered how Elmer had avoided a lynching party: his column is in many ways the dirtiest around town . . . which puts it well into the province of the Department of Sanitation, Sewer Division.

“He hasn’t been indicted yet.”

“Friday.” Elmer smacked his lips. “Had a little chat with Greaves ... old friend of mine. Used to know him when I covered Suffolk County in the old days." This was probably a lie. Elmer, like all newsmen, tends to claim intimacy with everyone from Presidents to police officials. “He's got a good little old case. That key! man, that’s first-class police work.”

I groaned to myself. Liz, I saw, was enchanted by the famous columnist. She listened to him with her pretty mouth faintly ajar. I said wearily: “You're right, Elmer. It takes real cunning to search a man’s room and find a key. They don’t make policemen nowadays like they used to in Greaves’ day."

Elmer sensed irony . . . something he doesn't come in contact with much in his line of snooping in the wake of elopements and divorces and vice-raids. “Don't sell Greaves short," he said slowly, his face solemn, his manner ponderous. “There aren’t too many like him around . . . clear-headed thinkers. That’s what I like about him. You could’ve picked up a lot from him. I did. I’m not ashamed to admit it. . . I’ll learn from any man." There was a pause as we all considered this.

Then I asked gravely, innocently, “You also find out why Brexton used the key to get into Miss Claypoole’s room?”

Bush looked at me as though I’d gone off my head. “You been in publicity too long," he said at last, contemptuously.

"He stole the key from Mrs. Veering ... it was kept in her desk, by the way, right in the top drawer where anybody could’ve swiped it . . . and he unlocked Miss Claypoole’s door when he heard the nurse go off duty. Then he tiptoed in, took a hypodermic, filled it with strychnine, tried to give her a shot, failed . . . ran back to his room and locked the door, hiding the key in his pillowcase."

“Oh, isn’t that fascinating!” Treacherous Liz was carried away with excitement.

“The strychnine," I said quietly, "was kept in Mrs. Veering’s room, not in Miss Claypoole’s. How could he’ve got it?”

“Any time . . . any time at all.” Elmer was expansive.

“Perhaps. That leaves only one other mystery. I’m sure you and Greaves have it worked out though: why did Brexton want to kill Allie?"

"Keep her from testifying.”

“Yet she has already testified that she was with Brexton at the time her brother was killed, isn’t that right? Well, it doesn’t make sense, his trying to destroy his only alibi."

Elmer only smiled. “I’m not at liberty to divulge the prosecution’s case . . . yet."

I was appalled at the implications. Neither Elmer nor Greaves was a complete fool. Did this mean that the state was going to try to prove that Allie and Brexton together had killed her brother? That Brexton might’ve then wanted her dead to clear himself? . . . No, it didn’t add up; the police weren’t that stupid. They knew something I didn’t or they were bluffing.

Alma Edderdale invited us all to her cabana. Liz and I followed her, leaving Elmer to circulate importantly among the important members of the Club.

Lady Edderdale’s cabana was a choice one on the end of the row, with a bright awning, a porch and a portable bar. A half dozen of us arranged ourselves in deck chairs. The afternoon was splendid with that silver light you only get in the autumn by the sea.

Lady Edderdale talked to me for some minutes. At last she began to place me. She seemed almost interested when I told her I was staying with Mrs. Veering.

“Poor dear Rose,” she murmured. “What a frightful thing to have happen! Brexton was my favorite modern old master too. Why should anyone want to have murdered him?”

I tried to explain that it was not Brexton but his wife who’d been murdered but Alma only nodded like a nearsighted horse confronted with oats in the middle-distance.

“His wife, Peggy, was always a trial, wasn’t she? But, poor darling, what will she do without him now? She was Rose’s daughter, you know."

I gave up. Lady Edderdale’s confusion was legendary. She ambled on in her rather British, dying-fall voice. “Yes, it must be a strain for all of them. I’m sure the person who killed him must be terribly sorry now. I should be, shouldn’t you? Such a fine painter, I mean. How is Rose, by the way? I haven’t seen her yet.”

I said she was as well as could be expected.

“Yes, I’m sure she’s very brave about it all. It happened to me, you know. Right out of a clear sky too. They came one day and said: Lady Edderdale, we’ll want a new accounting. Of course I didn’t know what they were talking about so I told them I never did accounts but my lawyer did. They went to him and, before you know it, I had to pay over a hundred thousand dollars.”

I had the sensation of being caught in a nightmare. Either Lady Edderdale had gone completely off her rocker or I had or we both had. I looked desperately at Liz but she was sunning herself wantonly beside a thick white Swede.

“Hundred thousand dollars?” I repeated the one thing which I’d managed to salvage from her conversation.

“More or less. I don’t know the exact sum but it was simply awjul trying to get that much in such short time. They are relentless. I hope they give Rose a little more time than they gave me.”

“Time?”

“Yes, to pay them.”

“Them?”

“Those awful Income Tax people"

Then it was all clear. “How long ago did Rose find out she’d have to pay all that money?”

“Weil, not too long ago. I’m awfully bad about time. We lunched at the Colony I remember with Chico Pazzetti . . , you know Chico? His wife’s left him by the way.”

“She told you this at the Colony? Recently?”

“A month ago, yes. I remember she was in town for several days; she’d come down to talk to them, to the Bureau of Internal Revenue people, about the thing.”

“Just what kind of . . . thing was it?”

Alma sighed and waved her emerald-laden arms helplessly in the air. “I don’t know, really. I know she was awfully upset and she wanted to talk to me because I’d gone through the same thing. I was no help, I fear. I think she said a hundred thousand ... or was that what I had to pay? No, we both had to pay that much and on short notice. I remember saying we were in the same boat except of course Rose, poor darling, really hasn’t much money any more.”

4

I told Liz I’d call her later that day, if I got a chance. Then, excusing myself, I went back to the North Dunes.

The house looked peaceful and strangely empty, as though no one lived there any longer. A prophecy? It was nearly empty too, I found, when I went inside. Everyone was out for the day except Miss Lung who sat at Mrs. Veering’s desk with the proofs of the penultimate “Book-Chat” in her hand.

“You see me at my labors,” said the pen woman, removing her glasses with a smile equally compounded of lechery and silliness. Yet she was not really a fool; I was beginning to see that.

“I went to see Allie,” I said, sitting down in the chair next to the desk, where I had had so many interviews with Greaves.

“Oh? I didn’t know anybody was allowed to see her?"

“They let me in. She’s much better.”

"I’m glad. I’m devoted to Allie. By the way, I’m doing Pearl Buck this week. I think her Indian phase so fascinating . . . especially after all the China she’s done. I mean, there’s just so much China to do and then one wants a change.” She read me the entire column of “Book-Chat.” I applauded weakly.

“Hard at work?” Mrs. Veering, looking businesslike and steady appeared in the alcove; she removed a sensible hat. “What a dayl The first chance I’ve had to get any work done.”

Miss Lung got to her feet. “I was just having the nicest chat with Mr. Sargeant. I was testing my column on. him: you know how I am about 'reader response.’ If only more writers would attempt, as I do, to gauge exactly the average response and then strive to that goal, as I do. I believe in making a direct contact with the average mind on every level.”

I excused myself, average mind and all.

I took a short walk on the beach in front of the house. The light was dimming; the silver day was becoming gold. I realized that no one had yet found the spot where Claypoole had been killed. It would probably be impossible to tell now: he had been dragged on the beach, probably close to the water so that the surf would hide the murderer’s footprints. I had a hunch the murder had taken place close to the house, probably just out of sight, behind the dunes. Yet why wouldn’t the murderer leave the body where it was? Why drag it to the terrace ... a risky business, considering the house full of police?

Something kept eluding me; it was like a word temporarily forgotten which the tongue almost remembers but the mind refuses to surrender up.

It was no use. Two gulls circled the sea. In the north the blue sky was smudged with gray: a storm approaching? the first blast of winter? I shivered and went into the house. I had one more errand to perform that day.

5. Brexton was seated gloomily on a bunk in the rather picturesque jail of Easthampton. He wore civilian clothes (I’d half-expected to see him in a striped suit) and he was sketching with a bit of charcoal on a pad of paper.

“Therapy,” he said with a smile as I came in. “You don’t look much like my lawyer.”

“It was the only way I could get in. I told the police I was a junior partner of Oliver and Dale. You look pretty comfortable.”

“I’m glad you think so. Sit down.”

I sat down on a kitchen chair by the barred window. The branch of a green-foliaged tree waved against the window: I felt like a prisoner myself.

“I don’t think you did it,” I said.

“That makes two of us. What can I do you for?”

“Three. I talked to Allie this morning. I don’t see how they could possibly arrest you in the light of her testimony.”

“But they have.” He put the pad down on the bed beside him and wiped charcoal smudges off his fingers with an edge of the blanket.

“I’m doing a piece about this for the Globe. I guess you’ve been following them,”

He nodded, without any comment.

“Well, I’m trying to solve the case on my own and I think you know who murdered Claypoole. I think you might even have watched the murderer roll the body under the swing. Your window looked directly onto the terrace, onto the swing.”

He chuckled softly. “If that's an example of your detective methods, I’m lost. For one thing I wasn’t in my own room until a good deal later and, for another thing, I was still sleeping in the room on the ground floor.”

“Oh,” I looked at him stupidly. I had missed on that all right, missed cold. I began to feel a little shaky about my deductive powers. “Well, that rules that out.” I rallied. “Where were you exactly at the time of Claypoole’s death?”

“Sitting in the dark mostly, with Allie, on the porch,”

“Did either of you leave the porch at that time, while the lights were out?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact both of us did, for short periods. I went to see the man on duty about the lights but I couldn’t find him. I guess he was hunting for the fuse box. Then I came back and Allie and I talked for a while. She left the room to get a book she'd brought me but forgotten to give me, an art book. . .

“All this in the dark?”

“There was a lot of moonlight. You could see perfectly well. She got the book from her room. We talked for a bit and then went to bed. The rest you know.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Mildred mostly.”

“You didn't talk about the possibility of marriage, did you? I mean between you and Allie.”

“That’s nobody’s business,” said Brexton sharply.

“I’m sorry.” I shifted ground. “What do you know about Mrs. Veering’s tax problems?”

He gave me a slow, amused smile. “You know about that?”

“Not much . . . just gossip. I gather she’s being stuck for a great deal.”

“Quite a bit.” Brexton nodded. “Over a hundred thousand dollars.”

“Can she pay it?”

“I suppose so, but it’ll wreck her income.”

“How does she happen to have to pay all that?”

“Well, the Veerings have a foundry out West. It does well enough and her interest in it pays her a large income. Her late husband’s brother runs the business and looks after everything. Rose has got a good business head herself. She started out as a secretary to old man Veering, the president of the company. He married her, died and left her his share. Now it seems that recently the brother pulled some fast business deals . . . mergers, that kind of thing. I’m not much on business . . . I do know it had something to do with a capital gains tax which really wasn’t, if you follow me. The government found out and now Rose and the brother both have to cough up a hundred thousand cash. . .

“And Mrs. Veering hasn’t got it?”

“Not without selling most of her interest in the foundry.”

“Then you’d say she was in a tough spot?”

“Yes, I’d say she was in a very tough spot.” Brexton spoke slowly, his eyes on the green branch which softly scraped the bars of the window,

I played my hunch. “Was your wife a wealthy woman, Mr. Brexton?”

He knew what I was up to but he gave no sign; he only looked at me without expression. “Yes, she was.”

“She was wealthy on her own . . .not through Mrs. Veering? not through her aunt?”

“That’s right. My wife’s money came from the other side of her family.”

“Did Mrs. Veering try to borrow money from your wife?” Brexton stirred restlessly on the bunk; his hands clasped and unclasped. “Did Allie tell you this?”

“No, I’m just playing a long shot.”

“Yes, Rose tried to get Mildred to help her out of this tax settlement. Mildred refused.”

Neither of us said anything for a moment; then: “Why did your wife refuse?”

“I don’t know. I suppose it was too much money, even for her. They had a terrible scene the night before she was drowned. I guess you heard the screams. Both had awful tempers. Mildred attacked Rose with my palette knife (by the way, Î never saw it again after that night . . . until it was found beside Fletcher’s body). I broke it up and calmed Mildred down.”

“I should’ve thought it would have been the other way around: Mrs. Veering should have been the hysterical one, for having been turned down.”

“They both were. They were a good deal alike, you know: mean-tempered, unbalanced. Mildred wanted to leave the house right then but I talked her out of it; by the next morning she was all right again.”

“Do you think that was why your wife was invited . . . you were both invited for the week end ... to help Mrs. Veering?”

Brexton nodded. “I know it. I think that’s why Mildred got so angry. She knew Rose was getting tired of her behavior. Rose had dropped us flat for almost a year. Then, when this invitation came, Mildred was really kind of bucked up; she always regarded Rose as the social arbiter of the family and it hurt her when Rose wouldn't see us any more. But then when she found out after dinner that first night that we’d only been asked down because Rose needed money, she blew up. I’m afraid I didn't altogether blame her.”

“Do you think your wife, under ordinary circumstances, would have let her have the money?"

Brexton shrugged. “She might have. It was an awful lot though. But then I never did know how much money Mildred had. She always paid her bills and I paid mine. That was part of our marriage agreement."

“You had a written agreement?”

“No, just an understood one. Mildred was a good wife for me . . . strange as that may seem to anybody who only knew her during this last year."

I shifted to the legal aspects of the situation. “What line do you think the prosecution will take?”

“I’m not sure. Something wild, I think. My lawyers are pretty confident but then, considering what I’m paying them, they ought to be.” He chuckled. “They should be able to buy ail the evidence they need. But, seriously, they can’t figure what Greaves has got on his mind. We thought Allie’s testimony would convince even the District Attorney’s office. Instead, they went right ahead and called the Special Court for Friday and stuck me in here.”

“I suppose they’re going chiefly on motive; you killed your wife because you didn’t like her and wanted her money . . . maybe they’ll prove you wanted to marry Allie which would explain why she gave you an alibi.”

“Except why should I want to kill her brother? The one person she was really devoted to?"

"I think they'll just pick a motive out of the air . . . whatever fits . . . and use the presence of your knife beside the corpse as primary evidence.”

“Thin,” said Brexton, shaking his head.

“Fortunately, the prosecution doesn’t know about the quarrel you had with Claypoole after your wife drowned. They probably know what we all know . . that he cursed you when she died . . . but they don’t know about the fight you had in your room, the one I heard while sitting on the porch.”

Brexton’s self-control was admirable. He showed no surprise, only interest. “You heard that?”

“Most of it, yes. Claypoole blamed you for killing your wife. Not directly ... at least I don’t think that's how he meant it. I couldn’t be sure. The impression I got was that he was holding you responsible, in some way, and that he was going to expose you.”

“Well, that was about it.” Brexton’s tone could not have been more neutral, less informative.

“I haven't any intention of telling the District Attorney this.”

“That’s very nice of you.”

“But I’d like to know what it meant . . . that conversation. What you meant when you said 'you’d tell everything too.”

Brexton paused thoughtfully before answering; his quick, shrewd painter’s eyes studying me as though I were a model whose quality he was trying to fix exactly with a line. Then he said: “There’s not much to tell. Mildred hounded Fletcher for the last few years, trying to get him to marry her. He wasn’t interested though he’d been in love with her before she married me. Then, during the last year, he began to change. I think I know why. He started to see her. They took a trip to Bermuda together under assumed names. I found out . . . people always do. I gave Mildred hell, just on general principles. She promptly had a nervous breakdown; afterwards, she asked me for a divorce and I said not yet. I guess that was a mistake on my part. I wasn’t in love with Mildred but I liked her and I was used to her and I suspected Claypoole was interested in her only on account of her money. Allie had told me how their income had begun to shrink these last few years, like everybody else’s. I think Fletcher decided the time had come to get himself a rich wife. He was furious with me for standing in his way. Then, when Mildred drowned, he was positive I had something to do with it, to keep her money for myself, to keep her from marrying him. That’s al! there was to it. He blew up and threatened to accuse me of murder. ... I have a hunch he did, before he died, and I think that’s what Greaves is counting on to get me indicted... Fletcher’s accusation of me before he himself was murdered."

Now it was making sense. “One other thing: what did you mean when you told him you’d drag Allie into the case if he accused you?”

Brexton actually blushed. “Did I say that? I must’ve been near the breaking point. I'd never have done a thing like that. ... I was just threatening, trying to warn him off.”

“In what way could she have been brought into the case?” “She couldn’t, ever; what I said had to do . . . well, with other things, with her and me and her brother. I was only threatening: it was the worst thing I could think to say to him. Funny, I’d even forgotten I’d said it, until you mentioned it.”

I was now fairly sure of the line the District Attorney would take. This was a help.

Then the jailer appeared. A fat policeman who waggled some keys and told me my time was up.

“Good luck,” I said as we parted.

Brexton chuckled. “I'll need it.” He picked up his sketch pad again. “I think you’re moving in the right direction, Mr. Sargeant.” But the policeman had me out of the cell block before I could ask him what he meant.

It was sundown when I got back to the house and parked Randan’s car in the drive. It was pleasant not to be observed by policemen. They were all gone. Only Miss Lung, Mrs. Veering, Randan and myself were in the house, not counting servants.

I found Randan alone in the drawing room, writing furiously in a notebook, a highball beside him.

“Oh, hello.” He looked up briefly to make sure I wasn’t all broken up from an automobile accident. “Car all right?”

“Car’s fine . . . ran over a small child but you’ll he able to square it with the parents: they seemed a broad-minded, modern couple.” I fixed myself a martini.

“I’m writing up the case," said Randan, dotting a period firmly and shutting the notebook. “Going to do a serious piece on it.”

I changed the subject. “Where are the beautiful ladies?” “Making themselves more beautiful. Dinner’s early tonight, in half an hour. Oh, your friend Liz called and asked me to ask you to join her at the party they’re giving Alma Edderdale in Southampton tonight. I said I’d drive you down...” “And got yourself invited too?”

Randan looked pained by my bad taste. “I was only trying to be helpful.”

“I’m sure of that. By the way, I saw Brexton this afternoon.” “In jail? I didn’t know they'd let anybody in.”

“I have influence. Did you try to see him too?”

Randan nodded. “Yes, I wanted to check on something. I’m beginning to get a little doubtful about the case,” he added importantly.

“Doubtful? I thought you agreed with Greaves that Brexton. . .

“I’m not so sure now. I . . . well, I overheard something this afternoon, here in the house. I don’t like to appear to be an eavesdropper but . .

“But you listened to a conversation not meant for your ears. Perfectly common human trait . . . after all, what is history but a form of eavesdropping?" Fortunately, this was a rhetorical question. Randan ignored it.

“I heard Mrs. Veering talking to a lawyer.”

“To Brexton’s lawyer?”

“Yes . . . but they weren’t talking about the murders. They were talking about a will, about Mrs. Brexton’s will. It seems she left half her estate to her aunt, to Mrs. Veering. The other half she left to Claypoole. Her husband didn’t get anything. Seems he even agreed to the will beforehand. Now what I was wondering . .