Sinful Woman

Chapter Nine

The sheriff spent a solitary afternoon on the front porch of his home, which was a pleasant house in the middle of a ranch four or five miles from town, on a road that forked off the road that led past the Galloping Domino. It was a cattle ranch, and he sat staring at his beeves; as to what was going on in his mind his face gave no clue. Once he went inside, picked up the phone that stood on a small table in the hall and called Mr. Flynn, to see if anything had been heard of the missing girl. Once Mr. Flynn called him, to say that there was such a jam of calls from the special writers who were arriving by plane, train, car and bus, that nothing was coming in from outlying parts of the state at all. The Sheriff told him to notify the police what he was doing, then lock the office and go out to the Galloping Domino, having all long distance calls transferred to there. Then, if the police learned something, they could report it, while other dial calls would simply get no answer. Mr. Flynn said O. K. The Sheriff, as soon as he had eaten a light supper served him by the Mexican woman who kept house for him, got in his car and drove over there. He found Mr. Flynn in the office, studying a pile of photostats, charts and reports. “What do they show, Flynn?”

“Not a thing.”

“All checks up?”

“So far, it does. Only fingerprints on the gun are Spiro’s, but the way he tells it he was the one had hold of the barrel, and it’s only on the barrel you get clear prints. Trajectory of the bullet corresponds right. Fired from an angle, on the right, which would just about be the way it would be doing the scene the way they said they did it. I don’t see anything wrong with it. What do you want the girl for?”

“Sister’s worried about her.”

“When are you having the inquest?”

“Soon as we find her. Did you eat?”

“Not yet I haven’t.”

“You better go, then. I’ll sit in here and take anything that comes along. Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”

When Mr. Flynn had gone, the Sheriff dug into the pile of evidential matter a bit grimly, and perhaps more carefully than Mr. Flynn had done. Soon the door opened and Dmitri came in. He said: “He told you, Sharf? Mr. Flynn? About this stuff?”

“What stuff?”

Dmitri pointed to the stack of communications brought from the hotel, explained why they had not been given to Sylvia. The Sheriff said: “O. K. I’ll release them to you after the inquest.”

“This one note—”

“Yes?”

“It’s from Vicki. I can tell by the crest. He borrowed my pen last night to write her a note. I didn’t give it to her yet. Might make her feel bad.”

The Sheriff picked up the note, dropped it in his pocket, went back to his photostats. Dmitri said: “You’re not reading it?”

“It’s to her, isn’t it?”

“I thought maybe, was evidence.”

“Of what?”

“Skip, skip.”

“You did right in turning it over to me, and I’ll see that she gets it. Now, is there anything else you wanted to see me about?”

“No, sir. No, thanks. You want me, I’ll be at Sylvia’s hotel at seven o’ clock.”

“O. K.”

Dmitri had barely gone when a call came, and the Sheriff answered. “Officer Enders talking from Lone Pine.”

“Sheriff Lucas. What is it, Enders?”

“We found her.”

“Alive?”

“No, sir.”

“That’s what I expected. Shoot.”

“The Army planes reported it, right after dark. Two lights pointed straight up at the sky. They took it for some kind of signal at first, and we got over there. The car was standing on its rear bumper, jammed against a ledge. It couldn’t be seen from the road. She must have driven it over on purpose, because there was no way it could have swerved that far by accident.”

“What have you done with the body?”

“Nothing. Waiting orders.”

“You have an ambulance there?”

“Yes, sir. Called one before I climbed down there.”

“Then send her right in to town. No inquest necessary, that I see. Come in yourself and report to me here at the Galloping Domino at nine thirty. I’ll call the Adlerkreutz inquest for ten.”

“Yes, sir. Is Flynny there?”

“He’s at supper.”

“I got one on him. I turned up more dirt on the other one, the sister Sylvia, that picture actress he was bragging about.”

“You — did what?”

“Didn’t he tell you?”

“No.”

“He met her today. She shook hands with him, or so he says. Boy, was he letting me know it. Well, it just so happens that when we went looking for Hazel, we turned up a trail on Sylvia that would make a hooker in the Red Mill at Tijuana look like a Minnesota schoolteacher. If there’s any tinhorn sport in this state she hasn’t checked in with at some hotel the last two months, I don’t know who he could be. Tell Flynny we found another one: Mrs. John L. Smith, registered at Bill’s Place, six miles below here, exactly one month ago today; except that Mrs. Smith, when somebody went up and asked her to autograph the lunchroom menu, signed it Sylvia Shoreham. Will you tell him, Sheriff? I just love to rib Flynny.”

“I sure will.”

“Thanks, Sheriff.”

When Mr. Flynn returned, the Sheriff said: “Is this all the stuff you got?”

“That’s all. This other stuff, the picture people brought it from the hotel, but I couldn’t see what we had to do with it. I didn’t even open it.”

“Where’s the report from Enders?”

“From — who did you say?”

“Enders. At Lone Pine.”

“...That wasn’t a report. That was a rib.”

“What he told me was a report.”

“Then write it up.”

“It was a report and you wrote it and where is it?”

Mr. Flynn hesitated for a moment, said nothing. He was a big, heavy-set man of forty, darkly sunburned, vividly handsome in his slacks and flannel shirt. Presently he said: “What’s the big idea, Parker? You’ve been stuck on this woman four or five years now, and I don’t blame you. She shook hands with me this morning, and when she came out she remembered my name, and when I rang her a little while ago to tell her how we were coming, she still remembered it. She’s a swell girl. Well, so she’s been playing around? Well, so what? What have you got to do with that?”

“I’m asking you for Enders’ report.”

His face purpling deeply under its sunburn, Mr. Flynn went behind the desk, opened the center drawer. In it was a little pile of scratch-pad sheets, with penciled memoranda on them. He found the one he wanted, handed it to the Sheriff. “O. K. She registered at these three hotels on these three dates under these three names, the men she was with all different. She was seen by several different people at each place and didn’t even try to conceal who she was. There you are. That’s the Enders report.”

“Are those other officers’ reports?”

“...Yes.”

“Hand them over.”

Sylvia, like most actresses, had made an art of relaxation: it held the secret of bright eyes, glowing color, and the vivacity needed in front of a camera. She lay on her bed now, eyes closed, hands folded on her stomach, no part of her moving except her chest, which rose and fell a little as she breathed. She had put on a black dress, but even without this she would have looked pale, haggard, and worn in the half light that came in from the street, for it had been in truth a trying day. But she was not asleep, for an alert hand went out at the first sound of the phone: she had given orders that she was to be disturbed for two calls only: her sister, or the Sheriff. The desk informed her that the Sheriff was in the lobby. She jumped up, put on her shoes, patted her face, and went out to admit her guest.

He came in, and at her invitation sat down on the hotel sofa, not answering her question about her sister. She turned on the lights she wanted, poked up the fire the hotel had made for her. Then she went over, sat down beside him and contentedly put her head on his shoulder. “Is there any news?”

He said nothing, and his arm did not go around her. After a long time he said: “Yes.” His voice had hanging fur on it, and shook. For the first time she really looked at him then, and became aware of his eyes. They hadn’t softened since they sobered Mr. Flynn, and by now, indeed, were a little frightening. He waited a long time before he went on, in slow, husky, measured words: “This morning, after saying you killed a man, you told me you thought you did right. I couldn’t hardly believe my ears then. I’ve killed two men since I held this office, and I never felt I did right. I felt I did what I had to, but I hated it. Now I know what you meant. Because I could kill you, as I sit here right now, and I wouldn’t feel it was wrong. I’d feel it was right.”

“And why do I deserve to die?”

“Because you’ve been deceiving me, and the people of this country, and the people of the whole world. Because you’re not what you pretend to be. Because you’re living a dirty, rotten lie.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

From his pocket he took a wad of crumpled scratch-pad sheets. Smoothing out the first one, he studied it and said: “On March 8 you spent the day at the Tumble Inn Roadhouse thirty miles south of here with a man that was known to several people there as Ted Genesee, a croupier at the Luckybuck Club not two blocks from here. You signed in as Mr. and Mrs. Edward Gentile, you spent the day, and at five o’clock he drove you back here. On April 2 you spent another day with Genesee at the Garden motor court, on the road east. On April 3 you didn’t bother to leave town, but checked in with him at the Westhaven, down at the depot. On April 5 you switched off from Genesee to a Cuban named Carlos Loma, that handles the stick for Dawson’s crap game over at the Monte Carlo. You went with him to Bill’s Place, down the line, and Hollister’s Dude Ranch, and Hack Schultz’s camp up in the mountains.”

He laid aside the first slip and picked up the second. He talked for ten minutes, giving names, dates and places, and when he got through he was twisting his face, and occasionally squeezing his mouth with his hand, to keep from sobbing. When he had some sort of control he burst out: “How could you come over to me this morning with all that talk about hating those cheap pictures and tell me you were going to make more like The Glory of Edith Cavell? And how could you pretend to be Edith Cavell?”

“I didn’t pretend to be Edith Cavell.”

“You did.”

“I was an actress playing a part.”

“You used her name and said her words and died her death and for two hours you pretended to be her. And all that time you were nothing but a common trollop that anybody could have, and if I were to go out of here and leave you dead on the floor right now, it wouldn’t be any more than you deserve, or any different from how women like you generally wind up.”

She started several times to say something, each time swallowed it back. Then she sat with a fixed, desperate look on her face, staring into the fire. He said: “You told me this morning you killed your husband.”

“I did kill him.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“A jury will, I think.”

“You want them to?”

“Dimmy says it was accident, and so will I.”

“Your sister killed your husband.”

“No! No!”

“I say she did. If he said he would marry her and then he wouldn’t do it, that would be enough reason for a whole lot of women. You didn’t have any reason.”

“I told you it was the only way out.”

“Except to sign his contract.”

“I tell you I did it.”

“Will you sign a confession you did it?”

“...Yes.”

“Then you better write it. Because I’m telling you, I know who did it.”

After a long time she got up, went over to the writing desk and wrote:

She got up, handed it to him, and resumed her seat on the sofa. He went over to the desk, put it in an envelope, marked it “Shoreham Confession.” Then he said: “This ends the matter.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Your sister has been found.”

“She — where is she?”

“It’s bad news.”

Briefly, under terrible emotion, he told her what had happened. Then he said: “Sylvia Shoreham, I love you more than any human being on earth. I’d give my right arm to be able to touch you right now. I’d give the other arm if I could be the one that helped you through this sorrow that must be heavy to you, I know how heavy from the way you’ve tried to protect that girl. But I don’t forget that judge, in the picture. He knew that woman hadn’t done what she said she did, but he did what he thought he had to do just the same. That girl can’t ever be tried for her crime now. She’s beyond human justice, and she’s beyond speaking for you, too. I’ve called an inquest at ten o’clock tonight, and at that inquest I’m going to let Spiro and his friends make it accident. I’ll let you bury the dead, and have no more trouble about it. But if you try to go into pictures again, I have this and I’ll use it. And you can tell Spiro that The Glory of Edith Cavell goes back in the can and it stays there. You are not going to pretend to be something you’re not any more, if I’ve got anything to do with it.”

Her face didn’t move a muscle, and he got up. “Isn’t that funny? At lunch, at that lunch we were going to have, I was going to ask you to start a fund for our tuberculosis hospital. It’s a poor state, and we got no hospital and we ought to have one, and it could be built now, for soldier use, and then turned back to us later. That’s what I was going to ask.”

“I don’t mind contributing.”

His face was tortured, and his eyes full of tears. “I can’t take your money. If I did I’d have to tear up your confession, and I swear that stays with me till I die — or you do.”

He looked at the envelope, put it in his pocket. Then, a blank look on his face, he pulled out the other envelope, the one Dmitri had given him. Identifying it after a moment, he said: “This came for you. Spiro didn’t give it to you because — well, I guess you can guess why.”

He laid the envelope in her lap. It was Vicki’s Baltic handwriting that did what nothing else had yet done: it brought a torrent of tears. She said: “I can’t face it... I’ve had all I can stand today! I—”

He went over, picked up the letter, walked with it to the fireplace, dropped it on the flames. Then, his shoulders shaking, he stumbled out of the room.