The Headless Lady

Chapter Five Burglars We

Within the tent the music of the band changed from waltz time to the sprightly rhythm of the “Beer Barrel Polka” as a group of liberty horses trotted in.

“There would seem to be something happening in all three rings at once,” Merlini said quietly. “But let’s take them one at a time. Assuming that it may be murder, you’ve given Pauline opportunity. Anything else?”

“Motive,” said Keith. “The show’s hers now. And the Carnival Equipment Company. Or most of it is.”

“Carnival Equipment Company?” Merlini asked. “Most of it?”

“That’s his estate,” Keith explained. “He owns a carnival-game manufacturing company, the circus, and a little real estate back in Indiana. But Pauline only gets two-thirds. The Major promised Joy Pattison a third. She’s his niece. And Pauline won’t stop till there’s another ‘accident.’ That’s what is driving me nuts. I need help. I checked all of Joy’s rigging myself before she went on this afternoon. I’m doing the same tonight.”

“Joy Pattison?” Merlini asked. “She wouldn’t be Pauline’s partner, the Paulette of the ‘sister’ wire-walking act, would she?”

“Yes, she is. Why—”

“What else does she do?”

“Swinging ladders and double traps. And it would be so damned easy to—”

“The ‘sisters’ don’t get along too well together, do they?”

Atterbury looked at him sharply. “What makes you ask that?”

“I caught the act just now. There was a misplaced announcement.”

Keith nodded. “You understand. Joy’s mother was a Hannum. When she died six years ago — her mother and father were both killed in a circus train wreck — Joy came with her uncle. Pauline was already doing the wire act and needed a partner. The Major coached Joy in the act, and then she made the mistake of getting too good for her own good. She practiced that forward all last winter and added it at the beginning of the season. Pauline had a fit. She wanted the Major to make Joy leave it out. He simply told her to get to work and see if she could top it. But Pauline was his daughter, and she kicked up so much fuss that he had to compromise by leaving her the announcement.”

“And the audience,” Merlin¡ said, “doesn’t realize what they are seeing.”

“No,” said Keith. “Not many of them know that a forward is a damn sight harder than a back flip. But the show people do, and it burns Pauline up. Another reason I’ve got to work fast on this is that Pauline knows that I side with Joy. And now she’s the boss of this outfit, I expect to get the ax any minute.”

“I see,” Merlini said. “Complications already. Tell me, why does Joy stay on? She could get a job with the Wait Brothers any time she wants it. She’s doing a big-time routine.” (The Wait Brothers Show was Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey, so-called by other circus men because of their habit of posting “wait paper”— posters that read “Wait for the Big Show.”)

Keith nodded. “Yes, I know. The Major asked her to stick it out the rest of the season. Said she had what it takes, and that he could make her the best woman wire-walker in the business. He was helping her dope out a single routine. He was pretty proud of her ability and his coaching.”

“Major Hannum used to do trapeze in his younger days, didn’t he? I seem to remember—”

“Yes. The Flying Hannums. Back around about ’14 and ’15.”

“You haven’t told Joy any of this?” Merlini asked then.

“I haven’t shown her the photos or hinted anything about the accident yet. But I’m going to now.”

“Here come the fireworks, Ross,” Merlini said. “An extra-special set-piece with fourteen kinds of colored fire and they very choicest serpentine aerial bombs, all spelling out the blazing word: Murder. I suggest we touch off the pyrotechnics as gently as possible, Keith, so that we don’t get a face full. The photos are the only real evidence you’ve got. The rest is all guesswork. And the scene of the crime — if that’s what it is — recedes rapidly. We need more evidence. The Major’s trailer. Did that come over with the show?”

“Yes. It’s out front now, parked behind the ticket wagon. The Major’s driver brought it along as usual when we moved. But it’ll be locked, and Pauline will have the keys.”

Merlini gave me a wink. “I don’t imagine the lock is anything too unusual. Come on.”

He didn’t wait for Keith to lead the way. He started off at once through the dark — quickly, as if the blackness of a circus lot was as familiar as his own bedroom. We went with him, skirting the menagerie top back toward the front door.

“Lot layout anything like this, last night in Kings Falls?” Merlini asked, his voice low and conspiratorial, in keeping with the illegality of our burglarous mission.

“Pretty much,” Keith said. “The Major’s trailer is parked in the same place.”

On our left now, I saw the lighted side-show banners across the midway, rising above the nearer ticket wagon and line of concession stands. The dark square shapes of several parked cars and trailers showed dimly before us.

“Who else parks here?” Merlini asked.

“Mac, Bob O’Hara — he’s the reserved-seat ticket superintendent — Brown, the treasurer on the ticket wagon, and Calamity. I park here sometimes. The Major’s trailer—” Keith stood still. “There’s someone in it! There’s a light.”

One trailer only showed a light, a faint glow from beyond the window curtains. Then the light moved.

“Flashlight,” Merlini said. “On your toes.”

There were two windows on this side of the trailer, one aft and one in the door. The window sash of the rear one, hinged at the top, had been propped open. We moved quietly toward it for a look.

As a Fenimore Cooper Indian, I’m a washout. Beneath my foot a discarded crackerjack box crunched loudly. It almost seemed to be connected with a public address system.

Instantly the light within the trailer vanished.

We halted abruptly and stood waiting. I swore under my breath.

For an instant I thought I saw, framed in the black rectangle of the open window, a lighter blur against the dark that might have been a face. It showed for half a second and then was gone.

“Windows. Other side!” Merlini ordered quickly. “Hurry! Watch them.”

I jumped, not bothering now about any noise I might make. The trailer’s occupant knew we were there. I circled the trailer, keeping in close to its side. There were two windows, both closed.

I heard Merlini rattle the doorknob, and I looked in cautiously. Then Merlini knocked.

There was no answer. After a moment of complete quiet I heard the faint click and scratch of metal on metal. I knew what that was. Merlini was picking the lock. Whoever was inside was completely surrounded— trapped. I felt the way an inexperienced speaker does just before he steps out with an impromptu speech to face a large and formal audience. I wondered how the person within the trailer felt.

The door’s hinges creaked then; and immediately after, the interior of the trailer was filled with light. I saw Merlini’s hand on the wall switch, reaching in through the partly open door. My eyes swept the interior.

There was no one there.

The furnishings of the trailer were obviously custom-built. The room was fitted out as an office and living-room. A desk of modern design and a tubular chair replaced the sink and kitchen equipment carried by most stock models. The walls were covered with circus memorabilia: posters, and photographs of performers, freaks, and animals. I noticed a miniature model of an ornately carved parade band wagon and, above the door, an elephant tusk. There was a table in the extreme rear flanked by built-in seats that, at night, could be converted into a bed.

Then Merlini’s figure filled the doorway, and he stepped in, picklocks still in hand, Keith behind him. I left my post, circled the trailer hastily, and went in after them.

It was then I saw the gun, a Colt automatic, in Keith’s hand.

Merlini noticed it also. “Where’d that come from?” he asked.

Atterbury, looking blankly around the room said, “Bought it this morning. I thought—”

“Good,” Merlini cut in. “Just point it this way.” He stood with one hand on the knob of a wardrobe door at the forward end of the trailer close to the outer door. “No one left by the open window. All the others, I see, are closed and locked on the inside. So—”

With the traditional gesture of the conjurer when he exhibits the magical cabinet that has previously been shown empty, Merlini turned the latch and swung the door wide. Just as with the conjurer’s cabinet, this time too, there was a young lady inside, a girl with golden hair and round, frightened blue eyes. She stood there, crouched back against the clothing on the hangers. She had a flashlight in one hand, and in the other, half upraised, a curious but familiar weapon, a heavy, rounded, three-foot length of wood that ended in a steel-pointed combination of prod and hook. I recognized it as an elephant goad. When the girl saw Keith, the bull-hook dropped from her fingers and fell with a solid thud to the floor.

Then she stepped from the wardrobe, and the light shone scarlet on the bolero vest and flaring trousers of her wire-act costume. She blinked in the light, the fear in her alert eyes replaced now by relief and, as she looked at Merlini and myself, by curiosity.

Keith said one word, “Joy!”

He stepped forward and grasped her arm. “What are you doing here?”

Joy’s eyes sought the door through which we had come. “The door, Keith. It was locked. How did you—”

Merlini jingled the picklocks on the key ring and dropped them back in his pocket. “Locks are made to be picked, Miss Pattison. Aren’t you going to introduce us, Keith?”

Atterbury was still looking at the girl with a completely bewildered expression. Still watching her, he said, “This is Merlini, Joy. You remember, Sigrid told us about him. And his friend, Ross Harte. But why— what were you doing here? Did you climb in at the window?”

Joy’s voice had a cool liquid quality that was easy on the ears. “Yes,” she said. “I was looking for the Major’s will.” Her statement was simple, matter of fact.

Merlini went toward the open window. “Wasn’t this one locked like the others?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied, “but there’s a hole in the pane. I reached in and turned the catch.”

Merlini examined the neat semicircular opening from which a section of glass had been removed.

“You used a glass cutter?” he asked.

She shook her head. “No. I found the pane that way. I noticed it this afternoon. So tonight, after the wire act, when Pauline told me the Major hadn’t made a will, I—”

“Pauline said that?” Keith asked sharply.

“Yes. And she said that he wouldn’t have left me anything in any case.”

Keith turned quickly to Merlini. Excitedly he said, “So that’s the gaff. I should have thought of it. There won’t have to be another murder after all; this is just as good. Pauline simply destroyed the will!” (A gaff is a secret device. In carnival games, the unseen gadget which sets the layout so the player cannot win. In conjuring, a “gimmick” serves the same purpose.)

“No other relatives, then?” Merlini asked. “The Major dies intestate and Pauline gets it all? Like that?”

Keith nodded. Joy was staring at him. “Murder?” Her eyes were wide. “Another murder? Keith, what do you—”

“Easy, kid,” Keith said, his arm around her. “I didn’t mean to blurt it out like that. The Major’s auto smash—” His voice trailed off; his eyes had fastened on the ten-gallon cowboy hat that lay near the desk on a chair. “Merlini,” he said slowly, “the Major always wore a hat. One of those. Sensitive about his baldness. I suspect he wore one to bed. But there was none with the body or in his car. I forgot to tell you that. And this is the one the Major was wearing last night.”

Joy paid no attention to the hat. She insisted, her voice thin and tight, “What about the accident?”

Keith turned to her and told her what he had told us. I watched Merlini pick up the hat.

“Gaudy,” he said, half to himself, “but not too neat.”

There were more than the usual number of dents in the hat’s crown, and a smudge of dirt on its gray surface. Merlini turned the hat in his hands and looked inside the crown. For a brief second he hesitated, motionless, saw me watching him, and then said, a shade too calmly, “Size seven and three-eighths.” He placed the hat carefully back upon the chair as he had found it.

Merlini began investigating cupboards and drawers. Suddenly he interrupted Keith’s recital. “Miss Pattison, you said you, were looking for a will. Did you find one?”

“No. I had just started to look when I heard you outside.”

“Sure that was all you were looking for?”

Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Why, yes. O£ course.”

“What were you intending to do with that bull-hook?”

“The bull-hook? I–I don’t know. I was frightened. I saw the three of you outside, watching the trailer. I couldn’t see who you were. Then I heard you at the door. I’d noticed the hook lying on the desk, and I picked it up almost without thinking as I started for the wardrobe.”

Merlini took it from the floor. “It’s not yours, then? Is it the Major’s?”

“No,” said Joy, “it’s Irma King’s. I don’t know why it should be—”

Keith said, “I do. Pauline had it when she came in here with the Major last night. I saw her.”

“Um,” Merlini said meaninglessly. Then to Joy, “Just where did you look for this will besides in the desk there?”

“No place,” she answered at once. “I’d just started on that when you—”

She stopped, seeing that Merlini had stopped paying attention. He had suddenly dropped on his knees to examine some shiny particles that sparkled in the light on the linoleum floor. He looked up at Keith and Joy.

“Did Major Hannum wear glasses?”

Keith said, “Reading glasses. Pair of horn-rimmed ones. Carried them in his breast pocket. Why?”

Without answering, Merlini took one of his business envelopes from his pocket and carefully brushed the dozen or so small bits of broken glass into it. He folded down the flap without sealing it and placed it on the desk top. He took Joy’s flashlight from her, went to the window with the cut pane, and snapped the light on. He held it at an oblique angle and peered closely at the window glass, moving his head slowly from side to side.

“Miss Pattison,” he asked, “where were you last night between ten-thirty and eleven o’clock?”

Keith started to say, “Now look here, Merlini. What do you mean by—”

“Act your age, Keith,” Merlini cut in. “You’ll hear that question fired at a lot of people from now on. Well, Miss Pattison?”

She frowned. “That would be during the concert. I was in my trailer getting ready for bed. We had a long jump this morning, and nearly everyone turned in as soon as they could. Then at one o’clock when we heard about the Major—”

The latch on the trailer door behind us clicked over.

We all started with guilty apprehension as the door slammed inward. A girl came through. She wore a white satin cloak over pink tights. Merlini and I immediately recognized an old friend, our determined lady of mystery — Miss Mildred Christine.

Mac Wiley, behind her, stopped halfway through the door, one hand on the jamb, staring at us.

Joy’s startled half-whisper said, “Pauline!”

Mildred Christine-Pauline’s words shot at us like a rapid staccato burst of machine-gun fire.

“What does this mean? What are you two—”

Only Joy and Keith had registered on her consciousness until then. Now she saw Merlini, and it stopped her cold.

Mac came to life briefly. “What the hell goes on here?” he blurted. “This trailer is supposed to be locked. What — why—” He bogged down.

“I’m afraid I owe you an apology, Miss — Christine,” Merlini said gravely. “We’re guilty of an illegal entry, a custom that is, unfortunately, all too common.”

Pauline glared at him, angry but uncertain. “What are you doing here — in this trailer?”

Merlini had the answer to that. And he gave it to her, politely but without warning. I could see the white deadly wake of the torpedo as it went.

“We are investigating your father’s murder.”