The Instant Enemy

chapter 32

I BOUGHT A plastic basket of fried chicken and took it my office. Before eating it, I checked in with my answering service. The girl on the switchboard told me I’d had a call from Ralph Cuddy.

I called the Santa Monica number that Cuddy had left for me. He answered the phone himself:

“Good evening. This is Ralph Cuddy.”

“Archer here. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you again.”

“Mrs. Krug asked me to call you.” His voice was stiff with embarrassment. “I told her Jasper was dead. She wants to talk to you about it.”

“Tell her I’ll get in touch with her tomorrow.”

“Tonight would be better. Mrs. Krug is very anxious to see you. You know that missing gun you were asking me about? She has some information on that, too.”

“How could she have?”

“Mr. Krug was security chief at Corpus Christi Oil at the time the gun was stolen.”

“Who stole it? Jasper Blevins?”

“I’m not authorized to tell you anything. You better get it direct from Mrs. Krug.”

I drove through heavy early-evening traffic to the Oakwood Convalescent Home. As the nurse conducted me down the corridor, I got a whiff of some patient’s dinner. It reminded me of the chicken I had left untouched on my desk.

Alma Krug looked up from her Bible when I entered the room. Her eyes were grave. She dismissed the nurse with a movement of her hand.

“Please shut the door,” she said to me. “It’s good of you to visit me, Mr. Archer.” She indicated a straight chair, which I took, and turned her wheel chair to face me. “Ralph Cuddy says my grandson Jasper was killed in a train wreck. Is that true?”

“His body was found under a train. I’ve been told he was murdered somewhere else, and that Laurel did the killing. That’s hearsay evidence, but I’m inclined to believe it.”

“Has Laurel been punished?”

“Not directly and not immediately. The local sheriff’s man covered up for her, or so I’m told. But Laurel was killed herself the other day.”

“Who killed her?”

“I don’t know.”

“This is terrible news.” Her voice had a rustling sibilance. “You say that Laurel was killed the other day. You didn’t tell me that when you came to see me before.”

“No.”

“And you didn’t tell me Jasper was dead.”

“I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t want to hurt you unnecessarily.”

“You should have told me. How long ago did he die?”

“About fifteen years. Actually his body was found on the tracks near Rodeo City in late May of 1952.”

“A bad end,” she said.

“Other bad things have happened.” I went on slowly and carefully, watching her face. “Three or four days before Jasper was killed, Mark Hackett was shot on Malibu Beach. Perhaps we’ve both been holding back, Mrs. Krug. You didn’t tell me your husband was security officer for Mark Hackett’s oil company. I admit I should have been able to work it out for myself, but for some reason I didn’t. I think you’re the reason.”

Her eyes flinched. “I have a lot on my conscience. It’s why I asked you to come here, Mr. Archer. The still small voice wouldn’t let me rest, and now that my grandson Jasper’s dead–” She let the sentence trail off into silence.

“Did Jasper steal the gun from Hackett’s company?”

“Joe always thought so. Jasper had stolen before – I had to lock up my purse when he was with us. And he visited Joe at the office that same day.”

“The day Mark Hackett was killed?”

She nodded very slowly. “The day before that he had a terrible quarrel with Mr. Hackett.”

“How do you know?”

“He told Joe. He wanted Joe to intercede for him with Mr. Hackett.”

“What was the problem?”

“Money. Jasper thought he had a legitimate claim on Mr. Hackett, for raising the boy. Actually Mr. Hackett gave Jasper a good deal of money at the time he married Laurel. That was all part of the bargain.”

“Are you telling me that Davy was Mark Hackett’s illegitimate son?”

“His grandson,” she corrected me soberly. “Davy was Stephen Hackett’s natural son. Laurel Dudney was one of the Hacketts’ servants back in Texas. She was a pretty little thing, and Stephen got her with child. His father sent him off to study in Europe. He sent Laurel out to us, to find a husband before she got too big.

“Jasper decided to marry her himself. He was barbering at the time, and he hardly made enough to keep body and soul together. Mr. Hackett gave them five thousand dollars for a wedding present. Later, Jasper thought he should get more. He was badgering Mr. Hackett the day before–” Her precise mouth closed without completing the sentence.

“The day before he killed him?”

“That’s what Joe always thought. It shortened my husband’s life. Joe was an honest man, but he couldn’t bring himself to accuse his own daughter’s son. He asked me if he should, and I told him not to. That’s on my conscience, too.”

“You did what most grandparents would do.”

“That isn’t good enough. But we were in the habit of making excuses for Jasper. From the time that he was a little boy and first came to us, he was a Tartar. He stole and fought and tortured cats and got in trouble at school. I took him to a head doctor once and the doctor said he should be sent away. But I couldn’t bear to do that to him, the poor boy wasn’t all bad.” She added after some thought: “He had some artistic talent. He got that from his mother.”

“Tell me about his mother.”

Mrs. Krug was confused for a moment. She looked at me with displeasure. “I prefer not to talk about my daughter. I have some right to the privacy of my feelings.”

“I already have some facts, Mrs. Krug. Your daughter was born in 1910 in Rodeo City. Oddly enough, I have a copy of her birth certificate. She was christened Henrietta R. Krug. You called her Etta, but at some point in her life she dropped that name.”

“She always hated it. She started using her middle name after she left Albert Blevins.”

“Her middle name is Ruth, isn’t it?”

The old woman bowed her head in assent. Her eyes refused to meet mine.

“And her second husband was Mark Hackett.”

“There was another one in between,” she said with an old woman’s passion for accuracy. “She took up with a Mexican boy from San Diego. That was over twenty-five years ago.”

“What was his name?”

“Lupe Rivera. They only stayed together a few months. The police arrested him for smuggling, and Etta got a divorce from him. Then came Mark Hackett. Then came Sidney Marburg.” Her voice rang harshly, as if she was reciting an indictment.

“Why didn’t you tell me Ruth Marburg was your daughter?”

“You didn’t ask me. It makes no difference, anyway. I haven’t had much to do with Etta since she threw herself at Mr. Hackett and rose in the world and became a great lady. She never comes to see me, and I know why. She’s ashamed of the life she leads, with young men half her age. I might as well not have a family. I never even see my grandson Stephen.”

I said I was sorry, and left her warming her hands at her Bible.