The twisted thing

Chapter 6

I set my watch by the clock on the corner while I waited for the light to change. Nine fifteen, and all was far from well. Just what the hell was it that threw York into a spasm? I knew damn well now that whatever it was, either Grange had it with her or she never had it at all. I was right back where I started from. Which left two things to be done. Find Mallory, or see who came downstairs the night of the murder and why that movement was denied in the statements. All right, let it be Mallory. Maybe Roxy could supply some answers. I pulled the will from the package and slipped it inside my jacket, then tossed the rest of the things in the back of the glove compartment.

Henry had the gates open as soon as I turned off the road. When he shut them behind me I called him over. “Anyone been here while I was gone?”

“Yes, sir. The undertaker came, but that was all.”

I thanked him and drove up the drive. Harvey nodded solemnly when he opened the door and took my hat. “Have there been any developments, sir?”

“Not a thing. Where’s Miss Malcom?”

“Upstairs, I believe. She took Master Ruston to his room a little while ago. Shall I call her for you?”

“Never mind, I’ll go up myself.”

I rapped lightly and opened the door at the same time. Roxy took a quick breath, grabbed the negligee off the bed and held it in front of her. That split second of visioning nudity that was classic beauty made the blood pound in my ears. I shut my eyes against it. “Easy, Roxy,” I said, “I can’t see so don’t scream and don’t throw things. I didn’t mean it.”

She laughed lightly. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, open them up. You’ve seen me like this before.” I looked just as she tied the wrapper around her. That kind of stuff could drive a guy bats.

“Don’t tempt me. I thought you’d changed?”

“Mike . . . don’t say it that way. Maybe I have gone modest, but I like it better. In your rough way you respected it too, but I can’t very well heave things at you for seeing again what you saw so many times before.”

“The kid asleep?”

“I think so.” The door was open a few inches, the other room dark. I closed it softly, then went back and sat on the edge of the bed. Roxy dragged the chair from in front of her vanity and set it down before me.

“Do I get sworn in first?” she asked with a fake pout.

“This is serious.”

“Shoot.”

“I’m going to mention a name to you. Don’t answer me right away. Let it sink in, think about it, think of any time since you’ve been here that you might have heard it, no matter when. Roll it around on your tongue a few times until it becomes familiar, then if you recognize it tell me where or when you heard it and who said it . . . if you can.”

“I see. Who is it?”

I handed her a cigarette and plucked one myself. “Mallory,” I said as I lit it for her. I hooked my hands around my knee and waited. Roxy blew smoke at the floor. She looked up at me a couple of times, her eyes vacant with thought, mouthing the name to herself. I watched her chew on her lip and suck in a lungful of smoke.

Finally she rubbed her hand across her forehead and grimaced. “I can’t remember ever having heard it,” she told me. “Is it very important?”

“I think it might be. I don’t know.”

“I’m sorry, Mike.” She leaned forward and patted my knee.

“Hell, don’t take it to heart. He’s just a name to me. Do you think any of the characters might know anything?”

“That I couldn’t say. York was a quiet one, you know.”

“I didn’t know. Did he seem to favor any of them?”

She stood up and stretched on her toes. Under the sheer fabric little muscles played in her body. “As far as I could see, he had an evident distaste for the lot of them. When I first came here he apparently liked his niece, Rhoda. He remembered her with gifts upon the slightest provocation. Expensive ones, too. I know, I bought them for him.”

I snubbed my butt. “Uh-huh. Did he turn to someone else?”

“Why, yes.” She looked at me in faint surprise. “The other niece, Alice Nichols.”

“I would have looked at her first to begin with.”

“Yes, you would,” she grinned. “Shall I go on?”

“Please.”

“For quite a while she got all the attention, which threw the Ghents into an uproar. I imagine they saw Rhoda being his heir and didn’t like the switch. Mr. York’s partiality to Alice continued for several months then fell off somewhat. He paid little attention to her after that, but never forgot her on birthdays or holidays. His gifts were as great as ever. And that,” she concluded, “is the only unusual situation that ever existed as far as I know.”

“Alice and York, huh? How far did the relationship go?”

“Not that far. His feelings were paternal, I think.”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure. Mr. York was long past his prime. If sex meant anything to him it was no more than a biological difference between the species.”

“It might mean something to Alice.”

“Of that I’m sure. She likes anything with muscles, but with Mr. York she didn’t need it. She did all right without it. I noticed that she cast a hook in your direction.”

“She didn’t use the right bait,” I stated briefly. “She showed up in my room with nothing on but a prayer and wanted to play. I like to be teased a little. Besides, I was tired. Did York know she acted that way?”

Roxy plugged in a tiny radio set and fiddled with the dial. “If he did he didn’t care.”

“Kitten, did York ever mention a will?”

An old Benny Goodman tune came on. She brought it in clearer and turned around with a dance step. “Yes, he had one. He kept the family on the verge of a nervous breakdown every time he alluded to it, but he never came right out and said where his money would go.”

She began to spin with the music. “Hold still a second, will you? Didn’t he hand out any hints at all?”

The hem of her negligee brushed past my face, higher than any hem had a right to be. “None at all, except that it would go where it was most deserving.”

Her legs flashed in the light. My heart began beating faster again. They were lovely legs, long, firm. “Did Grange ever hear that statement?”

She stopped, poised dramatically and threw her belt at me. “Yes.” She began to dance again. The music was a rhumba now and her body swayed to it, jerking rhythmically. “Once during a heated discussion Mr. York told them all that Miss Grange was the only one he could trust and she would be the one to handle his estate.”

There was no answer to that. How the devil could she handle it if she got it all? I never got a chance to think about it. The robe came off and she used it like a fan, almost disclosing everything, showing nothing. Her skin was fair, cream-colored, her body graceful. She circled in front of me, letting her hair fall to her shoulders. At the height of that furious dance I stood up.

Roxy flew into my arms. “Kiss me . . . you thing.”

I didn’t need any urging.

Her mouth melted into mine like butter. I felt her nails digging into my arms. Roughly, I pushed her away, held her there at arm’s length. “What was that for?”

She gave me a delightfully evil grin. “That is because I could love you if I wanted to, Mike. I did once, you know.”

“I know. What made you stop?”

“You’re Broadway, Mike. You’re the bright lights and big money . . . sometimes. You’re bullets when there should be kisses. That’s why I stopped. I wanted someone with a normal life expectancy.”

“Then why this?”

“I missed you. Funny as it sounds, someplace inside me I have a spot that’s always reserved for you. I didn’t want you to ever know it, but there it is.”

I kissed her again, longer and closer this time. Her body was talking to me, screaming to me. There would have been more if Ruston hadn’t called out.

Roxy slipped into the robe again, the cold static making it snap. “Let me go,” I said. She nodded.

I opened the door and hit the light switch. “Hello, Sir Lancelot.” The kid had been crying in his sleep, but he smiled at me.

“Hello, Mike. When did you come?”

“A little while ago. Want something?”

“Can I have some water, please? My throat’s awfully dry.”

A pitcher half full of ice was on the desk. I poured it into a glass and handed it to him and he drank deeply. “Have enough?”

He gave the glass back to me. “Yes, thank you.”

I gave his chin a little twist. “Then back to bed with you. Get a good sleep.”

Ruston squirmed back under the covers. “I will. Good night, Mike.”

“’Night, pal.” I closed the door behind me. Roxy had changed into a deep maroon quilted job and sat in the chair smoking a cigarette. The moment had passed. I could see that she was sorry, too. She handed me my deck of butts and I pocketed them, then waved a good-night. Neither of us felt like saying anything.

Evidently Harvey had retired for the night. The staircase was lit only by tiny night-lights shaped to resemble candle flames, while the foyer below was a dim challenge to the eyesight. I picked my way through the rooms and found Billy’s without upsetting anything. He was in bed, but awake. “It’s Mike, Billy,” I said.

He snapped on the bed lamp. “Come on in.”

I shut the door and slumped in a chair next to him. “More questions. I know it’s late, but I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all, Mike. What’s new?”

“Oh, you know how these things are. Haven’t found Miss Grange yet and things are settling around her. Dilwick’s got his men covering her place like a blanket.”

“Yeah? What for? Ain’t she supposed to be drowned?”

“Somebody wants it to look that way, I think. Listen, Billy, you told me before that you heard someone come downstairs between York and me the night of the murder. It wasn’t important before except to establish an alibi for you if it was needed, but now what you heard may have a bearing on the case. Go over it again, will you? Do it in as much detail as you can.”

“Let’s see. I didn’t really hear York leave, I just remember a car crunching the gravel. It woke me up. I had a headache and a bad taste in my mouth from something York gave me. Pills, I think.”

“It was supposed to keep you asleep. He gave you a sedative.”

“Whatever it was I puked up in bed, that’s why it didn’t do me any good. Anyway, I lay here half awake when I heard somebody come down the last two stairs. They squeak, they do. This room is set funny, see. Any noise outside the room travels right in here. They got a name for it.”

“Acoustics.”

“Yeah, that’s it. That’s why nobody ever used this room but me. They couldn’t stand the noise all the time. Not only loud noises, any kind of noises. This was like whoever it was didn’t want to make a sound, but it didn’t do any good because I heard it. Only I thought it was one of the family trying to be quiet so they wouldn’t wake anyone up and I didn’t pay any attention to it. About two or three minutes after that comes this noise like someone coughing with their head under a coat and it died out real slow and that’s all. I was just getting back to sleep when there was another car tearing out the drive. That was you, I guess.”

“That all?”

“Yeah, that’s all, Mike. I went back to sleep after that.”

This was the ace. It had its face down so I couldn’t tell whether it was red or black, but it was the ace. The bells were going off in my head again, those little tinkles that promised to become the pealing of chimes. The cart was before the horse, but if I could find the right buckle to unloosen I could put them right back.

“Billy, say nothing to nobody about this, understand? If the local police question you, say nothing. If Sergeant Price wants to know things, have him see me. If you value your head, keep your mouth shut and your door locked.”

His eyes popped wide open. “Geez, Mike, is it that important?”

I nodded. “I have a funny feeling, Billy, that the noises you heard were made by the murderer.”

“Good Golly!” It left him breathless. Then, “You . . . you think the killer . . .”—he swallowed—“. . . might make a try for me?”

“No, Billy, not the killer. You aren’t that important to him. Someone else might, though. I think we have a lot more on our hands than just plain murder.”

“What?” It was a hoarse whisper.

“Kidnapping, for one thing. That comes in somewhere. You sit tight until you hear from me.” Before I left I turned with my hand on the knob and looked into his scared face again. “Who’s Mallory, Billy?”

“Mallory who?”

“Just Mallory.”

“Gosh, I don’t know.”

“Okay, kid, thanks.”

Mallory. He might as well be Smith or Jones. So far he was just a word. I navigated the gloom again half consciously, thinking of him. Mallory of the kidnapping; Mallory whose very name turned York white and added a link to the chain of crime. Somewhere Mallory was sitting on his fanny getting a large charge out of the whole filthy mess. York knew who he was, but York was dead. Could that be the reason for his murder? Likely. York, by indirect implication and his peculiar action, intimated that Myra Grange knew of him too, but she was dead or missing. Was that Mallory’s doing? Likely. Hell, I couldn’t put my finger on anything more definite than a vague possibility. Something had to blow up, somebody would have to try to take the corners out of one of the angles. I gathered all the facts together, but they didn’t make sense. A name spoken, the speaker unseen; someone who came downstairs at night, unseen too, and denying it; a search for a stolen something-or-other, whose theft was laid at the feet of the vanished woman. I muttered a string of curses under my breath and kicked aimlessly at empty air. Where was there to start? Dilwick would have his feelers out for Grange and so would Price. With that many men they could get around much too fast for me. Besides, I had the feeling that she was only part of it all, not the key figure that would unlock the mystery, but more like one whose testimony would cut down a lot of time and work. I still couldn’t see her putting the cleaver into York then doing the Dutch afterward. If she was associated with him professionally she would have to be brilliant, and great minds either turn at murder or attempt to conceive of a flawless plot. York’s death was brutal. It was something you might find committed in a dark alley in a slum section for a few paltry dollars, or in a hotel room when a husband returns to find his woman in the arms of her lover. A passion kill, a revenge kill, a crude murder for small money, yes, but did any of these motives fit here? For whom did York hold passion . . . or vice versa? Roxy hit it when she said he was too old. Small money? None was gone from his wallet apparently. That kind of kill would take place outside on a lonely road or on a deserted street anyway. Revenge . . . revenge. Grange said he had no enemies. That was now. Could anything have happened in the past? You could almost rule that out too, on the basis of precedent. Revenge murders usually happen soon after the event that caused the desire for revenge. If the would-be murderer has time to think he realizes the penalty for murder and it doesn’t happen. Unless, of course, the victim, realizing what might happen, keeps on the move. That accentuates the importance of the event to the killer and spurs him on. Negative. York was a public figure for years. He had lived in the same house almost twenty years. Big money, a motive for anything. Was that it? Grange came into that. Why did she have the will? Those things are kept in a safe-deposit box or lawyer’s files. The chief beneficiary rarely ever got to see the document much less have it hidden among her personal effects for so long a time. Damn, Grange had told me she had a large income aside from what York gave her. She didn’t care what he did with his money. What a very pretty attitude to take, especially when you know where it’s going. She could afford to be snotty with me. I remembered her face when she said it, aloof, the hell-with-it attitude. Why the act if it wasn’t important then? What was she trying to put across?

Myra Grange. I didn’t want it to, but it came back to her every time. Missing the night of the kidnapping; seen on the road, but she said no. Why? I started to grin a little. An unmarried person goes out at night for what reason? Natch . . . a date. Grange had a date, and her kind of dates had to be kept behind closed doors, that’s why she was rarely seen about. York wouldn’t want it to get around either for fear of criticism, that’s why he was nice about it. Grange would deny it for a lot of reasons. It would hurt her professionally, or worse, she might lose a perfectly good girlfriend. It was all supposition, but I bet I was close.

The night air hit me in the face. I hadn’t realized I was standing outside the door until a chilly mist ran up the steps and hugged me. I stuck my hands in my pockets and walked down the drive. Behind me the house watched with staring eyes. I wished it could talk. The gravel path encircled the gloomy old place with gray arms and I followed it aimlessly, trying to straighten out my thoughts. When I came to the fork I stood motionless a moment then followed the turn off to the right.

Fifty yards later the colorless bulk of the laboratory grew out of the darkness like a crypt. It was a drab cinder-block building, the only incongruous thing on the estate. No windows broke the contours of the walls on either of the two sides visible, no place where prying eyes might observe what occurred within. At the far end a thirty-foot chimney poked a skinny finger skyward, stretching to clear the treetops. Upon closer inspection a ventilation system showed just under the eaves, screened air intakes and outlets above eye level.

I went around the building once, a hundred-by-fifty-foot structure, but the only opening was the single steel door in the front, a door built to withstand weather or siege. But it was not built to withstand curiosity. The first master key I used turned the lock. It was a laugh. The double tongue had prongs as thick as my thumb, but the tumbler arrangement was as uncomplicated as a glass of milk.

Fortunately, the light pulls had tiny phosphorescent tips that cast a greenish glow. I reached up and yanked one. Overhead a hundred-watt bulb flared into daylight brilliance. I checked the door and shut it, then looked about me. Architecturally, the building was a study in simplicity. One long corridor ran the length of it. Off each side were rooms, perhaps sixteen in all. No dirt marred the shining marble floor, no streaks on the enameled white walls. Each door was shut, the brass of the knobs gleaming, the woodwork smiling in varnished austerity. For all its rough exterior, the inside was spotless.

The first room on the one side was an office, fitted with a desk, several filing cabinets, a big chair and a water cooler. The room opposite was its mate. So far so good. I could tell by the pipe rack which had been York’s.

Next came some sort of supply room. In racks along the walls were hundreds of labeled bottles, chemicals unknown to me. I opened the bins below. Electrical fittings, tubes, meaningless coils of copper tubing lay neatly placed on shelves alongside instruments and parts of unusual design. This time the room opposite was no mate. Crouched in one corner was a generator, snuggling up to a transformer. Wrist-thick power lines came in through the door, passed through the two units and into the walls. I had seen affairs like this on portable electric chairs in some of our more rural states. I couldn’t figure this one out. If the education of Ruston was York’s sole work, why all the gadgets? Or was that merely a shield for something bigger?

The following room turned everything into a cockeyed mess. Here was a lounge that was sheer luxury. Overstuffed chairs, a seven-foot couch, a chair shaped like a French curve that went down your back, up under your knees and ended in a cushioned foot rest. Handy to everything were magazine racks of popular titles and some of more obscure titles. Books in foreign languages rested between costly jade bookends. A combination radio-phonograph sat in the corner, flanked by cabinets of symphonic and pop records. Opposite it at the other end of the room was a grand piano with operatic scores concealed in the seat. Cleverly contrived furniture turned into art boards and reading tables. A miniature refrigerator housed a bottle of ice water and several frosted glasses. Along the wall several Petri dishes held agar-agar with yellow bacteria cultures mottling the tops. Next to them was a double-lensed microscope of the best manufacture.

What a playpen. Here anyone could relax in comfort with his favorite hobby. Was this where Ruston spent his idle hours? There was nothing here for a boy, but his mind would appreciate it.

It was getting late. I shut the door and moved on, taking quick peeks into each room. A full-scale lab, test tubes, retorts, a room of books, nothing but books, then more electrical equipment. I crossed the corridor and stuck my head in. I had to take a second look to be sure I was right. If that wasn’t the hot seat standing in the middle of the floor it was a good imitation.

I didn’t get a chance to go over it. Very faintly I heard metal scratching against metal. I pulled the door shut and ran down the corridor, pulling at the light cords as I went. I wasn’t the only one that was curious this night.

Just as I closed the door of Grange’s office behind me the outside door swung inward. Someone was standing there in the dark waiting. I heard his breath coming hard with an attempt to control it. The door shut, and a sliver of light ran along the floor, shining through the crack onto my shoes. The intruder wasn’t bothering with the overheads, he was using a flash.

A hand touched the knob. In two shakes I was palming my rod, holding it above my head ready to bring it down the second he stepped in the door. It never opened. He moved to the other side and went into York’s office instead.

As slowly as I could I eased the knob around, then brought it toward my stomach. An inch, two, then there was room enough to squeeze out. I kept the dark paneling of the door at my back, stood there in the darkness, letting my breath in and out silently while I watched Junior Ghent rifle York’s room.

He had the flashlight propped on the top of the desk, working in its beam. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry. He pulled out every drawer of the files, scattering their contents on the floor in individual piles. When he finished with one row he moved to another until the empty cabinet gaped like a toothless old man.

For a second I thought he was leaving and faded to one side, but all he did was turn the flash to focus on the other side of the room. Again, he repeated the procedure. I watched.

At the end of twenty minutes his patience began to give out. He yanked things viciously from place and kicked at the chair, then obviously holding himself in check tried to be calm about it. In another fifteen minutes he had circled the room, making it look like a bomb had gone off in there. He hadn’t found what he was after.

That came by accident.

The chair got in his way again. He pushed it so hard it skidded along the marble, hit an empty drawer and toppled over. I even noticed it before he did.

The chair had a false bottom.

Very clever. Search a room for hours and you’ll push furniture all over the place, but how often will you turn up a chair and inspect it? Junior let out a surprised gasp and went down on his knees, his fingers running over the paneling. When his fingernails didn’t work he took a screwdriver from his pocket and forced it into the wood. There was a sharp snap and the bottom was off.

A thick envelope was fastened to a wire clasp. He smacked his lips and wrenched it free. With his forefinger he lifted the flap and drew out a sheaf of papers. These he scanned quickly, let out a sarcastic snort, and discarded them on the floor. He dug into the envelope and brought out something else. He studied it closely, rubbing his hand over his stomach. Twice he adjusted his glasses and held them closer to the light. I saw his face flush. As though he knew he was being watched he threw a furtive glance toward the door, then shoved the stuff back in the envelope and put it in his side pocket.

I ducked back in the corridor while he went out the door, waited until it closed then snapped the light on and stepped over the junk. One quick look at the papers he had found in the envelope told me what it was. This will was made out only a few months ago, and it left three-quarters of his estate to Ruston and one-quarter to Alice. York had cut the rest out with a single buck.

Junior Ghent had something more important, though. I folded the will into my pocket and ran to the door. I didn’t want my little pal to get away.

He didn’t. Fifty yards up the drive he was getting the life beat out of him.

I heard his muffled screams, and other voices, too. I got the .45 in my hand and thumbed the safety off and made a dash for them.

Maybe I should have stayed on the grass, but I didn’t have that much time. Two figures detached themselves from the one on the ground and broke for the trees. I let one go over their heads that echoed over the grounds like the roiling of thunder, but neither stopped. They went across a clearing and I put on speed to get free of the brush line so I could take aim. Junior stopped that. I tripped over his sprawled figure and went flat on my kisser. The pair scrambled over the wall before I was up. From the ground I tried a snap shot that went wild. On the other side of the wall a car roared into life and shot down the road.

A woman’s quick, sharp scream split the air like a knife and caught me flat-footed. Everything happened at once. Briars ripped at my clothes when I went through the brush and whipped at my face. Lights went on in the house and Harvey’s voice rang out for help. By the time I reached the porch Billy was standing beside the door in his pajamas.

“Upstairs, Mike, it’s Miss Malcom. Somebody shot her!”

Harvey was waving frantically, pointing to her room. I raced inside. Roxy was lying on the floor with blood making a bright red picture on the shoulder of her nightgown. Harvey stood over me, shaking with fear as I ripped the cloth away. I breathed with relief. The bullet had only passed through the flesh under her arm.

I carried her to bed and called to the butler over my shoulder. “Get some hot water and bandages. Get a doctor up here.”

Harvey said, “Yes, sir,” and scurried away.

Billy came in. “Can I do anything, Mike? I . . . I don’t want to be alone.”

“Okay, stay with her. I want to see the kid.”

I opened the door to Ruston’s room and turned on the light. He was sitting up, holding himself erect with his hands, his eyes were fixed on the wall in a blank stare, his mouth open. He never saw me. I shook him, he was stiff as a board, every muscle in his body as rigid as a piece of steel. He jerked convulsively once or twice, never taking his eyes from the wall. It took a lot of force to pull his arms up and straighten him out.

“Harvey, did you call that doctor?”

Billy sang out, “He’s doing it now, Mike.”

“Damn it, tell him to hurry. The kid’s having a fit or something.”

He hollered down the stairs to Harvey; I could hear the excited stuttering over the telephone, but it would be awhile before a medic would reach the house. Ruston began to tremble, his eyes rolled back in his head. Leaning over I slapped him sharply across the cheek.

“Ruston, snap out of it.” I slapped him again. “Ruston.”

This time his eyelids flickered, he came back to normal with a sob. His mouth twitched and he covered his face with his hands. Suddenly he sat up in bed and shouted, “Mike!”

“I’m right here, kid,” I said, “take it easy.” His face found mine and he reached for my hand. He was trembling from head to foot, his body bathed in cold sweat.

“Miss Malcom . . . ?”

“Is all right,” I answered. “She just got a good scare, that’s all.” I didn’t want to frighten him any more than he was. “Did someone come in here?”

He squeezed my hand. “No . . . there was a noise, and Miss Malcom screamed. Mike, I’m not very brave at all. I’m scared.”

The kid had a right to be. “It was nothing. Cover up and be still. I’ll be in the next room. Want me to leave the door open?”

“Please, Mike.”

I left the light on and put a rubber wedge under the door to keep it open. Billy was standing by the bed holding a handkerchief to Roxy’s shoulder. I took it away and looked at it. Not much of a wound, the bullet was of small caliber and had gone in and come out clean. Billy poked me and pointed to the window. The pane had spiderwebbed into a thousand cracks with a neat hole at the bottom a few inches above the sill. Tiny glass fragments winked up from the floor. The shot had come in from below, traveling upward. Behind me in the wall was the bullet hole, a small puncture head high. I dug out the slug from the plaster and rolled it over in my hand. A neat piece of lead whose shape had hardly been deformed by the wall, caliber .32. York’s gun had found its way home.

I tucked it in my watch pocket. “Stay here, Billy, I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?” He didn’t like me to leave.

“I got a friend downstairs.”

Junior was struggling to his feet when I reached him. I helped him with a fist in his collar. This little twerp had a lot of explaining to do. He was a sorry-looking sight. Pieces of gravel were imbedded in the flesh of his face and blood matted the hair of his scalp. One lens of his specs was smashed. I watched him while he detached his lower lip from his teeth, swearing incoherently. The belting he took had left him half dazed, and he didn’t try to resist at all when I walked him toward the house.

When I sat him in a chair he shook his head, touching the cut on his temple. He kept repeating a four-letter word over and over until realization of what had happened hit him. His head came up and I thought he was going to spit at me.

“You got it!” he said accusingly on the verge of tears now.

“Got what?” I leaned forward to get every word. His eyes narrowed.

Junior said sullenly, “Nothing.”

Very deliberately I took his tie in my hand and pulled it. He tried to draw back, but I held him close. “Little chum,” I said, “you are in a bad spot, very bad. You’ve been caught breaking and entering. You stole something from York’s private hideaway and Miss Malcom has been shot. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll talk.”

“Shot . . . killed?”

There was no sense letting him know the truth. “She’s not dead yet. If she dies you’re liable to face a murder charge.”

“No. No. I didn’t do it. I admit I was in the laboratory, but I didn’t shoot her. I . . . I didn’t get a chance to. Those men jumped on me. I fought for my life.”

“Did you? Were you really unconscious? Maybe. I went after them until I heard Miss Malcom scream. Did she scream because you shot her, then faked being knocked out all the while?”

He turned white. A little vein in his forehead throbbed, his hands tightened until his nails drew blood from the palms. “You can’t pin it on me,” he said. “I didn’t do it, I swear.”

“No? What did you take from the room back there?”

A pause, then, “Nothing.”

I reached for his pockets, daring him to move. Each one I turned inside out, dumping their contents around the bottom of the chair. A wallet, theater stubs, two old letters, some keys and fifty-five cents in change. That was all.

“So somebody else wanted what you found, didn’t they?” He didn’t answer. “They got it, too.”

“I didn’t have anything,” he repeated.

He was lying through his teeth. “Then why did they wait for you and beat your brains out? Answer that one.” He was quiet. I took the will out and waved it at him. “It went with this. It was more important than this, though. But what would be more important to you than a will? You’re stupid, Junior. You aren’t in this at all, are you? If you had sense enough to burn it you might have come into big dough when the estate was split up, especially with the kid under age. But no, you didn’t care whether the will was found and probated or not, because the other thing was more important. It meant more money. How, Junior, how?”

For my little speech I had a sneer thrown at me. “All right,” I told him, “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. Right now you look like hell, but you’re beautiful compared to what you’ll look like in ten minutes. I’m going to slap the crap out of you until you talk. Yell all you want to, it won’t do any good.”

I pulled back my hand. Junior didn’t wait, he started speaking. “Don’t. It was nothing. I . . . I stole some money from my uncle once. He caught me and made me sign a statement. I didn’t want it to be found or I’d never get a cent. That was it.”

“Yes? What made it so important that someone else would want it?”

“I don’t know. There was something else attached to the statement that I didn’t look at. Maybe they wanted that.”

It could have been a lie, but I wasn’t sure. What he said made sense. “Did you shoot Miss Malcom?”

“That’s silly.” I tightened up on the tie again. “Please, you’re choking me. I didn’t shoot anyone. I never saw her. You can tell, the police have a test haven’t they?”

“Yes, a paraffin test. Would you submit to it?”

Relief flooded his face and he nodded. I let him go. If he had pulled the trigger he wouldn’t be so damn anxious. Besides, I knew for sure that he hadn’t been wearing gloves.

A car pulled up outside and Harvey admitted a short, stout man carrying the bag of his profession. They disappeared upstairs. I turned to Junior. “Get out of here, but stay where you can be reached. If you take a powder I’ll squeeze your skinny neck until you turn blue. Remember one thing, if Miss Malcom dies you’re it, see, so you better start praying.”

He shot out of the chair and half ran for the door. I heard his feet pounding down the drive. I went upstairs.

“How is she?” The doctor applied the last of the tape over the compress and turned.

“Nothing serious. Fainted from shock.” He put his instruments back in his bag and took out a notebook. Roxy stirred and woke up.

“Of course you know I’ll have to report this. The police must have a record of all gunshot wounds. Her name, please.”

Roxy watched me from the bed. I passed it to her. She murmured, “Helen Malcom.”

“Address?”

“Here.” She gave her age and the doctor noted a general description then asked me if I had found the bullet.

“Yeah, it was in the wall. A .32 lead-nose job. I’ll give it to the police.” He snapped the book shut and stuck it in his bag. “I’d like you to see the boy, too, Doctor,” I mentioned. “He was in a bad way.”

Briefly, I went over what had happened the past few days. The doctor picked his bag up and followed me inside. “I know the boy,” he said. “Too much excitement is bad for any youngster, particularly one as finely trained as he is.”

“You’ve seen him before? I thought his father was his doctor.”

“Not the boy. However I had occasion to speak to his father several times in town and he spoke rather proudly of his son.”

“I should imagine. Here he is.”

The doctor took his pulse and I winked over his shoulder. Ruston grinned back. While the doctor examined him I sat at the desk and looked at nine-by-twelve photos of popular cowboy actors Ruston had in a folder. He was a genius, but the boy kept coming out around the seams. A few of the books in the lower shelves were current Western novels and some books on American geography in the 1800s. Beside the desk was a used ten-gallon hat and lariat with the crown of the skimmer autographed by Hollywood’s foremost heroic cattle hand. I don’t know why York didn’t let his kid alone to enjoy himself the way boys should. Ruston would rather be a cowboy than a child prodigy any day, I’d bet. He saw me going over his stuff and smiled.

“Were you ever out West, Mike?” he asked.

“I took some training in the desert when I was with Uncle Whiskers.”

“Did you ever see a real cowboy?”

“Nope, but I bunked with one for six months. He used to wear high-heeled boots until the sergeant cracked down on him. Some card. Wanted to wear his hat in the shower. First thing he’d do when he’d get up in the morning was to put on his hat. He couldn’t get used to one without a six-inch brim and was forever wanting to tip his hat to the Lieutenant instead of saluting.”

Ruston chuckled. “Did he carry a six-shooter?”

“Naw, but he was a dead shot. He could pick the eyes out of a beetle at thirty yards.”

The doctor broke up our chitchat by handing the kid some pills. He filled a box with them, printed the time to take them on the side and dashed off a prescription. He handed it to me. “Have this filled. One teaspoonful every two hours for twenty-four hours. There’s nothing wrong with him except a slight nervous condition. I’ll come back tomorrow to see Miss Malcom again. If her wound starts bleeding call me at once. I gave them both a sedative so they should sleep well until morning.”

“Okay, Doctor, thanks.” I gave him over to Harvey, who ushered him to the door.

Roxy forced a smile. “Did you get them, Mike?”

“Forget about it,” I said. “How did you get in the way?”

“I heard a gun go off and turned on the light. I guess I shouldn’t have done that. I ran to the window but with the light on I couldn’t see a thing. The next thing I knew something hit me in the shoulder. I didn’t realize it was a bullet until I saw the hole in the window. That’s when I screamed,” she added sheepishly.

“I don’t blame you, I’d scream too. Did you see the flash of the gun?”

Her head shook on the pillow. “I heard it I think, but it sounded sort of far off. I never dreamed . . .”

“You weren’t hurt badly, that’s one thing.”

“Ruston, how . . .”

“Okay. You scared the hell out of him when you yelled. He’s had too much already. That set him off. He was stiff as a fence post when I went in to him.”

The sedative was beginning to take effect. Roxy’s eyes closed sleepily. I whispered to Billy, “Get me a broom handle or something long and straight, will you?”

He went out and down the corridor. While I waited I looked at the hole the bullet had made, and in my mind pictured where Roxy had stood when she was shot. Billy came in with a long brass tube.

“Couldn’t find a broom, but would this curtain rod do?”

“Fine,” I said softly. Roxy was asleep now. “Stand over here by the window.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Figure out where that shot came from.”

I had him hold the rod under his armpit and I sighted along the length of it, lining the tube up with the hole in the wall and the one in the window. This done I told him to keep it that way then threw the window up. More pieces of glass tinkled to the floor. I moved around behind him and peered down the rod.

I was looking at the base of the wall about where the two assailants had climbed the top. That put Junior out of it by a hundred feet. The picture was changing again, nothing balanced. It was like trying to make a mural with a kaleidoscope. Hell’s bells. Neither of those two had shot at me, yet that was where the bullet came from. A silencer maybe? A wild shot at someone or a shot carefully aimed. With a .32 it would take an expert to hit the window from that range much less Roxy behind it. Or was the shot actually aimed at her?

“Thanks, Billy, that’s all.”

He lowered the rod and I shut the window. I called him to one side, away from the bed. “What is it, Mike?”

“Look, I want to think. How about you staying up here in the kid’s room tonight? We’ll fix some chair cushions up on the floor.”

“Okay, if you say so.”

“I think it will be best. Somebody will have to keep an eye on them in case they wake up, and Ruston has to take his medicine,” I looked at the box, “every three hours. I’ll give Harvey the prescription to be filled. Do you mind?”

“No, I think I’ll like it here better’n the room downstairs.”

“Keep the doors locked.”

“And how. I’ll push a chair up against them too.”

I laughed. “I don’t think there will be any more trouble for a while.”

His face grew serious. “You can laugh, you got a rod under your arm.”

“I’ll leave it here for you if you want.”

“Not me, Mike. One more strike and I’m out. If I get caught within ten feet of a heater they’ll toss me in the clink. I’d sooner take my chances.”

He began pulling the cushions from the chairs and I went out. Behind me the lock clicked and a chair went under the knob. Billy wasn’t kidding. Nobody was going to get in there tonight.