This Is Murder

Chapter Five

Dr. Hartwell turned savagely on Natalie Rice. Sam Moraine covered space in swift strides. His left hand caught Hartwell by the knot of his necktie. Natalie Rice, her hold shaken loose, reeled toward the door, braced herself with her hands pressed against the side of the wall.

Hartwell stared into Moraine’s eyes, saw Moraine’s bunched knuckles.

“I’m not shooting,” he said.

“You’re damn right you’re not,” Moraine told him, still holding him by the necktie. “What the devil do you mean by hitting that girl?”

“I didn’t hit her,” Hartwell said. “Let go my neck. You’re choking me.”

“Where’s that gun?”

Hartwell said nothing.

Moraine spun him around, clapped a hand to the dentist’s hip-pocket, pulled out a gun, then pushed Hartwell from him.

Hartwell’s face was livid.

“You give me back that gun!” he said. “You’re not the one I’m after. I wanted to get information from you, that’s all. But that little spitfire grabbed me and started tugging at my coat, and then you manhandled me. Who the hell do you think you are, anyway?”

Moraine, puffing slightly from his exertions, said, “I’ll show you a trick and see if you know where I learned it.”

He broke open the gun, slipped the shells out of the cylinder into his palm, tossed them into a wastebasket, snapped the gun closed and handed it to Hartwell.

Hartwell grabbed at the gun, hesitated for a minute, then pushed it back into his hip-pocket.

Moraine glanced over at Natalie Rice.

“Hurt?” he asked, sympathy in his voice.

She shook her head.

“Shaken up?”

Again, she shook her head. She made motions with her mouth for a moment before sounds came.

“I was just f-f-f-frightened,” she said. “I thought he was going to shoot you.”

“I didn’t pull that gun,” Hartwell said. “How did you know I had it?”

“I felt it through your coat when I grabbed at you as you were trying to go through the door.”

“What’s the idea, busting in here?” Moraine wanted to know.

“I haven’t got time to stand on a lot of red tape. You know who I am and you know what I want.”

Moraine nodded to Natalie Rice.

“Those people we’re expecting may be in any time, Miss Rice,” he said, “and it might be a good time for you to start carrying out the instructions I gave you.”

She nodded her head, started to say something, then glanced at Hartwell and remained silent.

“You can leave one of the typists in charge of the office?” Moraine asked.

“Yes,” she said; “Thelma Smith.”

“Okay, get started.”

He turned to Dr. Hartwell.

“What do you want?”

“You know what I want.”

“What?”

“I want to know about my wife.”

“What about her?”

“Where is she now?”

“I don’t know. The authorities were questioning her the last I saw of her.”

“How long have you known her?”

“Not quite twenty-four hours.”

“That’s what you say.”

Moraine stared moodily at Dr. Hartwell.

“Listen,” he said; “you’re all upset. You’ve worked yourself into a sweet lather. You’re packing a gun. You’re going to get into trouble. The best thing a man could do for you would be to ring police headquarters, make a complaint against you for assault with a deadly weapon and have you put some place where you could cool off for a while.”

“I didn’t make an assault with a deadly weapon. You’re the one that jerked the gun out.”

Moraine nodded and said, “I was thinking of what would be the best thing for your own good.”

“Never mind worrying about my good; I’ll do the worrying about that.”

Moraine sighed, walked over to his swivel chair, sat down and indicated a chair for Dr. Hartwell.

“Take a load off your feet, Doctor, and come down to earth. What do you want to know?”

“I want to know where my wife has been.”

“You can read her story in the newspaper,” Moraine told him.

“That’s a bunch of hooey. She hadn’t been kidnapped.”

“What makes you think she hadn’t?”

“Why should anyone make a demand on Doris Bender for ten thousand dollars and not make it on me?”

“Did you have ten thousand dollars?” Moraine asked.

“No.”

“I suppose Doris Bender did have. She scared up ten thousand dollars from some place.”

“She’s good at that.”

“Good at what?”

“Scaring up money from some place.”

“You speak as though you didn’t care much for her.”

“Look here,” Hartwell said, advancing to the desk and tapping emphatically with his knuckles on the edge of the desk as he talked; “you’re in on this thing some way — you and that Bender woman tried to frame up a murder charge on me. Don’t think I’m a fool. I know what was going on. My wife’s been associating with that Bender woman too much. She became a regular tramp. Then she disappeared. I wasn’t going to make any great commotion about it because I didn’t want to attract attention to my domestic difficulties. It would have a bad effect on my practice. And you and that Bender woman tried to hatch up a charge of murder. You were going to have me arrested.”

Moraine yawned, patting his mouth with four polite fingers.

“You’d better take a bromide, Doctor, and get a good sleep — or else get drunk — but, if you’re going to get drunk, you’d better check the gun somewhere. You’re off on the wrong foot.”

“I want to know where you found my wife.”

“The newspapers have the whole story,” Moraine said.

“You know more than you’ve told the newspapers.”

“That’s what the federal authorities thought — at first.”

“Did they question you?” Hartwell asked.

“Plenty.”

Hartwell’s manner lost some of its belligerency.

“How did you get into this?” he asked.

“Just between you and me,” Moraine told him, “I’m going to tell you the truth. I’m a friend of Phil Duncan, the district attorney. He went out to Doris Bender’s place when she got the ransom note. I went along. I’m an expert on paper and printing. Duncan thought he might want to consult me. That was night before last. Yesterday morning, a man showed up who told me the kidnapers had decided I would make a good intermediary. They’d found out that the district attorney had been consulted, and they threatened to kill your wife. This chap gave me ten thousand dollars and instructions how to get in touch with the kidnapers, also some photographs of your wife, so that I’d know her when I saw her again.

“I went out to the place, met the kidnapers, found your wife, paid the money, took her back on my yacht and was arrested as soon as I set foot on the dock. They grilled me half the night and then turned me loose. I haven’t had any sleep and it wouldn’t take very much to make me as irritable as you are. If I get that irritable, someone’s going to get hurt. You’d better take your face out of here before I do things to it.”

“And you hadn’t known her before you paid over the money?” Hartwell asked.

“I hadn’t even seen her. I didn’t know what she looked like. They had to give me a photograph so I could recognize her.”

“And you paid ten thousand dollars?”

“Yes.”

“In cash?”

“Just the way they asked for it — in old twenty-dollar bills — with no run of numerical sequence.”

“The thing doesn’t make sense,” Hartwell said.

“I never claimed it did,” Moraine retorted. “Now I’ve told you all I know and you can get out, and, as far as I’m concerned, you can stay out.”

“I want to talk with my wife.”

“Have you tried to get in touch with her through Doris Bender?”

“As far as I’m concerned,” Hartwell said, “I don’t want to have any contact with Doris Bender. She’s a snake in the grass.”

Moraine stretched, and yawned again.

“Attractive personality,” he said.

“She’s a bitch.”

“Beautiful figure,” Moraine remarked.

“She’s a dirty, two-timing little tart! She’s been putting bad ideas into Ann’s head. If it hadn’t been for that Bender woman, Ann and I would be living together happily right now.”

“Why come to me with your family troubles?” Moraine asked.

“I’m not coming to you with my family troubles, I’m trying to get information. I want to find my wife. I want to talk with her — in private.”

“She’s either in jail or Doris Bender knows where she is, or you’re out of luck,” Moraine told him. “Those are the only suggestions I could make.”

“I presume you’re a friend of Carl Thorne,” Hartwell said bitterly.

“Wrong again, Doctor. You certainly do jump at conclusions and get the wrong answer. I’ve never seen Carl Thorne in my life.”

“Doris is tied up with Carl Thorne,” Hartwell said.

Moraine lit a cigarette without offering Dr. Hartwell one.

“They’ve been using Ann for more than three months, getting out a lot of confidential correspondence.”

Moraine raised his eyebrows.

“She’s had secretarial training,” Dr. Hartwell said, “and three or four months ago Doris Bender asked her if she wanted to do some extra work. She said she did. I’m not making a great deal of money out of my practice. I told her she could do some work and pick up a little money of her own if she wanted to. That’s where I made my mistake. It turned out she was doing some extra work for Carl Thorne, and the work was largely done in Doris Bender’s apartment. My wife started commuting back and forth to the city, and the change in her dates right from that time.”

“The change in me,” Moraine said, “dates from the time you busted into this office and got rough with my secretary. I didn’t like you then, and I don’t like you now. I’ve told you twice to get out. I’ve given you a break and told you all I know.”

“Baloney!” Hartwell sneered. “You’re mixed up in the thing with the whole bunch of them. Why the devil should you be selected as the one to...”

Moraine got to his feet. His manner was grimly purposeful.

Dr. Hartwell’s hand swung toward his hip-pocket.

“Don’t you come closer!” he said. “I’ll defend myself. I’ll...”

He pulled out the empty gun and held it out in front of him.

“You forget it isn’t loaded,” Moraine said.

Hartwell’s face twisted in dismay. Moraine reached forward with his left hand. Hartwell struck out in a futile blow which Moraine slipped over his shoulder. He stepped in, grabbed the collar of Hartwell’s coat, flung open the exit door of his office, propelled Hartwell out into the corridor, fastened his left hand on the seat of Hartwell’s pants, gave him the bum’s rush down the long corridor.

“You would pull a gun on me, would you!” he said.

Hartwell twisted in vain struggles. Moraine swung him around the corner in the corridor, turned him loose, and, as he did so, swung a kick which missed by a matter of inches.

Hartwell, still holding the gun, turned to sputter indignant threats and protests. Moraine, dusting off his hands, walked back to his office.

Natalie Rice was standing in the doorway, her eyes apprehensive.

“What’s the matter?” Moraine asked. “Why aren’t you on your way? The detectives may be here any time now.”

“I was afraid,” she said.

“Afraid of what?”

“Afraid you and that man were going to have trouble.”

“We did,” he told her, grinning, “and I feel a lot better for it. I gave him the bum’s rush down the corridor and restored my good nature.”

“What’s the matter with him?” she asked.

“He’s nuts,” Moraine told her cheerfully.

“Aren’t you getting mixed into this thing rather deeply?”

He grinned gleefully.

“Most fun I’ve had since I had the measles. Go ahead and get out of here. Look up that information for me.”

“You’ll be in the office?” she asked.

“I will not,” he said. “For your private and personal information, I am now going to 4390 Washington Street, to interview Mrs. Doris Bender. I don’t mind telling you that I think Mrs. Bender is going to contribute some information to the cause.”