And kill once more Page 9

  Sandy Engle sat in front of the small fireplace, her face toward the blue flame leaping from the open butane valve used to start wood fires in the grate. There wouldn't be any smoke coming out of the chimney now. Because the papers she had been feeding into the flames were almost gone. I watched as Toland bent toward the bricks and tried to rake a corner of a white envelope out of the glowing ashes. When he finally pinched away the ember, all he had was a half-charred bit of paper.

  Wright s Bargain Room Three Rivers, Mich.

  NATIONAL GEOGRAPICS

  15$ Each Wright's Bargain Room

  Ten

  Toland flipped the valve and the sword of blue flame sputtered and died. He slipped his hard brown hand over the heavy brass poker and raked thoroughly through the red glow, but the fire had consumed all trace of whatever Sandy had fed it. A wisp of ash rose with warm air currents and disappeared up the chimney.

  "You haven't helped things any," Toland told her quietly. "I guess there isn't any need to ask what went up the flue just now."

  Sandy's eyes roved over the carpet underfoot but her hand indicated a disk of steel swung out from the wall across the room. "Everything. Everything from the wall safe, Mr. Toland."

  I took three quick strides, mounted the chair still under the safe, and looked through the opening. "She's empty," I said.

  Bob Widdle motioned me down, got up for a careful search, and added his echo. "Not a thing. It's clean."

  Sheriff Toland studied Sandy Engle for several seconds, then scratched his temple and said, "You must have read some of it, Mrs. Engle, to be sure of what you were burning."

  "I don't know a thing," Sandy said dully, her face still downcast. "When you said—everyone said George was living on the misery of our friends, I couldn't think of what to do. How can I face people again? Our money coming—that way. I—well, it took a while for things to clear up, but when they did I knew what had to be done. I told Kate I wanted to be alone, and as soon as she left I emptied the wall safe. There were a lot of envelopes.

  92

  Plain white envelopes, each with a name written across one corner. I glanced at three or four—enough to see that the names were of people who had been George's guests from time to time—and then I burned everything."

  "Uh-huh. Now look, Mrs. Engle. A man has been murdered. Your husband. Maybe he wasn't everything you thought—but we don't know that. It would help if we knew which of those present were paying hush money to Mr. Engle—if anybody was. Dr. Cronk's made the only accusation. Let's not try to be the judge and jury on this. Nothing is grounds for killing a man. If any one of these supposed victims had gone to the law it would have ended the blackmail racket. You know that."

  "I can't help you, Mr. Toland," Sandy said firmly. "I didn't open a single envelope. I only saw a name or two, just enough to know that I was getting rid of his private papers. But I didn't see any names of people here now."

  "You're sure of that?"

  "Yes."

  She said it too loud and too fast. I caught a look on her face that said she might not be leveling with Toland and I wondered if he felt it too. He nodded slowly, his leathery face serious and thoughtful. "Tell you what— I'd like to look around a bit here. No offence, ma'm, but it wouldn't seem right if I didn't try to make sure. You could all wander back out there by the pool and wait, if you would. Bob, you go along and keep the peace and I'll run through the bureaus and such here in the room."

  We went back and parked under our umberella, and waited for the big man to fumble through Sandy's things. Kate tried to soothe Sandy, but understandably Sandy wanted to be apart from us. She lay in a shaded patio swing, her face buried in the soft green pad. When she asked Widdle if she might go up to the house for a blanket against the cool breeze flowing down from the hill, he gave her a curt no, then asked Elsa Doyle to get one. I

  wasn't sure whether or not Sandy needed the blanket for warmth or to hide in. I could see the jerking movement of her body and every now and then the sounds of violent sobbing came from the swing. We tried conversation but it didn't quite come off. Then Elsa found a lounge and stretched out and Kate excused herself similarly. I scrounged around in my chair until I was comfortable and closed my eyes.

  I didn't sleep a wink.

  Probably the others didn't either. My own thoughts were coming fast and strong. I felt sure Sandy had lied about not reading any of those dossiers. She'd have been a fool to burn everything sight unseen, and she was definitely not slow-witted. If she'd hidden some of them, Toland would find 'em and maybe this would wind up the proceedings in short order. I for one hoped so. I'd been a little too close to the killing to make for comfort. If Toland didn't get his hooks into a good live suspect soon he was going to stop being so choosy and when that happened he'd settle on Bowman. Of that I was quite certain. I'd broken Cronk over the rack, of course, but there was one thing I hadn't done. I hadn't offered a single argument of my own that would rub out his case against me. No one had seen Engle after I did. No one saw me bring him out. He hadn't drowned; he'd been strangled—his air choked off and Toland had pointed out that it would have taken a reasonably strong pair of hands. And Cronk, phoney or not, had shown that my artificial respiration covered a mite too neatly all fingerprints, possible bits of hair from my arms, or anything else of mine they might have found on George Engle.

  Except that damned coin.

  I turned to Pilchers' side of the picture and tried to see them against the background of Engle's murder. Either one of them was definitely blackmail bait—but

  how to prove it to Sheriff Toland? Pilcher had the strength to have cut Engle down.

  Kate? She was a good enough swimmer to suggest considerable strength. Could Kate Weston have slipped a length of light rope or soft cloth around Engle's neck? True, one of the things I had been hired to work on was now an established fact. All the guests didn't come up because they liked it. Cronk by his own admission had been forced to come. Kate had added that they were bullied into making believe they enjoyed it. On that she was batting a little lower. I hadn't noticed any great pretext at enjoyment on anyone's part. Now, watching her, I tried to recall some bit of conversation, some word from George that would have told me she was not under his protective insurance and had indeed been invited by Sandy rather than the lord of the manor. Certainly Sandy seemed to consider Kate in the same light as the others, yet Sandy Engle had just discovered, or so she would like us to believe, that her ever-loving spouse was strictly poison pen. It wouldn't make a lady feel too well, you'd guess, so she would want to be alone for a while.

  Pushing it a little further, I came to Elsa Doyle and Sandy Engle herself. Assuming a girl could have swung this deal would have to put both of them in the light of possible suspects. Doyle first. I tried to turn her all around in my mind and see something besides that million-dollar frame and the deluxe henna job. A cool kid, from any angle. And she'd been around. It was a lead pipe cinch that she could have been a candidate for Engle's phony insurance. But she hadn't shown the least happiness over his exit, nor had the recent loss of the stack of damning envelopes seemingly added to her pleasure. I tried to figure why and came up with one plausible answer. You would expect a rising young starlet to be a reasonably good actress, an able person at controlling her emotions.

  In any case you'd have to give her that much. And this much more—she was a hundred and ten pounds of carefully cultivated feminine charm and it would still be shining through when she was sixty-seven.

  That wrenched my mental excursions to Sandy Engle. We hadn't tied off many loose ends as far as Sandy was concerned. Nothing at all on why she hadn't been away from the estate or swam seldom and then at night. Shy and retiring, she-had a dark-haired loveliness that seemed natural and it suited her somehow. One of those women who seldom exert any great amount of energy. You didn't see her hurrying about in the busy hostess role. She wasn't out to drink up all the liquor in the portable bar Engle had rolled out from time to time that first day
—in fact I guessed that lemonade was her forte, though there was no hint that she resented the whisky and soda pouring into other people's glasses. If anything, you could call her look a wistful one— wish I was there. Much too docile, too lacking in force to tighten a cord around anyone's throat, I was sure.

  Then I put that apparent lack of forcefulness up against Kate's suspicion that Sandy mifiht have been forced to remain on the estate. That same force might make her reticent—but it didn't have to keep her from murder. I was beginning to wonder if the e '~ad been an envelope with Sandra Engle written across its white surface . . . after all, George wouldn't have had to entrust her with the combination to the wall safe. She could have known just where to look for it after he was dead.

  The sun was warm on my face and I grew weary of graooling with the problem. I wanted to slip into a pair of swim trunks and splash around in Engle's pool for a while but it didn't look like Widdle would go for anyone's leaving long enough to change. So instead I began to do a little mental calculation on my own project—that gold mine I hoped some day to own. I let my eye measure the

  Engle plunge and wondered if there was anything here I could use when I went into business. Blue tile? No, I guessed I wouldn't go for that. In the setup I planned a white pool would look better and I could keep the water sparkling and blue without any help from the tile. The drain was extra large for speedy changing of water, the stainless steel grille sunk into the reinforced concrete to give maximum drainage through its bottom and sides —this kept the pool in operation practically twenty-four hours a day. Then. . . .

  I came out of it when Sandy Engle swung her feet down and stood up. She looked around leisurely, then folded the blanket and tossed it on the grass, ran a slow hand through her long black hair, and went toward the pool. She stood there several minutes, her eyes on the water, and I watched in silence. Then we heard the noise of a laboring car engine winding up toward the estate. It pulled onto the parking strip and a few minutes later Sheriff Toland came toward us, a firm smile on his brown face, and walking beside him was a tall woman wearing a simple business suit.

  "Miss Birch," Toland said, "from our office. I hate to bother you, Mrs. Engle, but we have to be sure about your not holding out an envelope or two. So if you you'd like, Miss Weston can go along, but I want you and Miss Birch to go up to the house for a while. She'll—" Toland hesitated, then finished—"go through your things."

  "You mean search me?" Sandy asked incredulously.

  "That's about it, ma'm. It would have been very easy for you to slip some of those things from the safe into your dress," Toland said firmly "We don't want anyone to claim later that you had, so for your protection Miss Birch will go with you to your room."

  Toland had put it nicely, I thought, and it didn't leave Sandy Engle much of an out. Not that she appeared to want one. She frowned momentarily, then said, "Of

  course. I'll be more than glad to cooperate. No one could be more interested in seeing justice—seeing the person who killed my husband brought to trial." Then she turned and went toward the house, Miss Birch a step behind her. Sheriff Toland nodded to Kate.

  "I'd really rather you went along. Miss Birch isn't a policewoman or anything—just our one-woman office force. It might be much better if you were to sort of add a third voice to the proceedings. Would you?"

  Kate stood up and we watched her join the other two going along the walk.

  Before they went through the door, Cronk began to nag at the sheriff. "Now look here, you got me out on a limb, Toland. "I may be on the hook for operating as an M.D. under a diploma mill license, but that's a hell of a way from a murder charge. I demand that you get to the bottom of—"

  "You don't demand anything of me, Cronk," Toland said shortly. "One of the things I don't need around here is someone telling me my job. We're making progress. Slow, maybe, but sure. If you didn't kill Engle you can spend all of your time worrying about what you'll tell the medical examiners; we're not going to railroad you on the killing. On the other hand, Cronk, maybe you did have a hand in giving Engle his send-off. In that case, mister, you're in for plenty of trouble. In the meantime all I'll need from you is peace and quiet. I can handle this job, and I will. You got that, Cronk?"

  Cronk nodded and Toland turned to me. "So far, Bowman, you've insisted that you weren't even acquainted with Engle; you're clear because you had no reason. That right?"

  "Yes."

  "You're strictly a friend of Miss Weston? How long have you two been chasing around together?"

  This was going to be easy. In those first few miles of the trip up here Kate and I had agreed on our check points. I'd stick to that script and be on safe ground, but along with that I could build us both in solid with Toland if I played it right. I let a grin spread over my face.

  "Kate and I met over three months ago." I reflected a moment, then said, "Almost four, now. Jim Spencer, a friend of mine has a steady and they worked out this double date, you see, and—"

  "What's that girl friend's name, Bowman? Spencer's girl, I mean."

  "Helen," I answered brightly, and tried to hide how glad I was he'd asked. Then I dribbled along, carefully working in all the points we'd set up. It made a fairly plausible situation and Toland seemed satisfied. He let that angle cool off and worked on the Pilchers a while, but the newly liberated fat boy wasn't going to talk much. He was convinced that George Engle's information had gone up the flue and sounded determined to stick by his first statement—simply a friend up for the weekend.

  Toland was still getting nowhere with Pilcher when Miss Birch came down the walk with Kate. Her report was short and negative. Mrs. Engle had concealed nothing on her person.

  "Uh-huh. Now Miss Weston, I've been going over some items with Mr. Bowman here, and I'd like to check with you. Bowman tells me you two have been running around for over three months and—" The sheriff went on easily, and I had to admit I had thought he was sharper than he appeared at the moment. He didn't change a thing, didn't alter a name or try to trap Kate. He wasn't even watching me to be sure I didn't prompt her a little. He just talked along, working in the facts I'd recited for him and which Kate and I had previously agreed upon.

  But halfway through I caught the pitch. He was keep-

  ing it straight and honest. When he made the shift she was going to be off the deep end. I closed my eyes and waited, and then I heard Toland's voice grow louder. I looked up to see he'd turned my way, was watching me, but he still spoke to Kate.

  "You two seem to agree on everything, but I still think you're holding back. I think George Engle himself invited Bowman up here. And I'll tell you when. According to Mrs. Engle, George was in town one week ago Monday, until late at night. Bowman says that you and he had dinner alone at a place called Karl's, on Wilshire out around Western Avenue. Me, I don't believe you two were alone. I think that you and Bowman met George Engle there for dinner and Bowman is lying when he says he didn't know Engle until yesterday."

  "No. We had dinner alone," Kate said. "At Karl's, just as Marty said, and George wasn't—" She stopped then. The look on Toland's face was enough to tell her she'd tripped.

  "Now wait a second," I cut in, hoping to blast one past him. "Karl's is a popular place. I eat there often and it just happens—"

  Toland held up a hand. "Not on Monday you didn't. I like to have a bite there myself when I'm in L.A. and I know the place pretty well—enough to know you're caught off base. It's closed on Mondays, son. I guess it's about time for someone to make a nice clean breast of things. We could start with you."

  "No, let's start with me," Kate said softly. "I—have been guilty of a lot of false answers, I'm afraid. I must have been blessed with an oversupply of concern for other people's business, because Mr. Bowman is a detective and I brought him up here to find out some things for me."

  Widdle spoke first. "I'll be damned," he said sarcastically. "A professional nosey. Now I've seen everything."

  Eleven

  You cou
ld have heard the ripples on the pool if there had been any. Toland scratched a leathery ear, then fixed his firm eyes on my face.

  "Uh-huh. I got nothing but help around here, it seems, but like I told Cronk, I can get by nicely on my own. You'll limit your hand in this game to answering questions and keeping your fingers out of things. You get that, son?" I nodded and Toland grunted another uh-huh. "We'll start with a look at your license, Bowman."

  There wouldn't be any use in tossing Fred's ticket out on the table. I had it; Fred had passed it into my wallet back at Gregory's; something to use for a quick flash if needed, but anything Toland looked at from here on would be strictly under a sharp eye.

  "Haven't one," T said simply. "Gregory Agency employed me and the papers haven't gone through yet."

  "A little previous, weren't you, taking on work without a card?" I didn't answer, but I was thinking fast. Fred was going to get word to Boreland Gregory when I called last night. By now the fat man must have started the wheels rolling on some kind of ticket for me, if only to protect himself, so it didn't have to be too bad. Vaguely I heard Toland's voice again. "That stuff about you being a lifeguard and all, the part you gave us last night—no wonder it checked out all right. Just went to work for that detective outfit. Well, now, exactly what were you supposed to dig out, Bowman? I guess with the latest developments under our noses we don't have to guess very hard. Miss Weston was under Engle's thumb in a big way, maybe? You were brought up to do something

  about it and by the looks of things, you certainly filled the bill—once and for all. You got Engle ofi her back for good."

  "Now wait a second, Sheriff. You've got things twisted a bit, and—"

  "You haven't said what you were doing up here, son."