Mark of Murder - Dell Shannon (10 page)

"Sure I remember. I remember that. But, like I
say, the light wasn't so good then as it is now, and I--"

"Did you know him? Had you seen him before? Pal
of yours maybe?"

"
Jesus, no! Me, knowin' one like that? I said--"

"
You saw him, God damn you, and you're going to
tell me more or I'll take you in right now! Brace me, Telfer. We can
help your memory down at headquarters--"

"I told 'em," said Telfer. He was nearly in
tears. "He was--sort of medium, 's all. And he kept turned
sideways, and he had this hat . . . And the light----"

"Anybody back you up about the dead bulbs?"

Telfer looked away, cringing. "I dunno if
anybody else noticed, why should anybody--"

"Who put in new ones?"

"
Damn it, I did. I don't hafta take-- I told 'em
all I--"

Mendoza looked at him, feeling very tired. He said
abruptly, "You'll be seeing more of us," and turned on his
heel.
 
 

SEVEN

The apartment building on Kenmore Avenue where the
Nestors had lived was an old one but reasonably well maintained.
According to the mail slots, they had the left-hand front
ground-floor apartment. The small lobby was a little dusty; the whole
place was very quiet.

He pushed the door button and heard the shrill buzz
from beyond the door. After an interval he pushed it again. He
wondered if she'd gone away somewhere. But presently the door opened,
a cautious few inches on its chain. "Who is it? What do you want
at this time of night?”

He brought out his badge. "Just a few questions,
Mrs. Nestor. May I come in?"

"Well, I must say it's a peculiar hour to come
bothering at me. But I suppose if you must, you must." She
unhooked the chain, stood back ungraciously to let him in. "I
haven't seen you before. There were two other officers--"

"
Yes. Lieutenant Mendoza. You remember Sergeant
Hackett, who questioned you on Wednesday? You saw him again?"

"Why, yes. I expect we can sit down." She
sat on the edge of the couch. She had undressed and was wrapped in an
aged and ugly striped flannel bathrobe, hugging it round her primly.
She had put her hair up in curlers, covered it with a pink scarf, and
her sallow face was bare of either make-up or vanishing cream. She
had on a pair of old run-down black mules with little pompons on the
toes.

The room said this and that. Old furniture, most of
it belonging to the apartment, very little ornament--the two pictures
probably had come with the apartment too. But everything very neat
and clean. The one floor lamp she had switched on in the living room
cast light into the visible corner of the kitchenette, and it caught
reflections from newly waxed linoleum there. She was, without much
doubt, one of those persnickety housekeepers. He didn't wonder that
charming, easygoing Frank Nestor had sought diversion elsewhere. He
had a suspicion that when she'd made up her mind that he'd married
her for her expectations and nothing more she'd subtly--and maybe
unconsciously--taken revenge by turning herself into the obvious
martyr.

He sat down facing her. "Where have you been all
day, Mrs. Nestor? We've been trying to get in touch with you."
"Oh, have you? Well, I had to go up to Forest Lawn to make the
arrangements about the funeral. They had the inquest yesterday, and
then that other officer told me they'd released the body, so I could
make the arrangements. And then I went to buy a black dress because I
didn't have one, and it will look better at the funeral."

Her voice was quite flat, expressionless, and her
shallow eyes were empty. "But I was meaning to get in touch with
you too, because they told me at the bank that you'd been asking
questions and they'd showed you all about Frank's account there. I
shouldn't think that would be allowed. And I don't understand why I
can't have that money--I'm his widow and he hadn't any other
relations at all--at least I never heard of any. Do you know, he had
nearly five thousand dollars in his account. I never suspected he'd
saved up that much."

And it was another interesting thing, thought
Mendoza. Considering that Nestor hadn't stinted himself in any
direction--his star sapphire ring, the Buick convertible, the
four-hundred-a-month office--he must have been raking it in from
somewhere, all right. Just the marked-up vitamins?

"Did Sergeant Hackett come to see you last
night, Mrs. Nestor?"

"Why, yes, he did. Just for a short time. Mr.
Marlowe was here. Why?"

"Mr. Marlowe?"

"Mr. William Marlowe, he's a very fine man, he
was an old friend of my father's."

"What time was Sergeant Hackett here?" He
was watching her. She answered him readily, without hesitation, but
without interest either.

"Why, let's see, it was early. About eight
o'clock, I think. He asked me a lot of questions all over again,
things he'd asked before. I must say it seemed very inefficient to
me. And about Miss Corliss too. I don't know much about her, I never
interfered in Frank's business. Come to think, it'd've been a little
before eight, because I happened to notice the clock when Mr. Marlowe
left and that was ten past."

"Mr. Marlowe was here when the sergeant came?"

"That's right. It was nice of him, he came to
see if I might need a loan to pay for the funeral, you see. He's a
very wealthy man." And all the while her expressionless eyes
stayed fixed on him as if she was memorizing him.

"He left before Sergeant Hackett?"

"Oh yes. Mr. Marlowe said he knew I was tired
and didn't want company, and he left, and Sergeant--whatever the name
was--he took the hint finally and left too, about half an hour
later."

"And that was the last you saw of either of
them?"

"Well, yes," she said. She dabbed at her
mouth with a wadded--up handkerchief. "Why do you want to know
all that? I'm sure, you all ask the oddest questions--I should think
you'd be out looking for whatever burglar it was shot Frank, instead
of bothering me."

"We're wondering whether it was a burglar, Mrs.
Nestor," he said casually. "Whether it wasn't someone your
husband knew. Or someone you knew."

"I?" she said blankly. "Why on earth
should you think that? I don't know any burglars, for heaven's sake.
Of all the ridiculous ideas. And to come asking questions at this
hour of night, when I'd already gone to bed--"

Essentially an ignorant woman? Concerned with the
practical matters only? The self-made martyr so wrapped up in herself
she was oblivious to anything outside? Or something a lot deeper?

The tiredness was catching up to him now. The long,
long day, most of it spent in enforced inactivity in the planes, with
the frantic worry gnawing at his mind.

Art . . . He got up, and he had to haul himself up by
the arm of the chair.

"All right, thanks very much, Mrs. Nestor,"
he said. "We'll be in touch with you." He pulled the door
open.

"I'm sure I don't know why," she said.
"That's the queerest thing I've heard yet, thinking I might know
the burglar. I don't know why you have to come bothering me.”

"Don't you?" said Mendoza, swinging around
on her suddenly. "Was there a burglar at all? We don't think so,
you know. Have you ever owned a gun, Mrs. Nestor?" She stepped
back, but there wasn't any shock or fear in the shallow eyes. "Well,
for heaven's sake," she said flatly.

"I should think anybody could see how Frank came
to get murdered. Of course l've never owned a gun. I must say I don't
see the point of all this. That sergeant getting me down there for
some kind of test, now I think it over, it's nothing more or less
than an insuIt. I'm a good Christian woman and--"

The cordite test. Negative, but it wasn't always
reliable by any means.

"We'll be in touch with you," said Mendoza
wearily, and went out. It was ten o'clock. He got into the car and
drove back downtown to drop it at the garage. He called a cab and had
himself driven home, to the house on Rayo Grande Avenue.

There were lights in the living room. It seemed years
since he had last walked up this flagstoned path, opened the wide oak
door to the square entry hall.

"You shouldn't have stayed up,
amada
,"
he said as he kissed Alison. Bast and her daughter Nefertite ran to
meet him, talking loudly, and he bent to pick them up, stroking the
sleek heads. He sat down heavily in the nearest chair.

"You'll not sleep without you have a bit of
whiskey in you," said M
á
iri
MacTaggart. "Wait up indeed. Would we be going off to bed and
you not in, as long a day as we've all had even so? I'll fetch it."
Her kind, wise blue eyes smiled a little; she trotted out.

"Luis--"

"Well, they're not saying one way or the other,"
said Mendoza. "The longer he hangs on, of course, the better his
chances--I suppose. He could stay in a coma for days." He roused
himself to tell her the details, briefly, and what they thought about
it.

"Oh, God," said Alison tiredly. She had,
probably, had a bath and was wearing her newest housecoat; she had
probably also had a meal, if he knew Mrs. MacTaggart.

"We got Angel to bed--she'd been sitting there
since three this morning, you know--and Máiri coaxed some hot broth
and toast into her, and I got her to take three aspirins, I hadn't
anything stronger. But if it's going to be that long before we
know--" She wandered around the room distractedly, sat down on
the couch to stroke Sheba, who was diligently applying herself to the
last bath of the day. Bast and Nefertite purred on Mendoza's lap;
dimly he realized that it was nice to be home again, with the cats,
and presumably the twins safely asleep in their own beds.

Mrs. MacTaggart came trotting back, looking like a
plump little lamb in her woolly white dressing gown, gray hair
standing out in little curls; she handed him an overgenerous supply
of rye in a juice glass.

"Get that down you, man," she said in her
soft Scots burr. "You're doing nobody any good getting yourself
fagged to death so you can't think proper. It's a caution, imagine
you two traveling more than three thousand miles since this morning.
You'll get that down and you'll both be going to
bed.

And," she added to Alison severely, "you
will not be up at the crack of dawn worrying about that poor young
thing in there, her man at death's door and her carrying. She'll
sleep in, all the pills you gave her, and I'll see to her when she
wakes."

Alison smiled at her wanly and said, "You're a
tower of strength, Máiri. I don't know what we'd do without you. She
even remembered Silver Boy, Luis--”

"
Somebody's needed to keep a little common
sense. Why wouldn't I? When Mrs. Dunne fetched the wee boy here and
told me of it, of course I would think of Mrs. Hackett's cat. And
that Bertha was here by then, so I just ran over in Miss Alison's
car--knowing you wouldn't mind it,
mo
croidhe
--and took him to Dr. Stocking's where
he'll be safe until we can sort matters out. And you'd best take the
man and put him into his bed,
achara
,
or he'll fall to sleep where he sits."

It had been a long, long day. But he wouldn't sleep,
not with Art . . .

He shook his head muzzily. The rye had hit his empty
stomach like a small bomb. He thought vaguely,
Passing
the love of women
. . . He hauled himself up
to his feet. "What would we do without you, Máiri? I haven't
even said hello to you .... The twins O.K.? That's good.. . .
Déjelo
paras mañana
.... It's got to be all right,
hasn't it? Alison--"

"Come on, darling, bed. You look like death.
Máiri--"

"You'll not be fussing. I'll see to everything.
The wee boy's snug asleep in his cot by my own bed. You see to your
man. They're troublesome creatures to love," said Mrs.
MacTaggart, "and often enough bringing sorrow on us, but nought
to do about that but the best we can."

In the big master bedroom Mendoza flung off his
clothes carelessly. The whiskey--damn the whiskey--had turned his
mind numb; he couldn't think.

El Señor, the miniature lion, had officially retired
on the foot of the bed hours ago, and gave them a very cold green
glare for disturbing him at this hour. "Señor Malevolencia!"
said Mendoza sleepily. "Alison--"

"Here, let me help you."

"Don't be silly. Quite all right. Alison, you
talk to Angel, tomorrow. Find out what he said before he
left--anything he told her about those cases. Explain--"

"Yes, Luis. All right"

He wouldn't sleep, because
there was Art . . .
Passing the love of women
. . . But he slept, his last conscious thought that it was good to be
home, to feel Alison's warmth close, and to feel the warm heavy
weight of four cats at the foot of the bed.

* * *

He was in his office at eight o'clock Sunday morning,
shaved and tidy in gray Italian silk with the newest discreet dark
tie, mustache newly trimmed, back to civilization and the job.