Night My Friend (30 page)

He found himself filling her in briefly on the events of the past few days, telling her of the strange messages, and his visit to the Angora home, and finally the murder of Lester Shaw.

“It’s like a nightmare,” she said. “Aren’t there any definite clues?”

“None that point to anyone but me. The detective, Kater, thinks I killed him because I was having an affair with his wife, Muriel.”

“Were you?”

“Hardly!”

She flung back her head in a gesture he’d seen her use before. “Still, this part about your wife being alive is so ridiculous. Couldn’t someone have set up the whole plan, the messages and everything, just to murder this man Shaw?”

“Somebody like Muriel?”

“Or that Angora you mentioned.”

“But why?”

She puzzled over it a moment and then went back to her beer. “I wish there was some way I could help you, Harry.”

“If you mean that, I think there is.”

“How?”

“I noticed you Saturday night because at a quick glance you looked something like Lois. I want to take you to see a couple of people in the morning. I want to see if they react the same way.”

“What people?”

“The newspaper vendor, Otto Carry. And perhaps Mrs. Angora, too.”

“But why?”

“These people think they saw someone; someone who might have been Lois. I want to visit them with you and try to get some reaction out of them. If they really did see her, they’ll probably notice your resemblance to her. Carry should, at least, since he never saw her alive.”

“Harry, do you want her to be alive? Or dead?”

He tried to think about that, but whatever the answer was, he wasn’t yet ready to face it. “I don’t know. I guess I’ll have to wait and see.”

“You’re an odd guy.”

“Will you come with me in the morning?”

“Sure. I guess so.” She hesitated a moment and then said, “Lois was a very beautiful woman. I found a picture of her in this magazine.” She reached over to the coffee table and picked up a three-month-old copy of a fashion magazine. There were some color shots taken at Newport last summer, and one of them showed him with Lois on the beach. He remembered how they’d kidded about it when the magazine appeared.

“Yes,” he answered simply.

Later that night, alone at home, he cried for the first time since the accident. But he cried for himself rather than Lois.

In the morning he picked up Rosie Yates early, and they reached the area of Sherman Park before eight. It was another sunny day, with train-bound crowds moving perhaps a little slower than they did in the chill months of winter. Harry parked the car and they waited till a dull period between trains before approaching Otto Carry at his post.

“Hello, there,” Harry said.

The old man looked up from his stack of papers, peering through the thick glasses with uncertain recognition. “You—you’re the fellow from yesterday, at the police station.”

“That’s right.”

“Want a paper?”

“Sure. Give me a
Times.
This girl is a friend of mine. Miss Yates.”

Otto Carry’s eyes swept over her. “Mornin’,” he said without interest.

“I was wondering… This woman you saw yesterday—did she look anything like Miss Yates here?”

The old man peered again. “Not much. Hair’s the wrong color for one thing. And no mole. The one yesterday, she had a lot more makeup on, too.”

Harry brought out the newspaper photo and the picture from the magazine. “Was this the girl?”

“I seen the one picture yesterday. Yeah, that’s the girl.”

“Thanks. Thank you very much.”

He started to turn away with Rosie Yates when a familiar voice said, “Playing detective, Mr. Gordon?” It was Sergeant Kater, looking sleepy in a topcoat he didn’t need.

“Hello. No, just buying a paper.”

Kater stepped up close. “Mind introducing me to the girl, Mr. Gordon?”

“Rosie Yates, Sergeant Kater.”

The detective nodded. “He told me about you. It’s a pleasure.”

“Look,” Harry began, “are you following me or something?”

“No. I was looking around over at the park and I saw you come in here. I was just curious.” He took out a cigarette. “I’m especially curious about your social life, Mr. Gordon.”

Harry was annoyed. “Look, I told you I just met Miss Yates last Saturday. Right, Rosie?”

The girl flushed a bit and nodded. “That’s right.”

Kater nodded. “I’ll see you around, Mr. Gordon.” He drifted out of the station, leaving them alone with the newsdealer.

“I don’t like that man,” Rosie said. “He thinks you’re hiding something.”

Harry was reminded of Lester Shaw’s words. Was it possible after all that he was hiding something? Was it possible he’d sent those messages to himself, and even murdered Shaw without knowing it? He remembered the head injury he’d suffered in the accident.

“I gotta go,” Otto Carry said suddenly. “Train due in three minutes.”

“Now what?” Rosie asked. “That woman? Betty Angora?”

“I guess not today,” Harry decided. “She’ll keep. Besides, I’ve got some other things to do.”

“That detective upset you.”

“I suppose so. He might still be following us, and I don’t want to go up to Angora’s now. I’ll take you home.”

They made the trip back to the Village apartment mostly in silence. He dropped her with a promise to call again, and then turned the car back toward Long Island. On the way he remembered an unpleasant duty. Lester Shaw’s body would be at the funeral parlor, and he would have to pay his respects. Somehow the thought of seeing Lester dead, and Muriel alive, was something he couldn’t yet face. The death of Lester had been almost more of a shock than the death of his wife, and there was no chance of Lester’s returning.

He parked across the street from the funeral parlor and went in. It was too early for regular visiting hours, but Muriel was already there, dressed in somber shadows that rustled when she walked. “Hello, Harry. It looks like a bad year for us both.”

“I’m awfully sorry, Muriel.”

“Who would want to kill him, Harry? Who would want to kill a big dope like Les?”

“He was an old friend, Muriel. I’d rather it had been me.” Harry walked into the dim sanctum where the casket rested among dripping baskets of flowers. He knelt for a momentary prayer, then went back to Muriel’s side. “Harry,” she said softly, “do you think he was killed because he saw something that night? At the accident?”

“I don’t know, Muriel. Look, I’ll be back tonight. OK?”

“Sure.” She tried to smile as he left.

Across the street, Sergeant Kater was waiting in his car. “Get in,” he said simply.

“You’ve been following me.” Harry slid into the seat next to him. “Why?”

“Because I wanted to talk some more.”

“About Muriel and me?”

“And other things.”

“Like what?”

“I want to hear everything you’ve been up to since the last time we talked,” he said curtly.

Harry gave a sort of growl. “Is that going to help find out if Lois is dead or alive?”

The detective stared straight ahead. “If I were you, Mr. Gordon, I wouldn’t be so anxious to find that out.”

“Why not?”

“Because if your wife is still alive, she’s a murderess. She killed Lester Shaw, and very possibly the person who burned to death in your car. If she’s alive, she might try to kill you next.”

The night came with uncertainty, the reflected glow in the western sky lingering far beyond its appointed time. Harry had spent a few hours at the office, shuffling papers into vague piles for a future date, and when he returned home it was with a feeling of emptiness that seemed worse than the day of the funeral. Lois dead was a body lost, but Lois alive might be a soul lost as well. He wondered if he could face her alive, the strange wild thing she might have become.

The telephone rang at ten minutes to ten, and he picked it up to hear a whisper that was tantalizingly familiar. “Harry?”

“Who is this?”

“Try to listen. I can’t speak any louder. This is Lois.”

Suddenly his body seemed to be sweating from every pore. A cold knot began to grow in the pit of his stomach. “Lois? Are you alive?” he asked, realizing at once how foolish the question must sound.

“Of course I’m alive. Didn’t you get my messages?”

“I can hardly hear you.”

“I’m alive. But I’m in awful trouble. I need money, Harry. I have to get out of town.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m hiding. It doesn’t matter where.”

“Les is dead.”

“I know it. I didn’t kill him, Harry. You have to believe that.”

“You were seen near the park.”

“I was there, but I didn’t kill him.”

“Who did? And whose body was that in the car?”

“I’ll explain it all when I see you, Harry. Can’t you trust me?”

Something, something. “Is this really Lois?”

“Harry! Do I have to come there?”

“Maybe you’d better.”

“I need money. Ten thousand dollars.”

“Where am I supposed to get it?”

“There’s money. And it’s really mine anyway.”

Really hers. Maybe that had been the trouble for all those years. “I can’t raise it in the middle of the night.”

“Don’t you have any around the house?”

“How much did I ever have around the house? Fifty, sixty dollars.”

“Tomorrow? Can you get it tomorrow? In cash?”

“You come here tonight and we’ll talk about it. I have to get to the bottom of a few things first.”

She gave a resigned sigh. “I’ll come, Harry. But it’ll be dangerous. There are people who want to kill me.”

“I’ll call the police.”

“No! They’d send me to prison, Harry. They’d say I killed Lester Shaw, and that woman in the car.”

“All right. Come out here now. Tell me what happened, the truth, and we’ll see what we can work out about the money.”

“I’ll be there in an hour,” she whispered, and hung up.

He sat for a long time at the telephone, wondering if he should call Kater. If it weren’t Lois, if it were someone else, then his life was in great danger. Even if it were Lois, he couldn’t be sure of handling her. If it were Lois… If she’d come back.

The doorbell buzzed at five minutes after eleven, and he knew it would be her. He walked to answer it, trying to keep his emotions under control, wondering what he would see when he swung open the door. He was ready for almost anything, but he was not ready for Lois.

She stood there, wearing dark glasses and a scarf that partly covered her hair. She was more beautiful than he remembered her, more mysterious, more feminine.

“Come in,” he said quietly.

“Hello, Harry,” She still spoke in a whisper, as if unsure of herself.

“You can speak up. We’re alone.”

“I…”

For a moment, for just a moment, he felt like forgetting the whole crazy business. He felt like taking this woman in his arms and making love to her, as he had with Lois so many countless times in the past.

“She would have used her key,” he said simply.

“What?”

“Lois wouldn’t have rung the doorbell. She would have used her key.”

The gun appeared in her hand by magic, and he knew she must have been holding it out of sight all the time. It was a tiny weapon, just enough of one to make a muffled cough against a man’s chest. “What do you want?” he asked her.

“Money. Ten thousand dollars.”

Then it was her natural voice, and it no longer went with this vision of Lois alive. He took a step toward the gun and saw it explode in a flash of anger. As the bullet ripped into his side he saw Kater leap from somewhere and tackle the girl with a bound of fury.

“I didn’t think she’d shoot,” Harry said stupidly, feeling the blood trickling through his shirt.

Kater had the gun now, and he held her on the floor in a viselike grip as he tried to get handcuffs on her. “She shot Shaw, didn’t she? Why not you, too?” Finally he had her on her feet and was calling an ambulance. “I told you,” he said to Harry. “I told you they never come back. Not from the grave.”

Rosie Yates looked at them both and spat.

Harry was back in the hospital for a few days, and it seemed somehow, awakening the next morning, that none of it had really happened. Perhaps it had all been a long, long nightmare. After a time, Sergeant Kater was standing by his bed, and he knew it was all too true.

“The girl is just plain nuts,” Kater was saying. “Imagine thinking she could get away with something like that!”

“I helped her get the idea,” Harry said. “I mistook her for Lois the first time I saw her, and then I told her all about it. Since Betty Angora had already come up with the idea that Lois was still alive, this Rosie Yates decided to follow through on it.”

Kater nodded from beside the bed. “She looked it up in the papers and learned that Lois had been fairly wealthy. I suppose that’s when she decided to try a shakedown by pretending Lois was still alive. From her point of view the scheme was pretty good. She’d send you a couple of messages and get you to send her some money, and that would be the end of it. She figured Lester Shaw for the go-between, because she thought she could fool him with her makeup.”

“How did she know Shaw’s name? She had it in the telegram.”

“That part was simple. She followed you Monday to see your reaction to the letter. She was probably wearing a wig. Remember, she was an actress. Anyway, in that restaurant she saw you show Shaw the letter. You said it was on the table between you for some time. She figured Shaw must be a friend, the kind you’d trust to deliver money to Lois. She simply followed Shaw and found out his name, and then sent the telegram. The real Lois probably wouldn’t have used his full name in the telegram, but she did, of course.”

“And like a fool I sent Les to meet her.”

“Don’t blame yourself. With her makeup on and her hair dyed to match that color photo in the magazine, she probably thought she could fool Shaw and get the money from him. Of course she couldn’t, especially since he’d seen Lois’ body in the car and was convinced she was really dead. He grabbed Rosie and she shot him in a panic.”

“How did she ever expect to fool me last night when she wasn’t able to fool Les?”

“She hoped you’d be enough in doubt that you’d have some money around for her anyway. Then she could take it, and it wouldn’t matter what you believed. She’d have left you dead. I guess the second murder always comes easy after the first one.”