The Fiend (33 page)

“No. I prefer to get some sleep.”

“Sleep is for babies.”

“Look, I don't want to be dragged into this thing any further.”

“You dragged yourself in, Mac. You didn't come here to­night out of idle curiosity or because anyone forced you. You're here on the chance that you might be able to help Kate Oakley. Why don't you admit it? Every time you mention her name, I see it in your face and hear it in your voice, that anxious, pro­tective—”

“It's none of your business.”

“Maybe not, but when I'm working with somebody I want to be sure he's working with me and not against me on behalf of a woman he's in love with.”

“Now you're telling me I'm in love with her.”

“I figure somebody should. You're a little slow about some things, Mac. No hard feelings, I hope?”

“Oh no, nothing like that.”

“Then let's go.”

 

The Brant house was all dark except for a light above the front door and a lamp burning behind the heavily draped windows of the living room.

Gallantyne pressed the door chime and waited. For the first time since Mac had known him, he looked doubtful, as if he'd just realized that he was about to do something he wouldn't approve of anyone else doing, dealing another blow to a man already reeling.

“Sure, it's a dirty business,” he said, as much to himself as to Mac. “But it's got to be done. It's my job to save the kid, not spare the feelings of the family and the neighbors. And by God, I think the whole damn bunch of them have been holding out on me.”

“If the only way you can handle this situation is to get mad,” Mac said, “all right, get mad. But watch your step. The fact that Brant's daughter is missing doesn't deprive him of his rights, both legal and human.”

“How I feel now is nobody has any rights until that kid is found alive and kicking.”

“That's dangerous talk coming from a policeman. If you ignore Brant's rights, or Gowen's, you're giving people an invita­tion to ignore yours.”

Gallantyne pressed the door chime again, harder and longer this time, although the answering tinkle was no louder and no faster. “I'm sick of a little lie here and a little lie there. Gowen's in the picture all right, but he's only part of it. I want the rest, the whole works in living color. Why did Mrs. Arlington claim the kid didn't go to her house?”

“Gowen might be the one who's lying, or mistaken.”

“I repeat, his statement jibes with Kate Oakley's.”

“It's not necessary to drag Kate into—”

“Mrs. Oakley dragged herself in, the same way you did. She volunteered that information about Brant. Nobody asked her, nobody had to pump it out of her. She's in, Mac, and she's in because she wanted to be in.”

“Why?”

“Who knows? Maybe she needs a little excitement in her life—though that should be your department, shouldn't it?”

“That's a crude remark.”

“So I'm having a crude night. It happens in my line of work, you get a lot of crude nights.”

A light went on in the hall and a few seconds later Dave Brant opened the door. He was still wearing the clothes he'd had on the previous night, jeans and a sweatshirt, dirty and covered with bloodstains now dried to the color of chocolate. The hand he'd injured in a fall was covered with a bandage that looked as though he'd put it on himself.

He was gray-faced, gray-voiced. “Is there any news?”

Gallantyne shook his head. “Sorry. May we come in?”

“I guess so.”

“You remember Mr. MacPherson, don't you?”

“Yes.”

“I'd like to talk to you for a few minutes, Mr. Brant.”

“I've told you everything.”

“There may be one or two little items you forgot.” Gallan­tyne closed the door. “Or overlooked. Are you alone in the house?”

“I sent my son Michael to spend the night with a friend. My wife is asleep. The doctor was here half an hour ago and gave her a shot.”

“Did he give you anything?”

“Some pills. I didn't take any of them. I want to be alert in case—in case they find Jessie and she needs me. I may have to drive somewhere and pick her up, perhaps several hundred miles away.”

“I suggest you take the pills. Any picking up can be done by the police—”

“No. I'm her father.”

“—in fact, must be done by the police. If Jessie turns up now, at this stage, it won't simply be a matter of putting her to bed and telling her to forget the whole thing.”

“You mean she will be questioned?”

“She will be questioned if she's physically and mentally able to answer.”

“Don't say that, don't—”

“You asked.”

Gallantyne hesitated, glancing uneasily at Mac. The hesita­tion, and the doubt in his eyes, made it clear to Mac why he'd been invited to come along. Gallantyne needed his support; he was getting older, more civilized; he'd learned to see both sides of a situation and the knowledge was destroying his appetite for a fight.

“Perhaps we'd all better go in the living room and sit down,” Mac said. “You must be tired, Mr. Brant.”

“No. No, I'm alert, I'm very alert.”

“Come on.”

The single lamp burning in the living room was behind an imitation leather chair. On the table beside the chair, pictures of Jessie were spread out: a christening photograph taken when she was a baby, classroom pictures, snaps of Jessie with Michael, with her parents, with the Arlingtons' dog; Mary Martha and Jessie, arms self-consciously entwined, standing on a bridge; Jessie on the beach, on her bicycle, in a hammock reading a book.

Silently, Dave bent down and began gathering up the pictures as if to shield Jessie from the eyes of strangers. Gallantyne waited until they were all returned to their folders. Then he said, “You asked me before, Mr. Brant, if I had any news. I told you I hadn't, and that's true enough. I do have something new, though. A man claims to have seen Jessie at 10:30 last night.”

“Where?”

“Coming out of the Arlingtons' house. Would you know any­thing about that, Mr. Brant?”

“Yes.”

“What, for instance?”

“It's not—not true.”

“Now why do you say that? You weren't anywhere around at that time, were you? I understand you were out searching for Mr. Arlington, who'd left here after a quarrel with his wife.”

“Yes.”

“Where did you go?”

“A few bars, some cafés.”

“And after that?”

“Home.”

“Whose home?”

Dave turned his head away. “Well, I naturally had to check in at Virg—at Mrs. Arlington's house to tell her I hadn't been able to find Howard.”

“This checking in,” Gallantyne said softly, “was it pretty involved? Time-consuming?”

“I told her the places where I had looked for Howard.”

“It took you exactly two seconds to tell me.”

“We discussed a few other things, too. She was worried about Howard, he'd been acting peculiarly all evening.”

“In what way?”

“He seemed jealous of the attention Virginia paid to Jessie.”

“Did he have any other cause for jealousy?”

“I don't know what you're getting at.”

“It's a simple enough question, surely.”

“Well, I can't answer it. I don't know what was going on in Howard's mind.”

“I'm talking about
your
mind, Mr. Brant.”

“I've—I've forgotten the question. I'm—you're confusing me.”

“Sorry,” Gallantyne said. “I'll put it another way. How did you feel when Mr. Arlington walked out of here last night?”

“We were all upset by it. Howard had never done anything like that before.”

“What time did he leave?”

“Between 9:30 and ten.”

“What happened after that?”

“I took Virginia home. Then I decided I'd better try and find Howard.”

“You decided, not Mrs. Arlington?”

“It was my idea. She was too depressed to be thinking clearly.”

“Depressed. I see. Did you attempt to cheer her up in any way?”

“I went looking for her husband.”

“And you returned to her house at what time?”

“I'm not sure. I wasn't wearing a watch.”

“Well, let's try and figure it out, shall we? You know what time you discovered Jessie missing from her room.”

“Eleven. She has a clock beside her bed.”

“Very well. At ten, your wife retired for the night. Half an hour later Jessie was seen leaving the Arlington house.

Dave kept shaking his head back and forth. “No, I told you that's not true. It's a—a terrible impossibility.”

“Impossibilities can't be terrible, Mr. Brant. By definition, they don't exist. Possibilities are a different matter. They can happen, and they can be quite terrible, like the one you're seeing now.”

“No. I don't, I
won't.”

“You have to,” Gallantyne said. “I suggest that Jessie went over to the Arlingtons' place between ten and 10:30. The house was always open to her, she could come and go as she liked, according to Mrs. Arlington. She entered by the back door —”

“No. It was locked, it must have been locked.”

“Did you lock it yourself?”

“No.”

“That was a pretty serious mistake, wasn't it, Brant? Or are you so casual about that sort of thing you don't mind an onlooker?”

“She didn't see us, she couldn't—”

“I think she did. She saw her father, and the woman she called her aunt, in an attitude that shocked and frightened her so badly that she dashed out into the street. I don't know what was in her mind, perhaps nothing more than a compulsion to escape from that scene. I do know there was a man waiting for her in a car. Perhaps he'd been waiting a long time, and for many nights previously, but that was the night that counted be­cause Jessie's guard was down. She was in a highly emotional state, she didn't have sense enough to cry out or to run away when the man accosted her.”

Dave's body was bent double, his forehead touching his knees, as though he was trying to prevent himself from fainting.

Mac crossed the room and leaned over him. “Are you all right, Brant?”

“Aaah.” It was not a word, merely a long, painful sigh of assent: he was all right, he wished he were dead but he was all right.

“Listen, Brant. It didn't necessarily happen the way Lieu­tenant Gallantyne claims it did.”

“Yes. My fault, all my fault.”

“Tell him, Gallantyne.”

Gallantyne raised his eyebrows in a show of innocence. “Tell him what?”

“Can't you see he's in a bad way and needs some kind of reassurance?”

“All right, I'll give him some.” Gallantyne's voice was quiet, soothing. “You're a real good boy, Brant. You had nothing to do with your daughter's disappearance. A little hanky-panky with the dame next door; well, Jessie was nine, old enough to know about such things. She shouldn't have been shocked or scared or confused. Don't they teach these matters in the schools nowadays? The birds and the bees, Daddy and Aunt Virginia . . . Now, you want to tell me about it?”

Slowly and stiffly, Dave raised his head. “There's nothing to tell except it—it happened.”

“Not for the first time?”

“No, not for the first time.”

“Did you plan on divorcing your wife and marrying Mrs. Arlington?”

“I had no plan at all.”

“What about Mrs. Arlington?”

“If she had one, I wasn't the important part of it.”

“Who was?”

“Jessie. Jessie seems to be a projection of herself. She's the child Virginia was and all the children Virginia will never have.”

“When did you find this out?”

“Today. I started thinking about it today.”

“A bit late, weren't you?” Gallantyne said. “Too late to do Jessie any good.”

“You—are you trying to tell me Jessie is—that she's dead?”

“The man who was waiting for her in the car has a history of sexual psychopathy. I can't offer you much hope, Brant.”
Not any hope except that the other child in his history managed to survive.

(23)

He was moving
toward the sea as inevitably as a drop of water. There were stops for traffic lights, detours to avoid passing places where Ben or Louise sometimes went; there were back­trackings when he found himself on a strange street. These things delayed him but they didn't alter his destination.