The Four Johns (6 page)

“Take it,” growled Mervyn. “Take it and go away.”

“Exactly,” said Boce. “Where is it?”

“Where is it? Where it always is—out in the back garage.”

“I'm afraid not.”

Mervyn stared. “What are you talking about? It's got to be there.”

“Well, it isn't. Go look for yourself.”

Mervyn donned slippers and bathrobe and went with the accountant through the gate at the rear of the court. The long shed that served as garage for the apartments was open. Three cars were housed here, none of them the mint-green convertible.

Mervyn walked to the street and looked up and down. No convertible in sight.

“Did you lend it to anyone?” asked John Boce suspiciously.

“No.”

“When was the last time you saw it?”

“I don't remember exactly. Thursday or Friday, I suppose.”

“Better report it stolen.”

“Who'd steal a beat-up old crock like that?”

“This,” said Boce in a measured voice, “is the car you've been trying to sell me.”

Mervyn ignored him. “Whoever took it must have known about the trick ignition switch.”

“Which of your friends would be most likely to steal your car?”

“Any of them. All of them.”

They returned to Mervyn's apartment. Mervyn started the coffeepot. While he waited, he went to the telephone and called several of his acquaintances. No one had seen the convertible.

“This is a fine how-de-do,” Boce said, with a suspicious glance at Mervyn. “Unless you're putting me on.”

“No,” Mervyn answered wearily. “You conned me fair and square. I'd resigned myself.”

“Could Mary Hazelwood have taken it?”

“I'd hardly think so.”

“It's possible. She knew about the ignition switch.”

“She wouldn't have taken it without telling me. It's been stolen.” Mervyn took up the telephone, called the State Highway Patrol and reported the loss. “That's that.”

The accountant poured himself some coffee. “It's a loss I feel as deeply as you.”

“Even deeper, since you weren't troubled by maintenance costs.”

“Come now, Mervyn. As you know, I was on the point of buying the car.”

“I wish we'd completed the transaction last week.”

Boce shook his head. “Mervyn, this is a quality in you I can't admire. Think big, man! What else is there in life but bringing happiness to others?”

“It's great, I agree. If others bring happiness to me. Instead, they steal my car.”

“You'll get it back. In the meantime I've got this ravishing creature waiting, and no wheels.”

“If it's Harriet, why not use Harriet's car?”

“It's not Harriet and I don't dare borrow her car. Not any more. I used my sick uncle in San Francisco once too often. She telephoned and found he'd gone to Las Vegas for the weekend. Something I couldn't explain. So here I am, relying on you.”

“In other words, you want the Volkswagen.”

“I don't see how you can say no under the circumstances.”

“It's hard, I agree,” said Mervyn. “I don't have a leg to stand on, except that I want to use it myself.”

“I thought you were working on your thesis.”

In the end, protesting and complaining, Mervyn tossed over the keys. John Boce jingled them with satisfaction. Mervyn muttered, “I must still be half asleep. How about leaving me a gallon or two of gas?”

The big man heaved himself to his feet. “Say no more. John Boce's generosity is proverbial.”

At nine o'clock on the morning of June eighteenth, Mervyn's telephone rang.

“Hello.”

“This is Sergeant Erickson, State Highway Patrol. Mr. Mervyn Gray, please.”

“I'm Mervyn Gray.”

“Mr. Gray, we've found your Chevrolet convertible.”

“In one piece?”

“Apparently. Hasn't been stripped, anyway. Somebody must have taken a joy ride. It turned up on the outskirts of Madera.”

“Madera?”

“That's right. Just this side of Fresno.”

“That's a hundred and fifty miles!”

“You're lucky it wasn't San Diego.”

“I guess you're right. What do I do now?”

“You can pick it up any time. We've towed it to the Sterling Garage in Madera, at Fourth and Willow. Bring identification and proof of ownership, and she's yours. There'll be a day or two storage charges.”

“No indication who took it?”

“We make a routine check for fingerprints. Chances are there won't be any. Your insurance should cover retrieval expenses.”

“I only carry public liability.”

“That's too bad. You've got the address?”

“Yes. Sterling Garage. Fourth and Willow, Madera.”

“Right.”

“Thank you very much.”

“Glad to be of help.”

Mervyn poured a cup of coffee, but made no move to drink it. He looked out across the court, testing, rejecting a variety of disturbing ideas. Madera. Mervyn knew Madera very well. He had been brought up there, and his mother still lived there; she was vice-principal of the Madera Junior High School. (Mervyn's mother, a forthright woman, had given him the Volkswagen after an unnerving near-accident.) So his car had been taken to Madera.… Coincidence?

He shoved his chair back suddenly, dressed, phoned to check on the bus schedule, then called a cab. At the depot he immediately boarded a bus, and ten minutes later he was en route south—along the Eastshore Freeway, past Livermore, over the tawny hills of the Diablo Range, down into the Central Valley; through Tracy and Manteca and out on old Highway 99.

The towns of the valley fell behind, with their intervening orchards, vineyards and grazing land. Modesto, Turlock, Merced, Chowchilla: to the casual eye all exactly alike. Service stations, hamburger stands, packing sheds for fruit and grapes, motels along the highway, the more sedate and substantial central districts three or four blocks inland. The air-conditioned bus was cool; outside, heat and an aroma of earth and eucalyptus resin and sunburned paint, a fume less palpable than dust.

The Giant Orange stands were crowded with men in shirt sleeves and women in cotton dresses: mostly Middle Westerners, assimilated Okies. These were sights and sounds and odors common to all the valley towns, and if Mervyn had not been otherwise preoccupied he might have felt homesick. But his attention was turned inward. Someone he knew had stolen his car and taken it to Madera to abandon it. Why?

The bus turned into Madera, a town like other towns. At the bus depot Mervyn got out and walked over to Fourth and Willow.

The Sterling Garage was a barn of a building, with walls of corrugated steel. In the dim interior, he at once spotted his car. He went over and circled it. The exterior was undamaged. He gingerly opened the door and looked inside. Nothing wrong that he could see.

He went into the office of the service manager, a fresh-faced young man with “Tim” embroidered above the breast pocket of his white jacket. Mervyn felt a faint stirring; he must have known Tim, probably in high school. Tim failed to recognize him. He was not surprised; he was a far cry from the withdrawn, rather sickly boy who had left Madera. Not even the name on his driver's license, which he produced for the service manager's inspection, struck a spark in the man. Mervyn was not surprised at that, either. Very few of his schoolmates in Madera had known his Christian name; to them, from middle grade school, he had been “Booksie”—Booksie Gray.

Mervyn signed a receipt and paid the storage charges. The service manager went back with him to the Chevy. “I didn't look her over, but she looks like she's O.K.”

Mervyn climbed in and reached under the dashboard to snap on the ignition switch installed by the previous owner. He pressed the starter button; the engine caught without hesitation. The service manager leaned through the window. “They leave you any gas?”

Mervyn glanced at the gauge. “A bit less than a quarter of a tank.”

“How's the oil pressure?”

Mervyn looked, his mind working at a new idea. “Everything seems O.K.”

“You're a lucky guy, mister.”

Mervyn was suddenly anxious to depart. He backed out of the stall, swung around and drove out into the blaze of the afternoon sun.

He went by old remembered routes around the downtown area and through a pleasant residential district of poplar trees, picture windows and green lawns. He passed within three blocks of the junior high school, where at this hour his mother would be conducting the school orchestra (in which Mervyn as a thin-faced, big-eyed urchin had played first violin). At the outskirts of town, in a neighborhood of small frame cottages, drooping trees and dusty gardens, he turned into a rutted dirt road, drove another two blocks and pulled over to the shady side of an abandoned packing shed.

For a moment Mervyn sat motionless. Then he checked the ashtray: empty. He opend the door, looked under the seat. Nothing but a pencil, several bobby pins, a few curls of dust. In the jump seat, nothing.

He took a deep breath; the car almost certainly had been taken by someone who knew the idiosyncrasies of the ignition system. He investigated the glove compartment. He found road maps, a pair of broken sunglasses, a road flare, a pair of rusty pliers, two paper clips, three hairpins, a pack of facial tissues, a beer-can opener, and the key he used' for locking the trunk.

He went around the car and unlocked the trunk. At once he recognized the twisted thing in the sky-blue skirt and jacket. He realized now that he had expected to find it.

For five seconds, while the galaxy receded, he stared at the body of Mary Hazelwood. The knees were folded almost daintily; even in violent death Mary Hazelwood could be nothing but graceful. The distorted face peered sightlessly forward. Wisps of hair curled flirtatiously over the pale cheek.

Mervyn lowered the lid of the trunk with infinite care. He turned the key in the lock and, impelled by some primitive impulse, stooped for a handful of sand, powdery and dry, which he worked between his fingers.

He looked up the street, down the street. Three or four sun-bleached cottages. A black panel truck crossing a far intersection.

Mervyn climbed gingerly back into the car. He reached for the steering wheel, hesitated as if the black ebonite had become infected. But then he gripped the wheel. Queasiness was a luxury he could not now afford. Henceforth he must be unemotionally decisive and ruthless.

CHAPTER 4

Above all, he must not panic.

He shivered as he thought how easy it would be to do something foolish. His first impulse on finding the body, for instance, had been to tumble it out on the ground and drive away at top speed.… He looked down at his hands on the wheel. The knuckles shone white.

He forced himself to relax; he could do anything—anything—if he had to. But what?

His first thought was to report to the police. His stomach flopped like a fish. To do that would involve him up to his neck. The car was his. Madera was his old home town. He had unsuccessfully wooed Mary. And his alibi for the night of her disappearance was nonexistent. It was not as if Mary Hazelwood were nondescript or drab. Mary Hazelwood was beautiful, a girl men fruitlessly pursued—the kind that often wound up as the central figure in a crime of passion.

Who killed Mary Hazelwood? the newspapers would ask. And they would mention his name in as close proximity to the question as they dared. Should the police fail to establish the guilt of someone else, his name would enter the conversation whenever the case was brought up. It was even conceivable that he might be openly accused. How could he prove he was not guilty? Outside the courts the burden of proof was on the accused.

Inevitably would come the appointment with Professor Burton. In his mustard tweeds, Professor Burton resembled an irascible old Airedale. He would rise when Mervyn entered, motion toward a straight-backed chair, sit down stiffly. There would be conversation:

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
: Mr. Gray, undoubtedly you know why I have asked you to drop by today.

M
ERVYN
G
RAY
: I've got a strong suspicion.

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
: We must face the crisis. It's no use to pretend that it doesn't exist. This wretched publicity is the poorest sort of thing for the department.

M
ERVYN
G
RAY
: I realize this, Professor Burton. Unfortunately I can't do anything about it.

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
: Then—unfortunately, as you put it—I must. Blameless as you well may be, we simply can't tolerate this sort of thing in connection with the university.

M
ERVYN
G
RAY
: You mean that I'm fired?

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
: I mean that you will not be rehired for the fall semester. For your own good I suggest that you resign. After this affair has been forgotten, there is no reason why you should not seek a similar post at another institution. If you choose to do this, you can look to me for references.

M
ERVYN
G
RAY
: And if not?

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
(
rising
): That aspect need not be considered. Surely you've thought the matter over.

M
ERVYN
G
RAY
(
desperately
): Naturally, Dr. Burton. But my whole career is at stake. I've even been hoping for an assistant professorship—

P
ROFESSOR
B
URTON
(
like steel
): That, I fear, is no longer remotely possible. The regents would be outraged at the mere suggestion, and rightly. These are the facts, Mr. Gray. May I have your resignation?

So much was academically inevitable. But that could be by far the least of it. For what if the police refused to believe that he had no knowledge of how Mary's body had come to be found by him in the Chevy trunk? That could be a matter not of his academic career but of his life.… He forced himself to think coolly.