The Four of Hearts (12 page)

Louderback raised suffering eyes ceilingward and said into the telephone: ‘I'm sorry, Miss Stuart, but Mr. Royle –'

‘Who?' yelled Ty. ‘Wait. I'll take it!'

‘Ty,' said Bonnie in a voice so odd a cold wave swept over him. ‘You've got to come over at once.'

‘What the devil's the matter, Bonnie?'

‘Please. Hurry. It's – frightfully important.'

‘Give me three minutes to change my clothes.'

When Ty reached Bonnie's house he found Clotilde weeping at the foot of the hall staircase.

‘Clotilde, where's Miss Stuart? What's the trouble?'

Clotilde wrung her fat hands. ‘Oh, M'sieu' Royle, is it truly you? Of a surety Ma'm'selle has become demented! She is up the stairs demolishing! I desired to telephone M'sieu' Butch-erre, but Ma'm'selle menaces me …
Elle est une tempête!
'

Ty took the stairs three at a time and found Bonnie, her mauve crepe negligée flying, snatching things out of drawers like a madwoman. The boudoir, her mother's, looked as if it had been struck by lightning.

‘They aren't here!' screamed Bonnie. ‘Or I can't find them, which is the same thing. Oh, I'm such a fool!'

She collapsed on her mother's bed. Her hair was bound loosely by a gold ribbon and cascaded like molten honey down her back where the sun caught it.

Ty twisted his hat in his hands, looking away. Then he looked at her again. ‘Bonnie, why did you call me?'

‘Oh, because I suddenly remembered … And then when I looked through the mail …'

‘Why didn't you call Butch? Clotilde says you didn't want Butch. Why … me, Bonnie?'

She sat very still then and drew the negligée about her. And she looked away from the burn in his eyes.

Ty went to her and hauled her to her feet and put his arms about her roughly. ‘Shall I tell you why?'

‘Ty … You look so strange. Don't.'

‘I feel strange. I don't know what I'm doing. This is the nuttiest thing of all. But seeing you there on the bed, alone, scared, like a lost kid … Bonnie, why did you think of me first, when you had something important to tell someone?'

‘Ty, please. Let go of me.'

‘We're supposed to hate each other.'

She struggled away from him then, not very strongly. ‘Please, Ty. You can't. You … mustn't.'

‘But I don't hate you,' said Ty in a wondering voice. His arms tightened. ‘I just found that out. I don't hate you at all. I love you.'

‘Ty! No!'

He held her fast and close to him with one arm, and with the other hand he tilted her chin and made her look up at him. ‘And you love me. You've always loved me. You know that's true.'

‘Ty,' she whispered. ‘Let me go.'

‘Nothing doing.'

Her body trembled against him in its rigidity, like a piece of glass struck a heavy blow; and then all at once the rigidity shivered away and her softness gave itself to him utterly.

They stood there clinging to each other, their eyes closed against the hard, unyielding vision of the disordered room.

A long time later Bonnie whispered: ‘This
is
insane. You said so yourself.'

‘Then I don't want ever to be sane.'

‘We're both weak now. We feel lost and – that horrible funeral …'

‘We're both ourselves now. Bonnie, if their deaths did nothing else –'

She hid her face in his coat. ‘It's like a dream. I felt naked. Oh, it
is
good to be close to you this way, when I know you and I, of all the people in the world, are –'

‘Kiss me, Bonnie. Christ, I've wanted to …' His lips touched her forehead, her eyelids, her lashes.

Bonnie pushed away from him suddenly and sat down on the chaise-longue. ‘How about Butch?' she said in an empty voice.

‘Oh,' said Ty. The hunger and the gladness drained out of his haggard face very quickly. ‘I forgot Butch.' And then he cried angrily: ‘To hell with Butch! To hell with everybody. I've been deprived of you long enough. You've been my whole life, the wrong way – we've got to make up for that. What I thought was hate – it's been with me, you've been with me, night and day since I was a kid in knee-pants. I've thought more of you and about you and around you … I've more right to you than Butch has!'

‘I couldn't hurt him, Ty,' said Bonnie tonelessly. ‘He's the grandest person in the world.'

‘You don't love him,' said Ty with scorn.

Her eyes fell. ‘I'm – I can't think clearly now. It's happened so suddenly. He loves me.'

‘You've been my whole life, Bonnie.' He tried to take her in his arms again, seeking her mouth.

‘No, Ty. I want some … time. Oh, it does sound corny! But you can't expect … I've got to get used to so much.'

‘I'll never let go of you.'

‘No, Ty. Not now. You've got to promise me you won't say anything … about this to anyone. I don't want Butch to know, yet. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe … You've got to promise.'

‘Don't think of anyone but me, Bonnie.'

She shivered. ‘The only thing that's really emerged these last three days has been to see mother avenged. Oh you simply can't say real things without sounding – dramatic! But I do want that … badly. She was the sweetest, most harmless darling in the world. Whoever killed her is a monster. He can't be human.' Her mouth hardened. ‘If I knew who it was I'd kill him myself, just the way I'd put a mad dog out of the way.'

‘Let me hold you, darling –'

She went on fiercely: ‘Anybody –
anybody
who was in any way involved … I'd hate him just as much as I'd hate the one who poisoned her.' She took his hand. ‘So you see, Ty, why all this … why we have to wait.'

He did not reply.

‘Don't you want to find your father's murderer?'

‘Do you have to ask me that?' he said in a low voice.

‘Then let's search together. It's true – I see it now – we've always had at least one thing in common … Ty, look at me.' He looked at her. ‘I'm not refusing you, darling,' she whispered, close to him. ‘When all this happened … I admit it, the only one I could think of was you. Ty, they – they died and left us alone!' Her chin began to quiver.

Ty sighed, and kissed it, and led her to the bed and sat her down. ‘All right, partner; we're partners. A little private war on a little private crime.' He said cheerfully: ‘Let's have it.'

‘Oh, Ty!'

‘What's all the excitement about?'

Bonnie gazed up at him through tears, smiling back. And then the smile chilled to a bleak determination, and she withdrew an envelope from her bosom.

‘For some time,' Bonnie said, sniffling away the last tear, ‘mother'd been receiving certain letters. I thought it was the usual crank mail and didn't pay any attention to them. Now … I don't know.'

‘Threatening letters?' said Ty swiftly. ‘Let's see that.'

‘Wait. Do you know anybody who sends cards in the mail? Do cards mean anything to you? Did Jack ever get any?'

‘No. Cards? You mean playing-cards?'

‘Yes, from the Horseshoe Club.'

‘Alessandro again, eh?' muttered Ty.

‘I've been searching for those other envelopes, the ones that came before the – accident. But they're gone. When I got back from the funeral I began going through a heap of letters and telegrams of condolence and found – this. That's what made me remember the others.'

Ty seized the envelope. It was addressed in a washed-out blue ink, and the writing – block-letters crudely penned – was scratchy.

‘But it's addressed to Blythe Stuart,' said Ty, puzzled. ‘And from the postmark it was mailed in Hollywood last night, the nineteenth. That's two days
after
her death! It doesn't make sense.'

‘That's why,' said Bonnie tensely, ‘I think it
is
important. Maybe when we add up all the things that don't make sense, we'll have something that does.'

Ty took out what lay in the envelope and stared at it.

‘And this is all there was?'

‘I told you it was mad.'

The only thing in the envelope was a playing-card with a golden horseshoe engraved on its blue back.

The card was the nine of clubs.

CHAPTER 10

FREEDOM OF THE PRESS

Whether it was because of the story in the paper or because banishing indecision meant seeing Paula Paris again, Mr. Ellery Queen concluded a three-day struggle with himself by driving on Thursday morning to the white house in the hills.

And there, in one of the waiting-rooms intently conning Paula's
Seeing Stars
column in the previous Sunday's night-edition of the Monday morning paper, sat Inspector Glücke. When he saw Ellery he quickly stuffed the paper into his pocket.

‘Are you one of Miss Paris's doting public, too?' asked Ellery, trying to conceal his own copy of the same edition.

‘Hullo, Queen.' Then the Inspector growled: ‘What's the use of beating around the bush? I see you've spotted that column. Darned funny, I call it.'

‘Not at all! Some mistake, no doubt.'

‘Sure, that's why you're here, no doubt. This dame's got some tall explaining to do. Give me the run-around since Monday, will she? I'll break her damned neck!'

‘Please,' said Ellery frigidly. ‘Miss Paris is a lady. Don't speak of her as if she were one of your policewomen.'

‘So she's hooked you, too,' snarled Glücke. ‘Listen, Queen, this isn't the first time I've locked horns with her. Whenever she comes up with something important and I ask her – in a nice way, mind you – to come down to
H.Q
. for a chin, I get the same old baloney about her not being able to leave this house, this crowd phobia of hers –'

‘I'll thank you,' snapped Ellery, ‘to stop insulting her.'

‘I've subpoenaed her from Dan to Beersheba time after time and she always wriggles out, blast her. Doctor's affidavits – God knows what! I'll show her up for a phony some day, mark my words. Crowd phobia!'

‘Meanwhile,' said Ellery nastily, ‘the mountain again approaches Mohammed. By the way, what's doing?'

‘No trace of that pilot yet. But it's only a question of time. My own hunch is he cached a plane somewhere near that plateau, maybe on the plateau itself. Then when he grounded Ty's plane he simply walked over to his own ship and flew off. You don't leave much of a trail in thin air.'

‘Hmm. I see Dr. Polk has confirmed my guess as to the cause of death officially.'

‘Autopsy showed an almost equal amount of morphine, a little over five grains, in each body. That means, Doc says, that a hell of a lot of morphine was dropped into those thermos bottles. Also some stuff Bronson calls sodium allurate, a new barbiturate compound – puts you rockababy.'

‘No wonder there was no struggle,' muttered Ellery.

‘Polk says the morphine and sodium allurate would put ‘em to sleep in less than five minutes. While they were sleeping that terrific dose of morphine began to get in its licks, and they must have died in less than a half-hour.'

‘I suppose Jack went first, and Blythe thought he was merely dozing. The soporific performed an important function. You see that? While the first victim, whichever it was, was apparently asleep although really dying or dead the second one, unsuspicious because of that sleeping appearance of the other, would drink from the other thermos bottle. The allurate was a precaution – just in case they didn't both drink at the same time. Damned clever.'

‘Clever or not, it did the trick. Death by respiratory paralysis, Polk calls it. The hell of it is we can't trace the stuff. Sodium allurate's now available in any drug store, and you know what a cinch it is to lay your hands on morphine.'

‘Anything new?'

‘Well,' said Glücke bashfully, ‘I'm not saying – much. I tried tracing the sender of that hamper, but no dice; we found the place it came from, but the order was mailed in and they threw away the letter. Phony name, of course. The plane's sterile; the only fingerprints are Jack's and Blythe's and Ty's – this guy must have worn gloves throughout. On the other hand …'

‘Yes? You're eating my heart out.'

‘Well, we sort of got a line on Jack's lady-friends. I swear he was a man, that billy-goat! Got a couple of interesting leads.' The Inspector chuckled. ‘From the way the gals in this town are running for cover you'd think –'

‘I'm not in the mood for love,' said Ellery sombrely. ‘How about this man Park? Not a word about him in the news.'

‘Oh, he's dead.'

‘What!'

‘Committed suicide. It'll be in tonight's papers. We found his duds intact in the cheap flophouse in Hollywood where he bedded down, with a note saying he was dying anyway, he was no good to his wife and crippled boy back East, who are on relief, he hadn't earned enough to keep his own body and soul together for years, and so he was throwing himself to the tuna.'

‘Oh,' said Ellery. ‘Then you didn't find his body?'

‘Listen, my large-brained friend,' grinned Glücke. ‘If you think that suicide note is a phony, forget it. We verified the handwriting. For another thing, we've definitely established the old guy couldn't fly a plane.'

Ellery shrugged. ‘By the way, do something for me after you get through boiling Miss Paris in oil.'

‘What?' demanded the Inspector suspiciously.

‘Put a night and day tail on Bonnie.'

‘Bonnie Stuart? What the hell for?'

‘Blamed if I know. It must be my psyche sniffing.' Then he added quite without humour: ‘Don't neglect that, Glücke. It may be of the essence, as our French friends say.'

Just then one of Paula Paris's secretaries said with an impish smile: ‘Will you come in now, Inspector?'

When Inspector Glücke emerged from Paula's drawing-room he looked positively murderous.

‘You like that dame in there, don't you?' he panted.

‘What's the matter?' asked Ellery, alarmed.

‘If you do, get her to talk. Sock her, kiss her, do anything – but find out where she picked up that story!'

‘So she won't talk, eh?' murmured Ellery.

‘No, and if she doesn't I'll drag her out of this house by that pretty grey streak in her hair and lock her up, crowd phobia or no crowd phobia! I'll book her on a charge of – of criminal conspiracy! Hold her as a material witness!'

‘Here, calm down. You wouldn't try to coerce the press in this era of constitutional sensitivity, would you? Remember the lamentable case of that newspaperman Hoover.'

‘I'm warning you!' yelled Glücke, and he stamped out.

‘All right, Mr. Queen,' said the secretary.

Ellery entered the holy of holies soberly. He found Paula finishing an apple and looking lovely, serene, and reproachful.

‘You, too?' She laughed and indicated a chair. ‘Don't look so tragic, Mr. Queen. Sit down and tell me why you've neglected me so shamefully.'

‘You do look beautiful,' sighed Ellery. ‘Too beautiful to spend the next year in jail. I wonder –'

‘What?'

‘Which part of Glücke's advice to take – whether to sock you or kiss you. Which would you prefer?'

‘Imagine that monster playing Cupid,' murmured Paula. ‘Disgusting! Why haven't you at least phoned me?'

‘Paula,' said Ellery earnestly. ‘You know I'm your friend. What's behind this story?' He tapped the Monday newspaper.

‘I asked a question first,' she said, showing the dimple.

Ellery stared hungrily. She looked ravishing in a silver lamé hostess-gown with a trailing wrap-around skirt over Turkish trousers. ‘Aren't you afraid I'll take Glücke's advice?'

‘My dear Mr. Queen,' she said coolly, ‘you overestimate your capacity – and his – for inspiring fear.'

‘I,' said Ellery, still staring, ‘am. Damned if I'm not!'

He advanced. But the lady did not retreat. She just looked at him. ‘I see,' she said in a pitying way, ‘that Hollywood's been doing nasty things to you.'

Mr. Queen stopped dead, colouring. Then he said sharply: ‘We've strayed from the point. I want to know –'

‘How it is that my column ran a story in the night-edition of the Monday paper, appearing Sunday evening, to the effect that Jack and Blythe were kidnapped on their wedding trip?'

‘Don't evade the question!'

‘How masterful,' murmured Paula, looking down demurely.

‘Damn it,' cried Ellery, ‘don't be coy with me! You must have written that item, judging by the relative times involved,
before
the actual kidnapping!' Paula said nothing. ‘How did you know they were
going
to be kidnapped?'

Paula sighed. ‘You know, Mr. Queen, you're a fascinating creature, but what makes you think you've the right to speak to me in that tone of voice?'

‘Oh, my God. Paula, can't you see the spot you're in? Where'd you get that information?'

‘I'll give you the same answer,' replied Paula coldly, ‘that I gave Inspector Glücke. And that is – none of your business.'

‘You've
got
to tell me. I won't tell Glücke. But I must know.'

‘I think,' said Paula, rising, ‘that will be all, Mr. Queen.'

‘Oh, no, it won't! You're going to tell me if I have to –'

‘I'm not responsible for the care and feeding of your detective instincts.'

‘Blast my detective instincts. It's you I'm worried about.'

‘Really, Mr. Queen,' cooed Paula.

Ellery scowled. ‘I – I didn't mean to say that.'

‘Oh, but you did.' Paula smiled at him; there was that damned dimple again! ‘Are you
truly
worried about me?'

‘I didn't mean it that way. I meant –'

She burst into laughter suddenly and collapsed in her chair. ‘Oh, this is so funny!' she gasped. ‘The great detective. The giant intellect. The human bloodhound!'

‘What's so funny about what?' asked Ellery stiffly.

‘You thinking I had something to do with those murders!' She dabbed at her eyes with a Batique handkerchief.

Ellery blushed. ‘That's – absurd! I never said anything like that!'

‘But that's what you meant. I don't think so much of your finesse, Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Trying to put it on a personal basis! I ought to be furious with you … I
am
furious with you!' And Ellery, bewildered, saw that she was indeed furious with him.

‘But I assure you –'

‘It's
contemptible.
You overlords, you Mussolinis, you strutting men! You were going to take the poor, psychically ill little newspaperwoman and give her a delightful free ride, weren't you? Make love to her, sweep her off her silly feet, talk dizzy pretty nonsense – dash gallantly into a romantic attack, hoping all the time you'd find out something damning about her!'

‘I should like to point out, in self-defence,' said Ellery with dignity, ‘that my “romantic attack”, as you put it so romantically, was launched long before either Jack Royle or Blythe Stuart was murdered.'

Paula half-turned her shapely back, applying the handkerchief to her eyes, and Ellery saw her shoulders twitch convulsively. Damn him for a clumsy fool! He had made her cry.

He was about to go to her and act terribly sympathetic and powerful, when to his astonishment and chagrin she faced him and he saw that she was laughing.

‘I
am
a fool,' he said shortly, pierced to the soul. And he stalked to the door. Laughing at
him.

She flew past him to set her back against it. ‘Oh, darling, you are,' she choked. ‘No. Don't go yet.'

‘I don't see,' he said, not mollified, but not going, ‘why I should stay.'

‘Because I want you to.'

‘Oh, I
see.
' Not frightfully clever, that remark. What had happened to his celebrated wits? It was bewildering.

‘I'll tell you what,' said Paula, facing him with large, soft eyes. ‘I'll give you something I didn't give that lout Glücke. Now will you stay?'

‘Well …'

‘There! We're friends again.' She took him by the hand and led him back to the sofa. Ellery felt suddenly pleased with himself. Not badly handled, eh? Proved something, didn't it? She liked him. And her hand was so warm and small. She did have tiny hands for a woman of her size. Not that she was so big! Well … she wasn't small. But not fat. Certainly not! He didn't like small women. He had always maintained a man cheated himself when he took to his bosom a small woman; man was entitled to a ‘generous measure of devotion'. Oho, not bad, that! He looked Paula over covertly. Yes, yes, generous was the word. The richness of the cornucopia and the aristocracy of a court sword. Beautiful patrician. Quite the grand lady. Queenly, you might say.

‘Queenly,' he chuckled, pressing her hand ardently.

‘What?' But she did not withdraw her hand.

‘Oh, nothing,' said Ellery modestly. ‘A little pun I just thought of. Queenly … ha, ha! I mean – what were you going to tell me?'

‘You do talk in riddles,' sighed Paula, pulling him down with her. ‘I think that's why I like you. It's so much fun just trying to keep up.'

Ellery wondered what would happen if he let his arm – oh, casually, of course – slip around her shoulders. They did look so strong, and yet womanly; were they soft? Would she flee to the arms of her phobia? Science – yes, the pure spirit of science – made it mandatory to try the experiment.

‘What,' he mumbled, trying the experiment, ‘happened?'

For one delicious instant she endured the reverent pressure of his arm. Her shoulders
were
strong and yet soft: just right, just right. Mr. Queen, in a heat of scientific ardour, squeezed. She jerked away from him like a blooded mare; then she sat still, colouring.

‘I'll tell you just this,' said Paula to her handkerchief, in a voice barely audible. ‘I – ‘ And she stopped and got up and went to the nearby table and took a cigarette from a box.