The Four of Hearts (22 page)

‘Why shouldn't he give up his whole plan?'

‘Because,' said Ellery grimly, ‘he's already killed two people in pursuance of his objective. Because we'll give him another opportunity he can't pass up. Because he's desperate, and coldblooded, and his motive – to him – is overwhelming.'

‘Motive? What motive? I thought he was crazy.'

‘Yes, what motive?' asked Bonnie tensely. ‘Nobody could possibly have a reason for killing me.'

‘Obviously someone has, as this last message indicates. Let's not go down by-roads now. The big point is: Are you game to try?'

Bonnie laid her head on Ty's shoulder. Ty twisted his head to look down at her. She smiled back at him faintly.

‘All right, Queen,' said Ty. ‘Let's go.'

‘Good! Then we've got to understand this clearly, all four of us. You, too, Glücke. You'll have an important job.

‘We'll let Sam Vix's plans for the wedding stand; in fact, we'll use them. As it's turned out, that studio mix-up just now was a break for us; it happened naturally, and that's what we need most – natural events arousing no possible suspicion on the part of … let's continue to call him Egbert.

‘All right. We can depend on Sam to ring the welkin tonight; there will be plenty of ballyhoo between now and tomorrow afternoon. We make it clear that you two are to be married in the plane; we make it even clearer – this is vital – that you two are leaving for an unannounced destination, for an indefinite stay. That no one, not even the studio, will know where you're going or when you're coming back. That you're sick and tired of it all, and want to be alone, to chuck Hollywood and all its sorrows for a while. If possible you must tell that to the press … convincingly.'

‘The way I feel,' grinned Ty, ‘don't worry about that.'

‘Now what does Egbert do? He's got to murder Bonnie – yes, and after the wedding you, too, Ty – before you slip out of his grasp. How is he going to do it? Not by poisoning food or drink, as in the case of Jack and Blythe; he'll realize that, with the manner of their deaths so fresh in your minds, you just won't touch untested gifts of food or drink. So he'll have to plan a more direct assault; that's inevitable. The most direct is a gun.'

‘But –' began the Inspector, frowning.

‘Let me finish. To shoot and get away safely, he can't attack on the field; even if he succeeded in taking two accurate potshots from the crowd, he'd never live to leave the field. So,' snapped Ellery, ‘he'll have only one course to follow. In order to make sure of a successful double murder and a successful getaway,
he'll have to get into that plane with you.'

‘Oh … I see,' said Bonnie in a small voice. Then she set her smooth jaw.

‘I get it, I get it,' mumbled Glücke.

‘Moreover, since we know he'll try to get into that plane, we also know how. He can get in, reasonably, only as
the pilot.'

‘The way he did it in the case of Jack and Blythe!' exclaimed the Inspector.

‘Since we're reasonably certain he'll take the opportunity if he's given the opportunity, all we have to do is give it to him. So we engage a professional aviator. That's part of our announcement. We see to it that the pilot isn't under surveillance, we permit Egbert to decoy the pilot into a dark corner, to incapacitate him – I don't believe he'll be in serious danger, but we can take steps to keep it down to a minimum – and we permit Egbert to take the pilot's place in the plane.'

‘Why a pilot at all? I run my own ship. Won't that sound phoney?' asked Ty.

‘No, because you're taking a pilot in order to have him drop you off somewhere to make connexions with a train or a boat – not even the pilot, we'll announce, will know where he's going until after the take-off. So of course you'll need a pilot, ostensibly, to bring the plane back after he dumps you. That's all right. At any rate, friend Egbert will hop into the plane and take off, secure in the feeling that he's left no trail and will be able to commit his crime in mid-air.'

‘Wait a minute,' said Glücke. ‘I like your scheme, but it means putting these two youngsters in a plane with a dangerous criminal, alone except for some fool of a minister who'll probably only make things worse.'

‘This minister won't.'

‘Erminius is an old woman.'

‘But it won't be Erminius. It will be someone who just looks like Erminius,' said Ellery calmly.

‘Who?'

‘Your obedient servant. Erminius has a beautiful set of black whiskers, which makes him a cinch to impersonate. Besides, Egbert won't be paying much attention to the preacher, I can promise you that. He'll be too intent on getting that plane off the ground unsuspected. Anyway Ty and I will both be armed. At the first sign of trouble, we shoot.'

‘Shoot,' repeated Bonnie, licking her lips and trying to look brave.

‘We'll subdue him if we can, but we must give him the opportunity to show his hand. And
that
can be brought out in court.'

‘Hell,' protested the Inspector, ‘you ought to know even catching the guy in an attempted homicide won't pin the murders of Jack and Blythe on him.'

‘I rather think it won't make any difference. I think that, once caught, our friend will collapse like a straw man and tell all. If the stunt works, sheer surprise at finding himself trapped at a moment when he thought his plans were about to be consummated will put him off guard. At any rate, it's our only chance to catch him at all.'

There was a little uncomfortable interval, and then Glücke said: ‘It sounds screwy as the devil, but it might work, it might work. What do you say, you two?'

‘I say yes,' said Bonnie quickly, as if she were afraid that if she hesitated she might not say yes at all. ‘What do
you
say, darling?'

And Ty kissed her and said, ‘I love you, Pug Nose.' Then he said to Ellery in an altogether different tone of voice: ‘But if anything goes wrong, Queen, I swear I'll strangle you with my bare hands. If it's the last thing I do.'

‘It probably will be,' muttered Ellery. ‘Because Egbert's plan will undoubtedly be to stage a second St Valentine's Day massacre in that plane with his popgun and then bail out leaving the plane to crash in the desert somewhere.'

CHAPTER 20

CASTLE IN THE AIR

Time, which had been floating by, suddenly took on weight and speed. Ellery kept looking at his wrist watch in despair as he went into the details of his plan, instructing Ty and Bonnie over and over in their roles.

‘Remember, Ty, you'll have to handle all the arrangements; Glücke and I can't possibly appear in this. In fact, we'll stay as far away from you as we can until tomorrow. Have you a gun?'

‘No.'

‘Glücke, give him yours.' The Inspector handed his automatic over to Ty, who examined it expertly and dropped it into his jacket pocket. ‘Now what's your story to the press?'

‘Bonnie has received a warning to break our engagement, but we both agree it's the work of some crank and intend to be married at once. I show the cards.'

‘Right. Not a word about our real plans to anyone. In a half-hour call Erminius and engage him to perform the ceremony, Bonnie.'

Bonnie peeped out from the cradle of Ty's arms.

‘You're all right?'

‘I'm feeling fine,' said Bonnie.

‘Good girl! Now do a little of that acting Butch pays you for. You're happy – just the proper combination of happiness and grief. You're marrying Ty because you love him, and you also know that Blythe and Jack must be happy somewhere knowing what you're about to do. The feud is over, never to be resurrected. You've got all that?'

‘Yes,' said Bonnie in a shaky little voice.

‘By George, I feel like a director!' Ellery grinned with a confidence he did not feel and stuck his hand out to Ty. ‘Good luck. By this time tomorrow night the nightmare will be over.'

‘Don't worry about us, Queen,' said Ty, shaking hands soberly. ‘We'll come through. Only – get into that plane!'

Glücke said abruptly: ‘Stay here. Send for your duds, Ty. Don't leave this house. It's surrounded right now, but I'll send two men in here to watch from a hiding-place – just in case. Don't do anything foolish, like those heroes you play in the movies. At the first suspicion of trouble, yell like the devil.'

‘I'll take care of that part of it,' said Bonnie with a grimace; then she tried to smile, and they shook hands all round, and Ellery and the Inspector slipped out by the back way.

The next twelve hours were mad on the surface and madder underneath. The necessity for boring from within was a bother; Ellery was constantly answering telephone calls in his hotel apartment and giving cautious instructions. He could only pray that Ty and Bonnie were carrying off their end successfully.

The first assayable results came booming in via radio late that night. Towards the end of an expensive Saturday-night programme a studio announcer interrupted with the detailed news of the projected wedding. Apparently Sam Vix had sailed into his assignment with his customary energy. Within two hours four of the largest radio stations on the Pacific Coast had broadcast the announcement of the Sunday aeroplane wedding of Tyler Royle and Bonnie Stuart. A famous female studio commentator climbed panting on the air to give the palpitating public the intimate details of the plan, as transmitted directly from the mouths of the lovers themselves. The interview, reported this lady, had been too, too sweet. Somebody, she said sternly, had had the bad taste to ‘warn' Bonnie against marriage. This was, it seemed, a frank and brutal case of
lèse majesté.
Those two, poor, sorrowing children! panted the lady. She hoped every friend Ty and Bonnie had within driving distance of Griffith Park airport would be on hand Sunday to show Ty and Bonnie what the
world
thought of their coming union.

The newspapers erupted with the news late Saturday night, chasing a scarehead concerning the Japanese war in China off the front page.

And so on, interminably, far into the night.

Ellery and the Inspector met secretly at Police Headquarters at two o'clock in the morning to discuss developments. So far, so good. Dr. Erminius had been duly, and unsuspectingly, engaged to perform the unique ceremony. Dr. Erminius was delighted, it appeared, at this heaven-sent opportunity to join two fresh young souls in holy wedlock with God's pure ether as a background, although he fervently prayed to the Lord that there would be no repetition of the ghastly aftermath of the first Royle-Stuart wedding at which he had officiated.

The pilot had also been engaged; he had been selected without his knowledge more for his character than for his skill as an aviator. He was known to have a healthy respect for firearms.

In his office at Headquarters Glücke had several photographs of the eminent divine ready for Ellery, who came down with a make-up box stolen from one of the Magna dressing-rooms; and the two men spent several anxious hours making Ellery up and comparing him with Dr. Erminius's photographs. They agreed finally that a bundling, muffling overcoat with a beaver collar, such as Dr. Erminius affected in brisk weather, would help; and parted with plans to meet early in the morning.

Ellery returned to Hollywood, snatched three hours of uneasy sleep, and at eight Sunday morning met the Inspector and two detectives outside Dr. Erminius's expensive house in Inglewood. They went in; and when they came out they were minus the two detectives and richer by a fur-collared coat. The good man howled ungodly imprecations from within.

Several telephone calls, a final check-up … Ellery crossed his fingers. ‘Nothing more for us to do,' he sighed. ‘Well, so long, Glücke. See you in the Troc or in hell.'

At noon Sunday the parking spaces about the Griffith Park airport were almost filled. At one o'clock there was a jam over which a hundred policemen sweated and cursed. At one-fifteen all cars were halted at the intersection of Los Feliz and Griffith Park Boulevards and detoured; and at one-thirty it seemed as if every automobile-owner in the State of California had come to see Ty and Bonnie married.

Ty's red-and-gold plane stood in a cleared area considerably larger than the area in which it had stood a week before. But the jam threatened to burst the ropes on the field, and the police heaved against them, shouting. When Dr. Erminius's royal-blue limousine rolled on to the field under motor cycle escort and the good dominie descended, complete with shiny black whiskers and beaver-collared coat, muffled to the ears – the doctor had a bad cold, it appeared – a cheer shook the heavens. And when Ty and Bonnie arrived, pale but smiling, the din frightened a flock of pigeons into swooping for cover.

Cameras were levelled, reporters yelled themselves hoarse, and Ty and Bonnie and Dr. Erminius were photographed from every conceivable angle and in every position commensurate with the moral tone of the family newspaper.

Meanwhile, the pilot who had been engaged, very natty in his flying suit, received a puzzling message and wandered off to the empty hangar in which only a week before Ty and Bonnie had been held up. He went into the hangar and looked about.

‘Who wants me?' he called.

Echo answered; but answer also materialized, and the man's jaw dropped as a bulky, shapeless figure in flying togs, wearing a face-concealing pair of goggles and a helmet, stepped from behind a tarpaulined aeroplane and levelled a revolver at the pilot's chest.

‘Huh?' gasped the pilot, elevating his arms.

The revolver waved an imperious order. The pilot stumbled forward, fascinated. The butt described a short, gentle arc and the pilot crumpled to the floor, no longer interested in the proceedings.

And from a rent in the tarpaulin, behind which he had been suffocating for two hours, Inspector Glücke, automatic in hand, watched the pilot fall, watched the bundled figure stoop over the man and drag him into a corner. The Inspector did not so much as stir a finger; the tap had been gentle, and interference just then would have been disastrous to the plan.

Because of his position, Glücke could see only the inert body. He did see a pair of hands begin to undress the pilot, divesting him of his outer clothing. It struck Glücke suddenly that the two flying-suits were of different cut; of course, little Egbert would have to put on his victim's suit and helmet and goggles.

It was all over in two minutes. Glücke saw the flying-suit of the attacker flung down on the unconscious pilot, then the helmet, the goggles; and the quick disappearance of the pilot's rig.

Then the attacker appeared again, dressed as the pilot, goggled and unrecognizable; he appeared stooping over the motionless figure. He began to bind and gag the pilot. Still the Inspector did not move.

The attacker pushed his bound victim under the very tarpaulin behind which Glücke crouched, pocketed the revolver, and with a certain grim jauntiness strode out of the hangar.

Glücke moved then, quickly. He clambered out of the covered ship, made a low warning sound, and three plain-clothes men stepped out of steel lockers. Leaving the unconscious man in their hands, he ducked out of the hangar by a rear door and strolled around the building to merge briefly with the crowd. Then he sauntered casually up to the group of shouting, gesticulating people around the red-and-gold plane.

The ‘pilot' was busily engaged in picking up the tumbled luggage and depositing it, piece by piece, in the plane. No one paid any attention to him. Finally he climbed into the plane and a moment later the propeller turned over and began to spin with a roar.

He looked out of the window and waved his arm impatiently.

The Reverend Dr. Erminius looked startled. But he caught the eye of Inspector Glücke, who nodded, and heaved a relieved sigh.

‘All set,' he said in Ty's ear.

‘What?' yelled Ty above the roar of the motor.

Dr. Erminius gave him a significant look. Bonnie caught it, too, and closed her eyes for a second; and then she smiled, and waved, and Ty, looking rather grim, picked her slender figure up in his arms and carried her into the plane to the howling approval of the mob. The Reverend Dr. Erminius followed more sedately. The pilot came out of his cubicle, shut the door securely, went back to his cubicle; the police and field attendants cleared the runway; and finally the signal came, and the red-and-gold plane began slowly to taxi down the field, picking up speed … its tail lifting, its wings gripping the air. And then it left the solid ground and soared into the blue, and they were alone with their destiny.

Afterwards, in recollection, it all seemed to have happened quickly. But at the time there was an interminable interval, during which the thousands on the field below grew smaller and smaller as the plane circled the field, and finally became only animated dots, and the hangars and administration buildings looked like toys, and the runway, the crowd released, suddenly took on the appearance of a grey patch overrun with bees.

Bonnie kept looking out of the window as Ty adjusted the speaking tube to her head, and put one on himself, and gave one to Dr. Erminius. Bonnie was trying to look gay, waving idiotically at the mobs below, steadfastly keeping her eyes averted from the cubicle in which the pilot sat quietly at the controls.

Ty's arms were tightly about her, and his right hand gripped the automatic in his pocket. And his eyes never left the back of the pilot's helmeted head.

As for the Reverend Dr. Erminius, that worthy beamed on the earth and on the sky, and fumbled with the Word of God, obviously preparing to preside over the coming union of two young, untried souls.

And the plane began imperceptibly to nose towards the northeast, where the desert lay, levelling off at eight thousand feet and throbbing steadily.

‘I believe,' announced Dr. Erminius solemnly, and at his words the bees being left behind stopped swarming and froze to the ground as the amplifiers on the field caught his voice, ‘that the time has come to join you children in the ineffable bliss of matrimony.'

‘Yes, Doctor,' said Bonnie in a low voice. ‘I'm ready.' And she turned round, and gulped, and the gulp was audible as a hollow thunder below. She rose to stand at Ty's knee and clutch his shoulder. Ty rose quickly then, placing her behind him. His right hand was still in his pocket.

‘Oh, pilot,' called Dr. Erminius over the mutter of the motor.

The pilot turned his goggled head in inquiry.

‘You have automatic controls there, have you not?'

Ty answered in a flat voice: ‘Yes, Doctor. This is my plane, you know. The Sperry automatic pilot.'

‘Ah. Then if you will come back here, pilot, after locking the controls you may act as the witness to this ceremony. It will be more comfortable than crowding about your cockpit, or whatever it is called.'

The pilot nodded and they saw him adjust something on the complex control-board in front of him. He spent a full minute there, his back to them; and none of them spoke.

Then he got out of his seat, and turned, and stooped, and came into the body of the plane with a swift lurch of his bulky body, looking like a hunchback with the protuberance of the unopened parachute between his shoulder-blades. The Reverend Dr. Erminius had his book open and ready, and he was beaming on Ty and Bonnie. Ty's hand was still in his pocket, Bonnie was by his side and yet somehow a little behind him, sheltered by his body and the body of the beaming preacher.

And the preacher said: ‘Let us begin. Bless my soul, we're leaving the field! Weren't we supposed –'

The pilot's hand darted into his pocket and emerged with a snub-nosed automatic, and he brought his hand up very swiftly, his finger tightening on the trigger as the muzzle came up to aim directly at Bonnie's heart.

At the same moment there was a flash of fire from Ty's right pocket, and a flash of fire as if miraculously from the pages of the Good Book in the no longer beaming dominie's hands; and the pilot coughed and lurched forward, dropping the snub-nosed automatic from a gloved hand which suddenly spouted blood.

Bonnie screamed, once, and fell back; and Ty and Dr. Erminius pounced on the swaying figure.

The pilot lashed out, catching Ty with his good fist on the jaw and sending him staggering back against Bonnie. Dr. Erminius snarled and fell on the cursing man. The two stumbled to the floor of the plane, pummelling each other.