Death Under the Moonflower, page 22
The young man caught it on his palm, looked at it and said: “I don’t have any change.”
“That’s all right. Keep it.” Christopher Hand got behind the wheel, waved at Bounty with a flourish and the car slid smoothly from the curb.
The young man returned slowly, pitching a dollar at the cracks in the sidewalk and grinning a little. “Thought cartwheels were extinct,” he said to Bounty, who had advanced to meet him. “That fellow must hoard’em, so his pockets will make a noise. And was it welcome! After breakfast, a shave and taxi fare, I was down to three cents and a tax token. Just smoked my last cigarette too. Know where I can buy some around here, Sheriff Peter Bounty?”
“You’re Malcolm Lack.”
“You make that sound like an accusation. But at least you didn’t say ‘John Belton Lack’s nephew.’”
Bounty was getting back as steady and keen an appraisal as he gave. “I wonder,” he said, “if you know how Doctor Lack described his nephew to me?”
“I know exactly. He said I looked like him. He’s been saying that so long that I think he actually believes it. Uncle Johnny may be one of the finest men in the world, but he certainly is the most possessive. For years he’s been trying to tie a nice red ribbon around my neck. I won’t let him. Yet I rather think I love the old fuss-budget. Don’t tell him that, though.” Malcolm Lack cocked an eye at the dollar and slipped it into a pocket. “Don’t tell him about this either. He wouldn’t see the joke and I don’t want to throw him into a conniption lit right at the start. By the way, we haven’t shaken hands yet, Peter Bounty. Shall we—or has Uncle Johnny blackened my character too much?”
Bounty’s thoughts were busy. “And Doctor Cotillion told me that you were pale as your uncle,” he said as their hands met. “But of course he saw you after you’d been ill.”
“Yes, and shaky in the knees, to boot, at the prospect of giving a blood transfusion.”
“And now?”
“Oh, the soul of courage.” Lack stared at the hospital door, the milky suffusion slowly leaving his eyes and with it most of the resemblance to his uncle’s eyes. At the same time a little of the doctor’s incisive nervousness came to the fore. “How is this Norcott boy?” he asked.
“I haven’t heard this morning. It seemed certain last night that he couldn’t live through another day without a transfusion.”
“Where’s Uncle Johnny?”
“At home, ill.”
Lack looked around quickly. “I called his house and got no answer. Is he seriously ill?”
“I don’t think so. When did you call?”
“About eight, just after I got in on the bus.”
“Damn!” Bounty said.
“What’s the matter?”
“Just cussin’ the way things happen. Do they know in the hospital that you’re here?”
“No, I didn’t give my name. I asked the girl at the desk if Doctor Lack was in. She said no, but didn’t volunteer any information. Then I asked for David Angelo but he wasn’t there either. So I thought I’d sit outside and wait awhile.” Lack’s hands went into his coat pockets and came out, their fingers twitching a little. “See here, Mr. Bounty. Why don’t you take me to get some cigarettes and tell me a few things? Or are you supposed to wait on someone?”
“That doesn’t matter now. I’m taking you into custody.”
Lack blinked as if a hand had been fanned past his face. “Things are as bad as that, are they? Well, your custody suits me fine, Mr. Bounty, so long as you let me get some cigarettes.”
“Let’s go then. Where’s your luggage?”
“I checked it at the bus station. Say, I wonder why Beck didn’t meet me? Or why he didn’t answer the phone at Uncle Johnny’s? You know Beck, don’t you? Uncle Johnny’s man.”
They sat together in the coupé but Bounty said before he started the motor: “Did Beck know you were coming?”
“Uncle Johnny did. At least I sent him a telegram last night from Corpus Christi.”
Bounty regarded him sleepily. “What time did you send the telegram?”
“About seven-thirty.”
“Did you tell what bus you were arriving on?”
“Yes.”
“Was anyone you knew at the bus station?”
“No. Of course I don’t know anyone here except Uncle Johnny and Beck and David Angelo. But wait, there was a reporter there looking for me. From the Hesperides Sun, is that it? When I got off the bus he was standing by the steps, calling my name. I answered, thinking he was someone Uncle Johnny had sent. But when he grabbed me and said he wanted to take me to the newspaper office, I thought it was time to call a halt. So I acted bewildered and said there must be some mistake, my name was Black. He cussed and started paging Lack among the other passengers. I skipped.” Lack took off his hat and passed a handkerchief across his forehead. His tow-colored hair was close-cropped and looked as if it had had too much water on it recently. “Let’s get those cigarettes now, Mr. Bounty,” he said with some of his uncle’s sibilance. “And if something has happened to Uncle Johnny, I wish you’d tell me.”
“At last account Doctor Lack was sound asleep,” Bounty said, driving slowly down a broad street which, like all the principal streets there, had a row of palms running down the center, to justify the town’s name. “It’s a case of nervous exhaustion but he’s being well taken care of, and I give you my word, I don’t think there’s anything to worry about. We’ll go see him after a while. But tell me what this reporter looked like.”
“Oh, he was a big tall fellow, looked like a college student. I’ve forgotten what he said his name was.”
“What was he wearing?”
“A white suit, like that mug’s that I carried the gladstone for.”
Just for an instant Bounty’s fixed frown deepened. “All young fellows wear those suits down here,” he said then. “Did he say how he came to know you’d be on that bus?”
“No. Mr. Bounty, you mean that Uncle Johnny didn’t get my telegram?”
“He didn’t get it, Lack,” Bounty said thoughtfully. “But somebody did.”
“And was looking for me.” Lack’s breath came and went quickly.
“We’ll probably find it was only a newspaperman’s game to get a scoop,” Bounty said. “But tell me where and how news of this streptococcus case reached you.”
“I was working my way up from Panama to New Orleans on a fruit boat. I’d intended to hang around New Orleans awhile, then come on down and surprise Uncle Johnny. But when I heard about this case over the radio I managed to transship and landed at Corpus Christi yesterday. I didn’t know till I saw a paper there that Uncle Johnny had charge of the case. I suppose he has messages following me all over everywhere. But then he usually does have.”
“What was the name of your boat?”
“The Moquete. Oh, in case you’re wondering, I had to forfeit most of my wages when I left it. I’m really not a tramp or a remittance man. And neither”—Lack put emphasis on the words—“am I dependent on Uncle Johnny. I’ll get him to cash a check for me here and I’ll be all right.”
“I understand you play variations on your uncle’s name. What was the one you used on the Moquete?”
“Malcolm Lack. My seaman’s papers and passports have to be made out that way. I don’t really use Uncle Johnny’s name scrambled. I just like to tease him by telling him I do.” Lack chuckled as Bounty drew up in front of a drugstore and honked. “Easy come, easy go. I might as well squander this dollar. What can I buy you?”
“Nothing, thanks.”
“Let me.” Lack laid a hand on his shoulder. “Peter Bounty, who named Hesperides but wouldn’t claim the prize. It was Uncle Johnny wrote me those things about you, just after he came down here. But he was merely quoting Beck.”
“Bring me a candy bar,” Bounty said to the curb-service boy. “A big one, with lots of chocolate and nuts.”
“And five packages of Camels. Uncle Johnny will try to make me quit smoking,” Malcolm Lack told Bounty, “so I want to enjoy my last moments of freedom.”
“You were with your uncle before he came to Hesperides?”
“Yes. What home I’ve had since my parents died has been with Uncle Johnny. I usually drop in on him, stay until I feel freckles breaking out on me, then move on. He sent me to Chicago from Boston this spring, to give a blood transfusion. Otherwise I suppose I’d have come on down here with him. But once I got out from under his wing I decided I’d like to see the West Coast again. I went out to Frisco and then on down to Panama.”
“You had your own bout with streptococcus in Boston?”
“Yes, I got it while I was up in Maine. But of course I went right down and put myself in Uncle Johnny’s hands. My case wasn’t very serious. I had to have only one transfusion. Uncle Johnny located a donor for me out in Washington and I got all right.”
“Remember that donor’s name?”
“Miles, I think. An anthropologist. I didn’t see much of him. He flew right back to the coast. I wonder if Uncle Johnny has been in touch with him again?”
“I couldn’t say.”
Malcolm Lack took his purchases from the boy. “Keep the change,” he mimicked Christopher Hand as he gave him the dollar. “That was once Uncle Johnny almost succeeded in hobbling me,” he said, tearing open a package of cigarettes. “I hadn’t realized how much he cared about me and how lonesome he was. He stayed with me day and night, doing most of the nursing himself. After that, I couldn’t just up and leave him. He was all fired up about this Hesperides move and, as I said, I’d probably have come with him if it hadn’t been for that Chicago case.”
Bounty had made no move to start the car. “Did you know these donors, Winters and Hieronymus?” he asked, munching candy.
Lack blew smoke through his nose. “I couldn’t say I knew them.”
“But you met them?”
“Yes. This reflects credit on Uncle Johnny rather than on me, so I’ll tell you. When I left he told me what he knew about Doctor Cotillion. He was a hard-working, brilliant man who’d gained professional recognition by his research but not much financial return. He had to teach at this little college outside Chicago and grind out textbooks when he ought to be free to do original work. Uncle Johnny gave me a big check and said I was to help him. That’s Uncle Johnny’s way, bless him. You know how generous he is.”
Bounty’s mouth was full and he made no comment.
“I didn’t see much of Doctor Cotillion,” Lack went on. “But I knew he wouldn’t want any doctor with a private income sticking a check at him. So I decided to lend a helping hand in another direction, on my own account. I’d got out of my streptococcus ordeal cheaply. This Seattle donor wouldn’t accept any compensation, just his expenses. So I figured I’d look up Doctor Cotillion’s donors. If he hadn’t taken care of their expenses yet, I’d do so on the q.t. They were leaving the hospital the morning I was there. Maybe I wasn’t very diplomatic in inquiring about their financial condition because as soon as they learned who I was they acted suspicious or sarcastic or something. I decided they could go to hell. I suppose they thought I was the rich playboy who let them give their blood and then barged in when it was safe to do some strutting.”
“I imagine they saw you putting a kink in their plan,” Bounty said and went on to tell of the extortion game which had been played once with good results and which he believed was to have been played again in Las Palmas with better. He watched Malcolm Lack as he talked and saw the cold gleam of John Belton Lack’s eyes come for an instant into these gray-blue ones.
“They got what was coming to them,” Lack said. “Though it’d been tough on the Norcott boy if I hadn’t got here when I did. I wish you’d tell me more, Mr. Bounty. There won’t be any use asking Uncle Johnny for particulars of what’s happening. He wouldn’t know it if there was a hurricane. I’d like to be here when the first one hits. I can see Beck entering and saying, ‘Sir’”—he mimicked the valet’s tone so perfectly that Bounty winced—“‘a hurricane is raging without.’ Up will jump Uncle Johnny and go out and order it to stop. Like King Somebody-or-other and the waves.”
“Beck died last night, Lack.”
“God!” The young man’s cigarette fell to his lap and there was the stench of scorched cloth in the air before he snatched it up and tossed it out the window. In the eyes which he turned to Bounty scarcely any blue was discernible in the milk. “Beck!” He gave it a reverence which he hadn’t given the name of the Deity. “So that’s what’s the matter with Uncle Johnny! I’ve got to see him.”
“Let me tell you what happened first,” Bounty said, glancing into the mirror and starting the car.
It’s no great distance from that drugstore to the telegraph office on the main street of Las Palmas, but they were some time on the way, for Bounty wasn’t so occupied with his narrative that he didn’t observe an excess of caution.
He did tell, with few reservations, what had happened. Malcolm Lack smoked avidly, inhaling deeply and blowing the smoke through his nostrils. He stared ahead and his face aged steadily.
“Beck committed suicide, I’m sure,” Bounty said. “I didn’t begin to realize the seriousness of the situation until he asked me for my gun. I didn’t know how much of Angelo’s spiel to believe, but his statement about Beck’s previous act did ring true. And when I found Beck had taken a knife from the examining room while I was outside, but tried to get my gun as a surer method probably, I knew I had to do something. I didn’t take time to explain to the undersheriff. For one reason, I thought he’d keep a closer watch over Beck if he thought the man was arrested on suspicion of murder. My idea was that if I kept him under guard until Doctor Lack was himself again I could patch things up between them. Or get Beck another job, another interest in life. That’s really what I had in mind.”
“Don’t blame yourself, Mr. Bounty. You couldn’t have done anything with Beck. He’d come to the end of another existence, as I’ll make you see later. You wouldn’t have been able to stop him from going out in one way or another. Maybe this was best. There’s just one thing I wish we could do for Beck now,” Malcolm Lack said in a hard voice as Bounty parked in front of the telegraph office and was preparing to get out. “One thing I wish we could save him from.”
“What’s that?”
“There’ll be an autopsy, I suppose, performed by David Angelo?”
“Not by Angelo, I’m ready to promise.”
“Good. I couldn’t bear to think of him—cutting on Beck.”
“Don’t talk about that, please,” Bounty said and fled.
While he transacted his business inside he kept an eye on the car. He saw Malcolm Lack wipe his eyes and blow his nose before lighting another cigarette. He saw Lack pick something from the cushioned seat behind the wheel, hold it between his fingers and stare at it before he flicked it away.
Not during his waking hours of the last thirty-six had the sheriff’s face been so sleepily inexpressive as when he re-crossed the pavement. For the first time he was ready to acknowledge that this case was more than he and his office could handle.
“Extra! Extra!” newsboys were screaming down the Street in the vicinity of Yznaga Park.
“You and I have got to do some talking, Lack,” Bounty said as he slid behind the wheel. “I’m taking you home with me.”
“Who’s there?”
“No one. Except my cat. My housekeeper is off having another grandchild.”
“Your men in the habit of dropping in on you?”
“They’re busy.”
“I wonder if you’re as sure as you seem to be,” Lack said with his eyes on Bounty’s face, “that that poison was intended for those blood donors?”
“I’m sure enough.”
“Of course you don’t have a man on your force who’d like to step into your shoes?”
“Nary a one.”
“I don’t seem to have much to say about going,” Lack observed dryly as Bounty was driving away.
“For a fact you don’t,” Bounty said. “How did you address your telegram?”
“Just John Belton Lack, Las Palmas.”
Bounty nodded. “Our hospital is known as the John Belton Lack. A telegram was delivered there about eight-thirty last night and signed for by Angelo. I didn’t get to see a copy of it, but my guess is that it was yours.”
A sideways glance told him Lack was frowning and had stopped in the act of putting his cigarette to his lips. “I can’t see why Angelo didn’t tell Uncle Johnny,” Lack said.
“Can’t you?”
“Why, no. He’s always been a troublemaker, of course.”
Bounty told him something of Angelo’s actions the night before and of Beck’s theory of murder to provide a misleading motive for contemplated murder.
Lack shook his head slowly and none too decidedly. “All Beck told you about Angelo was true,” he said. “I can see now why he wouldn’t want Uncle Johnny to know I was coming till he got himself established in the house. Though at that, I’d have sent him packing in no time. But I think Beck’s imagination was running away with him when it concocted any such scheme for Angelo. The man’s subtle enough, of course. And if he ever killed anybody it would be with poison. But … Oh, I don’t know, I don’t know.” The tanned and nicotine-stained fingers twitched as Lack lighted another cigarette from the butt of his last.
Bounty had slowed down the car and signaled to a newsboy. He reached into a pocket and brought out a nickel. “Oh, say, Mr. Bounty,” Lack said quickly. “That doesn’t happen to be the nickel, does it, that Beck had last night?”
“No, I don’t think anybody picked that up from the floor.”
“I want to get that nickel. Uncle Johnny is going to carry it for the rest of his life. A sort of albatross.”
Bounty made his purchase and glanced at the headlines: SECOND NORCOTT BLOOD DONOR MURDERED. A “reign of terror” was proclaimed, of course, and in smaller type he saw: POISON CLAIMS ADDITIONAL VICTIM BY ACCIDENT.
