THE EVENING PAPER WAS TOSSED UPON THE driveway by the middle-aged newsboy in a bright red convertible with a raucous radio. On the front page was a photograph stolen by an enterprising reporter. The snapshot, enlarged and framed in silver, had been taken in Jamaica during the honeymoon. Both Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher Strode wore jaunty tennis shorts. On the third page there was a two-column reproduction of an advertisement posed by Elaine before her marriage. In a chiffon nightgown and with outstretched arms, head thrown back, smile radiant, she demonstrated a girl’s ecstasy at having found a deodorant that guaranteed underarm daintiness. A smaller photograph showed the “one-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar death mansion” for which Fletcher had paid eighty-five thousand dollars.
Cindy said she thought it was awful, people’s lives being exposed in that vulgar fashion. “Just listen to this, ‘The beautiful blond daughter, New York debutante, here for a holiday with her lawyer husband . . .’ Isn’t it too silly?”
“You might just possibly have suggested it,” remarked Elaine.
Don laughed. Cindy’s mouth twisted. She went on reading the paper, aggressively rustling pages and reading aloud those passages which were most flattering to herself or most embarrassing to Elaine.
Elaine escaped to the garden. She was very nervous. The birds in the branches twittered restlessly. At this hour of the twilight— no matter how noisily they sang at night— they were quiet. Usually Elaine was not disturbed by natural sounds. This evening she felt positively ill with drowsiness. Fatigue lay upon her like a smothering weight. She had been neither able to sleep nor to arouse herself. Twice she had made coffee, twice let it grow cold in the cup. Once more the desert wind had conquered sea breezes and fog. There had been a three-day surcease and now the heat was upon them again. How Fletcher would have suffered! She felt now that she must find and comfort him.
Voices pursued her. Don and Cindy came out in bathing suits. “Do you think it’s heartless of us?” Cindy asked. “But we’ve simply got to cool off.”
She stood at the edge of the pool, but did not go in. Don dived with an enormous splash. Cindy shuddered away from the pool. “Come in, beauties, it’s marvelous.”
Elaine said she was too tired and returned to the house. She was afraid of what she might say if she remained in their nervous company. The scent of jasmine was too sweet, the fallen blossoms of red oleander like blood upon the grass. She had begun to hate her garden.
Cindy watched her go. She was tense and strung up, too. Since Nan had gone, Cindy had been flitting about like a moth under a lampshade. Don had asked about the important matter she had wanted to confide before her friend arrived. This had sent her into a twitter so that she could not keep her mind on any one thing. Don had thought a dip in the pool might soothe her.
“Aren’t you coming in?” he called.
“I’m not in the mood.” She looked over her left and right shoulders to be sure there were no more reporters waiting in the garden. The short twilight ended abruptly. Lights flashed frequently, for traffic had become heavy on the hill. Motorists came to gape at the death mansion, but were urged to keep moving by the two policemen in the car at the curb.
Don climbed out of the pool, shook himself like a terrier, and dried his face on his bathrobe.
“What’s it all about? Tell me and get it over with.”
Cindy ran ahead to the pavilion, looked about again, and drew a chair to the center. “You needn’t be so cross. I’m terribly upset.” Nan had emptied her cigarette case so that Cindy wouldn’t be left stranded. Cindy lit one and held the burning match until it scorched her fingers.
The match dropped, flaming, to the floor. Don sprang to stamp it out, but remembered that he was barefoot and pulled away. “For God’s sake, you could start a fire.” He looked down for something to press down upon the flame, but there were no small objects about. All the ashtrays had been removed. Perhaps on Monday, when their lives were normal, Elaine had taken them to the kitchen to be washed; perhaps the police had “borrowed” them for examination in the laboratory. Every detail had significance.
The small flame flickered out. Don walked to the rail and looked down at the rows of asters and marigolds, remembered what he had read in Fletcher’s diary about the poisons used in the garden.
“What happens to the people who hide things from the police?”
“Huh?”
“It’s supposed to be a crime or something, isn’t it?”
“What do you want to know for? Did you hide something?”
She was so slow about answering that Don had to snap at her again about dropping ashes on the dry wood. “We’ve had enough around here without a fire, too.”
“If you’re going to be nasty, I won’t tell you.” She joined him at the rail, flicked ashes into the flower bed.
“Concealing evidence in a criminal case makes a person an accessory after the fact. Have you concealed something?”
The cigarette was pressed out viciously against the wooden rail. She dropped the stub into the flower bed as slyly as if it were evidence of crime. “A plastic bag. The kind that comes over clothes from the cleaner’s.”
“Plastic bag? Where was it?”
Don touched her hand and Cindy shuddered away. She had neither the talent nor training for secrets. A child of the permissively bred generation to whom lies were unnecessary, she stated facts and feelings flatly and with little concern for effect. Her falsehoods had concerned clothing prices which she had inflated to improve her position with girlfriends. Otherwise she had always practiced easy honesty. Since Tuesday morning she had suffered a secret.
“On him. Daddy.”
Don drummed on the rail. To Cindy it seemed that years passed while he stood there tapping his fingers and looking out at nothing. “Aren’t you surprised?”
“You found the bag on your father?” His tone was measured.
“Yes. It was under that thing,” she touched the base of her neck, “he breathed through.”
“The bib?”
She nodded.
“Then it wasn’t an accident,” Don said. “And you pulled it off?”
“I didn’t want people thinking Daddy committed suicide.”
“For Christ’s sake!”
“I couldn’t bear it. People thinking . . . I mean . . . a girl at school, Martha Ann Lee, her name was, her father . . .” Confession felt like vomit rising. “It was terrible. All the girls whispered and we couldn’t look at her without thinking. I mean . . . she had to leave school . . . Martha Ann Lee. The whole family was disgraced. I didn’t want people thinking . . .” The taste of nausea filled her mouth. She couldn’t go on.
“You little fool.” Don’s anger attacked her like a weapon. “Suicide’s no disgrace.”
“But it was. One day we met Martha Ann on the street. Nan and I. We couldn’t forget. What could we say to her? People remember for the rest of your life.”
“Front-page headlines are a hell of a lot worse than whispers.”
She fought back sickness. “I never thought . . . the police and all that stuff. I mean . . . it could have been a heart attack if the people didn’t know.”
“Just when did that thought occur to you?”
“You needn’t be so mean. People do die of heart attacks all the time at this age.”
“Is that all there was to it? You didn’t want it to look like suicide?”
“Suicide is the coward’s way out. I was thinking of Daddy’s reputation. How did I know there’d be all that fuss? Besides, Donnie, there’s the insurance. A hundred thousand dollars, I told you the other day. And I thought of my mother’s insurance, too.”
“Did you think that they wouldn’t pay if it was suicide?”
“They don’t. Didn’t you know that? I was thinking of you too, darling.” She appealed like a child asking forgiveness of a father, and since she no longer had a father, elevating Don to that place. “We can’t afford to lose all that money.”
Don explained that she was mistaken about the insurance. Perhaps Martha Ann Lee’s family had not received the benefits, but the father might have taken out the insurance just before he died. Fletcher Strode had been insured for many years, since before Cindy was born; at the time of the divorce he had increased his insurance for the protection of the child and his first wife. It was unlikely that after so many years the benefits would not be paid; unlikely, too, that Fletcher Strode’s policies contained the suicide clause.
“How would I know that? I always heard they wouldn’t pay a nickel if a person committed suicide. Was it so terribly wrong?”
“Not only wrong, criminal. It could get you into a hell of a lot of trouble.”
“Oh, no!”
“It’s a crime to conceal evidence. You could go to jail for it.”
The sickness returned. Cindy raced to the edge of the pavilion and vomited into a bed of marigolds. Don came after her. “Take it easy,” he said and led her to the long chair. She was as chilled and damp as if she had been fished out of the pool, as tremulous as if she had been rescued from death by drowning. Don offered to her a drink of water, some brandy or hot tea, but she refuted everything except a cigarette, which she reached for with such agitation that she grabbed at the air.
“Do we have to tell them?”
“It’d certainly change the case. I don’t think Sergeant Knight would welcome the information.”
“Why not?” Cindy breathed more easily.
“It’s big opportunity for him. He can get a lot of publicity out of a murder case, make himself a big man. How do you think he’s going to take it if his murder turns out to be an ordinary suicide?”
“You see!” cried Cindy, who saw this reasoning as vindication.
“On the other hand, what does it prove? Only that there was a plastic bag and that it caused death by suffocation. He might well have done it himself.”
“Why do you keep saying that? Do you know anything special?” She dropped her burning cigarette onto dry wood.
Don did not notice. He had become the defense attorney, finding arguments to protect the client. “You might have saved your father’s life by pulling off that bag. You’d had no experience with death. How did you know when you came into the room that he wasn’t alive?”
“You’re right. That’s what I thought,” she cried eagerly. “That’s why I did it. Honestly, Don.”
As defense attorney he felt it his duty to be objective considering the case from all angles. “It was a bit late for that.”
“How did I know? You just said, Don, that I didn’t have any experience with death. You make me feel that I did something terrible.”
“You did something foolish. If you’d confessed to the detectives right away, your action wouldn’t be questioned.” It was necessary for the attorney to let the bewildered client know both the hazards and the hopeful aspects of the case. “The bag might be significant as evidence if it could be produced without incriminating you.”
“Can’t you do something to fix it up? You’re a lawyer.”
“Where is the bag? What did you do with it?”
“It’s in my closet. Over my beige organza.” She dared a small chuckle. “At first I hid it on the floor behind our bags, but when those detectives started snooping around, I hung it over my dress. What could be more natural? A light dress like that ought to be kept covered. One of those men,” she said almost gaily, “looked straight at it. He opened my closet door and there it was, over my dress.”
“They came into our room?”
“Just for a couple minutes. Looked around without much interest. Of course there was nothing to suspect us of.”
“Of course not.”
“There was the bag right over my dress. I don’t have to tell them about it, do I?”
“You’re not to mention it to anyone. Let me think about it.”
“I had to tell you. I couldn’t hold it in any longer.”
“If I thought it’d help, I’d advise you to let Knight know right away. But,” The pause was calculated, “Speaking as your lawyer, I want to give you this advice. Don’t breathe this to anyone unless I advise it.”
“Suppose they find it?”
“It’s just as you said dear, a plastic bag over a party dress is the most usual thing in the world.” A second and more ponderous pause was aimed at intimidation. “Is there anything else you think you ought to tell me?”
“Why . . . why should there be?”
“I’m asking.”
They went into the house. In their bedroom the sudden glare of electric light caused embarrassment, strangely, for they had lived together for almost a year. Cindy became as modest as if the sight of her body would expose something she wished to hide. Don went into the bathroom to take off his bathing trunks. He came out in pajamas. Cindy had put on a long, opaque nightgown. They faced each other warily.
“You know what I think, Donnie?”
Don was far off, in the courtroom, hearing the monotonous voice of the clerk reading from Fletcher Strode’s diary. When a man has written, not once but many times, that he suspects his wife of planning murder and murder is done, a jury cannot have much doubt.
“I spoke to you, Donnie.”
“Yes, dear.”
“Whoever put that bag over Daddy wanted it to look like suicide.”
“Obviously.”
“You don’t have to bite my head off. I was just figuring things out. Why are you so snappy about it?”
“Sorry,” he answered curtly. “I was thinking about something else.”
“You know what you sound like? Like you’re scared.”
“I have nothing to be afraid of,” Don said loftily. “Only for you, my sweet.”
“Oh, now! They wouldn’t put me in jail for hiding the bag. I don’t believe it.”
“You’ve got to be mighty careful. People get strange ideas. You know of course, that a person convicted of murder can’t inherit the victim’s property. That’s the law in most states.”
“Why should that bother me?” She gave him her most wide-eyed stare.
Like a cautious attorney giving advice across the width of a desk, he lowered his voice. “I don’t think for a minute that you’ve got anything of that sort to worry about, dear, but we do have to be careful about what we say since we . . . that is, you . . . are next in line for the inheritance of the property.”
“You’re the only one who knows.”
“Weren’t you a bit indiscreet this afternoon? It may have impressed Nan, but it might look to outsiders as if you wished to cast suspicion on someone else.”
Watching the blond girl in the mirror, Cindy rearranged a stray lock. “Don’t you trust me, darling?” And she enjoyed the reflection of a subtle smile.
“Naturally, darling. But it’s only that sometimes you’re,” he could not tell her she was crude and, instead, chose, “impulsive.”
“I can keep things to myself. You’d be surprised,” she told him with hauteur. “I may be thinking of something terrible right at this moment. And I won’t tell you.”
“By all means, keep your thoughts to yourself. It’s the safest way.”
In the mirror their eyes met. Cindy stared into his face with fixed zeal. Don wheeled around and looked at her directly. She moved toward him. In their eyes were understanding and promise. Cindy felt subtle. Don nodded delicately. Never in the wildest moments of love had they been closer in spirit. “Oh, Donnie, oh, darling.” It was like the final sigh upon a pillow.
THE NEXT MORNING, while Cindy was in the shower, Don took the party dress from its hanger. The almost inaudible rustle of the plastic stuff brought to mind the moment when he had kissed Elaine over a bundle of plastic-covered suits at the door of Fletcher’s closet. WARNING: TO AVOID DANGER OF SUFFOCATION KEEP AWAY FROM BABIES AND CHILDREN. DO NOT USE IN CRIBS, CARRIAGES, BEDS, OR PLAYPENS. THIS BAG IS NOT A TOY. A shadow passed the window. Instinct commanded Don to jump back and slam the closet door. Second thought told him that such precipitate action might arouse the curiosity of anyone looking through the windows. In a leisurely way he selected a linen jacket and dark slacks, moving as carelessly as a man whose mind is on nothing more than the selection of an outfit for the day.
He found Elaine in the garden. When he laid his hand upon her arm she jumped like a cat. “It’s only me, beauty. Nothing to get nervous about, is there?”
“This heat again. It tightens me up. And Sergeant Knight yesterday.” A delicate tremor possessed her. “I hardly slept at all. And even here, in bright daylight, I hear footsteps behind me. People jump out of bushes. I’m a mess.”
“You’ve handled yourself wonderfully. Few women would have such courage.”
She shook away from the light contact of his hand. “Ralph says I ought to have a lawyer.” Lest his pride be hurt by this, she hurried to say, “A local lawyer, someone who practices in California. What do you think?”
“Let’s wait and see how things shape up. Leave it to me, I’ll find you the best man in the state.” Don took her arm again, masterfully. When he had first heard about Fletcher’s wife from Cindy and her mother, he had been charmed by their vindictive descriptions of the siren who had stolen the doting father and husband, and had thought of his father-in-law’s young wife as one of the those lovely, unattainable New York girls who enter exclusive restaurants on the arms of wealthy older men or rich young playboys. Once Cindy had shown him a photograph in an old copy of a fashion magazine, Elaine wrapped in furs, stepping haughtily into a limousine. The lovely dream had become human, attainable, dependent upon Don Hustings. He wished the circumstances were different.
“Is it terribly serious, Don? Am I just being hysterical or do you think they really believe—”
There was a sudden flash of light. Someone jumped out from behind the row of oleander bushes. “Thank you, Mrs. Strode.” It was a thin girl with a leather case strapped over her shoulder and a camera in her hand. She scurried around the house to the driveway.
“There was someone in the bushes.” A trace of hysteria colored her laughter. “What were you saying, Don?”
He held more firmly to Elaine’s arm. “What a pity,” he sighed, “that innocence can’t be proved.”
FROM A BOOTH that smelled of old sweat and cigarettes, Don spoke to Sergeant Knight, “May I come and talk to you, sir? I’ve come across some information that might interest you.”
“Good. I’ll be out there this afternoon.”
“I’m not home. As a matter of fact, I happen to be downtown, right in your neighborhood. You don’t mind my leaving the house, do you?”
“You weren’t stopped,” Knight said. “But I’m afraid I can’t see you this morning. I’m just leaving for Lowell Hanley’s office.” He pronounced the name of the District Attorney with reverence. “Can you call me back in an hour?”
The meeting in the District Attorney’s office was a long one. When Don called back, he was told that Knight was tied up. Don was restless. It was impossible for him to sit among the bums at a morning movie and among well-dressed idlers before the board in the broker’s office. He wandered into a couple of shops, but found nothing to interest him in the way of Parisian ties, English macintoshes, Italian shoes. In hot sunlight he tramped without direction along ugly streets, among tawdry buildings, moldy movie theaters, appalling souvenir shops, cutrate drugstores, employment agencies, and cafés that poisoned the air with fumes of cooking fat too often heated. From time to time he paused, purposelessly, and found himself studying displays of secondhand furniture, Chinese vegetables, tropical fish, trusses, and artificial legs. Dispirited people shuffled past, ashamed to be walking in a city where self-respect is determined by the possession of a car, where the major pursuit is the car just ahead, and a pedestrian is looked down upon as a pauper.
The people who moved listlessly in the hot noon glare were poor and disenchanted, with shapeless clothes over coarsened bodies, dirty hair, and eyes that looked at nothing.
Sweating in a glass phone booth that caught and held the insufferable glare, Don began to doubt the wisdom of his latest move. He was certain that Knight would be grateful for his assistance and appreciate his honesty, but there was the possibility that the facts might be unpleasantly interpreted. While he wavered, Knight’s voice came through. The meeting was over and he was ready, in fact anxious, to hear the important revelation. How soon could Don get to his office?
On impulse, Don suggested that Knight meet him for lunch, named an expensive restaurant with a cuisine that would sooth the spirit of a curmudgeon, and give pleasure to a dyspeptic. Knight’s enthusiasm was disarming.
They had no sooner met and been led, like the blind, through dark caverns to their table when Knight said, “Well, what’s the earthshaking information?”
“Let’s order our drinks first. You’ll want to relax after that long conference.”
Although Knight was somewhat tense after an argument that had lasted more than two hours, he would take nothing stronger than a double tomato juice without Worcestershire sauce or Tabasco. Nor would he, although Don set a generous example by ordering the most expensive steak on the bill of fare, eat anything more extravagant than a vegetable plate with two poached eggs. Knight was no gourmet; he relished the restaurant’s extravagance for snobbish rather than epicurean reasons. At some time he would let drop, “Now at Ticino’s they really know how to poach an egg.”
“In dietetic habits I’m a Spartan. At home we eat only organically grown foods. My only weakness is coffee. A bad habit, but I need the stimulation in my work. But I limit my cigarettes. Most of the time I smoke to put other people at ease. They tend toward nervousness during an interrogation. Even the innocent wince when a member of the department asks a question. A cigarette gives them something to do with their hands. Let’s get down to business. What’s on your mind?”
“I’d like to ask you one question first, if I may, sir?”
“Go ahead.”
“You’ve read the diary?”
Knight’s hand fell upon the briefcase lying beside him on the banquette. In it was a copy of the diary reproduced by a new machine so accurately that every stoke of Fletcher’s ballpoint, every deviation in the flow of ink, every heavily stressed punctuation mark, showed clearly. The original was now locked away in Lowell Hanley’s safe. The meeting in Mr. Hanley’s office had concerned this subject. Discussion had been heated. The District Attorney had, in general, taken Knight’s view of the case while the Chief of Police had been skeptical about several important points. The department’s chief psychologist had given his opinion in words of four syllables. No agreement had been reached, and Knight had been instructed to go on with the investigation, but with discretion.
“Indeed I’ve read it. Very interesting.”
Don saw that the detective was not prepared to let him know how they meant to use the information Fletcher Strode had provided. “May I ask,” Don, too, exercised discretion, “if there were any references to suicide, overt or otherwise?”
“You haven’t read it?”
Don had told Knight yesterday, when the diary was brought out, that he had not read it. He knew, too, that Knight had not forgotten, but was also playing a discreet game. Instead of making an issue of it, he said, “All I know is that Dad wrote in it a lot. And if he was plotting suicide, there might have been some indication in a concealed journal. And,” he took out a cigarette and felt in his pockets for his lighter, which was there but which he pretended not to find because he knew that Knight liked to render small services, “some interesting stuff about the circumstances that preceded his death.”
Knight leaned over to touch his lighter to Don’s cigarette. He used a lemon-flavored cologne, but too profusely to be in good taste. Don drew back. Knight noted tension in the hand that held the cigarette, tautness in the flesh around the eyes.
He said, “Yes, the events of the poor fellow’s last days were given in some detail.” He waited. Since Don did not ask questions, Knight went on provocatively, “You lived in the house, you must have noticed that Mr. Strode was in a state of mental and emotional distress. Wasn’t it noticeable?”
“It was hell. Sheer hell for all of us, but particularly for Elaine.”
“Would you say that his wife was the cause of this condition?”
“More the victim.” Don observed a grim silence, sighed, added, “I hate to speak ill of the dead, but at times he was brutal to her.” His hand flew, as though self-impelled, to the place where the bruise stained Elaine’s jaw.
Knight sipped tomato juice.
“You don’t believe that cock-and-bull story about her slipping against the kitchen sink? Elaine’d die before she’d say he hit her. Especially now that he’s dead.”
Knight gave Don no encouragement.
“What I wanted to ask you, sir, was there anything in the diary about finding me in Mr. Strode’s bedroom with Elaine?”
“In his bedroom?”
Don’s smile dismissed implications of incest. “I was afraid he might have made something of it, although it was really innocent. The cleaner’s boy delivered a bundle when Elaine and I were alone, and I offered to carry it to his room for her. There were several of his suits in those plastic bags the cleaners use—”
He used a diversion to heighten Knight’s curiosity. Having finished his martini, he signaled the waiter. “You don’t mind if I indulge in my bad habit?”
“It’s your own liver,” Knight said. “I can tell you this much, there was nothing in the diary about that incident in the bedroom. Why does it bother you so much?”
“I was afraid that Dad might have made something of it. And I wouldn’t like anything of that sort to get out. Especially in the newspapers. People have nasty minds, and I have a wife to think of. I’m glad he didn’t mention it in the diary.”
“Is that incident the important information you had for me?” Knight asked sternly. “It was my impression that you knew something more.”
If he had noticed the mention of plastic bags, he preferred not to heed it.
“I know what caused Mr. Strode’s death.”
They had to sit silent while the waiter slid their plates into place. A silver cover was removed from a silver platter, vegetables and poached eggs exhibited. A chateaubriand stuffed with caviar could not have been more elaborately served. Knight nodded approval. When the waiter had gone, he poked at the vegetables with his fork. “Now this is a correctly cooked string bean. Not overdone, the vitamins are preserved. How did Mr. Strode die?”
“He was smothered with a plastic bag.”
Knight went on eating. His face showed neither pleasure nor surprise. Only a slight twitch of the nostrils betrayed excitement. “How do you know that?”
Like a defense attorney who has spent many hours preparing his arguments, Don gave facts. Even the mood has been considered: compassion for the sorrowing daughter, indulgence of Cindy’s mistake. Like a father speaking of an adored brat, he explained, “She had no idea that it was incorrect to keep the bag hidden.”
“Stupid,” was Knight’s word. Without compassion. “Just stupid.”
“She was trying to be gallant. In her own way. Protecting the family name. She believes that suicide is disgraceful. Her father’s reputation is very dear to her.”
Knight sniffed. He could understand Mrs. Hustings’s having snatched the bag away and, in the first moments of shock, hidden it away, but once an investigation was under way, she ought to have performed her legal duty.
“I’m afraid my wife isn’t too familiar with the law. She’s led a sheltered life.”
“Don’t they teach them anything in those fancy girls’ colleges?”
“Not such masculine subjects as the law,” retorted Don with a challenging glance.
Knight gave attention to the business of isolating the lima beans, carrots, and corn kernels from the beets and potatoes, which he pushed to the far side of his plate. As though it were a mere aside, less important than the string bean that now claimed his attention, he murmured, “Must be a lot of life insurance, huh?”
“None of us knows how much,” Don answered, “but does that mean much to your investigation? Even if the coroner’s verdict is suicide, I’m sure the benefits will be paid. Mr. Strode held his policies for a long time.”
“A lot of people, most of them, think the companies won’t pay in suicide cases.”
“I don’t think my wife knows anything about that.”
“Where’s the bag?”
“At the house. Over a dress in our closet. Your assistant looked straight at it and asked no questions.”
“I see.” What Knight saw were headlines and news photographs: Sergeant Curtis Knight who discovered the vital clue in the mystery death of the New York millionaire. He thought of the morning’s angry meeting, of the war between the District Attorney and the Police Chief, of ambition rampant and caution couchant, of the polysyllables offered by the psychologist. How would the introduction of the plastic bag affect the present situation and Knight’s future career? The whole thing might blow up in his face. “Of course,” he said thoughtfully, “this may change the entire aspect of the case.”
“In what way, sir?”
“The use of the plastic bag nearly always indicates suicide.”
“Nearly but not always?”
Knight pointed his fork at Don’s face. “Have you any good reason for believing this wasn’t?”
“I’m thinking of possibilities. Infants smothered in cribs are usually the victims of their mothers’ carelessness, but suppose, sir, that a parent finds a child a burden and wants to be free? You see the point, don’t you?” Again Don played lawyer, tried to impress jury and judge with logical theory. “A man drugged with sleeping pills is just as helpless as a sleeping child. That’s only an illustration, but certainly possible.”
A conical green lampshade protected a meager bulb in the small lamp set upon their table. The dusky ray, slanting upward from a circular opening, etched in Don’s face. Knight tilted the shade so that further light was shed upon his companion. The scrutiny was disconcerting to Don, who signaled the waiter for another drink. Knight cautioned him against it.
“If you’re going to drive home, it’s not safe.”
“Nor legal,” said Don with a wry grin. He changed the order to coffee, and tried a new strategy. “If you were to search the house again, sir, you might find the bag hanging over a tan party dress in my wife’s closet. And ask a few pertinent questions which, of course, would bring out the truth—”
“Allow us to handle it in our own way,” Knight said, stressing plural pronouns so that the young man could see he was not to be got around by any scheme to further his own career.
“You realize, of course, that my wife’s handled the bag and I’m afraid I touched it myself, inadvertently, when I looked at it.”
“Fingerprints don’t often show up on that plastic. Rarely. If that’s what worries you.”
“Why should I worry? So long as you don’t punish poor Cindy for her gallantry.” Don cast a smile of understanding at Knight to show tolerance of female foibles.
“I’ll want a written confession from your wife.”
“That’ll be very hard for her.”
“Gallantry requires a bit of hardship.” Knight grimaced.
“You haven’t mentioned this to anyone else?”
“No.”
“Does Mrs. Strode know anything about it?”
“Not that I know of, sir.”
Knight said nothing more until he had finished his coffee. In parting he offered a grateful hand. “You were right to tell me about this. Otherwise your wife might be in a lot of trouble. As things stand, I don’t think the delay in her confession will amount to much. I’ll talk to Lowell Hanley about it.”
Nothing more was said of the new clue, but the handshake was a gesture of tacit cooperation. Don drove home at an illegal speed. In midafternoon the freeway was fairly empty—a good omen. Cindy heard his car and ran to meet him at the door.
“I’ve got a surprise for you.”
“What is it?” He threw the question over his shoulder as he hurried to the bedroom closet to have a quick look at the sight which would soon greet the eyes of Sergeant Knight.
“Looking for something?” Cindy asked with feigned ignorance.
“Where is it?”
“Where’s what, Donnie?”
He closed the bedroom door before he spoke of the bag.
“Where? Who took it? Was anyone here?”
“I burned it”
“You . . . what?”
“Out there.” She tilted her head toward the window that looked toward the garden. “No one saw. It only burned for a few seconds, that stuff goes up in a flash. There were hardly any ashes and I put them in the dirt where the gardener puts all the old raked leaves and dead flowers and stuff. I mixed it all up with dirt and that guck.”
She waited for praise. Don grunted.
“No one will ever know now.” She smiled at the girl in the mirror. Don came up behind her. She saw him in the mirror, too. His hands rose so that she expected an embrace. Instead she was whirled around and shaken like a wet dishrag. “Donnie! What’s wrong now? I thought you’d be glad.”
He jerked her close and looked down into her face. “Why should I be glad?”
“I just thought you would.”
“Cindy, is there anything else you ought to tell me?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve acted very strangely since your father died.”
“Me?” She wriggled out of his grasp and backed away.
“You’re the one who’s acted funny. Really weird.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“Don’t you think I was trying to help you?”
“Thanks, don’t bother.” He flung himself upon the bed.
Cindy turned to the mirror, trying on a haughty expression but finding it difficult while she winked and screwed up her eyes in the process of putting on makeup.
Don watched. “What’s all that for? You don’t think you’re going to a party tonight?”
“Have you forgotten? We’ve got to go and arrange for the funeral. Elaine said we could spend as much as we wanted.”
“You have to make yourself up like a tart to go to a mortuary!”
He was impossible. Cindy gathered up her little pots and pencils, flung herself into the bathroom, closed the door with a bang. She spent a long time on her face, for her hand was unsteady with the brushes. When she came out her eyes were bare of the usual black rims and she had penciled her brows with a faint line. “I won’t wear any makeup if you don’t like it, darling.”
Don was in a better mood, too. The radio was on. An old-time combo played Dixieland. Don open the closet door. “Behold, milady.” The beige organza was enveloped in a plastic bag.
Cindy squealed.
“After the mortuary we’re going downtown and telling the truth to Sergeant Knight. They’ll make a recording and you’ll sign it.”
“No!”
“Yes you will. You’ve got nothing to worry about. I’ll be with you, and on the way I’ll coach you for the confession.”
“I’ll die.”
Once more he pulled her toward him. This time he was tender. “You’re okay, sweet. Remember, you’ve got me to take care of everything for you. Your very own personal, private lawyer.” Don was blithe again, sure of himself. In the pocket of his jacket was a plastic bag, the third one which had been hanging over Fletcher Strode’s cashmere jacket. There were no other bags in Fletcher’s closet now and Don, as always secure with a strong lie in him, felt that the future held good fortune.