Donald Westlake - The New Black Mask ( No 3 )

When he finished, Dewey left the film on the reader and started back upstairs. On his way he stopped and looked through an open door into another small room, this one furnished with a couch and club chair, end tables, a small refrigerator, coffee maker, and portable TV. In one comer was a worktable with a paper cutter, glue pot, and two small vises. In another, a book lift loaded with books to be hoisted upstairs. Between them was a small desk with a chair.

“That’s my little workroom, Mr. Taylor.”

Dewey whirled around at the sound of Elizabeth Lane’s voice. He had not heard her come back downstairs and she startled him.

“It isn’t much,” she continued, “but it’s a quiet place to work after hours. I do all the bookbinding and repairs myself. It saves on the library budget.”

“That’s very conscientious of you,” Dewey said, back in control of himself.

“Thank you. I came down to tell you that Fred Simply is waiting for you upstairs. He says you’re a famous newspaper reporter from Birmingham.”

“I’m not really that famous,” Dewey said, following her back upstairs. He liked the way she looked walking up the stairs.

“Hmmmmm. It surprises me that a newspaperman doesn’t know how to use a microfilm reader.”

Elizabeth Lane returned to her desk. Dewey suppressed a smile as he watched her walk away. She had long legs and a healthy, country-girl stride. Dewey liked that too. He felt a stirring inside that he had not felt in a long time.

“Uh, Mr. Taylor,” Simply said, touching his arm. “I, uh, I’m here.”

“Of course you are, Simply. I knew you wanted to take me to supper, that’s why I had you come over. Have you selected a nice place?”

“Well, I, uh—”

“I’m sure you have.” Dewey draped an arm around the stringer’s shoulders and guided him toward the door.

“Uh, about that byline, Mr. Taylor—”

“Later, Simply, later. Right now, I want you to tell me everything you know about your county librarian, Elizabeth Lane.”

As they left the library, Dewey glanced back at the desk. Elizabeth Lane was watching him leave. Dewey smiled a satisfied smile.

At ten the next morning, Dewey rang the bell at the Trane mansion. Leonora Trane herself answered the door. She was a tall, regal woman with perfectly coiffed hair and a splendid figure, wearing an ankle-length silk robe.

“Come in, Mr. Taylor,” she said easily. “We’ll talk on the veranda. There’s coffee.”

Dewey followed her through a dining room to a veranda laid in deep red Mexican rootstone, ringed by yellow roses. They sat and she poured coffee.

“Mr. Taylor,” she said, “the only reason I consented to see you was because you said on the phone that you had seen Jack and that he told you he believes I murdered George. If he told you that much, I’m quite certain he must have told you a great deal more. Such as the fact that he and I were lovers. And that I no longer loved my husband. All of which is true. But I assure you, I had nothing to do with George’s death. My late husband and I had an understanding: I went my way, he went his.”

“Did he know about you and Strawn?”

Leonora Trane shrugged elegant shoulders. “Possibly. No, probably.” She smiled slightly. “We didn’t discuss our affairs; we weren’t that decadent. But we were usually aware of what the other was doing, at least abstractly.”

“Was Mr. Trane having an affair at the time he was murdered?” Dewey asked.

“Oh, yes. George had a mistress. Someone he’d been seeing for several years.” She smiled again, in amusement this time. “I used to find all those telltale, silly little signs that wives notice: makeup smudges on his collar, a perfume scent on his coat and shirt. Jasmine fragrance, something I never use. It was so — well, mundane. Like afternoon television.”

“Do you know who his mistress is?”

“Was. No, I don’t. I never really cared to know.” She sipped her coffee, then said, “Shall we get to the main point of your visit? How can I convince you that I did not murder my husband?”

Now it was Dewey who shrugged. “Just tell me you didn’t.”

“All right. I didn’t. Anything else?”

“Why would Jack Strawn think you did?”

Again the amused smile. “Jack is the sort of man who thinks women would kill for him. You may have noticed that he’s quite impressed with himself.”

Dewey locked eyes with her. “You must have been a little impressed too. He was your lover.”

“ One of my lovers, Mr. Taylor,” she said without the faintest unease. “Just one of them.”

Dewey sat back and nodded thoughtfully. “I see. You didn’t want to run away with him then?”

“Certainly not.”

“Or sue your husband for divorce?”

“No.”

“Did you ever tell Strawn you wanted to do either? Or lead him to believe you would?”

“Never.”

Dewey shook his head. Strawn, you lying macho bastard.

“Who do you think killed your husband, Mrs. Trane?”

“I haven’t the vaguest idea. Frankly, I didn’t think for a moment that Jack had done it. Then that business came up about his wife being killed the same way.”

“You hadn’t known about that?”

“Heavens, no,” she said with genuine abhorrence.

“Did that change your mind about whether Jack might have done it?”

“Well, it certainly gave me pause for thought. But I’m still not sure. I don’t want to think that Jack did it, but it’s difficult to arrive at any other conclusion.”

“What about the mistress?”

Leonora Trane shook her head. “If I know George, she was only someone he toyed with for his own amusement. Someone he could dominate. He couldn’t dominate me, you see. So I suppose he needed someone he could impress. But I’m sure there was no emotional involvement of the sort that would lead to murder. Besides, George was killed here, on the estate. What would his mistress have been doing here?”

“What about business associates? Did anyone dislike him?”

Again she shook her head. “He was very popular. Honest as the day is long, in business anyway. A community figure — served on the school board, the road commission, the library board, the city council.”

No wonder Strawn was convicted so quickly, Dewey thought. He finished his coffee and rose. “Thank you for seeing me, Mrs. Trane.”

“Not at all. I hope I haven’t given you the impression that I’m totally without conscience. I’m sorry that George is dead, and I’m sorry that Jack is in so much trouble. But there’s nothing I can do about either of them, is there? And life does go on.”

“It does that,” Dewey Taylor agreed.

This woman, he decided as he was leaving, would not kill for any man.

It was almost noon when Dewey got back to town. He went directly to the library. A young library assistant told him that Elizabeth Lane was downstairs in her workroom. Dewey went down and tapped on the open door. Elizabeth looked up from her desk.

“Oh, hello. Come in. What can I do for the famous reporter today?”

“I’ve come to take you to lunch in celebration of your fifteenth anniversary as the librarian for this splendid little community,” Dewey said glibly.

She smiled the slightest of smiles and continued working. “I take it you’ve been asking Fred Simply some questions. He must have told you that the anniversary to which you refer was three months ago.”

“Yes, he did. I’m sorry I’m late.”

“Too late, I’m afraid.”

Dewey thought for a moment. “Suppose I had been early? Would that have made a difference?”

“Perhaps.”

“All right, then, I’d like to take you to lunch to celebrate your sixteenth anniversary. I’m afraid I’m nine months early.”