David Alexander - Masters of Noir - Volume 2

There was no visible change in his expression. “Are you a relative?”

“No, doctor.”

“Friend of the family?”

“No, doctor.”

He moved his shoulders patiently. “Then what is the purpose of your visit, if I may inquire? Mrs. Larsen is resting now. She had a touch of flu last month and she’s very weak.”

“I’d like to talk to her.”

He smiled patronizingly. “My dear fellow, we can’t allow just anyone to walk in and disturb our guests. Surely you realize that.”

I fished one of my cards out of my wallet and gave it to him. His lips moved as he read it. His eyes came up without any expression.

“I see,” he said. “You’re a lawyer. What, exactly, do you want, counselor? Who do you represent?”

“Mrs. Grace Denney. We want to find out if Mrs. Larsen is competent to handle her own affairs.”

He stroked his closed eyelids with infinite weariness. “Ah, yes. Mrs. Denney was here yesterday, but Mrs. Larsen refused to see her.” He shoved his chair back abruptly and came to his feet. “I think an interview can be managed. Suppose we just walk in on Mrs. Larsen. But please make it brief, counselor. Follow me.” His manner had turned crisp and businesslike.

A spiral staircase wound upward to the second floor. Our footsteps were absorbed on the well-padded broadloom. Dr. Vandam paused at the end of the corridor, opened a door, and walked in with a cheerful smile.

“Well, Mrs. Larsen, you’re looking chipper. How do you feel this afternoon?”

“Resting nicely, doctor. I—” She stopped when she noticed he was not alone and her faded eyes regarded me curiously.

I saw a small woman, very old, lying in a four poster, dwarfed by its hugeness. Her skin was wrinkled parchment and her hair was snow white. Only the porcelain dentures anchored to her gums kept her mouth from collapsing upon itself.

“I brought you a visitor,” Dr. Larsen said.

She searched my face, probing, trying to recollect if she knew me.

“How do you do, Mrs. Larsen,” I said. “I’m a friend of Grace’s.”

The gnarled fingers tightened on the coverlet and her withered lips contracted. “Then you’re no friend of mine,” she said.

“Grace would like very much to see you, Mrs. Larsen.”

“Well, I don’t want to see her. Why doesn’t she leave me alone and go back to California?”

I said quietly, “She’s divorcing Charles.”

Her eyes closed, as if the light hurt them. “Poor Charles. Grace must have made him very unhappy.”

“Please,” Dr. Vandam broke in firmly. “I’m sorry, but you can see that Mrs. Larsen is very tired. She needs rest and this excitement isn’t doing her any good.”

I smiled, first at him, then at her, and now I gave them both the shock of their lives.

“That’s too goddam bad about her,” I said unpleasantly. “Get up out of that bed, you old fraud. And get some clothes on, unless you want me to drag you down to Police Headquarters in your nightgown.”

Her mouth fell open. She gaped at me, dumbfounded, her eyes dark with apprehension and dismay. Dr. Vandam stood with his spine arched, his larynx paralyzed, speechless and staring. There were incoherent sounds in his throat that finally became words:

“What — what — what is the meaning of this?”

I was playing a hunch and I hoped I was right.

I said with acid precision, “Who do you think you’re kidding? This isn’t Mrs. Larsen. This woman is a phoney, a substitute, a ringer.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed erratically. “But Mrs. Larsen — where—”

“Dead, probably,” I said. “And kept a secret so this old bag could take her place.”

He seemed at a complete loss. “I–I don’t understand. Why?”

“In order to keep receiving those annuity payments. Five hundred smackers a week. Twenty-five thousand a year. It adds up, friend. If they could get away with it for only four years it’s a hundred grand.” I looked at her stonily. “Get up, lady. You won’t have long to spend in jail. You’re too old.”

But she wasn’t as old as she looked. She kicked her feet over the side of the bed and stood up, trembling and agitated. Her mouth was working and her quivering finger pointed at the doctor.

“He made me do it!” she shouted. “He hired me and asked me to play the part. I don’t know about any annuities. I don’t—”

Vandam cut her short with a snarl. “Shut up!” His eyes were glazed, abnormally bright as he turned on me, trying to pull himself erect. “These premises are private. You have no right here.”

But it was only surface courage, an attitude of desperation. Inside, he was demoralized. He knew the game was up.

“You didn’t coach her well enough,” I said. “Mrs. Larsen never told you about Grace and Charles, or why she had fought with her niece. She slipped on that one.”

The muscles in his angular face were out of control, warping his mouth.

“Mrs. Larsen died,” I said. “You thought she was alone in the world. She never told you about Grace. It must have been a shock when the letters started coming. Because the die had already been cast. She was dead and you thought you saw a chance to make some easy money. Instead of reporting it, you buried her quietly and secretly out in the garden somewhere. You accepted the checks and counterfeited her signature on the indorsements.” I showed him my teeth. “Or did greed make you impatient, doctor? Perhaps you couldn’t wait for her to die from old age. Maybe you accelerated the event. An autopsy will tell that part of the story when the police find her.”

Pallor diluted his complexion. Whatever control he had left was rapidly dissolving, disorganizing his thoughts. He sought desperately to salvage some remnants of his honor. “No, no,” he whispered hoarsely, “it — it wasn’t me. I didn’t kill her. She received a box of chocolates in the mail.” He swallowed painfully, like a man with the mumps. “Arsenic. I kept the wrapper.”

“Where did the candy come from?”

“San Diego.”

“I believe you,” I said. “You didn’t kill Mrs. Larsen. It was somebody else. But just the same you’re going to sit in that electric chair up in Sing Sing.”

He staggered back, cringing away from me. Beads of sweat condensed along his brow. His nostrils were pinched and gray.

“You killed somebody else,” I said. “Lester Britt. He was hired to find out why the old lady had failed to answer any letters. He investigated and fell onto your scheme and started to blackmail you. That was all right, until Grace Denney arrived in New York. Britt was panicked. He was a small timer who had an easy touch and he was afraid the girl would put an end to it. So he came to you, for a quick kill, trying to up the ante. You understood about blackmailers, doctor. You knew that sort of thing was endless. It got progressively worse. You were desperate. Britt had to be eliminated. So you went to his office and you did what had to be done. And you hired this old lady in case the girl asked someone else to investigate.”

His lips moved soundlessly. The truth was there in his distorted face for anyone to see. He backed away blindly through the door.

I didn’t bother to chase after him. What the hell for? If he wanted to commit suicide, let him. It would save the State a lot of trouble.

I looked at the old lady. “Get away from here,” I told her. “Get away from here as fast as you can.”

I took the same advice for myself.

I was halfway to the car when I heard the shot, a muffled report, absorbed in space.

Dr. Vandam had appealed his case to a higher authority.

Grace was waiting in the car, with the radio playing. Dinner music from some hotel, soft and muted. There were people who still led normal lives. I climbed in beside her and started the car. She twisted around to face me while I drove.