Doug Allyn - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 104, No. 4 & 5. Whole No. 633 & 634, October 1994

They were both silent until she said, “None of this is very conclusive, is it?”

He laughed harshly.

After a moment she asked, “What are you going to do about me?”

“You planning to run away?”

“No.”

“Then I’m going to think about it. How did you find the exact dates of her husband’s inauguration?”

She told him about the private sitting room in the mansion filled with Walter Melton’s proofs of achievement.

“Something of a pack rat?” he asked.

“Something...” She glanced at him, but he seemed absorbed in watching the swift river. “She might have kept anything from Philip, too. Not in the mansion, but in her private residence at the coast. Why did she go out there this weekend with so much going on?”

“Let’s take a ride, Blair. Let’s go look at the ocean.”

He complained about her driving on the steep winding road, and she snapped that she knew every curve in it. The road was narrow, posted the entire length for no passing, for fifteen miles an hour, ten miles; the forest pressed in close. The road descended precipitously. “Why do you keep telling me things?” she demanded, taking a curve too fast.

“Like I said, the more you know, the more help you are. A tight community like this one, if the door closes, it takes dynamite to get it open again. An insider helps. Don’t go near her house. Head into the village. I want to use a telephone.”

As they drew near the village of Crystal Beach, more and more young people appeared on the road, some walking, some on bicycles. “Spring break,” she said, slowing to a crawl. She stopped at a filling station a few minutes later and watched him go to the telephone.

“Something to eat,” he said when he got back. “A place with a view would be nice.”

Crystal Beach had a population of five hundred, but today there were dozens of college students on the streets making it appear much more populous. Weekend traffic on 101 was heavy. Haliday shook his head at a Dairy Queen, and again at a hamburger joint, and then pointed to Cap’n John’s Seafood House. So they were going to be here for a while, she thought, and pulled in to park.

It was a strange meal. They ordered, clam chowder for him, crab salad for her; he gazed out the window and said, “Pretty,” and then became silent and remained silent.

This was a rugged section of coast, with cliffs, many rocks jutting up from the water, rocky tide pools, and a narrow strip of sand. The restaurant was seventy-five feet above the beach. Down there kids were flying kites, tossing Frisbees, clambering over mountainous piles of driftwood that from here looked like a giant’s jackstraws carelessly abandoned. The water was deep blue and calm.

When the waiter came with coffee, he nodded, then ignored it. She sipped hers, waiting. He glanced at his watch several times, and the last time, got up. “Right back,” he said and left. Fifteen minutes after he returned, he grinned at her. “Time to go. Whoever taught you to keep quiet so a man could think did a good job of it.”

Her father, she thought, as they left the restaurant. Poor Dad had tried hard to teach her mother, who never had learned that particular lesson. She drove again, up 101 to Crystal River Road, back the way they had come for half a mile, and then she turned onto a narrow winding road, past two driveways, and into Hilde Melton’s drive.

“What am I supposed to do?” she asked then, reluctantly eyeing the house ahead. It was a low, rambling, unpainted cedar building, the rustic look of the wood offset by stained-glass windows on this side. Trees misshapen by the wind, wind-carved boulders, a few pieces of silvered driftwood made up the yard. Beyond, the ocean was visible.

“You don’t do a thing,” Haliday said. “Not a peep.”

They walked to the front stoop and he rang the bell.

Hilde was still wearing jeans and a sweater. She looked at the lieutenant, then at Ellen, and said angrily, “This is just too much! What are you doing out here? What do you want?”

“A couple of things came up,” Haliday said. “Can we come in?”

“Ellen, I told you you don’t have to work for this man any longer. Who is your superior, Lieutenant?” She moved aside to let them enter and slammed the door.

The room they entered was spacious and bright, with the stained-glass windows on one side and sliding glass doors on the other. A deck was beyond the doors with a view of the ocean. The furnishings inside were rattan and bentwood, with Indian print throws on chairs and a sofa, colorful cotton rugs on a wide plank floor with a nice gloss. On the deck the furniture was heavy wood, massive terracotta planters with greenery, nothing that would blow away.

“Captain Hersholt,” Haliday said. “Dr. Melton, you said you and your husband came out here Saturday morning after the big party. Are you sure? Our information is that he was in New York and didn’t get back here until the following week.”

“You asked me about an event that happened thirteen years ago. I told you what I believed was true. We always came out here after the party, I assumed we did that time, too.”

“I understand that your husband never attended college functions, that he stayed here on the coast when he was home.”

“Your informant is mistaken.”

“What kind of a car did your husband drive back then?”

Hilde was looking more and more angry; her face flushed deep crimson. She threw up her hands and turned her back on him, crossed the room to stand at the sliding door and gaze out. “This is insane,” she said. “I don’t remember what kind of car he had. He had a car and I had one.”

Ellen had not moved from the door; she watched miserably. Haliday was strolling around, looking at things, a vase with pampas grass plumes, a bowl of seashells, a magazine...

“Was it a green seventy-nine Dodge two-door?”

“I don’t know,” Hilde snapped.

“You see, our information is that you took a Dodge like that to a body shop in Salem on Friday following the death of Philip Seymour. You told them your husband had driven it off the road into bushes or something and banged it up.”

Hilde didn’t move. After a moment she said, “I did one year. I don’t remember when it was.”

“The problem is I can’t figure out how you managed to get it in town from out here and still have your own car available. I mean, if you drove out here and drove the Dodge back to town, your car must have stayed here. But on Saturday that week you went up to Portland and picked up your husband at the airport. Didn’t you?”

She turned toward them; the low sun behind her was so brilliant that she was only a black shadow. “Whatever point you’re trying to make, Lieutenant, just make it.”

He nodded. “I think Seymour followed you out here to the coast the night of the party, and for a time your car, your husband’s car, and his van were all here. When he went back to town in the van, you followed in your husband’s car, and later drove the van back out, leaving your husband’s car in the garage at the faculty residence. The following week you drove your car back to town, took your husband’s car to the shop, and all the pieces were accounted for, or will be when you tell us where you dumped the van.”

“And I don’t give a damn what you think,” she said coldly. “Now if you’ll get out of here, I have things to do.”

“I’m afraid I have to search your house, Dr. Melton,” Haliday said.

“Just exactly what do you think you’ll find?” she demanded. She went to the telephone on an end table. “You said Captain Hersholt, I believe.”

Haliday nodded. “I’d be looking for Seymour’s manuscript, personal letters, probably a lot of photographs, maybe a blue tuxedo, and a gold ring that looks like a snake.”