Samuel Holt: The Fourth Dimension is Death

“Colby’s made a statement,” the Sergeant said. “She and her husband were supposed to go to that banquet together. There’d been trouble in the marriage, he was jealous, thought she was playing around. They’d kept it pretty quiet, but it mixed in with Montgomery’s depression and his health problems, and that’s when he did himself in.”

“Without leaving a note.”

“Well, yes, he did,” she said. “The tape. He made a cassette tape of why he was killing himself, blaming his wife, listing people he thought she’d been sleeping with, all of that.”

“Ow. That’s nasty.”

“Colby insists none of it was true, it was just her husband’s depression and paranoia. Anyway, when she told him it was time to get ready for the banquet, he pulled the gun and made her listen to the tape. When she tried to leave the bedroom, he shot the mirror to let her know he was serious. They listened to the tape, and she started to deny it all, and he blew his brains out.”

“In front of her?”

“Yeah. She was rattled—”

“Well, she would be,” I said.

“Anybody would be,” Shanley agreed. “She phoned Kay Henry. He was always the one she turned to. He said come to town, bring the tape, you don’t know anything, he’d get somebody to go to the banquet with her and claim they’d been there for an hour already. Then Henry called Dale Wormley, told him what was going on, and sent him to the Waldorf to meet Colby. They did their public act together, with her going to the ladies’ room to break down every once in a while, and he stole the tape out of her purse. She didn’t realize until the next day. She called Henry again, he said he’d take care of it, and then he said he’d taken care of it, the tape was destroyed. In fact, Wormley was keeping it, and telling Henry the price was stardom.”

“Rita Colby was Kay Henry’s entire career and livelihood,” I said.

“So Henry went along with Wormley as best he could,” Shanley said, “but Wormley just kept pushing and pressing.”

“That’s what he’d do, all right.”

“Wormley wanted more and more, he got to be impossible, and finally Henry felt he didn’t have any choice. He followed Wormley, looking for his chance, and killed him. And he moved the body to that vestibule to give himself time to get home before it was discovered and he was notified.”

“Then,” I said, “he went looking for the tape.”

“And found it, too. But unfortunately Kim Peyser walked in while he was there.”

My rib gave me a bad twinge, and I lay back, grimacing. Sounding worried, Sergeant Shanley said, “Are you all right?”

“Well, no,” I said.

“Let me leave you alone now,” she said, getting to her feet. “We can talk some more tomorrow.”

“One thing,” I said, holding my left side with my right hand. “What about Mrs. Wormley?”

“Gone,” the Sergeant said. “Home to Iowa, I guess. The Kaplan girl came back from Florida yesterday and threw her out.”

That made me laugh again, and that made me hurt again. There was a fuzzy grayness at the periphery of my vision, trying to flow in. “I’m sorry,” I said. “This thing is getting to me.”

“I’m off,” she said, and moved toward the door. “You want me to call the nurse?”

“No,” I said. “I think I’ll just pass out for a while.”

And I did.