Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Backward Mule

The room gave forth the sounds of motion. A bolt shot back, the door opened a crack.

Clane put his weight against the door.

“Say, what the hell is this?” the woman demanded.

Clane pushed his way into the room. Chu Kee and Sou Ha followed.

Clane gently closed the door.

The woman who stood in the middle of the floor was barefooted. She was wearing a slip and apparently nothing else. Her blonde hair was uncombed. A cigarette dangled from her lower lip and her face had the sullen expression of surly defiance which comes to those who have refused to conform to the conventions of life and mask their doubts behind a pose.

On the dilapidated dresser with its cheap mirror which gave a distorted reflection of the room was a square bottle of gin half full. A streaked water tumbler on the dresser was partially filled with gin and an empty gin bottle lay on its side near the edge of the dresser.

“Say listen,” the woman said, “I’m respectable. I come here when I want to go on a bat. My old man don’t like me to hit the booze. I’ve paid my rent and I’m living alone and liking it. All I want is a chance to finish off this bottle of gin, twelve hours’ sleep, and then I’ll walk out of here and go back to listening to his line of chatter and washing dishes and ironing his shirts. Now what the hell do you want?”

Clane noticed that, while the room itself was impregnated with the odor of gin, the smell of alcohol was that of fresh liquor, not the stale smell which comes from the breath of a heavy drinker.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Taonon,” he said, “but in this particular instance, the disguise won’t work.”

Her eyes were quick with startled fear.

“So,” Clane said, “we may as well dispense with the alcoholic subterfuge and get down to brass tacks.”

For a moment she regarded him dubiously, then her eyes shifted to Sou Ha and Chu Kee. They were shrewd, calculating eyes now which studied facial expressions with quick appraisal.

Abruptly she crossed to a closet, took out a smart, well-tailored dress, slipped it on over her head, opened a drawer, took out wells made, expensive alligator shoes and nylon stockings. She put on both shoes and stockings, opened her handbag, took out a comb, and combed back the tangled mass of her hair. Abruptly she had transformed herself from a blowsy blonde into a smartly tailored, quick-thinking, dangerous antagonist.

“Won’t you sit down?” she asked. “I think there aren’t any bugs. That’s about all I can say for the place. Two of you will have to sit on the bed. The girl can take the rocking chair. I wouldn’t advise that straight-backed chair. It’s treacherous. Now what is it you want?”

“What are you running away from?” Clane asked.

“From people who want to ask me questions — perhaps.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m tired of answering questions.”

“Whose questions?”

“Yours, for one. Suppose we start with you. Let’s find out who you are. What authority do you have to question me?”

“I’m looking for information.”

“So I gathered,” she said somewhat scornfully.

She was calm, poised, and wary — very much in command of herself and rapidly ready to assume command of the situation.

“I’m Terry Clane. I know your husband.”

“Oh, so you’re Terry Clane.”

“Right.”

“And who are these people?”

“Friends of mine.”

“And why should you ask questions?”

“Because I’m trying to clear up a mystery. Because if you don’t choose to answer my questions, I’ll ring up a friend. Inspector Malloy, tell him where you are and let him ask the questions.”

That shot told. She said, “Go ahead and ask your questions.”

“What are you running away from?”

“I’m afraid.”

“Of what?”

“It might be any number of things.”

“Such as what?”

“My husband, perhaps.”

“What have you done that would make you afraid of him?”

“Nothing.”

“Where is he now?”

“You’ll have to ask him.”

“Where were you last night?”

“Looking for someone.”

“Who?”

“Perhaps it was my husband.”

“Was it?”

“I’m not saying.”

“Where did you go?”

“Places.”

Clane sighed. “This isn’t getting us anywhere. I guess we’ll have to let the police do the questioning.”

Once more she showed fear. “Tell me specifically what you want to know. I’ll answer.”

“Do you know Edward Harold?”

She hesitated, then said, “Yes.”

“You met him last night. Did your husband ask you to meet him?”

“What makes you think I saw Edward Harold last night?”

“A witness says you did, a waitress in a restaurant.”

“That’s nonsense.”

“Are you hiding from the police or from your husband?”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know. I’m asking because I want to find out.”

She faced him, took a quick breath, then said, “All right, if you’re going to drag it out of me, here it is. So far as Edward Harold is concerned, he means nothing to me. He’s friendly with my husband. We were both sorry to hear of his arrest for murder and I for one was glad to hear of his escape.

“But there’s another matter where Ricardo and I aren’t so... well, there’s another man, a business associate of my husband’s. He thinks he’s in love with me, and he wants to have a showdown with Ricardo... I’m in the clear. I’ve done nothing. But Ricardo is insanely jealous at times. I don’t know how much he thinks he knows or what he’d do. And he’s disappeared and I’m hiding out until I see what’s happened — or whether anything’s going to happen. I’m scared.”

“Who is this business associate of your husband who is infatuated with you? Is it Nevis?”

“Don’t be silly.”

“Was it Gloster?”

“Now aren’t you smart!”

Clane said, “Your husband carries quite a bit of insurance. It’s payable to you. Your husband is dead.”

She stiffened into frozen attention. “Ricardo dead?”

“You know he is.”

“Then if you know that, you must know why he was hiding.”

Clane said nothing.

“And why I was hiding,” she added.

“You were hiding for the same reason he was?”

“Of course. He got me on the phone, told me to get under cover where I couldn’t be traced. The fat was in the fire.”

“Do you mean,” Clane asked, “that he had murdered Gloster?”

She said, “If you know so much, why don’t you know more?”

“I’m asking you.”

“Ricardo is dead?”

“So I understand from the police.”

“How?”

“I don’t know the details. A police inspector inadvertently let the cat out of the bag.”

“That Ricardo was dead?”

“Yes.”

“When did he die?”

“I don’t know.”

For a long moment she studied him with thought-narrowed eyes. Then she said suddenly, “That’s different. Let’s go.”

“Where?”

“Back home.”

Clane said, “You don’t seem to show any grief.”

Her manner was scornful. “I thought I was dealing with someone of intelligence. You know as well as I do there’s no use showing any grief over something that has happened. Furthermore, the women who have hysterics and sob and shriek and whoop and want to be comforted are the ones who are putting on an act. I know the way I feel and that’s all that counts.”

Clane said dryly, “The position of the police is that you stand to profit by your husband’s death. You can’t expect them to overlook that.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Surely you can put two and two together?”