Ричард Деминг - The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK®

“Maybe Lionel Short wants somebody killed too,” she said with sudden inspiration. “And next time, Addison Turnbell is going to do it while Short makes himself an alibi.”

I gave my head a pitying shake. “You’re losing your grip, light of my life. If there were collusion between Turnbell and Short to murder the woman, why would Short admit being gone from the apartment at the time of the murder? They could have alibied each other simply by swearing neither was out of the other’s sight.”

She blushed again, then made a face at me. “Well, nobody’s perfect.”

“He could have hired a killer, though,” I said thoughtfully. “A pro, I mean.”

“Out of his salary putting together carburetors on an assembly line?” she mimicked me.

I picked up my toast again. The phone rang and Maggie got up to answer it. She caught it on the kitchen extension, which was a wall phone above the counter next to the stove. I was facing that way.

After saying hello, she cupped a palm over the mouthpiece, assumed a martyred expression and said in a low voice. “Grace Fenwick.”

Grace was one of Maggie’s more long-winded friends. I finished my toast to the accompaniment of only occasional monosyllabic comments by Maggie and the steady drone of Grace’s high-pitched voice coming from the phone.

I drained my coffee cup and was just getting ready to get up for more when Maggie gestured me to remain seated, picked up the pot from the stove and carried it over to the table to fill my cup.

“How’d you get away from old gabby so fast?” I inquired.

Maggie placed a finger to her lips and tossed her head in the direction of the phone. Looking that way, I saw that she had not hung it up, but had merely laid it down on the counter.

In a low voice Maggie said, “She’ll never know I’m gone. She never stops talking long enough for an answer. But she might hear you when you talk so loud.”

She went back to the phone. I gazed at her for a time, then left my second cup of coffee untouched, went into the bedroom and put on my necktie and suit coat.

Maggie was still listening to the telephone when I gave her a kiss on the free ear and whispered into it, “You haven’t lost your grip after all, doll. You solved it.” I continued on out.

On my way down to Carondelet I did a considerable amount of thinking. I knew I had a solved case, but proving it was going to be a problem.

I had the advantage that Addison Turnbell hadn’t seemed very bright. Actually he had been more lucky than clever, because his murder scheme had been pretty harebrained. It had contained so many possible pitfalls that its working could be ascribed to nothing less than improbable luck. His mother-in-law could have asked a question that required an answer; his apartment-mate could have returned before he got back; Emma Crowder could have arrived thirty seconds earlier and have seen him leaving by the back gate.

Anyone stupid enough to devise such a murder plan might be stupid enough to fall for a bluff, I decided.

It wasn’t quite nine a.m. when I rang the apartment bell. Addison Turnbell himself answered the door. He was in pajamas and a robe, but apparently had been up for a time, because his hair was combed and he looked freshly shaved. He greeted me without enthusiasm, but without surprise either, and invited me in.

“Where’s your friend?” I inquired as he closed the door behind me.

“Still sleeping. He went out on the town last night after you left us. Have a seat?”

“No, thanks. Mr. Turnbell, you are under arrest for investigation, suspicion of homicide.” I took out the little card and read him his constitutional rights.

When I finished, he gazed at me with his mouth open for some time before finally saying in a high voice. “You’re arresting me for what?”

“For murdering your wife,” I explained. “I think it must have been a spur-of-the-moment thing instead of something you elaborately planned, because the situation that developed was too accidental. All of a sudden you found yourself on the phone with a woman who talked so interminably that she probably wouldn’t miss you if you left her talking to herself even for as long as fifteen minutes. Your apartment-mate was off to the store, so he wouldn’t know you had left the apartment. And your wife was due home in a very few minutes. I imagine you still have a key to the house. You got there just before your wife did, hurriedly upended a couple of drawers in an attempt to make it look like a burglary, stabbed her as she walked in, wiped off your prints and took off for here again. By walking fast you probably made the round trip in no more than ten minutes.”

“You’re crazy,” he said huskily, licking his lips. “You’ll never prove it.”

“Oh, but I have proved it. Not by your mother-in-law, because she still thinks she was talking to you all the time, instead of to herself. Your wife’s neighbor across the alley happened to be trying out a brand-new Polaroid camera from his back porch just as you came out the back door, and he noted the time was exactly five thirty-two p.m. I have the print right here.”

As I reached for my breast pocket, he broke for the kitchen, presumably meaning to flee by the back door. I don’t know where he thought he was going in pajamas, a robe and slippers, but it became an academic question when he tripped over a kitchen chair and sprawled flat on his stomach.

I put a knee on his back and cuffed his wrists behind him before I helped him to his feet.

Originally published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine , July 1973.

When Irma married Stanton Carr, the premarital agreement hadn’t seemed important. While she wasn’t exactly in love with her former boss, she liked him well enough and she expected the marriage to last. At thirty she had long since given up her dream of a romantic Prince Charming and was willing to settle for luxury without romance. She had every intention of being a good wife.

The agreement provided that in the event Irma ever instituted legal proceedings to dissolve the marriage, she would claim no community property, no alimony, and would accept a lump-sum financial settlement of $2,000 for each year the marriage had lasted as a full and complete discharge of all Stanton Carr’s obligations to her. His lawyer had explained to Irma that the agreement would not apply if Stanton brought such an action, but only if she herself decided to end the marriage. Also, if she and Stanton had any children, the agreement would not affect any child-support claims she made, even if she instituted a divorce action herself.

It was understandable why Stanton insisted on such an agreement. His first wife, also a former secretary, had nicked him for a settlement of nearly a million dollars after only two years of marriage. Even though that had been ten years before Irma became his secretary, he was still a little marriage-shy. It had struck Irma as rather silly for Stanton to insist on her signing such an agreement, but he was too skittish about marriage for her to risk refusing.

Signing really didn’t bother her much. She had no intention of ever ending the marriage, and her rights were fully protected in the event he decided to divorce her. The latter seemed inconceivable to her anyway. Although he was quite a handsome man in a distinguished, gray-haired way, she was fifteen years his junior, extremely attractive, and he was evidently quite crazy about her.

Then, five years later, Prince Charming came along. His actual name was Gary Sommers. It was Stanton Carr’s fault that they met.

Stanton was chairman of the board of the Crippled Children’s Association, one of his several charitable activities; and when the organization decided to schedule some swimming classes for crippled children, he volunteered the pool at his and Irma’s Beverly Hills mansion. He also volunteered to locate and pay the fee of a swimming instructor.