Ross MACDONALD - Sleeping Beauty

He lay back against his pillows and looked at the ceiling. The surge of excitement and power that he had felt when he learned of his father’s death had passed through him and left him quite inert. He spoke in a different voice, a questioning tone that didn’t come naturally or easily from him.

“You know my daughter Laurel, don’t you?”

“Yes, I know her slightly.”

“And you like her, don’t you?”

“I like her very much.”

“Would you be willing to do Laurel a service? I’m not asking you to do it for me, but for her.”

“I’ve been trying to, as you know. I’ve been looking for her since Wednesday night.”

“You can stop looking. My wife just told me that Laurel came home last night. I found out in the same minute that my daughter was alive and my father was dead.” He spoke with a kind of egocentric sentimentality, as if he saw himself as a figure in a drama.

My heart was beating hard. “Where has she been?”

“Wandering around, I gather. Trying to get up the nerve to turn herself in.”

“What kind of shape is she in?”

“Not too good. Marian had to put her under sedation. Laurel’s still not over the idea of hurting herself.”

There was a silence between us. Lennox lay very still with his arms stretched out at his sides, as if he was trying to share and understand his daughter’s predicament.

“Did Laurel hurt anyone else?” I said.

“Yes. I’m afraid she did.”

“Did she push Nelson Bagley over the cliff?”

He nodded almost imperceptibly. “We have a cliffside patio with a low wall, and Laurel was sitting there trying to clean the oil off some kind of bird. Bagley must have seen her from the road and wandered down there. He took her by surprise, and she pushed him over.”

“Did Harold Sherry see this happen?”

“I don’t think so. He was up the road in his car. Laurel’s mother was the only witness, fortunately. But Sherry figured out what had happened – I couldn’t keep Laurel quiet, and she was yelling and sobbing – and he asked for a hundred thousand to forget it. I had to go along with it. There were other matters involved, going back a good many years.”

“Do you want to tell me about those other matters?”

“No, I don’t. I was willing to pay a hundred thousand to keep the whole thing quiet, and I still am.”

“Who suggested the kidnapping ploy?”

“I did. It fitted in with what the family knew about Sherry. And I couldn’t think of any other way to raise the money.”

“It had another advantage,” I said. “If you had managed to kill Sherry yesterday, nobody would have blamed you.”

He gave me a sharply interested look, but kept his mouth shut. I said:

“I still don’t understand why Laurel pushed Bagley over the cliff.”

“Neither do I, really. My wife thinks Laurel may have remembered him from the time that she was a little girl. Maybe she even saw him shoot Allie Russo.”

“Was Laurel in the Russo house when the shooting occurred?”

“It’s possible that she was. Allie Russo used to baby-sit for Laurel.”

“Did Allie baby-sit for Laurel the night she was killed?”

“I don’t remember.”

“It was the night before you went to sea on the Canaan Sound. You should be able to remember what happened your last night ashore.”

“Maybe I should, but I don’t. I was drinking all day. They practically had to pour me on board the ship.”

“If your daughter was at the Russo house that night, somebody must have taken her there. Did you?”

“I said I don’t remember.”

“Wasn’t Allie Russo your girl at the time?”

“No. She was not.”

“If Allie wasn’t your girl, why did you shoot Nelson Bagley?”

Lennox sat up abruptly. “Has Somerville been talking?”

“It doesn’t matter who’s been talking. The question is why you shot Bagley.”

He grimaced and peered from side to side like a man entrapped in the maze of his own nature. “So it was Somerville. Too bad for Somerville. All right. Allie was my girl for a short time while I was waiting for sea duty. When I went aboard the ship in Long Beach that night, I didn’t know she’d been killed. And I didn’t find out for several weeks, when our first mail came aboard in Asiatic waters. They’d made me the mail officer, so I got to it fast. Somebody sent me a newspaper clipping about Allie’s murder, and it gave a full description of the main suspect.”

“Which fitted Bagley.”

“That’s right. Whoever sent the clipping to me sent one to Somerville, too. It made him so jittery that he accidentally ruptured one of the gas tanks. And I can tell you it did nothing for me. I called Bagley up to the communications shack and got a forty-five out of the safe and held it on him while I asked him some questions. He admitted he was there at her house that night. When I showed him the newspaper clipping, he broke and ran. I followed him, and without really intending to, I squeezed off a shot. It hit him, and the flash set fire to the ship. But the fire was really Somerville’s fault – he was the one that ruptured the gas tank. If Somerville wants to make an issue of it at this late date, he’s the one who has a lot to lose. I’m the head of the company as of this morning.”

But Lennox looked around like a dauphin who had waited too long and was already weary at his coronation. I wondered how long he would exercise the power his father had had, and I thought not long. I said:

“Who sent those clippings to you and Somerville?”

“I don’t know.”

“Were there any messages with them?”

“Not in mine.”

“Any writing on the envelope?”

“No. The address was typed.”

“Fleet Post Office address?”

“That’s right.”

“Why were those clippings sent to you, do you think?”

“To make us suffer,” he said.

“Then whoever sent them must have known that you and Somerville had been close to Allie Russo, isn’t that right?”

“I suppose so.”

“How many people knew you were her lover?”

“Nobody knew.”

“What about the children? Laurel and Tom?”

Lennox leaned toward me, his eyes wide, as if he had been hit by a long shot fired from below the curve of time. “You think that little boy sent the clippings? Or Laurel? She was only three, and the boy wasn’t too much older.”

“They were both old enough to talk.”

Lennox lay back and absorbed the idea. His face became pale and anxious. He gnawed his lips.

“Have you thought of someone they might have talked to?” I said.

“No. There isn’t anyone.” He turned restlessly on the bed. “I asked you before if you’d do a service for my daughter.”

“You haven’t told me what it is.”

“Would you be willing to take care of her for a bit, maybe take her on a little trip?”

“I’d have to think about it.”

“There’s no time to think about it. I’m talking about right now, this morning. I can provide you with a jet and pilot, and I’ll pay you well.”

“Where do you want me to take her?”

“Out of the country. Central America would probably be best – we have connections down there.”

“It isn’t a good idea,” I said. “If Laurel killed Bagley, it’s better for her to stay here and face her day in court. Given the circumstances, and her emotional condition, she isn’t likely to be convicted of murder.”

“What will they do to her?”

“I can’t predict that. With the kind of lawyers and doctors you can afford, you should be able to get the charge reduced, maybe have her put on probation in her husband’s custody.”

“Would her husband take that kind of responsibility?”