the ice cold nude

“Everything was fine. Willie made the fake tiara and Patty passed it on to her sister. Then Louise and Marty told her the hell with her—they weren’t handing over the real tiara once they got their hands on it. They were going to keep it and whatever money they made on it. That put Patty in a real jam. She couldn’t go back to Byers and say Louise had double-crossed her—because she was Louise to little Willie—right?”

Schell’s face- contorted for a moment. “I guess so,” he said after a while.

“So she talked Willie into making a second fake tiara —she must have had a good excuse that some dreadful accident had happened to the first one. She’d tried it on in the bathroom and lost it in the plumbing or something—” “She’d need something better than that!” Schell said in a pained voice. “Oh, all right—she came up with something that was good enough for litde Willie to swallow.” “It wouldn’t be too hard,” I said. “Remember, he was crazy for her.”

“Are you talking about our Mr. Byers, by any chance?” Elmo asked suddenly. “It doesn’t seem possible!” “Willie was more sinned against than sinner, Mr. Elmo,” I said solemnly. “Anyway—” I turned back to Schell. “Then, I guess Patty worked on him some more —as Louise, she would have to make the switch—and told him it was too dangerous. Too many things could go wrong—what if she fumbled it at the crucial moment and was caught? What if the switch was discovered before she’d gotten out of the store and they insisted that everybody there be searched? She had a brand new idea, much better and much safer—foolproof in fact.” “Can’t you condense this a little?” Schell snarled at me. “I’m going around in circles already!”

“Patty knew from her good friend and confidante, Tamara O’Keefe,” I said cheerfully, “that Elmo’s jewelry store was in a bad way financially—like just about flat broke.”

“You are gravely misinformed, Mr. Boyd,” Elmo said acidly. “I shall investigate the source of these scurrilous rumors immediately!”

“You want to do it real fast, Mr. Elmo,” I said politely, “Because I have a feeling you won’t be around very long after this morning.”

“Get to the point!” the lieutenant snapped.

“She told Willie about this—suggested he approach Elmo with a nice snug little larceny proposition. That Elmo should switch the fake tiara Byers would give him for the real one, before the beauty contest people ever arrived. Then Byers should spot the fake in the window later that morning and it would appear one of the beauty contest people must have stolen the tiara. The insurance company would pay up and they would divide the money equally. Elmo would still have his tiara, and later, Byers could take the stones out of the setting and rework them into another piece of valuable jewelry.”

“Lieutenant,” Elmo said sorrowfully, “I’m afraid this man is insane.”

“So am I,” Schell said hopelessly. “Is there more to this, Boyd?”

“It was kind of cute,” I said in genuine admiration. “So the real Louise Lamont comes into the store with the first fake tiara, and neatly switches it for the second fake tiara. I bet Patty spent the whole day screaming with laughter. So when Louise got back to Marty Estell, the fake wouldn’t fool him for too long, right? So once he discovered they’d been gypped, he’d start looking for whoever double-crossed him. The logical suspect would be Louise herself—and that’s what Patty hoped for. But when Marty didn’t kill her sister, she had to do it herself.”

“And she put the second fake tiara on Louise’s head as a pointer toward Marty Estell?” the lieutenant asked.

“As a second bet maybe,” I said. “But that tiara was pointing right at Byers. Patty figured you’d be convinced that it was Louise who had stolen the tiara, double-crossed her partner with a second fake, and had been murdered for her trouble.”

“Lieutenant,” Elmo said frostily, “you surely don’t expect me to sit here and calmly listen to these monstrous allegations against my own integrity?”

“You’ll listen to Boyd until he’s finished,” Schell said curtly. “What else, Boyd?”

“Elmo yelled loud and long the insurance company wasn’t going to pay the claim,” I went on. “But his lawyer told him they’d pay from the very beginning—it was just a smoke screen. Asking your advice on a private eye was another smoke screen. As soon as he decently could, he told me the insurance company was paying the claim after all—his lawyer had somehow come up with a gimmick, so his deal with me was off. No five grand if I found the tiara—I could keep the grand he’d already paid me.”

“We can check all this later,” Schell said abruptly. “Where’s the real tiara?—that’s what I want to know.” “I figure it’s where Marty Estell was,” I told him.

He gaped at me. “Marty’s in the morgue!”

“The same theory applies,” I added quickly. “Where was the safest place for Marty to hole up—the place that nobody would think of looking? Back in Patty La-mont’s apartment.”

“The tiara’s not there,” Schell said in a defeated voice. “We ripped the whole place apart.”

“It’s the principle, Lieutenant,” I reminded him. “If you were Mr. Elmo now, and you had a hot tiara to hide someplace nobody would ever dream of searching for it— where would you put it?”

Schell looked at me for about five seconds, then nodded slowly. “Mr. Elmo,” he said formally, “I’d like to take a look inside your vault.”

The jeweler seemed to shrink suddenly to an even smaller size. He took off his gold-rimmed glasses slowly and put them on the desk, then rubbed his eyes with trembling fingers.

“Yes,” he said. “It’s there. Boyd was right about the deal Byers suggested to me—and I took it. I was desperate—not that it’s any excuse of course.”

“You want to come and get it for us now, Mr. Elmo?” Schell suggested firmly.

“Of course,” he nodded. “I can see I sadly underestimated you, Mr. Boyd.”

“It was that crack about having reservations as to whether you'd received sufficient services for that thousand dollars,” I told him sincerely. “It worried me—a dissatisfied client is always bad for business.”

Elmo smiled bleakly. “I can see 1 should have kept my big mouth shut—as you might put it, Mr. Boyd.” “I’m glad you didn’t,” I said. “Otherwise I probably never would have gotten your tiara back for you.”

Schell got onto his feet and gestured to Elmo. “Let’s go open that vault,” he said crisply.

The little man got out of his chair and made his way around the desk, and I watched the two of them walk toward the vault. Elmo wore elevator shoes, I noticed, and they brought him to somewhere real close to five feet. I figured Schell could have the rest of it, and if I moved real quick right now I could be out of town before he’d even had time to notice.

My fast getaway got sabotaged almost before it got started. I stopped beside the desk of a redhead who was studiously ignoring me.

“School’s out, honey,” I said. “Everybody go home.” “Are you talking to me?” she said in a frigid voice. “It’s a long story, but it’s true,” I said in a kindly voice. “Your Mr. Elmo stole his own tiarra and the Lieutenant’s on his way now to get it out of the vault. I don’t think Mr. Elmo will be back for some time.”

Her eyes widened as she lifted her head and looked at me. “Is that true, Danny? You wouldn’t kid me about something like that, would you?”

“It’s true,” I told her. “You hear about Patty?” “Yes,” she said, nodding gravely. “Was that what fouled up our date last night?”