Dead, She Was Beautiful Read online

  13

  HAGEN rolled the unconscious man over on to his face in the driveway and, straddling him, began to administer artificial respiration. Wayne Wishart needed fresh air, lots of it, more than his own shallow breathing would supply at the moment. Hagen pumped away rhythmically with the old refrain—out goes the bad air, in comes the good—until the lungs beneath his palms were doing their own work. Wishart began to give great sobbing gasps.

  Satisfied that he had done as much as he could and that nature would now take over, Hagen waddled to one side and began to do a little deep breathing for himself. He felt ready to drop and every muscle ached from this latest task he had imposed upon them.

  He surveyed Wishart grimly. “I sure hope you’re worth it, buddy. I’ve had nothing but trouble ever since I heard your name.”

  As he began to get his energy back and become more cognizant of his surroundings, Hagen discovered that he was sitting on some hard object other than the driveway. He put his hand down to investigate and discovered it was a book. He couldn’t imagine at first what a book was doing lying in the middle of the driveway until he recalled that Wishart had been carrying one. Apparently it had been in the pocket of his topcoat during his attempt at suicide and Hagen had unwittingly dumped it out while dragging him from the car.

  In the darkness, he couldn’t tell what kind of a book it was but his curiosity was piqued. Why should Wishart carry a book to his rendezvous with death? He found his flashlight and examined it. Hagen whistled softly. The book, gilt-edged and leather-bound and richly embossed, was a diary. He recognised the handwriting. It was Hilda’s.

  Since there was no one to stop him, Hagen put it into his pocket for perusal later on.

  Wayne Wishart was beginning to moan and turn his head from side to side as the effects of the deadly gas lessened. Hagen decided that it was time he secured a little professional assistance; his own knowledge of carbon monoxide poisoning was strictly academic. With a tired sigh, he pulled Wishart up by his armpits, stood him erect momentarily and then allowed the other man to fold across his shoulders. Wishart wasn’t a very robust individual, but in Hagen’s condition he weighed like Man o’ War. Staggering under his burden, Hagen crossed the concrete to the porch and tried the back door. It was locked.

  In the dark he couldn’t locate the bell immediately so he kicked at the panel several times, figuring he would raise somebody. He did. There was the sound of high heels crossing the linoleum, then the drape was pushed aside, the exterior light came on and Avis Gill peeped out at him. Her eyes widened so much that Hagen feared her contact lenses would fall out. When she saw Wishart’s red head hanging upside down, the last glow of colour left her wax-doll face and her lower lip vanished between her teeth, as if she was about to burst out crying. And then she disappeared into the house, leaving Hagen and his shoulder-sagging load standing outside.

  “Great!” he said between his teeth. “Think I’ve got nothing better to do but stand here all night?” Angrily he kicked some more at the locked door.

  More foot-noises came from inside and this time it was Rosemary Wishart who peered at him through the glass. Half-bowed to the ground by now, Hagen lifted his head to glare and bellow, “Open the door, will you!”

  She did. She wasn’t panicky the way the secretary had been. Instead, she barred his way with a pistol only a few inches from his nose. In a voice that was remarkably well under control, she announced, “If you don’t stand where you are, I’ll shoot!”

  “Another minute and I’ll die on the spot and save you the trouble. Let me in!”

  “What have you done to Wayne? Is he dead?”

  “Not yet. But if you don’t let me in—”

  That did it. Concern for her son overrode her fear of Hagen. Mrs. Wishart stood aside and Hagen stumbled into the kitchen. He croaked out a request for directions to Wishart’s bedroom and, bandy-legged, followed the woman through innumerable doors and down a corridor that seemed endless until at last they reached the destination he sought. With no attempt to be gentle—it was beyond him even if he had cared—he dumped the semiconscious Wishart on to the bed.

  Mrs. Wishart fell to her knees beside her son, clutching him with a hand that incongruously still held the pistol. “Wayne! Wayne! What has he done to you?”

  “Saved his life, that’s what he’s done,” said Hagen sourly. He discovered Avis Gill staring at Wishart from the hall and he growled at her, “Quick, bring some whisky!” She scuttled off.

  Mrs. Wishart glared at him across her unconscious son. “You’re going to pay for this, Hagen. Just as soon as I can call the police—”

  “Take my advice and call a doctor instead,” Hagen said. “And make it one who’ll keep his mouth shut, either for money or friendship. You call the cops and they’re going to want to know why your son tried to commit suicide.”

  “Suicide?” she echoed and her harsh face went suddenly slack. “Wayne tried to commit …”

  Hagen nodded. “In the garage, by letting the engine of his station wagon run. I got him out just in time.” He didn’t bother to explain how he happened to be so handy and it didn’t occur to her to ask. “You don’t have to take my word for it. He’ll tell you himself—or if he won’t, a doctor will.”

  “Suicide,” Mrs. Wishart said softly. She gave the impression of not hearing anything Hagen had said after that one word. Her fingers, relaxing, let the gun slide on to the bed. She didn’t notice.

  Avis Gill came back, almost running, with a generous glass of whisky. “It’s Scotch,” she panted. “It’s all I could find—”

  “It’ll do,” said Hagen, and drained the glass. “Um, good.”

  She gaped at him. “But that was for Wayne!”

  “I need it more than he does.” Hagen handed her back the empty glass. “Who’s the family doctor—and can he be trusted to keep his mouth shut?”

  “Why—” she stammered, unable to follow his rapid-fire change of subject, “I guess that Dr. Hebb—he’s the one who usually—”

  Hagen looked at Mrs. Wishart for confirmation. She seemed to be snapping out of her daze. She said, “Dr. Hebb will be fine. Just tell him that there’s been an accident and that Wayne is hurt. Don’t tell him how.”

  “I don’t know how myself,” Avis Gill said. Hagen pushed her firmly out into the hall and closed the door.

  “Now,” he said, “we’ve got to have a little talk, Mrs, Wishart.”

  “Later. After I’ve taken care of Wayne.”

  “He can wait and this can’t.” He paused. “I’ll lay it on the line for you. Your son tried to commit suicide tonight, right in the middle of the investigation of his wife’s murder. As of now, you, he, I—and maybe Miss Gill—are the only people who know that. Add the doctor and you have five, which is a nice cosy number, not too big for comfort.”

  She studied him narrowly. “What are you getting at?”

  “The only one of the five who hasn’t any real reason to keep his mouth shut about tonight is me. In fact, I stand to gain by doing my duty as a citizen and reporting the whole story to the police.”

  “You wouldn’t do that.”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  “Because if you intended to go to the police, you wouldn’t be telling me about it in this way,” she stated calmly.

  Hagen grinned. “You ought to take up fortune telling. You’re partly right, Mrs. Wishart. I don’t intend to go to the police—if I get what I want out of you and your son.”

  “Just what do you want, Hagen? Or am I being naïve?”

  “I want you to hire me to investigate Hilda’s death.”

  She nodded slowly and then rose to her feet. “Just a moment,” she said and left the room. Hagen waited, wondering what she was doing. He found out immediately. Mrs. Wishart returned with her purse and a sheaf of currency in her hand. She said coldly, “I have only about two hundred dollars in the house. Now take it and get out!”

  Hagen didn’t touch the money. He said, “I know t
his is going to come as a surprise to you, but I’m not interested in the dough. This isn’t blackmail that I’m proposing, Mrs. Wishart, at least not the ordinary kind.”

  “I don’t understand you,” she muttered, still holding out the money.

  “I’m not deep. But I need a client real bad, so I can have a solid footing in this case. Up to now, nobody’s wanted me—which is really a shame because, as you can see, my rates are very low.”

  “Am I to gather,” she asked, “that you will work for nothing—and keep silent about Wayne’s, ah, accident tonight—simply if I agree to hire you?”

  “Well, let’s back up a little,” Hagen amended. “I’ll work for nothing unless I come up with some results. In that case, it will be my usual fee—fifty bucks a day plus expenses. The rest of what you said is correct, though.”

  “I’d be a fool to turn you down, wouldn’t I?”

  “Well, yes,” Hagen admitted modestly. “That’s the way it looks to me. And since I know that you’re no fool, Mrs. Wishart, I’ll consider myself retained as of, well, let’s say a half-hour ago—so I can use the old duty-to-my-client excuse if the police ever want to know why I didn’t tell them about Wayne’s, ah, accident.” He grinned at her.

  She smiled back at him, a bit grimly. “You think of everything, don’t you, Hagen?”

  “Not exactly. I still haven’t thought of a good second reason why Wayne should try to kill himself tonight.”

  “Second reason?” Mrs. Wishart raised her eyebrows questioningly.

  “Well, the first reason is obvious. He murdered Hilda and didn’t want to face the music. But since he’s my client, we have to rule that out and find the second reason. Got any suggestions?”

  “Well …” She hesitated, obviously groping for straws. “I wouldn’t be surprised that Wayne was so upset about Hilda—yes, that’s it, of course. He was extremely despondent tonight—he misses Hilda terribly you know—and so, of course …”

  Hagen nodded gravely. With his own opinion of Hilda, he couldn’t quite buy this story. But there was no point in arguing with Mrs. Wishart about it. She didn’t know any more than he did, or—if she did—she didn’t intend to tell him. Even so, Hagen preferred an evasive client to no client at all; they were too hard to come by these days to let little matters such as mutual confidence upset him.

  So he said, “Well, that’s possible and it won’t hurt to go on that assumption for the present.” He was prepared to go into more extensive probing when he heard the doorbell ring. He guessed it was the doctor and Mrs. Wishart hurried off to see that he was admitted.

  Left alone with the torpid Wishart, Hagen picked the woman’s pistol up off the bedclothes. It was a .32, a standard purse model bulldog, loaded. He reflected that he seemed to have a penchant lately for relieving women of their firearms, but it certainly wouldn’t do to leave a gun lying around in this house. Wayne Wishart might be tempted to use it. A man who tries suicide once finds the second time easier.

  Hagen strolled into the bathroom. He raised the porcelain cover to the back of the toilet and dropped the pistol into the water. He flushed the bowl to make certain the gun didn’t block the mechanism and returned to the bedroom. He didn’t think anybody would find the weapon in a hurry, and he felt safer all around. He would have preferred to lock it up in his desk drawer with Dagne’s pistol—Larry Beldorian’s, actually—but that would involve transporting it across town. At this point in his career, Hagen didn’t want to chance being caught armed.

  The doctor, a contemporary image of Mrs. Wishart, bustled in and commenced to work. Hagen hung around only long enough to hear his prognosis confirmed—Wayne Wishart was in no danger—and then he effaced himself, leaving Wishart in the doctor’s hands and the doctor, in turn, in Mrs. Wishart’s hands. He thought she could be counted on to seal the doctor’s lips.

  On the way down the hall, he overhead the last of a telephone conversation. Avis Gill was telling someone that Mr. Wishart would be unable to keep his appointment this evening, due to an accident. “Perhaps tomorrow. Yes, we’ll call you. Goodnight.”

  Hagen had no way of knowing to whom she had been speaking. He half-suspected it was Jack but he didn’t question her. It was the wrong moment and he wasn’t sure Avis was the person to ask, anyway. A question of that sort was mainly a matter of intuition and timing, asking the right person at the right moment. He could wait.

  Instead, he went for a place where he could be alone and wound up outside in the cabana by the pool. He sat down on the chaise longue that Hilda had occupied the previous evening, put his feet up and relaxed pleasurably. Then, almost immediately, he rose, struck with an idea.

  He crossed the lawn to the archery course and opened the cabinet that held the bows and arrows. One of the bow racks was empty and he knew that one of the arrows was gone also, though its absence was not apparent since all the quivers were filled. Hagen chose one of the deadly shafts and hefted it in his hand absently. He did not take down a bow.

  Turning, he walked the length of the course to the gaily-painted target, backed by a bale of straw, that stood on a large easel. He paced back about ten yards and holding the arrow like a spear, hurled it at the target. It bounced to the ground harmlessly. It did the same on the next two attempts. But on the third, by fudging a trifle on the distance, Hagen was able to make the steel tip stick in the canvas.

  Thoughtfully, he walked back to the chaise longue. If he, strictly a novice, could make an arrow stick in the target in that manner, a practised knife-thrower probably could do a great deal better. It was an idea with possibilities.

  Still musing over this, Hagen stretched out once more on the comfortable patio furniture and took Hilda’s diary out of his pocket. He laid the book in his lap and groped for a cigarette. Without an effort on his part, the volume fell open to a well-thumbed page. His eyes skipped over the familiar handwriting.

  “Holy smoke!” he exclaimed and sat bolt upright, any lassitude vanished. Incredulously, he re-read the page. And then read it again.

  Under the date of June 8, the entry began like this: Today I killed Bruce …

  14

  THE diary was a thing of beauty in itself, quite apart from the treasure it contained. Ordinary book size, it was of English manufacture, expensive but not custom made. Blank editions were probably sold at “better” shops all over the world. The pages were edged in gilt as shining as Hilda’s hair. The book was bound in limp black leather, embossed with a golden floral design. Intertwined leaves and stems proceeded in bright intricacy up the spine to blossom into formal red and blue flowers, gold centred, on the front and back covers. It was a glistening thing. Obviously, Hilda had valued her secrets.

  At the moment, however, Mort Hagen’s appreciation for the book was quite apart from its aesthetic qualities. He was hardly a lover of books for their own sake, anyway. The contents were what mattered to him—and in Hilda’s diary he realized that he had struck a gold mine.

  Today I killed Bruce. … Nobody had to urge Hagen to read further.

  After he had finished, he remained in the cabana a while. He still couldn’t quite believe everything he had read, nor could he fit the picture together, not exactly. The diary was both a help and a challenge. A help, because it supplied him with information he hadn’t possessed heretofore; a challenge, because it didn’t supply him more.

  The entry that had caught his attention was probably the most explicit thing about the record, Otherwise, the book was inclined to be vague. There wasn’t even a year mentioned to hang the dates on, although the diary began precisely on January 1 and concluded the following December 31. But Hilda hadn’t dealt in specifics. There were no items at all of the type: Today I went shopping and bought a pair of earrings; or, Today John Doe and I saw Love in a Bucket and went dancing at the Diablo Room afterwards. Instead, the diary dealt with longings, emotions, dreams. Hagen was surprised. He hadn’t imagined that Hilda thought so much.

  There were a few proper names and pl
ace names, mentioned casually in passing, and from their flavour Hagen wondered if Hilda hadn’t spent the year covered by the diary in Hawaii or some other place with similar atmosphere. He couldn’t remember her ever mentioning such a sojourn as occurring previous to their marriage. But, of course, that had been three years ago.

  Bruce was mentioned several times, the most prominent name in the diary, previous to the June 8 entry. Again specifics were lacking, including Bruce’s last name. The suspicion occurred to Hagen that Bruce might be a pet frog or spaniel that Hilda had finally been forced to put out of the way. He discarded this notion when he read the description of one particular dream which involved Bruce. No, he decided, Bruce had to be a man, quite a man. And from the tone of the entries, he thought that Hilda had been in love with him, as much as she was capable of being in love with anyone besides herself.

  After the fatal entry, Bruce’s name vanished entirely from the diary, except by implication. On July 8 the entry was quite short: One month today. I’ll do it again! The second sentence was heavily underscored. And later on, there was a long essay on her failure to feel regret. What she might be expected to regret was obvious, Hagen thought.

  So what it all added up to was that Hilda, at some period in the not-too-distant past, had killed somebody named Bruce. Where, why, how, and who Bruce was were questions the diary didn’t answer. And Hilda was no longer around to satisfy Hagen’s curiosity.

  “It’s all wrong,” he muttered aloud, frowning at the blue waters of the pool where her life had ended. “A person who kills once usually kills again. They don’t get killed themselves, except …”

  The exception that came to mind was vendetta. Had someone tracked Hilda down and murdered her in vengeance for Bruce? Well, it was possible—particularly if the roots of this Bruce affair were buried in some far-off exotic soil where such behaviour was common—but in Southern California it sounded a little far-fetched. Another notion occurred to him and brought a grimace with it. Had Hilda’s death been a mistake? Had someone else been the intended victim, perhaps Hagen himself, and the scheme miscarried?