Thinking about it, she began to pace. The entire plan had been so diabolically clever, and yet three of the people involved were totally incongruous. Certainly their breed was not capable of deliberate, calculated murder, even for a million dollars; and surely they would let her go.
She was neither stupid nor naive, but the way it happened, who could possibly say that she should have seen it coming? From her bedroom she had heard a sound which, looking back, was nothing more sinister than Debby going out by way of the kitchen door. It must have been one of those days when her husband, working in another part of town, did not call for Debby in his gardening truck, and she walked to Sunset Boulevard instead and caught a bus; but it was an odd coincidence, or perhaps intuition, that she had been curiously uneasy.
She had checked the kitchen door and had found it locked. She had then gone back up to her bedroom and was in the process of applying her makeup when the phone rang. It was Claire Vanderhoff who lived in the big stone house next door. Claire was about her age, perhaps a couple of years older. She had been divorced and was recently married to Dwight Vanderhoff of the Vanderhoff Steamship Company.
The company was founded by Dwight’s father who had left him the house and a few millions to boot, it was said. Dwight was vice-president in charge of the West Coast office, while his older brother was president and ran the big show out of New York. The Vanderhoffs were alone in the house, but for a live-in servant couple, the man doubling as butler-chauffeur. The Vanderhoffs, complaining that they could not get reliable help, had discharged their servants about three months previously, and hired new ones. Apparently they were pleased with the present pair.
The Tillmans had been dinner guests at the Vanderhoffs on occasion, and vice versa. They were all members of the tennis club and often played doubles on the Tillmans’ court. Born of proximity and initiated by the Vanderhoffs, the friendship had not been deep, but they were at least a convivial foursome who shared a common interest in tennis. Over cocktails, Stan and Dwight had talked Big Business, while Claire and Andrea chatted of this and that, mostly surface trivia.
On the phone, Claire had sounded breathless. “Andrea, something dreadful has happened! Dwight said he wasn’t feeling well and I was taking him up to bed when he suddenly gasped, and then collapsed. He looks gray, he looks awful! I can hardly find a pulse. Andrea, I’m all alone. Our couple, Nita and Kirk, have gone to the movies. I’ve sent for a doctor, but meanwhile I think he’s dying and I don’t know what to do. Could you and Stan come over to help me?”
“Oh, Claire, of course! But Stan went up to Sacramento for a conference with the governor — thought we told you. I’m all alone myself at the moment, but I’ll be right over, dear.”
“Please hurry, Andrea! To save time, cut across the grounds and come through the hedge behind the tennis court. You know, that little gap.”
“Yes, yes! Don’t panic, Claire. I’ll be there in half a minute!”
She had raced from the house, and darting across the lawn to the space in the hedge behind the court, she had squeezed through and dashed to the front door.
Claire had opened at the first ring. “This way, darling,” she said. “I’m just pitiful when it comes to an emergency. I go all to pieces!”
They crossed the livingroom, which was bleakly lighted and in gloomy shadow, heavy draperies drawn over the windows. Though the atmosphere was oppressive, Andrea had no sense of danger or menace, only a feeling that the scene was incomprehensively subdued, as if they were to be confronted, not by Dwight in a state of collapse, but by a candle-ringed coffin.
They turned into a dim hallway, at the end of which she could see the stairs, though not a sign of Dwight. Then, although she did not actually hear a sound, she had the impression that someone was behind her. She hesitated. Peering over her shoulder, she had a fleeting glimpse of Kirk, the butler-chauffeur, his upraised hand clutching a towel.
Fingers closed around the back of her neck and at the same instant the towel, moist and malodorous, was clamped smotheringly over her face.
After a timeless void, she awoke in this cell of a room on the third floor. She was lying supine on the bed, her shoes removed, her watch gone. Claire was seated at the foot of the bed, Dwight standing behind her. The other two, Kirk and Nita, shorn of their servants’ uniforms, hovered just above her, observing with the clinical expressions of doctor and nurse attending a patient.
“Now, Andrea,” said Dwight, “you’re in this cozy pad on the third floor and you have nothing to fear. We’re not going to hurt you, not unless you become rebellious, that is.” He was a beefy man of middle height. Close to forty, his florid, puffy-eyed face was marked by the erosions of self-indulgence. “You may still be a little groggy from the drug,” he continued, “but you’ve only been out for twenty minutes. And while you were under, we broke into your house and set the stage, so to speak. Then we left a ransom note for Stanford. It demands a million dollars, a truly modest sum for the return of such a precious jewel.”
Andrea was a bit dizzy and slightly nauseated, but her mind was clear and, though with astonishment, she understood well enough. “I can’t believe this is real,” she said. “I can’t believe you would do such a thing. You practically run Vanderhoff Shipping and you’ve got millions.” Aided by Claire, she propped herself up, against the headboard. “Dwight, I thought we were friends. Have you gone crazy?”
He shook his head. “Andrea, like everyone else, you’ve been snowed by the illusion that I’m rich. My older brother, Floyd Vanderhoff, runs the company from New York. He is very rich but I’m just a figurehead, and extremely poor, by our standards.”
Andrea gasped and stared. “I still don’t get it,” she said.
“Very well, I’ll explain,” he said smugly. “You see, I had shown no inclination to work, and my father knew that, without money or position, I would become a glorified bum, thus defacing the untarnished image of the Vanderhoff name. So he gave me the bogus title of vice-president in charge of the West Coast branch of the company. I have a grand office and a big front, but absolutely no active function.
“As long as I check in sober every morning and remain on the premises until closing, I receive three hundred a week and the use of this house, owned and maintained by the company, complete with two servants of my choice. But Andrea, three hundred a day would not fill my extravagant needs, let alone three hundred a week. Right?
“So we have conceived this invincible plan to relieve Stan Tillman of a million tax-free dollars. As friends and neighbors, we had a built-in spy system, and now we can watch from our windows to see if the cops are arriving to campaign our entrapment. And for a clincher, try this one: we can’t miss knowing which way Stan will jump at all times, because we have a tap on your phone!
“Beautiful, oh beautiful!” he said. Beaming, he rubbed his palms together joyously.
“I can’t understand,” said Andrea gravely, “why you would confess all of this to me, and reveal your identity, unless you intend to kill me.”
“My dear Andrea, we could be classed as kidnappers, perhaps, though you came here of your own accord. But killers, never. No, we can give you the whole blueprint of our scheme, but in the end it will be of no value to you. Because by the time a certain message reaches Tillman, informing him that you are only next door in this room, we will be lost beyond a trace in a remote corner of the globe where no questions are asked. And the only requirement is enough coin to pay the tab. Now do you understand?”