“Officially I’m a medical assistant to the District Attorney, specializing in psychiatry. They only call me in when they want to determine the sanity of a witness or a suspect.”
“But you’ve done all sorts of things unofficially. You’re supposed to advise them on psychological aspects of a case, aren’t you? And this case has psychological aspects. The police will never get the hang of it unless you help them. There are only three people who could have killed that man, and Rod’s one of them. The police are playing eena, meena, mina, mo. They’ve counted out Wanda and Leon already. They’re going for Rod. You must help. Please!”
Tranquilly, Basil poured a second cup of coffee and lit his first cigarette of the day. “What makes you think that?”
“I don’t think it. I know it. Partly because of the knife. They just can’t get over the fact that it belonged to Rod and came from a surgical bag he carried on stage. It would’ve been so damnably easy for Rod to carry the knife in the bag, slip it into Vladimir when Rod’s back was turned toward the audience, and then go on with the play as if nothing had happened.”
Basil drew on his cigarette. “I don’t think you’re being quite frank with me.”
“Why not?”
“The police knew all this last night. There was no talk of arresting Rod then.”
Pauline looked at Rod across the table. “Shall we tell him?”
“We have no business to bother you with all this, Dr. Willing,” muttered Rod. “But Pauline would come and . . .”
Pauline cut him short and turned back to Basil. “They think they have a motive.”
“Yes?”
“You remember Milhau said Bernhardt used to ask her ‘boy friends’ to play Vladimir? The police didn’t miss that point. They think Wanda knew the dead man. They don’t believe her denial. He could have been a lover . . .”
Basil turned to Rod. “Would that give you a motive?”
“No, it wouldn’t!” Rod answered sharply. “But the police seem to think it would. And so does Pauline.”
“How can I help it?” cried Pauline. “You’re always with her! You brought her to that art gallery yesterday. There’s been so much talk that the police got hold of it as soon as the case broke. And it would explain—a lot of things. . . .”
Basil turned back to Rod. “Let’s hear your side of it.”
Rod flushed uncomfortably and thrust his hands in his pockets. “I suppose you’d think me an utter heel if I said she ran after me, wouldn’t you?”
Pauline’s brows were daintily skeptical. “We should indeed! It was you who ran after her. I saw you.”
“Well, I didn’t.” Rod appealed to Basil. “I know it sounds incredible as well as shabby, but she did come after me all the time. I didn’t even like her.”
“Do you mean she was in love with you?” demanded Basil a little ungently.
“No,” answered Rod, surprisingly. “That’s the funny part of it. I don’t believe she cared a rap for me at all!”
“How modest!” murmured Pauline.
“Well, she never—er—made any passes at me!” Rod laughed. “I do sound like a maiden with reluctant feet, etc., don’t I? But there was something queer about the whole thing. Whenever I was in a public place—a restaurant, or a theater, or an art gallery—Wanda was always there too, asking me to get her a cocktail or light her cigarette, or something, chattering away and rolling her eyes at me. She was always asking me to take her places, too. Somehow I just couldn’t get rid of her—in public. But if we were alone together, her whole manner changed, and she let me alone. It was just the opposite of the usual thing. I couldn’t shake her in public without being rude, and I couldn’t be rude because I was dependent on her for my job as her leading man. She and Milhau were giving me my first chance on Broadway. If she had been in love with me I could have understood it better. But I swear she wasn’t. It was an awful nuisance—especially when Pauline noticed it. And now, it’s worse than a nuisance. If the police can establish that Vladimir was Wanda’s lover, they’ll assume I had a motive to kill him—jealousy. That, plus the knife, makes a pretty strong case against me. It would be a sweet mess to be accused of killing a man for the sake of a woman you’ve never cared a hoot about!”
“Wouldn’t Wanda deny that you had been in love with her?” suggested Basil.
“Well, would she? That’s the whole point. I don’t know what she’d do, because I don’t know why she chased me.”
“Rod!” Pauline was impatient. “Surely you’ve heard about the bees and flowers. You know perfectly well why she chased you.”
“But it wasn’t that at all! How many times do I have to say so before you’ll believe it?”
“Anyway, that isn’t the point,” went on Pauline. “The point is that she’s got you involved in a murder case. I don’t know why I should care—but I do.”
They smiled at each other. Something about that smile made Basil regret he had left his twenties behind him.
“Are you two engaged?” he asked bluntly.
A delicate pink color came into Pauline’s cheeks. Rod dropped his eyelids.
“I seem to have said the wrong thing,” went on Basil, “but I really can’t help you unless I have some idea of the relationships involved.”
Pauline crushed her cigarette in the ash tray. “Shall we tell him that, too?”
“I suppose we’ll have to.” Rod was embarrassed.
Pauline looked at Basil. “We were engaged until yesterday afternoon just before I ran into you at the art gallery. We’re not engaged now, and we don’t care anything about each other only—I don’t want Rod arrested for murder.”
Basil was beginning to understand why Pauline had looked so pale and tired yesterday. “Why was this engagement broken?”
“Oh, well—incompatibility—mutual consent and so forth—”
“What was the real reason?”
Pauline lifted her chin defiantly. “I wanted it announced, and Rod didn’t. I stood that for a while; but when it dragged on and on, the best thing seemed to be a clean break.”
Basil’s glance shifted again to Rod. “And why didn’t you want it announced?”
Rod’s cheeks were cherry red. “Well—because of Wanda. I mean—I was dependent on her for my job and my chance on Broadway. I thought if I let her know, I was engaged before the play opened I—I might not get that chance after all. . . .”
“So you do admit she chased you for the usual reason?” cried Pauline, furiously.
“No, I don’t. I have no idea why she was always after me. That’s the honest truth. But, of course, I couldn’t help wondering. I didn’t want to complicate things any more than they were already—by suddenly getting engaged. . . .”
Basil’s eyes rested on Rod’s face seriously. “I suppose you realize that this may be far more dangerous for you than the fact that the knife belonged to you?”
“How?” asked Pauline.
“It’s the nearest approach to a motive the police have had so far. Assuming that the man who played Vladimir was a lover of Wanda’s, the police will concentrate on you immediately.
They were both silent for a moment. Then Rod’s temper exploded. “How ridiculous!”
“Not at all. You admit you were seen with her everywhere.”
“But good heavens! That doesn’t mean anything. I was engaged to Pauline at the time.”
“But you didn’t want it announced—because of Wanda. And finally it was broken—because of Wanda. The police may say that your engagement to Pauline was a clever move to conceal your real affair with Wanda and your motive for stabbing Vladimir.”