“No, I knew it was locked.”
“How did you know that?”
“Well, I ... I tried it some time ago . . . the way you do with doors.”
“The way you do, Mr. Brexton.”
“It’s a perfectly natural thing to do.” Brexton flushed.
“I’m sure, especially under the circumstances.” Greaves reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief which he unwrapped. It contained a key which he was careful not to touch. “What is this, Mr. Brexton?”
“A key.”
“Have you ever seen it before?”
“How do I know! All keys look alike.”
“How do I knowl Al! keys look alike.”
“This is the key to the door which leads from your room to Miss Claypoole’s.”
“So what?”
“It was found twenty minutes ago, hidden in the pillowcase of your bed. Mr. Brexton, I arrest you on suspicion of an attempted murder in the first degree. You may inform your attorney that a Special Court will be convened this Friday in Easthampton. I am empowered by the State of New York...”
Miss Lung fainted.
CHAPTER SEVEN
1
BREXTON was arrested and taken to jail at two a.m. Tuesday morning. The Special Court was scheduled for Friday. This gave me two days to track down the actual murderer for the greater glory of self and the blind lady with the scales. Forty-eight hours in which I was apt as not to find that Brexton was indeed the killer.
I got up the next morning at nine o’clock. I was barely dressed when the managing editor of the Globe was on the phone.
“Listen, you son of a bloodhound, what d’you mean by slanting those damned stories to make it sound like this Brexton wasn’t the murderer?”
“Because I don’t think he is." I held the receiver off at arm’s length while my one-time employer and occasional source of revenue raved on. When the instrument quieted down, I put it to my ear just in time to hear him say, “Well, I’m sending Elmer out there to look into this. He’s been aching to cover it but no, I said, we got Sargeant there: you remember Sargeant? bright-eyed, wet-eared Sargeant, I said, he’ll tell us all about it he’ll solve the god-damned case and what if the police do think Brexton killed his wife Sargeant knows best, I tell him, he’ll work this thing out. Ha! You got us out on a sawed-off limb. Elmer’s going to get us off.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere,” I said austerely. "Neither will Elmer. Anyway what would you say if I got you the real murderer, exclusively, and by Friday?”
“Why don't you...”
I told him his suggestion was impractical. Then I told him what he could do with Elmer, if he was in the mood. I hung up first.
This was discouraging, Elmer Bush, author of the syndicated column “America’s New York” which, on television, became the popular weekly resume of news “New York’s America” was my oldest rival and enemy. He had been a renowned columnist when I was only assistant drama editor on the Globe. But, later, our paths had crossed and I had managed twice to get the beat on him news-wise, as we say. This was going to be a real trial, I decided gloomily.
I called Liz who sounded wide-awake even though Î was positive she’d only just opened her eyes.
“They arrested Brexton last night.”
“No!” She made my eardrum vibrate. “Then you were wrong. I thought he did it. Of course that’s just woman’s intuition but even so it means something. Look at all the mediums.”
“Medium what’s?”
“The people who talk to the dead . . . they’re almost always women.”
“Well, I wish you'd put in a call to Mildred Brexton and...”
“Oh, don’t tease. Isn’t it exciting! Can I come over?”
“No, but I’ll see you this afternoon if it’s all right.”
“Perfect. I’ll be at the Club after lunch.”
“What happened to you last night?”
“Oh, I was at the Wilson’s dance. I was going to call you but Dick said you’d gone to bed early.”
Randan? Was he there?”
“Oh yes. He’s sweet, you know. I don’t know why you don’t like him. He was only there for a while but we had a nice chat about everything. He wanted to take me up to Montauk for a moonlight ride in his car but I thought that was going too far...”
“I’m glad you have limits.”
“Don't be stuffy.” After a few more cheery remarks, I hung up. This was apparently going to be one of those days, I decided. Elmer Bush was arriving. Randan was closing in on Liz. Brexton was in jail and my own theories were temporarily discredited.
Whistling a dirge, I went down to breakfast.
The sight of Randan eating heartily didn’t make me feel any better. No one else was down. “See the papers?” He was beaming with excitement. “Made the front pages too.”
He pushed a pile toward me. All the late editions had got the story “Painter Arrested for Murder of Wife and Friend" was the mildest headline. By the time they finished with the relationships, it sounded like something out of Sodom by way of Gomorrah.
I didn’t do more than glance at the stories. From my own newspaper experience I’ve learned that newspaper stories, outside of the heads and the first paragraph, are nothing but words more or less hopelessly arranged.
“Very interesting,” I said, confining myself to dry toast and coffee . . . just plain masochism. I enjoyed making the day worse than it already was.
“I guess neither one of us got it,” said Randan, ignoring my gloom. “I suppose the obvious one is usually the right one but I could’ve sworn Brexton didn’t do it.”
“You always thought he did, didn’t you?”
Randan smiled a superior smile. “That was to mislead you while I made my case against the real murderer, or what I thought was the real murderer. But I didn’t get anywhere.” “Neither did I.”
“That business of the key clinched it, I suppose,” said Randan with a sigh, picking up the Daily News which proclaimed: “Famous Cubist Indicted: Murders Wife, Cubes Friend.”
I only grunted. I had my own ideas about the key. I don’t like neatness. I also respect the intelligence of others, even abstract painters: Brexton would not have left that key in his pillow any more than he would have left his palette knife beside the body of Claypoole. In my conversations with him he had struck me as being not only intelligent but careful. He would not have made either mistake if he’d been the killer.
I kept all this to myself. Accepting without comment Randan’s assumption (and everybody else's) that justice was done and murder had out.
Mrs. Veering and Miss Lung came down to breakfast together. Both seemed controlled and brisk.
“Ah, the gentlemen are up with the birds!” exclaimed the penwoman brightly, fully recovered from her dramatic collapse of some hours before.
“I’m afraid it’s been something of an ordeal, Peter.” Mrs. Veering smiled at me. She was pale but her movements were steady. Apparently she had, if only briefly, gone on the wagon: she was quite a different person sober than half-lit.
I mumbled something inane about: well, things could’ve been worse.
“And I’m afraid we won’t be able to carry through our original project either.”
I had already given it up but I pretended to be thoughtful, a bit disappointed. “Yes, I think you’re right under the circumstances,” I said, nodding gravely. “It might not be the wise thing to do...”