Wolfendon looked back at me, and I said, “You’re paying the fee. I’ll play it any way you want. Only the first thing to do is report that phone call to the police.”
I rose, rounded the table to the phone and dialled police headquarters.
4
The rest of that day was uneventful. I drove back to my Miami apartment, packed a bag and returned to Miami Beach. I found the front door bolted when I got back. George Harbor peered at me through the thick glass before opening it. Obviously the phone call had brought on a maximum security effort.
They put me in a guest room on the first floor next to the servants’ quarters. Nothing happened all day except a phoned report from Lieutenant Curry that David Carr had still not been apprehended, but that an intensive search was underway for him.
We all retired at eleven P.M. Before going to bed I accompanied Joshua Wolfendon on a tour of the entire house while he inspected each window and each door bolt.
It didn’t seem very likely to me that, despite his boasts, David Carr would get into the house that night.
A ringing phone awakened me. I glanced at the luminous face of my watch, saw it was three A.M., and sleepily reached for the bedside phone before I realized I wasn’t in my own bed. Coincidentally the extension was in the same relative place that my own bedside phone is.
I put it to my ear just as Marie Wolfendon’s voice said, “Hello.”
I heard the click of still another extension phone being lifted, then a low voice rasped, “It’s not hello, Marie. It’s good-by.”
“David!” Marie gasped.
“Yeah, David, honey. Expect me. Expect me at any minute. I’m coming after you right now.”
The phone went silent. I continued to hear the sound of Marie’s breathing, then two clicks as two extension phones hung up.
Cradling my phone, I leaped from bed, groped for the bedlamp switch, pulled a robe over my pajamas and grabbed my gun. I didn’t bother with slippers.
A small night light in the upper hall furnished enough illumination for me to see my way up the stairs. I took them three at a time. At the top I found Joshua Wolfendon’s bedroom door open and Wolfendon, wearing only pajamas, in the act of reaching for the knob of his wife’s bedroom door. At the far end of the hall George Harbor was just coming from his room dressed in a robe. Both men had pistols in their hands.
I started to yell, “Hold it!” to Wolfendon, but it was too late. He already had the door open and stood framed in the darkened doorway, the dim glow of the nightlight in the hall silhouetting his form to his wife inside the room.
I sensed the tragic mistake that was going to happen, and braced myself against the roar of the shot even before it sounded. In the close confines of Marie’s bedroom it sounded like a cannon.
Josh Wolfendon went over backward like a falling timber. I didn’t have to move any nearer to see that he had died instantly. The slug caught him squarely in the center of the forehead and took along a section of skull as big as a tennis ball when it exited at the back of his head.
A dozen feet away George Harbor halted with his mouth gaping open.
Hugging the wall to one side of the door to Marie’s room, I called, “Hold your fire, Mrs. Wolfendon. Turn on your light.”
“Is he dead?” her voice came thinly.
“Yeah,” I said in a dry tone. “Turn on your light. I’m coming in.”
Light came up in the room and I cautiously stepped through the door. Marie was sitting up in bed in a filmy nightgown through which her flesh showed pinkly in the glow of the bedlamp. She held a snub-nosed thirty-eight in her hand. When she saw me, she let it drop to the bedspread.
“You sure he’s dead?” she asked fearfully.
“Certain,” I said. “Better put on a robe.”
She glanced down and became conscious of the filminess of her nightgown. Flushing, she pulled the sheet over her bosom. I picked a thin robe from the foot of her bed, tossed it to her and returned to the hall.
George Harbor was standing over his dead employer, looking down at him blankly. He glanced at me, his mouth still open.
“She thinks she shot David Carr,” I said. “I’ll let you handle the hysterics when she comes out. I’ll be phoning the police.”
I went into the dead man’s room to phone. Before I could dial, Marie stepped into the hall and went into the hysterics I had phophesied.
Stepping back to the doorway, I watched Harbor’s ineffectual efforts to quiet her screaming. I shouted over the racket. “Who’s the family doctor?”
It took two shouts to get the question to him. He said preoccupiedly, “Dr. Philip Hudson,” and returned to his back patting.
I phoned the doctor before I phoned the police. He got there first and had Marie back in bed under a sedative before the police arrived.
Lieutenant Sam Curry was the chief investigating officer. He talked to me first, and after hearing my account of events, he talked to George Harbor. It developed that Harbor had heard the phone conversation between David Carr and Marie too.
“Seems obvious it was just an unfortunate accident,” Curry said. “Damn shame, a thing like this happening. Wolfendon should have known his wife would be so upset after that call that she’d shoot when he opened the door.”
“He didn’t have time to think,” I said. “He was rushing to protect her.”
Curry said, “Well, there isn’t anything we can do tonight. The doc says she’s under a sedative and can’t be questioned. Not much point in questioning her anyway, since we know what happened. Have to eventually, of course, as a matter of routine. She’ll possibly even have to appear at an inquest. But that will be routine too. I’m convinced it was an accident. Any idea where that call came from?”
Harbor shook his head and I said, “No. But I’ll bet Carr never intended to make a try for her tonight. Or any other night, for that matter.”
The lieutenant raised his brows. “Why do you say that?”
“If he’s serious about killing her, why does he give advance warning? Tonight, for instance, he’d know his call would alert the whole house, plus the police outside. He’s a nut, but he can’t be that stupid. I think he’s just been trying to scare her pants off, and never intends to do anything else.”
He thought this over, finally said dubiously, “Maybe, but we’ll play it like he’s serious. I’m doubling the outside guard.”
“Get a reply back from Washington, Missouri yet?” I asked.
He nodded. “Early this evening. A long, chatty wire from the chief of police which boiled down to nothing. He verified the story of Carr’s confinement to the state mental hospital. Even knew about the threatening letter he sent Mrs. Wolfendon before she was married. His folks discussed it with him when she wrote them about it. But he has no idea where Carr is now. His folks died in an auto accident two years ago, and Carr was back for the funeral. Hasn’t been seen or heard from since. At the time he was playing in an orchestra in St. Louis. Played the clarinet.”
“Hmm,” I said. “Miami police co-operating in the search for Carr?”
“Yeah. If we don’t find him soon, I’m going to ask for a house-to-house search.”
It was nearly five by the time the body had been taken away and the police had left. Harbor and I made another check of the doors and windows and went back to bed.
5
The next morning Dr. Hudson dropped by with a nurse, gave Marie another sedative and told the nurse not to let anyone disturb the patient all day. George Harbor retired to his office to make funeral arrangements, and I sat around doing nothing.