“That’s enough background, I think. It’s time to be vulgar and start pointing.”
Jake put out his cigarette and lit another. He glanced around the room, and said, “Here’s the way it could have happened, of course, with names and everything.”
He turned to Brian and Denise.
“How long has your affair been going on?”
Denise said, “That’s a fine thing to say.”
“I know,” Jake said. “But it’s important to my theory.” He glanced at Brian. “Do you have something melodramatic to say, or would you prefer to answer the question?”
Brian said coolly, “You’re getting in nice and deep, my friend. Go ahead.”
“Why, thanks. Your father knew about the affair you’d been having with Denise, of course. Denise, who is majestically indiscreet when tight, let your father in on your secret.”
“That’s a lie,” Denise said.
Jake smiled. “Hardly. Remember the afternoon you and I had a few drinks? We came back here and Riordan entered a few moments later. You were lying on the couch and, to be a heel about it, you were stinking drunk. He told you to get to your room, whereupon you began to entreat him to take you up to the lodge again — a place you’d never been with Riordan. You said as much the first night I met you in Noble’s office. Riordan then learned that you had been up to the lodge, and that you were well aware of its aphrodisiac qualities — or the aphrodisiac qualities of its usual tenant. Riordan reasoned thus: you’d been to the lodge, ergo, it must have been with Brian.”
“I won’t listen to any more of this,” Brian shouted.
“When your father realized that you were two-timing him with his wife, he kicked you out,” Jake said calmly. “He’d taken quite a beating from you, Brian. He listened to your cynical moralizing about the war, and watched you posturing absurdly as the bitter, maladjusted war hero. Why he did is something a psychiatrist might tell us. But he drew the line at allowing you to play around with Denise.”
Brian shrugged and lit a cigarette. “You’re being awfully wordy about it. We had a disagreement and he blew his top, that’s all.”
“There’s a little more to it than that. What did you do when you realized that the golden eggs weren’t going to be laid any more?”
“Oh, that’s your story,” Brian said with a smile.
“Okay. When you were tossed out of your mink-lined nest you started thinking how you could clip him for some money.” Jake stopped and turned casually to Denise. “Remember, Denise, when you told me about your habit of listening in on the extension phone in your bedroom?”
Denise glanced uncertainly at Brian, and then said, “I may have mentioned it. It’s hardly a crime.”
“Well, that depends. Dean Niccolo made a call from here this afternoon. He called a girl named Toni Ryerson who is sitting with us now. Did that conversation surprise you?”
“Don’t say anything!” Brian said. “That’s none of his damned business.”
“Yes, you’d better be extremely careful now,” Jake said. “Dean called Toni to ask her to help him out of an embarrassing spot. Dean talked too much to me — he mentioned knowing that I’d received May’s diary — and he had to have an alibi. You see he had sent me the diary, after killing Meed. The police could have used that information, Denise. Why didn’t you go to them?”
“I didn’t know what the devil he was talking about,” Denise said, standing and facing him excitedly. “It didn’t make any sense to me.”
“Shut up,” Brian said.
“Damn it,” Denise said, wheeling on him. “I’m tired of being shouted at. I couldn’t make any sense out of it, and neither could you.”
Jake said, “So you told Brian about the call, eh? And Brian was confused and bewildered?”
“She told me about a conversation she’d overheard between Niccolo and some girl,” Brian said tensely. “Do what you can with that.”
“I’m going to try. You knew from that conversation that Niccolo had sent me the diary. That meant that Niccolo had clipped the stuff pertaining to your father from the diary and still had it in his possession — since I told your father, in your presence remember, that the diary received had no reference to him in it. You knew that Niccolo had the dirt on your father. And you wanted a way to make your father start laying those golden eggs again, didn’t you? So you thought of blackmail.”
Brian pushed a lock of hair from his forehead and attempted a smile. It was not a success.
He said, “Supposing you say what you mean in simple blunt language.”
“Fine,” Jake said. “I’m suggesting that you might have gone to Niccolo’s tonight, after learning he had the dirt on your father, and that you blew his brains out when he wouldn’t come across with the clipping. Didn’t you?”
Brian shook his head. “No,” he said.
Lieutenant Martin got up slowly and rubbed the back of his head with his left hand. “You took a drive out toward Niccolo’s apartment tonight, didn’t you?” he said, in a mild voice.
Brian turned to him with a startled expression. “You’re not taking this pipe dream seriously, are you?”
“Oh, very seriously,” Lieutenant Martin said.
“You can’t be,” Brian cried. “You’re trying to pin this on me to frame me, that’s all.”
Denise had been watching him tensely since Martin had spoken; and now she suddenly took a step back and put a hand to her mouth. “You killed him,” she whispered. “You simple fool. I told you...”
Brian turned and slapped her across the mouth with his open hand.
“You simply won’t keep quiet, will you?” he said coolly.
“That’s enough of the dramatics,” Martin said. He looked at Jake thoughtfully for a second, a worried line above his eyes; then he shrugged. “Okay,” he said to Brian. “Let’s go.”
The words seemed to act as a spur to Brian. He lunged forward suddenly and hurled Martin aside, and then broke for the door.
But he didn’t get far. Prior came out of his chair with astonishing speed, caught him by the shoulder and spun him round; and before Brian regained his balance, Prior straightened him with a savage right to the jaw. Brian’s eyes glazed over as he started to fall; and Prior’s next punch, a professionally expert left hook, dropped him to the floor unconscious.
A uniformed policeman stepped quickly over his prostrate body and caught Denise by the arms as she started for the door.
“That was neat work,” Martin said to Prior. He brushed his hair down. “He caught me by surprise.”
“Well, you were busy talking, and I had a better chance to watch,” Prior said. “I saw it coming.” Sheila slipped over to Jake. “You were wonderful,” she said. “Now can we get out of here?”
“Oh, sure,” Jake said, and looked at Martin who was scratching his ear and frowning somberly. “We’ll clear out right away. But first we’ve got to settle something.”
He paused and glanced around the room.
“You see, Brian didn’t murder Niccolo. The emotional difficulties in the Riordan family had nothing to do with that murder — or May’s.
“The fact that Denise overheard a conversation, that Dan Riordan absconded, and that Brian and Denise enjoyed an affair had nothing to do with Niccolo’s murder — or May’s. But they all formed so neat and logical a pattern that I was seduced. The person who murdered May and Niccolo was quite obvious for some time. I outlined a case against Brian and Denise just to show you all how misleading those developments were. And of course I had to show off a little too.”
“Well,” Martin demanded.
“Oh, yes,” Jake said. He turned and glanced at another person in the room. “How about it, Prior? Shall I tell the story, or will you?”