Homicide at Yuletide Read online

  “It may surprise you to know, Mr. Chambers, that he was going to return that.”

  I nodded. “It surprises me.”

  “He would have returned it. Once he realized a mistake, Sheldon never went halfway. He would have returned every penny of it, believe me.”

  “Then what was the whole deal about? What did he want it for in the first place?”

  “He needed time to arrange certain affairs. He wanted that money, temporarily, to use for the purpose of revoking certain trust funds. Once that was effected, he would have been in the position to return Bernandino’s money, and not be, in any way, involved with him.”

  “Trust funds?” I said. “Sounds real engaging.”

  “The principal is an enormous amount of money, Mr. Chambers. It would have taken care of him for the rest of his life, and then some. He needed Bernandino’s money, once he came to that decision, for lawyers and—”

  “What decision?”

  “To revoke those trusts.”

  “You’re on his side, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know he killed a man?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re still on his side?”

  “If you could only understand the man, sir. Sheldon Talbot, a cultured, remote man, had suddenly become involved in a world that was completely foreign to him. In this new environment, he took steps that were wholly repugnant to his nature. Then the fear—the pressure—he was no longer himself. I believe, I know—during the Chicago period—he was, well—deranged—there is no question in my mind about that. He was a frail man, Mr. Chambers, always having lived a rather cloistered life—despite his numerous marriages—”

  “Trust funds,” I said. “Would you tell me about that?”

  She scraped teeth against her upper lip. “There was one for the child, Stella, created at her birth, irrevocable.”

  “There were others?”

  “Three others.”

  “Recite them slowly, Mrs. Talbot.”

  “Five years ago, at the time he married Evelyn Dru—he still had a great deal of money at that time—he set up trust funds for the three of us, something in lieu of dower rights, for Evelyn, myself, and Gay. This was before Gay married Noah.”

  “Can you explain these—these trusts?”

  “I’ll do the best I can. The income from each trust fund went to each of us for a period of five years—then, there was a two-year period within which the trust could be revoked—and, if not revoked within that period, each became irrevocable.”

  “I see. And suppose he died?”

  “In that case, they were set, for the lives of each of us, the principal then reverting to his estate.”

  “And this—this five-year period?”

  “Was up within this next month. Then started the two-year period within which he had a right to revoke any of the trusts, and recall his principal.”

  “And, according to you, he was about to do that, using Barney’s fifty thousand for the necessary legal expenses, and that sort of thing.”

  “Yes. But first he wanted to see us, each of us, to know whether it would really hurt any of us—I mean, financially.”

  “Giving each of you, of course, a right proper motive for his demise.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “You will admit that it provides motive?”

  “That depends upon the people involved.”

  “Let’s start with you, then. He spoke with you about your special trust?”

  “Yes.”

  “He told you he wanted to revoke it?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was your reaction?”

  “I acquiesced, whole-heartedly. I have a very successful business, Mr. Chambers.”

  “What do you do, by the way?”

  “I am an interior decorator, with a large and wealthy following. My books can be checked at any time.”

  “So you told him it was perfectly all right with you.”

  “That is correct.”

  “When?”

  “When I saw him this morning. He told me, as a matter of fact, that he had already spoken both with Gay and Evelyn, and that they too had agreed.”

  “Do you know when he saw them?”

  “He had seen one of them a couple of days ago, and one last night.”

  “Which, and when?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t cross-question him.”

  “How much was in it for you people?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “How much did each of you get out of your respective trust funds?”

  “About ten thousand dollars a year.”

  We sat back eyeing each other. I reached for the bottle and gave her a drink and had one myself.

  “Have I answered all of your questions, Mr. Chambers?”

  “So far.”

  “I want to be on your right side.”

  “Why?”

  “Because my true interest in all of this is Stella. I want her protected, and I want your co-operation. You’re experienced in these affairs, and, well, there’s something about you, a resoluteness, I don’t know— You strike me as a person with force, a person one can depend upon.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I want you to work on it, to check into it, for which, of course, I will pay you. You’re not a police officer, I mean, a regular member of the Department?”

  “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “This. If by any far-fetched—if you find that Stella—I mean, if she was at all involved in it—then I want it covered up. Do you understand?”

  “Do you know what it means to compound a felony?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you want me to do that?”

  “Yes. And you can practically name your own consideration.”

  “Let’s pass that for the moment. Why Stella? Why should she?”

  “His will left everything to her.”

  “So what? If he lived, and revoked those trust funds, the principal would be his—and then she would inherit after he died. But why now? Why should she kill him now? If he’s dead now, those trusts set—and then she would be helping you, and Gay and Evelyn—but she would be doing nothing for herself. Right or wrong?”

  “Right, I think.”

  “What about that will? When did you see it?”

  “This very morning. He gave it to me, had me read it. He said he was involved in this Barney Bernandino affair, and he knew he couldn’t trust Barney. He told me to take the will with me.”

  I broke out cigarettes, but she shook her head. I lit up and I said, “What was the general content?”

  “Everything went to Stella. He itemized, right there in the will, each piece of jewelry, fully described, just in case something went wrong on that Bernandino business. When I got back to Stella’s place, I gave it to her, and she read it. Later, she went there.”

  “I’m beginning to see what you mean.”

  “I don’t mean anything. I don’t know what I mean. I know she’s peculiar, impulsive…. I honestly don’t think she had anything to do with it. I don’t know, I don’t know.”

  I blew a smoke ring and I shoved my finger through it.

  “I don’t know, either.”

  “What?”

  “Whether you’re a real good mamma who wants to put her daughter right square in the middle of a murder rap, or whether you’re really trying to show me that she really needs protection.”

  She was very calm. “I want to take you into my confidence completely. If you’re going to help, you must know every facet of it.”

  “All right. Let’s try it this way. She wasn’t going to wait for revocations of trust estates and inheriting principal. If he dies now, she inherits more than a half a million dollars’ worth of jewelry. So she kills him for it. All right. So would she then steal them?”

  “Yes.”

  “What?”

  “Please understand me. I’m trying to follow along with you
r reasoning. She doesn’t inherit anything—unless the Bernandino deal falls through. If the deal is successful, there are no jewels to inherit. There is fifty thousand dollars, but that is a small percentage of a half million.”

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  “Listen, Mr. Chambers. We’re not accusing her. We are talking all around it. We’re trying to bring out every possible idea. I want you completely acquainted with the facts. I don’t care who did it, as long as it wasn’t Stella. But if it was—”

  Noise broke it up. Party people staggered in. Someone pulled Terry to her feet. “Nice,” someone said. “A fine hostess. Sits around with a man and a bottle, while the living-room becomes a desert. Where do you hide the whisky?”

  We all went back. Stella immediately came to me. Much of the crowd had dispersed. The punch bowl was a dry crater; transparent whisky bottles were a multitude of empty sentinels. The band played droopily. The butler was busy handing out hats and coats. There is nothing to divest a party more quickly of its gay constituents than a dearth of the potables. This party was divesting as though a rumor of smallpox had set in. Soon there was nobody left except the principal characters, with addenda. The addenda totaled up to a French diplomat bending over the hand of Gene Tiny, a tall slender blond-haired man simpering prettily at Stella (while she squeezed my fingers), a redhead with green eyes and large breasts arguing with the scowling Noah, a Greek who spoke no English trailing the revived Gay, and a brawny, wild-haired, beetle-browed young man in slacks and a purple shirt who had Evelyn Dru firmly trapped in a corner, expostulating upon matters politic.

  I unhooked from Stella’s fingers.

  “Anybody,” I inquired, “interested in a drink?”

  A hush fell upon the assemblage.

  “Then what say we adjourn to my place? Early Christmas presents that arrived bore a marked similarity. Marked, that is, ‘Bonded.’ “

  Beetle-brow fell upon me. “Savior,” he cried.

  Stella’s blond young man looked at him with interest.

  Coats appeared, hats, mufflers, and furs, and we went out into the frosty night. The snow had stopped. The sky was black. Noah took a group in his car, and I took a group in a cab.

  We rode up in the elevator, and I opened the door, and threw the keys on the table, and collected hats and coats, and broke open two cases, and the party resumed.

  Once I found myself kissing Terry, and once I found Noah kissing the redhead, and once I found the blond young man kissing beetle-brow while Stella observed disdainfully. The blond young man was a lollipop and beetle-brow showed a lively interest in his new conquest, which left Evelyn free to accept the declarations of until-death-I-will-love-you from Gene’s thwarted Frenchman. Noah finally agreed with the redhead on something and smacked her solidly on the shoulder and she promptly passed out, which caused an argument between Noah and Gay on the curiously unrelated subject of infidelity. Soon Noah sat alone, scowling, and Gay and Terry and Stella were fused in a coffee-klatsch in a corner, and the lollipop and beetle-brow were entwined on a couch, and the diplomat was madly kissing Evelyn’s hand, and the Greek was being effusive in mother-tongue over Gene Tiny. But nobody had stopped drinking; except the redhead, now pallidly beautiful, supine on the carpet. Finally, Gene ducked around the Greek. The Greeks have been ducked around since the days they created mythology. Superbly non-nonplussed, he dropped to one knee, blithely, but pointedly, rousing the redhead.

  Gene came to me. “I’d like to go home now.”

  “Already?”

  “Will you take me?”

  “Sure.”

  I was going for my coat when the phone rang.

  It was Alger Shaw.

  “Got your party located,” he said.

  “Good. Where?”

  “Down at Eddie Nuki’s. You know Grace White?”

  “The picture girl?”

  “The same.”

  “Yes?”

  “Wine-red was there with a lady last night.”

  “She remembers it?”

  “Better than that.”

  “What can be better?”

  “Grace took a picture of a kid from Harvard and his girl friend, but the kid from Harvard turned the picture down.”

  Alger stopped talking. I knew Alger Shaw.

  “All right, thespian. Now you want me to throw you a straight-line. What am I supposed to say?”

  “You’re supposed to say—why?”

  “Okay. Why did the kid from Harvard turn the picture down?”

  “Because wine-red was in it, alongside his lady of the evening.”

  “Wonderful. Did you get the picture?”

  “No.”

  “You’re slipping.”

  “No, I’m not. Grace is a business lady. She destroyed that picture, and took another of the loving collegiate couple. That’s how she remembers wine-red.”

  “What about the negative?”

  “You’re smart. She’s still got that. And she tells me to come up tomorrow afternoon, she’ll develop it for me. For a pittance, of course.”

  “How much pittance?”

  “Ten bucks.”

  “Cheap. Take care of it.”

  “Can do. Because I’m not working tomorrow. One question?”

  “Yes?”

  “How much extra for me?”

  “Twenty-five bucks. Oke?”

  “Oke.”

  “But why tomorrow afternoon?”

  “Now you’re slipping. Grace works nights, remember? She’s entitled to sleep in the morning. That’s why tomorrow afternoon. Sold?”

  “Sold, and I’m awaiting delivery.”

  “You betcha.”

  Grace White was a cute blonde with a business head. She conducted her own picture-snapping thing in a couple of night clubs, a concession she had acquired by virtue of being a selective and excellent photographer, and by virtue, too, of being selective and excellent on a saltatory mattress, selective, that is, among night club owners. She was Grace White Enterprises, Inc., operating out of a little old horse stable in Greenwich Village which she had converted to home, saltatory mattress, and studio.

  I hung up. I said excuse me to Gene, be right up. I went downstairs and called the Kitten House from a booth in the lobby. I told Barney Bernandino what Alger Shaw had told me. “I thought you’d like to know,” I said.

  “Thanks. What’s the other reason?”

  “Dough.”

  “Means what?”

  “Means I don’t want to go into expenses on this thing. I haven’t earned enough. Yet.”

  “Yes?”

  “So it’s costing me a hundred and twenty-five for Alger and ten more for the picture. As long as I’m keeping you up to date, I think you ought to cover those expenses.”

  “They’re covered.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You going to attend to it?”

  “When?”

  “Now.”

  “You nuts? I’m in the middle of a party.”

  “Now, look, peeper. Get me right. I don’t give a hoot in hell who he was with, or where he was. All I want is a bunch of ice. If any of this leads to the ice—I’m interested.”

  “You look, Barney. I’m not working for you, and I don’t care what you’re interested in. I’ve traded with you. I’ve brought you up to date on a little information, and you’re taking care of the expenses. Period.”

  “Well, I think it ought to be followed up.”

  “It will be.”

  “Damn right it will be.”

  I hung up and went back. Nobody had missed me. I tapped a glass against a bottle and everybody looked up, including the redhead. “Ladies and gentlemen, one drink. Merry Christmas.”

  Everybody drank. Then they held up their empty glasses and, Noah leading them, sang, “For he’s a jolly good fellow….” It put a glow on me. I liked playing host. So I shot my big mouth off.

  “I am about to take Miss Tiny home. The rest of you, please continue in your various pur
suits, including getting stiff. When’s there a better night for it? But first, an invitation.”

  “Here. Hear.” It was the Greek, speaking English for the first time.

  “I’d like to invite all of you to a full, sober, wonderful, I hope, Christmas night supper, right here in my apartment, tomorrow night, say—about ten o’clock. How’s that?”

  Cheers.

  “Swell.” I shrugged, shivered maybe, but I didn’t give myself time to recant. I grabbed my hat and coat and Gene’s fur, looked for my keys and couldn’t find them, helped Gene on with her coat, cut short her good-bys, and led her out.

  In the cab, she said, “You’ve been wonderful.”

  “Thanks.”

  That’s all we said.

  I went up with her to a cozy one-room jackknife apartment, bed in the wall, kitchen in a closet, bathroom behind a mirror—an economy apartment, three rooms folded into one. She took my things, said, “One drink, to us, Christmas Eve, but let me change first.” She moved a tapestry, which developed into a closet, reached in, brought out something pale rose silk and shimmering, said, “Be with you in a jiffy,” and went behind the mirror to the bathroom.

  I found whisky and glasses in a hassock with a removable top, and after a short search I discovered soda in a refrigerator with a false wooden front. I was pouring when she came out. I stopped pouring.

  It was a long silk robe with a braided belt. That was all. Her feet were bare and her make-up was off and she wasn’t smiling. I looked at her, looked away, looked back. I put down the bottle and the glass. I said, “Look, sister—”

  “Yes?”

  “All the way from back there, from behind the wire mesh of that detention pen—”

  “Yes?”

  “Look. I’m high. I’m loaded right up to here.”

  “So am I.”

  “I’m going to kiss you, sister.”

  “You’re going to kiss me?”

  She took my face in her hands and opened her mouth on mine, bending backward as I held her….

  8

  COLD GRAY was Christmas dawn as I marched for a cab. Wind knifed through my overcoat. My homburg blew away and I let it. A horn honked and it was a taxi. I got in and the driver shut the door. He didn’t speak to me and I didn’t speak to him. He brought me home and I tipped him extra special for the silence.