Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine 12/01/12 Page 2

Obediently, he trotted to the bar.

  She introduced herself with all three names, opened a slim cigarette case, and handed me a gold lighter. As I lit her cigarette, I observed, "That's rather a lot of names."

  "I've had rather a lot of husbands, Mister . . ."

  "Masterson, William Masterson, but please call me Bill." For this con I'd taken the name of Bat Masterson, legendary lawman, who once said of New York, "They will buy any damned thing here." It seemed a fitting moniker for this particular hustle.

  Rich old Louis forgotten for the moment, she took my arm and started to walk me across the room.

  "So tell me, Bill, how is it we haven't met until now?"

  I spun a tale about having spent time protecting my family's financial investments in Canada, but she barely listened and moved right back to the topic of real estate. Was I considering any investments in the "outer" boroughs?

  But Louis was lumbering toward us.

  "I'm in the book, under Dumont, Park Avenue just off Seventy-fifth. Do call." She patted my lapel, linked arms with Louis, and walked away. She was the kind of woman a man liked to watch walk. If she was walking toward you, you felt a promise; if she was walking away from you, you felt the tease. A guy always felt something.

  I strolled around for a while, nodding at strangers as though we'd played golf last week, until I slipped out the door and into the fresh air. I thought of Jake Hartly. At this time of night, he was in lockdown, fast asleep, or maybe tossing fitfully, dreaming of Bright Star.

  I let her sweat a few days and then called. She was irritated by the time lag.

  "I held off making plans . . . but when you didn't call . . . well, I've little time left this week."

  To keep her unsure about my interest, my apology had little force behind it.

  She managed to find time for me.

  Within two weeks, she spent a night in my room at The Pierre. She was a skilled lover, and her presence was so intense that Jake faded further into the past. We became a couple about town, theater, cocktails, and dinner parties. Soon we were invited to weekend parties at her friends' country houses and given adjoining rooms. Society's tacit approval of our romance.

  In May one of Gloria's friends invited us to an early evening supper at Belmont Park to view a colt he'd just purchased. We drove over the Triborough Bridge and headed east on the newish Grand Central Parkway. As we passed the site of the World's Fair, a carillon tolled a heartrending melody.

  I slowed the car so we could listen until the bells finally stopped. As I increased our speed, Gloria spoke. "The bell tower is part of the Belgian Pavilion. How long do you think King Leopold can hold the Germans at bay?"

  She seemed genuinely concerned. I was surprised. For most society dames Hitler's march through Europe was more a threat to their vacation plans than a real problem.

  "I doubt the Low Countries will survive the end of this month."

  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught her face turn somber as she nodded. The notion of war was dampening the tone I needed for our day trip. I casually turned on the radio and we half hummed and half sang along with Bing Crosby's melancholy "What's New" and then we la-la-la'd "In the Mood" along with the Glenn Miller band, which seemed to brighten Gloria's spirits.

  I exited the Parkway and drove as if we were meandering aimlessly and parked opposite a wrought-iron gate. Beyond it we could see a high, tan brick building and some smaller, wider buildings scattered about an expanse of well-tended lawn.

  Gloria wondered aloud why we'd stopped.

  "Welcome to Creedmoor State Hospital, all three hundred acres."

  "Is this the land Kyle Bossard is talking about developing?"

  "This is the land that Smedley will get New York State to sell for development." I started the engine. "Let me show you the farmland Bossard has been eyeing."

  We turned the corner and crossed an old railroad spur. A white clapboard farmhouse stood a little way from the road, with two large barns and assorted outbuildings spread behind it. The surrounding fields had been planted in early spring and as the May sunshine warmed the ground we could see green leaves breaking through in orderly rows. Finally, I drove south for two or three minutes and showed her the nicely kept Dutch Colonial houses built in the 1920s.

  "These folks held on during the worst of the Depression. They're solid. The neighborhood is ready to expand. And Bossard has the imagination to pull the project together." Before she could respond I threw the car in gear and said, "Now we're off to the races."

  I made a sharp right on Jamaica Avenue, zigzagged for little more than a mile, and pulled into the parking lot of the grandiose Belmont Park Raceway. We found her friends in the clubhouse having cocktails at a table facing large windows that overlooked the track. Gloria ordered a Gin Fizz and took a cigarette from the slim case that never left her side. Her matching gold lighter refused to blaze and I came to the rescue with my own.

  "Must be out of fluid."

  Gloria raised her elegant shoulders in a languid shrug. "This lighter has been awfully troublesome lately."

  Our host, a genial financier named DeGroot, announced that he'd arranged for us to visit the horse stalls to see the colt up close. "Please, everyone," he cautioned, "no smoking. All that hay . . ."

  On the walk back from the stables, I overheard Gloria telling her friends that we had visited the farmland surrounding the state hospital.

  "How can you be sure the farmers will sell?"

  "Because with our pooled resources, we can offer more money than they've ever dreamed their farms were worth. And, we'll reap the profits many times over. Ride over and see the place. It's just up the road."

  I smiled inwardly. Gloria had become our shill, something her friends would remember long after Whitey and his crew took their cash and left town.

  We settled back in the clubhouse for a light "repast," as DeGroot called it, while his jockey took Country Boy around the track. I wondered what Jake would think of the chestnut horse.

  When the cigarette girl came by our table, I bought some lighter fluid but I couldn't get Gloria's lighter to flare up.

  Three days later I met with Whitey and JoJo in an Irish gin mill on Ninety-seventh Street. "This job is duck soup!" Whitey crowed. "The money is pouring in. What did you do to the Brasky broad? She's our biggest fan. Doubled her ante to fifty large and is pushing her friends hard."

  I smiled. "She's got the essential qualities of a perfect mark—she's greedy and she thinks she's smart."

  Now that the money was rolling, we needed to clinch the deal and hit the road. We decided to "close" on the property sales the following Tuesday in an office Whitey had sublet in a swank building on Madison Avenue. He invited all the investors to watch as he spent their money buying hundreds of acres of Queens farmland. During the post-sale handshaking, he'd invite all the marks to Belle Muniere on east Fifty-second Street for a celebratory dinner on Wednesday. By that time, all that would be left of us was our dust. We took bets among ourselves as to how long it would take them to figure it out.

  The closing was a breeze. The sharpie playing the wife of farmer number two even broke down in tears and begged the new owners not to kill her calves. A brilliant touch. I figured she'd go far in the game.

  I had one final piece of business—Gloria. After the closing she asked me to take her to dinner, but I said I had a business meeting. She wanted to know everything about it, and I promised to come to her house afterward to tell all.

  "Bring your pajamas," she whispered. "Not that you'll need them." And with a slightly wicked smile, she was gone.

  I met with Whitey and JoJo in a hotel room uptown and took my cut, seven thousand plus expenses.

  "Can't thank you enough," Whitey said. "With you priming that Brasky dame, we did far better than we figured we would. You must be jim-dandy in the sack." He snickered and elbowed JoJo.

  I laughed with them but shivered at the thought of no more warm nights with Gloria's sweet, willing body. I shook it of
f.

  We all agreed to keep in touch, but grifters always know there's not much chance that will happen. I grabbed a cab and nearly gave the wrong address before I remembered that Tiffany's had recently moved from Broadway to Fifth Avenue. A week ago I'd ordered a gift for Gloria—a cigarette case with attached lighter. The salesman filled the lighter with fluid, and showed me how opening the cigarette case sprung the lighter, so as you took a cigarette out, the flame rose to meet it. Ronson perfected the first model while I was in the joint, so I'd never seen anything like it. This one was sterling silver with cloisonné inlay. And it came in that box of distinctive Tiffany blue.

  Gloria opened the door herself, dressed in a silver negligee.

  "I gave the servants the night off," she whispered, her lips barely touching mine. Then she drew me into her very soul. Gloria didn't know this was our final night together, but for me, every kiss, every urgent touch, was poignant.

  The next morning, she took out her bright red Ford Runabout and we drove into Central Park at east Seventy-second Street. The day was as splendid as a day always is after lovers have spent a glorious night together. We parked outside the Tavern on the Green, and over a very late breakfast, I delighted her with the details of my "business meeting" the previous afternoon. I could tell she found me most captivating when I said, "fifteen-percent profit guaranteed within six months."

  Gloria began fondling my hand, her fingers massaging my palm ever so gently.

  "Surely, your colleagues would have room for my small investment." She gave me that same half pout, half smile that I'd first seen when she tossed it to old Louis all those weeks ago.

  I lifted her hand to my lips.

  "Of course, darling. Together, we'll grow richer by the season."

  We finished our eggs Benedict and lingered over coffee. Gloria took out a cigarette, and I obliged with a light.

  I fingered the Tiffany package in my jacket pocket. It was almost time.

  Gloria excused herself and headed to the powder room. I used those few minutes to walk to the parking lot and toss a small surprise in her car. I got back to the table seconds before her, but she'd seen me come in the front door, and raised an eyebrow.

  "I just realized that something fell out of my pocket in the car. I went out to retrieve it." And I slipped the Tiffany blue box out of my pocket and placed it on the table in front of her.

  She flushed with excitement. "Oh, my. This is so unexpected. And we've known each other such a short while. I don't know what to say."

  "Well, let me pay the check and we can go someplace more private and open your gift together." I put my hand firmly over the box and pocketed it once more. As soon as we were outside, she began wheedling, like a five-year-old waiting for a birthday present.

  "You're irresistible. Let's get away from prying eyes. You can have your present as soon as we're in the car."

  I opened the car door and ushered her in with a flourish. Her excitement was sure to blunt her senses. As soon as she was settled behind the wheel, I thrust the Tiffany box in her hands, and started to close the door. Then I tapped my pocket. "In all the excitement I left my money clip on the table. Not much in it, but it was Grandfather's. I'll be right back. Don't you open that package without me."

  And I shut the door.

  It was all up to Gloria now.

  I turned and headed directly for the Sixty-fifth Street exit. As soon as I rounded the corner of the Tavern on the Green, I picked up my pace.

  A man yelled, "Fire!"

  A different voice, "Oh my God, there's someone in the car."

  Then Gloria's agonizing scream.

  She'd opened the package. One of many bad choices she'd made. The screw I'd loosened began to drip lighter fluid on the front of her dress while she was busy opening the cigarette case, which in turn triggered the lighter and ignited the flame. The more she struggled to beat out the flames, the more likely she'd spark the splashes of lighter fluid on the backrest and ceiling of the car.

  The thought of the newspaper clipping I would send up to Sing Sing flashed through my mind. I stood on Central Park West, tipped my hat in the direction of the rising smoke, and whispered, "Jake says hello."

  Copyright © 2012 Terrie Farley Moran

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  FICTION

  EUREKA

  MITCH ALDERMAN

  It was July in Winter Haven, Florida, and two in the afternoon. Bubba Simms was dozing in the air conditioning that blew through his office and across his face. Without AC, Bubba knew that most of the people who lived here would relocate far away. Bubba didn't know if there were need for private detectives in the Yukon, but without the AC, he might have been forced to find out. At six five and three hundred pounds, it was a constant challenge for Bubba to stay cool. The phone was ringing, but he made no move to answer it. The machine would take a message for him. Talking to people usually meant he had to leave the office and face reality. October was not that far away. He would wait.

  But when he heard Corporal Marx of the Polk County Sheriff's Department telling him to put down the donut and answer the phone, he smiled and reached for the handset.

  "What is so important at two in the afternoon? Don't you have patrolmen to monitor?"

  "I do. But keeping you busy and out of the air conditioning seemed a far better thing to do with five minutes of my time."

  "What part of Polk County police work do you need explained?"

  "When is a suicide not a suicide?"

  "When it is an accident?"

  "Or murder."

  Bubba took his boots off the desk and sat upright in his swivel chair. "Who are we talking about?"

  "Griffith Taylor."

  "Surely read like suicide in the paper."

  "And to the department also."

  "Who doesn't think so?"

  "His wife. She's convinced that he was murdered. The detectives have been nice to her, but she won't quit."

  "Why are you calling me? If Lieutenant Bisse wants my advice, he'll call."

  "Like that'll happen. But I know her sister. She mentioned it to me."

  "Is she good looking?"

  "Mrs. Taylor?"

  "The sister."

  "Will you call her?"

  "The sister?"

  "The Widow Taylor."

  "Have her call me. I'm awake now. But I still don't want to go outside."

  "I owe you one. Back to miscreants."

  Bubba was microwaving a cup of cold coffee when the phone rang. He answered on the second ring.

  "Simms Investigations. May I help you?"

  "I sure hope so. No one else has. My sister said for me to call you."

  "Mrs. Taylor?"

  "Oh, yes, of course. I'm Brenda Taylor. My husband did not kill himself. Will you help me prove that?"

  "Can you come to my office this afternoon? We could talk."

  "I'm expecting phone calls. Can you come out here? I'm going to pay you, aren't I?"

  "If I think there is anything I can do for you, then yes."

  She gave the address and said that in an hour would be a perfect time for him to be there. They hung up. Bubba made sure he had a yellow pad, a blank contract, pens, and two Snickers in his briefcase. This did not sound like a case he would ordinarily be interested in, but Marx was a friend.

  The Bronco was parked in the only shade near his office, but it was still a solar sauna when he opened the door. Double nineties did that in Winter Haven—ninety-degree temperature and ninety-percent humidity made July an indoor sport. But twenty years of driving patrol cars all across Polk County had taught Bubba to ignore the normal.

  Bubba stopped by his house and let Elvis out to run around. The bluetick hound didn't seem to mind the trying conditions as he chased the soggy tennis ball up and down the slope toward Lake Otis. Bubba sipped unsweetened iced tea while he threw the ball off the back porch and dialed phone numbers. Lieutenant Ray Bisse of the
Sheriff's Department was away from his desk. Bubba would have to talk to him about Taylor's suicide if he took the case. David Browne at The Ledger was out covering a story. He'd know what details the paper hadn't printed. Elvis ran past Bubba back inside, flopping on the couch, balling up for a nap. He'd never mastered the TV remote.

  Brenda Taylor lived in one of the many estates created on the ashes of old citrus groves, south of Winter Haven. They had names that sounded like they should be in the English countryside. Bubba always expected to see ivy growing up the sides of the McMansions along the curving streets, but white stucco walls didn't seem to encourage ivy as easily as old brick.

  Bubba parked his Bronco in the triple-car driveway. Bubba smiled as he walked to the front door. The Bronco looked like the yardman should have had it parked in the road, not on the pristine concrete's width. The door opened before Bubba reached the buzzer. A small, elegant, dark-haired woman in all black—patent leather heels, simple dress, and various jewelry—smiled and held out her hand. "Mr. Simms, thank you for coming out. I'm Brenda Taylor. Come in, please."

  The great room had a fifty-inch plus flat-screen television at the far end of the room. A fireplace with gas logs marked the wall to the left as they entered the room. The all-white furniture was sparse but stark against the wood floors. Neither the couch nor the chairs faced the flat screen.

  Brenda Taylor motioned toward the couch. "Would you like an iced tea?"

  "No, I finished some on the drive over."

  "Isn't this heat simply awful?"

  "Imperial Polk County in the summer. Why do you think everyone is wrong about your husband's suicide?"

  "Griffith would never have killed himself. There were times I'd have liked to have killed him, and there might have been husbands through the years who thought about it. But Griffith was too, too much in love with himself to ever commit suicide."

  "Men get depressed. Business, health. All manner of things take the joy out of living."

  "I suppose, but Griffith was not rich yet. That was all that mattered to him. He promised me five years ago if I married him, we would be rich. He knew he'd better keep that promise."