“It’s enough,” Shayne muttered, “if anyone saw you.”
“But I’m sure no one recognized us.”
“Don’t worry. If this comes out you’ll find a dozen people who saw you together. Did your husband suspect?”
“No. Charles was a lamb. He wanted me to go out and have a good time.”
“But not clandestinely… with the man who was leading a strike against him.”
“No,” she admitted in a small voice. “I guess not. But I think Charles really liked George. I’m sure he admired him. He had agreed to his terms on ending the strike.”
“Are you positive?”
“Of course I’m positive. Charles showed me a copy of the agreement he’d signed… postdated on the day he was thirty and took control of the mines.”
“How many other people knew about that agreement?”
“No one. I’m sure Charles told no one. He made me swear I wouldn’t tell.”
“I suppose you realize how important this is as evidence in Brand’s favor. If it could be proved, it would absolutely kill the murder charge against him.”
“That’s what I thought. Except… Jimmy and Seth both said no one would ever believe me if I came out now and told it in George’s defense. On account of the way a lawyer would twist the other things around… to make it appear I was in love with him and just making it up about the agreement to save him.”
Shayne nodded thoughtfully. “We’d have to produce the agreement signed by your husband. Where is it?”
“That’s the trouble,” Elsa faltered. “Jimmy and Seth went through all his papers at home. They didn’t find it. I only saw the one copy… a few days ago. I think,” she went on faintly, “he was honestly afraid to let any of the others know about it before his birthday when he would be legally in control. You know. Because he was afraid they might…”
“Murder him before his birthday to prevent him from settling the strike?” Shayne supplied harshly when she hesitated.
“Yes. That’s it exactly.” She was sitting erect, and she turned her body to face him squarely, and continued earnestly, “You don’t know how fanatical they are, Mr. Shayne. You can’t imagine how they hate unions. They’ll spend hundreds of thousands to prevent the workers from getting a few thousands additional in their pay envelopes. I don’t understand it. I just can’t.”
Shayne was thoughtfully silent for a moment. It was too dark to see her expression, but she sounded sincere. He was puzzled, and tried to figure whether the drunken, hard-boiled woman he had met at the Roche house was the real Elsa Roche, or the woman who now sat beside him pleading for the miners. He frowned into the darkness and said:
“It isn’t the first few thousands. It’s the opening wedge they’re afraid of. Once the workers get power, they demand more and more of the profits.”
“But Charles insisted they deserve it. He planned all sorts of changes when he got control.”
“Your late husband evidently wasn’t cut out for the role of an economic royalist,” he told her grimly. “Let’s go back to last night.”
“One thing I don’t understand, Mr. Shayne… is why George was out playing poker instead of at home to meet Charles. Charles said they had an appointment to discuss the agreement, and it certainly was terribly important to George. It meant the end of the strike to him. Everything he had been righting for.”
“Perhaps there was a mix-up about the time?” he suggested.
“I don’t think so. Charles seemed very sure they were to meet at George’s house last night.”
Shayne shook his red head angrily, then tried to get things straightened out in his mind by speaking his thoughts aloud. “Your husband discreetly parked his car up at the corner and walked down Magnolia Avenue to Brand’s house. Finding it dark and unoccupied… if Brand is telling the truth… Charles must have been surprised. What would he have done then?”
“I don’t… know.”
“Suppose the house across the street had been lighted at that hour. Ann Cornell was up when Seth Gerald got there, and a little after five when Brand drove up. Mightn’t your husband have gone across to inquire whether she knew anything about Brand’s whereabouts?”
“He might.” Elsa Roche drew in a quick, audible breath, as though this train of thought was frightening to her.
“We might suppose that Mrs. Cornell was entertaining a friend,” Shayne went on slowly. “Someone who might stay in the background, unnoticed by Mr. Roche, when he asked about Brand. Would your husband have hinted to her the importance of his reason for wanting to find Brand?”
“You mean… tell her about the strike agreement? I’m sure he wouldn’t. He didn’t want anyone to know beforehand.”
“But he might have explained the queer hour of his visit by saying it was very important that he see Brand. To any one on the inside listening, it might sound very much as though he was negotiating with the strikers.”
“What are you getting at?” She caught his arm fiercely.
“Some one killed your husband,” he told her calmly. “After he left Brand’s house… or Mrs. Cornell’s… and was walking back to his parked car. Someone who had a reason to. Someone who wasn’t interested in the contents of his wallet.”
“With George’s gun?” she faltered. “They say it was found right there.”
“With Brand’s gun,” Shayne agreed. “His gun lying beside the body is one of the best arguments we have for Brand’s innocence. Certainly he wouldn’t have left it there… unless it was carefully premeditated and Brand realized that a smart lawyer would use it as proof of his innocence if it were found there.”
There was a short silence between them. The rush of the river and the crickets’ songs came faintly through the mist in the valley. Elsa’s hand was still gripping Shayne’s arm tightly. She asked, almost in a whisper, “Who do you think did it?”
He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Someone who wanted the strike broken. Who knew that the one sure way of breaking it was to have Charles murdered and have Brand charged with the crime?”
Her hand fell away from his arm. “Mr. Persona wouldn’t have stopped at murder to break the strike. He hasn’t stopped at murder in trying to break it. Three miners have been killed in the past few weeks.”
“On Persona’s orders?”
“It was all made to look perfectly legal,” she said listlessly. “The law doesn’t call it murder if an officer shoots a man who’s resisting arrest.”
“I wondered who pays the salaries of all these special deputies,” Shayne muttered. “It seems a big outlay for one mine owner.” He paused a moment, then went on, “Another thing that troubles me is this: If Gerald controls the local police department, and AMOK hires the deputies… why wouldn’t it have been much simpler to have put George Brand out of the way long ago, just as they did the three miners. Wouldn’t the strike have fallen to pieces without strong leadership?”
“I don’t know,” she confessed. “It isn’t until lately that I began thinking about such things.”
“Let’s get back to the facts and see where we stand,” he said briskly. “When did you first tell Jimmy Roche and Seth Gerald about the signed agreement?”
“This afternoon. At first I thought I wouldn’t say anything. I thought it would turn up. Then I began brooding. Please try to understand. I’m not in love with George. I’m not really in sympathy with the miners, I’m afraid. I don’t understand anything about the mining business. But I’ve been thinking about Charles all day. He would feel terrible if he knew that his death had been the means of sending the miners back to work at the same old starvation wages. And I do admire George. He was strong and fearless. He believed in what he was doing. It seems terrible that he should pay for a thing I know he didn’t do.”
“You’re basing your belief entirely on the fact that you know Charles had agreed to settle the strike, and that therefore Brand is the one man in Centerville who had every reason to want him to stay alive until his thirtieth birthday at least?” Shayne asked gently.