“No,” said Stan, “you can’t. You didn’t go to the one tonight, did you?”
She hesitated almost imperceptibly before she said, “No, I didn’t. I had to tear through a pile of work, as it was, to come over here with you.”
“It’s kind of you to take pity on a lonely man.”
“Don’t sound so tragic!” Lois laughed. “You’re moving me to tears.”
“Men must work and women must weep,” said Stan swinging into the road to River Inn.
The place was a babble of noise and smoke. The cauliflower-eared bartender gave them a glance as they came in the door and turned quickly away. The dance hall was dimly lighted. A dozen or more couples were moving about the floor to the blare of the victrola.
Stan found a table, sat down, and ordered Scotch highballs from a Negro waiter. “Tell that whiskey surgeon in there that if he cuts that Scotch to shreds I’ll carve his heart out!”
“What you say?” the waiter demanded, widening his eyes.
“Forget it,” said Stan. “Double talk! Hustle along.” He folded his arms, rested them on the edge of the table and looked across at Lois. “Do you love Jupiter Carnes?” he asked flatly.
She bit her lip hard, then laughed. “You’re a delightfully insulting man! I’m engaged to him! Let’s dance!”
Stan took her in his arms and they moved out on the floor. “Jupe knows I’m over here with you,” she said after a few steps. “Just because I’m engaged to him, he doesn’t try to keep me in a cage.”
“I’m afraid I would,” said Stan, “if you were engaged to me.”
She moved a trifle closer and said, “I’m not.”
“Where was he tonight?” asked Stan. “I didn’t see him at the fire either.”
“He was at the office until a short time ago.” Lois missed a step. “As a matter of fact, he said he might join us later here.”
Stan deftly avoided a slightly drunken couple and said without preamble, “I suppose you heard Phil Cox was murdered — shot through the head.”
Her body tightened in his arms and she stopped short. “Please,” she said, releasing herself.
Stan followed her to the table and pulled out her chair. “Just like Trimmer,” she said, her voice low.
Stan nodded. She drained her highball and asked, “Could we go now? I don’t feel much like dancing. I knew Phil, knew him quite well.”
“But you have no idea who killed him?”
“None,” she said emphatically. “How would I know?”
“I just thought you might,” Stan told her casually. “I learned today that you’ve been married to him for ten years.”
He took her arm, holding it hard, and helped her outside and into the car. “Pull yourself together, Lois,” he said kindly. “I’ll pay the check and be right back.”
Inside, he beckoned the surly bartender to the end of the bar. “I want the truth, and I want it fast,” he told the man. “You can take your choice between talking and having this clip joint visited by cops every day for the next six months. What time did that girl I was with just now leave this place last night?”
The bartender wet his lips and said, “One o’clock.”
“She was here with Jupiter Carnes. Did they leave together?”
“They had an argument. I think he got mad and left first and she followed.”
“She didn’t go home in his car?”
The bartender hesitated, caught the glint in Stan’s eyes, and said, “So help me, mister, I ain’t sure, but I think she drove across the river with some other guy.”
“Next time tell the truth right away and you’ll save trouble,” Stan advised and went back out to the car.
Lois was huddled disconsolately in one corner of the seat. Stan pushed the Buick savagely into gear and got it under way. “How long has Carnes known you were married to Phil Cox?” he demanded when they were on the road.
“I don’t know.” He could scarcely hear her.
“Why did you lie about him last night and tonight? You’re in a murder case, Lois, and you’d better come clean.”
“Jupe didn’t kill him!” she screamed suddenly. “He didn’t, I tell you, he didn’t!” Her voice trailed off and everything was quiet inside the car.
They were on the bridge when Lois began to speak again. Stan drove slowly, keeping silent, afraid to show sympathy for fear she would break down again and begin to cry.
“I loved Phil Cox devotedly years ago.” She spoke as though Stan were not present, telling her story to the yellow lights which flickered by. “He was sent to San Quentin for arson and I stayed by him until he escaped. His real name was Phil Gilbert, the name I go by now. His escape was a mistake. We became hunted things and had to separate until Phil came here. He sent for me three years ago. He was still afraid, frightened all the time, and we couldn’t live together.
She straightened up in the seat and said more firmly, “I fell in love with Jupiter Carnes. Phil understood, but I was on the spot. I was afraid to get a divorce, for fear it would stir things up and start the hunt for Phil all over again. Two weeks ago everything toppled about my ears. One of Phil’s old arson gang came to town and recognized us both. I was in an insurance office, and Phil in the Fire Department — a perfect setup for arson, according to this man.” She turned to Stan. “You saw him today.”
“Yes,” said Stan. “I’ve checked him also. He’s registered under the name of Charles Wentworth at the hotel.”
“He threatened to turn Phil up unless we played,” Lois went on. “Both of us refused, and he started his game by writing Jupe an anonymous note saying I was married, but not saying to whom.”
Her voice broke slightly, but she recovered herself again. “You must see, Stan, you must understand! Jupe would have had no reason in the world for killing Phil. He didn’t know Phil was my husband. You have to help me!”
“That’s what I’m here for,” Stan said kindly. “What’s the rest of it, Lois? What’s Wentworth doing to town right now?”
“He’s planning a fire, I’m sure. Listen, Stan,” she said desperately, “I had to fall in with his plans part way. He intends to set off one of two mills tonight — Carter’s moss factory out at the end of Lemon Street, or Randolph’s box factory at the bend of the river. Both of them are heavily insured. I don’t know which, for he doesn’t trust me that far, but I can find out if you’ll help me trap him.”
“Good girl!” said Stan. “It’s a deal!”
“I know he’s talked to Carter,” she added, “but I don’t know which will go first.”
“I’ll be back in a minute,” Stan told Lois, “and we can make our plans.” He climbed out of the car in front of his hotel and ran upstairs. He took his Colt .38 from his Gladstone bag, and slipped the heavy weapon in the side pocket of his topcoat. He put his flash-light on the other side, and was back downstairs in less than five minutes.
In the lobby he called the police station. A long series of rings produced no reply. As he stepped from the porch, Lois ran in through the front door of the lobby and crossed quickly to where he stood. Her face was white and drawn.
“Wentworth’s sedan just headed up Lemon Street!” she told Stan. “There’s no time to lose! He’s bound for the Moss factory, I’m sure!”
“Watch him!” said Stan curtly. “I’ll be there right away.”
Stan turned around and swore. The night clerk who had been back of the desk a few minutes before had disappeared, gone on some errand of his own. The lobby was entirely deserted. Stan seized a souvenir postcard from a rack on the desk, wrote on it: “Blunt: Moss factory, quick! Stan,” and laid it face up on the open guest register.
He spied a blue pencil in back of the cigar case, reached around for it, and scrawled in big letters on the guest register “Night Clerk: Get this to the Chief of Police in a hurry!”