Before leaving the development area that night, Ambrose made a quick trip to a small building of corrugated iron a short distance away from his field office. He let himself into the building with a duplicate key he’d had made a couple of months ago. Minutes later he was back in the field office again, an open brief case lying on his desk. He took the two sticks of dynamite from his pocket, taped them with care to the three sticks he already had in case, and tucked the lethal package into the bottom drawer of the desk. He had taken the dynamite sticks one or two at a time during the past few weeks, careful not to arouse the suspicions of Bartel, the construction boss.
When Ambrose brought his black sedan to a halt in his home driveway, he noted with satisfaction that Alice had already left in the little two-door. He carried his attaché case containing legal documents, plans, and architectural drawings into the house and placed it on his desk. The desk was so highly polished that he could almost see himself in its glossy surface. He shook his head slowly. She was always cleaning and polishing the house and everything in it! When she wasn’t doing that, she was fawning over him, waiting on him hand and foot, tryint to anticipate his every need. At first he had welcomed and enjoyed her attentions. But they had soon become annoying. And now he felt only a deep aversion to them.
He sank into his chair, picked up the telephone, and dialed a familiar number. Gloria Stone answered almost immediately, her contralto voice a heady, vibrant melody.
“And how is my little redhead?” Ambrose greeted her.
“Fine,” said Gloria. “And how is my big ambitious tycoon coming along?”
“Right now,” said Ambrose, “I’m busy as hell with architectural drawings. Some of these designers can’t seem to get it through their heads I want inexpensive houses, not mansions!”
“And you also want money and — and other things,” said Gloria.
“And I intend to get them,” Ambrose promised. “Very soon.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
“I’ll see you in a day or two,” said Ambrose. “Right?”
“Right,” said Gloria, and hung up.
It was Wednesday afternoon when Ambrose again stood before the desk of Chief of Police Weber.
Weber looked up questioningly. “Another letter?”
“Come,” said Ambrose, through tight lips. “I want to show you something.”
A half block down the street from the station Ambrose stopped beside the two-door he had driven that day. The window in the driver’s side was down. Ambrose pointed through to the opposite window. There was a round hole there, surrounded by an area of splintered glass.
A frown creased Weber’s forehead. “And just how did that happen?” he asked.
“It happened just a few minutes ago while I was driving out to the development. There is an uncleared fringe of trees and brush along the right side of the road. Someone was waiting for me there. Obviously, someone who knows that I generally drive along the road about two o’clock every afternoon.”
“Did you stop to investigate or anything?”
“Look!” snapped Ambrose. “When a slug misses my head by a fraction of an inch I don’t stop to investigate! I get out of there, but fast!”
“Don’t know exactly what we can do,” said Weber. “But I’ll send a couple of the boys out to have a look—”
“Well, it’s about time you did something,” Ambrose said pointedly. “Two threatening letters and now — now this! It’s beginning to get to me! Can’t keep my mind on my work, keep forgetting things.”
Ambrose drove the car to a garage, had the rest of the broken window removed, and ordered a replacement.
“We’ll have it here by tomorrow,” the mechanic promised, “and can install it in no time at all.”
Ambrose shook his head. “I’ll be tied up all day tomorrow. How about late Friday afternoon? I can bring the car around then.”
“Fine. We’ll be ready for you.”
A half hour later Ambrose parked the car in the shaded drive of a little cottage at the edge of town. He went to the door and pushed the pearl button.
The door opened almost immediately, and Gloria Stone stepped to one side and made a sweeping gesture for him to enter. Her low-cut white blouse and mauve stretch pants immediately stirred Ambrose.
In a moment they were on the sofa, locked in each other’s arms.
“And how is my financial wizard doing now?” Gloria asked, finally pushing him away. “Things shaping up?”
“Just fine,” said Ambrose knowing full well what she meant. “I think I’ll be able to start the divorce proceedings sometime next week.”
Sure. Let her believe he was planning to get a divorce. That way it would be better for everybody concerned.
He had met the red-headed Gloria nearly a year ago when she had come to Newton in search of a house. Her husband had died a few months earlier, and she had wanted to make a clean break from everything in the past — including the snoopy relatives in the town where she had lived. Before she had finally bought a house from his listings, he had spent the greater part of three weeks showing her about, during which time they had become acquainted — intimately. And after she had taken up residency in her new home, the intimacy had continued — mostly on Friday nights while Alice was playing bridge.
The vivacious Gloria had paid cash for the house, and it hadn’t taken Ambrose long to learn that she had received a large enough inheritance from her late husband to live gracefully for a long time to come. Because of their friendship he had hoped to get enough money from her to finish the Lostcreek Park venture and reap a quick harvest. But she had demurred.
“When I place money on a horse,” she had said, her green eyes flashing, “I’ll be doing the riding. Where Gloria’s money goes, Gloria goes.”
The implication had been plain enough.
And so Ambrose had been faced with an important decision. With the fawning, housecleaning, cloying Alice — and his growing accumulation of debts — it would take him years of struggle before he could get even close to where he wanted to be. But with the beautiful Gloria — and her ready cash — he could become a rich man almost overnight, a power to be reckoned with in the city of Newton. Together he and Gloria could go places!
It had not taken him long to reach the practical solution: get rid of Alice. He had considered divorcing her, but had dismissed the idea almost immediately. First, he had no real grounds for divorce. Second, she might suddenly become stubborn — since he had used her inheritance to initiate the Lostcreek Park venture — and demand the return of her money as part of the divorce settlement. Or, equally bad, a smart lawyer might get her a substantial interest in his holdings along with heavy alimony. Either way it would spell ruin as far as his future was concerned.
Divorce being out, there was only the obvious alternative, and he had devised a foolproof plan to bring about that alternative, a plan that he hadn’t even dared to tell Gloria. It was much better if she believed he was about to begin divorce proceedings. If she knew he was capable of getting rid of an unwanted mate, she might very well hesitate about placing herself in similar peril by marrying him.
Now, on the sofa, he took her hand in his and looked gravely at it. “There is something I should tell you, Gloria,” he said. “I don’t want to alarm you, but my life has been threatened several times during the last week or so. I have received two anonymous letters, and this afternoon on my way to the park someone shot a hole through my car window, the slug barely missing me.”