He took the letter into the kitchen and burned it in the stove, swearing silently at himself because he hadn’t done it before. This was poor country in which to get careless.
* * *
It was after sunrise of a hot, brilliant morning when he awoke. His head was better, but sunlight stabbed at his eyes and started it aching again. He put on a straw hat and went fishing anyway. Maybe he wasn’t fooling anybody now, but he couldn’t give up.
It could have been anybody, he thought. I had my hands on him, and all I know is that his shirt was wet with sweat. That and the fact that he was smart and had nerves like ice to wait me out. That would fit Counsel. . . . He shrugged irritably. Robert Counsel couldn’t have been here all this time unless he was dead. He would have been seen and recognized.
What about the Lasater girl; where did she fit in? There was no doubt, of course, that she could have followed him over to the Counselor to act as a decoy to keep him there while the man shook down his cabin. But had she? He was only guessing. He recalled the strange silence that had fallen over her while Griffin talked about the explosion. It obviously wasn’t the first time she’d heard the story, but still it fascinated her.
Thinking about it now, he remembered his own odd feeling about it, the illogical hunch that it could be somehow connected with the mystery in which he was already entangled. There was no basis for it except that it had been an explosion and Gage had said Counsel was an explosives expert. But still, Counsel could have been here then. He’d returned from Italy about that time.
He abruptly reeled in his lure and rowed back to camp. Mildred Talley was lying on the float in her bathing suit. She propped herself on one elbow and waved with a cigarette.
“Hello,” she said. “How are the bass and all the little bass?”
“Feeling no pain. At least, not from hunger,” he replied, tying up the skiff.
She smiled. “If you really want to catch the silly things, you ought, to go along with Max Easter. He never has any trouble.”
He looked at her curiously. “He doesn’t?”
“Not from what I hear—” She stopped abruptly and sat up. Reno looked up the path. Delia Malone had come out of the kitchen and was staring coldly at the girl.
“Oh, oh, I’d better get to work,” Mildred said, climbing to her feet. “Dell’s on the warpath this morning.”
Delia’s jumped her about talking too much, Reno decided as he changed clothes. He remembered Skeeter’s purring drawclass="underline" “If you can’t shut her big mouth, I can.” But talking about what? Most of her conversation appeared to be harmless.
Easter was a good fisherman; so what of it? She was a bird brain. But maybe that was the trouble—they didn’t know what she would talk about.
Delia was alone at the counter. She took his order with cold efficiency and as she departed for the kitchen Reno pulled the morning paper toward him. He unfolded it, and Vickie’s picture leaped up at him from the front page. “Actress Near Collapse,” the headlines read. “Maintains Innocence.” His eyes were bleak as he skimmed through the lead. They couldn’t leave her alone; they had to have more pictures and more rehash of the same old story. “In a highly charged and dramatic interview in the city jail today, Vickie Shane McHugh, radio and motion-picture actress held in connection with the August tenth slaying of her husband, tearfully reiterated her innocence.”
The screen door opened and closed. Reno looked around. It was Patricia Lasater, disturbingly good-looking in a summery cotton and spectator pumps. She smiled when she saw him, and sat down one stool away at the counter. He was grudgingly conscious of the fact that her smile was a distillation of pure charm, the velvety brown eyes just faintly bantering and amused and yet full of warmth and fringed with the longest and darkest lashes he had ever seen.
So she’s pretty, he thought, instantly savage. Isn’t that nice? Why don’t I tell her she’s a cute little thing and we can organize a club and just forget about everything else?
His face expressionless, he slid the paper along the counter toward her.
“Here,” he said. “I was just looking at the headlines.”
“Thank you,” she murmured politely.
“They really got that actress dead to rights,” he went on. “She hasn’t got a prayer.”
She glanced down at the picture, and when she looked up he saw her face had gone suddenly still. “Do you think they’ll convict her?” she asked anxiously.
“Sure.” He gestured’ with offhand confidence. “It’s open and shut. She drops in on her husband, finds him wandering into the hotel with some stray dish, and blasts him. She might get off with life, but I doubt it.”
“But I think she’s innocent—”
“Innocent?” he scoffed. “Fat chance. With the motive she had? She caught her husband playing around, didn’t she?”
There was something trapped and desperate in the brown eyes now, and she looked away from him. “But maybe it wasn’t the way it looked, at all,” she protested.
He turned the knife, suddenly and inexplicably detesting himself for doing it. “Well, all I can say is that she’s going to have a sweet time proving it. It’s obvious what it was, the way this good-time babe ducked out and left the country.”
She made an effort to regain control of herself now, and she said coldly, “You are quite definite in your opinions, aren’t you, Mr. Reno? Are you always as sure of everything?”
He shrugged. I had her going there for a minute, he thought grimly. Then he felt very little pride in it. Something was bothering her, and he had the feeling there was a lot here he hadn’t seen yet.
“No,” he answered: “There are a few things I’m not sure of. Are you going to town this morning?”
“Why, yes.”
“I’m going in for a couple of hours, if you’d like a ride. No use taking both cars.”
She considered it briefly, and her tone thawed to its accustomed friendliness as she accepted. Maybe I’m being stupid, he thought, as they went out onto the highway. Maybe I’m doing it all wrong. What I ought to do is pull right in front of the police station and take her in. She could skip.
No, he decided impatiently. He was up against the same old argument. If he turned her over to the police and she refused to verify Vickie’s story his sister would be in a worse position than ever, and he would be exposed. They’d know who he was, and he didn’t need a blueprint to see what that could mean.
Once, during a long period of silence, he turned his head and looked at her. The lovely face was troubled, as she stared moodily ahead at the road. Is that the only reason I don’t take her in, he wondered, or am I getting soft in the head?
She turned, and caught him looking at her. The brown eyes were a little flustered as she tried to smile.
“I—I’m sorry,” she said. “Did you say something? I was thinking.”
“Yeah.” He faced the road again. “Yeah. So was I.” Counsel and Easter weren’t the only explosives experts in this part of the country. There was just a touch of dynamite about this dark-haired girl.
It was a little after ten when he parked near the post office. “Meet you here at twelve-thirty,” he said shortly. “All right?”
“Yes. That will do nicely,” she said..
He started into the post office, but halted before he was up the steps. There wouldn’t have been time to receive a letter from Mrs. Conway. Maybe she hadn’t even reached San Francisco yet; at any rate it might be another two or three days before he heard. He turned away with disappointment and started toward Gage’s office.
Nuts, he thought, I might as well try, now that I’m here. Ducking into a drugstore telephone booth, he put through the call to San Francisco, listening anxiously while the long-distance operator asked Information for the number. Then he heard the telephone ringing. There was just a chance, a slight chance, she had arrived and hadn’t left yet.