“It does sound sort of ghostly,” Martin agreed, “but if it hadn’t been for the radio playing we might not have known about the accident for days.” He told them how Nate Morris had heard the radio and come down the slope to investigate, and then explained what he and his deputy had deduced from the physical evidence above.
“Suicide?” Albright asked doubtfully. He gestured toward the dead man. “That lipstick on his mouth looks mighty fresh to me.”
“It is fresh,” said Fulgreen quietly. “I wiped off a sample for possible laboratory analysis later. He kissed some woman a very short time before he died.”
“Lots of neckers park up on the Point,” Albright said.
“But where is she now? Where was she when the car went over? What do you get as the cause of death?”
Fulgreen disregarded the first two questions as rhetorical, and answered the third. “He’s bruised badly around the head, and that blow on his forehead from the instrument board probably caused a concussion. Offhand, I’d say the life was crushed out of him by the weight of the car across his chest.”
The wrecker had been brought up to the edge of the cliff above, and a steel cable was lowered to the battered sedan. A hook was attached to the rear axle, and the car was hoisted gently off the body.
The dead man was well-dressed and had the pale complexion and soft hands of an office worker. His billfold held $32 in cash, and papers that indicated he was William Petty of 127 South Race Street, Denver, Colorado, a bookkeeper. A driver’s license and registration certificate in the leather key-container on the ignition substantiated this identification and showed the wrecked car belonged to him.
After it was hoisted up onto the roadway above, Martin had it examined carefully for fingerprints, and then directed a number of volunteers with flashlights to search all along the slope for a tool that might have been used to pry the boulders loose from the edge. This search was unsuccessful, though the rocks themselves were both found in the bottom of the canyon, and they showed traces of having been pried up and rolled over the cliff.
While this search was going on, Sheriff Martin drew Nate Morris aside from the others to question him more fully.
“I came back as soon as I felt I could leave my wife,” the young rancher told him. “She was terribly upset.”
“Murder is enough to upset any woman,” the Sheriff said.
Morris looked surprised. “Murder? I figured the car had just gone out of control making the turn and plunged over.”
“I don’t think so.” Martin didn’t go into details, but said, “Tell me again exactly how it happened. Did you and your wife just drive up here to see the view?”
“It was a sudden impulse.” Morris shrugged. “It was a pretty night and — well, we did some of our courting here on the Point two years ago.”
The Sheriff nodded his understanding. “Did you meet any cars coming up?”
“I don’t think — wait a minute! There was a car coming down just as we started up that first long slope. There was a woman driving and she crowded me pretty well over the edge.”
“A woman? Alone?”
“Yes. As near as I could tell. She flashed by so fast I couldn’t be positive.”
“What kind of car?” Martin was taking notes.
“A sedan. Dark blue or black. I think it was a big car. Perhaps a Buick.”
“Let’s see. It must have been just about nine-thirty. We had been listening to ‘I Love a Mystery, ” Morris recalled. “I turned it off when the program ended at nine-fifteen, and it was a few minutes later when we decided to drive up here.”
“That the only car you met?”
“That was the only one. We drove on up and found the Point deserted. I guess we’d been parked there about ten minutes when we first heard that music drifting up and couldn’t place it. Then, I’ve told you about seeing the guard rocks missing and going down to investigate.”
“Did you touch anything down below?”
Morris shuddered. “Only the man’s wrist. His body was still warm, but there wasn’t any pulse.”
The Sheriff snapped his notebook shut. “That helps a lot,” he told the rancher. “Do you think you’d recognize the woman driver if you saw her again?”
“I’m afraid not. The moon wasn’t even up, you know.”
Whitaker came up just then to report that the searching party had been unable to find any trace of a tool that might have pried the boulders loose.
“I didn’t expect you would find it,” said Martin. “Whoever it was, carried the tool away with them. It’s murder. Or a suicide pact that only one of them went through with. Come on with me.”
With his deputy beside him as he drove down the steep grade, he told Whitaker about the fresh rouge on the man’s lips and the woman driver whom Morris had met.
“I don’t believe a woman could have pried those boulders loose,” the deputy objected.
“That’s why I mentioned a suicide pact,” Martin agreed. “Either that or there was some other man in the vicinity who knocked William Petty unconscious and sent his car over the edge.” He had reached the north and south straightaway at the bottom of the slope, and slowed to turn into a lighted filling station on the right.
The proprietor came out, and as soon as he recognized the Sheriff, he asked eagerly, “What’s goin’ on up to the Point? See a lot of cars up there.”
“Car went over and killed a man. You been on duty long, Jeff?”
“Since six o’clock.”
“Many cars go up or down the mountain tonight?”
Jeff shook his head. “That new highway has just about ruined my business. Several cars went up earlier, but none of ’em stopped for gas. I saw Nate Morris go by a-hellin’ it right about ten o’clock.”
“We know about him,” Martin said. “Any others?”
“One. Only customer all evenin’. She bought five gallons on a C-stamp. That was about nine-thirty, I reckon.”
“What kind of car, Jeff?”
“A big blue Buick. Had a Denver license, I recollect. She came down in a big hurry. Didn’t wait for me to clean her windshield. An’ you know I had a kinda funny hunch about her.” Jeff laughed sheepishly. “You know how ’tis when you’re alone an’ not much to do. There was a sort of funny bundle on the back seat, an’ I got the idea she didn’t want me to clean the windshield on account of she didn’t want me to look in.
“Well, sir, I made mention of it to her when I gave her the change. Just kiddin’, you know. Said it looked like she had a body back there. She said her husband had drunk too much and passed out. Then she roared away in a big hurry.”
The Sheriff thought about this information for a moment. Then he said, “Okay. Let me have her license number and I’ll—”
Jeff broke in, “But I didn’t notice the number. I can’t remember all the—”
“You said she got gas on a C-stamp, Jeff.”
The gas station proprietor nodded in a puzzled way and then suddenly grinned. “I see what you mean, Sheriff.” He turned and hurried into the station.
Martin got out and followed him inside. He came back with a Denver license number, remarking grimly to Whitaker, “One good thing about those OPA rules. Person has to write his license number on the gas coupons. I’ll stop by the courthouse and call this number in to the Courtesy Patrol in Denver. Save time by having them look it up while we’re driving in. I got a pretty good description of her from Jeff,” he added. “Young and thin and pretty. Wearing a little red hat and lots of lipstick.”
Half an hour later the Sheriff and his deputy pulled up in front of Courtesy Patrol Headquarters in Denver. The sergeant in charge had checked the automobile registration number and had a name and address written on a slip of paper. Sheriff Martin took it. It read: “David L. Waring, 183 South Vine Street.”