“It was described to me by someone who saw it.”
“Who?”
“A prospector named Squint Hurley.”
“Where did he see it?”
Ty tried not to scowl. “He saw it lots of times. He carried it around with him for two years.”
“Where did he get it?”
“He found it.”
“Where?”
Ty surveyed her a moment without further attempt to hide the scowl, then said abruptly, “All right. You’ll either help us or you won’t. He found it under the dead body of Charlie Brand in the cabin where he was murdered.”
“Oh.” Her lashes flickered. “Indeed. A paper I wrote found under a dead body. You don’t suppose I did the murder and have forgotten about that, too?”
“No. If I had I wouldn’t have come to ask you about it.”
“But you did come to ask me, trying to keep it casual, without telling me what I would be letting myself in for.” Her pupils were contracted, though she was not facing the sunlight, and her voice had an edge. “I was under the impression that I’m a client of your firm? That I’ve paid you a satisfactory retainer?”
“You wouldn’t be letting yourself in—”
“No? Really, Mr. Dillon. It sounds as if the least I could expect would be the witness chair in a murder case, which would be — shall I say inconvenient?”
“But I’m only asking — confidentially—”
“Oh, no. You’re cheating. If I admitted I had written such a paper, and its being found under the body of a murdered man made my testimony vital as to whom I had given it to, would you still keep it confidential?”
“In that case I’d ask you—”
“Of course. You’d ask me to testify, and I’d refuse, and I’d get a subpoena to appear written on white paper with black ink. Here’s the ice. Have another highball.” She poured and mixed. “It’ll brighten you up. You’ve only partly satisfied my curiosity. For instance, how did the prospector know the writing on the paper was mine?”
“He didn’t.”
“Then who else saw the paper?”
“No one that I know of.”
Her brows lifted. “Did you do it with mirrors?”
“I showed Hurley an envelope you addressed to me and he said the writing was identical. The word ‘mountain.’ ”
“Ah! Then you already suspected me by intuition? Whose? Not yours?”
“It was an accident. I happened to have that envelope in my pocket with others.” Ty hadn’t picked up his second highball. “You are wrong, Mrs. Cowles, if you think there was the slightest intention of causing you any trouble—”
“Oh, I don’t! No trouble at all. Just the key witness in a notorious murder case.” She shivered delicately. “This prospector must be quite a handwriting expert. I’d love to see the paper. What happened to it?”
“Hurley gave it to Dan Jackson Tuesday morning. That night Jackson was killed and the paper taken from him.”
Wynne Cowles’s glass had been started toward her mouth, but was halted midway on its course. Then it went on to its contact with her warm firm lips, and she drank. She put it on the table. “Well!” she said. “Not just one murder. Two murders. Thank you so much!”
“You’re welcome.” Ty leaned forward to her. “I’m a first class boob. I’ve messed this all up. I had brains enough to know you wouldn’t want to be mixed up in a murder trial, no one does, but I should have gone on from there and considered what kind of an appeal would be effective with you. I should have told you the whole thing to begin with and then put it to you: we need your help. The Brand girls need it. You say Delia is a nice kid. That’s putting it mildly. I heard you at the courthouse, day before yesterday, offering Clara your assistance up to any amount. I know you meant money, but money isn’t what they need. Your information, who you gave that paper to, is absolutely vital. It’s the only trail we have—”
“You’re assuming as a fact that I wrote such a paper.”
“Well, you did. Didn’t you?”
“No.”
“You didn’t write that on a piece of paper and put your initials on it, WD?”
“No.”
He looked straight at her eyes and said, “I don’t believe it.” She shrugged. He said, “What you mean is that you did write it, but the paper can’t be produced as evidence, so you propose to avoid inconvenience and notoriety by denying it. If you mean that, why don’t you say so and I’ll know where I stand? We’re here alone.”
She shrugged again. “I’ll say that if you’d like it better. Delia has been released from jail, hasn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Is there any danger of her being arrested again?”
“No. I think not.”
“And you told me Clara isn’t going to be arrested. They are already having their inconvenience and notoriety, but that can’t be helped. So I’ll say this: if I had written such a paper, and if I thought it would convict a murderer for me to admit it and get summoned to a courtroom and testify on the stand about it, I wouldn’t do it. Does that let you know where you stand?”
“It does,” said Ty bitterly. “It lets me know where you stand, too.”
“I know.” She grimaced, and picked up her drink. “I’m a cockatrice, a mugger, a harpy — hell, I’m a mountain cat. I don’t mind. I don’t like murderers, but I’m not crazy about hangmen either. Maybe I’m an anarchist. You have not touched your drink.”
“I don’t want it. Listen, Mrs. Cowles. Tell me in confidence and I swear you can trust me—”
“You’re in love. I’d be a fool to trust you. No.”
“Damn it, you offered to help Clara—”
“I’ll help her. How much?”
He kept it up ten minutes longer, but it was futile. All he got was a few scratches from the mountain cat’s claws. He lost his temper, and he left without it.
He drove back to Cody in thirty-five minutes, narrowly missing a collision with a flock of sheep in Engel’s Gulch. It was a quarter to five when he turned into the Brand driveway on Vulcan Street. Delia opened the door for him. His face answered her question before she asked it, and she proved her right to some rarer appellation than “nice kid” by not asking it.
“Did you lie down?” Ty demanded.
She shook her head. “I just fooled around. Wishing I had gone with you.”
“It’s just as well you didn’t. Mountain cat? She’s a hyena. Come and sit down and I’ll tell you about it.”
When he had finished, leaving nothing out, he sat and stared at her miserably, glum, licked. Her lips were moving, nervously jerking, and she put her teeth on the lower one to stop it.
“I did it wrong,” he said. “I’m a fish. I’m a goddamn worm. Two words from her was all I needed, and I muffed the chance. If I’d had an ounce of brains I’d have figured it out better. Like this: either she had a hand in the murder of your father or she didn’t. If she did, she already knew about that paper and it didn’t matter what kind of an approach I made, nothing would drag an admission from her. But if she had nothing to do with the murder, which we had agreed to suppose, then the approach made all the difference, because she couldn’t have known why I was asking about that paper. I could have cooked up a plausible tale that wouldn’t have alarmed her, and she would have told me. Now she’s on guard, and there’s not a chance. It was our one measly lead and I’ve thrown it away.”
“You did your best, Ty.”
“If that’s my best, my worst would be a world’s record.”
“You think she does remember writing it and what she did with it?”
“I know she does. A million to one.”
“Do you still think she had nothing — that she didn’t—?”
“The murder? I don’t know. But ten to one she had nothing to do with it. Why would she? Can you conceive of any reason?”