“You’re kidding!” I said. “Anyone who knows anything about me knows that I don’t have a pot to—”
“Right.” He cut me off. “So what the guy was after was you. He’d have you pinned down in the house. You’d probably wake up — he’d wake you, of course — to find him bending over your bed. A skeleton grinning at you in the dark. You couldn’t get away from him, and — yes? Something wrong, Britt?”
“Something wrong!” I shuddered. “What are you trying to do to me, Jeff?”
“Who hates you that much, Britt? And don’t tell me you don’t know!”
“But... but I don’t,” I stammered. “I’ve probably rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, but...”
I broke off, for he was holding something in front of me, then dropping it on the bed with a grimace. A pamphlet bylined by me, with a line attributing sponsorship to PXA.
“That’s why I came out to see you the other night, Britt. I ran across it in the library, and I was sure the use of your name was unauthorized. But I guess I was wrong, wasn’t I?”
I hesitated, unable to meet his straightforward blue eyes, their uncompromising honesty. I took a sip of water through a glass straw, mumbled a kind of defiant apology for my employment with PXA.
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Jeff. It was a public-service thing. Nothing to do with the company’s other activities.”
“No?” Claggett said wryly. “Those activities paid for your work, didn’t they? A lot more than it was worth, too, unless my information is all wrong. Three thousand dollars a month, plus bonuses, plus a car, plus an expense account, plus — let’s see. What else was included in the deal? A very juicy — and willing — young widow?”
“Look,” I said, red-faced. “What’s this got to do with what happened to me?”
“Don’t kid me, Britt. I’ve talked to her — her and her uncle both. It’s normal procedure to inform a man’s employers when he’s had a mishap. So I had a nice little chat with them, and you know what I think?”
“I think you’re going to tell me what you think.”
“I think that Patrick Xavier Aloe had been expecting Manuela to visit some unpleasantness upon you and is now sure that she did. I think he gave her plenty of hell as soon as I left the office.”
I thought the same, although I didn’t say so. Claggett went on to reveal that he had talked with Mrs. Olmstead, learning, of course, that we were much more than employer and employee.
“She put out a lot of money for you, my friend. Or arranged to have it put out. She also put out something far more important to a girl like that. I imagine she only did it in the belief that you were going to marry her...”
He waited, studying me. I nodded reluctantly.
“I should have known what was expected of me,” I said. “Hell, maybe I did know but wouldn’t admit it. At any rate, it was a lousy thing to do, and I probably deserve whatever she hands out.”
“Oh, well.” Claggett shrugged. “You weren’t very nice to your wife, either.”
“Probably not, but she’s an entirely different case. Manny was good to me. I never got anything from Connie and her old man but a hard time.”
“You say so, and I believe you,” said Claggett warmly. “Any damage you do, I imagine, is the result of not doing — just letting things slide. You don’t have the initiative to deliberately hurt anyone.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I guess.”
He chuckled good-naturedly. “Tell me about Connie and her father. Tell me how you happened to marry her, since it obviously wasn’t a love match.”
I gave him a brief history of my meeting and association with the Bannermans. Then, since he seemed genuinely interested, I gave him a quick rundown on Britton Rainstar, after fortune had ceased to smile upon him and he had become, lo, the Poor Indian.
Jeff Claggett listened attentively — by turns laughing, frowning, exclaiming, wincing, and shaking his head. When I had finished, he said that I was obviously much tougher than he had supposed. I must be to survive the many messes I had gotten myself into.
“Just one damned thing after another!” he swore. “I don’t know how the hell you could do it!”
“Join the crowd,” I said. “Nobody has ever known how I did it. Including me.”
“Well, getting back to the present. Miss Aloe expected you to marry her. How did she take the news that you couldn’t?”
“A lot better than I had any right to expect,” I said. “She was just too good about it to be true, if you know what I mean. Everything was beautiful for around six weeks, just as nice as it had been from the beginning. Then a couple of days ago, the day of the evening I jumped this character in the skeleton suit—”
“Hold it a minute. I want to write this down.”
He took a notebook and pencil from his pocket, then nodded for me to proceed. I did so, telling him of the dog and the mulatto woman and the bartender who had thrown the drink in my face.
Jeff made a few additions to his notes when I had finished, then returned the book and pencil to his coat. Leaning back in his chair, he stared up at the ceiling meditatively, hands locked behind his head.
“Three separate acts,” he said, musingly. “Four, counting the skeleton routine. But there’s a connection between them. The tie-in is in the result of those acts. To give you a hard jolt when you least expect it.”
“Yes,” I said uneasily. “They certainly did that, all right.”
“I wonder. I just wonder if that’s how her husband died.”
“You know about him?” An icy rill tingled down my spine. “She told me he died very suddenly, but I just assumed it was from a heart attack.”
Claggett said that all deaths were ultimately attributable to heart failure, adding that he had no very sound arguments for regarding the death of Manny’s husband as murder.
“They were at this little seacoast resort when it was hit by a hurricane. Wiped out almost half the town. Her husband was one of the dead. Wait, now—” He held up his hand as I started to speak. “Naturally, she couldn’t have arranged the hurricane, but she could have used it to cover his murder. I’d say she had plenty of reason to want him out of the way.”
“I gather that he wasn’t much good,” I said. “But—”
“She dropped out of sight right after the funeral. Disappeared without a trace, and she didn’t show up again for about a year.”
“Well?” I said. “I still don’t see...”
“Well, neither do I,” Claggett said easily, his manner suddenly changing. “What are you going to do now, Britt, that you’ve quit the pamphlet writing?”
I said that I wished to God I knew. I wouldn’t have any money to live on, and none to send Connie, which would surely cause all hell to pop. I was beginning to regret that I’d quit the job, even though I’d had no choice in the matter.
Claggett said I didn’t have one now, either. I had to go back on the job. “You’ll be safer than if you didn’t, Britt. So far, Miss Aloe’s only given you a bad shaking up. But she might try for a knockout if she thinks you’re getting away from her.”
“We don’t actually know that she’s done anything,” I said. “We think she’s responsible, but we’re certainly not sure.”
“Right. And we never will be if you break completely with her. Not until it’s too late.”
“But I’ve already quit! And I made it pretty damned clear that I meant it!”
“But she didn’t tell her uncle, apparently. Probably afraid of catching more hell than he’s already given her.” He stood up, dusting at his trousers. “I’ll be having a little chat with both of them today, and I’ll tip her off privately first — let her know that you’re keeping the job. You can bet she’ll be tickled pink to hear it.”