‘Okay, Mr. Keller. I’ll be seeing you again. Thanks for your help,’ and nodding to the police officer to take Keller out, Renick went to the telephone and called Barty to come in.
I felt as if a noose was slowly tightening around my throat. I just sat there, doodling and sweating.
‘There’s something phoney about this business,’ Renick said, sitting down at his desk. ‘I’ve had an idea from the very start that this wasn’t a straightforward kidnapping.’
‘What do you mean?’ I said, aware my voice sounded husky.
‘I’m damned if I know, but I’m going to find out.’
Barty came in.
‘What’s up?’
Renick told him what Keller had said.
Barty sat on the edge of the desk, frowning.
‘She went alone, but a redhead. This girl’s dark. There’s two of them – Keller and the air hostess who both swear the girl was a redhead. What was she listed as on the flight record?’
Renick took out a file and glanced through it.
‘Ann Harcourt: booked for L.A. Who’s Ann Harcourt? Look, Barty, drop everything. I want to know everything about this girl. Get the boys working. Get L.A. to check on her there. I want all the hotels checked just in case she stayed at a hotel.’
‘Just what’s on your mind, John?’
‘There’s something phoney about this set-up. The kidnapper tells the girl he is Jerry Williams who she hasn’t seen for a couple of months. He persuades her to go to a joint like the Pirates’ Cabin: a place where none of these youngsters ever go. From there she suddenly vanishes. A big guy wearing a brown sports suit is seen in her car at ten-thirty. Another car is heard to drive off, but is not seen. Then a big guy in a brown sports suit is seen with a girl wearing the same dress the murdered girl is found in at the airport at eleven o’clock. That would make the timing right. From the Pirates’ Cabin to the airport is just about half an hour’s drive. So far so good. She could have been kidnapped. She could have been so terrorised that she changed her dress, put on a red wig and sun goggles and gone with the man. But what happens?’ He slammed his fist down on the desk. ‘
‘Could have been a faked kidnapping,’ Barty said. ‘Providing this girl Ann Harcourt was Odette Malroux. That’s something we’ll have to find out.’
‘Yeah,’ Renick said. ‘Okay, get going. Let’s check on this girl, and when I say check, I mean check!’
He swung round to me.
‘Get that dress photographed. Get one of the office girls to put it on and block out her face. Someone else might recognise it. Get the picture circulated in all the local papers and in L.A.’
I picked up the dress and went back to my office. I felt as if I hadn’t a bone in my body. The teeth of the trap were closing too fast. In another twenty-four hours, if not sooner, Renick might even be on to me. Somehow I had to think of a way to prove that O’Reilly had killed her – but how?
I was too busy for the next hour to think about my problem. I got the dress photographed, gave a Press meeting and made sure the photograph would be circulated in Los Angeles.
By then it was lunch time. I was preparing to go to lunch with Renick and Barty when the telephone bell rang. We three were in Renick’s office. He answered the phone, then handed the receiver to me.
‘It’s Nina,’ he said. ‘She wants you.’ I took the receiver.
‘Yes?’ I said. ‘I’m just going to lunch.’
‘Harry, will you please come home?’ There was a note in her voice – a note I had never heard before– that sent a chill snaking up my spine. ‘I have to talk to you.’
The fear, the cold flat tone in her voice shook me.
‘I’ll be right over,’ I said and hung up. ‘Nina wants me to have lunch with her. Something’s come up.
One of the usual domestic things,’ I said. ‘I’ll be back by two o’clock.’
‘Sure, go ahead,’ Renick said. He was reading a file and didn’t even look up. ‘Take a car, Harry. I want you back here at two o’clock.’
As soon as I left his office, I ran down the passage and down the stairs. I got in a police car and drove home fast. I knew something had happened. I couldn’t imagine what, but I knew from the tone of her voice it was bad.
I parked the car outside the bungalow and walked fast up the path, took out my key and pushed open the front door.
‘Nina?’
‘I’m here, Harry,’ she said from the lounge.
I crossed the hall, pushed open the lounge door and entered. Then I stopped short.
Nina sat in a chair, facing me. She looked small and scared and very white.
Seated near her, his legs crossed was O’Reilly. He had changed out of his chauffeur’s uniform and he had on a sports shirt and bottle green slacks. He was picking his teeth with a match splinter and he grinned at me as our eyes met.
