murder, baby. They’ve heard it all. To them you’re just another nut along with a lotta nuts, and it won’t do you any good.”
He persuaded Hopper to get out of bed, and they went off together to the bathroom. That left me alone. I lay in the bed, staring at the six sharp-etched lines on the opposite walls and used my head. So Coroner Lessways was coming. Well, that was something. As Bland had said there wasn’t much point in my telling Lessways that Salzer was responsible for Eudora Drew’s killing. It was too far-fetched; too unbelievable, but if I had the chance I might give him something to chew on. For the first time since I had been in this trap I felt a little more hopeful.
I looked up suddenly to see the door slowly open. There was no one in sight. The door swung right open and remained open. I leaned forward to look into the empty corridor, thinking at first the wind had opened the door, but remembered the latch had clicked shut when Bland and Hopper had left the room.
I waited, staring at the open door, and listened. Nothing happened. I heard nothing, and because I knew someone had opened the door I felt suddenly spooked.
After what seemed an age I heard a rustle of paper. In the acute silence it sounded like a thunder clap. Then I saw a movement, and a woman came into sight.
She stood in the doorway, a paper sack in one hand, a vacant, unintelligent expression in her washed-out eyes. She regarded me steadily with no more interest than if I was a piece of furniture, and her hand groped blindly in the sack. Yes, it was her all right: the plum-eating woman, and what was more, she was still eating plums.
We looked at each other for a long moment of time. Her jaw moved slowly and rhythmetically as her teeth chewed up a plum. She looked as bright and happy as a cow chewing the cud.
“Hello,” I said, and it irritated me that my voice had gone husky.
Her fat fingers chased after a plum, found one and hoisted it into sight.
“It’s Mr. Malloy, isn’t it?” she said, as polite as a minister’s wife meeting a new member of the congregation.
“That’s right,” I said. “The last time we met we didn’t have the time to get matey. Who are you?”
She chewed for a moment, turned the stone out into her cupped hand and transferred it to the paper sack.
“Why, I’m Mrs. Salzer,” she said.
I should have guessed that. She really couldn’t have been anyone else.
“I don’t want to seem personal,” I said, “but do you like your husband, Mrs. Salzer?”
The vague look was chased away by surprise which in turn gave way to a look of weak pride.
“Dr. Salzer is a very fine man. There is no one in the world like him,” she said, and pointed her soft, round chin at me.
“That’s a pity. You’ll miss him. Even in our enlightened jails they still separate husbands and wives.”
The vague look came back again.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, you should do. If they don’t sit your husband in the gas chamber, they’ll give him twenty years. Kidnapping and murder earn a sentence like that.”
“What murder?”
“A woman named Eudora Drew was murdered on your husband’s instructions. I have been kidnapped, and there’s a girl across the way who I think has been kidnapped, too: Anona Freedlander. And then there’s Nurse Gurney.”
A sly little smile lit up the woman’s fat face.
“He has nothing to do with any of that. He thinks Miss Freedlander is a friend of mine who has lost her memory.”
“And I suppose he thinks I’m a friend of yours, too?” I said sarcasticallv.
“Not exactly a friend, but a friend of a friend of mine.”
“And how about Eudora Drew?”
Mrs. Salzer shrugged her shoulders.
“That was unfortunate. She wanted money. I sent Benny to reason with her. He got too rough.”
I scratched my jaw with my thumb-nail and stared at her. I sensed more than believed she was telling the truth.
“Where’s Nurse Gurney?” I asked.
“Oh, she met with an accident,” Mrs. Salzer said, and peered into the sack again. She brought out a plum, offered it to me. “Will you have one? They are good for you when you are in bed.”
“No. Never mind the plums. What happened to her?”
The face went vague again.
“Oh, she was going down the fire-escape when she slipped. I put her in the car, but I think she must have broken her neck. I don’t know why, but she seemed very frightened of me.”
I said in a tight voice: “What did you do with her?”
“I left her in some bushes out in the sand.” She bit into the plum, waved vaguely towards the window. “Out there in the desert. There wasn’t anything else I could do with her.”
I ran my fingers through my hair. Maybe she was crazy, I thought, or else I was.
“Was it you who arranged for me to come here?”
“Oh. yes,” she said, leaning against the doorway. “You see, Dr. Salzer has no knowledge of medicine or of mental illness. But I have. I used to have a very big practice, but something happened. I don’t remember what it was. Dr. Salzer bought this place for me. He pretends to run it, but I do all the work really. He is just a figure head.”
“No, he’s not,” I said. “He signed Macdonald Crosby’s death certificate. He had no right to.
He’s not qualified.”
“You are quire wrong,” she said calmly. “I signed it. We happen to have the same initials.”
“But he was treating Janet Crosby for malignant endocarditis,” I said. “Dr. Bewley told me so.”
“Dr. Bewley was mistaken. Dr. Salzer happened to be at the Crosby house on business for me when the girl died. He told Dr. Bewley I had been treating her. Dr. Bewley is an old man and a little deaf. He misunderstood.”
“Why was he called in at all?” I demanded. “Why didn’t you sign the certificate if you were treating her?”
“I was away at the time. My husband did the correct thing to call Dr. Bewley. He always does the correct thing.”
“That’s fine,” I said. “Then he better let me out of here.”
“He thinks you are dangerous,” Mrs. Salzer said, and peered into the sack again. “And you are, Mr. Malloy. You know too much. I’m sorry for you, but you really shouldn’t have interfered.” She looked up to smile in a goofy sort of way. “I’m afraid you will have to stay here, and before very long your mind will begin to deteriorate. You see, people who are continually drugged often become feeble-minded. Have you noticed that?”
“Is that what’s going to happen to me?”
She nodded.
“I’m afraid so, but I didn’t want you to think unkindly of Dr. Salzer. He is such a fine man. That’s why I have told you so much. More than I should, really, but it won’t matter. You won’t get away.”
She began to drift away as quietly as she had come.
“Hey! Don’t go away,” I said, sitting forward. “How much is Maureen Crosby paying you to keep me here?”
Her vague eyes popped a little.
“But she doesn’t know,” she said. “It’s nothing to do with her. I thought you knew,” and she went away rather like a tired ghost after a long and exhausting spell of haunting.
IV
