Which Way to Die? (9 page)

“Yes, as a matter of fact,” Baer said. “I can't go to bed until I've let you out and immobilized the elevator. How about saying good night, pal? The news stinks.”

“Watch your television, will you? I feel like a moonlight stroll on the roof. How about it, Norm?”

“I'd love it, Tim.” The glow had deepened.

Baer said, “How long you planning to stick around?”

“Oh, a while,” Corrigan said vaguely.

“Say an hour?”

Corrigan glanced at Norma. She said, “It's only eleven, Chuck. You won't be leaving before midnight, Tim, will you?”

“I guess not,” Corrigan said promptly. “Why not stretch out on the settee, Chuck?”

“I'm going stir-nutty. If you're going to be here anyway, Tim, how about if I duck out to a bar for a half hour or so?”

The suggestion found Corrigan
may simpáticó
.

“You poor bastard,” he said to the redhead. “Sure thing, Chuck. Go ahead.”

Baer muttered something about Greeks and gifts and switched off the TV. “I just have to put on a tie and my jacket.”

Corrigan took charge of the buttons while Baer rode down to the eleventh floor; he brought the car up and immobilized it at the roof. When he got back to the living room, the sliding glass doors were open and Norma was on the roof. He joined her, shutting the doors behind him.

Norma was standing at the lawn table. She was wearing a white strapless gown which clung to her figure as though she were charged with static electricity. In the moonlight her bare shoulders looked like Chinese ivory.

Corrigan took her hands and drew her to him. Her arms slipped around his neck and she raised her lips.

It was not their first kiss. But its predecessors had been mere good-night pecks on the way up in the elevator, inhibited by the knowledge that Chuck Baer would be standing there when the door opened. This was the first moment they had been alone without fear of interruption.

Corrigan could feel the girl turn to fire in his arms. She writhed against him and made a little moaning noise. He was feeling pretty good himself. But she broke the kiss and pulled away. She whispered, “Not here, Tim. It's too bright.”

It was bright. Light from the living room streamed through the glass doors; they might as well be embracing in a spotlight.

She took his hand and drew him around to the other side of the house. The bedroom windows here were all dark and draped.

“This is better, isn't it?” she whispered.

“Perfect, baby.”

She settled into his arms. This time the kiss left them gasping.

“Let me get my breath!” she giggled. She sank to the grass and pulled him down beside her. The grass was cool and dry.

Corrigan pressed her back. His lips buried themselves in her throat, then moved down. Norma melted like a candle, sighing.

And then she turned rigid. There was a sound as of a latch turning a few feet away. She pushed Corrigan off and scrambled to her feet. He was just jumping up when one of the French doors to Norma's and Mrs. Grant's bedroom opened.

Elizabeth Grant, in a quilted robe, her bottle-blonde hair in curlers, blinked out at them.

“Oh, it's you, Norma,” she said. She ignored Corrigan. “I couldn't imagine what that funny noise was. It sounded like someone in pain.”

Corrigan could have throttled her.

“Sorry we disturbed you, Elizabeth,” Norma said; her voice was muffled. “We'll be more quiet.”

She moved in the direction of the wall. Corrigan glanced back as he followed. Mrs. Grant sniffed and pulled the French door shut. He heard her latch it again.

Norma halted at the edge of the flower bed and looked up at the full moon. She was very pale. When Corrigan put his arm around her waist, she slipped away and glanced back at the house. Damn that Grant woman! he thought. That was thirty for tonight. He made no further attempt to recapture the mood.

“On our next date we're going to my apartment,” he growled. “Nobody'll be popping out of the woodwork there!”

“I'm sorry, Tim. I guess she scared me.”

“Sure,” he said.

She glanced over her shoulder. “Let's go back to the table. I think Elizabeth is watching us through the drapes.”

“Frank must get his nastiness from somewhere,” Corrigan said glumly. “Okay, Norm. Wait. As long as we're on this side, I'd better make a check of that other roof.”

He peered about in the moonlight and located the footprint he had left in the flower bed. He stepped into it, braced himself against the parapet, and peered across the street.

The roof of the opposite building was bright as day under the moon. There was no one on it. Corrigan pushed himself back and stepped out of the flower bed.

“Nothing,” he said. “Now all I've got to do is wait for Chuck to get back.”

“I'm sorry, Tim,” Norma murmured. Then she smiled and slipped her arm through his. “Next time your place. I promise.”

They were sitting at the lawn table, feet on one of the benches, sharing a cigarette, when the house phone rang inside. It was one o'clock. Corrigan got to it before the third ring.

“I'm back, lover boy,” Baer's bass voice said in his ear. “How'd you make out?”

“None of your goddam business,” Corrigan growled. “Chuck,” he said to Norma, who had followed him; and he went into the foyer and closed the toggle switch beside the elevator. A moment later Baer stepped off the car. Corrigan opened the switch again.

Baer grinned. “I take it that means you struck out.”

Corrigan opened his mouth to make a profane suggestion.

It was never made.

Somebody screamed in one of the bedrooms. The scream was so full of terror that it disguised the sex of the screamer.

Corrigan and Baer raced.

11.

Norma, paralyzed, was left behind. As they dashed into the hallway leading to the bedrooms, there was another scream. This time its sex was determinable, and its origin. The yell came from Frank Grant's throat, in the bedroom the two boys occupied.

They heard the bathroom door in the boys' room slam. Corrigan reached the bedroom door a step before Baer. He threw his shoulder against it and bounced off. It was locked.

They heard someone crash into the bathroom door inside, then the clatter of some metal object falling to the floor. There was a muttered curse in a voice Corrigan failed to recognize, then heavy footsteps pounded across the room away from them, which meant toward the French doors.

Corrigan and Baer worked together like parts of a machine. So when the MOS man spun past Baer and raced back up the hall, the private detective had no need to ask questions. He knew that, with his heavier build, he was delegated to break in the bedroom door while Corrigan circled around to cut off whoever had just fled from the bedroom.

Halfway down the hall Corrigan almost collided with Norma. She skipped into the bathroom out of the hall to let him pass, and he tore on by. An instant later he was across the living room, had rolled open the sliding door, and was racing around the corner on the roof.

Gun in hand, Corrigan skidded to a halt on the bedroom side of the house. One of the French doors to the boys' room stood open; no light showed from inside. There was no one in sight. The only sound he heard was the thud of Chuck Baer's beef hitting the door from the hall.

Corrigan ran around the entire perimeter of the house.

No one. Nothing. Whoever it was had got away. He deliberately put out of his head the question of how. That was for later.

Now he snatched a pencil flashlight from his pocket, flicked it on, and stepped through the French door to the scene of the commotion. Just as he did so the hall door crashed open and Baer flew in. His momentum carried him to the middle of the room, where he landed on hands and knees. The big man jumped to his feet and darted over to flip on the light switch.

Corrigan put away his gun and flash.

One of the twin beds was empty. The covers were piled on the floor as though the occupant had leaped out of bed in panic. The other bed still held its occupant.

Gerard Alstrom lay almost on his back, one leg off the bed, a hand still gripping the thrown-back covers. He was wearing pajamas of a poisonous green, the coat of which gave a grotesque Christmas effect: there was a glistening, ragged red circle in the heart of the green.

The mouth and eyes were both open. Corrigan knew a dead man when he saw one, but force of habit made him go through the motions. Then he straightened up to glance about the room.

A thin-bladed knife, its haft covered by black friction tape, lay on the floor near the bathroom door, which was closed. The knife looked homemade to Corrigan. Its pointed blade, some six inches long, was bright with fresh blood.

This was all Corrigan had time to see before his attention was diverted.

Norma Alstrom had come to a halt in the doorway from the hall. She had her hand to her lips, staring. Now Elizabeth Grant, pincurled and quilted, seized Norma by the shoulders from behind and hurled her to one side. The older woman rushed into the bedroom to glare down at Gerard Alstrom. Her mouth was as open as his, but hers was writhing in horror.

“Frank!”
she shrieked.
“Where's my Frank?”

“Take it easy, Mrs. Grant.” Corrigan strode over and tried the bathroom door. It was bolted. “Frank? You in there?”

“Captain Corrigan!” The relief in Frank Grant's voice was a short story all by itself. Thank God we've got a door between us, thought Corrigan; he'd kiss me.

And then he was butted out of the way by a charging Elizabeth Grant. She grabbed the doorknob with both hands, pulling violently.

“Frank! Darling! Open the door! It's Mummy, Frank dear!
Frank!
Did they do anything to you? Are you all right? Frankie, please, please … open for Mummy …”

Corrigan took her firmly by the shoulders. “We have no time for hysterics, Mrs. Grant. Your son sounds perfectly okay. It's Mr. Alstrom who's going to need help. Now will you please go back out into the hall and stay there? Mr. Baer and I have work to do.”

The woman turned on him with eyes flashing pure hate. But when she saw the look in that one brown eye she bit her lip, stepped aside, and went out. Norma was still standing in the door; her hand was still at her mouth.

From the bathroom side of the door Frank's shaky voice whimpered, “Is he gone, is he gone?”

“Uh-huh, whoever it was,” Corrigan said. “You can come out now, Frank.” He said swiftly to Chuck Baer, “Either the guy can fly, or he's still on the premises. Stand guard over Frank and the women, Chuck, while I search the place.”

The bathroom bolt turned over and Frank darted out. His pajamas were purple; he was barefoot; his dark hair was disheveled. Without his thick glasses his face looked naked, defenseless.

At sight of her son, Elizabeth Grant started back into the room. She was halted by Corrigan's cold glance. He was on the way to the doorway.

“Are you all right, honey?” she asked in a choked voice.

“Fine, Mother.” The boy went over to the dresser near his bed, took his glasses, and set them on his face. His hands were trembling.

Corrigan went past the two women into the hall. He searched the other two bedrooms, opening closets and looking under beds. Then he checked the study, the other bathroom, the kitchen, and the living room. In the foyer he found the toggle switch still open, which meant no one could have used the elevator. He went out on the roof and circled the house again. Then he re-entered the murder room by the French door. Baer glanced at him and he shook his head. Both men looked puzzled.

Elizabeth Grant was all over her son like a nesting eagle. Frank was actually clinging to her.

“I told you to stay in the hall, Mrs. Grant,” Corrigan said. “If you keep getting in the way of my investigation, I'll lock you in your room.”

She scuttled out.

“Are you all right?” Corrigan asked Norma. Her skin was bluish pale, but otherwise she seemed steady enough.

“I'm all right, Tim … Poor Gerry.”

“I'm sorry, Norm.”

“In a way I'm not,” she said in a high soprano, not like her own voice at all. “He's carried death around with him since he was a little boy. He used to torture a kitten I had, and cut the heads off our turtles. I know it sounds heartless, but he's better off dead.”

Corrigan went to her. “Go make that woman a drink or some coffee, Norma. You both need it. And don't worry, it's safe enough here. Whoever did it is gone. Don't ask me how he did it, unless he was Superman and flew away.”

Norma drifted off, a zombie. Corrigan shut the bedroom door. It did not latch; Baer had burst the keeper from the frame.

“Okay, Frank,” Corrigan said. “What happened?”

“Can't he be covered up?” Frank said. He was trying not to look at the body on the bed. “Or shut his mouth, or
something
.”

“He can't be touched yet,” Corrigan said. “We're in a hurry, Frank. What's the scoop on this?”

The thin young killer shivered like a wet puppy. “It … You'll think I'm batty, Captain. It wasn't a man.”

“A woman?” Chuck Baer said incredulously.

“No, no, I mean it wasn't—wasn't human.”

“Come on,” Corrigan said, “you're hysterical. What do you mean it wasn't human?”

“I'm telling you, Captain! It was some kind of—some kind of monster.”

“A monster!”

“A great big hump-backed sort of bug.”

Corrigan and Baer exchanged glances. The boy gave every evidence of fear; he was not being a smart-aleck. He seemed to believe what he was saying. He stood there in the vile purple pajamas shivering as if he could not stop.

“Start at the beginning, Frank,” Corrigan said in a calming voice. “Tell us everything that happened.”

“A sort of snapping sound woke me up. At the time I couldn't imagine what it was, but I realize now it must have been the lock on the French doors. Is it broken?”