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"Was he drunk?" Escott asked
"No I&039;d have smelled it on him Sensed it in other ways He went out just like the others" Or so it had seemed
Damned few people were immune to my kind of hypnosis Drunks were difficult, but I could eventually get through the booze by either taking it slow or just waiting for the didn&039;t work They tended to stay crazy and not go under at all Their minds were somehow resistant to an He&039;d played uy is nuts?" What a perfect pip Loony bin cases I didn&039;t like one little bit, too unpredictable
"He&039;s moneyed and probably unbalanced," said Escott "I&039;m quite terribly shocked No, I take it back; I&039;m bloody tired Been at it all day The Gladwell estate is under siege by the press Mrs Gladwell has hired bodyguards to keep out the riffraff So the poor woet rid of a ood God"
"Or as a publicity stunt Of course, they&039;re vague over exactly what it is she wishes to have publicized It&039;s sickening"
"This changes things"
"Indeed There is a serious likelihood that a clever lawyer could get Dugan free"
"No," I said decisively "I&039; to let that happen How can it happen with the othertheir heads off?"
"They&039;re seen as lying about his part in the crian, perhaps they will have shorter sentences to serve They all have records for various offenses Dugan&039;s is clean-officially-so with-"
"Officially? What&039;s he not done, then?"
"Interesting chap Took , but I found a few choice itean was ten, there was an incident involving the death of a governess She was found in her roo was proven one way or another It could have been murder, suicide, or an accident, but after that, he was packed off to a boarding school In the time he was there, another student died of an apparent fall down soain, and taught by private tutors
That was years past, though I found nothing of further interest unless you want to count deaths in the faitimate heart failures and disease"
"What was he, a one-man crime wave?"
Escott shook his head and sipped his drink "One should not leap to conclusions Though they are suspicious, neither of the episodes are necessarily connected to hier examples of coincidence in action"
I was less ready to give Dugan the benefit of a doubt He&039;d not actually discouraged Ralph fro He and the rest had been industriously preparing to dump her in that pit afterwards, dead or alive
"Look, if he&039;s gota kidnap job?"
"The very point he&039;s raised tiain to the press: that he has no motive
He&039;s stood on the front entry to his venerable faraphers that a man in such a home has no need of mon-"
"He&039;s not in jail?"
"His lawyerbond I&039; At least the other three are where they belong"
"Not good enough"
Escott finished his drink, hanging onto the eer around the top the way you do on crystal to get it to sing This one rean&039;s lack of reaction to your intervention, he likely is insane but able to behave normally most of the time We&039;ve both met that type before"
"Have you talked to him?"
"Only toan initial interview session She described hi&039; for what that&039;s worth, but sensed there was so &039;off&039; about him that she couldn&039;t describe"
"What was she doing there?"
"Taking stenography notes for the district attorney&039;s office
With my direct connection to the victim in this case, the lady could lose her post forin the street It&039;s extremely unethical, a jeopardy to the DA&039;s case, but this young fellow put the wind up her, so when I telephoned, hoping for a hint or two of how things were progressing, she fairly gushed"
"She owe you a favor or just like you a lot?"
He lifted one hand fro an put away She&039;s not above bending rules in a good cause and knows I can keep a confidence"
"My lip&039;s buttoned, too"
"Never crossed an do for a living before he took up crime?"
"Very little His uncle&039;s fa manufacture It an devoted himself to educational pursuits"
"Smart?"
"Graduated with honors froree of so with his class"
"Any mention what he does in that free tiirls?"
"You&039;ll hate this: charity events Before her des"
"Doesn&039;t support hiive him a point of connection to Sarah Gladwell She and her mother often attended the same affairs I&039;ve not yet been able to establish a similar connection between him and his tarnished companions in crime I should like to kno they an froing hi him He&039;d been the last in line for his turn, no special reason He was older than the others, in his young thirties, which had struck e were more or less settled into routines established years earlier He&039;d had a pale, good-looking face, mouth quirked in a kind of secret smile It was his natural expression, his lips shaped that way, not fading even when I had hio all dead-eyed and slack-jawed His eyes had glazed during his turn, but it&039;s easy enough to fake Could he have wakened sooner than the others, have heard things, been quick enough to understand what I was doing? If so, then that made him far too sh the newspapers Their pages had photos of the gang, Vinzer, Ralph, and Ponti, the bearded scruffiness of theirshots in stark contrast to a handsoan Also included were pictures of hi his sweet-faced, white-haired mother to past charity events, evidently plucked fron indeed
Several papers had sent photographers out to the set shots of the kidnappers&039; country retreat Captions for the scene of the cri Sarah had lain and the partly destroyed outhouse I&039;d stopped the cleanup before it had begun; hopefully there were still plenty of Dugan&039;s fingerprints to be found there
I looked at Escott "Does Dugan have a story on where he spent the last teeks?"
"He claims he was a prisoner to the other three, too fearful of his life to chance trying to escape"
"Bullshit He was in a car right behind Vinzer and Ralph the whole trip back to the house"
"Pity you can&039;t testify to that"
I grunted agreeles
Though all were anti-kidnapping, very feere anti-Dugan; the rest annoyed me
Were they that impressed by his wealth? Understandable in these hard tihtful ones reported on and speculated thoroughly about the mysterious Good Samaritan who had foiled the plot They called for him to coe theh to attract plenty of phonies They&039;d all have to get through the co-and-pony shoithoutto top Leopold and Loeb by getting aith it, skipping jail altogether" That was a lot of conclusion-juht have put one over on me I wanted him to live down to those conclusions "He didn&039;t need the ht have been an experiment to him, a thrill crime to see if he could do it"
"He very nearly did, if not for your intervention"
"He still could I won&039;t let that happen"
"Jack it would be best to deal with this before it ever goes to court"
"I&039;ll try the evil eye again, really press things See if I can n a confession"
That snagged me a doubtful look "If you think it worth the effort"
The idea behind the confessions was to wholly eliminate the need for a jury trial The kidnappers were supposed to ade to throw the book at thean and his fah ed
Thinking of Sarah Gladwell on the witness stand turned ood lawyer could make mincemeat of any sixteen-year-old, but one with Sarah&039;s mental state had no chance at all He could play up the fact that she&039;d been drugged, was too feebleminded to be believed, or make it look like she&039;d been in on the cri any better The star witness against Dugan and the rest would get pity or sympathy but no justice
"It&039;ll be worth the effort," I said "Let&039;s call it eliht The work I did on the other guys gave an&039;s turn, took things for granted, got sloppy with the work I&039;ll give it another try, see what happens"
"And if it doesn&039;t work?"
I didn&039;t want to think about that Escott apparently read it in my face We went quiet for a while, not the coot a saloon to run Why don&039;t you come over? See the show, bloay the cobwebs Bobbi would love to see you again She thinks I&039; hero on this case; you can tell her different"
He shrugged, not saying one way or another, frowning at his eain I answered it Another reporter who&039;d bluffed his way in Jeez, when I&039;d been one, I had no idea how irritating we could be "Wanna do an interview?" I called toward the front rooh "I&039;ve left for London A flying visit to see a certain Lady Crymsyn"
I told the a settled firht in the houses and stores, ed the streets
It would be hours before they thinned out and finally e, a second hoht people
We tookan hour earlier than necessary
After parking in ht Escott a decenthim company The smell of cooked food tended to inspire nausea in me, but the only way I could be sure he&039;d eat was to watch hi would have to wait To look nor a spoon in it whenever the waitress passed by
Once Escott started on his plate he didn&039;t stop, packing the stuff away like a starved ed hi the subject of Dugan, keeping strictly to business about the club This included a lengthy mention of Roland, Adelle, the exotic Faustine, and the so-far-unaware Gordy
"Bobbi said to keep ht, but I don&039;t like the potential for trouble"
"Then you&039;d best retire to a very distant and deserted island Any patch of earth on this planet with people on it has that potential"
"Screorld Why can&039;t we be hty has been asking that very question for several ages now
We are creatures of spirit and body, both in frequent conflict for supremacy, e should seek a balance between the two"
"Where&039;d that come from?" I&039;d never heard such ideas from him before
"Mrs Gladwell and I had sos, including certain foret her to talk to pass the ti too hter It seemed to help her bear up under the burden"
"How&039;s she doing now?"
"Oh, worlds better with young Sarah back"
"Is she all right? Those drugs they gave her"
"The doctor is optimistic about a complete recovery Fortunately, she reh the poor child has had nightmares TheyShe feels safer there I dare say Vivi-Mrs Gladwell is also the better for it She never lets Sarah froht There&039;s a nurse with her at all tireat pains to keep the troubles of the outside world distanced fro for them She&039;s remarkably perceptive And erudite Some people have libraries for show, but she&039;s read hers All of it Quite an achievement with that many voluot another earful about Mrs
Gladwell&039;s virtues Escott was impressed with her mind, which was a rarity
Usually a woman&039;s looks first hooked hi or acting He had a mile-wide streak of frustrated creativity with no tiency, but he liked talking shop A woman who appealed to him on an intellectual level was a rarity There were brainy women all over, but those who crossed his path in business never hung around long enough for anything to happen
He seemed more relaxed and less exhausted e strolled to the club, and I unlocked the front The staff was already at work; Wilton had let them in by the back door, and Myrna was there, of course The lobby bar light didn&039;t go out, but it did flare inexplicably brighter for a few seconds
"Hello, Myrna," I said, looking toward the bar I never saw anything, but it was a general point of focus
"That&039;s da," said Escott
"You used to say that about me"
"Only when you abruptly appeared out of thin air She&039;s not appeared at all"
"Would you be happy if she did?"
"I doubt it Have you thought of hiring a ghost-breaker?"
Before I could reply, all the lights in the place went out, and I low filtered in froh above, plenty for me to use, but no one else Startled exclamations came from the staff in the main room I shot a sour look at Escott that he couldn&039;t see, so I put it in onna happen Myrna stays"
He shifted "Jack, have you just vanished?"
"No Why?"
"Because I&039; all of a sudden"
I addressed the general air, which had gone strangely cold "Take it easy, Myrna, he didn&039;tas you want"
"I&039; humble
"That was unconscionably rude of h I held it in and waited Eventually, the lobby bar light cah
"It seeood reasons not to speak ill of the dead" Escott had gone bone white, and I could hear his heart thuranted had left hi? Is that you?" Wilton ca as he walked "What happened?"
"Mr Escott just has a misplaced sense of humor"
"Huh?"
"You knohere the switchbox is?"
"Yeah Reebie&039;s down there now Good thing you got these everyplace or we&039;d be breaking our legs" He lifted the flash It had only been prudent to keep several scattered throughout the joint; all the bars had at least two, and every fire extinguisher had one next to it ain Escott rerined "I think I should like a short walk," he announced "Work off this chill"
"Chill?" said Wilton "It rees outside"
"Thirty-four Should warm me up nicely Back in a tick" He turned on his heel and all but bolted out the doors
"What&039;s with hied and took off my coat and hat "Let&039;s open"
Wilton followed ister cash, then left ht&039;s paperwork It didn&039;t take long; out of pure self-defense against being shown up too often bys Escott said I&039;d lose the ability to add su just so the books balanced, andof triuether, and sealed both in a heavy envelope There was a bank with a night-deposit box only a block distant When I had a spare moh Wilton had other thoughts
"One of these days you&039;re gonna get clobbered, Mr Fle"
"I&039;ll be fine This way only one h to tangle with me
As I slipped the envelope into the desk safe and locked it, heels clacked purposefully upstairs Her color high froht in her fur-tri all over her blond head Her arms were full of the latest papers, which she plopped beforehello, then pointed to the newsprint
"Have you read those? What they&039;re saying about the kidnap case?"
"Charles did Gave ! Doesn&039;t anyone reh baby?"