Severed Key Read online

  “The only picture of Sigrid in the place was the one in the newspaper,” Simon added.

  “If a little thing like that bothers you,” Keith said, finally, “try this on your sounding-board. I’ve just been talking to the export firm in Stockholm where Axel Thorsen worked. Somebody is using me for something and I don’t like it.”

  “No Axel Thorsen?” Simon asked.

  “Oh, certainly. Axel Thorsen was with the firm for twenty years, and everybody remembers his lovely daughter who went to the United States to become a television star. The problem is this: Thorsen couldn’t have written that letter. He died of a heart attack three months ago.”

  The Vivaldi concerto had ended and the music from the stereo was now loud and Teutonic. Keith crossed the room and turned off the set. Silence made a dramatic punctuation for his disclosure.

  “Let me see the letter again,” Simon said.

  Keith had just finished telephoning the number on the letterhead. The missive was in his hand. He gave it to Simon along with the envelope. Simon scanned the envelope first.

  “The stamp is Swedish and the postmark is Stockholm,” he observed. “So we know it was really sent from Sweden.”

  “Planes go back and forth every day,” Keith said.

  “Right. So it could have been typed almost anywhere by almost anyone and flown back for mailing, or it could have been sent by someone in the export firm.”

  “Or by anyone who had access to the stationery and knew the principals involved. How the letter was sent is no problem. The question is: why was it sent?”

  “To direct your attention to Lundberg.”

  “That leaves us with another big ‘why?’”

  “And no Arne Lundberg to question. I’d still like to know who wrote this letter. Who, other than Sigrid’s father, would be that interested in Lundberg?”

  “There’s still the bank draft. I can check it back to its source—if that means anything. Anyone can buy a money order under any name if they have the cash. It still seems a weird way to make money.”

  “You’ll earn it,” Simon said. “You’re going to get that autopsy report on Lundberg tomorrow, and then see if anyone comes to claim his body and his possessions. Try to get a look at the possessions. I’d still like to find the other half of the severed key if for no other reason than to have something to tell Hannah. Now, if you’ll just call a cab for me I’ll get back to the Century Plaza and pick up my car—”

  Simon handed the letter and the envelope back to Keith. He pocketed it but made no move towards the telephone.

  “I thought you might stay in tonight,” he said.

  “And go along with you to the coroner’s office tomorrow? Not on your life! You’re the one who got the fee. I have to get back in the harness. I’ve got a wedding coming up.”

  “That’s not what I had in mind. Hell, I might as well confess. That line I gave you on the telephone this afternoon about having a bugged phone was just to get you in here. There’s a little thing going two flights down—a party. We’re expected. In fact, you’re the guest of honour.”

  “Oh, no!” Simon said.

  “Look, how did I know we were going to run into a corpse before dinner? This was just going to be a nice little celebration of farewell to your bachelor days. Come on down for one drink—just one drink and get me off the hook with Kelly.”

  “Who’s Kelly?”

  Keith went to his collection of eleven lovely photographs and pointed to the eleventh. The girl inside the frame was an ash blonde with a wide, friendly smile that didn’t quite match the sadness in her eyes. “Kelly Kendall,” he said. “Twenty-two, affectionate and very lonely since both her parents were killed in a plane crash and left her all alone with about four million dollars. She leased an apartment and keeps a continuous party going to keep away the things that go whoosh in the night. Makes a game of it. Always looking for occasions to start the festivities going again—like the time she celebrated the anniversary of the opening of the Trans-Siberian Railway for three weeks. When I mentioned that one of my friends was getting married, she insisted on giving a party. Just one drink, Si. It’ll do you good.”

  “So that’s why I had to eat that Longhorn sandwich.”

  “Exactly. I promised Kelly we’d be in before eleven and it’s almost that now.”

  “Okay,” Simon sighed. “One drink.”

  Later, when it was important that he remember details, Simon wasn’t sure how long he stayed at the party. He recalled meeting his hostess; Kelly Kendall, who was beautiful but much too gay. She was travelling at supersonic speed at a level barely discernible to the naked eye. She was going to kill herself, by one means or another, long before the millions gave out and that might be anywhere from six months to six years depending on the strength of her kidneys and her nervous system. She had a girl for him—a dark-haired, blue-eyed lass who was prepared to go all the way and had reached the ear-nibbling stage when Simon set her right. By that time they had progressed through the bee-hive confusion of the living room, den and dining alcove to the narrow sanctuary of the hall. As the din of an amplified combo receded, he unwrapped her arms from his neck and said:

  “Honey, there’s something you’re old enough to know. Fun and games is great for a free-lancer like Jack Keith, but when sex gets fused with emotion to the degree that a man anticipates marriage, it’s not just a sport any more.”

  She drew back and stared at him. She wasn’t hurt.

  “Wow!” she said. “You’re in love.”

  “That’s the idea, yes.”

  “Oh, wow! I like that. You’re romantic. Say, if you should ever have a change of heart—I mean, like in a year or so, look me up. I’m Theresa Jones, and I’m in the telephone book—western section.”

  “Thanks,” Simon said. “And now that I’ve put in an appearance like a good guest of honour, is there any way for me to sneak out of this place without making all those happy people spill their booze?”

  “There’s a door in the kitchen that leads to the back stairway.”

  “Right on! No, wait—I left my tie in Jack’s apartment. It’s a present and I’m supposed to wear it at my wedding—”

  “Oh, that’s romantic!”

  “But Jack has the keys—”

  “I’ll get them,” Theresa squealed and began to squirm her way back into the crowd like a salmon swimming upstream to spawn. Simon watched her reach Jack’s side and scream in his ear until he could hear above the combo. One hand fished in his pocket as the outer door opened and two late arrivals squeezed into the room. They were men. One was dark and on the young side of thirty; the other was older, larger and had lank, straw-coloured hair. The music stopped for a moment and Simon heard Kelly cry out: “Oh, how nice you could come. Who are you? Never mind, the booze is at the bar—” The combo started playing again and Theresa, bobbing in rhythm to the beat, made her way back across the room.

  She placed a key-chain in Simon’s hand.

  “Jack says you’re acting like an old man, and will you leave the front door unlatched so he can get in to change his shirt before he goes to work in the morning.”

  “Will do,” Simon promised.

  Theresa took him to the kitchen door. Opening it, she said: “The service stair is at the end of the hall. If you change your mind, come back. The party never stops.”

  “I’ll remember that,” Simon said. He kissed her lightly on the nose and proceeded down the hall. He took the stairway up the two flights to Keith’s apartment and let himself in with the key. The wall lights at the bar were still burning. Behind the bar was a small kitchen, and arrayed on the sink were four coffee-stained cups, four breakfast plates and silver. It was easy to deduce that the maid came on Thursday, and that Jack Keith was in no way a housekeeper. Beyond the kitchen was the open door to the bedroom through which he could see the luxurious fur spread that covered Keith’s king-size bed. It looked inviting. The long drive to Marina Beach was postponable. Simon remembered the c
ouch in the den and decided to leave the bed to Keith just in case he did make it back before breakfast. He found some pyjamas in the bedroom closet and retired to the den after making certain the hall door was unlatched.

  He slept soundly and didn’t wake until daylight. He looked at his watch: eight-thirty. Hearing no sounds of life in the apartment, he left the couch and went exploring. The bedroom door was still open, but the fur spread was now on the floor. The bed had been used, and a black telephone was half buried in the pillows. He checked the kitchen and saw that cup number five was stacked with the other dirty dishes. There was a note on the bar: Off to the morgue! Call you at the beach when I get the report. Jack. Simon showered in the small bath off the den, dressed, and then, picking up his tie from the bar lamp, left the apartment. There was no need to increase the clutter in the kitchen. He would breakfast at the Century Plaza where the Jaguar was garaged.

  He took a taxi to the hotel and picked up a morning paper in the lobby drugstore. There was a brief story on the front page reporting the discovery of Arne Lundberg’s body. Details were scant but the implication of suicide was underscored by reference to his fiancée’s death in the airline catastrophe. Simon read the whole story over breakfast in the patio grill, and then went back upstairs to order his car from the garage. It was another clear day in the city, and a few of the guests were already sunning themselves around the pool which was visible through the wide windows of the foyer. One of them commanded Simon’s attention. Berry-brown and wearing only white latex trunks. Raul Sandovar emerged dripping from the pool. He was still shaking drops of water from his glistening black hair when Simon strode through the glass doors and approached, smiling.

  “Good morning,” he said. “I think we flew in from Vegas together last Saturday morning.”

  Sandovar picked up a pair of Italian style sunglasses from the nearest lounge chair and put them on. He studied Simon carefully.

  “I don’t recall,” he said tightly.

  “Well, then, you must recall the crash of the New York plane that killed all those people. I saw you Saturday night at the receiving shed at Marina Del Rey.” Simon illustrated his remarks by pushing the newspaper into Sandovar’s hand. “Remember that guy in the overalls who came in and made such a fuss about finding his fiancée’s bag? He’s dead.”

  Sandovar was irritated. Only at the mention of a man’s death did he look at the paper. He read quickly and the muscles about his mouth grew taut.

  “Oh, that’s terrible!” he said. “That wasn’t necessary.”

  “Necessary?” Simon echoed.

  “I mean—for a man to kill himself because he has lost a woman. One gets over such things.” “This one didn’t.”

  “Yes, obviously. Now, if you will excuse me—”

  With a gesture of impatience, Sandovar shoved the paper back into Simon’s hands and started to turn away, but at that instant the loud speaker beside the pool announced that Mr Simon Drake was wanted at the front desk in the lobby. Simon’s reaction gave him away. Sandovar whipped off his dark glasses and stared at his informant.

  “Simon Drake?” he queried. “Are you Simon Drake?”

  Simon waved the folded newspaper in a gesture of dismissal and hurried back inside the hotel. The clerk at the desk directed him to a telephone where he took a call from Jack Keith.

  “No luck again,” Keith said. “I tried the apartment and got no answer, so I guessed you might still be at the hotel. I think I’m on to something, Si. The blood on the ring was Lundberg’s. The coroner found a small cut inside his mouth that could have come from a blow hard enough to cause bleeding.”

  “A hit in the mouth,” Simon said.

  “Right. But there’s more—”

  “What about the other half of the key?” Simon cut in.

  “The severed key? I’ve looked over Lundberg’s possessions but there’s no piece of a key in them. Maybe it’s still in his apartment. I’m working on another angle now to find out who hired me. I’ll call you this evening at the beach, so don’t go out to sea in your put-put. And, Si, one more thing. I don’t, repeat, don’t make mistakes about screws. Stand by now. Over and out.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  SIMON DROVE BACK to Marina Beach in the bright mid-morning when traffic moved at maximum speed along the winding grey ribbons of the freeways. He carried Keith’s words with him—the promise and the puzzle—but he was still a man of business. Reaching Marina Beach, he turned towards the centre of town and parked off the main street. He was still carrying O’Hara’s cheque for a sum sufficient to support the creature comforts of The Mansion indefinitely, and this, coupled with the thought of the woman who would share them, pushed Arne Lundberg back into the proper perspective of somebody else’s problem. He went directly to the bank. He was preparing a deposit slip when he became aware of two familiar figures on the opposite side of the desk. Familiar but surprising, because a bank wasn’t the sort of place he would normally expect to find the two young men first encountered on the highway defending their van from the militant Franzen.

  The one in the purple shirt, he recalled, was named Travis Dean. The one in the fringed jacket was Bob. Bob was toiling over a deposit slip.

  “I want Sunny’s name on it, too,” he said.

  “You can’t do that,” his companion protested. “You’re not legally hitched yet.”

  “What difference does that make? I ain’t hitched to you either, but you want your name on the account.”

  “That’s business. Look, we already agreed not to tell Sunny anything about this. Not yet. Now just make out the deposit for twelve hundred—no, make that eleven hundred. We got to get some cash. Then we go to the lady in new accounts. Christ, why do you look so scared? Ain’t you never opened a bank account before?”

  “No,” Bob admitted.

  “Okay, let me—”

  “No, I’m going back to the lady at the desk. She’ll know how to fill it out.”

  Simon completed his own deposit slip and went to the cashier’s window. While he waited for the return of his passbook, Bob and Travis Dean appeared at the adjoining window. Dean was grinning; Bob still looked worried. He slid a hundred-dollar bill towards the cashier and said:

  “I want change for this, please. Smaller bills.”

  The cashier scrutinized the boys and then scrutinized the bill. Unsure, she beckoned to an assistant manager to confirm the currency.

  “It’s genuine,” Bob said, quickly.

  “It’s genuine,” the manager agreed. “Where did you get it?”

  “I inherited it—” Bob began.

  “It don’t matter where he got it!” Dean exploded. “We’re businessmen and we got an account here. Bob, show ‘em the passbook and the cheques. See? Now does my friend get change or do we have to go to another bank?”

  “Give them the change,” the manager sighed. “Appearances don’t mean anything any more. They may have a rock band and earn a million dollars a year.”

  Intrigued, Simon watched the cashier count out the change.

  “We want four twenties and two tens,” Bob said.

  Dean tugged at his sleeve. “One ten and two fives,” he said.

  “Two fives?”

  “We decided—remember? If we send Morry ten he’ll get too high to write the letter. If we send him five and promise ninety-five more he’ll play ball.”

  “Four twenties, one ten and two fives,” Bob told the cashier. “That’s the ticket. Thank you.”

  He picked up the money and the two young men left the bank hurriedly. Out on the main street they slackened their pace.

  “Christ, you’d think we robbed the place the way we dug out of there.” Travis laughed.

  “It was easier than I thought.”

  “It was almost too easy. I was scared. Have you got that letter to Morry ready to mail?”

  Bob pulled a stamped addressed envelope from his pocket. Travis grabbed it and one of the five dollar bills. He put the bill inside the envelo
pe and sealed the flap. “Now we get our cover story—nice and clean. There’s a post box on the other side of the mall. Hey, Bobby, what are you starin’ at?”

  Bob was smiling foolishly at a point somewhere beyond Travis’s shoulder. Halfway across the mall, seated on a bench beside a toddler staggering about on unruly legs, was the girl, Sunny. “Isn’t she beautiful?” Bob sighed. “I mean like that—with the baby. A girl always seems more beautiful with a baby.”

  Travis looked startled. “Hey, you ain’t knocked her up, have you?”

  “Oh, no. She’s baby sitting this morning, that’s all.”

  “Well, don’t get any ideas. It’s still a long way to Brazil.”

  “I want to go to the City Hall and get a wedding licence.”

  “Now, why do you want to do that? Marry here and you have to get examinations and shots and all that. Get married in Mexico and there’s nothing to it. We could drive it in less than two hours.”

  “Is it legal?”

  “Movie stars do it.”

  “Okay,” Bob said. “But first I want to buy Sunny a new dress and a ring.”

  “Hey, give me a little of that loot,” Travis protested. “If I’m goin’ to be a best man, I need a different shirt.”

  “A white one,” Bob said.

  “Sure. And I need flowers, too.”

  “Why?”

  “You need two witnesses, don’t you? Remember that cute chicano, Lola, who works the late shift at the restaurant? If I show up in a new shirt and with flowers, she’ll come along.”

  Reluctantly, Bob relinquished one of the twenty-dollar bills. Travis held out his hand expectantly.

  “I’ll need gas for the trip.”

  Bob gave him another five.

  “Okay. Now I’ll mail the letter to that hophead lawyer and you go over and tell Sunny she’s about to become a bride. Personally, I’ll feel a lot easier when you two are hitched. You never know when she’s going to find out what we’ve got in that suitcase, and you know a chick just can’t keep her mouth shut.”

  Simon returned to the Victorian Mansion in the heights. He found Hannah on the landing of the main stairway, halfway between the first and second floors, her eyes glued to binoculars and the binoculars fixed on the new building site which was in a direct line with the long staircase window. She lowered the glasses as he approached.