Reason for Murder Page 6

  “Yes, we did. Under the circumstances, I thought it was prudent on my part.”

  “That should have made a few people think.”

  “Why?”

  “A guilty man would have accepted the lower charge.”

  “Maybe.” The district attorney shrugged. “On the other hand, a guilty man may have thought our case was too weak to convict him at all. No, Mr. Pelchek, I think you’re fighting a lost cause. I’m sorry for his wife and friends, but I think he’ll go Monday. Right on schedule.”

  “We’ll see,” Pelchek said. “What about this town, Newell? What’s the reason for it?” he asked, changing the subject.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It doesn’t feel like a town. Seems more like a place where a bunch of strangers live. Hell, Milwaukee has more of a feeling than this place and it’s fifty times larger. From what I’ve seen, there doesn’t seem to be any sort of community spirit here.”

  “No cohesion?”

  “That’s it. No cohesion. Isn’t there a core of old-timers or something?”

  “There used to be. Before the war. Since then it’s nearly doubled in size and most of the old-timers have either died or retired. Now it’s almost entirely commercial. Plenty of mines and cattle, but little culture. The Baker interests are the largest. They control a great deal of the pasturage and quite a bit of the mining properties, but they have little personal interest in the town any more. Oh, there’s a pseudo country-club set. Baker Land executives and some owners of the town’s business concerns. But no real moneyed group as a town force.”

  “How about the cattlemen and mine operators?”

  “They don’t live here. The cattlemen lease most of their range from Baker Land, hire a superintendent, and live up in Capital City. Same with the mine operators. The investors gradually moved away from Las Milpas as they accumulated money. That left only the Bakers, and only one of them stayed active. The girl spends most of her time in the East now, and Cal Baker jumped off the peak when he married the Aguilar girl.”

  “He sure as hell did! Maybe that’s why he’s sitting in the death cell.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “At first, I was pretty damn sure of his guilt. I didn’t figure all the courts could be wrong. Now, I’m not so sure. Whoever wanted him out of the way, and it looks like someone did, had a built-in patsy, didn’t they? A nice, vulnerable member of the upper crust who’d stubbed his toe on a pretty Mexican girl. And married her. What a target to give a jury of careful, middle-class people. They even were sure his brother couldn’t lift a finger to bail him out of the trouble.”

  “I don’t believe that!”

  “Could you believe it if you knew he wasn’t guilty?”

  Newell shrugged.

  “But could you if you did? For Christ’s sake, Newell, use some imagination! Besides,” Pelchek said, “someone could be using your office as an accessory.”

  “Look here, Pelchek,” the attorney said angrily, “I’m not entirely a fool. When this case came to me I thought of some of the things you’ve brought up and I searched around a good deal. I tried to find out who would benefit by Cal Baker’s removal. You know who I found?”

  He waited. Pelchek didn’t answer.

  “I found his wife. That’s who I found. His share of Baker Land and Mining is left to her and her children, if any. After that, to the city.”

  “The city?”

  “Yes. He changed his will after he got married. Evidently, the treatment his wife received from his family had a lot to do with it.”

  “Why have they frozen his funds?”

  “That’s something I can’t answer, Pelchek. It isn’t in my area and actually is none of my business.”

  “Do you think the new general manager would tell me? What’s his name? McCreery? Would he know?”

  “Perhaps. But I’m afraid you won’t get much out of Frank McCreery.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s a tough nut, Pelchek. Been with Baker Land and Mining twenty-five years or more. Started pretty close to the bottom and worked his way up. Has never married. When Walker was killed he was the natural choice to take over the operation, and he’s doing a good job of it. However, Frank is quite rigid and doesn’t like change. He took Baker’s marriage almost as a personal affront.”

  “He doesn’t like Mexicans?”

  “I don’t believe he thinks very much about either liking them or disliking them. He just believes they have a place in the scheme of things around here, and that place doesn’t include membership in a top family.”

  “The whole thing is like that, Newell.” Pelchek drummed lightly on the table. “No one mad at anyone else, and no one wants to talk about the case. Well, I don’t like the deal at all, and I’m going to try and break it open. How do you feel about that?”

  “I don’t care what you do, Pelchek.” The district attorney spread his fingers flat on the table and leaned forward. “Only don’t break the law in this county. If you can bring me something solid to act on, I’ll be glad to do so. In the meantime, I’m aware of Bartlett’s reputation and don’t think he’d be a party to any sort of high-pressure action. That clears you with my office. I understand you’ve already made some points with the local police.”

  “There was a reason for—”

  “Don’t tell me about it,” Newell broke in. “As long as Mathewson doesn’t want to do anything about it, I’m satisfied.”

  “Thanks. Where can I get in touch with brother Allen?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe at his home. He’s been drinking quite heavily since the trial and I haven’t seen much of him. However, I don’t expect he’ll help you much. He absented himself from the trial almost entirely.”

  “So I hear. Nice guy, huh? It looks like Baker’s wife is the only human in his family. She must be a throwback, Newell. There aren’t many women like her around any more.”

  “I can’t disagree with that.” The attorney looked up from his food as Pelchek rose. “Is that all I can do for you, Pelchek?” He wiped his mouth with the napkin, stood up.

  “I guess it is, Newell.”

  “Remember, if you have anything to offer, I’ll listen. I realize you have very little time and I’m afraid you’re wasting it. Nevertheless, I’m constrained to wish you luck. For the girl’s sake, and Baker’s too.” His lips thinned in a grimace. “This is an elective office, you know, and I can’t push too hard in certain directions.”

  The men shook hands, and Pelchek returned to the lobby. He picked up his key and went to the cottage.

  He put in a call to Elman, lit a cigarette, and waited while the call was being completed. Soon, he heard the little lawyer’s voice. It sounded worried.

  “No word from Bartlett yet, Mr. Pelchek.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I’m not sure. He chartered a plane to go up north and no word has come in since. I’m going to stay right here in the office until I hear something.”

  “Good. Call me the minute you get some word.”

  “I will,” Elman said, then added, “Some people down there have made inquiries about you.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  “Well, be careful. I still have a feeling about this case.”

  “Okay.” Pelchek sat on the edge of the bed. “I just had a talk with Newell. You may be right about McCreery. Now, how about Mathewson? You said he was all right.”

  “He is. Been there since there was a Las Milpas. Why?”

  “I like to know who I’m dealing with. Newell seems all right, but Mathewson isn’t very particular who works for him.”

  “It sounds as though you’ve run into Romero,” Elman said.

  “Yeah. How did you know?”

  “Just a guess, but I had some trouble with him, too. He was pretty zealous on his job. Maybe too much. But you can’t blame Mathewson entirely. For a while after the war Romero controlled the Mexican vote and Mathewson needed it to cinch his re-election.”

 
; “Doesn’t Romero control it now?”

  “I don’t think so. Someone has undermined him over in that part of town. Anyway, the chief can’t do much about demoting him or firing him.”

  “Civil Service?”

  “Right. He’d have to catch him doing something serious before he could bring charges before the Civil Service Board.”

  “Okay, Elman. Stick by your phone and call me as soon as you hear anything,” Pelchek said.

  “Will do,” the lawyer promised and hung up.

  Pelchek left the cottage, made his way to the main section of the motel. The temperature was still high, and he heard noise and laughter coming from the pool. He ate in the dining room, then wandered into the cocktail lounge. He ordered a drink, took it and walked to the piano bar.

  The girl was playing a medley of familiar show tunes. Unobtrusive, authoritative, with a very, very professional technique. She was too much talent for the Casa Camino or Las Milpas. She slipped easily from the show tunes into something less well known. Subtle, with infinite construction for the left hand. Pelchek leaned over the small bar and watched her intently until she stopped playing.

  “Tristano?”

  She looked up at him quickly, eyebrows raised. A pretty girl. Dark. She nodded.

  “I had a chance to study with him for a while.” She smiled at him, then looked closer. “Pittsburgh?”

  “Hell, no! Milwaukee. Does it show that much?”

  “Kinda. I’m from Homestead. I can tell you’re a hunky, not a Polack, and that you’ve never worked in the steel. Right?”

  “Right.” He smiled. “You play real good.”

  “I know it. If I was a man I’d be on top somewhere. As it is…” She shrugged.

  “Why the Casa Camino?”

  “Money. They want talent and are willing to pay. I don’t know how in hell my agent ever found out about this place. Las Milpas. Wow!”

  “Been here long?”

  “Too long. Came for a three-week deal and it’s turned into four months.” She glanced up at him. “How come you know about Tristano?”

  “Records. I haven’t the time to go hear these people, so I buy records.”

  She nodded. “My name’s Mary Perrini. What’s yours?”

  “Steve Pelchek.”

  “Here by yourself?”

  “Yep.”

  “Look, Steve Pelchek.” She let her eyes go over him carefully, seeming to make up her mind about something. “I’m awfully tired of hearing about cows and the price of copper. How about gathering me in when I get off?” She wriggled her bare shoulders above the white sheath and grinned sinfully. “Hunkies make me fall apart!”

  “What time?”

  “Closing tine. Two o’clock.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  “Fine.” She smiled at him, turned back to the keyboard.

  Pete Romero lay back on the davenport and groaned noisily as his wife applied ice packs to his outraged body.

  “Careful, goddammit!” He pushed her roughly away and tried to sit up, only to fall back with a cry of pain. He eyed her balefully. “You like this, don’t you?”

  “What did you do? Put your hands on someone who wasn’t afraid of you?” She looked at him disdainfully, tossed a sheet over his lower body. “It must have been a man,” she added.

  “Shut your mouth!” he growled. “And go get—”

  He was interrupted by the ringing phone. The woman handed it to him.

  “How badly are you hurt?” a voice asked quietly.

  “He ruined me,” Romero answered sullenly.

  “When are you going back to work?”

  “I’ll be able to make it tomorrow if I take things easy.”

  “Very well. I called to tell you one thing. Stay away from Pelchek! Completely away!”

  “All I did was—”

  “You could have hurt us badly,” the voice broke in coldly. “In fact, you may have done so. What did you do to Elena Baker? You were to question her and that’s all.”

  “I didn’t think the lousy little—”

  “Never mind. Fortunately, Baker will be executed Monday morning and I don’t think we’ll be bothered after that. But you stay away from Pelchek. And Baker’s wife. Understand?”

  “Okay,” Romero said, listened a moment more. “Yes, sir,” he said finally, replacing the phone.

  The woman looked at him. “Big man!”

  “Get the hell outta here!” he yelled, holding his body.

  Pelchek and Mary Perrini stood at the edge of the deserted swimming pool. They had driven into Las Milpas for a steak at an all-night restaurant, talked over their coffee, and she had made him laugh. It was nearly four o’clock in the morning.

  She held her hands behind her back, shoulders square under the lightweight stole, and looked up at the starry sky.

  “It’s a long way from Homestead.”

  “Yeah. You ever going back?”

  “I don’t know. Not to live, anyway. Not until I give this music a chance,” she replied pensively, then turned to him. “You want to kiss me?”

  “That doesn’t need answering,” he said, reaching for her. Half-parted lips met his and arms went around his neck, pulling her feet free of the tile walkway that surrounded the pool. It was a long kiss, and when it was over she bit his neck lightly and let her arms slide lower. She pressed her body against his.

  “I told you,” she said shakily. “Hunkies unglue me.”

  “Cows and copper, huh?”

  “Honest to God, Steve.” She grinned. “That’s all. Just cows and copper.” She leaned back in his arms. “Where do you live? Here at the Casa, I mean.”

  He pointed to the cottage in the center of the arc.

  “Can I go to your house?”

  “For kicks?”

  “That’s all. Just for kicks. I’m married to that keyboard in there,” she said lightly. “But I’m a grown girl and I have my moments.”

  “That ain’t all you got.”

  “Am I going to find out you’re a wicked man, Steve?”

  He didn’t answer. Putting one arm around her waist, he started for the cottage. Inside the dark room he reached for her.

  “Just sit down, Steve,” she said softly, pushing him toward the large chair. When he was seated she came and sat on his knees. The bright desert moonlight filtered into the room and made bright patterns on her head and shoulders.

  “Unzip,” she whispered. She lifted one soft arm and pointed to the side of the sheath.

  As he slowly pulled down on the zipper, creamy skin came into view and she looked in his eyes. The gown dropped to her waist, and she took a deep breath.

  “All right, Steve.”

  He took her by the shoulders and drew her close. As their lips met he rose with her in his arms, carried her across the room.

  The whir of the telephone brought a despairing wail from the girl, and Pelchek deposited her gently on the bed. He quickly picked up the phone. It was Elman, and he was excited.

  “We’re in business, Steve! Bartlett just called. The judge signed a thirty-day stay of execution!”

  “Does Baker know?” Pelchek asked quietly.

  “I’ve notified the prison by phone, and they’ve promised to tell him immediately. The papers will probably get there sometime tomorrow. Will you tell his wife?”

  “Right away.”

  Mary Perrini rested on one elbow and watched his face as he talked. She slowly tugged at her gown, pulling on the zipper as Pelchek finished talking. He replaced the phone, sat quietly for a moment.

  “About your friend?” she asked.

  “How’d you like to take a ride, Mary?”

  “A ride?” she asked dubiously.

  “Yeah. How’d you like to help me tell a girl she still has a husband?”

  Mary Perrini jumped up from the bed. “I can’t think of a thing in the world I’d rather do.”

  CHAPTER 6

  PELCHEK drove down Fourth Street, passing slow-moving
Sunday drivers. He turned on Birch, going by neat blocks of middle-class residences, a modern elementary school and one or two neighborhood stores. After crossing Eighth, sidewalk and pavement ended and the houses became smaller, some neat and well cared for; some dilapidated and untidy.

  At Ninth Street he paused, turned right toward a cluster of larger buildings three blocks away. There were kids everywhere. Playing baseball, pulling homemade coasters and wagons. Flashing bare legs, beautiful eyes and teeth, and all barefoot. An organized game of softball was in progress in a schoolyard. The school itself was a large, weather-beaten structure of a vanishing period. Its cupolas and ornamental wooden façade proclaimed it the castoff edifice of a society that had moved to paved streets, installment furniture, and a new car every two years.

  He came to the block containing a few small stores, a Mexican movie palace, and several garish bars, all fronted by a block-long wooden sidewalk. In the heat of midmorning, no one was in sight. Then he saw the sign. Mazatlan Pool Hall. He parked the car and went in.

  He stood inside the open doorway getting accustomed to the dim interior. The harsh canopy of illumination bathing the one occupied pool table provided the only light in the large room; the cadenced click of two overhead fans and the occasional sound of the colored balls, the only noise. There were three men in the place. Two busy at the distant table, one looking at him from a position behind the short bar.

  “You want something, mister?”

  “A beer.”

  “Draft or bottle?” The short man behind the bar was wearing a hat, held a toothpick in his mouth. He looked uninterested.

  “Bottle.”

  The man walked to the cooler, opened the glass-paneled door and extracted a bottle. He picked up a clean bar towel and wiped the sweating bottle dry after opening it. A water tumbler from the back bar was placed over the neck of the bottle, and both set before Pelchek. The bartender took the proffered dollar bill, rang up the sale, then placed the change on the bar. He took up his original position, watching the players.

  Pelchek stood drinking the beer. There were no stools. He looked around the quiet room, comparing it with every other small-town pool hall he’d ever seen. Old-fashioned theater seats lined the wall for spectator use. Seven of the eight tables were dark, covered with slate-colored cloth. Opposite him stood the cigar counter. Deserted now. A juke box filled a corner, its chromed and violent newness an apparent incongruity. He turned to the man behind the bar.