The Name Is Malone Read online

  The Name Is Malone

  Craig Rice

  MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM

  THE MURDER OF MR. MALONE

  “I’m still fogged down,” the friendly stranger said dolefully.

  “I feel the same way,” John J. Malone said, nodding sympathetically, before he realized that the airport weather had been under discussion.

  Under ordinary circumstances he would have been happy to be fogged down, or out, or even off the track in such pleasant surroundings as Mike Lyman’s Flight Deck cocktail lounge, and in such agreeable surroundings as the stranger’s, who was even then signaling the bartender.

  But the fact remained that he had to be home in Chicago by morning to collect a fee—not only because he needed the money in a hurry, but because he had an uncomfortable feeling that something, possibly lethal, might happen to his client before the fee was paid.

  “Funny thing, that Cable case,” the friendly stranger said, glancing at his newspaper.

  Malone winced, and hoped no one had noticed.

  “These old dames that leave screwy wills! They’re just asking for trouble. You been following the case?”

  “No,” Malone lied.

  The friendly stranger signaled for another double Manhattan and said, “Inquest must have been lively. You read about it?”

  “No,” Malone lied again.

  “‘All I possess I leave to the daughter of my beloved friend—’” The stranger snorted in derision. “What d’ya think? Was the old babe murdered?”

  “I think she’s dead,” Malone said truthfully.

  The friendly stranger slapped him on the back and said, “You’re a card, you are!” Then he glanced through the semi-darkness of the Flight Deck in the general direction of the windows and said, “Wonder how our flights are doing. You wanna check, this time?”

  “Glad to,” Malone said, seizing the opportunity to escape for a few minutes and compose himself.

  “Wunnerful,” the stranger said. “Take my ticket.” He handed it to Malone and added, “Gotta be in San Francisco fast.”

  The little lawyer hurried down the stairs and walked through the damply cold mist to the TWA offices, thinking of what he would say to his client, Ed Cable, in the morning.

  The pleasant-faced girl at the TWA counter checked both flights, and said, “Both of these will be leaving any minute now.”

  Malone said, “Thank you, beautiful.” He’d been hearing that same phrase since four in the afternoon. With a slower step he went back to the Flight Deck where the friendly stranger was discussing football with another friendly stranger who, as Malone approached, said, “Have a good trip, pal,” and went away.

  “Nices’ people in’s town,” the stranger said. “Never saw guy before, comes over passes time o’ day, buys me drink.” He downed the last of it, coughed and said, “How’s flights?”

  Malone deposited the ticket envelopes on the bar and said gloomily, “Not for hours.”

  The loudspeaker promptly made a liar of him by announcing, “Flight One-fifty-four is now boarding at gate three. Passengers for Flight One-fifty-four now boarding at gate three.”

  The friendly stranger looked at his ticket and said, “That’s me.” He aimed himself at the door, apparently walking with three left feet. Before Malone could rise, a young man seated near the door bounded up to offer assistance, only to be intercepted by a small, determined-looking dark-haired girl wearing a fire-engine red hat. Between them, the friendly stranger was steered toward the door.

  Malone stared moodily into his empty glass. The stranger’s casual remark had stirred up something he wanted to forget temporarily. He had nothing to tell his client in the morning except that his aunt, Eva Cable, was dead from natural causes, and that the will appeared to be genuine.

  This was according to the doctor who had attended her for years. Perhaps Ed Cable would even refuse to pay his fee.

  Besides, there was that definite hunch that something was very wrong. Four days’ hard work had failed to uncover even a hint as to what it might be, but it had stayed with him.

  On a sudden impulse, he hurried back to the TWA counter. Would it be possible for him to take a later flight? Not a lot later, but a little later? He’d suddenly remembered some very important business in Hollywood.

  The pretty girl smiled and said, “I think I can arrange it.” She did some fast paper work, handed him back his envelope, and said, “You’re on Flight Eleven, leaving at four-ten this morning. Be sure to get back.”

  “If only to see you smile again, Colleen,” Malone promised.

  Pushing his way through the crowd toward the cab stand, he caught a glimpse of the red-hatted girl, and scowled. What would Maggie, his secretary, be doing here? In a moment of rash generosity, he’d given her a week’s vacation in Hollywood, and she would be out enjoying it. But there was no time to stop and find out, and knowing Maggie, he wasn’t sure that he wanted to. He had enough worries already.

  The cab drove through the now rapidly lifting fog, and deposited the little lawyer in front of one of the small apartment buildings that fringe Hollywood and Vine. “You might as well wait,” Malone told the driver. He went through the cheaply ornate lobby and pushed a bell marked FAULKNER.

  The girl who opened the door was small and perfect. Her almost red hair curled softly to her shoulders, her bangs curled softly on her forehead. Her long-lashed gray eyes lighted as she recognized Malone.

  “You’ve decided to stay!” she exclaimed, hurling a smile at him as she ushered him in. “I’m so glad. And you haven’t met my brother Eric.” She indicated a blond young man who was unfolding six feet of length from the sofa. “He came here when he heard about the trouble I’m in.”

  “If you call inheriting two million dollars trouble,” Malone said. He nodded to the young man.

  “Delighted to meet you, Mr. Malone,” the young man said, and let it go at that.

  “You’ve thought of something new?” Mici Faulkner asked anxiously.

  Malone said, “I came here to ask you the same question.”

  “Mr. Rufus Cable was here,” Mici said. She frowned. “But it was only about the funeral arrangements. He was very fond of his aunt. He couldn’t stay for it because he was called back on business.”

  Malone frowned, too. Rufus Cable.… But he had been thousands of miles away at the time of Eva Cable’s death—which had been pronounced natural anyway.

  A quarter hour of talking in what always seemed to be circles left them still spinning and getting nowhere. Mici’s mother and Eva Cable, then Eva Gay, had been close friends in their musical comedy days. Eva had married a fortune, had been widowed, and eventually had died, leaving Mici a decidedly astonished heiress. Of her two nephews, Ed Cable had engaged Malone to investigate the will and the cause of death. Rufus Cable hadn’t cared.

  But the feeling that something was wrong was even stronger now.

  He gave up at last and said a reluctant farewell at the door.

  “You’ll come back, I hope,” Mici said. “Especially if I need you to defend me.”

  Malone scowled an unspoken question.

  “If they should have an inquest and decide Mrs. Cable didn’t die naturally,” Eric said, “they’ll accuse Mici of her murder.”

  The little lawyer brooded over that all the way to the airport.

  Halfway across the lobby he came to a momentary dead stop, then started again at a faster pace. Was the tall, gray-haired man just leaving the cigar counter, Ed Cable? And if so, what was he doing here? Malone shoved frantically through the crowd. This would be a stroke of luck; he could wind up the whole business and collect his fee right now.

  At the moment that he saw the gray-haired man disappear through the doors of the ramp, Ma
lone heard the loudspeaker call Flight Eleven. He headed for the ramp. There was no sign of the gray-haired man. Probably on his plane by now, Malone decided, and he hoped it also was Flight Eleven. He reached the gate just in time, getting an indignant look from the attendant as he passed through. There was no sign of Ed Cable or any other gray-haired man on board. Well, it was too late to get off now. Malone settled down, the stewardess sniffed thoughtfully at his breath and promptly brought him a pillow.

  In spite of his weariness, the pillow and the pleasant lullaby of the plane’s motors, the little lawyer stayed awake, brooding. What would Ed Cable have been doing in Los Angeles, if it had been Ed Cable? Aunt Eva’s funeral.… But that was tomorrow—Why hadn’t he stayed?

  There was something infernally wrong with the whole situation, in spite of the verdict at the inquest, and the signature on the will being pronounced genuine by Clark Sellers himself. There was absolutely nothing to indicate anything wrong. But Malone knew in his heart that there was.

  Perhaps, he told himself, his feeling was due to his anxiety to collect that fee, and Ed Cable at the airport had been an illusion caused by the same reason. It was a consoling thought, and he began to doze, finally falling asleep just in time to be gently shaken by the stewardess.

  “We’re coming into San Francisco, Mr. McNabb.”

  Malone blinked at her. Poor girl, he thought, she must be as tired as he felt. Or maybe this was her first flight. He looked at his watch. Ten to six. No wonder she was tired. It was a terrible time to be anywhere.

  He stumbled half-awake, into something between a mist and a drizzle. “Mizzle” would be the name for it, he decided. Objects were strange and unfamiliar in a light that threatened to turn a gloomy gray any minute. Somehow he found his way to the airport office.

  Maggie rushed at him. “We can’t talk here,” she said in a fast whisper. “I’ve got a cab waiting outside.” She hurried him through the door and into the cab before he could catch a second breath. “Give me your checks,” she said. “I’ll see to your luggage.”

  Malone obediently handed her his ticket envelope and she vanished.

  The little lawyer sat scowling. Had the Chicago airport been moved during his six day absence? And what was Maggie doing here?

  She came back with a porter bearing a handsome but unfamiliar grosgrain leather suitcase, and said, “Mark Hopkins Hotel.”

  Malone said indignantly, “Would you mind telling me exactly what you’re doing with my life?”

  “Saving it,” Maggie said calmly. “And until we can talk in private, you do whatever I tell you.”

  She showed him a newspaper and pointed to a headline.

  JOHN J. MALONE, CHICAGO ATTORNEY

  FOUND MURDERED ON PLANE

  Malone stared at it for approximately sixty seconds, and finally said, “But I never felt better in my life.”

  “Malone,” Maggie told him, “you’re in a fog.”

  He glanced through the window of the cab. “You’d compare Niagara Falls to a leaky faucet,” he complained bitterly.

  “A mental fog,” she said firmly. “And I suspect you’ve been drinking.”

  “How can I be drinking when I’ve just been murdered?” Malone growled.

  He tried to read the story in the semi-darkness, and finally gave up.

  The cab stopped in front of the hotel. Maggie said, fast, “Go in and register as J. J. McNabb from Los Angeles. I’ll see you in five minutes. Questions later,” she added as Malone opened his mouth to protest.

  A bellhop grabbed the suitcase and Malone followed him obediently to the desk. He suddenly became conscious that he’d been sleeping in his suit and that his necktie was under his left ear.

  “Rough flight,” he apologized to the room clerk. He almost added, “I was murdered en route,” and immediately thought better of it.

  Cold water on his face, a comb through his hair, and a noble try at straightening his necktie, made a slight improvement in both his appearance and his state of mind. He sat down on the edge of the bed to read the newspaper.

  The body of a man tentatively identified as John J. Malone, well-known Chicago criminal lawyer, had been found on a nonstop plane bound for Chicago. The stewardess had believed her passenger “—he seemed a trifle intoxicated when he boarded the plane—” to be asleep. Later she became alarmed at his appearance and called the co-pilot, who pronounced him dead. An unscheduled landing had been made at Tandem, Arizona, where Bert Gallegos, sheriff of Tandem County, had made the tentative identification by means of the dead man’s flight receipt and the contents of his brief case, there being no identification on his person.…

  Malone looked up as Maggie walked in. “I’ve been murdered, and it only makes page two.” He scowled at her. “How did you get into this, and why?”

  “I don’t want you to be murdered twice, just when I’ve gotten my first vacation in six years,” she told him. “Besides, I’d be out of a job.”

  “But how—”

  “I came to the airport to see you off, and naturally looked for you in the bar. The man you’d been talking with started to leave for his plane just as I arrived, and he—” She hesitated.

  “Say he was staggering a little,” Malone told her. “Never speak ill of the dead.”

  Maggie went on, “Naturally, I lent a hand as far as the gate, where his ticket was checked and I heard him called Mr. Malone. By the time I got back, I saw you going toward the cab stand. So I went to the ticket counter, pointed to you, and asked if you’d canceled your flight. The girl—pretty little thing—said no, you were booked on a later flight for San Francisco. Your plane was full, but there was a seat on the plane just leaving, so I took it.”

  Malone nobly refrained from commenting on what curiosity had done to a certain cat.

  “I also discovered,” she added, “that you were traveling under the name of McNabb.”

  The little lawyer said, “I can see just how it was,” and went on to tell her what had happened. “And because our luggage was already checked, I got his and he got mine. I hope we wear the same size shirts.” He yawned, reached for the telephone, and said, “I’ve got to call the police.”

  Maggie said, “No!”

  “One always calls the police when there’s been a murder. Especially, my murder.”

  She sighed. “Why do you think I rushed you over here from the airport and told you to register as McNabb? You’re the intended victim.”

  Malone blinked, thought it over, and said nothing.

  “Someone tried to murder you. The murderer may have found out his mistake by now. So you stay right here and don’t stir out of this room. I’ll find out what’s going on and tell you. You’ve got to trust me.”

  “With my life,” Malone said gallantly, “or at least, my murder.”

  “And meantime,” she went on, “you take off your clothes and get into bed and get some sleep. You look like something turned up by an amateur archeologist.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Malone said meekly.

  She paused at the door and looked at him sternly. “Remember now. Stay here.”

  Left alone, Malone obeyed to the extent of taking off his shoes and loosening his tie. Then he curled up on the bed, and two little sandmen came out from the woodwork and closed his eyes. They left him a pleasant dream in which Mici Faulkner, her brother Eric, and both Ed and Rufus Cable were sliding down the banister of a spiral staircase which amazingly turned into a rainbow with a pot of gold at the end. The race was turning into a dead heat but no winners had come in, when he was rudely wakened by the phone jangling as though it had taken a personal dislike to him.

  For just a moment he hesitated. Still, it might be Maggie. He picked up the receiver and said, “Good afternoon.”

  “Mr. McNabb?” the feminine voice sounded definitely secretarial. But also as though its owner was blonde, delightful and worth investigating.

  “Yes,” Malone said.

  “I’m sorry. It didn’t sound like you.�
�

  “A touch of laryngitis,” Malone said bravely.

  “We’ve been trying to reach you, and finally we started on the hotels.” She sounded faintly reproachful. “Mr. Cable has been trying to reach you from Chicago. About that will case.”

  “Oh,” Malone said, wishing he’d had six more hours of sleep. “Oh, that.”

  “I took the liberty of telling him where to call you. And a Mr. Linberry has been calling you; he says it’s about the same thing. I gave him your number, too.”

  “Very thoughtful of you,” Malone said, wondering if her looks matched her voice, and how he could meet her in person.

  He hung up, reached for a cigar and sat wriggling his toes.

  “You are J. J. McNabb,” he reminded himself sternly, “And, somehow, you are involved in the Cable will case.” He wondered if it was Ed or Rufus who had been calling from Chicago. He looked thoughtfully at the suitcase. It was locked, but that was no problem to Malone. Two minutes later he had learned that J. J. McNabb was a licensed private detective with offices in Los Angeles and San Francisco. He also learned that J. J. McNabb was carrying an expensive-looking but gaudy wardrobe, and ten thousand dollars in cash money.

  Malone was still arguing with his conscience about abandoning the legal profession and finding out just how long he could live in Tahiti on ten thousand dollars, when the phone rang again. Chicago was calling. Mr. Rufus Cable.

  “What happened?” Rufus Cable demanded, without preliminaries.

  Malone wished he knew.

  “I can’t tell you right now,” he hedged.

  “I understand,” Rufus Cable said. “But don’t let anything go wrong now. Linberry will call you. You have the money. Make the deal with him. Phone me what time to meet you at the Chicago airport.”

  Malone said yes to everything.

  “By the way,” Rufus Cable said, “how will I recognize you?”

  The little lawyer smothered a sigh of relief. Rufus Cable and J. J. McNabb had never met. He glanced toward the open suitcase. “I’ll be wearing”—he winced—“a yellow shirt, and a red-and-green checkered vest.”