The Richard Deming Mystery Megapack Read online

  She had a few clues to work on, however. The most valuable was that Janet’s husband was bowling with the Elks Men’s League.

  Looking up the phone number of the local Elks Club, she dialed it. After several rings a male voice answered.

  “Is there anyone there who would know all the members of the Elks Bowling League?” Martha asked.

  “Huh?” the man said. “Not me, lady. I’m just the bartender, and the steward has gone home.”

  “This is an extreme emergency,” Martha told him. “Isn’t there anyone there who knows your bowlers?”

  “The Exalted Ruler is at the bar. I’ll let you talk to him.”

  When the Exalted Ruler, who identified himself as Edwin Shay, got on the phone, Martha gave him her name and explained that she was a volunteer worker for Suicide Prevention.

  “It is absolutely essential that I get in touch with one of your Men’s League bowlers at once,” she concluded. “The difficulty is that I have only his first name. It’s Fred.”

  Edwin Shay said wryly, “The Men’s League has fourteen teams, Miss Pruett, with five men on each team. Offhand I can think of three Freds.”

  “His wife is named Janet, Mr. Shay, and he has a brother who is a doctor. Does that mean anything to you? Do you know who he is?”

  “Oh, sure,” the Exalted Ruler said with recognition. “You’re talking about Doc Waters. He’s a dentist.”

  That was it, Martha thought with jubilation, suddenly understanding the puzzling remark her caller had made the previous Wednesday. The woman had probably started to say National Dental Association Convention, or something similar, before she cut the phrase short and it came out simply, “National Den.”

  “Where does the league bowl?” she asked.

  “The Delmar Bowl. What’s this all about, anyway?”

  “I haven’t time to explain it now,” Martha said. “Thank you very much for your help.”

  She hung up, found the number of the Delmar Bowl in the phone book and dialed it. It took a few minutes to get Dr. Fred Waters to the phone, but finally a warm male voice said in her ear, “Yeah, Janet. What’s up?”

  “It isn’t your wife, doctor,” Martha said. “I’m a volunteer worker for Suicide Prevention. About fifteen or twenty minutes ago I got a phone call from your wife. You had better get home immediately, because she has taken some kind of pills. She passed out while I was talking to her.”

  “What!” Dr. Waters said with a mixture of fright and astonishment. “My wife took pills?”

  “You really should hurry, doctor,” Martha said. “And if it’s a very long drive to your home, I suggest that before you start, you phone for an ambulance to meet you there.”

  “All right,” he said hurriedly. “Who did you say this is calling?”

  “Miss Martha Pruett. I would appreciate it if you would take down my phone number and call me back later as to how things came out”

  “Of course, Miss Pruett. What is it?”

  Martha read off her number.

  “Got it,” the dentist said. “Thanks for calling.”

  An interminable period of waiting followed. The suspense was too great for Martha to generate any interest in either television or a book. She busied herself by brushing Ho Chi Minh, brushing her own hair, giving herself a manicure and, in final desperation, even giving herself a pedicure.

  She managed to dispose of two hours in that manner, but then she ran out of time-killing chores. She was contemplating dusting the already immaculate front room when the phone finally rang at eleven-thirty p.m.

  Her nervousness had long since discouraged Ho Chi Minh from all idea of a nap on her lap, and he had retreated to a spot in the center of the living room rug. This put him between Martha’s chair and the bedroom door, so that she ran straight toward him when she raced to answer the phone. Ho Chi Minh fled to the kitchen.

  Grabbing up the phone, Martha said breathlessly, “Yes?”

  “Miss Pruett?” a strange male voice asked.

  “Yes.”

  “This is Lieutenant Herman Abell of the police, Miss Pruett. Dr. Waters asked me to phone you, because he’s not quite up to talking. I understand you’re a Suicide Prevention worker and it was you who phoned him that his wife had taken pills.”

  “Yes, that’s right. How is she?”

  “It was too late to do anything for her. She was dead on arrival at the hospital.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Lieutenant.”

  “Just one of those things, Miss Pruett. We won’t know until the autopsy just how many sleeping pills she swallowed, but a bottle that Dr. Waters says held three dozen is empty.”

  “How horrible! And she was only thirty-two.”

  “Were you personally acquainted with her?” the police officer asked in surprise. “I thought you people kept yourselves anonymous insofar as callers are concerned.”

  “We do, but I managed to pick up a good deal of information about her. We had two previous phone conversations before tonight, Lieutenant.”

  “Oh? This wasn’t her first attempt then?”

  “Well, I don’t know that she made any previous attempts, but she had contemplated suicide. I would have contacted her husband before, but I was never able to worm out of her who she was, except for her first name. She never told me, even tonight. I tracked down her identity from certain clues she had dropped. I feel terrible about not worming her identity from her sooner. I might have saved her.”

  “Well, it wasn’t your fault,” the lieutenant said. “We’ll need your statement, of course, though. When could you stop by headquarters?”

  “At your convenience,” Martha said. “I’m retired, so my time is pretty much my own.”

  “Fine. I’m on the night trick and don’t go on duty until four p.m. Would four be convenient?”

  “All right, Lieutenant.”

  “Then I’ll expect you at the Homicide squad room at four p.m. Just ask for Lieutenant Abell.”

  “Homicide?” Martha said inquiringly.

  “Don’t let it throw you,” the police officer said with a slight chuckle. “The Homicide Squad doesn’t confine itself just to murder investigation. We have a half dozen separate responsibilities, and one of them is suicide.”

  “Oh,” Martha said. “All right, Lieutenant. I’ll see you at four tomorrow.”

  Martha had hoped there would be a photograph of Janet Waters in the morning paper, but there wasn’t. There was merely a brief item on an inner page reporting her death from an overdose of sleeping pills and announcing that, pending further investigation, the police had tentatively listed the death as a suicide.

  Martha arrived at the Homicide squad room promptly at four. Lieutenant Herman Abell turned out to be a thick-bodied, unsmiling man in his forties. Dr. Fred Waters was also there, and he made an instant impression on Martha. The dentist was a tall, lean, handsome man with thick wavy black hair and very white teeth. Martha guessed him to be in his mid-thirties.

  He was not only handsome, but exceedingly charming, she decided within minutes of being introduced to him. Part of his appeal was to her latent maternal instinct, she suspected, because he was so obviously bereaved. He seemed to be literally stunned by the news that his wife had repeatedly considered killing him. Under questioning by Lieutenant Abell, he admitted that she had recently had some rather severe bouts of depression, but he hadn’t even suspected psychosis.

  “She always acted as though she loved me,” he kept saying with rather pitiable insistence.

  “She did,” Martha assured him. “You’ll have to face it, doctor, that your wife was simply mentally deranged.”

  “That seems plain enough,” Lieutenant Abell confirmed. “Are you ready to make your formal statement, Miss Pruett?”

  When Martha said she was, he had her dictate it into a tape recorder, had it typed up and
she signed it. She included everything she could remember about all three phone conversations with the dead woman, and also her conversation with the Elks’ Exalted Ruler.

  The whole thing took less than an hour. The case was so obviously a suicide that the lieutenant gave the impression his investigation was routine, but Martha noted that nevertheless it was thorough. For instance, he checked by phone with the office girl of psychiatrist Albert Manners to verify that Janet Waters had actually made the appointment she told Martha she had when she made her last, incoherent phone call.

  She had made the appointment. Since the doctor’s receptionist said the only contact had been when she phoned in for an appointment, and that Dr. Manners had not even talked to her on the phone, Lieutenant Abell didn’t bother to talk to the psychiatrist himself.

  When first introduced to Dr. Fred Waters, Martha had murmured a word of sympathy and had gotten a courteous thank you in reply. In parting, she again told the dentist she was sorry for his bereavement and, this time, got such an appreciative smile in return that it dazzled her. Since her own dentist had recently retired and moved to Florida, she made a mental note to try Dr. Fred Waters the next time she had her teeth cleaned.

  It was another three months before Martha was due for her semiannual dental checkup and cleaning. In May she called Dr. Waters’ office. The girl who answered the phone gave her an appointment for a Friday afternoon at 4:30.

  Dr. Waters’ office was a good seven miles from Martha’s apartment. She mis-guessed the traffic situation and arrived five minutes late. She would have been even later if she had not found a parking place for her little sports car right in front of the office building. The dental office being on the first floor saved the time of waiting for an elevator, too. She entered his office out of breath at exactly 4:35.

  The young red-haired receptionist smiled away her apology and offered one of her own. Dr. Waters was running late with his appointments and probably couldn’t take her until five.

  “I may have to leave before he gets to you,” the girl said in further apology. “I’m going away for the weekend and have to catch a six o’clock bus. If I do have to leave, I’ll give you your chart, and you can just hand it to the doctor when he takes you.”

  “All right,” Martha agreed.

  The receptionist invited her to have a seat.

  It was a typical dentist’s waiting room, moderately well furnished with leather-covered easy chairs and a sofa, and with a table containing an assortment of out-of-date magazines. Martha found a women’s magazine she hadn’t read and settled back to wait. The receptionist, behind the counter running the length of one wall, was doing some kind of desk work.

  Ten minutes after Martha’s arrival the silence was suddenly broken by a single, “Cuckoo!” followed by three sharp chimes, then succeeded by another, “Cuckoo!” Martha glanced up at the wooden clock on the wall in time to see the bird pop out for the second, “Cuckoo!” then disappear again. Could this be the same clock she had heard in the background each time Janet Waters had phoned her, she wondered? That had cuckooed twice before and after chiming the hour, but perhaps this one did too, and cuckooed once only on the quarter hours.

  Clearing her throat, Martha said to the receptionist, “Miss, do you happen to know if Dr. Waters has a clock at home similar to the one you have here?”

  The receptionist said politely, “I’ve never seen Dr. Waters’ home. I’ve only worked for him a little over two weeks.”

  “Oh,” Martha said, and subsided. Several moments passed in silence, then the girl looked up again. “It may be that they have, and that’s why they put this one here. I wish they hadn’t, because it drives me crazy, sounding off every fifteen minutes.”

  Martha said puzzledly, “What do you mean they put it here?”

  “Dr. and Mrs. Waters, when they were married.”

  “But they were married ten years ago, weren’t they?” Martha said, confused.

  The redhead smiled at her. “I mean his current marriage, Miss Pruett. They were only married a couple of weeks ago. That’s how I got this job, because Joanne was his previous receptionist.”

  Martha was mildly shocked. He certainly hadn’t waited a very decent interval before taking a second wife. Men, she sniffed to herself. After all his show of bereavement.

  The redhead was saying, “Joanne had the clock at her apartment, and of course when she moved from there to Dr. Waters’ home, she had no place to put her furnishings, because his home was already furnished. She sold most of her things, but she brought a few of the smaller items here.”

  The girl went back to her work. Martha stared up at the clock while a series of astonishing thoughts ran through her mind. If all those calls had come from the apartment of Dr. Waters’ former receptionist instead of from his home, quite obviously it had not been Janet Waters to whom Martha had talked; and the fact that this same receptionist had become the second Mrs. Waters so soon after the death of the first added a sinister element. This thought so staggered Martha that she didn’t realize how long she had been sitting there mulling it over until the clock sounded again. This time all doubt was removed from her mind, because it cuckooed twice before chiming five times, then cuckooed twice again.

  At that moment the door from the inner office opened and Dr. Fred Waters ushered out a male patient.

  “Make Mr. Curtis another appointment for next week, Ruby,” the dentist said to the receptionist. “Then you can leave, because I know you have to catch a bus. I’ll close up.”

  He turned to glance at Martha and a startled expression crossed his face. “Oh, hello there,” he said. “I didn’t realize you were my last appointment. Ruby likes to surprise me.”

  The remark caused the receptionist to glance curiously from Martha to the dentist, but she made no comment. She merely handed him a large card and said, “Here is Miss Pruett’s chart, doctor.”

  After a brief glance at it, Dr. Waters said to Martha, “Sorry to have kept you waiting, Miss Pruett. Come on in.”

  Beyond a jerky nod, Martha had made no response to the dentist’s greeting, but no one seemed to notice. She rose and rather woodenly preceded him into the treatment room. She sat in the dental chair, allowed a bib to be tied around her neck, and obediently opened her mouth.

  “Hmm,” the dentist said after a brief examination. “Exceptionally fine teeth for your age.” He smiled down apologetically and amended that to, “I mean for any age.”

  He started to work with a scraper and a pick. Fortunately the nature of dental treatment prohibits conversation, because Martha couldn’t have thought of a word to say to him. Time passed in silence. She knew when fifteen minutes had passed, although it seemed much longer, because the cuckoo clock sounded the quarter hour.

  Only seconds later, at a moment when Martha was seated erect to rinse out her mouth, there was a light rap on the door, then it immediately opened. A strikingly beautiful blonde of about twenty-five stood in the doorway.

  “Oh, excuse me, honey,” she said in a husky voice. “I assumed your last patient would be gone by now.”

  She was starting to pull the door closed again from outside when Martha blurted, “You must be Joanne.”

  The woman paused to gaze at her inquiringly. Dr. Waters’ expression denoted doubt as to whether he should introduce the two women or simply request the blonde to wait outside.

  His patient took the decision out of his hands by announcing, “I’m Martha. Remember me, Joanne?”

  The blonde’s face lost all expression. Dr. Waters’ turned pale. The woman pushed the door all the way open again and studied Martha with pursed lips.

  “You sound as though we had met before,” she said with an assumed air of puzzlement which failed to fool Martha in the least. She could tell by the woman’s ex-pression that she had recognized Martha’s voice as instantly as Martha had recognized hers.

 
Martha said coldly, “Only over the phone. What a remarkable murder plan! You managed to establish through a totally disinterested witness that Janet was a psychotic who had committed suicide, when the poor woman was prob-ably entirely normal.” She looked at the dentist. “How did you give her the pills before you went bowling, doctor? In her coffee?”

  Belatedly, she knew that this verbal outburst had been unwise when she saw how both of them were looking at her. Sliding from the dental chair, she undid her bib and draped it over the chair arm. “I guess I’ll be going,” she said nervously.

  The blonde Joanne remained centered in the open doorway. In an unemotional voice she said to her husband, “Accidentally giving a patient an overdose of anesthetic won’t help your professional reputation, but it wouldn’t hurt as much as a murder trial.”

  The dentist gazed from his wife to Martha and back again with an expression of desperation on his face.

  Martha said to the woman in the doorway, with a mixture of fright and belligerence, “You had better get out of my way.”

  Ignoring her, Joanne said to Dr. Waters, “You have no choice. It’ll pass as an accident. It’s happened in other dental offices.”

  Dr. Waters came to a decision so suddenly he took Martha by surprise. Grasping her frail figure by both shoulders, he threw her back into the dental chair.

  Despite her age and small size Martha was as agile as an eel, and now she behaved like one. She writhed and kicked and twice nearly broke loose from the man’s grip before he finally subdued her by lying across her legs and holding her shoulders down with both hands. She had to give up then, because he was nearly double her weight.

  “You know how to use the gas,” the dentist said to his wife. “Get the mask over her face while I hold her down.”

  A moment later a conelike rubber mask with gas hissing from it was clamped over Martha’s nose and mouth. She shook it loose by violently shaking her head from side to side, but then Joanne grasped her beneath the chin with one hand and held her head immobile while she firmly reset the mask in place with the other hand.