Cold Night (Jack Paine Mysteries) Read Free Page A

Ms."—he looked down at a slip of paper in front of him—"Meyer. One of Grumbach's daughters, as you should already know. Her younger sister spoke with you at length this morning about signing one of our contracts." Barker didn't look up, but creased the slip of memo paper between his fingers. "Ms. Meyer said she has the signed contract for you, and that her sister left instructions that you stop by the Mallard Hotel." He swiveled completely away from Paine. The hidden stereo, its tape rewound, once again started on the Rachmaninoff piece. "She said her sister committed suicide this morning."

FOUR
     
    "Y ou have a letter for Mr. Paine?"
    The lobby of the Mallard Hotel was crowded, but the desk clerk recognized him, anyway. "Aren't you Mr. Johnson?"
    "My name is Paine." He showed the clerk his driver's license and a credit card.
    The clerk was gone a minute, then returned empty handed.
    "Sorry, nothing for Mr. Paine. But there's another letter for Mr. Johnson."
    "I'll take it."
    "But you said—"
    "Now I'm Mr. Johnson. Get the letter."
    He held a five-dollar bill out on the end of his fingers like a Christmas ornament. The clerk returned with an envelope. He hesitated before taking the money.
    "The Mallard is a good hotel, Mr. Paine."
    "And I'm a good customer," Paine said, taking the envelope firmly from him and dropping the five-dollar bill on the desk.
    When he got to his car he opened the envelope and drew out three photographs. There was nothing else. He spread the photos out on the seat. They were not the same as the others. These were three head shots of three different men. All of them looked like car salesmen. They looked like three salesmen for the same Plymouth dealership.
    Paine put the photos back into the envelope, holding it in his hand for a moment before putting it into his jacket pocket and starting the car.
    This time the Grumbach estate was alive with activity. There were two police cars parked at an angle in the circular drive, two vans with leading cables that could only be television crews. Two suicides in the same moneyed family in one week was obviously news. The gardener was nowhere to be seen. At the front door Paine waited for the ghostly maid to answer, but the door was opened by Rebecca Meyer.
    She was again in tennis whites. But now there were red puffy patches under her eyes, and her short hair was in disarray. As Paine stood there she brought her fingers up to her hair and drew them through it, making a nervous motion with her other hand.
    "Come in," she said.
    Paine took a step but she suddenly held her hand out and added, "No, don't. Let's walk." She stepped out quickly, closing the door behind her.
    "I hope you don't mind," she said as she brought him around the front of the house, across the manicured miniature garden and onto a flat-stoned path toward the side. "I just can't stand it in there. The television people, the police, it's . . . ghoulish." Once again her hand made its way up to her hair, but this time a tremble ran down her arm and made her shiver. "I'm sorry."
    Paine said nothing, because she wanted to talk.
    "My father," she said, "I was not very close to. In all honesty, I can say that when he killed himself I . . . wasn't very sorry about it. But Dolores . . ." The name trailed off; her hand made a movement out in front of her.
    She regained some of her poise. They had rounded the side of the house and were making their way through a copse of trees as pampered as the rest of the grounds; each branch seemed sculpted to fit with every other, and there was not a leaf or blade of grass out of place.
    Rebecca Meyer said, "I suppose that must sound hard, or something, my not feeling anything for my father?"
    When Paine said nothing she added, "You think I'm cruel."
    "I don't know you," Paine said.
    "That's true," she said. "But I wanted you to know that . . . I was not very close to my parents."
    "Not many people are."
    "Dolores and I got along better when we were younger. She's