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  Horton said nothing. He was too numb to speak. He felt as though he had been hit in the pit of the stomach by a giant fist.

  “I had lunch with the major just yesterday,” Velda went on, unaware of the bombshell she had dropped. “He’s a free lance writer doing research on the case for some magazine. I don’t know what his connection with Mrs. Whitney is.”

  Russ’s voice from the doorway said, “What’s all the gab?”

  Horton looked over at him, and Velda twisted her neck to look at him too. Apparently Russ didn’t expect an answer to his question. He came over to the bed to examine their bonds. Satisfied that they were still secure, he returned to the front room.

  “It’s your deal,” they heard him say to Hippo.

  The rest of the afternoon dragged by slowly. Finding Horton suddenly and unaccountably withdrawn, Velda finally gave up attempts to keep the conversation alive and dropped off to sleep. Beyond periodic checks by Russ or Hippo to make sure the bonds were still holding, there were no interruptions to Horton’s thoughts.

  It was hard for him to accept the implications of Velda’s story. But he had no choice. Belle had not only failed to mention her visit to Quincy’s home, she had stated in answer to Horton’s direct question that her only contact with Quincy had been a casual meeting in the Hotel Lawford bar.

  What had happened between the Wednesday night meeting at Quincy’s home and the Saturday morning the man died, he wondered? Had Quincy discovered he was being conned? And had either Belle or the colonel taken extreme measures to avoid arrest?

  It seemed incredible that either of them would kill for such a reason. Why not just flee town? And why had Quincy taken no action if he knew they were a confidence team? Why hadn’t he had them thrown into jail?

  There must have been some factor other than simple detection of the con game, Horton decided. Perhaps instead of calling the police, Quincy used his knowledge as a lever to force Belle and the colonel to do something they didn’t want to do. Something so repugnant to them that they killed him to avoid it.

  What, he wondered? A possibility occurred to him. Belle was an extremely attractive woman. And Quincy had been on the verge of divorce from his wife. Had he taken the opportunity to play wolf? Perhaps issued an ultimatum to Belle that she could either play ball or go to jail?

  That might be enough to bring her to murder. Or, considering the colonel’s chivalrous nature, it might be enough to make him kill in defense of her honor.

  Horton couldn’t imagine any lesser motive that could bring either to the point of taking a human life.

  He was tempted to awaken Velda and ask her opinion as to whether or not her husband had been capable of that type of lecherous blackmail. Then he decided it would involve too much explanation, and that the motive wasn’t important anyway.

  Whatever the motive, the facts seemed inescapable.

  Everything began to fit into place. Even the mysterious visitor who had been leaving Velda’s house by the back door as he entered the front. Belle, no doubt, returning the gun just in time for him to find it.

  She wouldn’t have bothered, he thought, if he hadn’t accidentally been accused of the murder. He had no doubt that she was sincerely in love with him. She had done everything possible to help him prove his innocence. Even to framing Velda for the crime.

  Apparently the original plan had been to let Tony Manzetti take the blame. The threatening note could have had no other purpose. Probably the gun had been stolen from Quincy’s house on the spur of the moment, simply because it was available and neither Belle nor the colonel owned any other. Confidence people rarely possessed guns. If Horton hadn’t been caught in the trap by coincidence, the gun probably would now be in the river. But with Horton in danger, the plan had been changed. The gun was returned to throw the blame on Velda.

  Horton experienced no lift of accomplishment from having figured things out. He had never felt so miserable in his life.

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  HORTON GUESSED that at least four hours had passed when he heard the sound of a car approaching the cottage along the dirt lane leading from the highway. The sound awakened Velda.

  “Is that Joey returning already?” she asked fearfully.

  “Probably,” he said. “It must be past five.”

  In the other room they heard footsteps move unhurriedly to the front door. Then Russ’s tense voice said, “Hey, Hippo! It’s not Joey. It’s some dame.”

  There was the sound of Hippo lumbering over to the door to have a look too.

  “All alone,” they heard Hippo say. “Better see what she wants and get rid of her.”

  The screen door creaked open and slammed again. Then, from outside, Belle’s voice came clearly. “Is this the Winthrop place?”

  Russ’s reply was too low-toned for Horton to understand.

  “They said the first turnoff after the Texaco station,” Belle’s voice said.

  The screen door opened and slammed again. From the front porch Hippo called, “This is the second turnoff, lady. You missed it.”

  A sound from the bedroom window turned Horton’s eyes that way. The insert screen in the lower part of the window was being quietly lifted out by someone outside. Then the window was silently pushed all the way up and a shapely leg hooked over the sill.

  Horton’s eyes bugged in astonishment as Helen stepped into the room. She had a thirty-eight revolver in her hand.

  Touching a finger to her lips in a gesture of silence, Helen climbed over the foot of the bed, straddled Horton’s legs and began to tug at his knots with her free hand. When they didn’t give, she dropped the gun on the bed between Horton and Velda and tugged with both hands.

  Outside Belle was saying, “It’s the next turn back, then? It must be hard to see, or I wouldn’t have missed it. Is there any landmark?”

  One knot gave, but it was only the one lashing his wrists to the sidebar. Horton shifted himself face down so that Helen could get at the other knots more easily.

  Russ’s voice said something they couldn’t catch. Hippo called, “Why don’t you go back to the Texaco station and start over, lady?”

  Suddenly Horton felt his bonds loosen. Helen reeled in several feet of rope, scrambled off the bed and tossed the rope on the floor. Horton let his legs flop full-length on the bed, got his hands beneath his chest and tried to push himself to his knees. Both hands were numb and there was no strength in his arms.

  Velda grunted as he rolled over half on top of her and managed to struggle to a sitting position. He rolled the rest of the way across her, dropped his feet to the floor and pushed himself erect.

  His legs were numb, too. His knees crumpled and he fell heavily to the floor.

  The sound of his fall seemed enormous to all of them. With a frightened look at the door, Helen rushed to kneel over him. Frantically she began massaging his arms.

  It seemed to Horton that minutes dragged by before he felt the tingling of restored circulation begin.

  Pushing Helen away, he beat at his legs with both hands until they started to tingle too. The exercise completed restoring circulation to his arms, so that when he finally got to his feet, he had full use of them. His legs were still half asleep, but at least he could walk at a wobbling gait.

  Just as the screen door opened and slammed again, Horton reached across Velda and grabbed up the gun Helen had dropped on the bed. When he motioned Helen back out of sight of the bedroom door, she pressed herself against the wall at the foot of the bed. Horton wobbled over to take up a position alongside the door.

  Apparently Hippo meant to make one of his periodic checks of the prisoners. His ponderous footsteps moved straight from the front door toward the bedroom. He walked right past Horton and came to a startled halt when he spotted Helen against the wall.

  Raising his gun, Horton brought it down squarely on top of the fat man’s head. Without a sound Hippo slumped to the floor.

  Moving on still unsteady legs, Horton lurched through the bedroom
door and across the front room. He heard Belle’s car start and back up just as he crouched beside the screen door. As the car drove off, Russ’s footsteps sounded on the porch.

  He, too, walked right past Horton. An instant later he was sprawled face-down on the floor, unconscious.

  Helen appeared in the bedroom doorway. She looked at Horton with a mixture of relief and concern.

  “What happened to your poor forehead?” she asked.

  “I tried to bend a gun barrel with it. It’s all right. Where the devil did you come from?”

  Before answering, Helen moved forward into his arms and kissed him.

  Then she said, “Your friend Belle brought me. She couldn’t find anyone else to help her. When she told me what trouble you were in, I got someone to take over the desk and came with her.

  “I have to signal Belle,” she added, and withdrew from his arms and stepped out on the front porch.

  Through the screen Horton saw her wave her arms in an all-clear signal. A moment later he heard the sound of Belle’s car returning.

  When Helen came back inside again, her body had begun to tremble in delayed reaction. Concerned, Horton thrust his gun into a hip pocket, took her in his arms and held her for a moment.

  “I’ll be all right in a minute,” she said. “I was so scared, Jim. If it hadn’t been you tied up, I never could have done it.”

  She shook herself and the trembling passed. Horton gave her shoulder a reassuring pat and turned toward the door. As he pulled open the screen door, he said over his shoulder, “If you’re up to it, go untie Velda.”

  Helen frowned. She made no move toward the bedroom.

  Horton was on the porch then, and had let the screen door close behind him. “Go ahead,” he said through the screen. “We don’t have much time.”

  Then he turned his attention forward as Belle stopped the rented car in front of the cottage.

  “Pull it around back and out of sight,” he called to her. “In case the other guy comes back before we get out of here.”

  Belle nodded, backed the car and drove it around to the other side of the cottage, where it couldn’t be seen by anyone driving down the dirt lane. Horton went back inside to find Helen standing where he had left her.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked her.

  “I wouldn’t touch that murderess,” Helen said with an expression of distaste. “She can stay tied up as far as I’m concerned.”

  “She didn’t kill him,” Horton told her.

  He moved past her into the bedroom, stepped over the prone Hippo and bent to loosen Velda’s knots. By the time Belle came into the house, Velda was sitting up massaging her arms and legs. Helen had come as far as the bedroom doorway, and Velda looked up to give her a brief glance.

  Helen swung her back and marched into the front room.

  Helping Velda erect, Horton supported her into the other room and over to a sofa. Velda sat and resumed her massaging. She didn’t look at Helen, and Helen didn’t look at her.

  Belle said in a concerned voice, “What happened to your head, Jim?”

  “Bumped it,” Horton said briefly.

  “Oh? How did you like our U.S. Cavalry act?”

  “Fine,” Horton said, not meeting her eyes. He couldn’t at the moment, after the thoughts he had wrestled with while trussed to the bed.

  Belle gave him a puzzled look. To cover his feelings, Horton said in a brisk tone, “Let’s get these characters tied up. You can tell me how you happened to make like the cavalry while we’re working.”

  Velda was not yet in shape to assist. She remained on the sofa massaging circulation back into her limbs while the other three went to the bedroom. Together they managed to heave Hippo’s dead weight onto the bed.

  It gave Horton some satisfaction to hogtie the fat man in exactly the way Hippo had tied him. After rolling him over against the wall, they carried the lighter figure of Russ from the front room, tossed him on the bed and trussed him up, too.

  As they worked, Belle explained how she and Helen happened to join forces as a rescue team.

  “I followed you to the Sixth Ward Athletic Club,” she said. “And then clear out here. When that third man drove back toward town alone, leaving you and his two companions here, I figured you wouldn’t be moving again for a while, and I’d have time to get help. I was afraid to call the police. I assumed your plan to plant the gun at Velda’s had misfired, or Manzetti’s men wouldn’t have kidnaped you. I thought bringing in the police would just put you from the frying pan into the fire.

  “I wasn’t thinking too clearly, I guess. I was nearly crazy with worry. Instead of finding a phone, I drove clear to the Rafferty House. I don’t think I dropped below eighty all the way, even inside the city. The colonel wasn’t in and had left no word as to where he was. I left a note in his box explaining the situation, then drove over to the Lawford. I had the wild idea of getting the gun you had left with me and coming back here to rescue you alone. Then, after I’d gotten it from my room and had come back downstairs again, I spotted Helen on the desk. I thought that if she was as crazy about you as you are about her, she ought to be willing to help. So I walked up to the desk and told her the whole thing.”

  Helen looked at Horton and blushed. “I nearly went into hysterics,” she said. “Belle was already near hysterics, so my reaction didn’t help things much. But we calmed each other down during the ride out here.”

  “We should have worked out our strategy on the way here too,” Belle said. “But we were both too upset even to start thinking about what we intended to do until we got here. We’ve been around here for hours, peeking in windows to locate where you were and where Manzetti’s men were. Helen finally thought of the plan of me luring them out front while she sneaked in the bedroom window.”

  Horton pulled the last knot tight just as Belle finished her story. As he straightened, the sound of a car coming down the dirt lane reached them.

  Gesturing to the two women to stay in the bedroom, Horton crossed the front room with long strides and peered through the screen door. The gray Oldsmobile was just pulling to a halt outside.

  “Get in the bedroom with the others,” he whispered to Velda. “And stay out of sight. Joey’s back and he’s got Tony Manzetti with him.”

  As Velda rose from the sofa and scurried into the bedroom, Horton flattened himself against the wall next to the front door.

  CHAPTER XXIX

  TWO CAR DOORS slammed and two sets of footsteps approached the house. Manzetti’s voice indicated that he was still in a bad mood, but that his rage had now faded to mere exasperation.

  “Always, I end up doing things myself,” he complained. “You might have known Velda’s place would be staked out after that tip the cops got about the gun. But when you can’t set it up there, you got no more ideas. You got to run back to me.”

  Joey said sullenly, “You hired me for my gun, not my brains.”

  “That’s for sure,” Manzetti snapped.

  Feet crossed the porch and the screen door jerked open. Manzetti stalked into the room with Joey trailing him. Neither saw Horton next to the door.

  “Get ‘em high,” Horton ordered, covering their backs with his gun.

  Both men whirled. Joey’s right hand streaked for his armpit in the fastest blur of motion Horton had ever seen. His gun was clear of the holster and swinging toward Horton before Horton’s brain could send the message to his finger to squeeze the trigger. Horton’s gun went off only a split second before the forty-five.

  It was enough. Horton’s slug caught Joey high in the right arm, spinning him around and making him release his gun so that it skidded across the floor beneath the edge of the sofa. Joey’s bullet shattered the window next to Horton.

  Manzetti’s arms shot skyward when Horton swung the gun at him.

  “Don’t shoot!” he said in a croaking voice.

  Horton glanced at Joey, who clutched at his right arm and staggered to an easy chair. Sinking into it hea
vily, he stared at Horton from eyes blank with shock.

  Keeping Manzetti covered, Horton sidled around him to the sofa, kneeled and felt for Joey’s gun. He flicked on the safety and dropped it into his pocket. Then he rose, ordered Manzetti to turn his back, and carefully frisked him.

  Apparently Manzetti believed in letting the hired help do his gun work. He wasn’t armed.

  Horton returned his attention to Joey. The thin gunman only looked at him dully as Horton lifted the pistol Velda had given him from his pocket. Horton thrust it into his belt.

  “All right, girls,” he called.

  Manzetti’s lower jaw sagged in astonishment as three beautiful women filed from the bedroom. First in line was the brunette Belle, then the blonde Velda and, finally, the redheaded Helen.

  “You sure like variety, Jimmy-boy,” Manzetti finally managed in an attempt at sang-froid.

  The screen door creaked open again. Horton started to turn, then froze when he found himself staring at a leveled Police Positive.

  The tall, carelessly-dressed man with the gun stepped the rest of the way inside and said quietly, “Drop it, Horton. Fast.”

  Horton had never seen the man before, but he recognized the deep voice. It was Lieutenant Grady of Homicide. Opening his fingers, he let his gun fall to the floor.

  “I didn’t hear you drive up,” Horton said a little stupidly.

  “We didn’t,” Grady said in a pleasant tone. “We parked on the highway and moved in on foot.”

  He saw Manzetti then, and seemed a little taken aback. “Oh, hello, Mr. Manzetti.”

  “How are you, Lieutenant?” Manzetti asked sourly.

  Grady moved forward, lifted the gun from Horton’s belt, patted his pockets and took Joey’s forty-five from one.

  “My, my,” he said. “Expecting a war?” He ran his gaze over the three women and Joey. “Quite an assemblage you have here.”

  A voice from the bedroom doorway said, “Couple of more in here, Lieutenant. All tied up, and they look like they’re out cold.”

  Everyone looked that way to see a uniformed policeman standing in the doorway. He, too, had a gun in his hand.