Hit and Run (12 page)

I stood up and went to the front of the car and again looked at the headlamp. Then I realized something else. Lucille's story that the cop had come up behind her and she had been startled and had hit him with the side of the car couldn't possibly be true. I was surprised I hadn't realized this before. For the lamp to have been damaged in the way it was damaged, she must have hit the cop head-on, and that meant he wasn't overtaking her when the accident had happened. He must have been coming down the road towards her. It meant I had caught her out in yet one more lie and a much more serious one. She had said she hadn't seta the cop, but had only heard him shout at her, and she had been so startled she had swerved and that was how the accident happened. It was obvious to me now that it hadn't happened like that at all. She must have seen the light from his headlamp as it came down the road. She had admitted driving fast. The road was narrow. She had lost control, and before he could get out of the way, she had hit him head-on. Her story that he had come up beside her and had startled her had been invented to make me believe the crash hadn't been her fault.

Did she imagine any jury would believe such a story once they had examined the car? Then I remembered my promise to take the blame. If I admitted I had been driving the Cadillac at the time of the accident, a jury would immediately jump to the conclusion that I had been drunk to have had such an accident. The road was straight. I could have seen the approaching headlight. I would have had plenty of warning to slow down. My mouth turned dry as I realized what I had let myself in for.

Then there was this puzzle of the bloodstains on the off-side rear wheel. How could they have got there? She had hit the motor-cycle on her on-side. It wouldn't have been possible for her to run the cop over with her rear off-side wheel.

I went back to the rear of the car and again examined the dull, sticky red marks on the tyre. They had to be bloodstains: they couldn't be anything else.

the kind of evidence that could confuse a jury if handled by a clever counsellor, and I felt in my bones I would be asking for trouble to remove such evidence.

I turned my attention to the garage doors. With the aid of the tools I had brought with me, I straightened the lock and got the doors to shut properly. Then I screwed on the hasp and fixed the padlock. I felt fairly confident the police wouldn't attempt to break into the garage. They would contact Seaborne first and ask for the key. That at least would gain me a little time.

I decided to go now down to the beach where Lucille and had bathed and examine the ground in daylight. I returned to the Pontiac.

By now it was a little after twelve o'clock, and I found the highway crowded with weekend motorists. I had to drive slowly, and it took me twenty minutes to reach the dirt track leading down to the beach.

As I drove down the narrow road with its low, undulating sand hills on either side, I examined the terrain carefully.

Again it struck me how odd it was that O'Brien should have been on this road. There was no cover on either side of the road, no trees or shrubs behind which he could have hidden.

I drove slowly on until I came to a disturbance in the sand dunes on my right. A large patch of ground had been trampled flat, and I decided this must have been the scene of the accident. I stopped the car and got out.

From where I stood I could see the sea and the beach some two miles ahead of me. The ground was flat with only slight sandhills, and no cover except the distant clump of palms where Lucille and I had been.

For some moments I continued to look around, but there was nothing to tell me more than I had seen at first glance, so I got back into the Pontiac. I drove down to the beach and pulled up within twenty yards of where we had parked last night.

The first thing I noticed was the tyre marks of the Cadillac, imprinted in the sand, and that gave me a shock. I saw also Lucille's and my footprints leading down to the palm trees. This was something I hadn't reckoned on, and I wondered if the police had been down here and if they had seen the tracks.

If we had left prints in the sand, then the man who had telephoned us, if he had really seen us on the beach, must also have left prints.

radius there were no other footprints except mine and Lucille's to be seen.

That told me two things: the police hadn't been down here, and therefore they couldn't have seen the tyre marks of the Cadillac and the man who had telephoned us couldn't have been on the scene either. That set me another puzzle. If he hadn't been down here, how had he known Lucille and I had swam together and then had quarrelled? After thinking about this for some moments, I decided the only possible way in which he could have seen us would have been from some distance away, and he must have watched us with the aid of powerful night glasses. That would explain why Lucille hadn't seen him.

I spent several minutes wiping out the tyre marks in the sand. Then, walking down to the palm trees, taking care to walk in the prints I had made the previous night, I started back to the road, wiping out each print and also Lucille's as I went until I once more reached the road.

I was sweating by the time I had completed the task, but it gave me a sense of security to see there were no tell-tale prints to be discovered if the police did decide to extend their search down here for clues.

Feeling at least I had taken every reasonable precaution not to be traced, I walked over to the Pontiac. As I opened the car door, I heard a car coming and looking around, I saw a yellow and red Oldsmobile turning the bend in the road and coming slowly towards me.

My heart gave a little kick against my ribs, and I waited, watching the car come, thinking if it had arrived three minutes sooner, the driver would have seen me wiping out the prints in the sand.

When the car was within a hundred yards of me, I saw the driver was a woman. She pulled up within ten yards of where I stood and she stared at me through the open window of the car. Then she got out.

She had on a scarlet dress, a small, white hat and white net gloves. She was slightly above medium height and dark: her face had the standard beauty of the Latin-American women you can see any day on the Florida beaches displaying themselves either as ornaments or as commercial propositions depending on who is looking at them.

She got out of the car with a display of long, tapering legs in nylon, smoothed her dress over solid, well-padded hips and stared at me, her black eyes intent and curious.

'Is this the place where the policeman was killed?' she asked, moving slowly towards me.

'Oh?' She paused near me. 'You think farther back up the road?'

The papers said he was killed on the road.'

She opened her handbag, took out a crumpled pack of Luckies, put one between her full red lips and then stared at me.

I took out my lighter and moved close to her. As she bent to dip the cigarette end into the flame I sheltered in my cupped hands, I smelt the perfume she had sprayed on her hair.

'Thank you.'

She lifted her head and stared directly at me. At such close quarters I could see her heavy pancake make-up had been expertly put on and she had a faint black line of a moustache that gave her that sensual quality that most Latin-American women have.

'Are you a newspaper man?' she asked.

'A newspaper man? Why, no. I just came down here for a swim.'

She turned her head and looked at the stretch of sand and stared at the smudge marks made while wiping out Lucille's and my footprints.

'Did you make those marks?'

'You mean those marks in the sand?' I tried to sound casual. 'They were there when I came.'

'They look as if someone has been trying to get rid of footprints.'

I turned to stare at the marks.

'Do you think so? They could have been made by the wind. The wind can make odd patterns in the sand.'

'Can it?' Again I felt the dark eyes move over my face. 'I passed a piece of ground that was trampled over about two miles up the road. Do you think that is where he was killed?'

'It's likely. I wouldn't know.'

'I'm not asking out of curiosity. I was going to marry him.'

a nightclub singer.

'Oh, yes. I read this morning in the paper you were going to marry him.'

'Did you?' She smiled. It was a cold, bitter smile. 'I don't suppose you had ever heard of me before you read that in the paper. I've been in show business now for ten years. It's not very encouraging that the first real publicity I get is when a man I planned to marry gets himself killed because he is too stupid to know any better.'

She turned abruptly and walked back to the Oldsmobile, leaving me staring after her.

CHAPTER SEVEN

I

I had a sandwich lunch and then drove back to my bungalow. While I ate the sandwiches and on my way back, my mind was busy, but I didn't come up with anything helpful. I was more convinced than ever that there was something very phoney about this accident. I was certain Lucille had lied to me about how the accident had happened. The situation had become more perplexing after I had looked over the ground. It was so obvious now she must have seen O'Brien as he was coming towards her. She could not have slowed down and she must have driven straight at him. With such an obvious set-up, she could expect no mercy from any jury, and it was even more obvious to me now why she was so anxious for me to take the blame.

But my immediate problem was what I was to do with the Cadillac. Sooner or later, if the police search was going to be as thorough as they claimed, they would find it in Seaborne's garage.

The Captain of Police had announced that anyone who damaged his car after the time of the accident would have to report the damage immediately, and explain how it had happened.

I wondered if this ruling could offer me a way out. If I drove the Cadillac hard against the garage door upright, and then telephoned the police, would they accept my explanation that I had damaged the car in this way? Had the damage been done only to the front of the car, I felt I might have been on fairly safe ground, but the two deep scars on the bodywork would not be consistent with ramming into the garage upright, and those two scars could easily arouse the police's suspicions.

But at least it was an idea, and I decided to keep thinking along this line. I was still thinking about it as I unlocked my front door when my mind was abruptly switched away from it as I heard the telephone bell ringing.

I entered the lounge and picked up the receiver.

'Mr. Scott?'

I recognized Watkins' voice, and I stiffened, wondering why he should be calling.

'Yes, speaking,' I said.

'Mr. Aitken asked me to call you, sir. He said it was possible you would still be at home,' Watkins said. 'If you could spare the time, Mr Aitken would be glad if you could come over.'

Watkins coughed.

'I suppose I could, sir, but Mr. Aitken gave me to understand the matter was urgent. However, if you think ...'

'No, it's okay. I'll be over. He wants me right away, of course?'

'I believe he is waiting for you, sir.'

'Okay, I'm on my way,' I said and hung up. For a moment or so I stood staring at my reflection in the mirror over the mantelpiece. I looked a little pale and my eyes were scared.

Had Lucille lost her nerve and told him? Had she got her word in first? Aitken had ordered me to take the weekend off and to relax, so why this sudden summons, unless there was trouble?

I left the bungalow, went down to the Pontiac and drove fast to Aitken's place.

During the drive my mind was as panicky as an old lady's who has heard a noise under her bed.

I parked the Pontiac beside a grey Buick convertible that stood on the tarmac before the marble steps leading up to Aitken's terrace. I got out and walked up the steps.

As I reached the top step and looked along the wide terrace I saw Aitken in pyjamas and a dressing-gown, a rug over his legs, lying in a lounging chair. He had with him a big, broad-shouldered man who sat in an upright terrace chair, his back turned to me.

I paused. My heart was thumping and my nerves were crawling as I looked at Aitken, who turned his head, saw me and waved. His leather, whisky-red face softened slightly into a welcoming grin and I felt suddenly a little sick. The relief of seeing that grotesque smile hit me like a physical blow. He wouldn't be smiling if he were after my blood.

'There you are, Scott,' he said. 'Were you going out to golf?'

The other man turned and I felt a sudden cramping sensation in my stomach. I recognized him immediately. He was: Tom Hackett; the man who had seen Lucille and me leaving the bungalow on the night of the accident: Tom Hackett, Seaborne's pal.

He looked at me, then got slowly to his feet, his red, good-natured face lighting up with a broad grin.

I took his hand, aware again that mine felt cold in his warm, firm grip.

'Sit down, sit down,' Aitken said irritably. 'Were you on your way to golf?'