Murder at Bridge Part 12

Hammond, you were the first to arrive, I believe?"

"It seems that I was!" Clive Hammond answered curtly.

"And yet you did not enter the living room to greet your hostess?"

"I wanted a private word with Polly--Miss Beale--my fiancee," Hammond explained briefly.

"How and when did you arrive?"

"I don't know the exact time. Never thought of looking at my watch,"

Hammond offered. "I came out in my own roadster--that tan Stutz you may have noticed in the driveway. As for how I entered the house, I leaped upon the porch and opened a door of the solarium. I walked across the solarium, saw Polly just finis.h.i.+ng with bridge for the afternoon, and beckoned to her. She joined me in the solarium, and we stayed there until Karen screamed.... That's all."

"Have you been engaged long, Mr. Hammond--you and Miss Beale?" Dundee asked, as if quite casually.

"Nearly a year,--if it's any of your business, Dundee!"

"And just when had you seen Miss Beale last, before late this afternoon?" Dundee asked.

"I refuse to answer!" Hammond flared. "That at least is none of your d.a.m.ned business!"

"I believe I can answer my own question, Mr. Hammond," Dundee said very softly.

CHAPTER EIGHT

"Then why ask me?" Hammond shrugged, but his eyes flickered toward Polly Beale.

"I thought perhaps you could give me a little additional information,"

Dundee soothed him. "You see, it happens that I saw you, Miss Beale and another young man come into the Stuart House dining room about half past one today, just when I was thinking of lunch for myself."

"The mysterious 'other young man' was Clive's brother, Ralph Hammond,"

Polly Beale cut in brusquely.

"Your decision to lunch with your fiance and his brother was quite a sudden one?" Dundee asked courteously. "Just when did you change your mind about Mrs. Selim's luncheon party at Breakaway Inn, Miss Beale?"

The tall girl threw up her mannishly cropped, chestnut head. "There is nothing at all sinister or even queer about it, Mr. Dundee! I was on my way to the luncheon, when I decided to drive past Nita's house, on the chance that she might like me to drive her over."

"Then you didn't know that Mrs. Dunlap had already arranged to meet Mrs.

Selim downtown this morning and to take her to the Inn?" Dundee asked.

"No! I didn't hear of the arrangement," Polly answered decidedly.

"You were a close friend of Mrs. Selim's perhaps?" Dundee prodded.

"Not at all! But that would not keep me from doing my hostess a courtesy.... She hated her Ford and liked expensive cars," Polly added unemotionally. "It was about a quarter to one when I got here, I should say. Nita wasn't here, nor was her maid, but I saw Ralph's car parked in front of the house--"

"_Ralph Hammond's car?_" a woman squealed, but Dundee let Polly continue.

"I rang and he answered the door. Said he was alone in the house, going over the premises at Judge Marshall's request," Polly said evenly.

"That's right--that's right!" Judge Marshall agreed hastily. "Nita--Mrs.

Selim--wanted the unfinished half of the gabled top story finished up.

Wanted a maid's room and bath, and a guest room and bath added to the living quarters already completed. I gave the commission, for an estimate, at least, to the Hammond firm, since they had built the house originally for Crain--Penny's father."

"I see," Dundee agreed. "And you sent your brother, Mr. Hammond?"

"He was the natural one to send," Clive Hammond retorted. "Small job.

All he had to do was to get together an estimate on additional furnace lines and radiators, electric wiring, plumbing, plastering, etc."

"Go on, Miss Beale," Dundee directed.

"Thanks!" There was sarcasm in her brusque voice. "But that's really about all I have to tell. Ralph complained that he was hungry and charged me with giving him too little of my time--the usual thing. I picked up Nita's phone, called Clive and made the date for the three of us. Then I called Breakaway Inn, cancelled the luncheon part of the bridge party with Nita, and Ralph and I drove back to Hamilton."

Dundee studied her strong, clever, almost plain face for a long minute.

Certainly Polly Beale did not look like a liar--but he would have taken his oath that she was lying now. Or rather not revealing the whole truth behind the actual facts of her movements that day. For instance, could a simple plea of her future brother-in-law make her do so discourteous a thing as to break a luncheon appointment, especially when such a course would not only disappoint her hostess and her friends but disarrange the seating plan of a rather formal party?

Of course the explanation was obvious. She had wanted, first, to see Nita and remonstrate privately with her for having so enslaved Ralph Hammond, when he was tacitly known to "belong" to Penny Crain--one of the sacred crowd. Failing that, she had found Ralph himself, and had not expected to find him; had talked with him about Nita, and had quarreled a bit with him, perhaps, over his love-sodden behavior. And the crisis had become so acute that Polly had arbitrarily called upon Clive Hammond and then had forced Ralph to accompany her.

"Do you know, Miss Beale, why Ralph Hammond did not keep _his_ engagement with Mrs. Selim this afternoon? Or rather, his promise to appear for c.o.c.ktails and to be Miss Crain's partner for the rest of the evening--dinner and dancing at the Country Club?"

"I do not!" Polly said crisply.

"Hammond?"

"Neither do I," Hammond retorted angrily.

"Then it was not to discuss Ralph Hammond and his--affairs, that you beckoned Miss Beale to meet you in the solarium upon your arrival?"

"It--_was not_!"

A shade too much anger and emphasis, Dundee decided. And he wished heartily that Strawn's detectives would not delay much longer in bringing the missing young man into this already involved examination.

"You say that you both were in the solarium from the time of your arrival, Hammond, until Mrs. Marshall screamed," Dundee continued. "Just what did you see and hear?"

Dundee watched their faces keenly, but again they were well-bred, expressionless. It was Polly Beale who answered: "Naturally there was not absolute silence, but I am afraid we were not listening. We were rather engrossed in our conversation. We were seated--near no windows--and I for one _saw_ nothing, as well as heard nothing that I can recall."

"Hammond?"

"That goes for me, too--absolutely!"

Abruptly abandoning the engaged couple, Dundee returned to Miles. "You were the second arrival, then?"

"Yes. I parked my car along the curb in front of the house," Tracey answered readily. "And I came right on in, and Nita jumped up--"

"Yes. We've had all that twice before," Dundee interrupted cruelly.

"Now, Judge Marshall--"