The Blue Hammer

I had said the right thing. She moved to unlatch the outer door. Until then, she hadn't shown her age. She was lame, and her hips moved awkwardly. I was reminded of certain kinds of pelagic birds that move at ease in the air or on the ocean, but have a hard time walking.

Her white head was like a bird's. It was sparse and elegant, with hollow cheeks, a thin straight nose, eyes that still had distance and wildness. She caught me looking at her, and smiled. One of her front teeth was missing. It gave her a gamine touch.

"Do you like my looks? I can't say they've improved with age."

"That's true."

She went on smiling. "Who would want them to? My looks got me into more trouble. I don't mean to complain. A woman can't have everything in her life. I traveled a lot-first class a good deal of the time. I knew some talented and famous men."

"I met one of them in Tucson yesterday."

"Lashman?"

"Yes."

"How is he?"

"Getting old. But he's still painting. As a matter of fact, when I left him he was working on another portrait of you."

She was silent for a moment. Her head was poised and her eyes were empty. "The way I am now, or the way I was?"

"The way you were."

"Of course, it would have to be. He hasn't seen me since I got really old." She talked about herself as if she were an object of art that unfortunately hadn't been made to last-a Japanese flower arrangement or a song by a composer who didn't know musical notation. "But that's enough about me. Tell me about Juanita."

She sat in an armchair under a standing lamp, and I sat facing her. I gave her a brief report on Juanita Grimes, then on Juanita's ex-husband, Paul, and his death.

She seemed shocked by the knowledge. "I can't believe Paul Grimes is dead. He was here just the other day, with his daughter."

"So she told me. I understand he wanted you to authenticate a painting of you."

"That was the general idea. Unfortunately I couldn't place it. All he had was a small photograph of it, and I've been painted so many times I lost track long ago. As a matter of fact, I've got very bored with pictures, especially pictures of my own face. I haven't hung any pictures since I moved in, though I've got a ton of them in the back room." She waved her fingers at the bare walls. "It's no fun being reminded of what you've lost."

"I know that. But would you mind taking another look at a photograph of a picture?"

"A picture of me?"

"I think so. It's the same picture that Paul Grimes was interested in."

I got out my photograph of the painting and handed it to her. She held it up to the light and studied it. Then she let out a little wordless grunt of recognition.

"Have you seen it before, Miss Mead?"

"This is the third time I've seen it. The second time tonight. But I still can't say for sure who painted it, or when. It looks like a Chantry, all right, but I don't remember him painting it."

"It's been suggested that it was a memory picture, one you never sat for-maybe done quite recently."

"That's what the young woman was saying this evening."

"What young woman?"

"The girl from the local paper. I told her I don't give interviews. But she was very persistent and I finally let her come. I must admit she was nice enough. I wasn't much help to her, though."

"Was her name Betty Siddon?"

"That's it. Betty Siddon. Do you know her?"

"I've been trying to get in touch with her. Did she tell you where she was going from here?"

"She said something about a beach-Sycamore Beach?"

"Sycamore Point?"

"I guess that was it. Anyway, the man who sold the picture to Paul Grimes drowned in the ocean there the other day. What was his name?"

"Jake Whitmore. He didn't drown in the ocean, though. He was drowned in fresh water, probably in somebody's bathtub."

Without intending to, I had succeeded in shocking her. The life and color drained from her face. Its bones still made it handsome, though her eyes had gone as dead as any statue's.

Her pale mauve mouth said, "This Whitmore was murdered, too?"

"The police and the coroner think so."

"Jesus." She was breathing like a ru

"Can I get you some water, Miss Mead?"

"Got something better than that." She pointed at a cabinet against the wall. "There's a fifth of Jack Daniel's in there. And glasses. Pour yourself one, too. I take mine straight. Double."

I got out the whisky and poured her a double shot and myself a single. She took hers in a single gulp. She asked for another double. I poured it, and she drank it. I watched the color rise in her face.

"Drink yours down," she said. "I hate to drink alone."

I wondered if she was an alcoholic, and decided she probably was.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" she said. "Do I look fu

"No. They look fine."

"Then quit staring at me like that."

"I'm sorry. I have to leave, anyway."

"You're interested in that Siddon girl, aren't you?"

"Yes, I am. You're a mind reader."

"I know men," she said. "Isn't she a little young for you?"

"Maybe. How long ago was she here?"

"I didn't look at the time. It was early in the evening."

"How did she find you?"

"She called the-" The old woman's mouth clamped shut. After a short period of strained silence, she said, "I have no idea."

"You were going to say she called somewhere."

"Was I? Then you know more than I do. I must have been thinking about something else. Don't let me keep you-you say you have to go. Just leave that bottle where I can reach it, will you?"

She touched the table beside her chair with one of her wrinkled white hands. I said, "I'm not leaving yet."

"I wish you would. I'm very tired. Anyway, I've told you all I know."

"I seriously doubt that, Miss Mead. When I was in Arizona, I stumbled into some very interesting facts. Back in the early forties, your natural son William was killed by someone and buried in the desert."

Her face grew paler and longer. "Juanita Grimes always did talk a lot."

"She wasn't my main source. Your son's murder was and is public knowledge. I talked to the man who discovered his body and investigated his death. Sheriff Brotherton."

"So?"

"Aren't you interested in who killed your son?"

"It doesn't matter now," she said. "What difference can it possibly make? He's dead. He's been dead for over thirty-two years."

"But I think the man who killed him is still alive."

"How can you know that?*"

"I feel it in my bones. Not that there isn't plenty of evidence. There have been other deaths. Paul Grimes, Jacob Whitmore. And the man whose remains were dug up tonight in Richard Chantry's greenhouse."

She tried to speak, and succeeded on her second attempt. "What man?"

"He hasn't been identified yet, but he will be. He came to Chantry's house about twenty-five years ago with a woman and a little boy. There was an argument, and a fight between him and Chantry. According to the account I heard, the man fell down and hit his head and died. The Chantrys buried him."

"Did Mrs. Chantry tell you this?" she said.

"Some of it."

Her eyes widened while the rest of her face had tightened and thi

"What else did Mrs. Chantry tell you?"

"That was the gist of it. What else was there to tell?"

"I'm asking you," she said.

"But I think you're the one who knows the answer. Why did Jack Biemeyer buy you the house in Chantry Canyon?"

"Because I asked him to."

"Jack Biemeyer isn't that generous."

"He was to me, in those days." A little color came into her face and gathered on her cheekbones. "I admit he hasn't improved with age. But then neither have I."

"I suggest that Biemeyer bought you that house on behalf of the Chantry family. Or possibly they gave it to you, by way of him, for nothing."