The Mouse in the Mountain, Norbert Davis [best e reader for android .TXT] 📗

to find Greg he could probably uncover what's left of him if he dug around under your house a bit."

Amanda Tracy was wearing a bandage like a lopsided turban over her frizzed hair. Under it the tanned skin of her face looked dry and yellowish.

"No," Janet breathed softly. "Oh, no."

"Yes," said Doan. "Amanda cooked up a deal to do Patricia out of some of her dough. Offhand I'd bet that she told Patricia that she had uncovered some of Predilip's paintings. The reason I say that is because Patricia was careful never to mention Predilip's name, although he's one of the best reasons to come to this town. Patricia was a bit of a chiseler in her refined way, and if she thought she could get an undercover bargain in some previously undiscovered paintings which now are very valuable, she'd come running, and she'd bring cash to overawe the person she was dealing with. How about it, Amanda?"

"You're so damned smart," said Amanda Tracy. "I'll tell you something you don't know. I didn't take anything from Patricia Van Osdel that wasn't mine. Do you know where her old man got his flykiller formula? From my mother. She made it up herself and used it around the farm. Old Van Osdel came along selling phony patent medicine one day, and he saw it work. He got my mother to tell him how she made it and got her to sign a release of all her rights in it for five dollars. Five dollars!"

"Patricia came by her chiseling honestly," Doan commented.

Amanda Tracy made a savage gesture with her clenched fist. "Just five dollars, and Van Osdel made millions out of it! And then later, when my father died and we lost our farm, I asked him to give us just a little to help us out--to keep my mother from dying in the county poor-house. He refused. I told him then that I'd get some of his dirty money whether he gave it to me or not--plenty of it. I waited for a long time before I got a chance. I painted up some damned good imitations of Predilip, and I contacted Patricia when she came back to America. I told her I'd found the pictures in an attic of a house Predilip had lived in. I made a good story of it. I intended to sell her the fakes and then tell everybody about it and laugh like hell when she tried to get her money back."

"Not a bad idea," said Doan. "Why didn't you do that instead of killing her?"

"You should ask, little man. Because of some others like you, and that's why I've always hated the whole breed. When I threatened old Van Osdel, he lured some private detectives to follow me around for awhile. I knew that, but I didn't know they had taken pictures of me--candid shots. I knew Patricia had never seen me, but she had seen those pictures. She recognized me right away. She knew then that the whole deal must be a gyp, and she just laughed at me. She didn't laugh long, though."

"Dios mio," Captain Perona whispered.

Amanda Tracy laughed at him. "The earthquake was just what the doctor ordered. Patricia was walking away from me when it happened. I picked up a rock and slammed her and grabbed her purse. Maria started running and squawking, but so was everyone else right then. I chased her and hit her with the rock. I thought I'd finished her. No one noticed me before or afterward. They're used to me in this town."

"What about Greg?" Doan asked.

"He followed me from the hotel last night. He knew why Patricia had come here, and he guessed what had happened. He wanted the twenty-five thousand. All of it, if you can imagine the nerve of him. He was a nasty one, that boy. But I knew he didn't have his knife with him. I did have mine. He slammed me with a rock once. That was all he had time for."

Janet made a little gulping sound.

"Brace up, dearie," Amanda Tracy said. "I've got a surprise for the three of you." She held out her right hand. "Isn't it pretty?"

"Mother of God--a hand grenade!" Captain Perona exclaimed.

"One of yours," Amanda Tracy agreed. "You should really keep better track of them." She reached behind her with her left hand. "I'm going to leave this little iron egg with you. There'll be quite a dust-up when it lets go, and after it's all over I'll be in my little hospital bed looking very surprised and innocent, and I don't think any of you will tell stories about what I've just said."

"Wait!" Captain Perona shouted. "You can't--"

"Good-by, now," said Amanda Tracy. Her left hand had found the latch, and she pulled the door open behind her.

Lepicik was standing in the doorway looking politely interested. He nodded casually to Doan and then hit Amanda Tracy in the back of the neck with the edge of his palm. Her head snapped forward, and Doan dove for her. He caught her right hand in both of his and held it rigid while her thick body twirled and slumped loosely down.

"Get it!" Doan gasped. "Get the grenade! Look out! She's got her finger through the firing pin ring!"

Captain Perona knelt down beside him, breathing hard. With infinite care he untwisted the thick fingers. He had the grenade then, and he shifted it from one hand to the other uneasily and then put it down on the desk.

Doan let go of Amanda Tracy and stood up and wiped his forehead thoughtfully.

"Mr. Doan," said Lepicik. "Excuse me, but I have a message here that came through the military wireless. It's a little confusing, and I thought perhaps you could explain it. It's from a man named Carpenhyer, who is a motion picture agent in Hollywood, California. Have you ever heard of the man?"

"Yes," said Doan. "He's one of the best. Are you really a director?"

"Certainly," said Lepicik. "I have directed many cinema productions--in London, Rome, Stockholm, Berlin, Paris, Vienna, Moscow. Before the war, of course. But this Carpenhyer says he can get me a job at--" Lepicik stopped to verify the figure "--one thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars a week. Could that be correct?"

Doan nodded, wincing. "I'm afraid so, if Carpenhyer says it is. Take it. But quick."

"You!" said Captain Perona, suddenly recovering himself. "How did you get out of my quarters? Where is the soldier who was guarding you?"

"He had a headache," Lepicik said. "So I gave him some opium."

"Opium!" Captain Perona repeated wildly.

Lepicik looked surprised. "Just a small pill. It is very good for headaches. But it put him to sleep."

Sergeant Obrian burst in the room through the front door. "Say, that old artist doll has scrammed out of the hospital, and I can't find--" His mouth stayed open.

"You," said Captain Perona dangerously, "have arrived, as usual, in the nick of time. There is the artist doll. She has just been frustrated in an attempt to massacre us all. Put her in jail and make sure before you do that she does not have any hand grenades or other deadly weapons concealed about her person."

Amanda Tracy stirred and moaned.

"Oh!" said Janet. "I can't stand to see... I've got to get out of here!"

She dodged nimbly around Sergeant Obrian and ran headlong out the door and across a neat, graveled plot of parade ground toward the plaza. Behind her she could hear both Doan and Captain Perona shouting at her anxiously, but she couldn't stop. And then she saw something that did make her stop.

"Yes!" said Bartolome proudly. "Is it not a wonder of wonders most incredible?"

It was the bus. It had dents in it as big as footballs. It was lopsided and swaybacked, and both the rear tires were flat. But it was out from under the debris and up on its own wheels.

Carstairs and Doan and Captain Perona pulled up beside Janet and stared, too.

"The engine," said Bartolome, "has fallen out and broken itself lamentably, but that is only a matter of the most minor."

Henshaw came pacing gloomily up to them. His head was bowed, and his hands were folded behind him.

"Observe!" Bartolome commanded him. "The bus of scenic magnificence resumes itself!"

"It ain't gonna do me no good," Henshaw said.

"What's the matter?" Doan asked him. "Didn't you sell Timpkins the bathroom?"

"No," said Henshaw. "I didn't sell him the bathroom." His voice rose to a wail. "Timpkins sold me his damned old hotel!"

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Publication Date: 01-05-2015

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