"It's a long story," he said, "and frankly, I'm not certain how much of
it you should hear. So suppose you begin by telling me why you think
they did it."
"The police--"
"Uh-huh. They paid a little more attention to your ideas than you
thought. They checked and found Gene had dropped out of sight over the
weekend. He and his father refused to cooperate, doubtless being very
surly about it, so now they're in the calaboose. But what could their
motive have been in the first place?"
Her fingers twisted together. "Oh, all that business years ago, when
their boat rammed Dad's."
"What more? It's something to do with you, isn't it?"
"Yes. Nothing disgraceful, I suppose. But ugly. A million people
sniggering over this new revelation about our family--isn't there going
to be end to it, ever?"
The drinks came. She tossed hers off recklessly and asked for another.
While she waited, and he worked on his beer, she looked squarely across
the table at him and said:
"Gene came back from the Navy last summer. He looked up Bruce in
Berkeley. Bruce took him home to our parents for dinner; I happened to
be there too. Gene gave me quite a play. He could be very charming. We
had a number of dates." The color crept into her face, but she went
on: "Yes, he did his best to seduce me. When that didn't work, he
asked me to marry him. Every time we went out, it would end up with a
proposal--and a wrestling match. I liked him, though. And he'd moved
back to San Francisco from the Eastbay, taken a different job, just to
be near me. Who wouldn't be flattered, and touched? But I finally had
to lay down the law. It was a fight, physically, to make him behave. I
caught a taxi home."
The waitress came back. Corinna picked up her second glass and sipped
slowly. "He apologized the next day," she said, "but I told him I
couldn't go out with him any more. He seemed to take it pretty well,
said he would go back to Chicago--he'd spent a lot of time there
once--but he asked for some kind of send-off. I--I spoke to Bruce.
Gene had always been an admirer of Bruce. Odd, that big, husky,
world-tramping fellow, admiring Bruce. We couldn't just drop him like
that. We arranged a double date for a weekend early in December, a trip
down to Carmel. I knew Bruce was in love, he couldn't hide that, but I
asked him to take a friend of mine from the theater. It would make the
atmosphere different. Safer, I thought."
Corinna stared into her drink. "We got a couple of hotel rooms down
there," she said flatly. "We did a little drinking. Gene did more than
a little. He made several open passes at me. I was afraid of a fight,
but this girl and I got to bed at last. Back in their room, Gene's and
Bruce's, Gene kept on drinking. He urged Bruce to come with him, into
our room. Well, what would you expect? Bruce lost his temper and threw
a punch at him. It couldn't have hurt--outside--but I wonder what it
did to Gene, really. He started screaming about how we were all against
him. I could hear him through the wall. We'd come down in his car. He
said we could all find our own way home, he staggered out to his car
and drove back along the highway--drunk."
Corinna brought her voice under control again. "That's all. We heard of
the accident after we got home next day on the bus. We went to see him
in the hospital as soon as we could. How he cursed us! Bruce was crying
too, when we left."
"I know," said Kintyre. "I saw him a day or so later." And, briefly, he
told her what Margery had done.
She seemed to thaw before his eyes. "If there could be such a thing as
a blessed sin--"
"Now let's return to business," said Kintyre. "I want to get the
nightmare off your back. _Imprimis_, how sorry are you for Gene?
Actually?"