One Minute Past Eight by George Harmon Coxe Read Free Book Online

long since you had seen each other?”
    “About four years.”
    Vidal glanced from one to the other. “You have a dislike for each other? There is some bad feeling?”
    “What?” Grayson said.
    “You have not seen each other for four years yet when you meet—or had you met earlier this evening without telling Zumeta?—you do not even bother to shake hands.”
    “How the hell do you know?” Grayson said.
    Vidal showed no annoyance at the remark, but swiveled his chair and pressed a button. With that a square of what had looked like black glass recessed in the wall behind the desk was brightly illuminated and Jeff found himself looking at a miniature view of the waiting-room as seen from above.
    “What’s that, television?” Grayson asked.
    “Mirrors,” Vidal said as the light vanished. “A sort of periscope,” He allowed himself a small smile. “It is sometimes wise to know exactly who wishes to see me.”
    “And hear what they say, hunh?” Grayson added,
    “When advisable.” Vidal leaned his forearms on the desk, “You understand now why I asked the question.”
    Jeff cleared his throat. “No bad feeling,” he said. “Just nothing much in common. Arnold’s seven years older and—”
    “Just say we’re not buddies,” Grayson said. “We never were. Jeff doesn’t approve of me; neither did his father.”
    Vidal considered the information.
    “Yet he made provision for you in his will… Tell me, Mr. Lane,” he said. “What would happen if you had not located your stepbrother—or if something happened to him?”
    “My sister and I would have received Arnold’s share,” Jeff said.
    “I see. Now about this evening”—he glanced at Zumeta—“we have a timetable that should be helpful but before we go into that I would like to say that we have checked the gun, which apparently killed Mr. Baker, with his permit. It was his gun. This suggests—though there could be other answers—that whoever came to his room came with a gun and relieved Mr. Baker of his gun. Later, when it became necessary to shoot—Mr. Baker might have made the mistake of resisting—Baker’s gun was used.”
    He paused and took time to examine each face in turn. Before he could add to the statement, Grayson spoke.
    “That’s very interesting, but what I’d like to know is why I was brought here in the first place.”
    “Because,” said Vidal, “you may have been the last one to see Mr. Baker alive.”
    Grayson leaned forward, his pale eyes hostile. “Who says so?”
    “Miss Holmes,” Zumeta said, and went on to relate her story of Grayson’s meeting with Baker. The corroboration that followed came unexpectedly from Dan Spencer.
    “She’s right about that,” he said.
    “Oh?” Vidal’s black brows climbed “How do you know?”
    “I was there, in the lobby.” Spencer took the pipe from his mouth. He explained his assignment to cover the monthly dinner and said: “They were to have a guest speaker over from the States and I tried to get a line on him from the dinner committee. I thought if I could buttonhole him and get a copy of his speech I could duck the dinner part… I saw Grayson come in and speak to Baker. They went over toward the elevators.”
    “And you?” Vidal said.
    “When they told me the speaker might not get there until around eight fifteen I went into the bar.”
    A faint buzz on the desk punctuated the sentence and Vidal picked up one of the four telephones from a shelf behind him. A moment later he covered the mouthpiece and frowned at Grayson.
    “You sent for Luis Miranda… Why?”
    Spencer, sitting next to Jeff, leaned over and spoke from the corner of his mouth: “A lawyer. A good one.”
    Grayson gestured emptily. “I didn’t know why you sent for me,” he said. “I hate to get caught out alone. I got picked up for speeding a while back and they held me overnight in jail and fined me three hundred B’s.”
    “That is the usual procedure on a first offense.” Vidal