Free Assassins Have Starry Eyes by Donald Hamilton Page B

circumstances, the police feel that a thorough investigation is indicated. I’ve persuaded them to let me handle it as far as Project personnel is concerned, since I know the people involved, and since there are some security angles that have to be treated with discretion.” He looked up. “You understand, this is a favor the authorities are doing us. If I can’t satisfy them, they’ll put their own men on the job.”
    I glanced at Natalie, still standing beside me, and patted her hand. “Well, we haven’t killed anybody, have we, Princess?” I said, and looked back to Van Horn. “Ask your questions.”
    “Your talk with Dr. Bates last night,” he said, “wasn’t exactly friendly, was it?”
    I said, “We didn’t fight, but I’m afraid I wasn’t as sympathetic as I might have been. I get fed up with that point of view.”
    “What point of view is that?”
    “Putting one man’s tender conscience ahead of… Oh, hell, let’s not get into philosophy, Van. Maybe that’s the only way to deal with these problems; just hide your head in the sand and pretend they don’t exist. Or wash your hands of them and let other people take the blame for discovering what’s inevitably going to be discovered anyway. Are you suggesting that I drove up into the mountains this morning and shot Jack because he wouldn’t work for us any longer? That would seem rather illogical, wouldn’t it? Alive, he might have changed his mind; dead, he certainly won’t be any help.”
    He said, “You’re referring rather callously to a man you claim to have been your friend, Dr. Gregory.”
    I said, “I’ll do my weeping in private. You let me worry about that. What else do you want to know? We left the DeVrys’ about one-thirty, drove straight home, and haven’t been out of the house since. That’s called an alibi, I think.”
    “Yes,” he said. “Can you prove it?”
    I said, “Only if you take Natalie’s word for it; and I suppose she would lie for me if I asked her to.”
    He said, “It’s not a question of Mrs. Gregory’s veracity, but of her knowledge. My understanding is that you don’t share the same bedroom.”
    I looked at him sharply. “You seem to know a lot about our private life.”
    “That’s my business, Dr. Gregory.”
    “Yes,” I said, “I suppose it is. However, your information is slightly at fault, Van. We do share the same room occasionally, and last night was one of the occasions.”
    He said to Natalie, “Is that right, Mrs. Gregory?”
    She said, “Yes. Greg was home from one-thirty on; I can swear to that. He’d taken a sleeping pill about an hour and a half before Larry DeVry called him. Being waked up, and having to dress and go out, and getting upset about Jack’s quitting all combined to give him a fine case of the jitters. We finally had a couple of drinks together—this must have been around three o’clock—and went to bed in my room, with lewd intentions which you’ll be pleased to know were satisfactorily carried out. I woke up early, but Greg was still sleeping soundly half an hour ago. I can vouch for the fact that he wasn’t shooting anybody up in the mountains at dawn.”
    Van Horn nodded. “Yes,” he said. “But from your account it’s obvious that being sound asleep all morning, he can’t do the same for you, Mrs. Gregory.”
    Natalie looked startled. “Oh,” she said, “do I need an alibi?”
    “The police seem to think so,” Van Horn said. “It seems that they found this hanging in a tree near Dr. Bates’s body.” He reached into his pocket and brought out the bright silk scarf Natalie had worn out driving the day before.
    No one said anything as he came forward and spread the scarf on the low table beside the gun, pushing the brown paper aside to give himself more space. The paper crackled loudly in the silent room. The scarf, although of more expensive material, closely resembled one of those multi-colored squares of thin silk all the teen-agers were