The Borrowed Alibi

Book 0: A Vic Varallo Mystery

by Dell Shannon

Genres: Mystery; Police Procedurals; Traditional Mysteries

Synopsis

'My favourite American crime-writer' New York Herald Tribune Vic Varallo is an ambitious police officer. He and his wife Laura fix up a room for a guest, Ross Duncan, who seems extremely likeable but a little odd. Ross reveals to Vic that he is flat broke, financially crippled by alimony to his ex-wife Helene. That is, until Helene is killed, and Ross charged with her murder. But against appearances, Vic believes in Ross's innocence. So he sets to work through a tangled mass of evidence and discovers some very odd things about a certain Mr Reilly, an eccentric old mother - and the dead woman herself . . .

Release date: July 28, 2014

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 240

Sample

When Vic Varallo resigned his captaincy on the Contera force, he’d figured the sensible thing to do was come down to the big town and join the force there. It was the job
he knew. He’d have to start at the bottom again, which wasn’t so good at thirty-three; but city forces paid higher, and Laura (against his private liking) didn’t mind working
awhile until they got some savings ahead.

He knew a couple of men in the L.A.P.D., and he knew that that crack force is perennially undermanned. But it was on the cards that promotion would come more quickly on a smaller force, that his
rather unusual status as a cop of twelve years’ experience, now again a rookie, would be understood and appreciated. In the end, he joined the Glendale force. Glendale was one of the larger
towns-within-the-big-Town—most northeasterly city at that end of the San Fernando Valley, a hundred and twenty-three thousand.

It felt strange to be back in uniform again, a tan uniform instead of navy, and riding a patrol car. There were a few new things to learn since he’d last ridden a car, and a lot of
different things to being a city cop; but people were people anywhere, he made some friends on the force—notably Sergeant Charles O’Connor—and most important of all, of course, he
had Laura.

On the other hand, they made a few mistakes, trying to plan ahead. They decided it wasn’t sensible to go on paying rent when they could be acquiring equity in a house; and, said Laura, it
would be silly to start to buy a house they’d outgrow in a few years. Because when they could afford it they intended to have a family of two at least. The upshot was that they
bought—or started to buy—the house on Hillcroft Road. Neither of them had ever owned a house before, and it turned out that they’d been a little naïve about this one.

It was a fine house, about twenty years old (“Because all these new ranch houses have such small rooms,” Laura had said. “I like nice old-fashioned bedrooms with walk-in
closets”) and well-built, a stucco house of Mediterranean design. It had a separate dining room, three bedrooms and a den, and even—attached to the double garage—a room and bath
meant for maid’s quarters.

This section of town, the Rossmoyne section, had for long been one of the best residential areas; these days it was not as fashionable as some of the new subdivisions, but the taxes were still a
little higher than in other places in town. That, they found out.

Laura didn’t want to go back to the telephone company because it meant such irregular hours; she got a job in the Security Bank downtown, posting and filing. Of course that didn’t
pay so well. And there were Varallo’s new uniforms to buy, and—because the .38 he had wasn’t the regulation model—a new gun. He’d had a backlog of savings, and so had
Laura, so they hadn’t had to go into much further debt except for the necessary furniture. They’d finish furnishing the house properly as they could afford it, but meanwhile there had
to be a refrigerator, a stove and a few other items. Both their cars—his seven-year-old Chevvy and Laura’s eight-year-old Ford—were in decent condition, but you never knew.

They’d make it, though things were, naturally, a little tight. Prices were up, and the house payments a pretty big bite out of their joint income—the house really a bargain, as Laura
said, at twenty-seven five, and much better value for the money than these jerry-built new places. But the payments were higher because of the higher taxes in this area; they’d just gone up,
the voters having passed another raise to the school board.

“Which,” said Laura, “is all to the good, isn’t it? You have to look ahead. The Glendale schools are supposed to be good. As good as any of them are these days. And if
we’re staying here—which we are—”

Varallo said, “Yes, but it ups the payments, damn it.”

There were summer uniforms to buy as well as the winter ones, and of course a certain amount of ammo because you had to keep up to standard on target shooting. And then the damn transmission
went out on the Chevvy. . . . Sitting there helpless at (of course) the busy intersection of Broadway and Glendale Avenue, Varallo had searched his memory for all the curses he knew in two
languages, which affected the transmission not at all. And that was a hundred and seventy-nine bucks. . . .

“Darling,” said Laura, “things come along. We’ll—weather it. And we can’t give up the house. We wouldn’t break even. And what with your—your
nursery of exotic females out there—”

Varallo said they weren’t all exotic females. He called her attention to Fred Howard and Horace MacFarland, adding that he was, however, going to get rid of MacFarland. “Because I
don’t like pink ones. There’s Dr. Huey too.”

“There is also,” said Laura, reaching to adjust his tie, “that duchess, who sounds to me like a high-class harlot. I’ll bet she was.”

Varallo told her she was a senseless female. “And I haven’t spent much on them—not over twenty dollars, anyway.”

“It’s the principle of the thing,” said Laura. “You will.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss him. It was seven-thirty in the morning and he was on days this month.
“Besides, think about me. Here I think I’ve married a big tough he-man cop, and what does he turn into? A damned rose fancier.”

Varallo told her not to swear. “We’ll make it somehow,” he agreed. “But it’s a little rough, sometimes. Because—” And he left it all unsaid. How time
slipped away, and Laura was twenty-nine this year, and they wanted a family; and he didn’t like her working, and did want to give her more than he could; and though he’d made friends,
was getting along O.K. and liking this force, it was a little galling to be riding a squad car in uniform, to be plain “mister” off duty. She knew all that, and patted his chest,
smiling up at him.

“It’ll all turn out all right, Vic. Or do I sound like Pollyanna? It’s all all right now so long as it’s us together. Isn’t it?”

And that of course didn’t need answering in words. It was.

What Laura called his exotic females had been as much of a surprise to Varallo as to anybody.

They’d moved into the house on the first Saturday in December, a little over two months after they’d been married and a month after Varallo had joined this force.

Late that Sunday morning, a warm blue-and-gold morning, he had strolled idly out into the back yard because Laura said it made her nervous to be watched while she hung the curtains and, no, he
couldn’t help her, thank you—go away. The back yard of the house on Hillcroft Road was deep, and for the first time Varallo really noticed how many flower beds it contained, and all the
lawn to be kept mowed, and felt qualms of doubt. He knew absolutely nothing about that kind of thing, and wasn’t interested. The grass needed cutting now.

All the flowers seemed to be roses—one of the few flowers he could identify. The house was on a corner, and on that side, against a low cement wall, grew a tangled climbing growth sparked
here and there with round yellow-pinkish roses. All over the yard were scattered small beds in various shapes with rose trees in orderly rows, or lower bushes. There was a pleasant brick-floored
patio at the rear of the house, with a tall fan-shaped trellis partially sheltering it, and up that was growing another tangle of rosebush. The cement wall carried on across the back and down the
other side of the yard; there were more small beds and about the middle of the wall another tangle of climbing bush sprouting roses of a different shade of yellow.

Varallo stood and looked at all the roses and thought the whole thing looked like the hell of a lot of work, for which he experienced—as someone had said—a deep feeling of no
enthusiasm.

“Per Bacco,” he said to himself, “I think we’ve been fools here.” The real-estate woman, Mrs. Williams, had seemed a little stunned at the rapidity of
their decision, but Laura had fallen in love with the house, and though the payments were high, they’d be just as high or higher on any house this size in this good a residential area. Which,
of course, was the point. They should have found out more about the various sections of town before—

At that point he became aware that he was being regarded over the wall by a paunchy bald man of fifty-odd, with a pink face and horn-rimmed glasses. The man smiled and nodded at him.
“You’ll be our new neighbor,” he stated, and came up to the wall to offer a somewhat grimy hand. “Name of Anderson—Marvin Anderson.”

“Varallo,” said Varallo, deciding to spare Mr. Anderson the Lodovico. “Vic Varallo.”

“Varallo?” said Anderson involuntarily, glancing at Varallo’s thick crest of tawny-gold hair, fair skin and blue eyes.

Varallo explained about North Italians. Anderson said, “Oh,” cautiously. Varallo wondered if he’d now get a polite brush-off for possessing a funny foreign name, but Anderson
only said, “I’m retired—had an automobile agency. What line you in, Mr. Varallo?”

The mister still sounded queer. Varallo told him, added (in sudden and unusual self-consciousness) that he’d ranked captain up to two months ago and was starting all over. Anderson said Oh
again and Tough luck, and seemed to warm up a little to so respectable a citizen as a man on the force. Of course this was that sort of neighborhood. “You a gardener?” he asked.

“I was just thinking it all looks like a lot of work. I don’t know one damn thing about it.”

“Now that’s a damn shame,” said Anderson glumly. In fact, he looked ready to cry. “All Fred’s roses.” He looked over the wall sadly. “That Duquesa de
Peñaranda, way he’d nursed her along—and President Hoover too. It’s a damn shame. . . . Fred Woolsey, that owned this place. Had his last heart attack six months back, and
Mrs. Woolsey decided to sell and go live with her married daughter in San Luis Obispo, see. Built this place, Fred did, and planted everything here himself. A rose man, he was, like me. Matter of
fact, it was Fred got me interested. Used to take prizes with his hybrid teas, he did. Two years running, with Charlotte Armstrong and Hector Deane.”

It was Varallo’s turn to say Oh. “I couldn’t let ’em go,” said Anderson apologetically. “Mrs. Woolsey arranged for a gardener, to keep the place in shape
until it was sold, but—well—roses need more attention than once a week. I been coming over, mulching ’em here and there, like that. Fred was sure looking forward to seeing that
Duquesa de Peñaranda. He just put her in last January and she hasn’t produced yet. Something to see when she does.” He pointed. “That’s her there.” It was just
another rose tree to Varallo; it hadn’t a bloom on it. “Shame he never got to see it.”

Varallo agreed. “I never knew they had names. Names like that. What’s that one?”

Anderson looked at the climbing bush on the wall and said, “Doubloons, that is. Pretty color, that deep yellow. Fred fussed around that Duquesa to beat all, it does seem a damn shame. . .
.”

Varallo agreed it was a shame he’d never got to see it bloom. He really felt it was a shame. But then Vic Varallo was a very good cop, the one cop in about five hundred who had the flair
for the job; and that meant, to start with, empathy for people. “What does it look like?” he asked casually.

“Oh, she’s a beauty. A kind of long, tight bloom—neat and close, you know—and an awful clear light red, almost what they call a Chinese red. A little like Floradora, only
even prettier. It’s funny she hasn’t,” said Anderson. “She ought to have, by November. In this climate. Ought to be producing now.”

“Is that so?” said Varallo. And presently said it had been nice to meet him and he hoped they’d find each other good neighbors, and gone in.

But that grass had to be cut; and of course they couldn’t afford a gardener. So he bought a lawn mower—the old-fashioned kind—and inexpertly mowed the lawn. That was on Tuesday
evening. There was a smaller front lawn to mow, too; and more rose trees and climbing bushes out there. As he worked back and forth, he found himself looking at the rose tree with the improbable
name and wishing it would produce just one bloom. Maybe Fred Woolsey could see it from somewhere, and be pleased.

The day after that he saw Anderson in his yard in late afternoon, and asked him what to do to rose trees to make them bloom. Anderson talked for a long while, and it wasn’t until Laura
called him for the second time to dinner that Varallo realized it was dark.

The day after that he bought some rose food at a nursery.

“I’ve just realized,” said Laura that night, sounding worried. “All this yard to keep up. We can’t, not properly, Vic. Neither of us knowing
anything—”

“Oh, well, mowing the lawn ’ll be good exercise for me,” said Varallo vaguely.

“You haven’t the time—”

And as time went on, he began to agree with that.

He started out just willing the Duquesa de Peñaranda to produce a rose. Just one. For poor dead Fred Woolsey, who had labored over her. He fed the duchess the best brand of rose food, and
carefully gave her what Anderson said was the right amount of water. She continued to stand there greenly, putting out leaves and nothing else. Varallo got mad at her. Damn it, she’d be made
to produce! Every day, the week after that, he’d come home off duty, kiss Laura and at once go out to look at the duchess. She didn’t produce. Anderson said she should be producing
now.

He also said, worriedly, that that Neige Parfum wasn’t doing so well. Only one bud. He pointed it out. Varallo had never seen a rose that color. It was real silver—gray-white,
luminous, a close-curled round blossom. There were holes in the green leaves around it. “That Goddamned aphis,” said Anderson. “You ought to spray. And even that— Your best
bet is Aerosect.”

Varallo got some Aerosect.

On his next day off, he went to the library, got a card and brought home five books about rose growing.

“Darling!” said Laura.

“Go on and laugh,” said Varallo. “By God, I’ll get that damned Spanish duchess to bloom for me or know the reason why!”

Laura rocked with laughter. “What would the boys down at headquarters say?”

“I couldn’t,” said Varallo, “care less. Silènzio, per favore.” And he opened The Rose-Grower’s Guide.

On the last day of January, the Duquesa de Peñaranda presented him with one perfect bud, which opened to one exquisite blossom—close-furled, long, of a peculiarly beautiful clear
deep coral. He called Laura out to admire it, and that was the first time—looking resignedly and amusedly at Vic Varallo’s six-one of hard compact muscle and very masculine good
looks—that Laura brought out that remark about having thought she’d married a big tough cop. . . . But she duly admired the duchess, and (as an afterthought) added that she supposed a
hobby was good for a man.

Especially—she had remarked several months later, after Varallo was really captured—for a good-looking married man.

“You have to look ahead, after all,” she said, nodding her bright brown head at him, pseudo-serious. “I can just see myself, you know, looking perfectly awful, ready to go to
the hospital for the first one— Well, but you do look awful at the last, you can’t deny it—and you—bad policy to flatter husbands, but the uniform and all—
But I wouldn’t have, as they say, a moment’s anxiety. Where other women were worrying about Harry or Jim taking up with some floozy, my husband, he’d only be out fooling around
with his Spanish duchess.”

“Impertinènza,” said Varallo. “You miscalling me—”

“I wouldn’t dare. I only said—”

“So it’s funny. Sure, so it is. It’s—damn it, I think,” said Varallo, “it’s because I’m a cop. They defy you. Challenge you, do I want to
say? In a kind of way. And then when they do come out, it’s like a miracle—and all so different, you know. . . . And that Goddamned aphis— Remind me to get some more
Aerosect.”

In February he had planted his first tree—a Floradora, under Mr. Anderson’s instructions. He had Neige Parfum blooming fairly well by then. A week later, the Duquesa put out three
new buds; and Varallo had never looked back after that.

Then, in August, the transmission went out on Laura’s Ford. Over two hundred bucks, that was. And the garbage disposal already installed in the kitchen when they bought the house needed
repairs to the tune of twenty-three dollars more. Both of which came along just after the July income-tax installment.

And prices—

“We’ll manage,” said Laura. “Somehow. Next year—”

Yes. They were stretching a point for him, considering his background. They were letting him take the sergeants’ exam next time it came up. And of course he’d already passed
it—and the lieutenants’ exam—once; he hadn’t any doubt of doing so again. But passing it didn’t mean automatic promotion—that would come, maybe, when there was a
vacancy. Of course, Lieutenant of Detectives King was due for retirement next year, and very probably Sergeant Charles O’Connor would get his step to lieutenant then and leave a hole. A hole
to be filled by one of, say, fifteen or twenty eligible men. If he made the highest score—

He thought he could. He had, before. And that would mean a fatter paycheck, and also on the way up again to superior rank. But that was at least eight months off. Now if he could qualify as a
sharpshooter, that would mean another few bucks a month too—

“I’ve had an idea,” Laura said tentatively that night over dinner. “Just an idea. Don’t fly off the handle, Vic. But couldn’t we rent the room and bath off
the garage?”

“And why should I fly off the handle?” asked Varallo.

“You do. Stiffnecked pride,” said Laura.

“Don’t be silly, it’s an inspiration. A damned inspiration. What could we ask?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea. Let’s look at the ads.”

They looked at the ads, in the Independent and the News-Press. It appeared, by the ads, that a furnished room rented for about forty a month on the average.
“Furnished?” said Varallo. Laura said firmly, Good plain furniture—secondhand—leave it to her. “We can ask more. Fifty. A private bath, a private entrance. I’ll
even get a hot plate. Maybe even fifty-five. You won’t mind, Vic?”

“There are things I mind,” said Varallo, “and being over my head in debt is one of them. But we want someone—”

“Oh, of course, quiet and respectable. We will, I’ll get busy on it,” said Laura energetically. She did. When she showed it to him, a week later, Varallo thought it looked the
hell of a lot homier and more comfortable than his Contera Hotel room where he’d lived the last five years or so. But Laura had a knack for making you comfortable.

There was a neat studio couch ($12 secondhand) with a neat brown corduroy cover. A bed. . .