The Bigger They Come

Chapter 10

It was getting daylight. Somewhere over behind the wall of gray, toneless buildings was a streak of dawn-colored sky. Colorless gray light filtered into the street. Buildings seemed shadowy and unreal, but bulked high against the sky.

We walked three blocks before we found a cruising cab. While Bertha Cool was getting in, I said to the cab driver, ‘Get us to the nearest place where we can find a telephone directory.’

He tried to run us to the Union Depot, but Bertha Cool spotted an all night restaurant and said to me, ‘Slide back that glass, Donald, dear, and let me talk to that son of a bitch.’

I slid back the glass.

‘Where the hell do you think you’re going?’ she asked the driver. ‘Turn around and go back to that restaurant. When I say the nearest phone, I mean the nearest.’

The driver mumbled something about having to watch for traffic and swung the car. Bertha said to me, ‘Look under the classified lists, Donald. Find a Holoman who’s a doctor. And remember this cab is costing me waiting tune — don’t take all day.’

‘I don’t think he’s a full-fledged doctor yet. He won’t have an office. I’ll have to call the hospitals. I’ll need some dimes.’

She sighed, dug four dimes out of her purse and said, ‘For God’s sake, Donald, get some action. I can’t charge this as an expense. This is a gamble. I’m using my money.’

I took the coins, went in and started calling hospitals. The second one was the Shelly Foundation Hospital. The girl said they had an Archie Holoman serving as an interne.

I thanked her, hung up and told the scowling taxi driver to take us to the Shelley Foundation Hospital and climbed back in beside Bertha Cool.

It was a short run, and the cab driver made it fast. Mrs. Cool said, ‘He probably isn’t on duty now, Donald. Get his home address — unless he happens to be living at the hospital. I’ll wait here.’

I ran up the marble stairs and into the hospital. It was rapidly growing lighter. The freshness of dawn in the air made the interior of the hospital seem steeped with the exudations of sickness and death. A tired-eyed nurse, sitting behind a desk, looked up at me. Daylight streaming through an easterly window, mingled with the lamp light on her face, made it gray and pasty.

‘A Dr. Archie Holoman has a position here as interne?’ I asked.

‘Yes.’

‘I want very much to see him, please.’

‘He’s on duty. Just a moment, I think I can get him on the telephone. What is your name, please?’

‘Lam,’ I said. ‘Donald Lam.’

‘Does he know you?’

‘Yes.’

The nurse went over and spoke to the switchboard operator. Then after a minute or two motioned to a phone booth, and said, ‘You can talk with him in there if you wish, Mr. Lam, or here at the desk.’

I choose the booth. I knew I had to be careful with my approach. I didn’t want him to think I was bluffing. I figured it would be best to let him know I was wise to the play all the way through.

‘Donald Lam, Doctor. I wanted to talk to you about exactly what happened when those papers were served on Mr. Birks this afternoon. And I wanted to check your diagnosis on a broken-nose case. I wonder if you’d mind coming down for a moment. Mrs. Cool is here in the cab.’

‘What’s the name?’ he asked.

‘Lam. Donald Lam. You know, the investigator.’

‘I’m afraid I don’t place you, Mr. Lam.’

I said patiently, ‘You remember when you were patching up Bleatie’s broken nose out at Sandra’s apartment?’

‘I’m quite certain you’re mistaken,’ he said. ‘You’ve confused me with someone else. I’m not practising as yet.’

So that was it. He was afraid to have the hospital know he’d been handling any medical work.

‘Pardon me,’ I said. ‘I guess I made a mistake there. However, Doctor, I’d like to talk with you for a moment. Is it possible for you to come down? We couldn’t talk here,’ I added hastily, as he hesitated. ‘Mrs. Cool’s outside in the taxicab. We could talk out there.’

‘I’ll come down,’ he said, ‘to find out what the devil this is all about.’

I thanked him, hung up the receiver, and walked out to stand in the lobby, looking through the plate glass windows into the freshness of early morning. After a few minutes, I heard the elevator descend and turned to greet Dr. Holoman. It wasn’t he. A young man stepped from the elevator, walked across to the nurse’s desk. I turned back to look out of the window. After a moment, I heard the sound of low-voiced conversation. The young man walked across to stand just behind me.

I turned.

‘You wanted to see me?’ he asked.

‘No, I’m waiting for Dr. Holoman.’

‘But I’m Dr. Holoman.’

I said, ‘I guess you’re right, Doctor, there’s been a mistake. I want Dr. Archie Holoman.’

‘But I am Dr. Archie Holoman.’

I looked him over. He was somewhere in the late twenties, or perhaps had just turned thirty. He was an earnest, sincere-looking chap, with a pallid face, high cheekbones, smoldering black eyes, and dark, wavy hair. I said, ‘Would you mind stepping out to the taxicab with me? I’d like to have you explain to Mrs. Cool that you’re not the Dr. Holoman she’s looking for.’

I could see he was suspicious. He glanced over at the nurse, then out to where the taxicab was standing at the curb. Then he looked me over, evidently figured he could handle me if he had to, said curtly, ‘Very well,’ and accompanied me out to the door of the taxicab. I said, ‘Mrs. Cool, this is Dr. Holoman, Dr. Archie Holoman.’

She looked him over and said, ‘The hell it is!’

After a moment, he said lamely, ‘I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs. Cool. Was there something I could do?’

‘Not a damn thing,’ she said. ‘Hop in, Donald.’

‘Thank you very much, Doctor,’ I told him.

He looked at me then with the growing conviction that we were both crazy. I hopped into the car. Mrs. Cool gave the driver Sandra’s address, and the cab jerked into motion, leaving Dr. Holoman standing there at the curb looking at us with the expression of a man who has reached for a purse on April First, only to find it jerked out from under his fingers.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘the plot thickens.’

‘Thickens, hell,’ she said. ‘It’s like gravy that’s had too much flour dumped in it. It’s full of lumps. Are you sure that was Dr. Holoman?’

‘He said he was, and the hospital said he was.’

She fumbled around in her purse, and said, ‘Donald, I’m out of cigarettes.’

I gave her one out of my fast-diminishing store, and took one myself.

We shared the same match. She said, ‘Damned clever, Donald, my boy, damned clever. They needed an authentic background. They couldn’t get a real doctor to do the dirty work, so they stole an interne’s identity and background. If we’d ever wanted to check back on Dr. Holoman, we’d have found his record, date, graduation, present location, and all of that. There wasn’t one chance in fifty we’d have gone to Dr. Holoman at the hospital.’

‘That,’ I said, ‘brings up the question: Who was the chap masquerading as Dr. Holoman?’

‘Her boy friend, probably,’ she said. ‘Where there’s so much smoke, there’s apt to be some fire.’

We rode for a while in silence. She turned to me, and said, ‘Now listen, Donald. Don’t be a damn fool about this.’

‘Meaning what?’ I asked.

‘You’re just about half in love with that Hunter woman.’

‘Make it two-thirds,’ I said, ‘if you’re going in for fractions.’

‘All right. Call it two-thirds. Hell, I don’t care. Call it a hundred per cent. She’s in a jam. You’re going to try and save her. Now don’t get excited. Keep your shirt on, and look at the facts. She lied to you about the shooting.’

I said, ‘I’m not certain that she did.’

‘No,’ Mrs. Cool observed dryly, ‘you wouldn’t be.’

There was another interval of silence.

‘You had some plan?’ I asked.

‘Yes.’

‘What is it?’

She said, ‘We’ll pin the killing on Bleatie.’

‘Not so hot,’ I objected. ‘We’ve just established that there isn’t any Bleatie.’

‘That makes it swell,’ she said. ‘It gives the police a hard nut to crack. The way the thing stands now, there were two persons — Bleatie and Morgan Birks. We are the only outsiders who know Morgan Birks and Bleatie were the same people. Morgan Birks is dead. Therefore Bleatie is dead too. No one knows Bleatie is dead. They can’t ever prove it because they can’t ever find his body. We pin everything on Bleatie — if she pays us enough.

‘Now, you walk in there and spill what you know, and everyone says, “That’s right. Clever of the boy, but we were right on the verge of reasoning it out ourselves. Another half hour and we’d have had it.’ But we go in there and start asking where Bleatie is, and pretty quick some damn flatfoot gets the idea Bleatie’s guilty of murder. Play it that way and you’ve got something.’

‘But how could any flatfoot figure Bleatie’d killed anyone when Alma Hunter admits she raised the gun and pulled the trigger?’

‘That’s where our ingenuity comes in,’ she said. ‘If Sandra wants us to clear Alma Hunter of the charge, and I think she does, and pays enough for it, and I hope she will, we drag Bleatie into it by the ears. Alma Hunter was hysterical. She was excited. She doesn’t know what happened. She heard a shot, and she thought it came from the gun she was holding in her hand. Really it didn’t. It was fired by Bleatie, who was in the room.’

‘What was he doing in her room?’ I asked.

‘Looking at her etchings.’

‘And Alma didn’t know he was there?’

‘No.’

‘And Alma didn’t shoot at all?’

‘No, of course not.’

‘But suppose it’s her gun that’s on the floor?’

‘No, it wasn’t her gun. She screamed, dropped her gun and ran. Bleatie picked up her gun, left the gun with which the killing had been done, and walked out into the night.’

‘That,’ I said, ‘is a pretty tall order.’

‘We can make it sound plausible.’

‘I don’t think I like your way,’ I said. ‘I think I like mine. What’s more, the police won’t like yours.’

‘The police have hands, ears, eyes, legs, noses, and mouths just the same as we do. They can gather the facts and draw conclusions just the same as we can. It isn’t up to us to prove that girl innocent. It’s up to the police to show that she’s guilty. If we can account for the circumstances by some other explanation which doesn’t leave any loose threads dangling, that’s all we need to offer to a jury. That’s the law.’

‘Well,’ I said, ‘that’s not an exact statement of the law, but it’s close enough.’

‘Now then,’ she demanded, ‘Do you want to get Alma Hunter out of this or not?’

‘Yes.’

‘All right then. Keep your mouth shut, and let Auntie Bertha do the talking.’

The cab pulled up in front of Sandra’s apartment house. A police guard was stationed in the lobby. Apparently the few early morning stragglers had no inkling of what had happened. There was no outward indication of a homicide.

Bertha Cool paid off the cab and barged up the apartment house. The officer said, ‘Just a moment. Do you live here?’

‘No.’

‘Where are you going?’

‘To call on Sandra Birks.’

‘What’s your name?’

‘Bertha Cool, head of the Cool Detective Agency. This is one of my operatives.’

‘What do you want?’

‘To see Sandra Birks.’

‘What do you want to see her about?’

‘I don’t know. She wants to see me. What’s the matter? Is she under arrest?’

‘No, not under arrest.’

‘It’s her apartment, isn’t it?’

‘Oh, go on up,’ he said.

‘Thanks. I intend to,’ Mrs. Cool announced.

I tried to be polite about the door, but she beat me to it, grabbed the knob and flung the heavy door back as though it had been made of cardboard. She strode on in, and I came along in her wake. We took the elevator to the fourth floor. Sandra Birks flung open the door as I tapped gently on the panels.

‘It took you long enough to get here.’

Bertha Cool said, ‘We didn’t want to run into the police.’

‘There’s a guard downstairs.’

‘I know.’

‘Did he try to stop you?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you get by?’

‘Walked by.’

‘You told him you were a detective?’

‘Yes.’

‘Would he let anyone in who wasn’t a detective?’

‘How the hell do I know, dearie? He’s a cop. You can’t tell what a cop will do.’

Sandra bit her lip and frowned. ‘I’m expecting a young man — a friend of ours — I wonder if they’ll take him into custody—’

‘Better call him up and head him off,’ I said.

‘I think they have my line tapped. I think they’re leaving me here as bait for a trap.’

‘What sort of a trap?’

‘I don’t know.’

Bertha Cool said, ‘Let’s take a look in the bedroom, then we’ll j talk.’

Sandra Birks opened the bedroom door. A chalked outline on the carpet showed where the body had lain. A section had been sawed from the door, a small square piece cut out of the wood.

‘What’s that?’ Bertha Cool wanted to know. ‘Where the bullet was embedded?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are they sure the bullet came from that gun?’

‘That’s what they’re going to find out.’

Bertha Cool said, ‘Where did she get the gun?’

‘That’s what I can’t understand. I’m absolutely certain she didn’t have one yesterday morning.’

Bertha Cool looked at me. Her eyes were steady, thoughtful, and filled with rebuke.

‘Where’s your brother?’ she asked.

Sandra Birks shifted her eyes. ‘I’m sure I don’t know.’

‘Where was he when the shooting occurred?’

‘In his room, I guess. He was supposed to be there.’

‘Where is he now?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Had his bed been slept in?’

‘No, he evidently hadn’t retired.’

‘Rather late for him to be up, wasn’t it?’ Mrs. Cool asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Sandra said, with a flare of temper. ‘I was out myself. Of course, if I’d known my husband was going to be shot, I might have planned the evening differently. But no one told me; therefore, I didn’t sit by my brother’s bedside to see what time he retired or what his plans were.’

‘Anything else?’ Mrs. Cool asked.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Is there anything else you want to say?’

‘Why?’

‘Because,’ Bertha Cool said calmly, ‘it’s costing you money to talk to me. If you want to spend your money trying to stand between your brother and the consequences of his act, it’s all right with me. I’ll listen as long as you want to talk, dearie.’

Sandra had been talking with that swift, vehement articulation which a woman of her type uses when she’s putting on a counter offensive, trying to cover something up. Now her eyes showed puzzled surprise. ‘What do you mean, standing between him and the consequences of his act?’

Bertha Cool said, ‘You know what I mean, dearie. Your brother murdered your husband,’ and then, as Sandra Birks started to say something, she turned to me and said, ‘Come on, Donald, let’s take a look through the other rooms. I suppose the police have messed things up like hell, but we’ll look around anyway.’

She started walking before she was finished talking. Her huge figure moved slowly and majestically through the door, and I followed along behind.

Sandra Birks was standing in the middle of the floor, her eyes clouded with thought.

‘You talked with Bleatie in the other bedroom, Donald?’ Bertha Cool asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Show me where it is.’

I detoured around her and took the lead. Sandra Birks remained in the bedroom with the twin beds. When I had opened the door to Bleatie’s room, Bertha Cool said, ‘Not that I give a good God damn about what’s in here, Donald, my love, I’m just giving her time to realize the possibilities of the situation.’

‘You think she wants to protect Alma Hunter?’ I asked.

‘Of course, otherwise why did she want to have us on the job?’

‘Perhaps,’ I said, ‘she’s already said too much to the police. They must have asked about her brother.’

‘Well, let’s hope it’s nothing she can’t lie out of afterwards,’ Bertha Cool said. ‘She doesn’t impress me as being a particularly wide-open type. She’s secretive and furtive as hell. You ask her what the weather is, and she’ll find some way of avoiding the subject very tactfully, stopping just short of telling you whether it’s raining or sunny, hot or cold — so this is Bleatie’s room. Well, let’s take a look around.’

Bertha Cool started opening bureau drawers, making a quick mental inventory of the contents, and closing them again. Suddenly she swooped down on the interior of a drawer, and pulled out something bulky. ‘Now then,’ she said, ‘what the hell is this?’

‘Looks like a cloth life preserver,’ I said.

‘Straps on the back,’ she mused. ‘I have it, Donald. There was something wrong about Bleatie’s figure. Remember that watermelon stomach he had — not watermelon exactly, sort of a cantaloupe stomach?

‘Well, Morgan Birks didn’t. Morgan Birks was slender. He had a dimple where his stomach should have been. This was the gadget Morgan Birks put on when he wanted to become Bleatie.’

I looked it over. That’s what it was, all right.

Bertha Cool calmly rolled it up and said, ‘See if you can find me a newspaper somewhere, Donald, my love. We’ll just take this God damn thing away with us. It doesn’t need to figure in the case at all.’

There was no newspaper there in the room. I walked out into the living room and met Sandra Birks coming from the other bedroom. ‘Where’s Mrs. Cool?’ she asked.

I indicated the bedroom, and Sandra walked on past me. There was a newspaper on the table, lying on top of the pile of magazines. I picked it up, spread it out so it was flat on the table and then waited for a couple of minutes before I walked back to the bedroom and said, ‘I’ll fix it.’

Bertha Cool and Sandra were facing each other. I heard Mrs. Cool say, ‘Don’t tell me anything, dearie, until you’ve had a chance to think it all out. You’re all nervous and upset. Keep your trap closed until you’ve thought it out carefully, and then we’ll talk about dough.’

‘I’ve thought it out,’ Sandra said.

Mrs. Cool handed me the cloth padding, and said, ‘Wrap it up, Donald. Tie it good and tight, and then bring it back.’

I took plenty of time wrapping the bundle. I made a good job of it. I found some string in a drawer in the kitchenette and put in lots of knots. I’d just finished tying it when imperative knuckles banged on the door and a voice said, ‘Open up.’

I left the package on the table, put my hat over it, and called to Sandra Birks, ‘There’s someone at the door.’

She walked from Bleatie’s room to the door of the apartment. The man on the outside was pounding on the panels again before she had the door open.

Two plain-clothes men pushed into the room. One said, ‘Okay, sister, the jig’s up.’

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘The gun that killed Morgan Birks was the gun that killed Johnny Meyer, and Johnny Meyer, just in case you don’t know it, was the Kansas City detective who had been working on the organized rackets. He was to go before the grand jury and blow the lid off. He never got there. He was last seen alive with a good-looking frail. He was found the next morning with three slugs in his chest. The K. C. police broadcast photomicrographs of the bullets, and warned all police officers to be on the lookout for the gun.

‘Now then, sister, suppose you start talking.’

Sandra Birks stood very straight, very white, and very frightened.

Bertha Cool came out from Bleatie’s bedroom. The second plain-clothes man said to Sandra, ‘Who are these people?’

‘We’re detectives,’ Bertha Cool said.

‘You’re what?’

‘Detectives.’

The man laughed.

Bertha Cool said, ‘Private detectives, investigating this thing at Mrs. Birks’ request.’

‘Get out,’ the officer ordered.

Bertha Cool settled herself complacently in a chair. ‘Throw me out,’ she invited.

I glanced significantly at my hat and the newspaper package on the table. ‘I’ll leave,’ I said.

Bertha Cool caught my eye as I picked up my hat and the newspaper-wrapped package.

‘I’m within my rights,’ she said. ‘If you want to arrest Mrs. Birks, go ahead. If you want to talk with her, go ahead. But I’m here, and I’m going to stay here.’

‘You just think you’re going to stay here,’ the officer roared, pushing toward her belligerently.

Sandra Birks silently held the door open for me. As the two officers converged on Bertha Cool, I slipped out into the corridor. I didn’t dare wait for the elevator. I sprinted for the stairs, and went down them two at a time. I slowed down halfway down the last flight, walked casually across the lobby as though I had a bundle of laundry with me, and gained the sidewalk. The police car was parked in front of the place.

An attendant was commencing to move automobiles out of the apartment house garage and park them at the curb. I picked a prosperous-looking machine on the theory that the owner would be sleeping late, climbed in and sat down, leaving the package on the seat beside me.

Bertha Cool came marching majestically out of the apartment house, looked up and down the street, and then started toward the corner. She didn’t see me in the automobile as she walked past. I let her go. After she’d walked another fifty feet I could pick her up in the rear-view mirror of the automobile. Apparently she was puzzled by my complete disappearance. She stopped twice before she got to the corner, looking around inquiringly. At the corner, she turned left. I couldn’t tell whether she had headed for the better-traveled streets, looking for a taxicab, or whether she was still looking for me. I didn’t dare to turn around. I kept slouched in the seat, glancing in the rear-view mirror occasionally, but keeping my attention focused on the entrance of the apartment house.

After a while the two plain-clothes officers came out. Sandra Birks wasn’t with them. They stood for a moment talking. Then they got in the car and drove away.

I picked up my newspaper package, slid out of the automobile, and walked rapidly toward the apartment house. A big refuse can had been dragged out by the janitor and was placed near the curb. I opened the lid and dropped my package into the can, replaced the lid, and went directly to Sandra Birks’ apartment. She didn’t open the door until I’d knocked twice. She hadn’t been crying, but her eyes were dark and her cheeks seemed to be all caved in. Her mouth looked drawn and hard. She said, ‘You!’

I slipped in through the door, closed it behind me and snapped the bolt.

‘The package,’ she asked. ‘How about it? Did you get rid of it?’

I nodded.

She said, ‘You shouldn’t have come back here.’

‘I had to talk with you,’ I said.

She put her hand on my shoulder. ‘Oh, I’m so frightened,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what it means. Do you suppose that Morgan — that Alma—’

I slipped my arm around her waist and said, ‘Take it easy, Sandra.’

That arm seemed to be the signal she was waiting for. She insinuated her body up close to mine. Her eyes looked into mine. ‘Donald,’ she said, ‘you must help me.’

And then she kissed me.

She may have had other things on her mind. Probably there was plenty to worry her, but it didn’t interfere with that kiss. There was nothing sisterly or platonic about it.

After a moment she held her head back so she could look into my eyes. ‘Donald,’ she said, ‘I’m depending on you.’ Then before I had a chance to say anything, she said, ‘Oh, Donald, you’re such a dear. It’s such a comfort to me, knowing that I have you to depend on.’

‘Hadn’t we,’ I suggested, ‘better get my mind on our work?’

‘Oh, Donald, you will help me, won’t you?’

‘What do you suppose I came back for?’ I asked.

She was smoothing my hair back with the tips of her fingers. ‘I feel so much better already,’ she said. ‘I feel that I can trust you, Donald. I’ve felt that way from the first. I’d do anything for you, Donald. There’s something about you that—’

‘I want some money,’ I said.

She stopped. ‘You want what?’

‘Money.’

‘What do you mean money?’

‘Currency,’ I said. ‘Lots of it.’

‘Why Donald, I gave Mrs. Cool a retainer.’

‘Unfortunately,’ I said, ‘Mrs. Cool hasn’t joined any of the Share-the-Wealth movements— At any rate, not as we go to press.’

‘But you’re working for her, aren’t you?’

‘I thought you wanted me to work for you,’ I said. ‘Perhaps I misunderstood you.’

‘But, Donald, she’s working for me, and you’re working for her.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Have it your own way.’

She slowly pushed herself back so that the warmth of her body was no longer perceptible through my clothes. ‘Donald,’ she said, ‘I don’t understand you.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘I thought perhaps you would. It’s my mistake. I’ll go hunt up Bertha Cool.’

‘How much money would you want?’ she asked.

‘Lots of it.’

‘How much?’

‘When you hear how much,’ I said, ‘it’s going to knock the props out from under you.’

‘But why do you want it?’

‘For expenses.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘I’m going to take the rap,’ I said.

‘Donald, tell me what you mean.’

I said, ‘Bertha Cool’s got funny ideas. She thinks she can use Bleatie as a red herring and blame this on him simply because Bleatie can’t be found. She might have done just that if it had been a simple bedroom killing. The way the cards stack up now, it can’t be done. A Kansas City police officer was killed. You know how cops feel about people who shoot police officers. They don’t like it.’

‘What do you mean, you’re going to take the rap, Donald?’ she asked, her eyes shrewd and calculating as she searched my face.

‘I mean I’m going the whole hog,’ I said. ‘I’m going to give you both an out. I’m going to say I shot him, but I’ve got to do it in my way.’

‘But, Donald, they’ll hang you,’ she said.

‘They won’t hang me.’

‘But, Donald, you can’t. You wouldn’t be willing to. You couldn’t be—’

‘We can either waste time arguing about it,’ I said, ‘or we can do something about it. Those cops didn’t take you into custody because they decided they didn’t have enough on you; and a smart lawyer could get you loose. So they figured they’d give you plenty of rope and see just how you’d go about hanging yourself. They also wanted to see what other fish would get drawn into the net. As soon as they get back and report to police headquarters they’ll have this apartment sewed up so tight not even a cockroach could get out without being picked up and shadowed and classified. Do you want to wait for that?’

‘Of course I don’t.’

‘I don’t either. I want to get out before that happens. That means just about now.’

I started for the door. ‘How much do you want, Donald?’

‘Three thousand dollars.’

‘Three what?’ she cried.

‘Thousand,’ I said. ‘Three grand. I want it now.’

‘Donald, you talk as though you were crazy.’

‘You act as though you were,’ I said. ‘This is your only out. I’m giving it to you. Do you want it, or don’t you?’

‘How do I know I can trust you?’ she asked.

I wiped lipstick off my lips and said, ‘You don’t know.’

‘I’ve been betrayed lots of times by men whom I’ve trusted.’

‘How much did Morgan leave in those safety deposit boxes?’ I asked.

‘He didn’t have any.’

‘They were in your name. It won’t be long until the police sew those up too.’

She laughed then, and said, ‘Do I look as though I was born yesterday?’

‘I suppose,’ I observed, ‘you went out and stripped the boxes, and thought you were being smart. By the time the prosecuting attorney gets finished with that, it’ll make a swell motive for murder.’

I could see startled realization in her eyes.

‘And if you happen to have that money on you,’ I said, ‘you’re just crazy, because every move you make from now on is going to be shadowed. Sooner or later the police are going to take you down to jail and a great big broad-hipped matron is going to take all your nice clothes off and search your pretty little body. While that’s going on, detectives will be searching the apartment. What do you think of that?’

‘Donald, they wouldn’t!’

‘They’re going to.’

She said, ‘It’s in a money belt on me.’

‘How much?’ I asked.

‘Lots.’

I said, ‘You don’t dare to ditch it all, Sandra. You’d better leave some money, a hundred or two, in the money belt so they won’t realize you’ve slipped one over on them. As far as the rest is concerned, you can do either one of two things. You can either trust it to me, knowing that I may go south with it; or you can split it up in a lot of letters, address those letters to yourself at general delivery, and drop them in the mail chute. You’d better do something quick.’

It took her about five seconds to make up her mind. During those five seconds she stood staring at me, her head slightly on one side. I stood still. She looked at me and I met her look. Then she unsnapped buttons at the side of her skirt, slipped it down and fumbled with buckles — it wasn’t exactly a money belt. It was a money corset. She handed it to me. I couldn’t get it around me. I loosened my belt, shoved it down along my back, and pinched my belt tight.

‘God knows why I’m doing this,’ she said. ‘I’m putting myself absolutely in your power. I’m stripping myself of everything.’

I said, ‘Just one thing— Give Alma a square deal and I’ll give you a square deal. I’m doing this for her.’

‘Not for me?’ she asked, pushing out her lips in a little pout.

‘No,’ I said. ‘For Alma.’

‘Oh, Donald, I thought it was because you―’

‘Well, think again,’ I said, and stepped out into the corridor, pulling the door shut behind me.

I’d got as far as the head of the stairs when she opened the door and screamed, ‘Donald, come back here!’

I went down the stairs in a rush. I heard her scream and run after me. I must have beat her to the lobby by a matter of seconds. I started through the door. A car was parked in front of the place with two men seated in it. They weren’t the two plain-clothes men who had been there earlier. The way in which they looked up as I came out showed what they were.

I pretended not to see them, crossed to an automobile, got in, and stepped on the starter, leaning forward as I did so, so that my head was lowered almost below the line of the windows.

She came dashing out to the street, looking up and down, her face showing puzzled bewilderment as she saw I was nowhere in sight. She started to run toward the corner. The officers exchanged glances. One of them climbed leisurely from the car. ‘Looking for something?’ he asked.

She turned to look at him — and knew.

‘I thought I heard someone yell fire,’ she said. ‘—Is there a fire?’

The officer said, ‘You’re dreaming, sister.’

To my surprise the ignition wasn’t locked. The motor of the car I was in throbbed to life.

I straightened up. She caught sight of me then, and stood there with the eyes of the officer on her, powerless to do anything.

I’ll hand it to her. She played the one card that would have got her by. Her lips quivered, and she said, ‘I’m awfully n-n-nervous this morning. My husband was m-m-murdered.’

I saw tension go out of the officer’s frame. ‘That,’ he said sympathetically, ‘is too bad. May I see you up to your apartment?’

I drove away.