Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 67, No. 3. Whole No. 388, March 1976

THE MAN IN 13-B by S. L. Burns[6]

This is the 440th “first story” to be published by Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine... Jamie was the youngest of the elevator “boys,” but not too young to want a piece of the action...

The author, S. L. Burns, has been a writer for more than ten years — on the staff of the “New York Herald Tribune,” then on “Scholastic Magazine,” and currently as a freelance. But until now all S. L. Burns’s published writing has been nonfiction. “The Man in 13-B” is the author’s first plunge into fiction.

If S. L. Burns has a hobby, “it is the time-consuming one of dog-walking.” The author has “often thought that being a dog-walker is a perfect disguise for snoopers, legal and illegal. It is a good excuse for loitering at all hours and in strange places.” Would EQMM be interested “in a story about a rather fussy busybody attached to a dog — one of those people who notice everything, who spend their idle moments at the other end of the leash speculating about other people’s business?” We would indeed be interested in a dog-walker detective...

It was strange about the man in 13-B. Jamie never saw him in the elevator. Neither did any of the other boys who worked in the building. “Boys.” That’s what they called each other, but Jamie thought he was the youngest of them all. He wondered if he, too, would still be wearing a cap and white gloves at the age of 65.

The “boys” used to meet at the coffee machine in the basement. Sometimes when Jamie arrived, one of the day men was still there, changing his clothes and talking about “the one horse” or “the five” — the horse he should have bet, wanted to bet, and would have bet if one of the other boys had not thrown him off it by a chance remark. Jamie found out from the others what happened in the building while he was off duty.

No one else ever saw the man in 13-B on the elevator, either. A grocery boy in a white jacket delivered cartons of food to 13-B. The cartons, Jamie saw, were stacked with TV dinners. A man from the dry cleaner delivered 13-B’s suits, which hung over the delivery man’s shoulder from a crooked finger. Anyone could see through the clear plastic covers that the suits were not very expensive. “I’d never live that way if I had the money for Park Avenue,” said Jamie to the day man.

“Neither would I,” said the day man. Both fell into a dreamy silence.

If I had the money, thought Jamie. Would he ever be able to get out of this uniform? He had taken the four-to-midnight shift originally because he wanted to go to night school. He had signed up for an accounting course. He was beginning to understand the flow of money now. But he felt like a hunter in the forest without a gun. As an accountant, he could track his quarry as it moved from place to place, but he could not bring it down. He was no closer to capturing some money for himself.

Jamie reflected on the perversity of money, which stuck to those who didn’t use it or those who didn’t seem to need it or even to enjoy it. For them, money sat around and multiplied with biblical fruitfulness. But for people like Jamie, money just dwindled, grew thin, and expired in moments of stress.

Shortly after four, when Jamie took his station by the door, the tenants began returning. Some came in cabs, with tight faces, their briefcases full of work. Some toiled from the bus or subway stop. Others floated in from cocktails. All seemed preoccupied. Their thoughts were turned inward, and the view there seemed to depress them. Jamie soon learned that this was a bad time to try to start a conversation.

The post-dinner crowd was always more cheerful. Some of them noticed him and joshed or smiled. Usually, though, neither tenants nor visitors spared a glance at the elevator men in uniform. Nevertheless, Jamie knew a great deal about the people who didn’t look at him.

He knew about the woman in 4-B, for instance. She was a juicer. She sat on the back stairs with a bottle between her knees while her husband watched television. Did he really think she was doing the dishes all that time? For a while the boys kept track of how many bottles they took out in the trash from 4-B.

Jamie knew that 7-D was out of a job and worried about it. He received unemployment checks and carried in his own groceries. No tips from him. 6-A’s boy friend had walked out on her. She was wondering how to pay the bills too. She spent many evenings in a nearby bar. Good luck to her. The old man in the penthouse was off his nut. Round-the-clock nurses for him, and a regular visit from the trustee at the bank.

But no one knew anything about the man in 13-B.

Then, late one evening, 13-B called Jamie upstairs. No one else was in the lobby. Jamie was too curious to wait for the other man to return from a trip to the basement. He locked the front door while he took the elevator up.

13-B was standing at his door when Jamie arrived. He was a middle-sized man with a bland white face like the face of a clock with the works concealed behind it. He was in shirt sleeves. “I’d like you to do something for me, if you will,” said 13-B politely.

“Yes, sir,” said Jamie eagerly. His hand went automatically to his hat in a semi-salute.

“Someone may ask about me,” said 13-B. “I’m a man who appreciates his privacy.” He unfolded a wallet and slid out some bills. “If anyone should ask you, I’d like you to say that apartment 13-B is empty.”

“Absolutely,” said Jamie. “13-B is empty. Got it.”

The man nodded, smiled, and softly shut the door. Then Jamie realized he had seen nothing of 13-B’s interior.

Before he started the elevator down, Jamie counted the bills. $50! Now that was a tip! The biggest by far he’d ever received.

Jamie soon heard that the other boys had been tipped too. They all liked 13-B now. They nicknamed him “Mr. Big.”

A few days later two men came to the front door of the building. Jamie was standing under the canopy, enjoying the air. He saw them striding up the sidewalk, unhurried, about a foot apart. They looked as though they were used to working together. It must have been the way they walked without bumping or conversing. Each seemed to know the other’s intent. Cops, thought Jamie.

The two men stopped under the canopy. “Tell us who lives on the 13th floor,” the shorter one said.

Jamie told them about the tenants in 13-A, 13-C, and 13-D.

“A and B are in the front, C and D in the back?” asked the taller one.

“That’s right,” said Jamie.

“What about 13-B?”

“Nobody lives there,” said Jamie. “The apartment’s empty.”

“The City Directory shows the name of a couple,” said the smaller one. “Are they away on vacation?”

“No. Nobody lives there. The couple moved out a few months ago. The apartment hasn’t been rented.”

The two men looked at each other. Then they continued up the street. They seemed satisfied.

But Jamie started to think about it. I lied for 13-B, he thought. I stuck my neck out. What if those cops find out I lied? What would they do to me? Jamie had a mental picture of the subway station where he waited for a train every night after midnight. He saw himself alone. And then he saw two figures approach him, one on either side, handcuffs out, and ready to arrest him.

Jamie quickly turned off that picture. A young woman tenant, pulled by a leaping spaniel, was trying to maneuver her baby carriage through the door. Jamie jumped forward to help her. Then he received a package from a delivery man and shook it when nobody was looking. He whistled for cabs. He ran energetically to the curb to fling open the doors of arriving cars. He was too uneasy to stand still.

Finally, at the end of his shift, Jamie thought, I got fifty bucks for lying. Whatever 13-B is up to, it must be worth a lot more than $50 to keep quiet about it.

The next evening, during the lull after dinner, Jamie locked the front door. He took the elevator to the 13th floor and knocked on the door of 13-B. When the door opened, the man in 13-B raised his eyebrows inquiringly. “Yes?” he said

Jamie told him about the two men who had asked questions. He told 13-B about his answers. Then he took a deep breath. “They smelled like cops to me. Whatever your game is, man,” Jamie said, “I want a cut of it.”

The eyes of 13-B narrowed while he inspected Jamie’s face. Jamie’s heart quaked. He wondered if he had gone too far.

Then the man said, “Okay. I can use you.” He thought for a minute. “See if you can get on the night shift. There is something you can do for me. I’ll give you your instructions after you’ve made the switch.”

Jamie traded off with the night man for a week. Now his shift was midnight to eight. In the small hours the night man usually took off his shoes and stretched out on the lobby sofa. This self-awarded “perk” made up for the boredom of the night shift. Sometimes the tenants complained how hard it was to rouse the night man when they came home late.

But Jamie had to stay awake and stand in the foyer. He stood there with his cap on his head and his whistle in his pocket until he thought his legs would turn to wood.

Then one shift at three in the morning, when even the street lights looked dim and lonely, he saw a car stop in front of the entrance to the building across the street. Jamie was ready. He put the whistle between his teeth and walked out into the street. There were few cars to be seen. He looked downtown as if for a taxi. He looked uptown. He looked through the windows of the stopped car.

A group of men was moving slowly through the lobby of the building across the street. They were moving close together. As they neared the door, Jamie saw that there was a girl in the middle of the group. That was the tipoff the man in 13-B had given him.

Jamie blew his whistle. Then everything happened at once. Men came running out of doorways up and down the street with guns in their hands. The group of men stopped, then tried to turn back. Someone darted in and grabbed the girl’s arm. She staggered as he pulled her roughly. Then another man ran past with his arm held straight out, football style. Guns fired. Jamie felt a pain in his arm.

A man ran past Jamie and across the street. He was the man from 13-B. He put his arm around the girl and pulled her away down the sidewalk. Others were fighting in the building and on the street. Jamie’s arm hurt. He walked back into his building.

Through the gold-etched glass of the outer door he watched. Suddenly everything was quiet. Men were being lined up, facing the wall. Others picked themselves up slowly from the concrete. Police cars swung up to the curb. They must have been waiting around the corner, Jamie thought. For a few minutes they blocked the street. Then the police loaded the cars and took everyone away.

The man from 13-B came back to Jamie’s building. He was smiling. His arms were swinging as he leaped for sheer pleasure from the pavement to the sidewalk.

“What happened, man?” asked Jamie. He was holding his arm. Blood was dripping off the fingers.

“You wanted a piece of my action,” 13-B said. “You got it. I’ve been watching that house for weeks. Those men were kidnapers. We didn’t dare go in after the girl. We were waiting for them to take her out. I knew it would have to be this week, most likely at night.”

He laughed and clapped his hands like a boy. “Bull’s-eye!” he said. “You did a good job, Jamie. Now I’ll put that crowd away so long they won’t remember what a dollar bill looks like.” He pointed to Jamie’s bleeding arm. “Let’s go take care of that. I’m the cop, Jamie. That’s the game you wanted a cut of.”