Meet Me at the Morgue

chapter 20

The hideous concrete façade of the courthouse, Moorish-arched and Byzantine-turreted, was lovely to my eyes. The lights in the embrasured windows of the sheriff’s wing shone like the lights of home. But Molly hung back: she saw the bars on the windows. I had to help her up the steps and through the door.

I deposited her on a bench in the outer office, with Lemp’s suitcase beside her. There were three deputies on night duty instead of the usual one. Six eyes converged on Molly, swinging to me reluctantly when I spoke:

“Any word of the Johnson boy?”

“Not yet. Could be they’re not telling us everything. Who’s the cutie?”

Molly thrust her shoulders back and posed for the deputies’ flashbulb admiration.

“A witness I’m bringing in. Is Sam still on duty?”

“In his office. He won’t go home.”

“Forest?”

“He set up temporary headquarters in the Clerk’s rooms,” the man at the telephone desk said. “You want to talk to him, I’ll see if I can get you a passport and visa. You ever consorted with Democrats?”

“Don’t bother.”

“That was a joke, son.”

“Ho ho.”

“What’s the matter, Howie, you losing your sense of humor?” He turned to the other deputies. “Mister Cross done hitched his wagon to a star.”

I said: “If you want to do something, order me in some food. I haven’t eaten for several weeks.”

“I leap to do your bidding, marster.” He swiveled back to the telephone.

“Thanks. Make it ham and eggs and coffee. I’ll be in with Sam.”

I tossed a dollar across the counter and took the suitcase and Molly down a tile-floored corridor to Sam Dressen’s cubicle. Sam was asleep, his gray head resting on his desk like a large granite paperweight. I shook him and he sat up, blinking and smiling:

“Must have dozed off for a minute. That was a red-hot tip, Howie, that business card you gave me. We got one corpse identified already.”

“Art Lemp?”

The smile sagged disappointedly. “You know, eh? Where you been?”

“To hell and back. This young lady knew Lemp, and the other one was her husband.”

I nodded towards Molly. She was making herself small and flat against the door-frame. I wondered if she recognized the jail smell that sifted down inevitably from the second floor. Or perhaps it was the WANTED circulars that were the only pinups on Sam’s walls.

“You wouldn’t kid an old man old enough to be your father, Howie?”

“She’s his widow, common-law possibly, but his widow. His name was Kerry Snow.”

“We were married in Las Vegas,” she cried. “On the fifteenth of January. It was legal!”

“I believe you, Molly. Come in and sit down now, and tell us all about it.”

A session of questioning followed, until my breakfast arrived. Molly gave us no additional information. Either her men had kept her completely in the dark about their illegal activities, or she was afraid of talking herself into jail. She looked afraid, and hungry.

I shared my toast and coffee with her. Sam had eaten at midnight, he said. It was nearly two.

I stood up, feeling the stiffness in the hinges of my knees. “Is Amy Miner still here?”

“She’s in the special cell on the third floor. I’ll take you up.”

“Who’s on duty?”

“Stan Marsland.”

“I can run the elevator. You’ve got work to do, Sam. This suitcase belonged to Lemp. It’s loaded with grist for your mill.”

His lined face expressed a nice balance of anticipation and foreboding. “Fine,” he said doubtfully. “What do I do with the girl?”

“Forest will want to talk to her. Perhaps you’d better turn the suitcase over to him, too. They’ve got their mobile laboratory down here, haven’t they?”

“It’s in the garage courtyard.”

“Good. You can go home then. Why not take Molly with you? She doesn’t want to spend the night in jail.”

“I’ll say I don’t.”

Sam regarded her dubiously. “I got a wife already.”

“That’s the point. I haven’t.” I turned to her. “If Sheriff Dressen puts you up in his house, you won’t run away?”

“Where would I run away to?”

“Okay, Howie,” he said. “You did enough for me lately. One thing you didn’t do, though, you didn’t bring back my pictures.”

“I will. Give me a few minutes more.”

The automatic elevator was the only way to reach the jail floors at night. I rode it up. Stan Marsland was waiting at the top of the shaft with his hand on his holster.

“Isn’t it kind of late for visiting-hours?”

“Special circumstances, Stan. How often do we have a kidnapping?”

“Often enough to suit me. What’s in the briefcase, food? I hope it’s food.”

“Files and hacksaws.”

“Don’t mention them there things.” The graveyard shift made everybody garrulous. “I was hoping maybe it contained a steak, onions, fried potatoes, and a glass of draft beer. All of which I could use.”

“Is Mrs. Miner awake?”

“I wouldn’t know. She probably is. They don’t sleep so good the first night. You want to see her?”

“Yes.”

“Down here?”

“In her cell will do. It will only take a minute.”

He led me up a curved iron stair to an iron-railed gallery with a riveted floor. We passed a series of iron-sheathed doors with small wire-reinforced windows. There were shouts and howls and laughter behind one of them.

“Drunk tank,” Marsland said. “It’s just like fiesta, on a Saturday night. But oh on Sunday morning!”

At the end of the gallery he unlocked a door and turned me over to a sleepy matron. The women’s cells were open cages with barred doors. I could smell perfume among the animal and chemical odors. Amy Miner, alone in a corner cell, was standing at the bars as if she had known I was coming.

“Mr. Cross! You’ve got to get me out of here.”

“Quiet, Amy,” the matron said soothingly. “You’ll disturb the other girls.”

“But I’ve got no right to be here. I’ve done nothing wrong.”

The matron wagged her head in my direction. Her hair was tied back in an old-fashioned bun that looked as hard and shiny as a doorknob. “Amy’s been quite a problem, Mr. Cross. Do you think they’ll be letting her out in the morning?” She added in a whisper: “I had to take her stockings off, she was talking about putting an end to herself.”

“They have to let me out,” Amy was saying. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Your husband has, apparently.”

“I don’t believe that, either.”

“Until it’s settled, one way or the other, they’re going to have to hold you. I don’t like it. Nobody likes it. Still, it’s got to be done.”

I moved up closer to the bars. A wire-netted light burned feebly in the ceiling. Amy’s eyes were puffed from crying. The lines in her face had deepened like erosion scars. Her mouth had set bitterly. Her hair straggled in grayish-brown ropes over her temples.

“What have they done to Fred?”

“Nothing’s been heard from him.”

“They’ve killed him, haven’t they? They’ve killed him and stolen the boy and locked me up and thrown the key away.”

I didn’t like the hysterical lilt in her voice. “Calm down now, Amy. Things could be worse. You’ll be out of here in a day or two.”

Her hands came through the bars. “Do you promise?”

I took her hands. They were as cold as the metal. “I think I can promise that. You’re being held as a witness, partly for your own good. When you’ve done your job as a witness, you’ll go free.”

“But I didn’t witness anything.”

“You must have. You were married to Fred a long time. How long, ten years?”

“Just about. Long enough to know that Fred’s no criminal.”

“Wives have been mistaken before.” I turned to the matron. “Can we have a little more light?”

She strode to a bank of switches and turned the ceiling light up. For the fourth and last time, I brought the posthumous photographs out of the briefcase.

“Did you ever see this man in your husband’s company?”

I held a blown-up full-face to the bars.

She made a sound in her throat: “Augh.” Her knuckles strained around the bars, and whitened. “Who is he?”

“He served on the Eureka Bay. Your husband must have known him. Fred was aboard the ship from the time it was launched.”

“Is it the Snow boy? Is that who it is?”

“Yes. Kerry Snow.”

“What happened to him?”

“He’s the one Fred ran down in February. These pictures were taken after his death.”

“He’s dead?”

“Your husband killed him. Did they know each other well?”

“I don’t think so. I hardly knew him at all. He came to our flat in Dago once or twice. Fred liked to be hospitable to the younger men. But that was way back in forty-five.”

“Has Fred been seeing him since then?”

“I don’t know.”

“What about Arthur Lemp?”

She answered, after a pause: “I never heard of him.”

“You’re sure?”

“Why should I be? You told me if I tell what I know, I go free.”

“One more question, Mrs. Miner. There’s a possibility that Fred took the boy into the desert. Where would he be likely to go in the desert?”

“I couldn’t tell you. I’m sorry. Fred always hated the desert, it bothers his sinuses. When Mr. and Mrs. Johnson went to the desert, they always left Fred behind, after the first time.”

“Is that what they did in February?”

“Yes. Mrs. Johnson did the driving.”

“Speaking of Mrs. Johnson, how well did Fred know her?”

“She was a good friend of his, she always has been.”

“Did they see much of each other before Fred went to work for her?”

“Naturally they did. She was in charge of his ward in the Navy hospital. He was laid up with his back there for nearly a year.”

“Did they meet outside the hospital?”

“Not that I know of. Fred didn’t get out much, except for a few weekends towards the end.” She thrust her gray face forward between the bars. “I know what you’re hinting at. It isn’t true. Fred never messed with any other woman, let alone Mrs. Johnson. What are you trying to get at, anyway?”

I said I didn’t know, and asked the matron to let me out of there.

Forest was questioning Molly in Sam Dressen’s office. Their voices came low and monotonous through the closed door:

“Can you prove that you were in bed all morning?”

“There wasn’t anybody sitting there watching me.”

“Sleeping in is hardly an alibi.”

“It’s no crime.”

“Stabbing a man to death with an icepick is.”

“I don’t even own an icepick.”

I knocked on the door and handed Sam his photographs. Neither Forest nor Molly looked at me. They were absorbed in their question-and-answer game.

I had seen and heard enough of the girl for one night. She was my responsibility, in a sense. In a deeper sense, there was nothing I could do for her. Her life was running swiftly by its own momentum, streaking across the midnight like a falling star.

“Take good care of her, Sam,” I said out of a sense of inadequacy. Go and catch a falling star.

“The wife will look after her.”

“Tell Forest I’m waiting for him.”

Someone had abandoned a local newspaper on the bench at the end of the corridor. It carried no story on the kidnapping or the murder. One of the front-page items interested me, however. My matron had succumbed to her kleptomania once again. Out on bail, she had walked into a department store and stolen two bathing-suits, size nine.

I leaned my head back against the wall and lapsed into a coma approximating sleep. Forest’s quick footsteps aroused me. He sat down on the bench, looking as sharp and well groomed as he had that afternoon, but just a little white around the mouth.

“You’ve been doing some nice work, Cross. I had my doubts about your wild-goosing off by yourself, but you seem to have an instinct.”

“I know the local people. That always helps. Sam Dressen there, for example, is getting a little old and slow, but he’ll die trying.”

“I told him to get some rest. How did you happen to turn up the girl?”

“That story can wait. You talked to Bourke?”

“I did. What’s your opinion of him?”

“A sharp operator, but cautious.”

“You don’t think he could be the mastermind behind all this?”

“Not Bourke. He was too ready with his information, and it checked. I think Arthur Lemp plotted the kidnapping himself.” From my inside pocket, I produced the penciled envelope containing Lemp’s birth certificate. “This seems to be proof of it.”

Forest read the “timetable” aloud, punctuating the reading with an exclamatory whistle. “Miner’s definitely in it then. What’s this about taking the boy to the desert?”

“I can’t add anything to that. There’s a lot of desert in California.”

Forest thought in silence for a minute, biting the inside of his upper lip. “Lemp plotted the kidnapping, it would seem. He didn’t plot his own murder.”

“That seems to be a reasonable working-hypothesis.”

Forest smiled, rather grimly. “And it isn’t likely that Miner killed him. His assignment was to dispose of the boy. Certainly he’d get out of town before the ransom letter was delivered. A third member of the gang is indicated.”

“Or nonmember. Lemp was a very small-time criminal, until today. A big-time criminal, or an organized mob, may have got wind of his plan and decided to pluck the reward.”

Forest said, musingly: “Murder Incorporated favored the icepick m.o. But then, a number of private individuals have, too. Icepicks are too convenient. What do you think of the Fawn girl as a possibility? She was in a position, or could have been, to know what was going on.”

“It’s possible she did it. Not very probable, though. If she had fifty thousand dollars cached somewhere, she wouldn’t sit around and wait to be picked up.”

“If she was smart.”

“She isn’t. In her world, everyone’s either a victim or a victimizer. She’s a victim.”

“Worms can turn, littler fleas have littler fleas, and all that. She had reason to hate this Lemp, I understand, which gives her a double motive.”

“Frankly, I’m more interested in her husband – her ex-husband – Kerry Snow. I’ve established a connection between him and Miner. They served on the same Navy vessel during the war, and Snow and Miner were friendly acquaintances. I got that out of Mrs. Miner just now. So long as there was no connection, Miner could claim it was a hit-run accident. Not any more.”

“I had a feeling,” Forest said. “What ship were they on?”

“The Eureka Bay. Kerry Snow was ship’s photographer.”

“Damn my eyes!” He struck himself sharply on the scalp with his clenched fist, but in such a way as not to disturb the part. “I should have remembered the name of that ship from your report on Miner. We’ve got a record on Snow, you see. As soon as we ascertained his name, I teletyped Washington. Our Los Angeles office arrested him in January 1946. We turned him over to the Naval authorities as a deserter. They found him guilty on a desertion charge, and another charge of theft of Navy property. He served six years and four months in Portsmouth, and was released last spring.”

“Molly told me some of that.”

“Do you know who gave us the information that led to his arrest in 1946?”

“She mentioned a red-headed woman–”

“No, sir. Snow’s Los Angeles address was provided to us by Lieutenant (j.g.) Lawrence Seifel, then attached to the Eleventh Naval District in San Diego.”

“Are you certain?”

“There’s no mistake. His name is on file in the Los Angeles office. We keep fairly thorough records on our cases,” he said a little combatively. “What do you know about Seifel?”

“Not too much. He seems to be very intelligent, and very nervous. I should say, for the record, you haven’t seen him at his best today, he’s having private troubles of some kind. You did see him?”

“Naturally, as soon as his name turned up.”

“A mutual acquaintance says he’s money-hungry and highly egotistical. And Seifel did know Lemp slightly, by his own admission.”

“Lemp approached him, once, according to his story. As for the Kerry Snow affair, he admits he must have given us the address of Snow’s hideout, since it’s on the record, but he claims he doesn’t recall the circumstances, or even the name. His wartime job was handling courts-martial for the Eleventh Naval District, and as he says scores of cases passed through his hands. So it’s possible he’s telling the truth, and actually doesn’t remember.”

“Where is he now? At home?”

“When he left here, about eleven, he was going out to the Johnson place. He said he wanted to do whatever he could for Mrs. Johnson in her bereavement.” Forest’s tone was edged with sardonic mimicry.

“Bereavement! Is the boy dead?”

“Johnson is. I thought you’d have heard about it.”

“Has he been murdered, too?”

“He died a natural death, early this evening. I suppose you could call it indirect murder. The doctor told me the strain was too much for his heart.”