Murderers Row

ELEVEN

WHEN I CAME out of the hotel, after getting the information I wanted, the sky to the east held a pale hint of dawn. There weren't any yellow Cadillacs around. I hoped I hadn't lost him. I started walking. It might not be the best plan, judgment-wise, but I was too sleepy to be clever. I wanted to stir up some action, and if it happened to involve hand grenades, submachine guns, or sawed-off shotguns, well, it was about time a little hardware came my way, for a change, so I could prove I could be real tough on the receiving end, too.

Atonement, Mac had said. He'd pulled the rug out from under me very neatly-or, rather, instead of pulling it out, he'd left me standing on it. He'd given me no chance to back away from the position I'd chosen. To put it a different way, I'd stuck my neck way out, with melodramatic flourishes, and instead of crudely chopping it off, as I'd invited him to do, he'd just pulled it out a little farther and tied a pink ribbon around it…

Balanced or unbalanced, glad or sorry, I was stuck with the job. In theory, I was picking up the case where Jean had left it. In practice, I wasn't anywhere near that place and had no idea where to find it. Jean, according to her reports, had had a real contact, a muffled voice on the phone, somebody interested enough in an alcoholic, disillusioned, potentially disloyal member of our team to make propositions; interested enough to bug her motel room and check up on her. All I had, so far, was a screwy kid with a grudge against her vanished papa's handsome lady friend.

What I needed was action, I thought, or about twelve hours' sleep, or a month in the sun with a lady named Gail. Well, it was no time to start thinking about that. I was thinking about it, nevertheless, when a yellow Cadillac glided up beside me and stopped. I stopped. The near door of the car opened, and the handsome, sunburned face of Louis Rosten looked out.

"Please get in, Mr. Petroni," Rosten said. "I've been trying to catch you. I would like to speak with you."

I shrugged and got in. He sent the car away smoothly. Well, it was action of a sort. I leaned against the door, watching him drive and wondering if he could possibly be Jean's mysterious telephone contact. That slick, gutless air could be a fake-so could Orcutt's Don Quixote act. So could Mrs. Rosten's air of regal indifference, or pretty little Teddy Michaelis pose of a blood-thirsty kitten.

"I'll buy you a cup of coffee," Rosten said. "We'll drive out the highway. Under the circumstances, I think it is better if we're not recognized eating together, don't you?"

I shrugged. "Circumstances? What circumstances? I've got nothing to hide."

"Nothing except a murder," Rosten said.

It was hard to think of Jean's death in those terms; but of course Petroni would. "What are you driving at, mister?" I demanded with sudden harshness. "The cops let me go, didn't they?"

"Please!" he said. "Don't think I have any intention of-what I mean is, Petroni, I do have eyes in my head, whatever my wife may think. You're rather a distinctive figure. I could have made a great deal of trouble for you last night, but I chose not to. That's all I'm trying to say."

I studied him balefully. "Okay," I said. "Okay, so you saw me and kept quiet. What do you figure it's going to buy you? What do you think you've got on me? You'd play hell trying to change your story now. The police would crucify you."

"Please," he said. "I'm not a blackmailer. I have no intention of changing my testimony. The dead woman was nothing to me; nor do I have any strong feelings about law and order. I must say, however, that I am curious. How did you get Miss Michaelis to lie for you, too? Had you known her before?"

I said, "She's my long-lost kid sister. It was a family reunion. How could she send me to the electric chair, her own flesh and blood?"

He glanced at me, and laughed politely to show he got the joke. "Ha ha. Well, never mind. It isn't important, except that it enabled me to find you again. Knowing that she'd lied for you, I could guess that you would make contact with her sooner or later. It was merely a matter of- well, of getting away from my wife unsuspected, so I could watch the motel. Of course I couldn't let her know what I was doing."

"Of course not," I said. "She might have got the wrong idea about your hanging around a pretty young girl."

He looked a little startled, as if I'd offered an unexpected thought. Then he laughed again, rather nervously. "Ha ha. Yes, well, there's that, too. And of course Teddy, Miss Michaelis, is quite attractive. There's something very charming about a small, really feminine woman, don't you think?"

I had a picture in my mind of the small, really feminine woman asking bright-eyed, How much would you charge to make a hit for me? But it wasn't for me to disillusion him, if he wanted to take her doll-like appearance at face value.

"Feeling that way," I said, "maybe you should have married one."

"Maybe I should."

"Of course," I said, "there's something even more charming about a rich woman."

He laughed. "If you're trying to insult me, Petroni, you're wasting your time. Of course my wife is wealthy. Of course I married her for her wealth-why else would anyone marry such a female horse?"

"I think Mrs. Rosten is quite a handsome dame, myself."

"Handsome!" he said. "My God, man, do you know what it's like, living with a handsome woman with the authority of money behind her, and a will of iron?"

"No," I said. "I don't know what it's like. I never had any offers."

"I'm a sensitive man," he said. "I-I feel things. She has no conception of-she is a brutal woman, Petroni. A horrible woman, a grasping, selfish, avaricious woman. She has a pathological sense of family and property. She shot a child once, a mere boy, who'd broken into the house at night and was making away with a silver candlestick. I watched her throw the shells into that Purdey shotgun of hers-she loves to hunt-and close the breech deliberately and take aim out the window, swinging the gun as casually as if she were knocking over a rabbit. When we got out there, the boy was dead. The buckshot had practically torn him to shreds. It was dreadful!"

"I always figure a burglar takes his chances like anybody else outside the law. Your wife sounds like quite a girl."

"You'd say that. I don't suppose a human life means anything to you, either."

It was an echo of what Mac had said, and I didn't like Rosten any better for saying it, even though he was saying it to Lash Petroni, not Matt Helm.

"Well, no little juvenile slob had better try running off with any of my silver, mister. If I had any. What did Mrs. Rosten have to say about it?"

Rosten grimaced. "She said, 'I couldn't let him get away with great-grandmother Sandeman's candlestick, could I?'"

"Did she get away with it?" I asked. "I guess she must have. She isn't in jail."

"Of course she got away with it," he said resentfully. "She always does, no matter what high-handed action it may be. Well, not quite always. There was the time she tried to hold off the Federal Government with that same Purdey double-they were taking over some run-down family property she'd inherited down the Bay. For the Navy, I think. They talked her out of it, somehow. I think they just made her see she was making herself perfectly ridiculous, and there's nothing she hates worse than that. Well, here we are." He stopped the big car at a roadside joint, half restaurant, half drive-in. "We might as well have our coffee in the car," he said.

"Sure."

I told the girl who came up that I'd have coffee and a doughnut. He ordered black coffee and watched the girl move away through the lights in tight lavender pants and a frilly white blouse. At that angle, retreating, the pants were much more interesting than the blouse. Rosten licked his lips thoughtfully.

"I-I have a proposition for you, Petroni," he said.

"I know," I said. "It'll cost you five grand. Twenty-five hundred down, twenty-five hundred on delivery. Cash. No bills larger than a hundred. I like fifties and twenties better."

He turned sharply to stare at me, shocked that I'd read his mind. From his expression, I knew I'd read it right. Before he had recovered, the girl was returning. From this angle, advancing, the blouse was more interesting than the pants, but the poor guy wasn't noticing.

"I'll take the coffee with cream, miss," I said, and waited until she'd gone. "Get to the bank as soon as it opens," I said, to Rosten. "Well, there's no rush; any time today will do. Twenty-five hundred in used bills. You know the countryside; you pick a place where we can get together this evening. After dark would be best. I don't have to tell you to keep an eye on the rearview mirror. We don't want any witnesses to this little transaction, do we, mister?"

He watched me take a bite of doughnut as if he'd never seen a man eat before. He licked his lips. "I-I don't know what you're talking about," he said weakly. "I don't-there must be some misunderstanding. I didn't-"

I said, "What's the matter, is the price too steep for you? Hell, you're making a million on the deal; what's five grand to you?"

"A million!" He cleared his throat and said more strongly, "Really, Mr. Petroni, I'm afraid we're talking at cross purposes. The proposition I had in mind-"

"Was killing your wife," I said.

He turned pale and looked around fearfully. I thought he'd actually put his fingers to his lips and say hush. He started to speak, but nothing came.

"Cut it out, little man," I said. "Last night you lied for me. Why? Why did you help me stay out of jail, knowing I was a murderer? This morning you went to a lot of trouble to find me-and to make sure your wife didn't know you were trying to find me. Why? You've told me you married her only for her money. You've told me what a terrible person she is. Hell, she's a murderer herself, according to you; she deserves to die. That's what you were saying just now, isn't it? You were trying to justify what you were going to ask me to do to her. What the hell did you look me up for, if not to have me kill her? I don't do plumbing or paint houses or wash cars, mister. The police told you what my business is."

I sounded as if I'd figured it out very logically. I didn't bother to tell him I'd been able to guess what was in his mind because somebody else had already introduced me to the same idea. A coincidence? Maybe, but if you leave a loaded gun lying around, it's apt to give ideas to more than one person. To these folks, I was just that: a deadly weapon provided in the hour of need by, so they thought, a benevolent fortune.

Rosten still hadn't spoken. I said, "Okay, so it's settled. Where's a good place for us to meet?"

He licked his lips. "Well," he said, "well, there's a place down on the Bay, a little cove called Mason's cove-"

"Show me on the map, if you've got a map." He had one. He showed me. I asked, "When can you be there with the money?"

"I-we're going out this evening. A cocktail party at the Sandemans. I don't know if I can get away afterwards."

"You'd better get away, mister. I don't work for nothing. What about before the party? We'll take a chance on daylight."

"All right." His tongue came out again and discovered that his lips were still there. "All right. Four-thirty at the cove. Don't drive too far down that side road or you'll get stuck in the sand-Petroni?"

"Yes?"

"It will-" He did the tongue bit once more. "It will look like an accident, won't it?"

I said, "One day I'm going to have somebody ask me to do a murder that looks like a murder-"

He drove me back into town and dropped me a couple of blocks from the hotel. I watched the big car drive away. Then I found a phone booth in a drugstore, looked up a number in the book, and dialed it. A maid answered.

"I'd like to speak with Mrs. Rosten," I said. "Mrs. Louis Rosten. This is Jim Peters. She'll remember me."

"Mrs. Rosten's asleep, sir."

"Wake her up," I said. "It's important."

I waited. Presently I heard the maid return and pick up the phone. "Mr. Peters?'

"Yes," I said.

Her voice sounded a little breathless. "Miz Rosten say she sure do remember you, Mr. Peters, and she can't think of a thing she have to say to you this hour of the morning or any hour. She say, if you bother her again, she call the police!"

"I see," I said. "Thank you."

I hung up. Well, I wouldn't really have known how to handle it if the woman had come to the phone, but I'd had to make at least a gesture towards playing it straight, like a conscientious government agent who'd stumbled on a dark conspiracy against a citizen's life-two dark conspiracies, to be exact.