Owls Don't Blink

Chapter Nine

We moved away from the desk. Bertha kept staring at the telegram. I said, “He’ll be here almost any time now. There’s an early plane gets in from New York. He didn’t say just what plane he’d take, did he? Richmond must have been where he was grounded on the trip north.”

“No-the first available plane. That was because they’re so crowded these days.”

I said, “When he comes, I’ll do the talking.”

Bertha reached a sudden decision. “You’re damn right you’re going to do all the talking. Bertha is bundling herself into an airplane and flying to Los Angeles. In case Mr. Hale asks questions, it’s because Bertha has some war work which demanded her presence. You aren’t going to tell him anything about having gone down there this morning and about what happened, are you?”

“No.”

“That is all I wanted to know,” she said.

“Want me to go out to the airport with you to see you off?”

“I do not. You’re poison. You’re the smarty pants that held out on Hale just because you thought Hale was holding out on you. It’s your party. You sent out the engraved invitations, and now you can seat the guests as they come in. Bertha is going over and get some nice pecan waffles, and then be on her way.”

“I want a key to the apartment,” I said, “and—”

“It’ll be in the door. I’ll pack my bag and leave my key in the door. Good-by.”

She strode to the door, and I watched her get into a taxicab. She didn’t even look back.

When the cab had pulled away, I went into the dining-room, had a good breakfast, went up to my room, stretched out in a chair with my feet propped on another chair, and read the morning paper while I was waiting for Hale.

He arrived shortly after ten o’clock.

I shook hands and said, “Well, you certainly made a quick round trip.”

He pulled his lips back from his teeth in his characteristic smile. “I did for a fact,” he admitted. “I didn’t realize I was teamed up with two such fast workers. What happened to Mrs. Cool? I inquired for her, and they said she’d checked out.”

“Yes. She was called back to Los Angeles on an emergency — war work.”

“Oh,” he said. “You’re doing work for the F.B.I, then.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Well, you intimated as much.”

I said, “I’m not familiar with all the partnership business, but I don’t think we are.”

He grinned. “If you were, you wouldn’t admit it?”

“Probably not.”

“That’s all I wanted to know. I’m disappointed she isn’t here, however.”

“She said there was nothing more she could do. Since Roberta had been located, it was simply a question of cleaning up details.”

“Well, in a way, that’s right. You certainly are fast workers. They told me at the desk that Mrs. Cool had checked out last night about seven o’clock. She didn’t leave last night, did she?”

“No. This morning.”

“But she checked out last night?”

I said, “That’s right. She got an apartment down in the French Quarter. She thought it would be more centrally located for our investigations. She was to stay down there, while I stayed up here.”

“Oh, I see. Where is this apartment?”

“I can’t tell you exactly. It’s one of those apartments where you go in one street, wind around through half a dozen turns and twists, and come out on another. Or are you familiar with the French Quarter?”

“No.”

I said, “You’ll get a kick out of this apartment. It’s typical.”

“So Mrs. Cool is doing war work. She didn’t tell me that.”

“You didn’t ask her, did you?”

“No.”

I said, “She seldom volunteers information about her business to clients.”

He flashed me a quick look. I kept my face absolutely straight.

“She hasn’t talked with Miss Fenn then?”

I let my face show that I was surprised. “Why, we understood from your telegram that you wanted us to hold off that interview until you came, so you could talk with her.”

“Well-not exactly. You say she’s living in the Gulf-pride Apartments on St. Charles?”

“Yes.”

“I’d guess we’d better drive down there. Had breakfast?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Well, let’s go see her.”

“Want me there when you talk with her?”

“Yes.”

We called a taxi and gave the address of the Gulf-pride Apartments. When we were about halfway there, the driver slid the glass window back, turned, and said, “That’s the place where they had the murder this morning, ain’t it?”

“What place?”

“The Gulfpride Apartments.”

“You can search me. Who was killed?”

“I don’t know. Some man name of Nostrander.”

“Nostrander,” I said, as though trying to recall the name. “I don’t believe I know anyone of that name. What did he do?”

“He was a lawyer.”

“Sure it was murder?” I asked.

“That’s the way I understand it. Somebody plunked him right in the middle of the heart with a thirty-eight caliber.”

“Did he live there?” I asked.

“No. He was found in some jane’s apartment.”

“Like that, eh?”

“I don’t know. This girl worked in a bank somewhere.”

“What happened to her?”

“She’s missing.”

“Don’t happen to remember her name, do you?”

“No, I don’t wait a minute. I heard it, too — one of the boys was telling me about it. Let me see. It was a short name, name of — name of Pen — no, that’s not right. Wait a minute. Fenn. Fenn, that was the name. Roberta Fenn.”

I said, “Police think she pulled the trigger?”

“I don’t know what their theory is. All I know is what I picked up from a gabfest we were having down at the stand. One of the boys had had a hurry-up call to pick up a photographer for some pictures of the body. Said it was an awful mess. Well, here’s the building. Cars certainly parked all around it.”

Hale started to say something. I beat him to it. “What do you say,” I asked in a loud voice, “if we go and see this other party first, and then come back for our interview at the Gulfpride after the excitement has died down? I don’t like to try and carry on a business conversation with people running in and out, chasing up and down stairs, making noise and—”

“I think that’s a very wise decision,” Hale said.

I said to the cab driver, “Okay, drive us on down to Napoleon and St. Charles and let us off there.” I settled back against the cushions and said in a loud Voice to Hale, “Our party at the Gulfpride won’t be interested in talking business this morning, anyway. He’ll be swap ping gossip with the other tenants. My idea is we’d better let him go until afternoon.”

“Okay, just as you say.”

After that, we were silent until the cab driver let us off at Napoleon and St. Charles.

“Want to have me wait?” he asked.

“No. We’ll probably be here for an hour or two.”

He took the tip I gave him and drove off.

“Well?” Hale asked.

“We wait for a streetcar and ride back to town.”

He showed his excitement. “We want to find out all we can about that case. Look here, Lam, you’re a detective. Would it be possible for you to get in touch with the police and find out what they know about—”

“Not one chance in ten million,” I interrupted firmly—

“Don’t the police and the detective agencies work together?”

I said, “The answer to that is best contained in a one-syllable word of unmistakable meaning. It’s no!”

“But this raises the devil with all of my plans. You’re sure this woman was the same Roberta Fenn whose pictures I showed you?”

“Yes.”

Hale said, “I wonder where she is.”

“The police are probably asking themselves that same question.”

“Do you think you could find her again, Lam?”

“It’s possible.”

His face lit up. “I mean in advance of the police?”

“Perhaps.”

“How would you go about doing it?”

“I can’t tell just yet.”

We waited by the car tracks. He was nervous, kept glancing at his watch.

A streetcar came along. We swung aboard, and I knew Hale had reached a decision on something by the time we took our seats. He kept looking for an opportunity to break it to me, but I didn’t give him any conversational opening for anything. I simply sat looking out the window.

We craned our necks as we went by the Gulfpride Apartments. Quite a few cars were still in front of the place. A little group of men was standing on the sidewalk, heads close together, talking.

That gave Hale the opportunity he wanted. He sucked in a deep breath, said, “Lam, I’m going back to New York. I’m going to leave you in charge here.”

I said, “You’d better get a room, hole up, and get some sleep. You can’t keep commuting back and forth to New York all the time.”

“I’m afraid I wouldn’t rest much.”

I said, “That apartment Bertha Cool just vacated is wide open. You can move in there and go to sleep. It won’t be like a hotel. There won’t be anyone to disturb you. You can simply lock your door and pass out.”

I could see that the idea appealed to him.

“What’s more,” I said, “you’ll find that apartment interesting for another reason. Roberta Fenn lived there for several months. She was then going under the name of Edna Cutler.”

That brought him bolt upright. His eyes, red-rimmed, slightly bloodshot from lack of sleep, were wide with startled interest. “Is that how you found her?”

“I got some clues there, yes.”

He seemed a bit worried. “It’s uncanny how you find things out. Lam. You’re a regular owl.”

I laughed at that.

“Perhaps you know a lot more about Miss Fenn than you’ve told me?”

“You wanted me to find her, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I found her. We try to give results, and don’t bother our clients reporting methods, or talking about clues.”

He settled back once more in the car seat. “You’re a very unusual young man. I don’t see how you found out so much in so short a time.”

I said, “We get off here and walk the rest of the way. It’ll take five minutes.”

Hale was very much interested in the furniture, and the old-fashioned, high-ceilinged rooms. He walked out onto the porch, looked around at the plants, looked up and down the street, came back, tried the bedspring with the palm of his hand, and said, “Very, very nice. I think I’ll be able to rest here. And so Roberta Fenn lived here — very, very interesting.”

I told him he’d better try to get some sleep, left him there, went out, and hunted up a telephone booth where I’d be assured of privacy.

It took me half an hour dealing over the phone with a detective agency in Little Rock to find out that 935 Turpitz Building, the address given in Edna Cutler’s letter to Roberta Fenn, had been a mailing address only. It was a big office where a girl rented out desk space to small businessmen, did stenographic work, and forwarded mail.

She would forward mail to Edna Cutler, but the actual address of her client was confidential — very much of a secret.

I told the Little Rock man the agency would send him a check, and then hunted up a commercial typing agency. I asked the girl in charge, “Could you make a stencil for me and run off a thousand letters on a mimeograph machine?”

“Why, certainly.”

“Got a stenographer I can dictate a sales letter to?”

The girl smiled at me, picked up her pencil. “The managing department now becomes the clerical unit. You can start whenever you’re ready.”

I said, “I’m ready. Here we go.”

I started dictating:

The girl looked up. “That all?”

“That’s all,” I said, “except that it will be signed Silk-wear Importation Company, and I’ll have to work out a color chart and order blank to enclose.”

“How many of these do you want?”

“A thousand. After you have the stencil made, I’d like to see one or two samples before we go ahead with the full thousand letters.”

She looked up at me, studying me. “All right. Now, what’s the racket?”

I just stared at her, saying nothing.

“Look — there was an embargo on silk a long time before Pearl Harbor, and when did stockings ever come from Japan?”

I grinned. “If the people who get these letters are as smart as you are, I’m out of luck. I’m a private detective. This is a stall. I’m trying to smoke someone out from behind a blind address.”

She looked me up and down. I could see the puzzled surprise in her eyes change to respect. She said, “Okay, you almost took me to the cleaners. So you’re a detective?”

“Yes, and don’t tell me I don’t look like one. I’m getting tired of hearing that.”

“It’s a business asset,” she announced. “You should be proud of it. All right, what’s the real dope on these? How many of them do you really want?”

“Just two. Don’t make too good a job of it. Smear them up a little as though out of a thousand copies these people were getting the last two. You can address the envelopes. The first is Edna Cutler, 935 Turpitz Building, Little Rock, Arkansas, and the other is Bertha Louise Cool, Drexel Building, Los Angeles.”

She laughed, swung the typewriter from the side compartment of her desk, and announced, “It’s a good gag. Come back in half an hour, and I’ll have ‘em ready.”

She fed the stencil sheet into her typewriter and started playing a tune on the keyboard.

I told her I’d be back, went out, bought an early afternoon paper, and sat down at the lunch counter to read the account of the murder.

As yet, the newspapers didn’t have all the details, but they had enough to hit the high spots. Paul G. Nostrander, a popular young attorney, had been found dead in the apartment of Roberta Fenn. Roberta Fenn was missing. Employed in a secretarial position in a downtown bank, she had failed to show up for work. An examination of her apartment convinced police that if she had fled, she had taken no clothes with her, not even her facial creams, toothbrush, or even her purse. The purse was lying unopened on the dresser in the bedroom. Not only did it contain her money, but her keys as well. Police reasoned, therefore, that she was entirely without funds, without means of re-entering her own apartment. They expected either to find her body sometime within the next twenty-four hours, or that she would voluntarily surrender to the police. Police inclined to two theories. One was that the murderer had killed the young attorney, then forced Roberta Fenn to accompany him at the point of a gun. The other was that the murder had taken place during Miss Fenn’s absence from her apartment, that she returned to find the body in much the same position as police had found it, and, in a panic, had resorted to flight. There was, of course, the third possibility, which was that Roberta Fenn had been the one who pulled the trigger on the gun.

Apparently police were inclined to give more credence to the first theory.

Police were making a diligent search for a young, well-dressed man wearing a gray checkered suit who had been waiting for Roberta Fenn when she finished her work at the bank the evening before. Witnesses had seen him escort her into a taxicab. Police had a good description: Height, 5 feet 5½ inches; weight, 130 pounds; hair, dark, wavy; eyes, gray and keen; age, 29; suit, gray, double-breasted; shoes, brown and white sport.

Nostrander had been practicing law for about five years. He was 33 years of age, and among lawyers was noted for his ingenuity as well as his mental agility in the trial of a case. He was a bachelor. Both parents were dead, but he had an older brother, 37, who was employed in an executive capacity with one of the bottling companies. So far as was known, the dead lawyer had no enemies, although he had a host of friends who were shocked to learn of his passing.

The crime had been committed with a .38 caliber police special. Only one shot had been fired, and only one shot had been needed. Doctors said death was almost instantaneous. The position of the body and the distance from the hand of the corpse to the gun which was found lying on the floor made it almost impossible to consider the death as other than deliberate murder. Police were also investigating the theory that the death might have been part of some strange suicide pact, that Roberta Fenn had become too nervous or frightened to carry out her part of the bargain, and so had disappeared.

Police fixed the time of the murder as being almost exactly at 2:32 in the morning. Because a pillow had been held over the gun, the report had been muffled. Only one person had actually heard the shot. That person, Marilyn Winton, a hostess at the Jack-O’-Lantern, had been returning home. She had the apartment directly across the hall from that of Miss Fenn. It had been just as she was fitting her latchkey to the street door to the apartment house that she had heard what she took to be a shot. Two friends, who had driven her home, were waiting at the curb to “see that she got in all right.” Miss Winton had immediately returned to their car to ask if either,of them had heard a shot. Neither had. Police attached some significance to this, as it indicated that the pillow had muffled the explosion sufficiently to make the single shot inaudible above the sound of the idling motor.

The friends had convinced Miss Winton that she had merely heard a door slam. She had gone on upstairs to her apartment, but still only half convinced that it was not a shot she had heard, had looked at her watch to note the exact time. The time was then exactly 2:37. She estimated it had then been not over five minutes since she had heard the shot.

There was nothing in the paper as to how the police had happened to discover the crime. News of that mysterious telephone call of mine had apparently been deliberately suppressed. The newspaper explained that the police who stumbled upon the murder were “merely upon a routine tour of inspection.”

I read the news, smoked a cigarette, and went back up to the public typing agency.

Ethel Wells had pulled a proof of the letter for me.

I read it over.

“You think this will do the work?” I asked.

She said, “It rang the bell with me — as you may have noticed.”

“I noticed.”

She laughed up at me. “You were all eyes, as the saying goes.”

I said, “I need an address for the Silkwear Importation Company.”

“Three dollars a month entitles you to use the office as a mailing address. You can have as many letters sent here as you want.”

“Can I trust your discretion?”

“Which, I suppose, is a nice way of asking if I can keep my mouth shut if someone comes around asking questions?”

“Yes.”

“If it’s a postal inspector, what do I do?”

“Tell him the truth.”

“What’s that?”

“That you don’t know my name or anything about me.”

She turned that over in her mind for a few seconds, then said, “That’s an idea. What is your name?”

“On the books, it’ll be Cash. You’ve added three dollars to your month’s income, as well as the price of the typing.”