The Chinese Doll

Chapter 15

  Boone, Ill.

  Saturday, A.M.

Dear Louise:

My second day in the hospital. I tried to get out of here last night with very little luck.

About midnight I had crawled out of bed, found my clothes in the closet, and put them on. I tiptoed downstairs with the intention of leaving by the doctor’s entrance. But I reckoned without the night-owlish tendencies of a headnurse.

“May I ask where you’re going?” She stood between me and the door.

“Out to catch a streetcar,” I snapped at her. “My wife has decided not to have the baby tonight. So I may as well go home.”

“I think not, Mr. Horne. There is no Mrs. Horne in the maternity ward at the present time, nor are there any unwed mothers. Are you returning to your room now?”

“Yes, mam,” I said. The price of fame, I suppose.

I’m a wiser man this morning. I know a safe and sure way to get out, tonight.

Eleanor had hit me with that gun butt, damn her soul. And then there had been nothing.

For a long time there was nothing. Nothing, like the stark, empty blackness of night skies on a barren planet; nothing, like the confining hollowness of a covered grave.

The first thing that came out of the empty nothingness was a painful buzzing. A buzzing by a solitary fly trapped in that coffin in a covered grave. The fly wanted out and couldn’t get out — ever.

The buzzing changed; it didn’t stop, but it changed pitch with a suddenly cold and refreshing wetness. I pushed myself up on one weak arm and looked down at the white light playing on the snow I was lying in. I realized only that it was a light, and it was snow, and fell face forward again. It was wet and cold and good on my face.

Above the buzzing a woman’s voice spoke to someone.

“Get up.”

She wasn’t talking to me, she couldn’t be talking to me. I didn’t want to get up; couldn’t she see that? I wanted to lie there and push my face deeper and deeper into the good, cold snow. It was wet and came up between my lips.

The voice spoke again.

“Please — get up!”

Who was she talking to?

“Please, Chuck! Get up from there.”

I don’t want to get up I said to the woman’s voice, I don’t want to get up, I don’t want to get up.

The woman picked up my arm and twisted it. The pain shot to my finger-tips and the buzzing changed pitch again. Damn you Eleanor, I don’t want to get up. Let me alone.

My arm was warm against the cold snow; the buzzing stopped, the pain stopped.

They were replaced by a smell. The smell was good and it was bad. It smelled like something I knew. A jail. It smelled like a jail — no, not quite. It was a different smell from a jail, a different kind of lysol. It didn’t smell like lysol at all now, now that I had thought of lysol. It smelled like ether. Ether and flowers.

The flowers were roses, a big bunch of them, and they were very pink roses placed in a very white vase. Beyond them was a window with snow on the sill and on either side of the window was a very pale green wall. All of the colors seemed rich and smooth and quiet as if they had been put there for me to look at when I opened my eyes. The very pink roses contrasted with the very pale green wall.

And on the left side of the bed was a small white table, a dresser, two chairs and a door. The door was standing open a few inches and through the opening came the clack-clack of fast heels on the marble floor of the corridor. Clacking heels accompanied by flashing glimpses of white. And everything smelled like ether and roses.

I looked back to the little table standing beside the bed. There was a water glass on it, upside down, a pitcher, a folded towel, and a small white card propped against the glass. The card was too far away to reveal the printing on it, but it seemed familiar. I reached for it but my left arm wouldn’t move.

I looked down to see why and saw the plaster cast. It began just below the elbow and ended just past the wrist, leaving a part of my palm and the fingers free. I wiggled them. Fractured or broken wrist, I guessed. So I reached for the card with my other hand.

It was a duplicate of the card I had found propped up between the typewriter keys. On the back Elizabeth Saari had written in brown ink:

“Send for me immediately, Chuck.”

I put the card back where I had found it and lay down to think.

Mother Hubbard came to mind first. Mother Hubbard would have worried about me when I didn’t get home last night. You know how she fusses around, Louise. An old hen with one chick. I’m the chick. She’d like for you to give up your job and come back to town so there’d be two chicks. I wondered which would worry her the less: to call her and tell her where I was, or not to do anything and let her think I was out chasing around somewhere.

There and then is when I tried to scratch my head. It was wrapped up. My friend, Eleanor.

Eleanor’s name brought other things to mind. There had been a fuzzy something about wet snow, and a buzzing fly, and Eleanor telling me to get up.

The buzzing fly must have been my buzzing skull and my imagination. Wet snow, and a stinging arm. The plaster cast explained the arm. I suppose I fell on it, or twisted it when I fell. In wet snow. I must have stumbled out of the farm house and fallen in the snow. Or was pushed.

But the dog? He would have been on me if I had gotten out of the house. He wouldn’t have just bitten my wrist and walked away; the dog would have gone for my throat.

So I was pushed, and not from the farmhouse porch. I was pushed from a car after I had been carried away from the farm. Packed in the Cadillac, hauled off a long distance down the road, and dumped out. Why? Why was I still around to think about it?

Because Eleanor had received a telephone call and the message hadn’t been the one for which she and Paul were waiting. That was only too apparent. Instead of being killed outright — as they were expecting — the message had ordered a “once over lightly.” Afterwards, I was dumped in a ditch.

And then Eleanor had said—

But Eleanor couldn’t have said anything. Eleanor couldn’t be there, in the ditch. She had either remained at the farmhouse or gone on with the car. She wouldn’t have gotten out to stay there with me, begging me to get up.

I turned to look at the card propped against the water glass. Dr. Saari’s card.

There was a flash of starched white at my door. I hadn’t been paying much attention to the heels. The flash of white came in and gave me the conventional hospital smile from an attractive face. The starch in the white camouflaged the probably attractive figure that belonged to the face.

“Good morning,” she said cheerily. “How do you feel?”

“With my fingers. What’s your name?”

“Bartlett. Do you feel better now?”

“Bartlett what? I’m doing all right. When do I get out of here?”

“Hazel Bartlett. I’m glad to hear it. We’ll have to ask the doctor.” She puttered around with the bedclothes, doing nothing constructive. Then she asked me, “Do you want anything from the closet?”

“No. Unless there’s a drink hidden there.”

She hadn’t of course but she pretended it was a very funny thing for me to say. And she zipped away. I followed her heels down the corridor until they stopped. I heard her give a number and call Dr. Saari by name. Her voice dropped. Then she hung up and the heels faded away altogether.

Pretty soon she was back with a large shot glass of colored liquid. She smiled a genuine smile and held it out to me.

“The doctor says you may have this.”

“What is it?”

“Taste it and see.”

I sniffed it first. It was bourbon. I drank it. It was fine bourbon.

“You’re a good girl, Hazel. I want you for my nurse the next time I check in here.”

“You and a thousand others. The doctor asked me if you had requested anything.”

“The doctor is good to me in my old age. Now I’d like to make another request.”

She studied me carefully before answering. “What is it?”

“See who sent those roses.”

I couldn’t be sure but I think I disappointed her. She walked around the bed and over to the vase to glance at the little tag that had accompanied the flowers.

The tag read “Louise.” Thank you, baby, again.

The doctor arrived about half an hour later. When she came in her cheeks were still pink from the wintry air; her bedside manner gave me the impression that the visit was partly professional and partly personal. She made no attempt to disguise her delight in finding me looking so well.

“Well, hello,” she laughed. “How’s the slick sleuth this morning?”

“If that’s irony, it’s lost.”

“Chuck—” She pulled up a chair and sat down very close to the bed. Her forefinger traced a vague pattern on the blanket. “Chuck, what happened?”

“You don’t know?” I watched her face.

“Oh, I don’t mean this.” The forefinger pointed to the bandage on my head and the cast on my lower arm. “But what happened to you?”

I had to admit it, “I didn’t take good advice. When I finally realized what excellent advice it was, it was too late.”

“I found you, you know,” she said.

“No. I didn’t know, but I had guessed. I rather thought it would be you. Rather convenient, eh?” She either missed the point or pretended to.

“It most certainly was. Your car was perhaps half, or three-quarters of a mile ahead of mine. I saw them stop and toss something into the ditch. I have to admit to my curiosity, Chuck; I’m from Chicago, remember. The newspapers make you aware of such things. When I reached the spot I turned my spotlight on the something — it was you.”

“And then?”

“I got out of my car and ran to you. I tried to make you get up, but you were a dead weight. Your head was bleeding. I took your arm to help you up and you screamed. That made me suspect a fracture. I returned to my car, got my bag, and made an injection. In a few minutes you were peacefully asleep.”

How much of her story could be accepted at face value? How could I know someone else hadn’t helped her put me in her car, after she put me to sleep?

I said, “I must have been heavy.”

“I didn’t think I was ever going to get you into the car. It required a long time.”

“And my wrist is fractured?”

“Yes. You fell on it.”

“Tough luck. That’s my gun hand.”

She thought a moment. “I saw you writing with your right hand.”

I nodded. “I’m ambidextrous. I learned to use a gun with my left at a time when my right arm was in a sling. I’ve never changed.”

“You’re not going to use it for a while. Several weeks, anyway.”

“That’s what I’m thinking. Damned unfortunate it had to be my left I fell on.” I changed the subject back to something that interested me more, and watched for a reaction. “What were you doing on that road?”

There was no hesitation. “I was on my way back to town. I’d made a call on a patient. Lucky for you the woman lived on that same road.”

“Yeah, wasn’t it. I might have bled to death.”

She shook her head. “The blood was already beginning to congeal. You would have frozen to death. That gash on your head looked like the well-known blunt instrument.”

“A gun butt.”

Her eyes widened. She said nothing for several seconds but she was thinking of the advice she had given me not to go to Croyden, and obviously wishing I had heeded her. Then she saw the roses.

She didn’t get up and walk over to inspect them, not then. Instead, she asked, “Chuck, who is Eleanor?”

I frowned. “Eleanor?” Stalling for time. I still didn’t want to betray Eleanor, despite her dirty work.

“Yes, Eleanor. You called me Eleanor when I picked you up.”

“Oh, Eleanor is the... a girl I know.”

“Eleanor is the what?”

“Is the perfect type of American beauty.”

Annoyed, she arose from the chair and sauntered over to the vase of roses. She read the tag.

“That reminds me: there is some mail in your office from the lady. Shall I bring it out this afternoon?”

“I’d appreciate it.” So she was still hanging around my office. Dr. Saari stood there by the roses, absently. Her long fingers pressed a flower gently to her cheek.

“Chuck—” and she walked back to stand beside the bed, “are you going to be a good boy and stop playing with fire?”

“Who,” I asked, startled, “Louise?”

“No, silly. I’m speaking of this nasty business.”

“I don’t know,” I replied warily. “Sometimes I’m in the mood to forget the whole affair and settle down to raise chickens for a living. And then again, something like this happens and I get mad all over again.”

“And you are angry now?”

“Would you let anyone do this to you?”

“N...o.”

“Then I’m mad.”

“I see. Well, Chuck, I’ve warned you twice.”

Yes, she had. Once in my office, and again just now.

Dr. Saari fiddled around for some useless minutes and made ready to leave. I asked her to send in the nurse as she went by the desk. Her good-bye was ineffective.

Hazel bubbled in with the same old hospital smile and started for the closet without a word. I stopped her.

“Not that. I want to send a couple of telegrams. You phone them in for me.”

She searched in the drawers of the dresser for paper and waited. I dictated that wire to you, and a second one to Rothman. I told Rothman where I was, but that I was doing okay, and to keep his eye on Eleanor.

Hazel asked eagerly, “You’re the detective, aren’t you?”

“The detective?”

“Boone has only one. The girls have been talking about you. I’m sorry, Mr. Horne, but you’ll have to pay for these in advance. Hospital rules.”

I paid for them. And questioned her.

“How old are you, Hazel?”

“Mr. Home!”

“No, I mean it. Are you old enough to vote?”

“I certainly am. I voted in the last elections.”

“Have you heard of a man named Don Thompson?”

“Oh, yes! He’s handsome. I voted for him. I had to scratch my ballot, but I wanted to, for him.”

“That’s what I thought, but I wanted to make sure.” A lot of people in Boone County scratched their ballots and put Thompson into office. That’s the kind of a man he was; his personality and ability outweighed the opposite machine. “Will you phone him for me, Hazel?”

“I’d love to. What shall I say?”

“Tell him what you know about the circumstances of my being here. Tell him that I want to talk to him, this afternoon, if he can make it.”

She smiled in obvious pleasure and clacked out.

Rothman should have my message in an hour or less. In a matter of minutes if the wires were clear. I hoped they were. I hoped my telegram would reach him before Elizabeth Saari could reach someone else in Croyden.

I was plenty sore at Eleanor for the part she had played in putting me in the hospital, but not so sore and so callous as to sit idly by and see her murdered. Because I had made the mistake of calling her by name while lying in that ditch.

The State’s Attorney came in late yesterday afternoon, just as somebody’s radio across the corridor was about to drive me nuts with the ninth or tenth consecutive hillbilly program.

Donny Thompson stopped in the doorway in some surprise and checked me carefully from head to foot. Or what he could see of me above the covers. He held himself straight and tall, causing his suit to fit him as his tailor had intended. And then he casually closed the door behind him and pulled a chair close to the bed. When he sat down he kept his upright bearing. His expression wasn’t anything to make a patient happy.

“Just what was it you finally decided to tell me?”

“You know something,” I accused him.

“You’re damned right I know something. I would have been here sooner if I hadn’t been out of town. Horne, I’m not the blamed fool most people in this city take me for.

“I know which side my bread is buttered on. I know how I got into office and I know how I’ll get in next time unless I rub someone the wrong way — make them want to keep me out. But I’m not altogether a damned fool. And I’m peculiar enough to want to obey my oath of office.”

I started in cautiously, “Well, I got a few things I’d like to talk over with you. But I can’t tell you everything I’d like to tell you — it involves confidences.”

Thompson stared at me without moving.

“You think I’m a fool, too, don’t you? Don’t deny it. You can’t play poker. Your face gives you away.”

“But I tell you there are some professional confidences involved. I’m not in the habit of breaking promises.”

“Let it be for a moment. Let me tell you something first. Something that may help you to see your way clear to help me.

“Horne, despite what that crowd in the sheriff’s office may appear to believe, I don’t regard it as simply an ironic coincidence that Evans was killed by his own car.”

“You don’t?”

“Nor do I regard it as simply an ironic coincidence that a girl drove the car, and that Evans was known to have a mistress who now is missing.”

“Go on.”

“Nor do I regard it as simply an ironic coincidence that a dead Chinese girl is pulled out of the lake, and that a private detective attends the autopsy, and that the said private detective was temporarily in the employ of the late Harry Evans.”

“Mister,” I cut in, “you are getting warm.”

“I am warmer than that. I know that a certain gambler uses a supposedly abandoned bam on the outskirts of town as a place of amusement. I know that he is protected, and by whom. I know that I can’t and don’t dare touch him unless I have enough to explode his protection as well.”

“Do you... have enough, I mean?”

“No. Not quite enough. Not yet.”

“I haven’t either. I’m sorry I can’t help you, but that’s the truth.”

“I can wait.” He had the patience to wait a long time. “But there is more: I know that this gambler has been transporting his patrons to and from the place of amusement via private taxi system which, up until a couple of nights ago, was operated by one or more Chinese drivers. Girls.”

I cut in. “There were only two of them, I think. Sisters. And one sister — the one in the lake — was brand new at the job. It may have been her first or second trip.”

There was something behind his eyes that said he knew I had been keeping something from him, but he went on.

“I also know that since the body was found in the lake, the other Chinese girl (or girls, if there were more than one) has disappeared from the taxis.

“I know that a private detective has thoroughly checked into the pasts of his late employer, Harry W. Evans; of his late employer’s late mistress, a girl named Leonore; and his late employer’s very much present partner, a colorful gambler who calls himself Raymond A. Swisher.

“I know that the private detective has been rather indiscreet in his relations with someone in a position to do him harm, and as a result has lost his license for thirty days.”

“You know a lot,” I told him admiringly.

“I daresay,” he answered pointedly, “the private detective has found other interesting things of which I know nothing. I am hoping he’ll tell me.”

Well, why not, Louise? He had me squarely on the nailhead and he could bang down the hammer any time he chose. And he darned near knew as much about the whole business as I did. Probably more. It quickly occurred to me that the State’s Attorney was a good poker player. He hadn’t told me everything yet — he was holding the kicker until I laid down my hand.

I had an aching desire to find out what that kicker would be. So I began at the beginning, from the moment Harry Evans walked into my office looking like the uncle in Utah, and repeated the whole story. The whole and complete story, holding back nothing, and bringing him up to date as of the moment. I seem to be telling that story pretty often these past few days.

As I unfolded it to him I watched his face, hoping to see behind the poker mask. The mask failed to reveal how much of it was new to his ears. He just sat there, unmoving, not revealing anything until I had finished. And then he sighed.

“So you’re the man who cost Uncle Jack his job.” Uncle Jack was the colored porter at the City Hall, the man I used as a contact. “My one trustworthy man in the City Hall.”

“What! I didn’t know Uncle Jack was out.” I tried to sit up but he pushed me back.

Thompson nodded. “This morning. Somebody found liquor in his broom closet. He was fired for drinking on the job.”

“Uncle Jack doesn’t drink,” I said indignantly.

“I know that.” He raised his eyes to stare out the window. “But someone found out that you and I had been using him.”

“Of all the raw deals! I’ll get him another job.”

“I already have. It may have been my fault, not yours.” He lapsed into silence. I saw no reason to break it, and waited for the kicker I knew was coming.

After a while it came.

“What you’ve found out and what I’ve found out pretty well coincide. I merely duplicated your trail. Except of course for this or that little detail the other didn’t think of. I, for instance, didn’t think of the hobby angle. The Chicago kid who prints magazines.”

“You leading up to something?” I challenged him.

“Yes. Such as the water content in the dead girl’s stomach.”

I shot upright. My head spun and little colored specks swam before my eyes. Here was the kicker coming out of his sleeve.

“I had the contents analyzed,” he continued tonelessly. “She didn’t drown in the lake.”

“No?”

“No. It was chemically treated water such as comes from city taps. From Boone’s purification system.”

More later, Louise.