This Is Murder

Chapter Thirteen

Sam Moraine registered at the cheap hotel under the names of James C. Belton and Carlton C. Belton.

“My uncle and I want a quiet room with twin beds,” he said.

The clerk regarded the key rack for a moment, then pulled out a key to which was attached a big brass tag.

“Something at four dollars?” he asked.

“That’s okay,” Moraine said.

“Just the one suitcase?”

“Just the one suitcase, and we’re paying for the room in advance.”

The clerk nodded, accepted the four dollars, and slammed his palm down upon a call bell.

“Front!” he called.

The bell boy took the key and the suitcase, showed them the way to a room on the back of the fourth floor. He sighed as he let the suitcase down to the floor.

“It must be loaded with bricks,” he said.

“Gold bricks,” Moraine told him, handing him half a dollar.

When the boy had left, he closed and locked the door. He indicated a chair.

“Sit down,” he said to Alton Rice, “and don’t disturb me. I’ve got work to do.”

He elevated the suitcase to one of the beds, opened it and spread out the contents. For more than half an hour he was busy reading papers, making an occasional note. Then he returned the papers to the suitcase, paused as he inspected four stenographic notebooks tied together in a package.

“Know what these are?” he asked of Alton Rice.

The white-haired man said wearily, “I have a general idea. I didn’t make a complete inventory. This stuff was all in the suitcase and I took it. I realize now how utterly foolish it was, but when I heard Natalie’s voice...”

“It may not have been so foolish at that,” Moraine told him as he started pacing the floor, his eyes fixed in frowning concentration upon the carpet.

Alton Rice sat as calmly inert as though he had been a piece of furniture.

Suddenly Moraine whirled on him.

“You had no business going there to-night! You should have known that!”

“On the contrary,” Alton Rice said in a calm, steady tone, “it was the only possible course open to me.”

There was no irritation in his voice, nothing of the driving, nervous insistence which characterized Sam Moraine’s voice when he was trying to drive home a point.

“Why?” Moraine asked.

Alton Rice went on in that same calm voice, “Because nothing matters with me any more. Do you stop to realize my position? I’m an old man — that is, I’m not a young man. I have no property. I have no means of making a living, save by using my knowledge of bookkeeping and accounting. I am in disgrace. I have served a term in a penitentiary for embezzlement. Honest men are going without work these days. I stand no chance whatever of getting work. I wouldn’t let Natalie support me. She has her own problems. My race is run — I am finished.”

Moraine, staring somberly at him, said, “In other words, you intended to commit suicide?”

“Yes,” Alton Rice said, “but not so that she would ever know. She would have thought it was an accident. But first I intended to stake everything on getting back her position in society. I intended to fix things so she could hold up her head once more and keep her own self-respect. She’s sensitive — no one realizes how sensitive — no one realizes how much suffering she’s gone through because of the disgrace.”

Moraine nodded slowly and thoughtfully.

“Do you know what a penitentiary does to one?” Alton Rice asked.

Moraine stared at him silently.

“Remember,” Rice said, in that same calm, dispassionate voice, “I had been a man of some prominence. I was prominent in fraternal organizations. I knew a good many influential people in the community. I stood well. I was able to run for treasurer and get elected. That means something — not much, perhaps, but something. I was able to hold the office even when the Dixon ticket made a clean sweep of all opposition. My opponent was a member of the Dixon machine, yet I beat him.

“Perhaps I didn’t amount to very much, but I amounted to something. I was able to stand up and make a speech in front of a crowd. I flattered myself that I had a certain dynamic personality, a certain force of character.”

He ceased speaking for several seconds, then said, quite simply, “It’s all gone now.

“I’m not broken,” he said, after a moment, “in the sense that my spirit is broken; I’m simply atrophied. Up there in jail I was a cog in a machine. I didn’t even have a name — I had a number. I had no friends; I had no associates; I was locked in; I was subjected to an impersonal discipline. Everything I had is gone. There was a time when I could address a political meeting and sway them. Tell me, my friend, do you think I could sway a meeting now?”

His steady eyes regarded Moraine from the setting of a haggard face.

After a moment, when Moraine made no answer, he laughed bitterly.

“How about the Governor?” Moraine said. “Did you never make an appeal to the Governor?”

Alton Rice said, without bitterness, but with the flat finality of a physician announcing a death, “All public offices are filled by politicians. Politicians affiliate themselves with one political party or the other. I was convicted because powerful political interests wanted me out of the way. You can figure how much chance I stood. Why, my very attorney, who took my money and promised to beat the case before a jury, had his instructions. He didn’t dare to buck the political machine. He was appointed to a judgeship three months after I went to jail. He’s still a judge.”

Moraine shook himself, as though trying to dislodge some physical object which had settled upon his shoulders.

“Will you promise me one thing?” he asked.

“What is it?”

“If they arrest you and question you, don’t be in too big a hurry to make that confession. Don’t make it until after I tell you to make it.”

“Will you promise me that you’ll tell me to make it before it is too late? Before the facts are brought out about Natalie?”

Moraine said evasively, “Well, let’s cross that bridge when we come to it...”

“Exactly,” Alton Rice said. “You make me no promises and I make you no promises.”

“You’ll promise me to try and avoid the police?”

“Temporarily, yes.”

“You’ll stay here in the hotel and have your meals sent up?”

“Yes. Where are you going?”

“I,” Moraine announced, “am going out and do things. I’ve got a pat flush in my hand but I’m damned if I know how to play it.”

“The minute you use those documents, or even intimate that you have them,” Alton Rice said, “you will implicate yourself in the murder of Pete Dixon; as soon as you do that, you implicate Natalie. As soon as you do that, I confess, and kill myself. Let’s not have any misunderstanding about that.”

“If you keep under cover here it’s going to be a while before the officers spot you,” Moraine said, snapping the suitcase closed and fastening the leather straps. “Answer the telephone when it rings. Remember that your name is Belton. I may call you. Now go to bed and get some sleep.”

“You’ll take care of Natalie?” Alton Rice said.

“I’ll take care of Natalie,” Moraine assured him.

With the suitcase banging against his legs, he went down the corridor to the elevator.

“Taxi,” he told the bell boy who ran for the suitcase as he emerged from the elevator.

“Fourth and Central,” he told the cab driver. But, after the cab had got well on the way, he tapped on the glass and said, “I’ve changed my mind, buddy, let’s run down to the Union Depot.”

Moraine paid off the cab at the Union Depot, carried the suitcase to the checking stand, surrendered it, paid a dime and received a pasteboard check. He put this pasteboard check in a stamped envelope, addressed it to ‘James Charles Fittmore, City, General Delivery,’ sealed the envelope and dropped it in a mail box.

It was now daylight. Moraine took a cab to a Turkish bath.

“Give me the works,” he said, “and get me out of here at five minutes to nine.”