Twenty Plus Two

Chapter 11

The voice on the phone was Jim Honsinger’s. “I’m still at home, Tom, having breakfast, but my night manager just called me with what they were able to get during the night. Sally Weaver first. She’s married. Mrs. Kirby Bokker. Her husband’s in Wall Street. Home address, 881 Fifth Avenue.”

Alder was already writing it down. “Go ahead, Jim. Anything else?”

“The pediatrician, Dr. Drucker, 220 West 72nd. Big Frenchy — I’ve got a report on him as long as your arm. I’ll have the office send it over to you by messenger. Too long to read over the phone. One thing I noticed, though. He couldn’t have had anything to do with the Delaney case. He was doing a stretch in Atlanta at the time. Went in ’35, didn’t get out until ’42. The same year he went back in — this time to our own little Siberia, Dannemora. The big stretch. Life. But he somehow beat it, because he got out four years ago. Nothing on him since then. Retired, I guess. May dig up something on him during the day.”

“Perhaps not. That pretty much checks with his story.”

“His story?”

“He was here last night. I talked to him — rather I listened, because when Pleschette gets going that’s all you can do — listen. Anything else, Jim?”

“Mrs. Delaney. She’s going to be difficult. She’s become a recluse. No phone listed. I did manage to get her address, however. Madison Avenue, 645. The dope is she won’t talk to anyone about the case — and that anyone means anyone.”

“I’m not surprised, Jim. All right, keep at the rest of it, will you?”

“Lunch?”

“I don’t know yet. It depends. I’ll call you.”

Alder swung out of bed, headed for the bathroom. He took an icy shower, rubbed himself dry and dressed, putting on a suit he had had delivered only the week before.

He had breakfast in a modest place on a side street, then stepped into a taxi and gave the cabby an address on Fifth Avenue.

It was a fairly expensive apartment building, but the doorman was quite willing to let Alder ride up unannounced. For a dollar. Alder pressed the button at the door of Apartment 5D. The door was opened to the length of the chain, about three inches. A black face appeared in the slot.

“We don’t wan’ anythin’,” the owner of the face said.

“I’m not selling anything,” Alder replied. “I’d like to talk to Mrs. Bokker.”

“’Bout what you wan talk?”

“I’ll tell her. My name is Mister Alder.”

The door was closed. A full minute went by, then the black face appeared in the aperture. “Mis’ Bokker say, you leave name, telephone. She don’ feel so good.”

A dollar had worked downstairs. Alder tried one now. “I’m from out of town and it would not be convenient to talk later. Tell Mrs. Bokker it’s important — and urgent.”

Another minute went by and the chain was removed from the door. Alder crossed a foyer, went into the living room. Sally Weaver Bokker was propped up on a sofa, pillows behind her back, her feet up on the sofa. But she was fully dressed.

She had to be within a year of Doris Delaney’s age, so she was either thirty-seven, thirty-eight, or thirty-nine. But she looked a good forty-five. She was plump; dumpy would perhaps be a better description. Her hair was short, faded from too much bleaching. Her skin was sallow.

She looked at Alder as he approached. “I don’t believe I know you, Mr. Adler.”

“Alder. I want to talk to you about Doris Delaney.”

The sallow face twitched and a spark came into the dull eyes. “That’s your important business? Good day, Mr. Alder.”

“Please, Mrs. Bokker. Give me three minutes — well, five. I will not be offensive, I will leave whenever you ask me.”

The smoldering in her eyes seemed to fade. She looked him over carefully, then made a gesture to an overstuffed chair. “You’d think I had no life of my own. I’m famous, because, once upon a time, I was Doris Delaney’s best friend, the girl who knew her better than any living person. I hardly remember her. It was so long ago!”

“Yes, it was, Mrs. Bokker. But you were her best friend, weren’t you?”

“We roomed together. You get to know a girl when you live with her five days a week.”

“For how long? I mean, how long did you room together?”

“From September until — well, when it happened.”

“Happened, Mrs. Bokker? You used that word as if it meant something. Wasn’t it rather the lack of something happening? She just went out — disappeared. Never came back.”

Mrs. Bokker was not happy about this. “You — you’re talking like those G-men. They tried to trick me every time. Questioned me over and over. Looked me up and down and jumped on me every time I used the wrong word, or said something they couldn’t understand. Half the time I didn’t know what was happening. You — you’re not one of them, are you?”

“No, Mrs. Bokker. And I’ll try not to talk like that again. I’ll simplify my questions. Did you know — did Doris tell you anything about — well, a boy?”

“You mean did I know she was pregnant?”

Alder nodded. “Was she pregnant?”

“I don’t know, I really don’t. Somebody brought that up and — well, Mrs. Delaney, Doris’ mother, got me alone one time. She asked me, but I really didn’t know. If she was pregnant, she never let on, and I was her best friend.”

“Do you have any children, Mrs. Bokker?”

“I don’t see what—” She shook her head. “No, I don’t. Not that I couldn’t have — it’s just, well, my health has never been too good. I had a miscarriage a year after we were married and the doctor said—”

“One thing in the reports has always bothered me, Mrs. Bokker,” Alder said. “Why didn’t you go with Doris to the malt shop?”

“We weren’t allowed to. It was against the rules. Mrs. Tubbs’d give us — I mean, she’d make us do all sorts of things, if she caught us breaking the rules.”

“Doris Delaney broke them apparently.”

“She didn’t care. She’d just as soon be sent home as not.”

“Any of the other girls break the rules — the rule about leaving the school, going to the malt shop?”

“Most of them did, at one time or another. I did, too, only I got caught once and after that — besides, I was on a diet at the time. Doris didn’t have to worry about that. She had the kind of a figure — well, she could eat anything and it didn’t show on her. She ate more than I did, but it didn’t bother her.”

“You did go to the malt shop, however. Did you — did you meet any boys there?”

“What do you mean, meet? Sure, there were fellows there sometimes. Lots of time. A good-looking girl like Doris—”

“She was good-looking?”

“You must have seen pictures of her. Yes — she was good-looking in a, well, rather a skinny kind of a way.”

“So there were boys at the malt shop. You talked to them sometimes?”

“Kidded around. Teen-age stuff. We weren’t any worse than the kids today. Probably a lot better.”

“Was there anyone, well, any one boy that Doris seemed to have a preference for — at the malt shop, I mean?”

“I answered that question a thousand times, if it was once. I didn’t go across the street that often. I don’t remember anyone any more than any other Doris wasn’t a bad girl — not bad, if that’s what you’re driving at.”

“I’m afraid I was. It was that — the doctor who tentatively identified her once—”

“Bosh! He was trying to get his name in the papers. So was everybody else. For months people kept calling the newspapers, the police. They’d seen Doris here, they’d seen her there. Her father sent detectives to all the places. They showed pictures, and it wasn’t ever Doris the people’d seen — just a blonde girl, that’s all.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Bokker. I won’t keep you longer. Just one more question, and I wish you’d think a moment before you answer it. It’s about Doris — her manner, her attitude those last days before she went out and failed to return. Was she — despondent? Worried?”

“I don’t have to take time to think about that one. I answered it before. Doris wasn’t the worrying kind. I was the quiet one then. Not Doris. She talked a blue streak. Her father was a rich man. She didn’t have a worry in the world. She wasn’t afraid of anything. She was rich, she was good-looking and she had a figure.”

“Figure?”

“You know what I mean,” Mrs. Bokker spread out her hands, made a rounding gesture.

“Awhile ago you referred to her as a thin girl. Skinny was the word you used.”

“At first. When we started rooming together. Her — she began developing then and by the time — well, by the time she ran away, she wasn’t skinny. Not that way, anyhow.”

“Her — breasts had developed?”

There was a sudden sting to Mrs. Bokker’s reply. “That’s not exactly a fit subject of conversation between mixed company, Mr. Adler, or Alder.”

“I’m sorry. I meant it as an impersonal thing. Thank you, Mrs. Bokker. Thank you for the time you’ve given me. You’ve been most kind.”

“It’s all right. You — you’ve been polite up to — well, most of the time. But you forgot to mention something. Who are you? I mean, who are you working for — the police?”

“No. I’m not working for anyone, really. It’s just that I’m very much interested in mysteries. Thank you, and goodbye.”

She was frowning, but she let him go. He looked back at her as the maid let him out. She was sitting upright on the sofa looking at him.