1950 - Figure it Out for Yourself Page 9

  I climbed the three stone steps to the glass-panelled doors of 274, pushed one open and entered a dark, smelly lobby full of silence and neglect. Along the left-hand wall was a row of mailboxes. I went over and read the names mounted in grimy brass frames above each box. There was a surprising number of Eves, Lulus, Dawns and Belles among the three dozen names, and I wondered if the brass plate on the door was entirely truthful. The fourth frame from the right read: Miss Gracie Lehmann. Rm. 23. Flr. 2.

  Stairs, carpeted with coconut matting, faced me. I puffed gently up thirty of them before I reached the first-floor landing and a long corridor that went away into a quiet dimness surveyed on either side by numerous doors before which stood bottles of milk and newspapers. As the time was ten minutes past noon, it seemed to me the businesswomen were neglecting their business, if they had a business, which on the evidence didn't seem very probable.

  As I began to mount the second flight, a lean, hard-faced man appeared at the head of the stairs. He wore a fawn flannel suit, a white felt hat and sunglasses. He gave a nervous start when he saw me, hesitated as if in two minds whether to retreat or not, then came down the stairs with a studied air of nonchalance.

  I waited for him.

  He scratched his unshaven jaw with a thumbnail as he passed me. I had an idea the eyes behind the sunglasses were uneasy.

  'No animals and positively no men,' I said softly as he walked across the landing to the lower flight of stairs.

  He looked hastily over his shoulder, paused, said aggressively, 'Ug-huh?'

  I shook my head.

  'If you heard anything, it was probably the voice of your conscience.'

  I went on up the stairs, leaving him to stare after me, pivoting slowly on his heels until we lost sight of each other.

  The second floor was a replica of the lower floor, even to the bottles of milk and the newspapers. I walked along the corridor, treading softly, studying the numbers on the doors. Room 23 was halfway down and on the right-hand side. I paused before it, wondering what I was going to say to her. If what Maxie had told me was true, and it probably was, then the girl could clear Perelli if she wanted to. It now depended whether or not I could persuade her to throw Barratt to the wolves.

  As I raised my knuckles to knock on the door I heard a quiet cough behind me. I looked furtively over my shoulder. There was something in the atmosphere of the place that would have made an archbishop feel furtive.

  Behind and opposite me a door had opened. A tall, languorous redhead lolled against the doorway and surveyed me with a smile that was both inviting and suggestive. She wore a green silk wrap that outlined a nice, undulating hip, her legs were bare and her feet were in swan's down mules. She touched her red-gold hair with slender fingers that had never done a day's work in their lives, and her neat, fair eyebrows lifted in a signal that is as old as it is obvious.

  'Hello, Big Man,' she said. 'Looking for someone?'

  'Huh-uh,' I said. 'And I've found her. Don't let me keep you from your breakfast.'

  The smile widened.

  'Don't bother with her. She's not even up, but I am, and the safety catch's off too. I'm all ready to fire.'

  I raised my hat and gave her a courteous bow.

  'Madam, nothing would please me more than to pull the trigger, but I am committed elsewhere. Perhaps some other time? Regard me as food for your dreams, as I most certainly will regard you. Bear your disappointment as I am bearing mine, remembering that tomorrow is another day, and we too can have fun even if it is fun postponed.'

  The smile went away and the green eyes hardened.

  'Awe hell, just another nut,' she said, disgusted, and shut the door sharply in my face.

  I blew out a little air, rapped on Gracie's door and waited. A half a minute later I rapped again; this time much louder. Still nothing happened. No one opened the door.

  I looked to right and left, put my hand on the doorknob and turned it gently. The door moved away from me as I pushed.

  I looked into a room that was big enough to hold a bed, two armchairs, a wardrobe and a dressing table fitted with a swinging mirror. There was no one in the room. The bed hadn't been made, and the sheets hadn't been changed, by the look of them, for probably six months. They were grey and crumpled and as uninviting as only dirty sheets can be. There was a film of dust on the mirror and cigarette ash on the carpet. From where I stood I could see bits of fluff under the bed. Not a clean room: a room that gave me an itchy feeling down my spine as I looked at it.

  At the head of the bed was another door that probably led to the bathroom. I stared at it, wondering if she was in there and knocked sharply on the panel of the open bedroom door to see if anything happened. Nothing did, so I stepped inside, and in case the redhead opposite became curious, I closed the door.

  On one of the armchairs was a pile of clothes: a frock, stockings, a grey-pink girdle and a greyer pink brassiere.

  There was a distinct smell of marijuana smoke in the room. Not new, but of many months' standing. It had seeped into the walls and the curtains and the bed and hung over the room like a muted memory of sin.

  I moved silently past the bed to the closed door, rapped sharply and listened. I heard nothing. No one called out, and I was suddenly aware of a drop or two of sweat running down my face from inside my hat.

  I turned the handle and pushed. The door opened heavily and sluggishly, but it opened. Something behind the door jumped against the panels and sent my heart jumping like a frog on a hot stove. I looked into the empty bathroom, saw the soiled pink bath, the mussed-up towels, the loofah, the cake of toilet soap and the half-squeezed tube of toothpaste.

  I knew she was behind the door. She had to be.

  I stepped into the bathroom, my nerves creeping up my spine. She was there all right: hanging from a hook in the door, in a blue, crumpled nightdress, her knees drawn up, her head on one side, the knot of her dressing-gown cord carefully under her right ear, the cord imbedded in the flesh of her neck.

  I touched her hand.

  It was cold and hard and lifeless.

  chapter seventeen

  I looked up and down the corridor. There was no one in sight. A faint and far-off sound of movement told me that at least some of the occupants behind the many doors were beginning to greet the day; even if they went no farther than rolling over in bed.

  I moved cautiously out of Room 23 and closed the door. Then I took off my hat and wiped my face with my handkerchief. I lit a cigarette and drew in a lungful of smoke. That helped a little, but not much. What I needed was a large whisky, neat, and in a hurry.

  I stepped across the corridor to the redhead's door. On the left-hand panel with a card that read: Miss Joy Dreadon. At home weekdays after five.

  I tapped with my fingernails on the door, making no more noise than a mouse makes when it is nibbling at die wainscot-ting, but it was loud enough.

  The door opened about eight inches and Miss Dreadon peered at me through the opening. She seemed to have lost her bonhomie and her trustful air of welcome.

  'Well?'

  Her big green eyes were suspicious and watchful.

  I decided to waste no time and to talk to her in a language she would understand and appreciate.

  'I want to buy a little information,' I said, and pushed my card at her. 'Twenty dollars buys ten minutes at my rates: nice clean bills and secrecy guaranteed.'

  She read the card with that pained expression people usually wear who don't read a great deal and are still bothered by long words. She had to make an obvious effort not to move her lips while she spelt out the letters to herself.

  Then she opened the door a couple more notches and pushed the card back at me.

  'Let's see die money.'

  A simple, direct soul, I thought, who gets straight to the point of interest and doesn't bother to ask unnecessary questions.

  I took out my billfold and showed her two crisp clean ten-dollar bills. I didn't give them to her. I just showed them
to her.

  She eyed them the way a small child eyes Santa Claus's sack, and opened the door.

  'Come on in. I don't care who you are, but those berries certainly make my palms itch. Sure it's information you want?'

  I stepped past her into a room a little larger than 23, and much more pleasant and comfortable. There was a divan, a settee, two armchairs, a couple of expensive Chinese rugs on the grey fitted carpet and a bowl of red-and-yellow begonias on a table in the window recess.

  I put my hat down on a chair and said I was sure it was information I wanted.

  She held out a white hand with dark red, polished nails.

  'Let's have half. It's not that I don't trust you, but it's a good principle. You can have a drink if you like, or coffee.'

  I gave her one of the ten-dollar bills, thinking this case was costing me plenty. I seemed to be spending the entire morning giving my money away.

  She folded the bill and hid it in her brassiere as I said a Scotch would adequately meet the case.

  She wasn't niggardly about it. She gave me the bottle and glass and told me to help myself.

  'Give me a second to get my coffee.'

  By the time she was back I was two drinks ahead of her.

  She set a tray on the table near her and flopped on the settee, showing me a pair of long, slender legs that might have given me ideas if my head wasn't already full of ideas of a different kind. Seeing the direction of my studied stare, she flicked the wrap into place and raised her eyebrows.

  'What are you: a private dick or something?'

  'Something like that. Not quite, but it'll do.'

  'I knew it. As soon as I saw you, I knew you weren't the usual prowler. You've got nice eyes. Sure you wouldn't like a little fun?'

  I started to make a courteous speech, but she stopped me with a wave of her hand and a wide, friendly grin.

  'Forget it, honey, I was only kidding. It's not often I get a good-looking man in here who doesn't start climbing up the wall immediately the door shuts. It's a novelty, and I like it. What do you want to know?'

  I made a third drink.

  'The subject of the inquiry is Gracie Lehmann. Do you know her?'

  Miss Dreadon's face hardened.

  'For crying out loud! You're not wasting good money to find out about her, are you?'

  The Scotch had set me up. In fact it was so good it nearly, set me up on my ear.

  'I'm working for a client who's in trouble with the police. Gracie could have cleared him. No other reason.'

  'Well, go and ask her. Why come to me?'

  'I doubt if she's going to be much help now. She's dead.'

  She started and spilt some coffee on her bare knee, she swore softly under her breath, put down the coffee cup and wiped her knee with her handkerchief.

  'Must you say things like that?' Then, as I didn't say anything, but looked at her, she went on, 'You don't mean she's really dead?'

  'She's dead all right. I've just been in there. She's hanging at the back of the bathroom door.'

  She gave a little shudder, grimaced, gave another little shudder and reached for the whisky bottle.

  'She was a stupid little fool, but I didn't think she'd be that stupid. The trouble with her was she couldn't leave reefers alone.'

  'I guessed that. I could smell the stuff in the room.' I took out my cigarette case and offered it

  She took one and we lit up, then she poured a shot of whisky into her coffee and drank it.

  'Now I've got the jitters,' she confessed. 'I hate hearing things like that.'

  'Did you see her last night?'

  'Yes; I'm always running into her.'

  'When?'

  'Oh, when I went out to dinner she was coming in, and we met again on the stairs when I returned. She must have gone out again while I was having dinner. We both came in together.’

  'What time was this?'

  Miss Dreadon suppressed a yawn, not very successfully.

  'It was late. About three-thirty I guess. I didn't particularly notice, but it was plenty late enough.'

  'Was she alone?'

  She shook her head.

  'Oh no. She had a man with her as usual. What they can see in that dirty little ...' She broke off, frowning. 'Oh well, I'd better not talk like that now she's dead.'

  'What was he like?'

  'Much too good for her. The kind of man I'd go for in a big way: like Clark Gable. Not like him in looks, but his style.'

  'How was he dressed?'

  'He had on a snappy number in fawn flannel suiting, a white felt hat and a hand-painted tie. He wore big doughnut sized sunglasses. I guess he put those on in case any of his friends spotted him going in with her. The tricks men get up to.'

  I was sitting on the edge of my chair now, trying very hard to keep calm.

  'Did he have a thin, black moustache and hard, lean face?'

  'Certainly he had. Do you know him?'

  'I ran into him coming down the stairs this morning.'

  'This morning?' Her eyes opened very wide. 'But if she's dead...?'

  'Yeah. She's been dead some time. I'd make a guess and put it at about eight hours.'

  'You mean she went into the bathroom and hanged herself while he was in the other room?'

  'I saw him coming downstairs about twenty minutes ago. She died eight hours ago; say about four o'clock in the morning. Obviously she died while he was in her room, unless he left before four and came back this morning for some reason or other.'

  She sank back on the cushions of the settee and fanned herself with her hand.

  'He could have done that, couldn't he? Gee! I was getting all worked up.'

  I remembered the lean man's unshaven chin. If he had left last night, why hadn't he shaved this morning before coming out on to the streets? There might be a perfectly good answer to that one, but until I heard it it seemed to me he had spent the night in Gracie's room.

  This was too important to let slide. I had to find out for certain.

  I got to my feet

  'Here's the other ten I owe you. Thanks for the help. Take my tip and keep out of this. Let someone else find her.'

  'Uuugh! I won't sleep a wink thinking of her in there.'

  'You'll sleep even less if some tough cop takes you down to Headquarters and gets to work on you. Keep out of it.'

  'Aren't you going to tell them?'

  I shook my head.

  'I haven't the time to waste on a suicide case. You'll be surprised how quickly someone will miss her. They always do.' I took out my billfold and another ten-dollar bill. 'If they ask questions, keep me out of it. Tell them about this guy in the fawn suit, but not until they ask you.'

  She took the bill and stowed it away in her brassiere.

  'I'll keep you out of it.'

  I left her sitting on the settee, biting her underlip and frowning. She looked a lot less happy and a lot more worried than when I had first seen her.

  Out in the corridor again, I peeped to right and left, satisfied myself no one was watching me, then stepped across the corridor into Room 23. I closed the door and began a quick but systematic search of the room.

  I was looking for some proof that would tell me the lean man had spent the night here. I didn't know what I was looking for, but I looked just the same.

  First I examined the bed and found a couple of black hairs on the pillow. Gracie was blonde. If he had rested his head on the pillow, it didn't mean he had stayed in the room all night. But it certainly hinted he had.

  It wasn't until I had covered practically every inch of the apartment and was giving up that I found what I wanted. There were two cupboards in the kitchenette: one contained cups and saucers and plates; the other, jugs and dishes and cooking utensils. There was a cup and saucer amongst the jugs. They shouldn't have been in that cupboard. They should have been in the adjacent cupboard. That gave me an idea. I turned my attention to the trash basket. Dumped on top of the usual refuse was a small pile of coffee grou
nds; and they were lukewarm. There was no mistake about that. They had been emptied out of a percolator some time this morning.

  Gracie hadn't made coffee this morning. That was certain. If the lean man had returned because he had forgotten something he wouldn't have made himself coffee. That I wouldn't believe. But if he had slept there the night, he might have made himself coffee before leaving. It would be a cold-blooded thing to have done, as he must have known Gracie was hanging dead in the bathroom. Come to think of it, he probably knew she was dead before he went to bed; and that was even more cold-blooded.

  Then suddenly it was as obvious as a neon light on a dark night. This wasn't suicide: it was murder.

  chapter eighteen

  There was a call-box in the darker part of the lobby. I opened the door and stepped inside. It smelt as if someone had kept a goat in there at one time, and not a particularly nice goat at that.

  Holding my breath, I hung my handkerchief over the ancient mouthpiece, lifted off the receiver and dialled.

  After a while a voice bellowed: 'Police Headquarters. Sergeant Harker talking.'

  'Connect me with Lieutenant Mifflin,' I said, speaking away from the mouthpiece. I probably sounded at the other end like Hamlet's father's ghost.

  'Who's that?'

  'Harry Truman,' I said. 'Make it snappy. You may not think it but time's money to me.'

  'Hold on,' the sergeant said. I heard him call across the room, 'Is the Lieutenant in? There's a guy wanting him. Says his name is Harry Truman. That's familiar, ain't it? I've heard it before somewhere.'

  Someone called the sergeant a very rude name.

  Then Mifflin came on the line.

  'Lieutenant of the Police talking,' he said sternly. 'Who's that?'

  ‘I'm reporting a hanging in Room 23, second floor, 274 Felman Street. If you get over there fast you'll find a clue in the refuse bin. Don't be too sure it's suicide, and take a little trouble checking on the woman. It'll pay dividends.'

  'Who's that talking?' Mifflin demanded.

  I could hear the scratch of his pen as he wrote down the address.

  ‘I haven't the faintest idea,' I said, and hung up.