“This had better be good,” I said.
“It will be.”
“And it had better be true. You’re quite an effective little liar, Jill.”
“You believed all of it?”
“I even went looking for you on East End Avenue. If that’s any satisfaction to you.”
Evidently it was. A smile turned up the corners of her mouth, then died there as her face took on a serious cast once more. “I’m awfully sorry about that, Roy. I didn’t want to feed you a story like that. I kept wanting to break down and tell you the truth. But I couldn’t.”
“Start at the beginning.”
She sighed. “Could I have a cigarette? Thanks. You said something about seeing a picture of me before. When we were out in the cold, I mean. Did you see it?”
I nodded.
“There were six of us, Roy. Me and five other girls. Barb Taft was one of us and—”
“I saw the whole set.”
“The six?”
“Yes.”
She dragged on the cigarette. “Well,” she said. “Well, it’s quite a display of artistic photography, isn’t it? You probably can figure out most of it, then. We were at a party, Roy. A party in Fort McNair—that’s the next town along Route Sixty-eight and it’s even smaller and duller than Cliff’s End.”
“Whose party was it?”
“Some guys in Cliff’s End. One of the girls—I think it was Barb but I’m not sure—managed to get herself picked up by one of the guys. His name is Hank, Hank Sutton. He’s the leader.”
“Of the blackmail mob?”
“That’s right, Roy. He’s a ... a gangster. I didn’t think they had gangsters in little hick towns like this one. But he’s in charge of numbers and bookmaking and God-knows-what-else in this half of New Hampshire. Even when I found out about him, I thought he must be small-time. But he has connections with New York gangsters. I found that out.”
I put out my cigarette. “Let’s return to the party.”
“Sure. Well, it was . . . quite a party. The six of us aren’t a bunch of vestal virgins. I guess you figured that out for yourself, didn’t you? Well, we’re not. But we didn’t think it would be that kind of a party. I mean, we figured on some heavy necking, and maybe going the limit if we felt like it.”
“You didn’t feel like it?”
“We didn’t have any choice. I don’t know what that bastard Hank put in the drinks, but it worked. God, did it work! I remember the way the party started but that’s about all I remember. The rest is a big blank. Then I remember coming out of the fog when they let us out of their cars back on campus. We sat around for two hours drinking coffee and trying to wake up and trying to figure out what happened.” She paused dramatically. “Well, in a few days we found out.”
I said: “They showed you the pictures?”
She shook her head. “They mailed ’em to us. Each of us got a set of prints in the mail, six pretty little prints in a manilla envelope. No note, no letter, nothing. You can imagine what it was like opening the envelope.”
“I know what it was like.” I decided to toss her a curve. “I found one of those envelopes. It was in Gwen Davison’s closet.”
I waited for a monumental reaction. Jill disappointed me. She didn’t bat so much as an eyelash, just nodded as if that was perfectly natural.
“Must have been Barb’s set,” she said. “Don’t . . . uh . . . lose them, will you? I wouldn’t want them floating around campus. It might be a little embarrassing.”
“It might,” I agreed. “Let’s get back to the pictures. Did this Hank Sutton get in touch with you?”
“On the phone. He told me what he was going to do with the pictures if I didn’t ‘play ball.’ I asked him what playing ball meant. It meant two hundred dollars from each of us. That was a starter. He wanted more money again not too long ago. Just a day or two before Barb disappeared, as a matter of fact.”
“How did you pay him?”
“I got together with the rest of the girls. We decided that we had to pay off, at least for the time being. Until we figured out something we could do. Each of us kicked in the two hundred bucks and I carried the loot to Hank.”
“You were the messenger?”
She nodded soberly. “Little old me. It was bad enough paying him a cool twelve hundred dollars. That wasn’t enough. He decided he liked me. He ... he made me stay there with him. It wasn’t very much fun, Roy.”
I could imagine. I looked at her, still nervous but beginning to pull herself together. I was getting plenty of pictures now, including the pornographic ones in the manilla envelope, but outside of that we weren’t getting anywhere in particular. I still hadn’t the vaguest notion whether Barbara had killed herself or whether she had had help. I still didn’t know who had slashed the young life out of Gwen Davison.
I said: “How come you picked me up?”
“In New York? That was on orders, Roy. Orders from Hank Sutton.”
“Tell me about it.”
She nodded. “Well, Barb took off. You know about that. I thought she was going for money or something, or just trying to run fast and hard to stay away from Hank and Radbourne and the whole rotten mess.
“But instead she killed herself. Hank learned about it almost as soon as the police fished her out of the Hudson. Then he heard you were on the case—I don’t know how. So he sent me to New York to work on you.”
She paused and narrowed her eyes. “I didn’t have any choice, Roy. He told me to go and I went. I was blackmailed into it—he still had the pictures, and as long as he had them I had to do whatever he wanted.”
“Go on.”
“I went to New York. Hank had men there checking on you. They must have followed you all over the place. I’m surprised you didn’t notice them.”
“I wasn’t looking for them.”
“I guess not. Of course, you couldn’t know anybody would want to follow you, could you?”
I agreed that I couldn’t. She finished her cigarette and managed a smile. It wasn’t a very firm one. “So that was that, Roy. I picked you up coming out of the restaurant on Times Square. I ran for your cab and hopped into it. Then those two men—they were some of Hank’s New York friends—pretended to be chasing me. They weren’t supposed to chase too hard. Even with an ordinary cabby we would have gotten away. The driver we had lost them so nicely it didn’t look like a set-up at all.”
“That’s true enough. What were you supposed to do next?”
“Just what I did—give you a phony story, find cut what you knew about Barb and whether or not you were going to invesigate. Hank figured that if you stayed on the case you’d find out about the pictures, and it would be messy. He thought I could find out whether you were interested in it or if you were going to let it die a natural death.”
“And I was interested.”
“Uh-huh. So then I was supposed to try and divert your interest. Jesus Christ, it was like a spy movie or something. You know—Mata Hari and all that jazz.”
I said: “Divert my attention. And that accounts for your performance in bed, I imagine.”
“You rotten bastard!”
“Well—”
“I was supposed to pump you, dammit. That’s all. Then I was supposed to arrange a meeting with you for sometime the next day and stand you up. That way you would think I ran into trouble. It was supposed to make you forget all about Barb.”
She was standing up now, her eyes fierce, her hands on her hips and her nostrils flaring. I told her to cool herself off. She thought it over, then sat down again.
“I slept with you because I wanted to,” she said finally. “Take that and feed your ego with it if you want. I’m not a tramp. I’ve been around, I lead a full life for myself. I’m not a tramp. Don’t call me one.”
I looked at her. “Why did you come here tonight?”
“To talk to you.”
“Why?”
“Because I think you can help me. Because I think we c
an help each other. I’ve already told you a few things, haven’t I?”
“Nothing I hadn’t guessed,” I said. “Why did your playmates give me a blackjack message?”
Her face darkened. “I’m sorry about that. I didn’t know they were going to.”
“How did the plans go?”
“They weren’t too exact.” She crossed one leg over the other, gave me a quick flash of thigh and a secret smile to accompany it. “I was supposed to stand you up last night. Then this morning or afternoon you’d get a phone call or a visit or something. A call from me or a visit from some of the boys. That would get you all wound up and you’d forget about Barb.”
“Then the plans changed.”
“Uh-huh. Hank called me this morning, Roy. He told me that Barb’s roommate was knifed by that Al Marsten kook. That made it pretty obvious that you were going to get interested in Barb all over again. So I hurried back here.”
I found my suitcase in my closet, opened it, took out what was left of the pint bottle of scotch the bellhop had brought me. I looked around for glasses and found none. There was probably a glass or two in the lavatory down the hall but I did not feel like going on an expedition. I opened the bottle and took a long drink straight from it.
“Don’t I get any, Roy?”
“No,” I said.
I took another drink, longer, and recapped the bottle. I unpacked my suitcase—since it looked as though I’d be around Cliff’s End for a good time—and buried the bottle in a dresser drawer between a pair of white shirts. I turned to face her again, the scotch doing inexplicably magnificent things to my bloodstream.
I said: “It’s a bloody shame.”
“It is?”
“Yes.”
“What is?”
“That you’re not younger, or that I’m not older. You deserve a spanking, old girl. You should be turned over someone’s knee and beaten to the point of tears.”
“Me?”
“You. Did you happen to realize that you’re up to your neck in at least one and probably two murders? Or didn’t that occur to you?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about murder. Barbara, for example. The suicide notion was foggy from the start. Now it’s turning to pea soup, and thin soup at that. Dishwater, perhaps.”
“You think she was killed?”
“Probably.” I studied her. “And then there’s Miss Davison, for that matter.”
“But Alan—”
“—is sitting in a cell,” I finished for her. “Accused of her murder. I don’t think he’s guilty.”
“Then who is?”
“I don’t know, I’m afraid. How does Hank Sutton look for the role? He’s got a finger in all the other pies.”
She thought it over elaborately. She tapped me for another cigarette, then managed to convince me that she deserved some of the scotch herself. I liberated the bottle from the dresser and passed it to her, watching her take it straight from the bottle without coughing or wrinkling up her pretty nose.
“That was a help,” she said, returning the bottle. “I’d like to think Hank did it, Roy. I’d like to find a good reason to send him to the electric chair. Or watch somebody else send him. God, I hate that man!”
“But—?”
“But I can’t believe it. Roy, when I talked to him on the phone this morning he was shocked. He couldn’t believe it about Gwen, how it would have you back here on his neck and all. Why would he kill her? He was trying to let things cool down and that only stirred them up again.”
She was right.
“Anyway, let’s forget him for a minute,” she said suddenly. “Don’t you want to know why I came to see you?”
“I already know.”
“You do?”
“Certainly,” I said wryly. “You recently witnessed a murder. A man named Dautch—”
“Damn you, Roy!”
I laughed at her. “Now we’re almost even,” I said. “So you can tell me now.”
“It’s like this,” she said. “Hank Sutton has those pictures. The negatives, anyway. And God knows how many prints he has of each of the pictures.”
“Go on.”
She went on. “I’ve been to his house, Roy. To deliver the money, of course. And before that ... at the party.”
“The photography session?”
She colored. “The photography session,” she repeated. “Yes, I suppose you could call it that Oh, you could call it a lot of things, Roy. But to hell with it. Listen—I’ve been to his house. It’s a big old place on the outskirts of Fort McNair and he lives there all by himself. He has . . . company, sometimes. I was his company once or twice, so I know. I told you about that, how he thought I was a lot of fun. An extra dividend in the blackmail game.”
I nodded and wished she would come to whatever sort of point she was attempting to make. Hank Sutton lived alone in a large old house. But what did that have to do with anything?
“Those pictures are making everything a hell of a mess, Roy. If they were out of the way you might be able to get somewhere with your investigating. And the rest of the girls and I could take things easy, relax a little. It’s horrible, knowing that there are pictures like that in existence. Sort of a photographic Sword of Damocles.”
I was beginning to understand.
“It would be so simple, Roy. We would go there late after he was asleep. And we’d get inside the house and take the pictures away from him.” Her eyes drilled into mine, radiating sweetness and warmth and innocence.
“You’ll help me,” she said. “We’ll get them. Won’t we, Roy?”
Nine
THE ROAD was a ribbon of moonlight and the red MG was a lunar rocket. And, while that particular imagery might have worried Alfred Noyes, it didn’t bother me in the least. I had other far weightier considerations on my mind.
“Bear right,” Jill was saying. “Then take the next left turn past the stoplight.”
I nodded and went on driving. It was late—well after midnight, and I’d been up since four in the morning. It was almost late enough for me to behave like a bloody fool, and I was doing just that. We were on our way to the house where Hank Sutton lived. We were going to steal some dirty pictures from him.
The wisdom of this move was still lost on me, as it had been when Jill first suggested it. She’d had a properly difficult time selling the notion to me. But she was evidently a good saleswoman. We were headed for Sutton’s house, ready to do or die, hearts set on securing the photographs once and for all.
It wasn’t completely aimless, as I saw it. Jill herself was about as hard to figure out as a four-year-old’s riddle, as transparent as a broken window. She wanted the photos back because she was tired of being blackmailed, tired of taking orders from New Hampshire’s version of Al Capone. Her childish chatter about getting hold of the photographs in order to clear the air was a lot of bloody nonsense designed to make me think she was taking her stance on the side of the angels.
Still in all, she happened to be right—if for the wrong reasons. The damned pictures cropped up no mater which way I turned around. In a sense they were the focal point of the entire case. As long as this Sutton individual had then in his possession, he would be tossing body blocks at me every step of the way.
But if we had them he might be out of the picture altogether. Perhaps that was too much to hope for, but at the least he would be subdued, with one major weapon taken away from him. It was vaguely analogous to nuclear disarmament; he might still start a war, but he couldn’t do nearly so much damage.
And we were on our way.
“Turn right,” she said. “Uh-huh. Now keep going straight ahead for three or four blocks. You’re in Fort McNair now. Isn’t it an exciting town?”
“Not particularly,” I told her. It wasn’t—very few tiny towns are especially exciting after midnight. This one was no exception, with its tree-shaded lanes and green-shuttered houses. It might be a fine place to live, but
I’d hate to visit there.
“You’re now almost out of Fort McNair, Roy.”
“That was quick.”
“Wasn’t it? There’s his house, on the other side of that open field. See it?”
I nodded.
“Open fields on every side. He likes peace and quiet. It should make everything easier for us, don’t you think?”
I nodded again. I had slowed the car down and we were coasting in now. I pulled to a stop in front of the field she had mentioned and looked beyond it to Sutton’s house. All the lights were out. There was a car in the driveway, a late-model Lincoln.
“He’s home,” she said. “That’s his car, the only one he’s got. So he’s home.”
“Asleep?”
“He must be. Or in bed, anyway. He might have a girl with him, Roy.”
“Not with the lights out,” I said.
“Why not?”
“Because you can’t take pictures in the dark.”
That made her blush a little. She turned off the blush, took out a cigarette and let me light it for her. “The front door’s probably locked,” she said. “How good are you with locks?”
“Fairly good.”
“You’re a talented guy, Roy. Okay, you go in the front door. The stairs are straight ahead, one flight of stairs up to the second floor. His bedroom’s right at the landing.”
“Bedroom?”
“That’s where he keeps the pictures. He has them in this metal lockbox that he keeps under the bed. You can just take the whole box. You don’t have to open it.”
She was an amazing girl. I took another long look at the house and the car, then a shorter look at Jill. She was waiting for me to say something.
“That’s all I have to do,” I said. “Merely pick the lock, head up the stairs, sneak into the bedroom where he’s either sleeping or making love to someone, crawl under the bed, grab the lockbox, and leave.”
“Uh-huh.”
I said: “You must be out of your mind.”
“Can you think of a better way?”
I thought of a great many superior methods, such as turning the car around on the instant and driving directly back to Cliff’s End. I suggested a few methods of this nature and she frowned at me. She looked extremely unhappy.
You Could Call It Murder Page 9