The Noir Novel

by Thomas B. Dewey

  “Look, wise guy. Let well enough alone.”

  “Hate me all you want to, but I think you better keep an eye on her.”

  “Jason, we don’t need no Percy the Poets telling us our business. Keep outa this. I got enough troubles.”

  “I’m just trying to be a good citizen. How did you make out with Louise Schmidt’s ex-husband, whatever his name is—”

  He muttered something Irish and unprintable and cut the connection.

  He was in a tight spot. The Herald had been giving him and his department and the Commissioner an editorial raking over. And several angry letters had been printed in the Forum, wondering what the police were doing about traffic fatalities.

  So far Riley had kept the TT information out of his reports to the press, which maybe was a mistake, because other people in Layton, not known by him or me or our friends, might also be getting spook calls. It seemed to me the more calls reported the easier it would be to pinpoint the source. But that was his business. Anyway, I had offered to help. And I didn’t envy him at all.

  I called Henry and asked him how he’d made out with Chester Vently.

  “Mark, I had my ribs re-taped today—I ain’t feeling so hot. Maybe in a day or two.”

  I made sympathetic noises.

  “Oh—I found out one thing. His neighbor’s got a mean German shepherd. Going out there at night might be kind of risky.”

  “No doubt. Take it easy—I’ll be in touch.”

  That evening I looked up Chester’s number, plugged in, and gave it a buzz. It rang seven times before I gave up. I waited a while and dialed again. No answer.

  During the day, against Schiller’s orders, I had tried my legs out, found them not so bad. I could get around. Sometimes I think these docs pour it on a little just to be on the safe side. Basically, it’s good psychology. But I had things to do, and maybe the nerves would come around better if I gave them something to chew on.

  Next I called a cab driver I knew, and prepared to embark, not this time as Percy the Poet. My only weapons were a pocket knife and a small flashlight, ordinary enough to be carrying, in case I got stopped.

  During the day I had also made inquiries by phone about a certain stew-bum named Eli Markham, ‘witness’ to the fog-shrouded death of Louise Schmidt. I learned that his hangout was Jumpy’s Tavern on lower Main, not far from my own diggings.

  When the cabbie arrived, I told him where to go. And don’t get the wrong idea—I went along with him.

  I hadn’t been downtown for a long time—but nothing important had changed. Just as much expensive neon tubing as ever, a few more vacant storefronts. The city was moving west and south into the suburbs, and lower Main had become skid-row.

  Jumpy’s place reeked with beer and something like unwashed socks. The usual line-up at the bar, heads turning, bleary eyes focusing on each newcomer, hoping for a live one. I sidled up the bar, not so much out of place because I had dressed accordingly. I hadn’t shaved. The hospital and city pallor was still with me.

  “Hi, tall and rugged.”

  The voice belonged to a bottle-blonde with a sagging face behind the bar.

  “Hi, yourself. Eli been around?”

  She lifted her large bosom and let it drop. “He’s sittin’ right over there.” She squinted at me. “You a cop?”

  I grinned and put a dollar bill on the plank. “No, honey. Do I look like one?”

  She snorted, glancing at the money. “No, you sure don’t—but we don’t want no stoolies around here—”

  “All I want to do is buy old Eli a drink.”

  “You won’t have no trouble. He likes dark port.”

  I pulled out another skin. “Give him a double and keep the change.”

  She nodded. I didn’t know Eli from the next one, so I followed her and homed in on my target.

  He sat at a table by the window, staring out at Main street. I sat down across from him as the wine was delivered. The blonde winked at me and waddled back to the bar. I wondered if she was Jumpy.

  Markham appeared to have had a slow day—he was fairly sober. His eyes didn’t track too well, and I’d noticed before I arrived that he had a tendency many older men have of talking to themselves, letting their lips move, their head nod occasionally. As though they were reliving past glories, reminiscing. “You buy this, mister?”

  I nodded.

  He squinted at me. “Now, that’s right kind! I ever seen you before?”

  “I don’t think so, Eli. Just say I’m a friend of a friend.”

  He nodded jerkily, lifting the glass. His gnarled hand was quite steady. Maybe he wasn’t as far gone as some people thought.

  “I wanted to ask you about the night this girl got run over,” I said. The juke box began to moan, and I had to raise my voice a little.

  He frowned, his lips moving silently again. I had a smoke and offered him one. He took it. I lit them, watching his eyes. They didn’t hold on mine.

  “You some insurance guy?”

  “Nope. Just a friend, remember.”

  “Sure. A real purty girl—too bad…”

  “Yes, it was bad,” I said. “The police ask you questions?”

  “Some. They think old Eli don’t know nothin’.”

  I dragged hard on my cigarette raised my arm and waved it toward the blonde. I held up two fingers. In a minute she brought another double, and I paid her. Eli gripped the fresh glass, his eyes brightening. “But you do know something,” I suggested.

  “I just know what I saw. I told ’em. They didn’t pay much attention—”

  “I get it. What did you tell them?”

  He squinted, blinking down at the dark port. “It ain’t no secret. I was walkin’ along in the fog, mindin’ my own business. Some cars goin’ by, but I didn’t pay no attention. Then I heard this groan out in the street. There’s a street light there on the corner, and I could see somebody lyin’ there—”

  I waited. He gulped more wine.

  “I—walked over there, an’ I see two of them, all stretched out on the pavement. Jesus! The girl was bleedin’ something awful—I touched the guy, and he let out a groan. He kinda turned and looked up—”

  I sighed. I fiddled with my cigarette trying to get an idea. “When you were walking along, did you hear the car—hit them?”

  He shook his head. “Musta been before I got there. The cars make a lotta noise. Not many that night, though. Most of ’em comin’ along D—”

  “A block south of where they were hit,” I said. “Yah.”

  “Did you hear anything else?”

  His off-track eyes raised, and one of them looked at me. “I did hear somethin’—kind of a curse, a bad one. Somebody in pain, before I went over there.”

  My stomach curled. Henry, half conscious, or crying out involuntarily at the driver who had knocked them there…

  I stood up, feeling queasy. “Thanks, old timer”

  He shrugged, staring down into his empty glass. I took a powder out the front door. Even the smog was a welcome change. I had another quick smoke, wishing I’d had a beer myself.

  I walked up the street to a cab stand and took the first one in line. I was tired and disgusted. I told the driver to take me home.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Back at the apartment, I was still restless. I had planned to visit Chester, and had decided to go down to Jumpy’s, where I hadn’t learned enough to fill a thimble. A rehash of what had been in the paper, and what Henry had told me—

  I still wanted to look Vently’s place over. Barely nine o’clock, and maybe—

  The phone rang. I’d forgotten to unplug it after I’d called a cab. I glared at the black thing and spit out a curse. It kept ringing.

  “Hello!” I yelled.

  I heard a faint gasp. “Is that the way you greet all your callers?”

  The voice was feminine and vaguely familiar.

  “Not the ladies,” I said. “Not if they sound young and promising.”

  “Disg
usting!” she answered, and then I had it.

  “You’re slipping, Rita. Calling a man—”

  “Is that what you call yourself?”

  “Some gals think so. Why are you spooking me? Slumming, just for kicks?”

  “Oh—!” She cut the connection.

  I shrugged and had myself a grin. Miss Ice Water had thawed enough to buzz me, anyway. I felt so much better, I gave Vently’s number a ring. All quiet on Exham hill.

  I had the cab driver let me out on a street behind the spread where Vently lived, gave him a tip and told him to come back to the same spot in half an hour.

  “That’s not very long, buddy,” he said.

  “Her husband’s due home early,” I answered.

  He snickered and drove off through the fog. I silently thanked the weatherman for providing this bit of cover for my nefarious doings. Provided I could find number seven, where he lived, and escape a certain demon on four legs. However, my exposed position between one street lamp and a row of bare locust trees rising in the misty blackness reminded me that I ought to be much more afraid of another demon on two legs.

  Houses out here were scattered, far back from the road. A few lights struggled through the fog, but not enough to give me any peace of mind. My legs protested the chilly dampness.

  I found a sidewalk that looked like it would take me to the Exham, but didn’t use it. I stayed on the grass. The click of heels might arouse our German. As soon as buildings loomed ahead, I circled through a weedy field and reached the rear area without incident.

  Henry had given me an idea about where to look, and sure enough, I found it. Lights burned in the apartment next door, but number seven was separated from it by a carport, empty.

  Now the fog didn’t seem quite so ominous—and it had certain advantages for anyone planning to break and enter. I saw the shine of glass, located a rear double window and quietly fiddled around with it. No screens. Maybe taken down for the winter.

  Neither window would budge. I slipped through frosty grass to another. A screen here. I found the release and undid it. A metallic snap as it unfolded didn’t do my nerves any good.

  I waited and listened. No human or canine barking. The faint groan of a TV set from next door. A car went by slowly, fighting the smog. I fooled with this window and it gave.

  I slid it up, feeling nice warm air. Slick curtains, the drip of a faucet. Probably a bathroom. I had no trouble getting in—my arms and shoulders were always good, and once upon a time, my legs had been good, too.

  I nearly fell in the bathtub.

  Once over it, I closed the window, my keen hearing unable to detect an adversary. I turned off the dripping faucet. The hot one, too. The power company would love me for that. Then, like a regular sneak-thief, I wiped the faucet handle with my handkerchief.

  I opened the bathroom door, sniffed, and moved into what my outstretched hands told me was a hallway. I used my flashlight sparingly. Hardwood floors, a carpet runner leading into a nice-sized living room. The drapes were drawn.

  Bypassing the large room, I slipped down the hall, searching for Vently’s ‘study.’ He was sure to have one. At the end of the hallway I found it. Also the door to his bedroom. His retreat seemed more promising, so I moved inside. Double windows, the ones I had tried first, looked out on the weedy lot. I drew the heavy drapes. No other windows, so I risked turning the light on.

  When my eyes quit hurting, I discovered his den was decorated in a way that some people would call ‘cute.’ A yellow studio couch, red chairs, solid black floor. Olive drapes and walls and a white ceiling. The switch at the door had turned on a carmine-shaded lamp over his desk. The whole thing was too too.

  A classy portable typewriter sat on a swing-out stand. Neatly covered, of course. A black file cabinet with feminine bric-a-brac on top drew my eyes. I eased over there and found it locked.

  Temporarily stymied, I ran an eye over his desk. No ashtrays. Everything spic and span, even the wastebasket. A few books sat carelessly on the back of his desk between onyx bookends. Roget’s latest, a Webster dictionary, several books on how to write poetry, a few copies of Jasmine & Lace. A pink telephone.

  Had any of my spook calls originated here?

  No writing pads in sight, and the desk drawers were locked. Very careful, our Chester.

  And what had I expected to find? A synopsis of how all the murders had been committed?

  I wandered over to the inside wall, where a large bookshelf held more promise. A pile of book-club novels, volumes of verse, a set of Shakespeare that looked untouched, Currier & Ives reproductions. No psychological stuff, all very normal—except maybe copies of his own book, Drifting Leaves, printed as I had expected, by a vanity publisher.

  Then I made a definite find. Hidden between the covers of an ordinary Atlas, neatly bound into it, was some fancy erotica. Pictures and texts. European and some Japanese, with no holds-barred.

  While thus engrossed, I heard the purr of a sports car. Coming too close to be out in the road. I made a dive for the light switch.

  I got it, all right, but I fell on my side, one foot slipping on his damned black floor, and when I straightened out it hurt so bad I nearly fainted.

  I cursed between clenched teeth, hearing car doors slam. I got on my feet, heading for the bathroom, and nearly went down again.

  Now they were on the front porch. Sweat dribbled down my back. I couldn’t make it. Cursing and gasping, both quietly, I limped quickly back into Chester’s study just as the front door opened. A light came on in the living room.

  I eased behind the study door, leaning against the wall, breathing so hard I was sure they’d hear it over their conversation. My left leg throbbed like it had knives stuck in it. The kicks had gone clear out of this adventure.

  When the pain eased I figured I would have to get out a study window. If I couldn’t walk over to them, maybe I could crawl…

  Meanwhile my ears caught two recognizable voices—Chester’s, of course, and Mrs. Snark’s. Their conversation didn’t sound very bookish.

  “—after all,” she was saying, “You didn’t have to stare at her all evening!”

  “Now, Teresa—I didn’t.”

  She came out with a very unladylike snort. “Wiggling around like a trollop—showing herself off to that nasty impostor…”

  I had a grin. They were rehashing the ‘meeting.’

  “—and that little snip of a Fay—not much better, if you ask me!”

  Her voice wasn’t moving, so it must be Chester out in the kitchen, making glasses clink, ice cubes rattle. Then the pulse of recorded music, an odor of cigarette smoke. Chester didn’t use them. Everything indicated that the President of the Jollies was preparing to let her hair down.

  The conversation sagged along a while, the music trilled and throbbed. I was on my knees, moving toward my goal, when a few words stopped me.

  “—you know that Jason’s background…”

  “You’ve lived here longer than I, Teresa…”

  “He’s a snoop! Kind of a trashy amateur detective—”

  “No!” he gasped.

  “Oh, I’ve done some checking. He could be dangerous, honey—”

  “You’re imagining things!”

  “Well, if it ever came out…”

  “Shhh. Have another drink, darling. He looked like a clown to me.”

  “You were sure whooping it up for him!”

  He cleared his throat. “And so were you, my dear, until you read the paper the next morning.”

  “All right!”

  That stopped him for a while. Finally: “Oh, Teresa, why don’t you get dressed and stop worrying about such a simpleton. Really! ‘Silent Recitation…’”

  And why was she dressing? I was used to having women do it the other way.

  I was making progress toward the double windows when I heard a throaty giggle. Chester’s neigh. Glasses with ice in them tinkled. The lights in the living room dimmed.

  I made it
to the draperies, leaned against the desk and got up on my one good leg. I pulled the heavy cloth aside, found the latch and turned it, carefully. I figured they were having too much to drink and do to bother me—unless Chester happened to come hunting for a book of poems. I didn’t think he would.

  The window slid up easily. I could use my arms now, and there was no pain until I got my bad leg over the sill and swung it downward. I nearly screamed. I dangled there, sweating, as the opened study door framed a section of the living room.

  Now my good leg was on the ground, and the cold air seemed to revive me. I inched the window down. It would be unlatched, but perhaps Chester wouldn’t notice.

  I moved away through the fog and darkness like a defeated, wounded beast. My stomach curled with disgust.

  Just before skinning out of the window, my new position had put me in line with the living room. And I had paused, even in pain, to gawk at the two occupants—Chester all made up like a woman, down to negligee and nylons, and Mrs. Snark in masculine shirt and trousers, her hair combed severely back, like a man’s.

  It takes all kinds.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  When I finally got home I was completely dogged out. My cab driver had been late, and I’d got a chill standing out there in the cold. He’d asked me if I’d had any luck, and I said no, she’d tossed me out.

  I took some pain-killers Schiller had left, had a can of beer, and the ache in my left leg began to ease off. But the pain in my head hadn’t. I’d learned very little, if anything. Mrs. Snark and Chester had something they didn’t want exposed, but I wouldn’t want it known I was cutting queer capers, either. Especially in a burg the size of Layton. It would ruin President Snark’s social standing, and might possibly get them in legal tangles, too.

  It seemed improbable they would be collaborating on a mess like this one.

  I was thinking about beddy-bye when a familiar stride on the ramp moved me, cursing and hurting, back into my chair and under the old lap-robe. I rolled over to the back door, waiting.

  A knock, the usual remarks, and I unlocked. Goofy Joe came in. To strangers, Joe is something of a shock. Small and stooped, with a tiny monkey-shaped head, beetling brows and too-dark skin, he was probably very near to being what is unpopularly known as a mongolian throwback, and what in reality is living proof that heredity can play mean tricks in any family.