I said: “Sure, I catch. But listen. About this woman business.”
“Yes?”
I winked at Kewpie and said: “You might as well know, I won't work unless I've got women around me. I'm the type that has to have women around. Can you get 'em for me?”
“Sure! Sure! Sure, mister.”
I said: “And you just getting through telling me that piano players were the pimps. Shame on you.”
Kewpie and I turned and headed back for the bar. I looked back, as we went through the door, and Gino Rucci was standing by the piano and staring after us.
He was scratching his head and showing a lot of gold teeth in a grin and I figured my crack was probably more truth than poetry.
We had drinks and dinner—on the house. Rucci himself came back to us and asked if everything was okey. Then I ambled over to the piano and started noodling around, getting the feel of it. It was good, and in tune. Kewpie showed signs of wanting to sing and I didn't want that so early in the evening, so I said:
“Listen, kid! Call up the hotel and get the kid. Tell him to go out and get himself something to eat, if he hasn't already done it. Tell him that if he wants to, he can come out. Tell him to take a cab.”
Kewpie said, very quickly: “I though he was broke and hitch-hiking?”
I said, just as quickly: “And I thought you didn't have nose trouble?”
He grinned and went looking for a phone booth. He came back in a couple of minutes, said: “He wasn't in. He'd left no message because I asked for one.”
I said he was probably out getting himself some dinner and just happened to turn my head toward the door.
In came Lester. He had his glasses on and they hid his eyes, but I'm willing to bet he was wild-eyed behind them. He looked proud and scared, all at the same time. He was with a big blonde wench that out-weighted him by at least forty pounds. She had on more than just a paint job. She was practically enameled. She had curves in the right places but she curved too much. And she was wearing a slinky, sneaky evening gown that brought the curves out to perfection. Far too much so. I thought of all the honky-tonks I'd worked and all the madames I'd known and couldn't think of a one that could hold a candle to this one. She out-madamed them all.
Lester saw me, waved a hand, very weakly, and she took him in tow and headed for a booth. I jerked my head at him and he stopped her and they had an argument for a moment. Lester won out. She went in the booth and he came over to the piano.
I said: “Where in Christ's name did you pick up the ut-slay? Or is it the other way around?”
He blushed and said feebly: “Now, Shean, you shouldn't talk like that.”
“Why not?”
“She's a very nice lady.”
“For my dough, she's a bum. I'll admit she's a big bum, though.”
“She's a very nice lady,” he argued again.
“Who is she?”
“Her name is Mrs. Heber. Well, there's more to it than that. It's really Mrs. Hazel George-Wolff-Heber. She's a ... a divorcee, I guess.”
I said: “What d'ya mean guess? You know damn well.”
He admitted he knew damn well.
“Where'd you meet her?”
“Well, I was in the lobby. Sitting there and waiting for you to come back. She was sitting by me. She got up and left her purse and I returned it to her. That's all. We just sort of ... well, sort of got talking and she wanted to come out here.”
“You're no help to me, kid. You're supposed to be a hitchhiker I picked up. That's what I told Kewpie, anyway.”
He got on the defensive and said: “I don't see why you told him that.”
“I had reasons. Now listen. From now on your story is you're a college kid on a lark. You started hitch-hiking to Reno, just because your room-mate told you you didn't have the nerve. I'll tell Kewpie the same thing. Does this big tart know you've got any money?”
“Well ... I ... ugh...”
I said: “You put on a flash, hunh? Showed the bankroll That it?”
“Well, we had a couple of drinks before I left town. She... ugh... may have that idea.”
“Does she know you're supposed to be a detective?”
“Of course not, Shean!” He sounded indignant on this. “I know enough to keep my mouth shut.”
I said: “There's two sides to that argument. Yours and mine. Okey. Go on back to her. Tell her that I'm the guy that rode you in here. Let it go at that.”
“Are you working here?”
I grinned and said: “Anyway for tonight. I want to see something.”
“What?”
“The kind of women Gino Rucci can dig up.”
He looked at me as though I was crazy. I quit riding him and said: “It's this way, kid. I've got to get close to the Wendel woman in some way. The Chief told me not to try and talk to her.”
Lester looked indignant and said: “He can't do that. This is a free country; you've got a right to talk to somebody, certainly.”
I said: “Okey, kid, you're right and the world's wrong. Remember this is Reno. Remember this Chief should know what he's talking about.”
“What did he say, Shean?”
“He didn't come right out with it but he just the same as said what I told you. Now run along; I'm supposed to be working.”
He went back to his booth and blonde.
CHAPTER SIX
ABOUT half an hour later I was just stalling around, on what I could remember of the SARI waltzes. There was nobody dancing; only about a dozen couples in the booths, though the bar was packed and noisy. Lester came over and grinned at me and said:
“Shean, will you play something we can dance to?”
I said: “Sure, if you hit the kitty. And don't put in two hits Go first class with a buck.”
He looked pained and split the difference with a half dollar and I started out with a slow fox-trot. Kewpie came over and started to bellow out the chorus, and I couldn't decide whether that or his saxophone playing was worse.
I knew he'd do both, too enthusiastically, through the evening, and that I'd have a chance to decide. Lester and his blonde and two other couples started to cavort around and when Kewpie got through with his chorus he decided he'd take his sax out of wraps. He started to unpack it and I started to go to town on the tune.
It was an old-timer. BREEZE. The one that blew the gal away, according to the lyrics. An old Goodwin and Hanley number. A honey to go to town on. I got hot on it; it was always a pet of mine, and I could see two good-sized parties leave the bar and head for the back room and dance floor. Some of them started to dance and some went in the booths and I put in a few more licks for good measure and quit just in time because Kewpie had the mouthpiece on his sax and was showing signs of joining in, dry reed and all.
Lester came over right then. He took off his glasses and started polishing them and his eyes looked as big as saucers. He hissed at me:
“One of them's the Wendel woman! Hazel told me!”
I looked over at Kewpie, who was mouthing his sax reed and looking interested. Lester got the idea and said loudly: “That was fine, Shean! D'ya know WHERE OR WHEN?”
“That's a show tune. I don't know whether this place has got a license to play that sort of stuff.” I looked at the kitty and then at Kewpie. And then winked.
Lester was getting smart. He bounced another fifty cent piece in the cat and Kewpie said: “That's working, Shean, old kid. That's the stuff to give the troops. If they think we're working here because we like music they're nuts. What key you taking it in?”
I said: “E flat, and if you play flat on that damned thing I'll take it away from you and shove it down your neck.”
He said happily: “The same old Shean!” and we started out.
Things got going good by eleven o'clock. I'd spotted the Wendel woman by then and the crowd she was with and had been paying more attention to them than I had to the music —though this didn't seem to make any difference to anybody. Rucci had brought over at l
east ten assorted women and all of them had gushed over the music and said it must be wonderful to be able to play like that. The old line. Assorted women is right; blondes, brunettes, and one red head. All of them the same general type, however. Looking for excitement and all drinking too much by far.
The Wendel party was the exception, apparently they were nursing their drinks. There were six in the bunch, altogether; and my boss, Rucci, and a startlingly blonde gal he seemed to favor sat with them the bulk of the time.
The Wendel girl was prettier than I'd thought she'd be from her picture. Medium-sized, quite dark, and apparently not too fond of talking. At least she seemed to spend most of her time either listening or dancing.
There was a big bald-headed man that I thought might well be her lawyer, Crandall. Very boisterous in manner but the kind of manner that doesn't mean a thing. All on the surface. He had light blue eyes that didn't look merry at any time. Just smart and cagy. A tough baby, I figured.
There were two men that might have been twins, though they didn't look at all alike. The same type, exactly. My guess was private cops and that they were the guards Wendel and Joey Free had mentioned.
They had two girls with them and the less said about the girls the better. They both looked as if they should have been working for Lester's big blonde divorcee mama. That is, if the big tramp was running the kind of place that she looked as though she should be running.
It bothered me, this last. I couldn't figure why nice people like this Wendel girl would be out with such trash. And apparently friendly with Rucci and his girl friend.
But I kept on playing, sitting sidewise on the bench so I could watch the dancers, and pretty soon I decided I had the answer. The whole crowd was the same; just a mixture. You'd see girls that had lady written all over them dancing with men that had hustler written as —plainly.
And the opposite. Decent-looking men playing around with tramps.
I just put it down to Reno and let it go.
Kewpie and I quit at four and there was still a crowd. My arms and hands ached from whaling away at the box and my head ached worse from hearing Kewpie sing and play consistently out of tune. He had damned little more idea of pitch than an alley tom-cat. And Rucci had kept on bringing gals over and introducing me but hadn't brought any of the Wendel crowd.
He'd tried to please; I'll give him that. He kept sending out to the bar for drinks for Kewpie and me until I told him plenty. I hadn't lied; one hell of a lot of the customers had done the same and we didn't want to take a shingle from the roof and tell them no. Kewpie and I cut thirty-one dollars and sixty cents, which wasn't bad for a week night, and he said: “You see, Shean! I told you this was a good spot and it is. Kewpie knows, by God! We'll do better over the week-end always, and when we get a live one in we'll really go to town. Wait until Monday night.”
“Why wait until Monday?” I asked.
He grinned and said: “It ain't any different than any [' other sporting town, Shean. A bunch of the gals lay off on Monday, because it's a slack night for them, and they give the spot a play. A lot of them will hustle a John who's good for dough and bring him along. And any dumb prostitute will spend as much as a dozen business men herself. You know that.”
I said I had that recollection, even though I'd been out of the business for a little while. We ate, then drove back to If the hotel, and Kewpie walked on to the rooming house he was honoring, after telling me he'd drop up and see me around noon the next day.
I parked the car and went up to the room and didn't find Lester. He'd left the club around two and he'd told me he was going to take the big bum home, then go to bed. He'd had about five more drinks than he could really hold and I'd told him it was a good idea. Just about the time I'd decided to call the desk and find out if the big gal was registered in the hotel, he came in.
He'd been pretty well plastered when he left the club and now he really had a load. I looked at him and said:
“Well, well! And you the boy that doesn't believe in drinking. Maybe it was something you ate.”
He didn't answer me. He just waved his hands in front of his face and stumbled for the bathroom. I followed him in and kept him from taking a header while he heaved, then said: “This ought to be a lesson, kid. You're just one of the kind that can't take it. This ought to show you.”
He said, in an all-gone voice: “I couldn't help it, Shean. She kept saying 'Let's have another one, honey' and what could I say? I couldn't very well tell her I didn't believe in drinking.”
“Why not?” He managed to straighten up a little. “It wouldn't have been polite.”
I'd been trying to keep from laughing, but this was too much. I asked: “Did you slap her face, or were you too drunk?”
He looked puzzled and asked what that meant. I said: “Hell! Usually when I'm trying to make a gal and get her too drunk she passes out on me. If she don't get that drunk, she's still sober enough to slap my face. Did you give in?”
He said: “My God, Shean! I'm sick! Don't rib me now. I can't stand it!”
I said: “That's just your notion,” and proved him wrong during the time it took him to get to bed. This was about an hour. He'd get a shoe off and then have to make another run. He undressed in sections, as it were. I felt sorry for him, but I laid the lash on his back just the same.
He'd bawled me out for hangovers too many times. Though, of course, always in a polite way.
CHAPTER SEVEN
KIRBY called me at ten the next morning. I answered the phone and he said: “This is John Kirby. How about coming down for a little while?”
I said I could, as soon as I was dressed. He said that was fine and hung up, and Lester rolled over in bed and groaned:
“Who was that?”
I said: “The Chief, is all. Your Mrs. Heber has gone down and lodged a complaint against you.”
He came wide awake. He sat up in bed and said:
“WHAT!”
“Sure! You might have known. You can't get tough with a woman in this town and get away with it.”
“But Shean! I didn't do anything.”
“How in hell do you know you didn't? You were so stiff when you got home I could have propped you up against the wall. That happens lots of times, Lester. A man will do things and not remember them.”
I kept this up while I got dressed and I just about had him believing me by the time I'd finished. He was almost crying by then, and he said, just when I went out:
“Shean, I didn't do anything. Honest, I didn't.”
I said: “That's the beef, you clown,” and slammed the door. It was a shame to ride him but too good a chance to miss.
Kirby wasn't alone when I got to the station. He had a lantern-jawed, gabled-shouldered man with him whom lie introduced as Len MacIntosh. He added: “Len's with the Sheriff, Connell. We work together pretty well.”
I said I was glad to meet Mr. MacIntosh, even though I didn't know whether I meant it or not, and took a seat across the desk from the two of them. Kirby tossed a telegram across to me and said:
“From New York. They get action back there, those boys do. Twenty-four hours for this is all.”
The wire read FRANCINE DEBREAUX ARRIVED JULY THIRTY-TWO STOP TWICE MARRIED STOP WORKED FOR G L STODDARD STOP DISMISSED FOR THEFT STOP WORKED FOR GEORGE ARM-BRUSTER STOP ARRESTED FOR THEFT STOP TWO YEAR TERM IN BEDFORD STOP SERVED FIFTEEN MONTHS STOP NO FURTHER RECORD STOP REFERENCES GIVEN US FALSE STOP
It was signed by somebody in the Identification Bureau. I said: “That's nice work, Chief. It's a wonder she wasn't deported.”
“They don't deport them that easily,” he said. “Chances are, nobody thought it was worth the bother. D'ya notice that bit about references?”
I said: “That would be a cinch for her. She probably made some connection while she was in the gow. Forged references would be a cinch and the average person doesn't bother to check them.”
Kirby picked up the phone and called a number. He asked to speak to Mrs.
Ruth Wendel, got her after a wait, and asked: “Mrs. Wendel. Did you bother to check your maid's references before you hired her a year ago? I have a reason for asking.”
There was another wait, then I could hear tinny sounds coming from the phone. Kirby said: “Thank you!” hung up the receiver and told me:
“She says she didn't bother. That the girl seemed careful and competent and she just didn't bother.”
I said: “Okey, then you've got it. She had fake references. But now you got it what does it mean?”
He said slowly: “It means this. This French maid was a crook. Or at least she'd been one. Maybe some person she'd crossed back in New York followed her out here and knifed her. Maybe she'd had an affair with the knife man back there and the guy followed her. It's something to go on.”
“I can't see it,” I argued. “I don't blame you for passing the buck back to New York but I can't see it. It's a local mess, I think.”
“We've checked that woman for the time she's been here and she wasn't out with a soul. That's out. She made no contacts that could lead to murder. Isn't that right, Len?”
Len MacIntosh said that was right; that his office had assisted in the check and the Debreaux woman had met no one and had gone out with no one. He reached in his pocket for cigarettes, passed the package to me and said:
“Have one?”
I looked and saw they were Turkish, the kind the young gals smoke when they want to be devilish. I said no, that I always smoked my own kind, and the long lean hungry-looking bird said: “I can't sand those. I have to have them mild like these. Never smoke any other kind.”
This, with him looking like the breath of the old West, mind you.
Kirby said thoughtfully: “I wanted to tell you this, Connell, because I think Wendel is mixed up with this murder someway. I know you're in the clear, of course. But I don't know anything about him.”
I said: “My good God! The poor devil's nuts about his wife. That's all that's the matter with him. He couldn't have murdered this girl; he was at the same party I was, at the time it happened. You can check it.”
42 Days for Murder Page 3