Murder in High Places

by Hugh Pentecost

  "I have a beef stew keeping warm for you in a chafing dish," Cardoza told me. "French bread, a green salad."

  "Oh brother!" I said. "I've got to see the boss. I'll be down as quick as I can."

  Mr. Paul Dumont, Welch's last caller of the day, seemed unimportant when I got up to the roof. Mitchell Prescott was there with Chambrun when I walked into Penthouse 1. Chambrun looked almost out on his feet.

  '*No question anymore," Prescott told me. **The man who visited Welch wasn't Martin Steams. Steams is in Tel Aviv. I got him on the phone, talked to him personally. He never got a message from Welch. Of course he wasn't here."

  '^Does Welch know?"

  *'I was about to go across to tell him," Prescott said.

  "Go with him, Mark," Chambmn said.

  We hadn't gone ten feet toward Penthouse 3 when a dark shadow loomed up from behind Mrs. Haven's quarters to block our way. It was Jericho. A flash-hght shone in our faces.

  ''We'd better arrange some kind of signal," the giant artist said. "Another time I might not bother to find out who it is." His light switched off.

  I told him what the news was we were taking to Welch.

  "I'll go with you, if you don't mind," Jericho said.

  Larry Welch hadn't turned in. I guess it wasn't a night for sleeping for any of us. I thought he'd put a pretty good dent in the bottle of bourbon on the sideboard. He listened to Prescott with a look of disbelief on his face.

  *'If the man who came here with Martin Stearns's credentials was a fake, why did he just walk away and leave me with the material I have? He could have polished me off right here, taken the stuff I have, and walked out without anyone paying any attention to him."

  ''He knew you weren't going to break your story till you'd talked to some other people,*' Prescott said. ''They have time to plan whatever it is they have in mind for you. You told this fake Steams who it was you were going to consult, where they were coming from?"

  Larry nodded. "Told him everything there is to know."

  "Paul Dumont?" I asked. "You told this fake Steams a Paul Dumont was coming to see you?"

  "God help me, yes."

  "Who is Paul Dumont?" Jericho asked.

  "A courier from my friend Claude Perrault in Paris," Larry said. "He brought me some more material Claude had dug up in Europe. Believing Stearns was Steams, I told him Dumont was bringing me evidence that would certainly help make my decision for me.

  "And did he?" Prescott asked.

  Larry's smile was grim. "I was sitting here when you arrived, thinking that if Steams saw what Ehi-mont brought, he would forget the advice he gave me

  about dropping the story. What Dumont brought me is a dincher."

  •'So you've answered your own question," Jericho said. ''When you told this fake Steams that more evidence was coming he had to have it—had to wait until you could receive it before he acted. Look, man, isn't it time you told us what this is all about? We need to know who to expect to be coming here after you.

  Larry shook his head. "I can't. I need a green light from someone in authority before I can tell any-thing.'^

  **Who has that authority?" Jericho asked.

  "Who knows? Maybe only the secretary of state or the president himself! Understand something, Jericho. I'm sitting on a ticking bomb. It's going to explode no matter what anyone does. If I break my story, it will explode in one place; if I turn over what I have to someone in authority, it will explode but the damage may be different; if it falls into the hands of these bastards who are after it, it will explode somewhere else! There are two men coming here tomorrow whose judgment I will trust. I've got to sit tight until then."

  "Who are these men who are coming?" Prescott asked.

  "I can't tell you," Larry said.

  "You're going to let them just walk into what may be waiting for them here?" Jericho asked. "You've told your enemies who's coming."

  **The fake Steams, you mean?"

  **You say you told him who you were going to consult/*

  **If they knew Steams was supposed to be coming, they'll know who else is supposed to be coming,'' Piescott said.

  "They know now, for sure," Jericho said. *'If you won't tell us, at least give than a chance to decide whether or not to come."

  "Or arrange a different meeting place," Prescott said.

  Larry glanced at me and I saw a question in his eyes. Was it all right to tell Prescott he couldn't move somewhere else because of the Betsy Ruysdale situation. I know Chambmn didn't want anyone in an official position to know. Larry made his own decision.

  "I can't let these people who are coming know because they're traveling. I have no idea how to reach th«n," Larry said. "I can't relocate somewhere else because they won't know how to find me. I have to sit this out here, through tomorrow at least."

  Prescott looked grim. "If this tums out to be something that will come my way in Washington, Larry, I'm not likely to forget that your hunger for a journalistic scoop kept you from taking help from me, from Chambran, from Jericho."

  "It isn't the story that matters," Larry said. "Not any longer. If the man who was here this afternoon

  wasn't Steams, then the wrong people know exactly what I know and how I can prove it. I could never put a word down on paper and it would still be too dangerous for these people. They know I won't forget what I've discovered and it won't be safe for them to let me walk around with it stored away in my memory."

  **So sooner or later you're a loser," Prescott said. "Give us a chance to help you."

  "Like I told you, it's a ticking bomb," Larry said. "I told Steams—or whoever he was—I needed advice on who to hand it to. They'll know where to toss it, where to explode it. Once that's done I've got a chance. It won't matter anymore whether I know or not. The whole world will know when the damned thing goes off."

  Prescott shmgged. "It's your funeral," he said. "If you can't make your own decisions, you shouldn't be handling explosives. If you change your mind, I can provide you with the most sophisticated kind of help there is."

  "I know," Larry said, "but I have to wait. The people who are coming to see me tomorrow will have the answer I need."

  I have to say that I didn't know then whether Larry was inventing a gaudy melodrama to keep from telling Prescott that Betsy Ruysdale was under the gun somewhere, or whether what he told us was for real.

  In any event, Chambrun's secret was intact for the moment.

  Jericho gave Larry a kind of twisted smile. **You hear that little spaniel of Mrs. Haven's yipping, Larry, hide under the bed till you're sure it's a false alarm.'*

  Jericho and Prescott and I started back across the roof, and, sure enough, Toto sounded a shrill warning.

  ''Nasty little beast," Jericho said cheerfully.

  '*You started your painting yet?" Prescott asked.

  '*In a sense, yes," Jericho said. ''The first step in starting a painting is studying the subject. Paint and canvas will come tomorrow, when the light's right."

  Prescott chuckled. "You shacked up with Queen Victoria?"

  "About forty years too late for what you're suggesting." Jericho said. "But, yes, I am the lady's houseguest." He stopped outside the front door of Penthouse 2. "See you around."

  Prescott and I rejoined Chambrun. The Man was sitting in a chair by his desk, head bent forward, his heavy eyelids closed. He looked up with a start as we came in.

  "I must have dozed off," he said.

  Prescott gave him the essence of what had happened in Penthouse 3. "If Welch isn't buUing us, you ought to provide him with extra protection if you don't want another murder in your hotel, Pierre."

  "He hasn't asked for anything extra," Chambrun said, **and until he does I'm mainly concerned with the one murder I've got. Welch isn't going to be murdered while the place is swarming with cops and reporters."

  I knew what he was thinking. Ruysdale!

  My job was to keep circulating while the night life was still active in the Beaumont. I might be of us
e somewhere, and I could act as a shield between Oiambrun and the press, who were eager to get his version of things.

  I was beginning to feel something like pain in my stomach, which I guessed was the result of slow starvation. I went down to the lobby, hoping Cardoza hadn't lost patience with me and was still keeping that beef stew hot! I knew I should have trusted him.

  "Ready when you are," he told me, standing by the red velvet rope that blocked off new customers from an already overcrowded room. "Lady goes on again in about ten minutes."

  "Maybe I'd better go back to her dressing room for a moment before I eat," I said.

  "It's your stomach," Cardoza said.

  I went around backstage to the dressing rooms and knocked on the door with the gold star on it. Hilda called out a "Come in!" She was sitting in front of her dressing table mirror, working on the finishing touches of her stage makeup.

  *'You brute!" she said to my reflection in the mirror.

  I went over behind her and put my hands on her shoulders. I knew from experience that this wasn't a "hug-and-kiss" time. That would endanger the makeup so painstakingly applied.

  "It's kind of a madhouse," I told her. "It's on radio and TV and half the nightcrawlers in the city are dropping by to see what there is to see."

  She looked up at me, still in the mirror, and the fake eyelashes she wore onstage helped to make her eyes look wide as saucers. "I—I never thought I'd be scared," she said.

  "Scared of what?" I asked her.

  "Him," she said, "that creep! It's been hours and the police hav^i't caught up with him. Or have they?"

  I shook my head.

  "It's everywhere that I saw him just before he killed that poor guy, that I helped identify him for the cops. If he's some kind of a psycho, he may come back here, looking for me."

  "The place is overrun with cops and security people," I said. "Just stay inside the hotel till they catch up with him and you couldn't be safer."

  "When do you get off, Mark?" she asked.

  "Closing time; probably around three o'clock."

  "Could I—could I wait for you in your place?" she asked. "I—I'd feel better to know you were coming and would be there."

  J

  *'Of course," I said. ''But I have to warn you I may not be much of a lover this time around. Vm just about out on my feet."

  She turned around and looked directly at me. ''Sometimes you just need to be close to someone you care about," she said. She reached up and touched my cheek with her fingers. "I care for you, Mr. Haskell."

  "That's made my day," I said. I bent down to kiss her but she leaned away.

  "You'll spoil my face," she said. "I've got to get moving now, Mark."

  "I'll see you as soon as they'll let me up," I said.

  Cardoza had saved me a little comer table out front-I could take a lot of space describing his beef stew, but it's really not part of the story. It's enough to say that it made a new man of me. While I was eating it the lights dimmed and Billy Chard came out onstage to a ripple of applause, and began doing some ups and downs on the piano. Then Hilda came out and they tore the place apart for her. She leaned against the piano and began singing Jerome Kern's great old song from Show Boat.

  He's just my Bill, An ordinary man...

  Wherever Helen Morgan is—here or in the hereafter—she would have to be jealous if she were listening.

  I finished my stew and slipped out quietly while Hilda was still doing her thing. The lobby had a strange feeling of being out of order. Cops and reporters, who didn't normally belong, seemed to be everywhere. I couldn't take three stq)s in any direction without someone stopping me to ask if there was anything new.

  A little after two o'clock I saw people flooding out of the Blue Lagoon and I knew that morning's playtime was coming to an end. I checked out with Mike Maggio, told him I'd be in my apartment if there was any kind of crisis.

  He gave me what might be classified as a leer. "I don't imagine you'll be up to any kind of crisis but your own," he said. *'The lady went up to your place not long ago."

  '*She wearing a sign?" I asked.

  **We're just not letting people wander around tonight without asking them where and why," Mike said. "She told me where—but not why!"

  Mike's comedy at that hour of the morning didn't enchant me. I took an elevator up to two and walked along the corridor to the door of my apartment. The south end of the second floor includes Chambrun's suite of offices, the accounting department—closed for the night—my place, and my office at the east end of the corridor—also closed for the night. I unlocked

  J

  the door to my place and went in. There were a couple of lights burning in the living room, but no Hilda. I walked over to the bedroom door, and in the light from the living room I saw her stretched out on my bed.

  **Better late than never," I said.

  She didn't answer, I walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed beside her. "Hey, wake up,*' I said.

  She didn't respond and I reached out and turned on the light on the bedside table. I think I came as close to screaming as I have ever come in my life. Her tongue was sticking out of her mouth, swollen and dark with blood. Her eyes seemed to be popping out of her head, staring at the ceiling. There were cruel marks and scratches on her throat.

  Hilda had been strangled to death.

  Part Three

  IT'S HARD TO describe how I felt in that moment of horror. I am not totally unaccustomed to violence. It has happened in Chambrun's world over the years I've worked for him, just as it happens in the outside world multipUed by thousands. Violent things, some of a criminal nature, some by way of accidents, have happened to people I know. Less than ten hours ago Bob Ballard, someone I knew and liked through my job, had been brutally murdered. But this was something else! I had held this once lovely girl in my arms, laughed and joked with her, and made exciting love with her.

  I think I should say here—so that you won't be feeling sorry for me in the wrong way—that when I say I was **in love forever" with Hilda it was a joke of sorts. I knew that when her engagement at the Blue Lagoon was ended and she moved on to her next job in some other city it would be over. I'm not a guy who is partial to the one-night stand. I like a period of time with someone, a few days, a few weeks, a few months if it pans out. Someday I think it will be '^forever" with someone. With Hilda? It might have been, it could have been. It wasn't to be.

  I reached for the telephone on the bedside table and asked to be connected with Jerry Dodd. He'd turned in after hours on the go and he answered, sleepy and a little angry at being disturbed.

  **rm in my apartment," I told him. ''Hilda Harding is here. She's been strangled, Jerry. She's dead."

  Jerry has a cop's mind. ''Don't touch anything," he said.

  "Police?" I said.

  "I'll handle it," Jerry said. "You want me to call Chambrun?"

  "If you will. I'm just not—"

  "I understand. Stay put. Don't touch anything!"

  I didn't follow his instructions to the letter. I went into the bathroom and took a clean towel off the rack there. I contemplated the possibility of throwing up, and then I realized that the turmoil I felt in my gut was a fierce, growing anger, not nausea. I went back into the bedroom and covered that ghastly face with a hand towel. I was telling myself that Hilda wouldn't want anyone to see her that way. It was absurd, of course, because the police would look at her, and the medical examiner's boys, and the police photographers.

  I went out into the living room. A couple of things I was going to touch in spite of Jerry's warning. They were a glass and a bottle of Jack Daniel's. I poured a good four ounces into a glass and drank it in one long gulp. It went down like water. I guess I was beyond feeling anything.

  Then Jerry was ringing my doorbell. He looked tense, like a tiger about to attack. '* Where is she?"

  **In the bedroom."

  I followed him as he streaked across the living room. He stood in the doorway. **You
found her hke that, towel over her face?"

  **I— I couldn't stand looking at her, or having anyone else see her the way she is."

  *'I told you not to touch anything!"

  '*I didn't touch anything but a clean towel—and a bottle and a glass on the sideboard in here."

  He went over, lifted the towel, and stood looking down at—what was there.

  **Jesus!" I heard him whisper. He turned back to me. "Hardy's on his way, you found her like this? What was she doing here?"

  '*Waiting for me," I said.

  "You brought her up here?"

  "She—she had a key."

  "Oh, brother, you don't know when she came, then?"

  "I saw her in the Lagoon just before she went on for her last show," I said. "She was scared. She asked if she could come up here and wait for me when I got off the hook."

  "Scared of what?';

  "The guy she identified for Hardy, Ballard's killer."

  "How did he get in? The door wasn't forced, was it left unlocked?"

  It was hard to go back over it. **It wasn't forced. It was locked when I came up here. I opened it with my own key."

  *'Whereisherkey?''

  **I don't know. In her purse, I suppose. You told me not to touch anything."

  He started to pick up her bag, which was lying on the floor beside the bed, and changed his mind. **ril leave that for Hardy," he said. ''God, Mark, I'm sorry. I know how hard it is for you to take. But two in less than twelve hours!"

  ''Chambrun?" I asked.

  *'He hoped you'd understand why he won't come running," Jerry said. *'He might be hearing from— someone."

  ''He thinks it may be connected with what's happened to Ruysdale?"

  "You said it yourself," Jerry said. "That man identified by your girl as Ballard's killer. 'Wrong man at the wrong time in the wrong place.' Isn't that what Ruysdale's kidnapper said to the boss on the phone?" He looked back at Hilda's body. "When did you give her the key?"

  "A week ago, I guess. She and I—"

  "I read you," Jerry said. "You had a thing going, right?"

  "You could say—"

  '*! don't give a damn what you do with your private life, Mark," Jerry said. "But what you do with your keys may be important. Who else has one?"