by Holly Baxter
Bernice looked up. “Oh?” Her hand went to her mouth. “Oh, dear. That must have been Elodie Browne. I forgot to ring this morning to tell her I couldn’t meet her for lunch.”
“Ling seemed impressed by her.”
“Ling is an old devil,” Bernice chuckled. “He likes a pretty face.”
Lee Chang looked at her. Her cheeks were a little flushed from embarassment about her friend. It was very becoming. “Is she just a pretty face, then, this Ellie Browne?”
“Oh, no. Ellie is the smartest person I know. You’ve met her, Mr. Lee. She was one of the girls I brought to serve at the party.” The memory of the party darkened her expression slightly. “She was the one with brown hair.”
“Ah,” said Mr. Lee. “She seemed interested in our jade.”
“Ellie is interested in everything—she’s a writer, you know.” Bernice was gabbling a bit. “Writers have lots of curiosity. She’s very clever.”
“So.” Mr. Lee arose from his desk. “I am going out to the vault, Bernice. Just carry on with those invoices, please.”
“Yes, sir.” Bernice obediently turned back to her stack of paperwork.
Walking slowly through to the dining room, Mr. Lee approached the glass passage. The new guard, an American with an unpronounceable Polish name, sat at the end of it, outside the vault.
That is how she learned the word, Lee thought to himself. At the party. Webster’s words had been so slurred he had hoped nobody had noticed or remembered the word accurately. Obviously this Miss Browne—this very clever and curious Miss Browne—had remembered. That could be very unfortunate.
At the door of the vault he indicated that the guard should admit him and then lock up behind him, and this was done. Once in the room he looked around with pleasure, then scowled as he approached the large table in the center, on which were stacked many old and battered cardboard boxes. He looked down at them and his left hand curled into a fist.
He was a fool. He should never have taken this chance. What right had he to try to alter the future of China? His beloved China, bright in his childhood memories, was all grace and beauty in his eyes. And he revered more than ever the old culture, now that it was under threat. With the downfall of the Manchu Empire, China had begun to change and was changing still.
But to risk his life and the lives of others?
He was an American, now. It was not his concern. But oh, the General was persuasive. Wily, charming, intelligent, and a master salesman. The General had written to him, even come to Chicago the previous year, convincing him it would be easy and simple, without complications. No mention of the dangers. Perhaps the General had not known then what trouble would come.
And now this girl, this curious white girl who was asking questions.
What of Elodie Browne?
He raised his clenched fist and pressed down on the topmost box before him. The thin cardboard split slightly under the pressure. It seemed as if the evil of the original owner had travelled with it, bringing fear and desperation.
The bitter truth was, he could do nothing to protect the girl. He could barely continue protecting himself. If she persisted in asking questions, there was no telling what would happen to her.
Curiosity killed the cat.
But Miss Browne definitely did not have nine lives.
***
Sounds of a busy street.
Announcer: Welcome to the Hotel Imperial, where the rich and famous come to stay. Where the best people receive the best service in all the world—and where there’s a story behind every door.
Theme music.
Announcer: Hotel Imperial is brought to you by the Leatherlux Luggage Company. Leatherlux cases are the first choice for people of taste and refinement. Only Leatherlux cases are handmade individually by experienced craftsmen, following classic designs handed down for generations. Ask for Leatherlux when you want to show you know the best.
Sounds of a busy lobby. A desk bell rings.
Dunning: Boy! Take Mrs. VanNoble’s luggage up to Suite 560.
Bellboy: Yes, sir. Right away.
Dunning: It’s very good to see you again, Mrs. VanNoble, and I hope you enjoy your stay with us. If there’s anything you require, you have only to ask. (She is obviously moving away—Pause—then he adds, sotto voce.) As long as it isn’t for caviar. The delivery is late, again.
Desk bell rings again.
Dunning: Molly, put Mrs. VanNoble’s jewelry case into the safe, please. She will send her maid down for what she wants later this evening. And Molly—
Molly: Yes, Mr. Dunning.
Dunning: When you’ve done that, go down to Chef Alexander and tell him to find out why the shipment from Ganucci’s is late.
Molly: I believe there was some kind of accident—
Dunning: That’s no concern of ours.
Molly: A mix-up at the wholesalers.
Dunning: Ha! They used that excuse last time.
Molly: Yes, Mr. Dunning. (She sighs heavily.)
***
“Are we sure we want to start out with something like that?” Sal asked, clicking off her stopwatch and putting it onto the table.
“Only as background,” Elodie said. “To show some of the troubles a big hotel has. We could make it something else.”
“Well, let’s move on, we can always change it later.” Sal made a note on the script. “It’s getting late and I see Mr. Wilson is champing to escape to the nearest speak for a refreshing libation.”
“I can stay here as long as you can.” Drew did look a little desperate.
Elodie looked at her watch. “Are we going to be much longer?” she asked, diffidently. “I should phone home…”
Sal looked at her own watch and sighed. “All right, we’ve made a start. Can you type up the notes you’ve taken before tomorrow?”
“Yes…but…”
“Maybe she has plans for the evening, Sal—did you ever think of that? Some of us have lives outside of radio,” Drew said pointedly.
Sal Schultz looked angry and started to say something, and then apparently thought better of it. “Tomorrow, then. Good night, Elodie. Good day’s work.” She began to stuff things into her huge leather handbag. Elodie stood and retrieved her jacket and hat from the stand in the corner.
“I’ll type up the notes at home,” she said in a conciliatory voice. She didn’t want Sal angry at her, although why she was cross Elodie didn’t know.
“Good, good,” Sal said as she poked around in the bag, making room.
Elodie hesitated a minute, then said “Good night,” and went out. She was nearly to the elevator when Wilson caught up with her.
“You’ll have to forgive Sal,” he said. “Once she gets caught up in a project you have to set off an explosive to stop her. You’ll get the hang of her soon enough. You just have to be firm.”
“She seemed angry.”
Wilson shook his head as he pushed the elevator button. “No—she’s already thinking about tomorrow. I have the words, you see, but Sal has the focus. She pushes everybody the way she pushes herself. She’s a terror, but she knows her stuff. You’re lucky to have her on this. I still can’t believe she asked for me—I haven’t worked on a script for months.”
“Is it because you drink too much?” Elodie found herself asking. Good heavens, what was wrong with her, she wondered, saying something like that to someone she hardly knew and had to work with.
He grinned, not at all insulted. “Honey, everybody drinks too much these days. I just go along with the crowd. You want to come out for a cocktail or two?”
“No, thanks. I have to get home. But…”
“But no socializing with colleagues? I bet they told you that at the agency, didn’t they?”
“Well…” She felt herself blushing.
Again, he seemed to take it well. “Good advice.” The elevator doors opened, and he made a sweeping gesture. “Going downhill? Or is it just
me?”
***
As she came out of the revolving door at the main entrance, Elodie saw that in the opposite compartment was Lieutenant Deacon. She lowered her head quickly, but he saw her, and completed the circuit to run after her.
“Miss Browne!”
Reluctantly, Elodie stopped and waited without turning. Then he was beside her, removing his hat. The thick dark red hair gleamed in the light of the streetlamps and passing cars. She had forgotten that he was actually quite good-looking. For a policeman. “I was hoping to catch you. Your mother said you must be working late. She seemed worried.”
Elodie looked up at him in horror. “You spoke to my mother?”
“On the phone, yes. We need you to come downtown and sign your statement about Saturday night. We did mention it at the time,” he added.
“Oh—I’m sorry, I forgot,” Elodie stammered. “I started a new job today and…”
“So your mother said.”
They were walking along now, side by side, dodging the few other pedestrians on the sidewalk. “You seem to have had quite a conversation with my mother.” Elodie was not at all pleased.
“Official business. She seems a very nice woman.”
“She is.” They continued to walk in silence for another half a block, but he didn’t seem inclined to leave. “Can it wait until Saturday?” Elodie finally asked.
“Not really. If you like, we can go now, and then I’ll arrange for you to be driven home afterward.”
“In a police car?” The shame of it! The neighborhood would be scandalized, to say nothing of her family. Maybelle would never speak to her again.
“No, of course not.”
“Oh.”
“I did explain this to your mother.”
“Doesn’t she expect me?”
“No.”
“So you decided between you?”
“More or less.” He took hold of her arm and stopped her. His eyes were very green under the streetlight, she thought. “It really is important. The guard has to be arraigned, you see, and we need all the statements in order for the District Attorney to prepare his case. Everyone else has done theirs without a problem.”
“Including Bernice Barker?”
“Why, yes, I believe so. Why?” He seemed puzzled.
“I’ve been worried about her—I haven’t seen her since last Saturday and we were supposed to meet for lunch today.”
“I think someone went out to Mr. Lee’s house on Sunday and took both their statements and that of various servants.”
“Bernice was still there on Sunday?”
He grinned. “I believe she went home as you did, but Mr. Lee asked her to come back on Sunday for some urgent work.”
“Oh. And today?”
He shrugged. “I have no idea about today.”
Elodie considered. “Well, will it take very long, this statement business?”
“About half an hour, that’s all.”
In the end Elodie agreed rather than stand on the street arguing over it. She was past hunger and was just so tired she wanted to go home and go straight to bed. She’d had no idea writing for radio—even the way Sal and Drew did it—would be so exhausting.
Lieutenant Deacon led her to a plain sedan which was parked a little way down the street. She got into the back seat and he sat in front with the driver, who was uniformed. She leaned her head against the back of the seat and closed her eyes. A headache was beginning to grow upward from the back of her neck, and the lights of the shops they passed were making it worse. It seemed only minutes before they stopped.
The car door beside her opened and Deacon bent down to look in. “Are you asleep?” He seemed amused.
“No,” Elodie snapped, and got out, a little dazed. Despite the few minutes of rest, the headache was really digging in now.
“This way.” He led her up some steps and into a foyer. She looked around her in amazement. She had never been in a police station, had no idea what they looked like. Chaos would have been a good description.
The noise was deafening, people shouting, a woman crying, another singing, two uniformed officers struggling with a very drunk but otherwise respectable looking older man, other officers milling around, talking and laughing. Against one wall a line of chairs contained the most varied collection of people she had ever seen. Girls dressed so outrageously she could only assume they were entertainers or even prostitutes, others in somber business clothing much like her own. There was one very well-dressed woman who sat upright and appeared outraged at the company she was forced to endure. There were men of every size and shape, truculent, sheepish, sad, defiant, arrogant, beaten. They all turned their heads to stare at her. She felt like crying—did they think she was a criminal, too?
“Not much further.” Deacon took her arm and moved her gently along and toward some stairs. “Up we go.”
“I’m not a child.”
“I realize that, but you’re not used to this kind of thing, are you?” His voice was kind, and her tears came closer. She hated him for forcing her down there like this, but on the other hand it would have been easier to bear if he hadn’t been nice about it. She wanted to hang onto her irritation—it was a kind of shield.
Upstairs was quiet and orderly, with closed doors to offices and people in the hall who walked quickly and seemed preoccupied. Many carried papers. None were in uniform. There were even a few women busy at desks. Elodie began to relax.
“Is it always like…like it was downstairs?”
He chuckled. “You caught us at a bad moment—there was a raid earlier on a speak. Looks like they took in quite a haul this time.” They stopped at an open door and he gestured for her to precede him. Inside there was a very nice motherly-looking woman seated behind a desk, typing.
“Evening, Maggie,” Deacon said. “This is Miss Browne—we need to take her statement about Saturday night at the Lee house.”
“Okay,” said Maggie, cheerily. She reached across her desk and picked up a pad and pencil.
Deacon brought a chair over for Elodie and she sank onto it with a long sigh. Maggie looked at her sympathetically, put down her pad and pencil, rummaged in a desk and produced a small bottle of aspirin. “Get her some water,” she ordered Deacon. “Can’t you see she’s exhausted?”
Deacon peered down at Elodie. “She looks fine to me.” But he went out to do Maggie’s bidding.
“Men.” Maggie shook out a couple of white tablets and handed them over to Elodie. “You look like a nice girl, you shouldn’t be here. Why on earth didn’t he take you to the District Attorney’s office?”
“I have no idea,” Elodie said. “Maybe it’s closed or something.”
Maggie gave a derisory snort. “Not likely, these days.”
Deacon returned with the water, and Elodie swallowed down the aspirin, then tossed the cup into a wastebasket. Maggie picked up her pad and pencil again. “Shoot.”
Elodie looked at Deacon. “Where shall I start?”
“Start with when you got to the house,” he suggested. And so she did. It took no more than ten minutes because she merely stated the facts and left out all her feelings. He seemed unsatisfied.
“Are you sure that’s everything?” He raised an eyebrow. No winking, now.
“Yes. Everything I can remember.”
“Are you certain you don’t remember Webster saying more than that?”
She shook her head. She had purposely not said the mysterious Chinese word, partly because Mr. Lee hadn’t wanted anyone to say it, but mostly because Deacon had made her come down here the way he had. “Just ‘they got me—I got away—look out behind you.’ Why, has anyone else said more?
“What makes you think that?”
Elodie shrugged. “What did the others say?”
He was leaning against Maggie’s desk, his long legs outstretched, his arms folded across his chest. “It doesn’t matter about the others. All I want
is what you say,” he told her, reprovingly.
The aspirin was beginning to take effect, and she suddenly felt more angry than tired. “Did you make Miss Hutton come down here to this place?” she demanded. “Did you make her walk through all that downstairs, make her feel like a criminal?”
“Is that what you felt like?”
“Yes.” She wanted to slap his face.
“Interesting,” he said. He glanced over his shoulder. “Just type that up so Miss Browne can sign it, Maggie, and we’ll be done.”
Maggie looked at him in exasperation. “Why did you bring her down here and not to the DA?” she asked. “Are you trying to frighten her or something?”
“No,” Deacon said, evenly. “This was closer, that’s all. I’m not a monster, Maggie. You know that.” He spoke over his shoulder, keeping his eyes on Elodie. She lifted her chin and stared right back.
“You could have fooled me,” Maggie muttered to herself as she rolled fresh paper into her machine and began to type. Elodie watched her fingers flying over the keys and wished she could achieve that kind of speed. Even with Maybelle’s help, she was still very slow. It had taken her ages to do her essays for college, but typing them pleased the professors, and Maybelle said it was all good practice. It was Maybelle’s belief that every woman should be able to take shorthand and type so as to always be able to support herself. She was already trying to teach Alyce.
It only took a few minutes for the statement to be finished. Elodie read it carefully at Deacon’s insistance, then signed it at the bottom. “I want to go home, now.”
***
He drove her himself this time. When they went out he took her another way, avoiding the front lobby, and she wondered why he hadn’t done that before. The car was a small sedan, unmarked like the other, but she had a feeling it was his own, because there was a St. Christopher medal swinging from the mirror.
“Are you Catholic?”
His eyes followed hers briefly then returned to the road. “I believe St. Christopher watches over everyone, even sinners. You don’t have to go to Mass to qualify.” Which wasn’t really an answer, she realized, but she had only asked out of idle curiosity. She had been brought up in the faith, but in the past few years it had meant less and less to her. Her sisters were more devout than she, but she wasn’t sure about Mumma anymore. Sometimes she recognized a flash of defiance in Mumma’s eyes when they returned from church on Sundays. Mumma had been to college, too. In many ways it made believing very difficult, as did the times they lived in.