“Fill them? With what?”
“Newspapers, scrap, I don’t give a damn, fill ’em.” The clerk filled them with old wrapping paper. Emil handed one fat briefcase to me, the other to Sid. “Here. More window-dressing.”
In the lobby, we staged a final war conference. “Remember,” Emil ordered, “don’t either of you guys say a word unless necessary. I’ll introduce you as my associates. Every important man has associates. People will assume you’re lawyers, or accountants, or appraisers…”
Sid frowned. “Emil, you know how Murray and Totten feel about reporters misrepresenting themselves.”
“We wont misrepresent ourselves. If anyone asks, we’ll admit we’re reporters. On the other hand, if certain people jump to the wrong conclusion about why I want to see the owner of the Skyline Towers, that’s their lookout.”
I said, “Isn’t it likely DeLand or someone in his office will know you’re with the Express now?”
“I don’t think so. I haven’t worked for the paper long. My father hasn’t spoken to DeLand in years and except for a casual acquaintance here and there—they don’t move in the same circles. Straighten your tie and brush the ashes off your suit, Sid, and let’s go.”
* * * *
An automatic elevator carried us to the twentieth floor. The walls of the carpeted reception room were lined with architect’s renderings of apartment properties. About a dozen people were sitting around as Emil marched to the receptionist, a cigar jutting at a jaunty angle from his mouth. Discreetly, Sid and I followed.
Emil said, “Hi. Horace DeLand in?”
“Yes sir, but…”
“I don’t have an appointment, but I think he’ll see me anyhow. I’m Emil Ryker, Junius Ryker’s son. You call DeLand’s secretary and tell her to tell him that, hey?
Suspiciously, the girl rang DeLand’s secretary and transmitted the message. She waited for perhaps fifteen seconds and then put the phone down, viewing Emil with new-found respect.
“Go right in.”
Horace DeLand greeted us at the door to his office. In his sixties, he was short, bald, and fat. Warmly, he pumped Emil’s hand.
“Well, well. We’ve never met, but there’s no doubt who your father is. The resemblance is remarkable. Your dad and I, you know, were in a deal together once.”
“I know.” Vaguely, Emil waved at Sid and me. “My associates.”
Since Emil displayed no more interest in us, Horace DeLand didn’t either. We went on inside. De-Land settled behind his desk and Emil, Sid and I took chairs.
Emil said, “Sorry to break in this way. I know I should have called…”
“That’s quite all right. What can I do for you? The last I heard, you’d finished college and were wandering around Europe.”
“Yes. Well, I’m back for good now. It took me a while to decide what career I wanted to follow, but I finally made up my mind, and since I’m here in your office today, you can probably guess what career that is. Mr. DeLand…”
“Horace.”
“Sure. Horace—earlier today I was out at one of the properties you manage. The Skyline Towers. At what I saw there, I was very interested. I’d like to talk to the owner or owners of that building. Direct with the principals, because I mean business.”
DeLand smiled. “That is a nice property. It nets the present owner about 15 percent; it’s one of the best buys he ever made. But I doubt very much he’d want to let it go. I have some other properties…”
“No, I wouldn’t be interested in anything else.”
“I see.” DeLand shuffled some papers. “If you could give me a rough idea—how much did you think it was worth?”
“The Skyline Towers?” Emil’s eyes narrowed, and the tip of has cigar glowed. “Well, I suppose the Skyline Towers could be worth as much as ten million dollars.”
DeLand was impressed. “Ten million?”
“It could be worth that. If a man was willing to pay that.”
“Um-humph. And considering your name’s Ryker, there’d be no trouble about financing, would there? I presume your father is taking an interest in this new career of yours.”
“Oh, yes. He didn’t like the idea at first, but he finally agreed to give me his full support.”
“Excellent. You know, it so happens the owner of the Skyline Towers is in his office right now. Ordinarily he runs around quite a bit…” DeLand picked up his phone. “Give me an outside line.” He dialed a number and while waiting for an answer, looked up at Emil again. “It’s a coincidence you should be interested in that building. I’ve been on the phone about it all day. It seems Irene Bowser, the woman who was strangled, lived there a long time ago.”
“I know. I was at the property when your manager held a sidewalk press conference.”
“Were you, now. How did our man handle himself?”
“Frankly, not very well.”
“I was afraid of that. I…Hello, this is DeLand. Is he there? Okay. Hello? Horace, here. No, it isn’t Irene Bowser this time, it’s something else. Listen, there’s a young man in my office.” DeLand winked at Emil. “A very personable young man. Emil Ryker, his father is Junius Ryker of the mercantile millions. Right out of the blue, Emil tells me he’s interested in Skyline Towers. I told him you were very pleased with that property, but he mentioned ten million dollars. I thought you ought to know. He seems a very determined young fellow. Of course. Certainly. Right away.”
Beaming, DeLand put his phone down. “He’ll be glad to meet you. You can go right up.”
“Up?”
“Yes, to the top floor. The owner of Skyline Towers is Gabriel Nalon, the owner of this building.”
* * * *
Even though I hadn’t been in the city long I’d heard of Nalon. A self-made millionaire, he built his fortune in real estate and expanded into a multitude of enterprises. As a rule he avoided the public eye. Heightening the aura of mystery surrounding him were rumors that he led a dissolute private life.
In the corridor, we conferred again. Kells said, “Emil, I got to hand it to you. Management will have a fit, but that was as slick as anything I ever pulled in the old days.”
My two friends seemed quite pleased with, themselves, but a few sobering thoughts had occurred to me.
“Maybe so. But before you stick your necks out further, you’d better weigh the consequences.”
“Come on, Pete,” Emil drawled. “This is shaping up as a blockbuster. We’ve gone this far, let’s take it all the way. Nalon’s a big man. A few quotes from him and Sid and I will have the banner in the bulldog for sure. ‘Tycoon Linked to Murder Victim…’”
“He’s a big man, all right. So big that in your place I’d go back and tell DeLand who you really are. Then if Nalon agrees to see us, fine. If he doesn’t…”
“Emil,” Kells argued, “is right. I don’t think Nalon would agree to see reporters and as things stand now we can’t print a word of what I learned from that nurse. It’s all unsupported. We can’t mention that the girls in 201 never paid rent; all we can say is that Irene lived in the building once and Nalon owns it.”
“Assuming Nalon sees us under any circumstances, you think he’d admit knowing Irene?”
“He might, when we hit him with what we know face to face. And even if he doesn’t, we’ll force his hand. After we see him, he’ll have to go to the police and make an immediate statement. Either way, we’ll have a better story than we got now.”
I shrugged. “It’s your future. Nalon can’t get me fired, I’ve been fired already and Farrar hasn’t hired me permanently yet. I’ll just point out that in addition to the fact that I don’t think Murray Hale or Totten will approve of this approach, Nalon is probably a big advertiser.”
“I haven’t told a lie yet,” Emil said. “Nalon doesn’t spend one-twentieth the money in the Express that my father d
oes. And how can Sid get in trouble? Technically, he’s still on his lunch hour.”
“Hale strikes me as a man who wouldn’t let a technicality stand in the way of firing anyone.”
“Oh, hell.” Angrily, Kells shoved the UP button. “Murray was a pretty hard-nosed reporter in his day, he won’t let an advertiser tell him how to cover a homicide. Nothing will happen to us if we can bring in a big exclusive…”
* * * *
Whatever Gabe Nalon had been doing when DeLand called, the prospect of ten million dollars for the Skyline Towers didn’t deter him from continuing to do it. I guess Nalon already had ten million dollars. We waited in his reception room for half an hour until a light flashed and the receptionist looked at us and said, “You can go in now.”
On our way we passed through a large inner office where perhaps a dozen people operated business machines or talked on telephones. A gray-haired lady waited for us at a short corridor leading to a door marked Gabriel Nalon.
“Mr. Ryker?”
“Correct.”
“If you’ll wait just—no, it’s all right, go on in.” She changed her mind when Nalon’s door opened and a man backed out. From inside the office, another man snarled, “Next time, you baboon, get it right.”
Kells and Emil brushed past the man but I took a good look at him. In his forties, he was tall and thin, and as soon as he turned his back on the door an expression of intense malevolence crossed his face. It might be something to remember…
Balding and beetle-browed, Nalon sat behind a large, empty desk, his hands folded in front of him. The industrialist was flat in the belly and thick in the chest, with round, apelike features. He gazed at Emil with frank curiosity. Then his little eyes dwelled briefly on Kells and shifted to me, where they hovered a moment before swinging back to Emil.
“Ryker? You re the spitting image.” The voice was deep and resonant. It was difficult to gauge Nalon’s age, which could have been anything from forty-five to sixty-five. “I told your father once he was the ugliest man I’ve ever met.”
“You know him?”
“I know everyone in this city with money. You re even uglier than he is. Don t let that worry you, though, beautiful women like ugly men. But are you really serious about Skyline Towers? Because if you’re not, I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
“I’m serious.”
“You’re offering to buy it for ten million?”
“I never said that.”
“What did you say?”
“That the building could be worth that to someone willing to pay it.”
“That’s double-talk. Are you here to make an offer or not? And if not, why are you here?”
Emil took a last puff on his cigar. Carefully, he leaned over and stubbed it out in an ashtray at his elbow. “Since you put it that way—I’m interested in Skyline Towers because I’m a reporter for the Express, working on Irene Bowser’s murder.”
Nalon’s hands tightened. His lips pursed, and his face began to turn red. “I see. And your associates?”
“Mr. Kells is also an Express reporter. Mr. Ames is doing a story on Irene for Metropolis magazine. I know our approach was unorthodox…”
“Unorthodox?” Nalon’s face got a little redder. “Unethical and disreputable, you mean. Which one of you wise guys thought up this scheme?”
“I did,” Emil said. “But you do own the Towers, don’t you?”
“If you connect my name with a murder, I’ll sue your paper for millions.”
I said, “Mr. Nalon, let’s be realistic. There’s nothing libelous about printing the fact that you own the Skyline Towers. DeLand’s public relations firm has already admitted Irene lived there.”
“I know about the statement. I composed it.”
“What you might not know is—we know about Apartment 201. If we learned that so fast, it won’t take the police long to learn it either.”
Nalon threw me a venomous look, but waited to hear more.
“A whole string of girls lived in that apartment since you bought the building, but none of them paid rent. If you’re under any illusion you can keep that a secret, forget it. It’s common gossip to half the people who live or work in Skyline Towers. And it’s obvious Irene and those other girls were maintained either by someone you know very well, or by you.”
“You’ll be a lot better off,” Kells put in, “giving us your story direct. If you don’t, we’ll have to get it secondhand from the cops, and you know how cops garble things. They can’t even spell names right.”
“Believe me,” I added, “all we want to do is help you.”
“Help? What kind of lice are you guys anyhow? Don’t you have anything better to do than to snoop into people’s private affairs, looking for something dirty to print? All on the flimsy excuse you’re investigating a murder? You bastards, I don’t see how you can sleep at night, but I’ll tell you one thing. You put my name in the Express and your paper will lose a lot of advertising revenue. I’m going to phone my agency the second you leave, and…”
“We can appreciate your feelings,” I said, “but since Irene’s murder is still unsolved, you’re going to be dragged into this whether you like it or not. In an hour or two this building will be crawling with reporters.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Your friend Evelyn Royal,” Kells said, “took off in a cab from the Skyline Towers with a reporter from the Journal. She was talking her head off. He’ll be here any minute himself, and after him there’ll be a whole army.”
“Is that so?” Nalon took a deep breath. “Once more, I have no statement. I admit nothing—I’m damned if I’ll reward you for the childish trick you pulled on poor old DeLand. Get out.”
“In other words,” Emil said, “you don’t deny paying Irene’s rent…”
“In other words, get out.”
We got out.
As we passed through the office I spotted the man we’d seen backing away from Nalon earlier. Now the man sat behind a desk with a sign on it reading: Willard Fordyce. He still looked real sore.
CHAPTER EIGHT
There’s an old axiom to the effect that you can learn a lot about a man by consulting people who don’t like him. Certainly Willard Fordyce didn’t like his boss, Gabriel Nalon.
“I don’t think Fordyce will be willing to tell me much,” I conceded, slipping another piece of paper into my typewriter. “But he’s Nalon’s office manager. He must know what’s going on, and maybe he can refer me to someone in a better position to talk.”
Wanda Stashonis leaned against the door to my cubicle, arms folded over her breasts. An ink smudge emphasized the cleft in her chin. I’d dropped in at Metropolis after supper to transcribe my notes and found Wanda there, going over proofs. She’d asked what progress I’d made on the story so far.
“That’s not nice,” she said. “You might cost this Fordyce his job.”
“I’ll be careful. But based on the few inquiries I’ve already made, Gabe Nalon is a tough customer. For some reason, people are afraid of him. Learning about his life with Irene won’t be easy.”
“You’re not even sure that there is what you call a relationship. You said Nalon refused to discuss the woman.”
“We’re sure now.”
I nodded to a copy of the first edition of the Express, which lay on my desk. The banner read: TYCOON ADMITS ‘SHELTERING’ IRENE. Emil’s byline was on the story, which substantially matched Vance Hargrove’s story in the first edition of the Journal. Both were pitched on a brief announcement by Lieutenant Moberg late in the afternoon.
“Nalon,” I said, “and a battery of lawyers turned up at the Detective Bureau an hour after we left his office. He’s still giving his statement to the police, but it’s already known he admitted maintaining Irene in Apartment 201 ten years ago—and also Evelyn Royal, the girl who f
ives in the apartment now. Or did, until today.”
“What does this Royal girl say?”
“That she’s a singer, and Nalon was just being kind to her in a fatherly way, helping her career.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Nobody does. But what else can she say? She didn’t know anything about Irene. She only lived in the apartment a year herself. Of course Nalon won’t help her so-called career any more, not after all the things she told the Journal. She announced that she’s moving out of Apartment 201 and is open to all nightclub offers.”
Stash shook her head.
“Such terrible people! And such a fuss for nothing! The Irene woman hasn’t lived in Nalon’s apartment since 1955. The only reason he is being involved now is to create more sensation.”
“Until Irene’s killer is found, any facts about her are as pertinent as any others. The police still don’t have the faintest notion why she was murdered. And if Nalon’s own record was clean, he wouldn’t be in this spot.”
“So he liked young girls.” Wanda shrugged. “He had a peculiarity, what of it? I suppose next people will want to know what he made the young girls do for him, as though that would have anything to do with the crime.”
“Conceivably, it might.”
“If it does, I don’t think we’ll print it in Metropolis magazine.” She paused. “But never mind that. Ames, there’s something I must tell you—it’s why I waited here tonight. A man was in the office this afternoon, a Mr. Herman Jax, and he asked a lot of questions. All of them about you.”
* * * *
I leaned back. “The state’s attorney’s investigator? I’ve met him. The night of the murder, he interrogated me—if you can call it that.”
“Sam was at the printer’s, so I talked to this Jax.” Stash looked down at the tips of her toes. “I didn’t like him. I don’t know how to say why exactly—he just made me feel unclean. The way he looked at me—I think he looked at me that way on purpose, to frighten me. I think he enjoys frightening people.”
“I don’t like Jax either. What happened?”
“He asked me why Sam hired you, and whether Sam came to you first or you came to Sam? He wanted to know whose idea it was to do a story on the Irene woman, and what kind of story it would be.”
The James Michael Ullman Crime Novel Page 28