The James Michael Ullman Crime Novel

by James Michael Ullman

  “Who’s she?”

  “Works at Len Powell’s restaurant. You know about Powell’s, don’t you?”

  “Yes. Iris worked there awhile. Got the job a few weeks after I’d met her. Stayed a few months and then quit.”

  “Why?”

  “Said she didn’t like it. They were too strict. Powell treated the girls like slaves. But what’s Powell got to do with this? And Morris Maxwell? And that Saralee or whatever?”

  “I’ll ask the questions. You have any second thoughts about what you’ve told us? Anything you want to change?”

  “No,” St. Clair said. “It’s God’s truth, every word.”

  Forbes, Curley and Rose held a conference in the hall.

  “What do you think?” Forbes asked.

  “It’s barely possible,” Curley mused. “I wouldn’t say that if it weren’t for the bit about Claude.”

  “Who,” Rose asked, “is Claude?”

  “Someone we saw in Iowa last weekend,” Forbes said. “Apparently he and four other men tailed us there from Chicago. Probably thought we’d gone up there to look for Iris.”

  “Well frankly,” Rose said, “I wouldn’t believe that old thief unless—”

  “I agree. I have reservations too. He fooled me once, I won’t buy so easily again. But until we can disprove any part of what he’s told us, we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and put him on ice for a while.”

  Curley frowned. “I don’t like it. Hell, after what St. Clair just theorized, if Claude and his pals walked in now I’d run for my life. And how are we supposed to keep St. Clair on ice? With a ball and chain? Technically that’s kidnapping.”

  “I’ll handle St. Clair. That brother of yours—could you prevail on him to board St. Clair in the apartment over his tavern? In a room where that big dog of his would start raising hell if St. Clair tried to sneak out?”

  “I guess so.”

  When they returned, St. Clair was still perched unhappily on the bed.

  Forbes walked to him and said, “Walter, I’ll give you a choice. One, as best we can we’ll check your story out. If it checks, we’ll go on looking for Iris Dean in your behalf. If we find her, we’ll try to get your money back and learn who those men are. Or two, I’ll give you to the police right now.”

  St. Clair was outraged. “We had a deal! I’d tell you the truth about Iris only on the condition that you wouldn’t—”

  “You proposed it. I never accepted it. I’ll call the papers too. It’ll be some story. You’ll make page one, especially after I tell the reporters your theory about Helen’s murder. It’ll fascinate Homicide, not to mention Barry Axburn and the company you’re suing. And Claude, of course. He’ll know where you are—at Headquarters. And if they can’t find a reason to hold you, you’ll walk out a celebrity. You try to hide from Claude then.”

  “You’re unconscionable! You—all right, damn it. Go on looking for her then. If you found her, we could clear up the whole matter. And while you’re looking, I’ll be—”

  “You’ll be where I want you to be. Curley’ll take you there, you won’t stir from the place unless I say so.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “I am doing it. Skip, and I’ll call the press and the law anyhow. Then everyone’ll be on your trail. Here.” He handed the old man his checkbook. “I’ll take that retainer now. Write a check for a thousand. If your story’s true, you’ll get it all back. I’ll settle for ten percent of what we recover from Iris. If we don’t recover anything or I can’t find her, you’ll still get it back. But if I learn you’ve lied to me again I keep it all, no matter what.”

  “But that’ll leave a balance of only four dollars.”

  “Exactly. We’ll also take your pocket money. You won’t need it. You’ll be taken care of, even supplied with a reasonable amount of booze.”

  For a long minute the old man fixed Forbes with an angry stare. Then he reached for his pen. “Very well.” His tone was grim. “I have nothing to hide any more. Find Iris. The sooner the better. My money aside, I am worried about her now. But I hope you’re proud of yourself. Humiliating me, just because I’m old and down on my luck.”

  “By the way,” Forbes said. “That patent suit of yours—why’d you bring it to Barry Axburn?”

  St. Clair blinked. “Now that you mention it, Iris gave me his name.”

  “Are you trying to tell us,” Curley asked slowly, “that Barry Axburn was Iris Dean’s lawyer?”

  “No. I’d told Iris about the suit. Said I didn’t know any lawyers here, I wanted a first-class one who might take my case despite my record. She said she didn’t know about lawyers but she’d ask a friend who did. The next time I saw her she said her friend thought Axburn would be just the man.”

  “What friend?”

  “She didn’t say. Someone she’d met at work, I assumed.” He paused. “She was working at Len Powell’s restaurant then.”

  * * * *

  Whoever ransacked St. Clair’s little apartment had done a thorough job of it. Drawers had been emptied, clothes ripped from closets and dumped on the floor, and stuffing torn from bedding and furniture.

  Forbes looked around and said, “Well, this part of his story holds up. And the old lady across the hall said she heard those men in here Friday night. She thought it was just a wild party.”

  Kneeling, Rose rummaged through a pile of debris. “He’s a pistol, isn’t he? I can see where he’d take Helen in. Even you. But if he’d waved that Polaroid in front of my nose with that just-want-to-know-she’s-all-right routine—Hey, look. Dirty pictures. Girls and boys together. Do you think he—”

  “Never mind his sex habits. Since we can’t find Iris’s notes for that money, bundle up some of his clothes. Don’t forget his straw hat and his cane. He insisted on them.”

  Forbes settled in a chair to open the mail he’d found in St. Clair’s mailbox. Seemingly the old man was angrily resigned to his new situation. Along with his money he’d given Forbes his keys, demanding that Forbes bring him something to wear or buy him a new wardrobe. Curley was driving him to the brother’s tavern now.

  The mail consisted of some advertising flyers plus one envelope from Axburn’s law firm and another with Forbes’s own letterhead. Axburn’s contained carbons of correspondence pertaining to the law suit. Forbes’s envelope held the original snapshot of Iris, plus the photofinisher’s negative and a few of the blowups.

  Helen had attached a typewritten note. It said, “Dear Mr. St. Clair: Here’s your picture back, with the negative, which is yours now, and some prints. Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be all right.”

  Helen. So many things had happened since Monday night that he’d almost stopped thinking about her, except in the most abstract way. Her note to St. Clair was suggestive though. “Everything’s going to be all right,” underlined. Certainly she hadn’t thought that when Forbes last spoke to her. A fragile bit of evidence, but the first so far to support Eric’s story. All St. Clair had provided to date was conjecture.

  Rose walked up behind him. Peering over his shoulder, she dropped a pile of clothes onto a sofa and said, “Julian, even if St. Clair is a rascal, maybe we’re being a little hard on him. We haven’t caught him in a lie yet. The old lady even saw those men carrying out the shopping bags. We haven’t found any personal papers.”

  “Wait until Curley checks the brokerage house. And if Iris doesn’t have an account there…”

  He tossed St. Clair’s mail aside and strolled to a window. Yes, the vestibule was just below. Up here St. Clair could easily have heard one of those men say, “The second floor.” Still, it was remarkable how alert St. Clair had been when those men came calling Friday night. Almost as though he’d half expected them.

  Down the block a green Impala with two men in it eased into a space beside a fire hydrant. Then a third man,
long and lean, with a hawk-like profile, walked out of a rooming house across the street and joined them. They just sat there.

  Driving away from St. Clair’s apartment, Forbes glanced at the rear-view mirror. The Impala had fallen in a few blocks behind.

  “Don’t get alarmed,” he told Rose, “but we’re being followed. They must have staked out his place, hoping he’d come back for some of his possessions.”

  Nervously Rose lit a cigarette. “What’ll we do?”

  “For the moment, nothing. If I told the police immediately, I’d have to explain what we were doing in St. Clair’s apartment. I’d rather not yet.”

  “You’ll just let them follow you around?”

  “No, but this changes our plans. Unless there’s a damn good reason, I don’t want any of us going near St. Clair for a while. We’ll take the old man’s stuff to my place and leave it there. Then we’ll grab a late breakfast in the neighborhood before going back to the office. I’m starved. Those guys’ll learn soon enough that my apartment’s vacant, I’m not even spending my nights in it. Fine. Let ’em worry about where I do spend my nights. And if they’re dumb enough to follow us back to the Loop, I’ll lead ’em right into the police garage.”

  “Who do you think they are?” Rose wondered. “There seem to be a lot of them. And if they followed you all the way to Iowa…”

  “They’re well financed, aren’t they? And, of course, Morris Maxwell has lots of money. Rose, after what happened to my last secretary I don’t think those men would dare go near you. But if you have the faintest suspicion that anyone’s following you home tonight—”

  “Don’t worry. Some of the night men at our district station are old friends of Victor’s. They’ll take care of me.”

  There was no breakfasting in a restaurant. Saying hell, she hadn’t fixed a meal for a man since Victor died, Rose prepared a mammoth repast in Forbes’s kitchen. And as far as Forbes could tell, they weren’t followed back to the Loop. That meant nothing, of course. By now Claude’s people might be dogging him in two or more cars, picking him up in relays.

  From the office he phoned Axburn.

  “No,” the attorney said thoughtfully, “I can’t possibly imagine who’d have given my name to Iris Dean.

  Until yesterday I never heard of her. I’ll certainly ask around though. I’m curious about that myself. But I take it you’ve found St. Clair. What did he—”

  “It’s a long story. We’re checking it out. Until we learn more one way or another, I’d rather not discuss it.” Rather abruptly Forbes hung up.

  Curley called in a little before noon.

  “St. Clair’s settled in his new home,” Curley announced. “His wing has a bedroom and a bath, but if he strays into the hall that dog’ll tear his head off.”

  “You check the brokerage house?”

  “Yes, I’m in a booth near there now. Iris had a very small account, which she closed out last week. She bought mostly cats and dogs, a couple hundred bucks’ worth at a time. Usually she lost her shirt. Her customer’s man remembers St. Clair. She brought him in with her one day and introduced him as her uncle, but he doesn’t recall what they talked about or how long they stayed.”

  “Well,” Forbes mused, “there we are. The old man’s story could be true. But on the other hand he may have seized upon an unrelated visit to the broker’s to support a yarn about a nonexistent stock swindle. Iris vanished with the fake buy-and-sell slips and Claude’s people presumably walked off with the notes for the money she borrowed. How convenient. We’ll keep our part of the bargain though and go back to investigating Iris’s disappearance. And let’s begin by trying to learn what Morris Maxwell knows about it.”

  CHAPTER 8

  Curley eased his battered Plymouth sedan through an executive parking lot behind the newest and largest Giveaway Store, a rectangular, windowless structure two stories high. As a sort of afterthought a glistening glass-and-steel penthouse had been tacked to one corner of the building’s flat roof.

  A blue Continental nestled in a space marked reserved for MR. MAXWELL. Curley braked.

  “I guess,” he said, “Maxwell’s still inside. According to my informant he usually hangs out in the penthouse. His executive suite’s up there. The other half’s an apartment, in case he wants to spend the night at the office.”

  “Okay.” Seated beside Curley, Forbes wore painter’s coveralls and a white painter’s cap. The chances that they had been followed to this western suburb were extremely remote. From the office Forbes had taken an El train to the Fullerton Avenue station, where Curley had been waiting with the motor running. “Let’s beat it before someone comes out to see who and what we are.”

  They pulled away and rolled past a row of semis lined up at an unloading dock.

  “Odd guy, Maxwell,” Forbes said. “Digging into his life’s like eating Jello with your fingers. Groton, Yale, esteemed family name, heir to millions. Won a flock of medals in World War Two. Fighter pilot. But after that nothing. A retiring, publicity-shy vegetable. Nothing, that is, until he bought Giveaway Stores.”

  “Judging by all those cars in the customer lot, he must be coining a mint. It looks more like a weekend grand opening than late on an ordinary Wednesday afternoon.”

  “Apparently. But Giveaway’s privately owned, no public reports. And some whispers are circulating to the effect Giveaway may have expanded too fast. They’ve been tardy paying bills lately. So far the creditors aren’t very alarmed. They figure a man of Maxwell’s social standing wouldn’t allow Giveaway to get into serious trouble—that he’d use his personal fortune to save it first.”

  “What’d you learn about his girlfriend?”

  “Saralee’s older than she looks—thirty-four. Native of East Chicago. Married once, a Marine pilot killed in a peacetime accident. She met Maxwell while working in a Loop brokerage house that handled his investments. A few months later she quit and he started maintaining her. It’s said they’re very close, almost pathologically so. That Maxwell consults her before making any big decisions.”

  At the edge of the customer lot Curley braked again and turned the engine off.

  “Well,” he said, “here we are. I suppose you still insist on going through with this crazy idea.”

  “Why not?” Forbes opened the door. “I hardly think he’d give me an appointment. And if I asked for one, it’d just tip him off to the fact that I know he and Saralee are mixed up with Iris Dean somehow. This way, if I can take him by surprise, I may startle him into making an important admission. Maybe even saying something about Helen. I’m going to tell him I think the murder may be linked to Iris. I want to observe his reaction. You sure this rig’ll work?”

  “The wireless microphone in your cap has a range of five-hundred feet. I’ll be parked on that side street, my equipment should be able to pick up anything in the building from there.”

  “Don’t flub it. I want a complete tape. If I get him to say anything at all, he may have second thoughts later and try to deny it.”

  “Suppose he turns you over to his security people, or they catch you before you can even get near him?”

  “Phone Axburn,” Forbes said, “and ask him to bail me out.”

  The store was mobbed. Shoppers jammed the aisles and long lines stretched from the checkout counters, and no wonder. Some prices were ridiculous: men’s suits, $14.99; transistor radios, $2.99; ladies dresses, 99 cents. They were what are called loss leaders, merchandise priced below cost to lure a crowd, but as Forbes looked around, it seemed to him there were an awful lot of loss leaders.

  Like all the other Giveaway Stores, this one was self-service. He went to the hardware department first, where he picked up a screwdriver and a few paint brushes and shoved them into his hip pockets. Next he grabbed a can of paint—any color would do—and, of course, a bucket and some drop cloths.

  He dumped
the paint and drop cloths into the bucket. Now for a ladder. A painter should have a ladder. Hoisting a small aluminum ladder under his right arm, he lifted the bucket with his left hand and walked back up the aisle to an escalator, which he rode to the second floor.

  There he wandered around until he found the credit department. Leading off it were a pair of swinging doors marked executive offices. Forbes backed through them, almost barging into a man coming out. The man cursed and gave Forbes a dirty look, but Forbes went stolidly down a short hall to a large reception room.

  Half a dozen people sat around waiting to see Giveaway executives. A bored expression on his face, Forbes approached the receptionist’s desk and stood in front of it as the girl talked on the phone.

  She said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Atwood, but Mr. Maxwell couldn’t possibly okay those advertising layouts until tomorrow morning at the earliest. No, he’s in the penthouse boardroom. It’s a very important conference with all the department heads, and his secretary left word that when it’s over he’ll be unavailable for the rest of the day.”

  Forbes’s gaze strayed past her to a small foyer where a uniformed guard sat on a chair beside an elevator door marked PENTHOUSE.

  Uniformed guard? Maxwell liked privacy, all right. And at the moment, Forbes wanted to avoid close observation by any member of the store’s security force.

  The girl hung up, looked at Forbes and asked, “What do you want?”

  He patted his pocket. “I’ve got a work order. For the executive washroom. I just started here Monday. Where is it?”

  “Nobody told me…” Her phone rang, and she reached for it with one hand and waved to her right with the other. “Down there. My God, what a crazy place.”

  “Down there” was an office-lined corridor. The executive washroom was near the end of it, a few yards from a massive fire door marked keep out—EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY.

  Two executives were in the washroom, but Forbes ignored them and they ignored him. He laid the drop cloths out, set the ladder up, pried the top from the paint can, and kept puttering around until he was alone.