“I’ll deny some of it. I may be able to explain the rest. I think he trusts me.”
“How about Dick?”
“I don’t know about Dick. I hope you won’t tell him, and I don’t think you’re the kind of person who would do it out of spite. Anyway, I can’t let you threaten me. It’s not as though you have any proof.”
“I saw the picture,” I said as the elevator stopped. “Does that make a difference?”
I hadn’t expected much of a reaction, but to my surprise it nearly knocked her down. Her mouth opened and her face was suddenly as blank as a wall. She put out a hand to steady herself.
“How—”
“I got there ten minutes before you and Burns.” She went on staring at me and I added, “It was in one of the folders at the bottom of the garment bag. But I didn’t need to see a picture of you in bed with a mark to know that you and Leo were working the badger game.”
She swallowed, and some of her confidence began to come back. “There’s a difference between guessing and knowing. I didn’t want anybody to see that picture, ever. The expression on my face! I’ve had nightmares about it. I was so high on reefers that I didn’t know what I was doing, and certainly I didn’t care. But from the picture you’d think I was congratulating myself on my cleverness. Leo knew what he was doing when he kept it.” She checked her hairpins. “You really rocked me for a minute. Why didn’t you take it?”
“I wanted to find out how badly you wanted it.”
“Well, you found out, didn’t you? God, that was close. If you and Chad hadn’t been arguing I might have been stuck with it.”
I leaned down to get Chad’s shoulders. “You don’t think you owe me anything?”
“No,” she said. “That’s the way it worked out.”
I dragged Chad halfway across the lobby and stopped to rest.
“But I didn’t leave it entirely to chance,” I said. “I wanted you to find the picture, but I couldn’t be sure I wouldn’t need it. So I photographed it.”
“No, you didn’t,” she said coldly. “You’re only saying that to scare me.”
“It’s true that I’m trying to scare you, but I’ve got the film in my pocket. You must have seen the camera in the bedroom. Didn’t you notice the infrared filter? When Lorraine gave me her keys she tried to persuade me to come in and surprise them, and she wanted me to get a picture first.”
“Maybe it didn’t turn out.”
“There’s always a chance,” I said. “But I don’t have to get a really sharp negative, just one we can read. It was a good camera. Leo wouldn’t economize on something that important. And I’ve got your gun, so you can’t shoot me. You may have to be nice to me after all.”
“You’re as bad as anybody!” she said furiously. “That’s blackmail.”
“Sure it is. That’s how district attorneys get most of their convictions.”
I dragged Chad to the outer lobby and propped him beneath the mailboxes. Anna’s face was working.
“Go over to the bar across the street and call St. Clare’s,” I told her. “Ask for Emergency. Give them this address and tell them a man’s lying on the sidewalk. I’ll clip him again if he starts to come out of it.”
She didn’t move until I looked up. “Go ahead, Anna. I want to be sure there’s no fracture.”
“You smug—conceited—horrible—”
She turned abruptly and started across the street. A man and woman came into the vestibule. They looked at Burns.
“Drunk,” I said. “I’ve called the cops.”
The man was in such a hurry to get out his key that he dropped it. After they had gone inside I waited. Burns showed no signs of intelligence and few signs of life. I saw Anna come out of the bar. By the time she was back I heard the siren. I pulled Burns onto the sidewalk and we walked away.
We stopped in a doorway and waited till the ambulance attendants had made the pick-up. Burns still took no interest in anything that was being done to him.
“Well,” Anna said.
“Let’s get a drink.”
“Ben, I know you’ll think I’m being difficult but I can’t help it. If you actually have that picture I know I have to tell you. Then it’s up to you. But wouldn’t I feel foolish if the picture turned out to be no good?”
“It might be a big weight off your mind if you told somebody.”
“Oh, no. This is one weight I want to keep on my mind.”
“I can rig up a darkroom at my place and we can find out for sure.”
“That’s what I was getting at,” she said. “And then, if worst comes to worst—” She took my arm. “I never know where I am with you, Ben. I don’t know if you’re for or against.”
“Neither do I,” I said. “Has Dick Pope asked you to marry him?”
She didn’t answer. Apparently I couldn’t expect any rewarding conversation until I found out if I had succeeded in capturing her picture on the 35-mm film. The garage man found my Buick and we drove downtown in silence. Anna was far over on her side of the front seat, no doubt figuring the odds. I figured a few of my own and, after I found a parking place, took Anna to my apartment and showed her where I kept the liquor, I called Mrs. Rooney.
The phone rang five times before she answered. “Finally,” she said. “I dozed off on the sofa. Now I can put in for overtime.”
“You can put in for it,” I said, “but unless somebody pays me you may not get it. Did you hear from Elmer?”
“I did, and I’ve got his time schedule if you want it, but what it all boils down to is not such a hell of a lot. Mr. Pope, Jr., got into a white Mercury in front of such-and-such an address on Central Park West. Drove up to the country so fast he nearly gave Elmer combat fatigue. Made a phone call—outdoor booth. Met somebody by the side of a highway, and this is what you’re going to want or I’m a lousy guesser.”
“Less editorializing, Mrs. Rooney,” I said.
“Are you in a hurry?”
“Excuse me. Take your time.”
“This was on a curvy road up near I think he said Prosper. I made a good note of it some place, don’t worry. No street lights up there, so he had to ditch his car and work back through the forest. By that time there was another car behind the Merc. A black Pontiac. Elmer got the license and he’ll call the Bureau in the morning unless you want to. He couldn’t tell if the driver was male or female. He lost the tail there because he couldn’t get back to his own car in time. But he went to where the guy lived, and the white Mercury was in the garage. He’s been calling every half hour to find out what you want him to do.”
“I’m home now. Tell him to call me here. If you’ve got a pencil and paper I want you to write something down.”
Anna came in with the drinks as Mrs. Rooney said, “All right.”
“A girl’s name, Anna DeLong.” I spelled it for her. “I asked her up for a nightcap, and I don’t know much about her except that she carries a gun.”
“That’s D-e-capital L? O.K., Mr. Gates. If you’re found dead in the morning, I’ll tell the cops. Any address?”
“She lives in White Plains.” I looked at Anna, and she gave me a street address which I repeated to Mrs. Rooney. “Another thing. She used to shack up with Leo Moran. Put that down, too.”
“Le-o Mo-ran,” Mrs. Rooney said. “I suppose she’s lovely. That’s the thing about your work, as I was saying to Mr. Rooney half an hour ago. It’s chancey. People think they’re entitled to take a shot at you any time they feel like it. You put in a lot of overtime you don’t get paid for. But you do meet some attractive girls.”
“Unattractive girls don’t get in so much trouble,” I said. “Good night, Mrs. Rooney.”
Anna gave me one of the drinks as I hung up. “Very clever. I think I’m actually beginning to like you, Ben. God knows why.”
I set the drink down without tasting it. “I’ll see how your picture turned out first. Maybe you can find something on television. I’ll be with you in half an hour.”
>
“Half an hour, Ben! I’d be dead in ten minutes. Let me watch. I’ll be good.”
I didn’t think she meant it, just as I wasn’t sure that she hadn’t put rat poison in my drink along with the ice and whiskey. Still, it was a challenge. Could I handle a 115-pound girl in a darkroom, or couldn’t I?
“O.K.,” I said.
It was a one-man bathroom. I told her where to sit and advised her to sit still. I locked the door from the inside so she wouldn’t be tempted to throw it open at a crucial time and fog the film. After I took the developing tank and the chemicals out of a cupboard I turned off the light and loosened the bulb.
“Spooky,” she said in the darkness. “Surely we don’t have to wait half an hour to see if we have a good negative?”
“We’ll know that in ten minutes. But you can’t tell much from a thirty-five negative. You’ll want to see how it prints.”
“Speak for yourself, Ben. I don’t want to see—” The end of the magazine came off and I removed the tightly-rolled film. Anna must have been wound up just as tightly. In the single vulnerable second when the film was out of the magazine and not yet in the tank, her hand darted forward and a lighter flared. I swung away, clapping the film into the tank with my hand over the opening. There was a spatter of breaking glass. I clubbed at the lighter with the tank until she dropped it. It went out as it hit the floor, and we were again in darkness. I felt among the broken glass on the shelf until I found the cover for the tank. After I screwed it on I tightened the light bulb and turned on the light to see how much damage she had done.
She had broken a bottle and knocked the hypo beaker off the shelf. That was all right. I had replacements.
“This stuff splashed all over me,” she said. “What is it?”
“Sodium hyposulphite. Has it started to burn yet?”
“No! Does it?”
“It eats through shoe leather,” I said, exaggerating. “You can rinse it off in the kitchen.”
“I’m really soaked,” she said.
We both stooped for the lighter. I got there first. It was a handsome piece of machinery in an alligator case, with a small silver plate engraved with the initials R. P.
“Junior or Senior?” I said.
“Junior, I think,” she said, taking it out of my hand. “He’s always leaving things around.”
I let her out of the bathroom and locked the door. I measured the developer and poured it into the tank. While it was working I cleaned up the broken glass, giving the tank an occasional shake. I smoked a cigar and thought about my problems. I came to only one conclusion, as a result of which I took Anna’s .25 apart and removed the hammer spring. I assembled the gun again and put it back in my pocket.
When enough time had passed I changed the solution. I was using a rapid mixture, and four minutes later I was able to take out the film to see what I had.
Thirty-one negatives were blank. The thirty-second looked a little overexposed, but I could compensate in the printing.
I unlocked the door, leaving the negative under the cold-water tap.
“Too bad,” I said. “It won’t win any prizes, but it’s—”
I stopped. Anna had taken the pins out of her hair. She was sitting on the sofa wearing one of my shirts. The sleeves were rolled up above her elbows, the collar was open. Sonia Petrofsky had given it to me on my last birthday, a faint red and black check. It was a good shirt. It wasn’t exactly transparent, but it wasn’t exactly not transparent, either.
“That sodium whatever it was got on everything,” she said.
“On everything?”
“Everything,” she repeated firmly.
“Are you sure you’re comfortable? Got everything you need?”
“I’m fine. What’s the matter with you?”
“Not much air in this bathroom. Well, relax. Take off your glasses.”
I retreated, locking the door again. I shouldn’t have been that surprised. Like Lorraine, she had been Leo Moran’s girl.
I set up the enlarger and worked for a while under a dim red light. Then I called her. I rocked the printing paper gently in the tray, watching the figures begin to form, the anonymous victim, gesturing angrily at the camera, the smiling girl beside him. They seemed to float effortlessly up from the depths where they had been hiding. Anna probably couldn’t see them too well, having followed my advice and taken off her glasses. After glancing at the picture, she watched me.
“Where do we start?” I said. “With the coffee?”
Chapter 13
After fixing the print I hung it from the shower curtain to dry. I gave her some wire hangers, and she hung up her wet clothes. Each time she reached upward for the shower curtain, the shirt-tail climbed in a way that helped to take my mind off my troubles.
I locked the negative in my filing cabinet, poured the drink she had made for me into the sink and made another.
“You’re a cautious bastard,” she said, “What do you think I am, a registered pharmacist?”
“I just don’t want you to get in any more jams. You’re in enough already. Was that all you could find to put on?”
“What’s the matter with it?”
“I didn’t say there was anything the matter with it. But I have some pajamas. They’d be too big for you too, but at least they have bottoms. Or how about my raincoat?”
“Ben, you know you don’t want me to bundle up in a raincoat. Don’t be silly.”
“It’s just that I’ve been interviewing girls since six o’clock,” I said. “Very different types, but they all seemed to think there was only one way to win my friendship. I mention no names. After a certain point I need to rest.”
She was laughing, her hands on her hips and those red and black checks moving in and out. “Do you think I deliberately splashed acid on myself so I’d have to take off my clothes? But you’ve got something I want, and since I did splash acid on myself I’d be stupid to put on a raincoat instead of a good-looking, comfortable, roomy shirt. And when girls make these advances to you, don’t you tell yourself that it’s a good way to find out what they want you to do?”
“Not only that,” I said gloomily. “I enjoy it.”
“Come and sit down. I’ll tell you about the coffee.”
She sat on the sofa. There was room beside her, but I sat in a leather sling-chair designed to hold only one person at a time. I wanted a certain amount of fresh air between me and this girl.
“I’m half-blind without my glasses,” she said. “So any time you want to come over on the sofa where I can watch your reactions— I know. The coffee.”
And drugging the coffee, after all, had been simple. There were three coffee pots in the pantry. Anna had hidden two. She broke open several sleeping capsules she stole from her employer, pouring the powder into the remaining pot. When she told Hilda Faltermeier to take coffee to the gentleman in the library, the cook had made up a powerful mixture by pouring coffee on top of the barbiturates she hadn’t known were there. Later, when Davidson and Minturn had been busy, Anna had washed the pot and the cup and saucer and put them away.
“Are you going to admit this to anybody but me?” I said.
“I hope I won’t have to. The next question they’ll ask me will start with why. But if I have to choose between that and having you put the picture into circulation, I’ll admit I was working with Leo on the robbery. Not because he made me but because I wanted the money. Would that help?”
“A little.”
She rapped her fist against one bare knee. “God! When Leo showed up out of the blue, after all those years, if I’d only gone to Mr. Pope and told him the whole story! Well, I didn’t, and now I’d better start thinking about how to stay out of jail.”
“Let’s go back. What made you leave Leo in the first place?”
“Throw me a cigarette, Ben.”
There was a pack on an end table near me. I shook one out for her and she lit it with Dick’s lighter. I went back to my leather chair, which crea
ked in protest as I sat down. Anna breathed out a mouthful of smoke.
“What you meant,” she said, “was why that girl in the picture left Leo. But the picture’s wrong, Ben. I wasn’t that girl even then. And even if I was, people change! Before I met Leo, I was one of the most conventional girls in the state of Michigan. I had a perfectly nice respectable set of middle-class parents. I had two sisters and a brother who are all married now and members in good standing of their local PTA. That sounds nasty. They actually are quite nice, but I don’t see them very often. What happened to me to get me in that picture instead of the PTA? Leo Moran happened to me. He was an act of God, like polio. I got over him, the way most people get over polio now, but I was pretty paralyzed for a while, from the moral sense down. It only happened twice, that scene in the picture. I didn’t mind it the first time, but the second time cured me. As far as Leo Moran was concerned, my temperature was back to ninety-eight point four. I moved out without even taking a toothbrush. I got a typing job with Mr. Pope’s company. But I was always worrying. Sooner or later I knew Leo would find me. So when Mr. Pope was looking for someone to work for him out of town, I asked for the job and got it.”
“Were you and Leo married?”
“He needed the wedding certificate—you can get in trouble without one. We had a justice-of-the-peace wedding in Maryland, but I always thought it might not be legal. He had a wife before me, and I doubt if he got divorced.”
“When he caught up to you, it was through Pattberg?”
“How did you know that? Yes, Pattberg saw me the day he came out to reconnoiter. He wanted to be sure there was a back way out in case of a raid, I guess. I didn’t think he recognized me. He only saw me for the tiniest part of a second, and he never knew me well. But creatures like that have a special instinct for things they can turn into money. And do you know how much Leo paid him? Five dollars. That’s how good Leo was. Leo let a few weeks go by before he showed up in White Plains. By then I’d almost stopped worrying. He had the picture with him, in case I’d forgotten. He wanted a percentage of my salary, and I wouldn’t have been taking much home every week, after taxes and after Leo Moran. I might as well tell you—Dick came to my apartment quite late one night when Leo was there. They didn’t run into each other, but Leo saw Dick’s car outside and traced the license number. This made things more serious, because if there was one person I didn’t want to see that picture, it was Dick.”
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