Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  “You got curious,” Keenan finished. “Okay. Think you can open it again?” Silently Joe went to the desk, manipulated a hidden spring, and stepped back as the heavy piece of furniture slid out at an angle. There was a black gap in the wall.

  Keenan went over and switched on a light. Hatch followed him. He looked down into a small square room, quite empty, with unbroken bare walls, lit by a single bulb in the ceiling.

  “There’s no way out of it,” Keenan said. “You can look around if you like. The boys shouldn’t have been fooling around. Hardly anybody knows about this hide-out.”

  “Hide-out?”

  “I got enemies.” Keenan smiled. “It’s a sort of bomb shelter—just in case.”

  Hatch nodded. “Okay.” He turned to the other masked figure. “Let’s see what you look like.”

  The second chorus man had a sallow, unhealthy, thin face, and untidy yellow hair. He evaded Hatch’s eyes.

  “Look, Mr. Hatch,” Keenan repeated. “One of my girls has been stabbed. How about it?”

  “I heard somebody run past in the hall, just before you busted in,” Joe broke in.

  Hatch rubbed his jaw. “Yeah. I don’t think you guys did it. The killer had a gun. And you’d have used a gun on me if you’d had one. Still, I’m not taking any chances. Keenan. will your little pals stick around?”

  “Sure,” the stocky man said. “Won’t you, boys?”

  The boys nodded sullenly. Hatch remembered Lannigan. He told Keenan to call the local police and, holstering his gun, pushed through the crowd into the night-club proper.

  It was seething with confusion, but Lannigan, Hatch saw, still sat motionless at his table.

  LANNIGAN kept on sitting there, rigid, and slumped back with his arms dangling at his sides, even when Hatch, his pulses pounding, bent to peer into the agent’s face. Lannigan’s eyes were open, the pupils dilated. There was a small polished chromium tray on the table, on which the Martini had been served. Hatch held this to Lannigan’s open mouth and drew it away unfogged.

  He lit a match before Lannigan’s eyes. There was no contraction of the pupils.

  Hatch felt his stomach turn over. He touched the corpse’s chest, felt the muscles flaccid and loose. Then something made his eyes widen. He slid his palm inside Lannigan’s shirt.

  The dead man’s heart was beating!

  Under his hand the slow beat hesitated and stopped. Had it been merely imagination? Hatch didn’t think so, but he made certain it was not some gadget that he had felt.

  Presently he stepped back and stared at the body, his eyes clouding. He had known Lannigan for a long time. It was tough for Rudy Lannigan to go out like this—dying even as Hatch had sat opposite to him in the dim-lit booth.

  Poison? The olive in the Martini glass was untouched, and there was a tiny puddle of gin and vermouth left. Hatch smelled the glass, but the odor of the drink was all he could catch. The Martini’s strong taste must have effectually disguised the poison.

  There was a noise from the back room. Hatch went there, shaking his head to clear it of the pounding ache. The man in overalls had recovered. Surrounded by a group of the club’s performers, with Keenan in the front row, puffing at a cigar and stroking his bald head, he was gulping a drink someone had given him.

  Hatch shouldered forward. “Let’s have it,” he said curtly. “What happened to you?” The overalled man looked at Keenan, who nodded.

  “Yeah. What happened, Bottley? Spit it out.”

  “That guy must have been hiding on the platform,” Bottley said. “Behind the curtains.”

  “You mean the murderer?”

  Bottley shuddered, his wrinkled face twisting. “Yes. He did kill Janna, then? I was at the switchboard, working the lights, when she peeled and went up on the platform. I worked the switches, same as always, and then this guy comes rushing off the platform and swats me over the head with a gun.”

  Hatch narrowed his blue eyes. “He was wearing that screwy outfit—false face and all?”

  “He was. Like the rest of the dancers.”

  “I get it. Our little friend hid on the platform, behind the curtains, stabbed Janna, jumped out and socked Bottley. He worked fast, all right! Then he heard me at the door, and dived back on the platform just in time to hide.”

  “I phoned the police,” Keenan said. “They’ll be along directly.”

  Hatch pulled him away from the others. “Listen, Keenan,” he said. “There’s a dead man out in the club. Poisoned.”

  The cigar jerked. “Yeah?” Keenan said. “Yeah. He was a Federal agent, too. Man named Lannigan. Take a look. You can see him from the door.”

  Keenan obeyed and came back with his eyes hooded.

  “I see. This’ll be sweet publicity for the Window, I don’t think.”

  “Ever seen Lannigan before?”

  “I have. He’s been coming here off and on for a week.”

  “Tonight—what happened?”

  Keenan’s harsh face remained impassive. “I didn’t see him come in, but I noticed him at that booth.”

  “Janna was with him for a while,” someone said.

  The club owner’s teeth clamped with soft savagery on his cigar. “That’s right,” he said. “She served him a drink.”

  The bartender who had interrupted Keenan before spoke again.

  “I served the drink to Janna. But it wasn’t poisoned.”

  Hatch looked at the man. “She took it straight to him?”

  “Yes, sir. She did.”

  “You saw that? She didn’t stop anywhere?”

  The bartender shrugged. “No. Except one of the dancers bumped into her, but it didn’t spill the drink.”

  “There it is,” Hatch said. “All wrapped up. Our friend the murderer again, disguised as one of your chorus boys, Keenan. He managed to drop poison into that Martini.”

  KEENAN didn’t say anything.

  “Headquarters will have the rest of that Martini analyzed,” Hatch went on, “but I’ve a hunch it was calabar bean—African ordeal poison. When you take that, you stay conscious to the last, but you can’t move. You’re paralyzed. And your heart keeps beating for a while after you’re dead. Does that suggest anything to you?”

  “Not a thing,” Keenan grunted. “You figure it was one of the dancers, eh? Want to question ’em?”

  Hatch shook his head. “The killer just used that disguise. You had extra monkey-suits and masks, didn’t you? I thought so. Well, in that dim light one extra man wouldn’t be noticed.”

  He hesitated. What next? Who had killed Lannigan, and why? Why had Janna called the Federal man to this rendezvous with murder, as Lannigan had told him she had done? A hundred questions raced through Hatch’s mind, but none could be answered yet.

  The siren of a squad car sounded outside.

  The next ten minutes were a swift blur of questions and answers. A sergeant drew Hatch aside.

  “Is this Federal business?”

  “An F.B.I. man’s been murdered.” Hatch said grimly. “That’s our business, all right. But you’d better take over. I’ve a few ideas I want to follow up. Will you send that Martini down to the Department to be analyzed?”

  He went in search of Keenan, who was in his office, sitting imperturbably behind his desk listening to the tinkle of an old-fashioned music-box.

  “I collect ’em,” he explained, showing the little cube to Hatch. “What now?”

  Hatch sat on the desk’s comer. “Who was this girl Janna?”

  Keenan found another cigar, clipped and lit it.

  “Janna Duquesne,” he said. “I hired her two weeks ago. Don’t know anything about her, otherwise.”

  “Let’s have her address.”

  Keenan opened a drawer of his desk, took out a card file, and copied an address on a note pad.

  “Here,” he said. “I think she lives with her sister. Janna used to work for an escort service. That’s where I met her. I liked her looks and offered her a job.”

 
; Hatch didn’t comment on the fact that, a moment ago, Keenan had said he didn’t know anything about Janna Duquesne. He pocketed the address, grunted, and turned to the door. There was a faint touch of mockery in the low voice that followed him out.

  “Good luck, G-man.”

  The address Keenan had given was a small frame bungalow on Serrano, a quiet street where tall palms masked the sidewalk lamps into dim obscurity. Hatch killed his motor and let the light coupe slide silently in to the curb. A few other cars were parked along the block. That might mean nothing, or a lot. He got out, went quietly to the bungalow’s porch, and hesitated.

  There was no light from within. Janna’s sister might be out. Maybe. Hatch wished he could think clearly. His head was still throbbing. He rubbed his flaming thatch and tried the bell.

  The sound rang shrilly, disturbingly, through the dark house.

  Then Hatch saw that the door was ajar—not much, but a significant dark line showed. Instantly he had swung it open, stepped in, and closed it behind him. Or, rather, he tried to close it. The door had expanded, and grated in protest as he forced it into its frame.

  Hatch’s eyes narrowed in the darkness. Someone—some intruder—had left the door ajar, so it wouldn’t stick in the jamb and slow down his get-away. Unless he’d already made a get-away!

  What next? Hatch wished desperately that he had a flashlight. A blaze of light from the electric fixtures would betray him to the killer, who might be waiting for just a move. All this on the assumption that someone was actually in the house—someone who didn’t belong there.

  A slight sound warned Hatch. His eyes were becoming accustomed to the obscurity. He made out a dim rectangle—a doorway. Beyond it was darkness, and from that darkness came an almost inaudible rustle that made the short hairs lift on Hatch’s neck, though he could not have said why.

  He slipped like a shadow across the threshhold and flattened himself against the wall by the doorway, his gun cold against a sweating palm. There was silence.

  Dim light came through the window. It revealed the body of a girl, a blonde like Janna, slim and pretty, lying motionless on the faded carpet. She was wearing a negligee over pajamas, and there were dark splotches on her throat—bruises that had been made by fingers. But her chest moved slowly. The killer had not had time to finish his job.

  And the murderer was still in the room with Hatch. The Federal man knew that, with a vivid certainty. There was the feeling of another presence!

  CHAPTER III

  MASKED GANG

  NOTHING was visible to Hatch but the girl’s body, and the lighter rectangle that marked the doorway. He could not see the murderer. The reverse was equally true.

  And the killer dared not fire at the girl, though no doubt he had a gun. The flash would have revealed his location to Hatch.

  Silence. A breeze rustled scratchily through the fronds of palm trees outside. Hatch closed his eyes and opened them again after a moment or two. But the darkness was still too intense for him to make out anything more.

  The girl on the floor groaned and opened her eyes. Instantly a low whisper cut through the blackness.

  “Don’t shoot, fella. She’s all right. I haven’t hurt her.”

  Hatch didn’t answer. He was trying to discover just where that voice came from.

  “I thought Ruth knew something,” it went on tonelessly, “but she doesn’t. I’d have killed her if she did. But she doesn’t know anything.”

  Something hurtled through the room, crashed against the window with a splintering of glass. For a second Hatch swung toward it. His gun blasted. Then he realized that the killer had thrown a chair through the window.

  It was too late then. A heavy body hurtled against him, sent him sprawling over some piece of furniture. Struggling to swing his automatic into line, Hatch was in time to see a figure dart through the doorway and vanish. He bounded up.

  “Stay here!” he said to the girl. “I’m going after that killer!”

  There was no time to make sure she understood. Hatch leaped into the front room and saw the door standing ajar. He plunged on to the porch, gun ready.

  A black sedan was already lurching away from the curb. Its engine roared as it swung

  on two wheels around the first corner, fifty feet away. It was gone.

  Pursuit, Hatch felt pretty sure, would be useless. The killer would abandon his car almost immediately, and lose himself in a maze of black alleys. Meantime, Janna’s sister would have been unguarded.

  He found her hunched over the telephone, trembling as she tried to dial Police Headquarters.

  “Don’t bother about that, Miss Duquesne,” Hatch said.

  She stared at him, eyes wide with fright. Hatch showed her his credentials.

  “Now—how do you feel?” he asked. “Hurt bad?”

  She touched the ugly black marks on her white throat.

  “No. You came along before he had a chance to do much.”

  Without invitation, Hatch lowered himself into a chair. The girl had switched on the lights, and he saw that the room was clean, neat, ordinary, and feminine. Janna’s sister was almost a ringer for the dead girl, except that her face was softer, rounder, and weaker. There still was fear in the dark eyes.

  “Who was that man?” Hatch asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said, without hesitation. “I got out of bed when the bell rang, and there was a man on the porch wearing a mask, and a fuzzy sort of suit.”

  Hatch nodded. So the killer was still wearing his Magic Window floor show get-up. A convenient disguise, easily donned or discarded at a moment’s notice.

  “He switched off the light and forced me back into the bedroom,” Ruth Duquesne went on. “He didn’t say anything. He just choked me. That’s all I know.”

  Hatch took out a pack of cigarettes and held it out.

  “No? Well—I think you do know something, Miss Duquesne. Something important to that killer.”

  She shook her head. “Honestly, I don’t.” Her red lips trembled. She pulled the negligee closer about her.

  Hatch’s blue eyes went bleak and dangerous.

  “Listen,” he said grimly. “That man intended to kill you. I stopped him. He didn’t dare shoot you, because I’d have fired at the flash. So what did he do? He waited till you woke up, and said—apparently to me—that if you had known anything, he’d have killed you. That was a warning to you—and you got it, all right. A warning to keep your mouth shut.”

  She looked at him like a bird fascinated by a snake. But her mouth was stubbornly tight.

  “Don’t be a fool,” Hatch said. “He won’t trust you to keep quiet. He’ll be back. Did you know your sister was murdered tonight?”

  THE thrust was intentionally brutal. Ruth Duquesne shrank back, the color flooded her cheeks, and then she went ghost-white. Her hand flew up.

  “No!” she said. “No!”

  “Somebody stuck a knife in Janna Duquesne’s heart,” Hatch said. “He won’t hesitate to do the same to you. If you talk, I’ll see that you’re protected. Otherwise—” He stood up and began to walk toward the door.

  Ruth leaped after him, dragging at his arm.

  “I’m sorry! I didn’t know! Please come back! Janna—”

  Hatch got her a glass of water from the kitchen and waited until the girl had calmed.

  “Okay,” he said at last. “Now what’s the answer?”

  Ruth was shivering. “I don’t know. Honestly! I’d tell you if I did, but … There’s only one thing.”

  “Well?”

  “For the past few weeks Janna’s been nervous. Once she said we’d soon have plenty of money, and then shut up like a clam. But—but there wasn’t anything else.”

  “Could be you might have some information without knowing it,” Hatch said. “Suppose you answer a few questions.”

  She was willing to talk. Ruth Duquesne worked for an escort service, had been working there since coming to Los Angeles from Iowa three years before. Things
had fallen off a lot since the war, though. Men didn’t have to phone an escort bureau to find a girl to take dancing or to a show. A month ago Janna had joined her sister, running away from home to come to California. She, too, had tried the escort bureau, but only for a week.

  “Keenan took her out, eh?”

  Ruth frowned. “Why, no.”

  “He said he did—and offered her a job at the Mirror.”

  The girl looked puzzled. “That wasn’t the way of it. Somebody told her to go see Mr. Keenan.”

  “Who?” Hatch asked quickly.

  “One of her escort service dates. Wait, I’ve got his name and address here somewhere. Ruth always left those with me before she went out on dates. Just in case. Sometimes the men try to get funny. But Janna could take care of herself.”

  Hatch lifted an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. He watched Ruth go to a secretary in one corner and fumble through copies of old movie magazines, letters, and papers.

  “Here,” she said. “This is the name of the man—Dyke Carnevan. A man from Des Moines who wanted to kick over the traces.”

  “What do you know about him? Anything?”

  “No,” Ruth said. “I don’t even know if Janna ever saw him after that once.”

  “And he told her to see Keenan, uh? Look, you two kids lived here together. Didn’t Janna ever say anything you thought was funny? That made you wonder?”

  Ruth bit at a fingernail, scowling in concentration.

  “N-no. Except … Oh, that wasn’t anything.”

  “Let’s have it,” Hatch said.

  “Well, she got in awful late a few nights ago, and I could tell she was excited. I thought she was tight. She’d been on a party. That was funny. She wasn’t tight at all, but she acted like it.”

  The G-man’s mouth hardened. “Did you notice her eyes?”

  “Her eyes? I don’t understand.”

  “Reefer party,” Hatch said. “Or worse, maybe. What’d she say? Mention any names?”

  Ruth nodded. “Just this Dyke Camevan—the client who told her to go to the Magic Window. She said he’d met Mr. Keenan in Des Moines a year and a half ago. That was all, really. She kept repeating it and laughing a lot.”