1949 - You're Lonely When You Dead

by James Hadley Chase

  There was a ragged tear in it near the window where Benny’s spaniel pup had chewed it. It wasn’t much of a carpet, but it was a relief to see it, for it meant I was in my room and on my bed and the woman’s face framed in blood was probably a nightmare. Probably...

  A man’s voice said, ‘He stinks like a distillery, and he’s as soused as a mackerel.’ A voice that sent a chill down my spine. Brandon’s voice. ‘Who’s the woman out there?’ the voice went on. ‘Ever seen her before?’

  Mifflin said, ‘She’s a new one on me.’

  I looked through my eyelashes. They were there all right.

  Brandon was sitting on a chair and Mifflin stood at the foot of the bed.

  I kept still and sweated. The back of my head felt as if the bone had been removed. It felt pulpy and soft as if there was a hole there: a hole that let in the draught that suddenly played about my pillow.

  Mifflin had opened a window by my bed. He had pulled the blind aside to get at the window and a lot of hot, bright sunshine fell on my face, sending shooting pains into my skull.

  I thought of Anita Cerf lying out there on the casting couch and the bloodstained yellow cushion and the Colt automatic. A beautiful setup for Brandon to walk into. A red-handed, no alibi, God’s gift to a lazy cop setup. Even Brandon wouldn’t look far for the killer. I thought of the way he had looked at me when he was questioning me about Dana’s death.

  ‘But she had to pass your place to get to where she was killed, didn’t she? It seems funny to me she didn’t look in on you.’

  If a little thing like that seemed funny to him, imagine the bang he was getting out of a setup like this.

  The same gun. Dana, Leadbetter and now Anita. All shot through the head. The same method; the same killer.

  Motive? I didn’t kid myself that a little thing like a motive would stop Brandon. Ever since he had been in office the police administration had been sagging like a bed with worn-out springs. If he wanted to stop awkward questions, muzzle the Press, quiet the flutterings of the men who had put him in the job he had to solve these murders quick. He’d cook up some motive. He wouldn’t miss out on a chance like this.

  ‘Hey! Malloy! Wake up!’ Mifflin bawled. His heavy hand fell on my shoulder and shook me. Bright lights burst before my eyes, and the pain in my head went shooting down to my heels and back to my head like a runaway roller-coaster.

  I threw off his hand and sat up, only to clap my hands to my head and bend over, groaning.

  ‘Snap out of it!’ Mifflin urged. ‘We want to talk to you. Hey! Malloy! Pull yourself together!’

  ‘What do you think I’m doing - a fan dance?’ I snarled, and swung my feet to the floor.

  ‘What have you been up to?’ Brandon demanded, leaning forward to peer at me. ‘What kind of drunk-up is this?’

  I squeezed my aching head between fingertips and peered back at him. He looked fat, well fed and well shaven. His linen was immaculate; his shoes gleamed in the sunshine, and he looked every inch the corrupt policeman. In comparison I must have looked like hell. My fingers rasped my unshaven jaw, the awful stink of whisky fumes made me feel sick and my evening dress shirt stuck to my chest.

  ‘What do you want?’ I asked, as if I didn’t know. ‘Who let you in?’

  ‘Never mind who let us in,’ he barked and brandished his half-smoked cigar at me. It smelt as if he had picked it out of an ashcan on his way over. ‘What’s going on here? Who’s that woman out there?’

  Not quite the right note, I thought, puzzled. Maybe these two birds were hard-boiled, but not so hard-boiled that they could be calm about a killing like the killing in the other room. And they were calm: disapproving, censorious and smug, like neither of them had ever touched a drop in their lives, but calm.

  ‘Is there a woman out there?’ I asked.

  Not very bright, but the best I could manage under the circumstances. At least it was non-committal.

  ‘What’s the matter with this guy?’ Brandon demanded, and looked over at Mifflin.

  ‘He’s drunk,’ Mifflin said stolidly. ‘There’s nothing else the matter with him.’

  ‘I’m beginning to wonder,’ Brandon said. ‘Get that woman in here.’

  It came out of me before I could stop it.

  ‘No! I don’t want to see her! I don’t...’

  The kind of voice you hear gangsters use on the movies when they’ve been cornered and are about to get the works. I snapped it off short, but it must have been pretty good because it brought Brandon to his feet and turned Mifflin as still as the Graven Image.

  Then a voice said from the doorway. ‘What are you doing with him? Can’t you see he has the shakes?’

  And there was Miss Bolus in a fawn linen frock, her red hair caught up with a green ribbon, and her chink eyes moving from Brandon to Mifflin and to me and back again.

  ‘I told you not to barge in on him,’ she went on, leaning her hips against the door frame, one hand touching her hair, pushing it into place. ‘Why can’t you leave him alone?’ She turned her head slightly to look at me. ‘Would you like a drink, honey? Or has the dog bitten you too hard?’

  ‘He doesn’t want a drink,’ Brandon said. ‘What did he mean, saying he didn’t want to see you? What goes on around here?’

  I thought maybe my mind had given way. Right behind Miss Bolus, in the other room, was the casting couch. From where she stood, if she looked over her shoulder, she could see it. She must have seen what was on it as she came to my bedroom door. Brandon must have seen it. Mifflin must have seen it. And yet here they were as calm as three oysters on the ocean bed, making no attempt to put on the hand-cuffs, telling me I was drunk, and even offering me more drink.

  Brandon was saying something as I pushed myself off the bed. But I didn’t listen. I had to see what was going on in the other room. I hoisted myself to my feet. I felt like a diver trying to walk on the floor of the sea without the sea being there.

  Brandon suddenly stopped talking. None of them moved.

  Maybe they sensed something of what was going on in my mind. Maybe they didn’t like the way I looked. If I looked anything like the way I felt I must have been something to see. They watched me crawl across the room. Captain Webb on the last lap of his Channel swim had nothing on me; but I got to the door.

  Miss Bolus put her hand on my arm. Her fingers dug into my muscles, but I wasn’t in the mood for warnings and I shoved her aside. All I wanted to do was to look into the other room; to look at Anita Cerf lying on my casting couch with her face framed in blood and a hole in her head big enough for me to poke my finger in.

  I looked into the other room and I looked at the casting couch and I felt the breath whistle through my locked teeth, and sweat start out on my face the way a boxer sweats when he has been hit far south of the line.

  There was no Colt automatic lying on the carpet and no blonde woman on the casting couch. I here was no yellow cushion soaked in blood. No nothing — nothing at all.

  II

  I was back on the bed again. I didn’t remember how I got there, but I was there and Miss Bolus was standing over me, a glass of whisky in her hand. As I half-struggled up, she bent over me, holding the whisky to my lips, and as I drank I found myself looking down the front of her dress. I must have been pretty bad, because she hadn’t a brassiere on, and as soon as I saw she hadn’t a brassiere on, I closed my eyes.

  That’s how bad I was.

  I drank the whisky. There seemed a lot of it, but there was no bite to it, so it was easy to keep drinking until there was nothing more to drink. It must have been all right because as soon as Miss Bolus moved away I felt its effect. I felt it rushing around in my system like a sheep dog chasing up sheep, only it wasn’t sheep the whisky was chasing, it was my nerves, and I could feel it pulling them this way and that, tightening them, disciplining them, bringing them back to their tough everyday standard. And after a minute or so although my head hurt still, I was suddenly
and miraculously well again.

  Cool fingers took the glass from my hand. Miss Bolus smiled at me.

  ‘I’ve seen the shakes a good many times in my young life,’ she said, ‘but nothing to compare to yours.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, and sat up slowly. ‘Let it be a lesson to you. It’s cured me. From now on—’ I broke off to stare at Brandon who sat on the straight-backed chair at die foot of the bed; his snake’s eyes missing nothing. ‘Hey!’ I exclaimed. ‘But I am seeing things. I’m seeing coppers. Look!’ I pointed.

  ‘Can you see coppers?’

  ‘I can see one,’ Miss Bolus said. ‘And the Police Captain. I wouldn’t call him a copper. He mightn’t like it.’

  ‘Cut out the funny stuff, Malloy,’ Brandon said bleakly.

  ‘We want to talk to you.’

  ‘Give me another drink,’ I said to Miss Bolus, and as she went across the room for the bottle, I said, ‘Who asked you in here, Brandon?’

  ‘All right, you can cut that out too,’ he said, glaring. ‘What’s going on here? Who’s this woman? What’s she doing here?’

  I discovered suddenly that the front of my dress shirt was soaked with whisky and that explained where the awful stink came from. I got unsteadily to my feet, ripped off my collar and dropped it on the floor with a grimace of disgust.

  ‘And get me some coffee,’ I said as Miss Bolus came over with the whisky. ‘Strong enough to lie on and plenty of it.’

  ‘Did you hear what I said?’ Brandon snarled, starting out of his chair.

  ‘Sure, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get an answer,’ I said, sending Miss Bolus away with a wave of my hand. ‘You have no right here. What’s it to you who she is? What’s it to you what’s going on?’ While I was talking I stripped off my tuxedo and shirt. ‘I’m getting myself a shower. Stick around if you have to. I shan’t be long.’

  It was only when I was opening the bathroom door that I wondered if the body was in there. I kept right on, shut the door and shot the bolt. No body. I reached out and pulled the shower curtain aside. Still no body. There was nowhere else to look, so I stripped off the rest of my clothes and got under the shower. Two minutes of hissing cold water cleared my head the way nothing else could have cleared it. I was beginning to get things under control. The electric clock on the wall told me it was twenty minutes past eleven. Anita Cerf had been shot at three forty-five a.m. I had been unconscious for nine hours. My fingers explored the back of my head. It was tender and felt a little soft, but so far as I could judge it was still all in one piece, and that was something to be thankful for.

  The body was gone. That seemed pretty obvious. If it had been hidden anywhere in the cabin Brandon would have found it. Who had taken it, and why? I flicked the electric razor into life and began to shave. Why take the body away?

  Why? Was the killer crazy? If he had left the body and the gun he could have been practically certain that Brandon would have nailed me for the murder. But maybe the gun could be traced. Was that it? Or maybe the killer hadn’t taken the body. Maybe someone else had. Miss Bolus? I couldn’t see Miss Bolus carrying away a body across her square young shoulders. She might have done. She had enough nerve, but I couldn’t quite sec her doing it. Who then? And who was the guy in the slouch hat who had sapped me? The killer?

  That was as far as I got: not very far, but then I wasn’t in the condition for brilliant deductions. Brandon hammered on the door.

  ‘Come out of there, Malloy!’ he shouted.

  I put down the razor, felt my chin and decided it was smooth enough, slipped on a bath robe and opened the door.

  Brandon was standing just outside. He looked as amiable as a tiger and a lot more ferocious.

  ‘I’ve had enough of this,’ he said violently. ‘You either talk here or you’ll come down to the station.’

  ‘I’ll talk here,’ I said, moving over to the table where Miss Bolus had put the coffee. ‘What is it?’

  I could hear her humming in the kitchen. She wouldn’t hum like that, I thought, pouring coffee, if she had seen Anita Cerf, let alone handled her. It couldn’t have been her.

  Who then?

  Brandon said, ‘Where’s Benny?’

  I wasn’t expecting that one. I wasn’t aware that he even knew Benny. I picked up the cup of coffee, held it a few inches below my nose and stared at him through the steam.

  It was good strong coffee. The smell of it made my mouth water.

  ‘You mean Ed Benny?’

  ‘Yes. Where is he?’

  ‘He’s in San Francisco.’

  ‘What’s he doing there?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’ I asked, sitting on the bed.

  ‘The San Francisco Police Department are asking.’

  ‘They are? Well, why don’t they ask him? What’s the idea?’

  For no reason at all I felt a cold chill run up my spine. I put the cup of coffee down on the bedside table.

  ‘It’s no use asking him,’ Brandon said harshly. ‘He’s dead.’

  The cold chill spread right across my back.

  ‘Benny? Dead?’ The voice didn’t sound like mine.

  ‘Yeah. The harbour police fished him out of Indian Basin,’

  Brandon said, his eyes glued to my face. ‘His hands and feet were tied with piano wire. They reckoned he died around nine o’clock last night.’

  III

  I stood at the window and watched them go.

  Brandon stamped down the path to the gate, the dead and chewed cigar pinched between clenched teeth and tight lips, an angry, frustrated look on his smooth, fat face. The uniformed cop who opened the car door for him, saluted, but even that didn’t seem to please him. He bundled himself into the car and glared back at the cabin as if he would like to set fire to it and kick the ashes into the sea.

  Mifflin followed him into the car. Mifflin didn’t look angry, but he looked very thoughtful, and he was still apparently thinking when the car drove away.

  I remained at the window, looking at the ocean without seeing it. Dana, Leadbetter, Anita and now Benny. The thing had suddenly gone mad: it wasn’t a murder case anymore. It was a massacre case.

  I felt rather than heard Miss Bolus as she came to the door, and I could feel her watching me.

  ‘How did you get here?’ I asked without turning.

  ‘I called you around nine o’clock this morning,’ she said.

  ‘The operator said your receiver was off and no one was answering.’ She joined me at the window. ‘I hadn’t anything better to do so I came over. You were lying on the floor. The lights were on; the doors open. I got you on to the bed and was trying to bring you round when I heard them drive up. I poured whisky over you and told them you had been celebrating. I kept them away from you as long as I could. I didn’t want them to know you had been sapped. I didn’t think you would want them to know either. I don’t think they did, do you?’

  ‘No.’ I took a package of Camels from my pocket, shook out two, gave her one and lit up. ‘The whisky was a good idea. You didn’t see anyone else here when you came in?’

  ‘There wasn’t anyone else here. What happened?’

  ‘Someone was waiting for me. I walked in, and, Bingo! That’s all there was to it.’

  She went over and began straightening the bed.

  ‘You make it sound pretty simple,’ she said.

  ‘Being hit on the head with a sock full of sand is simple. There’s nothing to it. You should try it some time.’

  ‘Don’t you have anyone to look after you?’

  I had forgotten Tony, my Filipino boy, then I remembered it was Sunday. He didn’t come in on Sundays. That was a break. I wouldn’t have liked him to have walked in here and found me lying on the floor. He was a respectable boy. He would probably have quit.

  ‘Not on Sundays. On Sundays I have a beautiful redhead who comes in and does for me,’ I said, and went into the sitting room. I stood over the casting cou
ch and stared at it.

  If the yellow cushion had been there I should have been convinced that I had had a nightmare, but the yellow cushion wasn’t there.

  It was a pity about the casting couch. I had grown fond of it, but I would have to get rid of it. It was lucky there were no bloodstains on it, but it did smell of death. At least it smelt of death to me. You don’t make love to a girl on a couch that smells of death. Even a Malloy has his finer feelings at times, and this was one of the times.

  I wandered around the room. Nothing out of place. There was no sign that Anita Cerf had been here: no sign whatsoever. I examined the carpet where the Colt automatic had lain. There were no oil stains. I got down on hands and knees and put my nose on the carpet and sniffed. There seemed to be a faint smell of gunpowder, but I couldn’t be sure if I was imagining it.

  Miss Bolus stood in the bedroom doorway and watched me. A troubled little frown wrinkled her brow.

  ‘What’s on your mind?’ she asked. ‘Or do you always act like this?’

  I stood up and ran fingers down the back of my head.

  ‘Sure,’ I said absently. ‘You want to see the way I act when I’m not hit on the head.’

  ‘I don’t think you’re well. Hadn’t you better go back to bed?’

  ‘Didn’t you hear what Brandon said? I have to go to Frisco to identify Benny.’

  ‘Bosh,’ she said sharply. ‘You’re not fit to go. I can go or someone from the office.’

  I went over to the cupboard where I kept the aspirin.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, not paying a great deal of attention to what she was saying. I took four aspirins from the bottle and flicked them one after the other into my mouth. I washed them down with lukewarm coffee, ‘But I’m going all the same. Benny was a friend of mine.’

  ‘You had better get a doctor to look at your head,’ Miss Bolus said. I could see she was worried. ‘You may have concussion.’

  ‘The Malloys are famous for their rock-like skulls,’ I said, wondering if I had taken enough aspirins. My head still ached. ‘Nothing short of a sledgehammer would give me concussion.’ I shot two more aspirins into my mouth to be on the safe side. I was wondering why Anita Cerf had come to my place, and how the murderer knew she was there. Then an unpleasant thought dropped into my mind. Perhaps he didn’t know, .and was waiting for me. That seemed much more likely. Maybe he thought I was getting too inquisitive and had come out here to silence me the way he had silenced Dana, and had knocked Anita off for practice. Well, not exactly practice . . . This needed a little thought. This needed one of those brain sessions for which I’m not particularly famous. I decided to put the problem in lavender until my head stopped aching.