Stretching her arms over her head, she gave a kittenish yawn. The movement arched her full but firm breasts upward, drawing the skin so tight that their pink tips jutted out like a teen-ager’s. Cushman stared down at her, his tongue flicking out to caress the bottom edge of his mustache.
Glancing fearfully over his shoulder at the door to the dining room, he said weakly, “Don’t do that. I’m not made of iron.”
Maintaining the stretched-out position, she looked up at him without expression. “Mr. Calhoun will be here again at two P.M. tomorrow. You’ll bring the money in the morning?”
Gazing down at her again, he lifted his shoulders in a shrug of acquiescence. “We’ll try it this way,” he said. “And hope your character analysis is correct.”
4
The next day was Thursday. At noon Barney Calhoun phoned Emergency Hospital and learned John Lischer’s condition was charted as unchanged. Two hours later the colored maid Alice again let him into the foyer of the Powers home.
This time, instead of making him wait while she checked with her mistress, she merely said, “Mrs. Powers is expecting you, sir,” walked off, and let him find his own way to the sun porch.
Though the living room was thickly carpeted, the dining-room floor was inlaid tile. Calhoun’s summer loafers were crepe-soled, and made no noise on the hard floor. He stopped in the open doorway to the sun porch.
If Mrs. Powers was expecting him, as the maid had said, apparently she was also expecting the maid to announce his arrival, because she wasn’t dressed for company. Like yesterday she was stretched out in one of the deck chairs with sun flooding her body. Her eyes were closed, though she didn’t seem to be asleep, and she wore nothing but a pair of yellow shorts as brief as the red ones she had worn the day before.
Calhoun stood for some time just looking. Presently, as though sensing another presence, she slowly opened her eyes and turned her head in his direction. She looked at him for a long moment, neither surprise nor embarrassment on her face. It bemused him that she didn’t make the instinctive feminine gesture of covering her bare bosom with her arms.
“It’s obvious that you’ve never had any children,” he said a little huskily.
Without hurry she rose from the deck chair and lifted a scarf the same color as her yellow shorts from an end table. Silently she turned her back, folded the scarf across her breasts, and held the two ends beneath her arms for him to tie. Equally in silence he crossed them and tied a square knot.
“You pulled it too tight yesterday,” she said in her curiously flat voice. “Please leave it so that I can undo it without help.”
He loosened the knot a little. He was sweating when he finished.
She turned around, just as she had yesterday, without first moving an inch away. Again he found himself looking down into her upturned face at uncomfortably close range.
“Why is it obvious I’ve never had any children?” she asked. “Pregnancy doesn’t necessarily make a woman sag.”
“No,” he said in a voice even huskier. “But it turns the pink to brown. You still have a little-girl body.”
“Thank you,” she said without expression.
A man can stand only so much temptation. When she merely continued to look up at him, making no attempt to move away, he dropped a hand on each of her smooth shoulders, pulled her against his chest, and kissed her.
She made no resistance, but she made no response, either. She just stood there, her lips soft but unmoving, and her eyes wide open. After a moment he pushed her away.
“Was your mother frightened by an ice cube?” he growled at her.
She turned, then padded across the screened-in porch on bare feet to a small table against the inner wall. “Maybe you’re just not the man to melt the ice, Mr. Calhoun,” she said over her shoulder.
A brightly colored straw bag lay on the table, and she removed a banded sheaf of currency from it.
“Your fee,” she said, returning and handing him the money. “One hundred fifties.”
“How about the settlements?”
“We don’t know what they’re going to amount to, do we?” she said. “Harry wants to see the agreements releasing me from further claims in writing before he pays any more money. When you bring me those, I’ll see that you get whatever money the agreements call for.”
“Harry is smarter than I thought he was,” Calhoun remarked.
He riffled through the bills enough to make sure they were all fifties, then stuffed them into a pocket without counting them. “I’ll pay my personal expenses and the car repairs out of this, and you can pay me back when it’s all over.”
Without comment she returned to her deck chair.
“I’ll try to have all three agreements drawn up by tomorrow,” Calhoun said. “Is it all right if I take them directly to Cushman for approval instead of bringing them here?”
“Why?” she asked.
“Because I’d like to get that part of it settled before I take off with the car. So I won’t be in quite so much of a jam in case I get picked up driving it. By the time I deliver the agreements to you, you relay them on to Cushman, and I call to get them back again, it will already be Monday.”
After reflecting, she said, “I suppose that will be all right. I’ll phone Harry to expect you sometime tomorrow. You know where he lives?”
“I looked it up in the phone book. I’ll pick up your car just after dark Monday night. Around nine thirty. Leave the garage unlocked and the keys in the car if you’re not going to be home.”
“Hadn’t I better phone you first?” she asked. “Suppose Lawrence changes his mind at the last minute and doesn’t go?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Maybe you better.” He gave her his home number.
Calhoun’s plan was to contact the injured John Lischer before he got in touch with either of the other two men, as there would be no point in trying to settle with the others if Lischer refused to cooperate. But before doing even that, he decided, it would be wise to find out just how much of an interest the police were taking in the case.
After leaving the Powers home, Calhoun drove straight to Police Headquarters. He found Captain Ben Simmons alone in his office, morosely going over a stack of case records.
The head of the Accident Investigation Bureau was a big man, nearly as big as Calhoun, with an air of restrained energy about him. He hated desk work, which made up a good part of his job, and usually was glad of any excuse to postpone it. Although he and Calhoun were friendly enough, they had never been intimate. But because the private detective’s arrival gave him an excuse to push aside his case records, he looked up at Calhoun almost with relief.
“Hi, Barney,” he said. “Pull up a cigarette and sit down. I was just getting ready to take a break.”
Calhoun slid a chair over to one side of the desk, produced a pack, offered Simmons a cigarette, and flipped another in his own mouth. The captain furnished lights.
Simmons leaned back in his chair and blew an appreciative shaft of smoke across the desk. “If you came in to report an accident, walk right out again. We’re up to our necks now.”
“Just killing time,” Calhoun said. “Thought maybe I could dig up a client from among your cases. I haven’t had a job in five weeks.”
The captain laughed. Calhoun reflected that policemen always seemed to enjoy hearing that a private investigator wasn’t doing so well.
“You should have stayed on the force,” Simmons said. “Probably you’d be a sergeant by now.”
“Probably I’d still be pounding a beat. Anything stirring that I might get a finger in?”
“Like what?” the captain inquired. “People involved in auto accidents hire lawyers, not private eyes.”
“I was thinking of hit-and-runs,” Calhoun said. “Maybe somebody’d pay to have a hit-and-runner tracked down.”
“We have a Hit-and-Run Squad attached to the Accident Investigation Bureau,” Captain Simmons said with a shade less friendliness.
Simmons said gruffly, “Sorry, Barney. There’s only one unsolved hit-and-run on the books, and there wouldn’t be anything in it for you.”
“Any insurance companies involved?”
“Not for the dead guy,” Simmons said. “He didn’t have any insurance. There was a little property damage covered by insurance, but not enough to pay the insurance company to hire a private eye to track down the hit-and-runner.”
Apparently he was talking about a different case, Calhoun decided. John Lischer had been neither dead nor in immediate danger of dying when Calhoun had checked with Emergency Hospital at noon.
He said, “You’ve only got one unsolved hit-and-run?”
“At the moment. The thing happened about two thirty A.M. Tuesday, and the guy’s condition was listed as fair up until one P.M. today. Then he suddenly conked out. The Hit-and-Run Squad just got the call an hour ago.”
Calhoun felt his insides turn cold. Forcing his tone to sound only politely interested, he asked, “Who was he?”
“Old fellow named John Lischer. All he had was a fractured hip, but he was pushing eighty and I guess he couldn’t stand the shock. His heart gave out.”
Calhoun calmly puffed his cigarette, but his mind was racing. Up to that moment his actions hadn’t been exactly ethical, but the most he had been risking was his license. Once he had arrived at settlements with the three injured parties, there would have been little likelihood of his getting into serious trouble for not reporting what he knew to the police, even if the whole story eventually came out.
But the unexpected death of John Lischer changed the whole picture. Suddenly, instead of merely being guilty of somewhat unethical practice, he was an accessory to criminal negligence, or possibly, if the district attorney decided to make an example of the case, even to manslaughter.
Both were felonies.
He asked casually, “Got any leads on the case?”
“A little green paint and a bumper guard. Enough to identify the car as a green Buick.”
That did it, Calhoun thought. So much for Mrs. Powers’ assurance that she’d left no clues at the scene of the crime. With the case now a felony instead of merely a misdemeanor, there’d be a state-wide alert for a damaged green Buick. Even Rochester wouldn’t be safe.
Somehow Calhoun managed to get through another five minutes of idle conversation with Ben Simmons. Then he pushed himself erect with simulated laziness.
“Guess I won’t pick up any nickels here,” he said. “See you around.”
“Sure,” the captain said. “Drop in any time.”
It was nearly three thirty when Calhoun left Headquarters. He debated returning to the Powers home at once, then decided it was too close to the time Mr. Powers would be getting home from the bank. Instead he phoned from a pay station.
The colored maid Alice answered the phone, but Mrs. Powers came on almost immediately.
“Barney Calhoun,” he said. “There’s been a development. I have to see both you and Cushman at once.”
“Now?” she asked. “I expect my husband home within minutes.”
“Arrange some excuse with Alice. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t urgent. Can you get in touch with Cushman?”
“I suppose.”
“Then both of you come to my place as soon as you can get there.” He gave her his lower Pearl Street address. “West side of the sheet, just right of the alley. Lower right flat. Got it?”
“Lower Pearl Street,” she said with a slight sniff. “That isn’t a very nice neighborhood.”
“I’m not a very nice person,” Calhoun told her, and hung up.
5
Buffalo’s lower Pearl Street is a neighborhood of dusty shops, second-rate taverns, and low-rent apartment buildings. It is not a slum section, but neither is it a very good residential area.
Barney Calhoun lived in a four-unit apartment building flanked by a hand laundry on one side and a tavern on the other. The two upper flats were occupied by the family of the Chinese man who operated the laundry and by a man who operated a hand book. The flat across from Calhoun was rented by a pair of streetwalkers who used it for business purposes.
Harry Cushman arrived first, coming by taxi shortly after four P.M.
When Calhoun opened the door, Cushman inquired curtly, “You’re Bernard Calhoun?”
“Yeah,” the private detective said. “Come on in.”
Cushman didn’t offer his hand. He followed Calhoun into a small and not particularly well-furnished front room, looked around superciliously, and finally chose a straight-backed chair as the piece of furniture least likely to be contaminated.
“Helena said it was urgent,” he said. “I hope you can make it fast. I have a five-thirty cocktail date.”
It was the first time Calhoun had heard Mrs. Powers’ first name. Helena Powers. Somehow the name seemed to suit her calm and expressionless beauty.
He said, “Depends on how fast Helena gets here. What I have to say won’t take long.”
The buzzer sounded at that moment and Calhoun went to let Helena Powers in. Glancing past her at the curb, he saw she had come in the station wagon.
Harry Cushman rose when she came into the room, crossed and bent to kiss her. She turned her cheek, then moved away from him and sank into an easy chair that had a broken spring. She was wearing a bright sun dress that left her shoulders bare, open-toed pumps, and no stockings. Her jet-black hair was tied back with a red ribbon, and she looked about sixteen years old.
Cushman returned to his chair.
Without preliminary Calhoun said, “John Lischer’s dead.”
Cushman stared at him with his mouth open. As usual, Helena Powers’ face showed no expression.
“But you told Helena you’d been checking the hospital and his condition was listed as fair,” Cushman said stupidly.
“His heart gave out. All he had was a fractured hip, but he was nearly eighty.”
Helena asked in a calm voice, “How does this affect our arrangements?”
“It changes the whole picture,” Calhoun told her. “You can’t settle with a dead man. If you get caught now, you may be charged with criminal negligence. Possibly even manslaughter.”
Harry Cushman’s face was gray. “Listen,” he said. “I know a little bit about the law. The fact that it was hit-and-run doesn’t have any bearing on a criminal-negligence or manslaughter charge. There’d be two separate charges. And a hit-and-run charge is only a misdemeanor no matter how many people get killed.”
“Sure,” Calhoun told him. “But you can bank on it that with a death resulting from the accident, the judge will give the maximum possible sentence for hit-and-run. And while under the law, the mere act of running isn’t supposed to be considered a factor in a charge of criminal negligence or manslaughter, juries do consider it despite judicial instructions to disregard it. Theoretically the prosecution has to prove blatant disregard on the part of the driver for the safety of the injured person. But believe me, it’s a lot easier to convince a jury that excessive speed and reckless driving constitute ‘blatant disregard’ in a hit-and-run case than in one where the driver stopped and tried to help the injured party. My opinion is that after all this time Mrs. Powers would be charged with at least criminal negligence even if she voluntarily turned herself in now.”
Harry Cushman ran his tongue over the underside of his mustache. “What are we going to do?” he asked. “I can’t afford to be accessory to a felony charge.”
“You already are,” Calhoun informed him. “You were in the car that killed Lischer. If you didn’t want to be an accessory, you should have reported to the cops at once.” He let a little contempt creep into his voice. “Of course if you go to them right now, they’ll probably let you off the hook because they’ll be more interested in the dri
ver. Mrs. Powers will take the rap—up to five years and a thousand-dollar fine if she’s convicted of criminal negligence, up to fifteen years and a fine if they make it manslaughter—and all you’ll get is a little bad publicity.”
Cushman licked at his mustache again and flicked his eyes at Helena, who stared back at him expressionlessly.
“Naturally we have to protect Helena,” he said with an effort to sound protective. “What’s your suggestion?”
“They know it was a green Buick.” Calhoun looked at Helena. “Your belief that you hadn’t knocked anything loose was a little wrong. You left a bumper guard at the accident scene.”
He turned his attention back to Harry Cushman. “Now that it’s classified as a felony instead of just a misdemeanor, every repair garage in the state, in upper Pennsylvania, and halfway across Canada will be alerted. The risk of getting the car fixed has at least tripled. And so has my fee. I want another ten thousand dollars.”
“Ten thousand!” Cushman squeaked. “You agreed to five!”
“Not to help cover a felony, I didn’t. Make up your mind fast. Either it’s fifteen grand or nothing. If you don’t want to play, I’ll hand back your five right now and call the police.”
Both of them stared at him, Cushman with petulant belligerence and Helena with mild curiosity, as she might have examined an interesting bug on a flower.
Finally Helena’s husky voice said, “I don’t see what there is to argue about, Harry. Mr. Calhoun seems to be in a perfect bargaining position. He always seems to be in a perfect bargaining position.”
“You said he wouldn’t ask for any more,” Cushman accused her. “You said he’d perform exactly the service he agreed to for exactly the fee he agreed to. You and your ability to judge character. I told you we’d end up paying blackmail.”
Calhoun’s face became very still. With a lithe movement that was startling in so big a man, he stepped forward, gathered a handful of Cushman’s shirt front, and effortlessly lifted him to his feet. The dangerous glitter in his eyes caused Cushman to raise both palms defensively.
Hit and Run Page 3