Eye Witness

by George Harmon Coxe

  That she had actually married him was due, Murdock thought, as much to her uncle’s stupid and stubborn ultimatums as to her fascination with Farnsley and now, eyeing his visitor morosely as he finished his second drink, Murdock wondered just what the man had expected out of the marriage. Had there been some hope that Dorrance would relent, thereby allowing Helen’s money to be used as he, Farnsley, wished? Had he actually been waiting for such a break, convinced that when it came he would be well paid?

  He realized that the man was talking, his tone still nasty. ‘You always were a pal, weren’t you?’ he said, getting up to fix his third drink. ‘You tried to talk her out of marrying me in the first place, you and that uncle of hers. I resented it then and I resent your sticking your nose in now. You know why?’

  ‘Because’, said Murdock, whose self-control was getting a little frayed, ‘you know that if you hang on you might get your hands on some of that money she’ll inherit next year.’

  ‘Yeah! Dorrance and his ten thousand dollars!’ Farnsley laughed shortly. ‘Well, when you go back tell him this. Tell him if there’s any divorce I’ll get mine in advance or else …’

  Murdock knew there was no point in arguing, but Farnsley had other things to say, none of them pleasant, and Murdock found himself replying. As a result their voices rose until, a few minutes later, a new and angry voice broke in.

  ‘Knock it off, you guys! Or do I call the manager?’

  It came from outside, that voice, from the window of an adjoining room. It was followed by the banging of a sash and now Murdock went over and closed his own window, which had been open a crack.

  ‘All right, Lee’, he said wearily. ‘If you’re going to fight a divorce you’re going to fight it. If I’m sucker enough to get tangled up in a marital mix-up I suppose I should expect some abuse. But for now why don’t you finish your drink and shove off!’

  ‘Not me’. Farnsley stood up and slipped off his jacket. He draped it on the back of the chair and turned, grin fixed and eyes challenging. ‘It just happens that I’m in hock to a guy in town and he’s on my neck. He’s a mean bastard and I don’t want to tangle with him. Maybe to-morrow I can dig up a down payment and stall him, but to-night I don’t want to see him.’

  Murdock peered at him, brows warping, recalling the information Simon Rigby had given him but not expecting anything like this. ‘What?’ he said.

  ‘I’m staying here.’ Farnsley balanced himself, his hands hanging in loose fists at his sides. ‘You’re my pal, aren’t you? And you’ve got room. You can have half of that double bed, or you can get another room, or’—his chin came up a little—‘you can try tossing me out if you think you can make it.’

  Standing face to face that way they were about the same height, with Murdock the darker of the two and somewhat less bulky, but looking fit and well-poised. The anger was starting to work on him now; it showed in the bright glints in his eyes, in the set, tight line of his mouth and jaw. He tried once more, keeping his voice down.

  ‘Look, Lee’, he said, ‘let’s not—’

  Farnsley cut him off. ‘I told you how it was. Go ahead. It’s your move, baby.’

  For a moment, then, Murdock measured him, his ire rising at the other’s stubborn unreasonableness. He noted the fleshy softness of Farnsley’s face and upper arms, and there was no doubt in his mind that he could handle the man if he had to. But not easily, and not without taking some punishment. There would be a nasty shambles before the business was over and that would mean the house detective and quite possibly the police. It would mean risking some unpleasant publicity that might involve Helen and would serve only to make an ugly situation worse.

  The thought of all this, the sight of Farnsley’s flushed, insolent features made him stiff and tight all over, and for one lingering instant he considered putting a hard fast one on that twisted mouth, just for luck; then he saw in time that it was a luxury he could not afford. Turning, legs shaking as his anger made itself felt, he swept up the telephone and asked for the room clerk.

  When he got his man he asked if he could get another room and the clerk, not understanding, asked if anything was wrong with 617. Murdock said no. He said he was inquiring for a friend.

  ‘I’m sorry’, the clerk said. ‘We’re full up to-night, Mr. Murdock. You might try the State Hotel a block down the street. They most always have something.’

  Murdock put down the receiver carefully and picked up his hat. He glanced at his wrist-watch and turned to Farnsley, his voice tough but controlled.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do’, he said. ‘I’ll give you the use of the room for an hour, chum. If you can shake the guy that’s on your neck, okay. If not, okay. Either way I’ll be back, and if you’re still here out you go. If I can’t handle you myself I’ll get the house dick to help me.’

  There were perhaps a dozen men sitting in the lobby when Murdock stepped from the elevator, and as he paused to discipline his thoughts his glance came to rest on a man sitting by the nearest pillar, a swart, narrow-eyed fellow with a small, black moustache, and wearing a fitted blue coat and a light-grey felt hat. That he noticed him at all was due partly to the fact that the man was watching him over the top of his newspaper, having glanced up as the elevator door opened, as though wanting to see who would step out. This obvious curiosity and a certain unremitting steadiness in the other’s glance served only to annoy Murdock further and, though he was to remember the incident later, he rewarded this interest with an impatient glare of his own before he wheeled and strode towards the street.

  It had grown steadily colder during the evening, but Murdock’s anger kept him warm, and it was not until he approached the lighted, vertical sign which hung suspended from the façade of the State Hotel that he began to think about where he was going to spend the hour. A smaller sign which said Cocktail Lounge decided him and he turned into the entrance.

  The lobby beyond was a cut or two below the Greene in its appointments. A second-rate establishment, it boasted no rugs or potted palms; the chairs and settees were upholstered in black leather, and instead of sand-filled urns which were regularly tended and raked, the receptacles were tall cuspidors on rubber mats, heavy looking, brightly burnished, and strategically placed. On the right, half-way to the desk, a corridor led to the bar and he turned there, seeing now the three telephone booths and the stand holding some directories. He stopped as a new thought came to him, and when he had looked up Helen Farnsley’s number he stepped into the nearest booth and dialled it.

  ‘I saw Lee’, he said when her voice came to him. ‘He came to the hotel. We had a lovely session’, he said, and briefly explained what had happened.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry’, she said, sounding genuinely concerned. He heard her sigh and then she said: ‘But I’m not surprised, knowing Lee. I ’phoned him at six-thirty and told him I was going to get a divorce.’

  ‘So he said.’

  ‘As you can imagine after what happened to you, he was extremely nasty about the whole thing. He said he’d fight unless he got paid.’

  Murdock considered telling her about the offer he was authorized to make and then decided it could wait. ‘What he really wants’, he said, ‘is to cut in on your inheritance, probably for about a third.’

  He went on quickly, telling her not to worry. ‘I just wanted to tell you that for an hour or so I won’t be in Room 617. After that I’m going back and toss him out.’

  As he came out of the telephone booth, Murdock stood for a moment looking back towards the lobby with sultry eyes. That was how he happened to notice the man walk past on his way to the entrance. Apparently coming from the desk or the elevators, he was a bare-headed, dapper fellow who looked neither to the right or left and moved with small quick steps that gave him a sort of bounding gait.

  Murdock had last seen him in Room 617 when he entered—with a key he had neglected to turn in—in search of the hidden envelope, and he remembered his name was Harry. It struck him as odd that the man w
ould be here in the State Hotel after having so recently checked out of the Green, and now as Harry passed from view he wondered why he should have thought it necessary to move. Then, because he was too concerned with his own troubles to bother thinking about this man Claire Emerson had said was a talent agent, he wheeled and walked quickly to the bar.

  The first drink he got there did him no good at all, so for the second round he asked for a double. He had a seat that faced the bar mirror, and when he had taken stock of the room and its occupants, he found himself staring morosely at his own image. This went on for quite a while, but as the drinks warmed him the edge of his anger lost its temper. Unconsciously his mind went back to review the things that had happened in Room 617. The more he thought about it the more preposterous the incident seemed, and finally, as his thoughts moved on, a grudging smile began to work at the corners of his eyes.

  He still resented everything about Lee Farnsley, but in all honesty he finally admitted that he himself was not without blame. Viewed realistically, Lee had a legitimate beef. A man had a right to be sore at anyone who interfered in his marital affairs. Murdock had done just that. That his intentions were of the best—and to him justified—did not alter the fact that Farnsley had a right to resent this interference.

  And so, glancing at his watch and finding the hour was up, Murdock lost the round by default. He found he was grinning at himself. Maybe it was because the whisky had mellowed him; more likely it was his own sense of the fitness of things. Whatever the reason, he understood that to go back now would be childish and idiotic. Let Farnsley have the room. The hell with it providing there was a vacant room here.

  Telling the bar-tender he would be back, he left his unfinished drink and wheeled back into the lobby. He had no trouble getting a room, though he had to pay in advance, and when he returned to his drink he felt better.…

  Murdock awoke the next morning shortly after nine, feeling rested and temporarily free from resentment of any kind. He stood up in his shorts and started for the bathroom before he realized he had no razor or toothbrush. For a brief time he surveyed himself distastefully in the mirror while he considered the idea of calling a bellboy and asking him to do a little shopping at the nearest drugstore. That he discarded the idea was due to his desire to get back to his own room at the Greene Hotel as soon as possible, and so he washed hurriedly, combed his hair as best he could with his fingers, and left the room.

  He turned in his key at the desk and walked briskly up the street, shivering a little now because the morning remained raw and cold. He still had the key to 617 in his pocket and he did not stop for coffee, but went into the Greene, determined to see the manager if Lee Farnsley was still in his room.

  The two policeman, who stood talking together opposite the elevators in the sixth-floor hall, surveyed him idly as he stepped from the car. He hesitated, speculating, as he turned left, and then he was walking down the corridor, the tension rising in him as his pulse began to quicken. For half-way down that hall the door to Room 617 stood open. There was a uniformed policeman here, too, and four curious men, apparently guests, who were trying to glance inside.

  Murdock kept on; he had no choice, though his steps were dragging, and he had to concentrate to keep moving at all. He heard the policeman saying: ‘Now, I’m asking you to keep moving. Go on, now, no loitering.’

  And someone else saying: ‘We heard a man was killed.’

  Then the policeman: ‘That he was. His head bashed in with one of those heavy glass candlesticks they have on hand for emergencies. Now, do you get moving like I’m asking you, or do I call the boys down the hall and give you a free ride to the station? Hey, you!’

  Murdock had passed the open door, walking on rubbery legs, a horrible emptiness in his stomach. He had glanced through the open door to see the men standing about inside, and he was grateful for the curious guests who had occupied the policeman.

  Now he had to stop. He looked back over his shoulder. ‘Me?’ he said with all the innocence he could muster.

  ‘Yes, you.’

  Murdock waited, breath held and intent on maintaining an expression of innocent surprise.

  ‘A guest here, are you?’

  Murdock flashed his key. He said he had a room down the hall. He noticed that the quartet of morbidly attracted men had moved off, but not very far. ‘Some trouble, officer?’ he said.

  ‘You can read about it in the papers.’

  Murdock needed no urging to keep moving. It never occurred to him in that moment of shock and uncertainty to stop and identify himself. All his experience and every bit of his training in other situations of this sort should have told him that there was only one sensible thing to do. But like anyone else, Murdock made mistakes, and he made one now. For this was all so sudden, the implication so clear and damning, that his only concern in those few seconds was to get out where he could pull himself together and consider things clearly.

  All he could think of now was his quarrel with Farnsley, and the unknown witness to that quarrel who had yelled for quiet from an adjoining room. The police would presently locate that witness, and with the motive so obvious, there came to Murdock the certain knowledge that he would be arrested at once.

  So, having made his mistake in that split instant when he had to decide on his course, he kept moving. He reached the end of the hall without further interference from the policeman. There was a transverse corridor here and he caught a glimpse of the red-lettered exit sign on his right. He turned towards it and the green metal door at the end. He pushed at it, and there was a landing beyond, and stairs, and he went down one flight, dazedly, and along to the elevators.

  Chapter Five

  THE morning was bright but there was a briskness to the air that quickened the steps of those who passed Murdock by as he hesitated outside the hotel. He turned left, for no other reason than that it was a route he had travelled before, feeling the cold strike through him and having no inner warmth with which to combat it. The hollowness centring around the pit of his stomach still worked on him, a corrosive force that destroyed temporarily his ability to reason. He moved like an automaton for a block, until he found himself outside the State Hotel, and now, remembering that he had turned in his key, he kept on.

  He crossed the intersection, looking for sanctuary, and presently his immediate goal became the sign of a bus terminal a short distance ahead. He turned in here, and the warmth and the smell of coffee from the urns behind the lunch counter helped steady his nerves. He ordered coffee, and as he felt its warmth and goodness inside him something happened to his appetite, and now that the effect of his emotional shock began to wear off he was suddenly ravenous.

  He ordered orange juice. Then he ordered scrambled eggs and bacon and waited impatiently for their preparation. He cleaned his plate, ate every crumb of toast, and had a second cup of coffee. Only then was he able to light a cigarette and take stock of his surroundings.

  Half-turning on his stool, he inspected the people waiting on the benches, the parcel lockers along one wall, the doorway leading to an adjoining barber shop, the ticket-seller’s cage, and candy counter. Out front a New York bus was loading and at the side entrance other smaller buses waited in a paved enclosure. As the only man in the place without a topcoat of some kind he felt conspicuous, but when he saw that no one paid him any attention he turned back to his coffee and considered his predicament.

  By now he realized he had made a mistake, and he tried to assess the consequences with all the detachment he could muster. He told himself that the damage was not irreparable, even though he was keenly aware that this was not Boston, where he had a newspaper to help him and friends on Homicide to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  Here he was a stranger and the circumstances were all against him. With no one of importance to help him, his experience told him that once he gave himself up he would be held and questioned, quite possibly all day long. Meanwhile there were some things he wanted to do while he had his fre
edom, and having passed up the chance to surrender and tell the truth, he saw no further harm in postponing the crisis for another hour. So long as he gave himself up voluntarily the impression of innocence could be maintained and no great harm would result—or so he thought as he picked up his check and left a coin for the waitress.

  There was a taxi stand just down the street and Murdock climbed into the first cab, giving the driver Helen Farnsley’s address which turned out to be an unpretentious apartment house on a quiet, residential street. Approaching it, Murdock told the driver to slow down but not to stop. What he was looking for was a police car, for he had assumed that once Farnsley’s body had been identified his wife would be notified, and he did not want to get trapped so quickly.

  But if there was a police car among those parked at the kerb Murdock could not identify it, so he left the cab some distance beyond the entrance, giving the driver a couple of bills and telling him to wait there for him. He said he would make it as quickly as he could, and the fellow opened up his morning paper and settled back in his seat.

  It was at once obvious when Helen Farnsley opened the door that she knew nothing about her husband. She wore a red-and-white cotton dress, recently laundered, and her face had a fresh, scrubbed look that made her seem younger than she was. She smiled instantly and perhaps with some surprise, though none of this showed in her voice.

  ‘Well’, she said. ‘Good morning. Had breakfast? Like another cup of coffee?’ She put out a tentative finger as he said no, and rubbed it along the edge of his bearded chin, her hazel eyes mischievous. ‘I guess you forgot your razor when you walked out on Lee last night.’