Vanishing Ladies

by Ed McBain

  “Where’s your husband?” I asked.

  She looked into the room as if she’d temporarily misplaced him.

  “Must be in the john.” She paused. “Want me to get him?”

  “Never mind,” I said. “Come on, Barter.”

  We left the girl. She stared after us as we went down the path. Then she closed the door.

  “Rest of the cabins is empty,” Barter said. “Want to see them?”

  “You’ve been right about everything so far, haven’t you?” I said.

  “Sure.”

  “Then why bother looking at them?”

  “Just the way I feel about it,” Barter said. “Why don’t you go back to your own cabin and get a good night’s sleep? You’ll see, in the morning you’ll wake up feeling better.”

  “Um-huh,” I said, and I started for my car. “Except there’s one thing I’ve got to do first.”

  “What’s that?” Barter asked, smiling.

  “I’ve got to go get the police,” I told him.

  7

  The Cadillac Carlisle had arrived in was still parked up near the office. I was half-tempted to open the door and look for Stephanie’s purse, but I hardly thought it necessary. There are some things you sense instinctively in detective work, some things you automatically know. I’m a new detective, and my nose isn’t as sensitive as the noses of guys like Burry O’Hare or Tony Mitchell who have been plying their trade for quite some time. Burry or Tony can simply look at a man and tell you whether or not he’s honest. I can’t do that yet. It comes from being around thieves, I guess, and it’s only natural. Crime detection is a line of work, the same as any other line of work. When a jeweler’s been handling gems long enough, he doesn’t have to put in his eyepiece to differentiate the real from the phony. He can tell from the feel of the gem, and the sheen and the glitter. Thieves glitter, too.

  Maybe Stephanie’s purse was in that Cadillac.

  Maybe I only imagined putting Ann in cabin number 13. Maybe I was nuts and everybody else was telling the truth. Maybe Carlisle did travel light, and maybe he and his wife checked into number 13 at eight o’clock. And maybe the sun rises in the west.

  But a woman’s purse is like a man’s wallet. You take it with you. When you’re getting out of a car, it’s the first thing you reach for. It contains all the paraphernalia of a woman’s trade. It’s as essential to her as her left breast.

  I put the convertible into reverse and backed up around the Caddy. My headlights picked up Barter walking toward the office. I don’t know what he was thinking, but he was walking very fast with his head down, Hezekiah following behind him like an elongated shadow.

  I headed directly for the log cabin of Justice Oliver Handy. I could have called the police by telephone, I suppose, but it was close to 4:00 A.M., and only God knew where I’d find a telephone booth.

  I was wide awake, you understand. Wide awake and beyond the first agony of paralyzed panic. It seemed idiotic to me that I could have ever believed the blood in cabin number 11 belonged to Ann. Ann was gone and—I was sure—in danger, but I no longer believed she was dead. The danger, it seemed to me, was very real. If she was gone, there was a good reason for her absence, and the blood in cabin 11 seemed like a very logical and strong reason. People don’t voluntarily bleed on a closet floor. Where there’s blood, there’s danger.

  So I drove quickly and with purpose. I was a cop and I was being tolerated. But the shield I carried was weightless, and I needed the heavy hand of the local law to put the machinery of fear in motion.

  Fear.

  A very helpful thing to a cop. Everybody’s got a skeleton some place, and nobody wants it dragged into the middle of the living room during tea. Fear urges the innocent man to protect his own skeleton by telling the truth about someone else’s bag of bones. Fear can lead the guilty man to panic, and panic is the great undoer among criminals.

  There was a little bit of fear on the face of Oliver Handy when he opened the door for me. The fear surprised me. Perhaps he was just the kind of man who automatically becomes frightened when someone raps on his door in the wee small hours. But there had been a light burning in the cabin when I pulled up, and when Handy opened the door—even though he was in pajamas and robe—he did not have the look of a man who had come directly from a warm bed. There was something else strange about the way he admitted me. I knocked, and he didn’t ask “Who’s there?” or anything. He came straight to the door, opened it, and said, “Oh, Colby”—almost as if he’d been expecting me.

  “I’m glad you remember me,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said, nodding. His eyes were very tired. He looked much older than he’d looked that afternoon—when he’d been telling me about the good fishing at Sullivan’s Point. The blue of his eyes had been piercing then; it was faded now. His Cupid’s bow mouth had been animated then; it now looked as if it had shot its last arrow.

  “What is it, Colby?” he asked.

  “I’d like to talk to you.”

  He nodded briefly. “Come in.”

  I followed him into the cabin. There wasn’t much change since I’d left it three hours earlier. Handy had probably gone straight to bed the moment Ann and I cleared out. I looked around the room quickly. The only thing that stuck in my memory was the cigarette burning in an ash tray near the telephone.

  “I was asleep,” he said. “What is it?”

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” I said.

  “That’s all right. What is it?”

  “I want some policemen.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s complicated,” I said.

  “Life usually is,” Handy replied, and he sighed a curiously forlorn sigh. “Since you got me out of bed, why don’t you tell me about it?”

  “My fiancée is missing,” I said.

  “What do you mean by that, exactly?” Handy asked. He slipped the lid from the cut-glass cigarette box and took a filter-tip cigarette which he immediately placed in his mouth. “Cigarette?” he asked.

  “No, thank you.”

  Handy fired the cigarette, using the lighter from the table. “Now what’s this about your fiancée being missing?” he asked. He blew out a long stream of smoke. Some of the life seemed to be coming back into his eyes. “Bad habit,” he said. “Always take a cigarette when I wake up.”

  “Yes,” I said. “The girl—”

  “Do you believe this stuff about throat cancel?” Handy asked.

  “What?”

  “Cigarettes,” he said. “Causing throat cancer?”

  “Oh. I don’t know. I’ve never given it much thought.”

  “All the good things in life are either forbidden or no good for you,” Handy said. He smiled tiredly. “That’s not the way it goes. I quoted it wrong.”

  “We checked into a motel run by a man named Mike Barter,” I said.

  “Yes. At the Point.”

  “Yes. I left Ann in her cabin. She’s gone now. Clothes, luggage, everything. Gone.”

  “Who did you leave in the cabin?” Handy asked.

  “Ann. My fiancée.”

  “Oh,” Handy said. He looked puzzled. He drew in on his cigarette slowly.

  “The girl who was with me this afternoon,” I explained.

  Handy blew out another stream of smoke. “I don’t think I follow you, Colby,” he said thoughtfully.

  “The girl who was with me,” I said patiently. “When your trooper pulled us in. This afternoon. When he gave me the ticket.”

  Handy lifted his eyes to meet mine.

  “What girl?” he asked.

  “The girl—” I stopped dead. Our eyes were locked over the table. The Cupid’s bow mouth was taut and drawn now. The blue eyes were wide awake and alert. Justice Oliver Handy was en garde and ready to start fencing.

  “I don’t remember any girl,” he said. “Fred brought you in alone this afternoon.”

  “I see,” I said.

  Handy smiled. “Perhaps it was the long drive,�
�� he said.

  “Or perhaps it was the telephone call,” I answered.

  “The what?”

  “The call you undoubtedly received just before I got here. The reason for the burning cigarette in that ash tray.” I gestured with my head. “What’s going on, Handy?”

  “I have no idea what you mean,” Handy said.

  “Don’t you? You know goddamn well I had a girl with me today. Now what’s the pitch?”

  “If there was a young lady with you, I didn’t see her.”

  “She fell asleep right on your couch!” I shouted.

  “I didn’t see her!”

  “What are you trying to pull? What’s happening here? Why the big coverup? Do you think you’re going to—”

  “I didn’t see any girl,” Handy said firmly.

  “Okay, Handy.” I got up. I pointed my finger under his nose and said, “You may think this hick burg is the beginning and the end of the world, but you’ve got your geography figured a little wrong. There are state cops, and there are federal cops, too—and kidnaping happens to be a federal offense!”

  “There’s a state trooper who will testify that he arrested you while you were alone,” Handy said. “Why don’t you relax, Colby?”

  “There are state troopers who’d shoot their own mothers, too,” I said. “I want some cops. Do I get them from you, or do I have to start working?”

  “Why do you want cops? To trace the disappearance of a nonexistent girl?”

  “No,” I said. I grinned. “You don’t think I’m crazy, do you? You don’t think I’d ask for police aid on something as obviously lunatic as that, do you? I want cops because I found a pool of blood in a motel closet. I think the cops might be interested in finding out who or what made that blood.”

  “They might,” Handy said.

  “Well?”

  “I’ll call a trooper,” he said. “I don’t want to stand in the way of a private citizen reporting a suspected crime.” He shrugged. “About the girl, though …” He shrugged again.

  “What girl?” I said.

  Handy lifted his eyes, and a slight smile began forming on his face. Slowly, methodically, he stubbed out his cigarette. “I’ll call a trooper,” he said, and he rose and walked to the telephone. The cigarette in the ash tray there had burned down to the filter tip and was beginning to smolder. Unceremoniously, Handy stubbed it out. He lifted the receiver and dialed four numbers.

  “I have a theory about people,” he said to me.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yes. I happen to believe that most of them are sensible. I’m also something of an optimist. I believe—” He cut himself short and said into the phone, “Hello, Fred? Did I get you up? Oh, well I’m sorry. No, nothing too important. Remember that young fellow you brought in this afternoon? Speeding. The detective, remember?” Handy paused. “No,” he said emphatically, “he was alone. Nobody with him.” Handy paused again, listening. “Yes, that’s right. Yes, now you’ve got it. Well, he thinks he’s run afoul of some trouble out at Mike Barter’s place. Thought the local police might give him a hand. Think you can take a run over?” Handy listened. “No, not Mike’s. I’m calling from my place. Sure. Okay then, we’ll be expecting you. Listen, tell Janet I’m sorry about calling at this hour, will you? Fine.”

  He hung up.

  “Be right over,” he said. “Nice fellow, Fred.”

  “You were philosophizing a minute ago,” I said.

  “Oh, yes. People.” Handy went to the cigarette box and lighted another cigarette. “Most of them are sensible, don’t you think?”

  “I suppose.”

  “Oh, yes,” Handy said. “Yes. Most of them are sensible. Any man will eventually come to the realization that there’s no sense in shoveling manure against the tide.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning it’s sweeter-smelling and much less energetic to simply take a bench on the boardwalk, away from the breakers.”

  “Unless there happens to be something you want in the ocean,” I said.

  “It’s been my experience, Colby, that there is absolutely nothing you can find in the ocean which you can’t also find on the land.”

  “A lot of fish will be surprised to hear that.”

  “A lot of fish would be surprised to hear that anything but ocean exists at all. That’s still no argument for shoveling against the tide.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “If you’ve got something to say, say it in English.”

  “The English language,” Handy said, “becomes a skill when you can use it and not make it sound like English.”

  “I thought the purpose of language was communication,” I said. “If you’re trying to communicate, your ‘ocean’ is away over my head.”

  “Very good,” Handy said, smiling. “Very, very good.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “I’m trying to tell you to relax. Stop shoveling. Show a little optimism.” Handy paused. “This nonexistent girl friend of yours.”

  “Yes?”

  “Relax, Colby.”

  “Why?”

  “Optimism. Show a little optimism.”

  “You know she exists,” I said.

  “I know nothing. I’m simply asking you to look on the bright side. Let us suppose for an instant that she does exist. You came here to Sullivan’s Point with her, you rented separate cabins, and now she’s vanished. All assuming she existed in the first place.”

  “She existed,” I said. “She does exist. Say what you’ve got to say.”

  “I’m saying that if she did exist, if she did indeed vanish … she’s probably safe right now.” Handy fixed me with a level stare. “And she probably will be safe when this is all over and done with.”

  “Is she safe now?” I asked.

  Handy shrugged. “Your nonexistent friend? I would say that she is safe, yes. I would say that she is a lot safer than she could be were you to start … ah … shoveling manure against the tide.”

  “We’re back to the ocean again, huh?”

  “The ocean is very peaceful. You don’t know how nice it is not to live in a land-locked state.”

  “Where is she?” I said.

  “I haven’t the faintest idea,” Handy said. He paused. “I never even saw her.”

  “But she’s safe?”

  “Colby, would you like some sound advice?”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Yes, but your attitude is an arrogant one. I’m a lot older than you, and a lot wiser, and I’ve done a bit of shoveling in my day, too. I don’t shovel any more. Take that antagonistic look off your face.”

  “Is that your advice?”

  “My advice is this. Go back to the motel. Go to sleep. By tomorrow afternoon, all of this will be in the past. You can continue your vacation as if nothing happened.”

  “With or without Ann?”

  “Who’s Ann?”

  “Will she be back by tomorrow afternoon? Safe?”

  “I don’t know who she is. But I have every reason to believe you could continue your vacation as planned.”

  “One other question, Your Honor,” I said.

  “Yes?”

  “The person who bled in that closet. Will he or she be able to continue a vacation as planned?”

  “In life, people bleed. You’re a cop. You should know that. Some bleed. Some have to bleed.”

  “You’re a very cryptic fellow, Your Honor,” I said. “In our state, we don’t happen to believe that some must bleed. We’re idealists. We like to think that no one has to bleed. That’s why we’ve got a police department.”

  “And this magnificent police department of yours has undoubtedly stopped the flow of blood, has it?”

  “We try,” I said.

  “Colby,” Handy said, “don’t be a goddamn hero.”

  “What?”

  “Go back to your cabin and sleep this off. Tomorrow, pack up and go on your way. This is friendly advice. Ri
de with the punches. Think whatever the hell you want to think. Think at night. In the daytime, play the cop, or the butcher, or the homey j.p., or whatever particular role life has doled out to you. Don’t think during the daytime. If you start thinking, you get in trouble. Just play your part, Colby. Save your thinking for when you’re alone—and never think out loud.”

  “You’re thinking out loud right now,” I said.

  “Only because I’m trying to save you a lot of trouble.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I appreciate it.”

  “You don’t. Your tone of voice tells me you don’t.” Handy sighed. “Fred should be here soon. When he comes, I suggest you tell him you were mistaken about that blood. That’s my strong advice to you.”

  “I wasn’t mistaken,” I paused. “I don’t make mistakes about blood.”

  Handy sighed again. “You can be making a bigger mistake,” he said. “A bigger mistake than you imagine.”

  And that’s when the knock sounded on the door.

  8

  It was amazing to watch the change that came over Handy as he opened the door. A few minutes before he admitted Fred, he was something of the melancholy cynic. He’d been thinking aloud, but he stopped thinking the second his hand pulled open the door. He stopped thinking, and he became the small town j.p. again. His stature changed, his voice changed, his speech pattern changed.

  “Well, well,” he said. “Fred. Come in, come in. Heck of a time to be gallivantin’ over the countryside, isn’t it? Come in, come in.”

  “I was sound asleep,” Fred said. He looked over at me briefly. He was wearing his trooper’s uniform, but he needed a shave and he looked a little seedy. “What’s the trouble?”

  “Young fellow here thinks he saw blood in one of Mike Barter’s cabins.” Handy paused and turned to me. “Or is that right?” he asked in a last stab at getting me to forget what I’d seen.

  “That’s right,” I said.

  “Probably somebody cut himself shaving,” Fred said.

  “I doubt it. People don’t shave in closets, and no shaving cut makes a puddle on the floor.”