“He probably did buy the original negative,” Casey said, “after Bates had photographed an enlargement and made this negative. Did he ever try to collect again?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
Casey drew back as the drinks were served, and accepted this additional proof that his original estimate of Marty Bates’s activities had been right. Bates took his pictures here and there and made a small charge for their nuisance value. Blackmail was not his business and once a deal had been made that was the end of it. The fact that he had kept copies, even though he had no intention of ever using them, was understandable enough to another photographer.
For Casey had a file of his own that was well filled with negatives which had interested him and which he had been reluctant to destroy. There were others, going back over the years, in the cellar of the building where he lived. Once or twice a year he would remind himself it was time to clean them out but he never seemed to get around to it.
“How did Marty happen to get that particular shot?” he asked.
“You know the family has a place on the Cape,” Shirley said. “We spend most of the time there during July and August. Ralph Jackson happened to be playing on the Cape.”
“But you knew him before that,” Casey said, taking a guess.
“Yes, I did … This was on a Monday, his day off, and he had borrowed this cruiser from a friend of his. I went out fairly early that morning, leaving word that I was going to drive down the Cape and look for some antiques. Instead I went over to Woods Hole, where the boat was, and we went out in the Sound. We cruised along the islands toward Cuttyhunk and when we got hungry I went down to the galley to whip up some bacon and scrambled eggs.”
A small and crooked smile began to work on her mouth as she studied the drink in front of her. “I wasn’t paying attention,” she said. “The bacon started to smoke like everything and the grease caught fire. It wasn’t anything serious and Ralph put out the fire with an extinguisher, but the smoke came pouring out of the hatch and it must have looked a lot worse than it was. Another boat with four men on it was passing us a couple of hundred yards away and they thought we were in trouble and swung over. They came almost alongside and while Ralph was waving them off I saw this little man with a camera. I didn’t know who he was but I guess Ralph did. Anyway, a couple of weeks later Ralph got a note with this print inside. The note said if Ralph wanted the negative and a dozen prints he could have them for a hundred dollars.”
“It sounds like Marty,” Casey said. “I mean the part about offering a dozen prints, as though it was a run-of-the-mill business proposition.”
“We didn’t think it was so funny at the time. Ralph bought the negative and made some threats and that was the end of it … Where did you get it?”
“I’ll tell you,” Casey said, “but first let’s talk a little bit about you. That business on the boat wasn’t just an isolated incident, was it? You’ve been seeing Ralph Jackson since then.”
“What makes you think so?”
“I happen to know you’ve been a fairly frequent customer at the Melody Lounge. You’ve been in there a couple of times with Arthur Mayfield, but mostly it’s been a solo appearance. I don’t think it was just to listen to the music.”
“That’s not as farfetched as you might think,” she said calmly. “I happen to like that kind of music. I also happen to like to sing. I tried it a few times in Florida. But I’m not in the mood to quibble with you. Yes, I’ve seen Ralph Jackson. Frequently. I happen to like him very much.”
She took some of her drink, put the glass down, and looked right at him with her big green eyes. “Since you’re buying the drink and since you always were a good listener, I’ll try to tell you the story of my life in four or five lengthy paragraphs.” The red lips fashioned a small, humorless smile and she said: “I’m aware that what I’m about to say may be used against me, but I’ll take the risk. Because, you see, while it may not be common knowledge it’s no secret.”
Casey sipped his own drink, put his forearms on the edge of the table, and waited.
“I understand that a person’s character is shaped both by heredity and by environment,” she said. “In my case they seemed to work together, at least in one respect. The moral deficiency I seem to have in my character may have come from my mother. In spite of the fact that she came from a good family, she was, morally speaking, a tramp. My father died when I was six and I don’t remember much about him. I have vague recollections of my first stepfather but he had faded from the picture by the time I was ten.”
She moistened her lips again and said: “I must have been twelve years old before I realized that there were other men in Mother’s life. Sometimes they’d be sitting around having a drink when I came home. Sometimes they’d be getting ready to leave. The third husband was the worst of all, a younger man, the gigolo type, with shiny hair and an oily manner. I suppose I remember him best, because my first sexual experience came from him and it took the form of rape.”
Casey stared at her, and the insolent half-humorous look was once more in her eyes. There was no embarrassment in her manner, no note of apology in her tone, and he knew somehow from the way she talked that she was telling the truth. A moment later she continued.
“I was sixteen at the time and had heard the story of the birds and the bees, but for all of that I was pretty naïve. I was also rather well developed for my age. Leon—that was his name—had trouble keeping his hands off me. I was afraid to let Mother know about his little passes and I’m telling the truth when I say that when it finally happened it was over before I really understood what he had done. I was shocked and hurt and a little hysterical but he was more scared than I was when he realized what would happen if I talked. Actually I was too ashamed and mortified to tell anyone, but he didn’t know that. When I finally realized I was the one in the driver’s seat, we made a pact. The next time he so much as touched me I would not only scream my head off but tell Mother exactly what had happened.”
“Well, that cured him as far as I was concerned. He faded from the picture when I was in my last year at finishing school. Donald’s younger sister, Alice, and I were good friends and I wasn’t home any more than I had to be, and that fall Mother was off to Europe and I was shipped down to Jacksonville to stay with some friends. I stuck it out for six weeks or so. I had a little money and when I couldn’t stand it any longer I went to Miami. I got a room in a hotel and started looking for a job to sing. I got a few chances, not because of my voice, I’m afraid, but because I had a good figure and a pretty face. Usually they were grubby little traps where the piano was out of tune and the musicians third-rate. The jobs never lasted long either. When I got tired of fighting off the owner or the orchestra leader, I had to quit. It went that way until I found a piano player who tried to help me.”
She finished her drink and Casey asked her if she would like another and she said yes. He offered a cigarette and gave her a light but she said nothing more until the drink came and the waiter went away.
“His name was Jerry,” she said as though there had been no break in her narrative. “He was a very nice guy and I guess I fell in love with him. Unfortunately, he was married. He also made the usual promises about getting a divorce as soon as he had a little more money. We spent the night together occasionally and it went on like that until his wife found out about it.” She laughed softly, an abrupt, humorless sound. “She gave him his choice and he picked her.”
She tapped ashes from her cigarette and said: “To keep from being repetitious, let’s just say that I met Ralph Jackson a couple of months later. I won’t say I fell in love with him. I’m not sure I know what the word means. But we got along well together and liked the same things and he was fun to be with. He was working steadily but he wasn’t making much more than scale. I was doing very little, and to keep the expenses down I moved in with him. He wasn’t married. He didn’t want to get married until he was better established, and when a big band came t
hrough town on tour and offered him a spot in the brass section, he took it. Well, not being married, there was no place for me making one-night stands and riding the bus with the band. He gave me what money he could spare. We promised each other we’d get together and that he would send for me when he could.”
“About ten days later I woke up,” she said. “It was just one of those things. I was lying on the beach, mentally counting my resources and wondering what I was going to do. I was not yet twenty-three and I had already developed into an amateur tramp. In a way, I was following in Mother’s footsteps, but without her resources … Oh, I forgot to tell you. Until just before Ralph left, I’d been getting a small allowance, a monthly check. Then this letter came from Europe saying that she was marrying for the fourth time. She was going to live in Majorca—she’s still there—but the husband was an artist with no steady income and she would be unable to send me any more checks. That may have influenced me, but whatever the reason, I knew I wasn’t going to make it on my own as a singer without some help. So I decided it was time to straighten up and adopt a new set of values and do something about my self-respect.”
She put her cigarette out and swallowed some of her drink. She put the glass down and began to turn it slowly with the tips of her fingers.
“I’d met the assistant manager of one of the big hotels down there,” she said, “and I went to see him. I washed my hair and did my nails and tucked myself into a girdle and put on my best dress. I still remembered how to act like a lady and I guess I impressed him because he offered me a job as one of the assistants to the entertainment director … Have you been down to one of those big Miami Beach hotels lately?”
“No,” Casey said. “Not lately.”
“Then maybe you don’t know that entertainment of the guests is an important part of the operation. Everything is organized. The guest expects entertainment with a capital E—that’s why they have those fancy night-club shows—and he gets it. The bridge players and the gin-rummy players and the bingo players take care of themselves pretty well, but as for the rest of it— Look, it doesn’t matter. The point is that it worked out well for me, and gave me a chance to get back my self-esteem, and my finishing-school manner went over very well. Of course, I also had to fight off eager husbands now and then, and not just the fat, bald-headed ones with heavy beards. But I’m doing all right—you know, rather proud of myself, and my self-respect is back in one piece, and then Donald Farrington comes along.”
“Ahh—” Casey said.
“Yes.” She gave him a small, lopsided smile. “I guess you’ve been wondering when I’d get around to him. Well, what brought him to the hotel was a convention of investment dealers or brokers or something like that; I’ve forgotten the name of the organization. Donald came along and I recognized him immediately. When I was sixteen, and spending so much time at the Farrington place, he was twenty-three and I thought he was dreamy. When he saw me there in the hotel I went over to him, ready to introduce myself if I had to, but he recognized me and the way his eyes popped and his jaw dropped I knew he liked what he saw. The fact that he was always naive about women—he still is—plus the fact that I had become something of an expert at handling men, was all to the good. Because right then I knew what I wanted.”
She finished her drink, refused another, and said: “Here was a handsome, well-built man who was just the right age. He was considerate, polite, and well mannered. He had money, social position, a fine reputation, and a future. It was all right there and the minute I found out he hadn’t married I went to work.”
“But you didn’t love him?”
“I made myself believe I did and that’s the truth. It’s been said that the anticipation of some special event is more exciting than the event itself and I suppose it was that way with me. He was there four days and he proposed before he left. I had sense enough to let him know how I felt but I wasn’t going to say yes and then have him come back here and decide that maybe he had made a mistake. I told him we ought to know each other better. I said if I could find a suitable job here I’d come north; that if, after a few months, he still wanted to marry me I’d say yes.”
“So he made a job for you.”
“The very next week.”
Casey knew the rest of it and he was reminded again that, in addition to her incomparable physical qualifications, she had a mind that was quick, realistic, and basically sound.
“It was all right until Jackson showed up?” he asked.
“Not all right, endurable. I’m terribly fond of Donald in spite of his conventional viewpoint and Puritan standards. I suppose I might have gone along indefinitely if it hadn’t been for Ralph. I had what I thought I wanted, what every woman wants. I conformed to the Farrington standards, but underneath I felt hemmed-in, frustrated, and bored. I told you that there was probably some basic defect in my character. I still wanted to sing. I once suggested it—after all, there have been other so-called society singers who performed in polite spots—and I thought old Mrs. Farrington would have a stroke. The only singing I’ve done since I’ve been married is a few times at private parties after I’d been properly urged. Even that was frowned upon.”
“You said that what you told me about the time you spent in Florida was no secret. Who else knows?”
“Donald.”
Casey peered at her, not doubting the truth of the statement, but finding it hard to understand.
“You told him?”
“I asked for a divorce,” she said. “I wanted a reasonable settlement. When he said no, I told him the rest of it. I told him I hadn’t been a very good girl and that he deserved something better … Oh, it shocked him all right,” she added. “He didn’t want to believe it. When he finally accepted it he said that it didn’t matter, that what I’d done had happened years ago and what I did before I married him was no longer important.”
“Did you tell him about Jackson?”
“Certainly not. I’ve seen Ralph and we’ve been together now and then. We’ve talked about a lot of things. We know what we want and what we’d like to do, but since I married Donald I’ve been faithful. I still am. I think too much of him to cheat. Donald still says he loves me. He thinks it will work out and I can’t fight that kind of stubbornness, or innocence, or whatever you want to call it. I can buy anything I want, so long as I charge it, but I don’t have any money. He’s given me no real grounds for divorce. If I tried to get one he’d contest it.”
“You want a divorce and a fat settlement,” Casey said, “so you can back Jackson while he gets his big band together … You still want to be the girl singer,” he added sardonically.
“I’m not quite twenty-seven,” she said, “and I’ll never be sure about this thing until I get it out of my system. I’m willing to take the chance. I think I can afford to waste a year or two. If it still doesn’t work out, I’ll settle for the house in the suburbs and the wife-and-mother routine.”
Casey signaled the waiter and asked for the check. “Okay,” he said. “I’ve got the picture now.”
“What picture?”
“To get the settlement you wanted, your husband had to be framed. I had a visit from your sister-in-law last night and she said then that if anyone was responsible for what happened to him you were.”
He watched her pick up her bag and put it in her lap. She pushed back her chair a couple of inches and he could see die tension in the mouth and the cold and distant look in the narrowed green eyes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said stiffly.
“I think you do,” Casey said and went on to give her a quick resume of the story Donald Farrington had told him that first morning. “You had to be in it,” he said when he had finished.
“Did I?”
“For two reasons. It wasn’t just coincidence that a private detective who specializes in divorce work, and a blonde accessory, happened to be in the Melody Lounge when your husband got drunk. The bartenders and the waiters are not
the sort that would give anyone a mickey, but Farrington’s drinks had to be doctored to make him want a second one, and a third, and maybe a fourth. I don’t mean with chloral hydrate or anything like that. That would have knocked him out. I don’t know what you used but you used something; you were the only one who had the opportunity.”
“That’s your opinion.”
“Right. So then I came in and made things a little tougher. I was a friend of Don’s. I could tell he was carrying a pretty good package. If I stayed—and there was no way of telling that I wouldn’t—Earl Geiger and that blonde would never have had a chance to take him out because, without even knowing what was going on, I would have moved in and taken him home. So you came up and turned on the charm. You were going to leave the car for Donald. You were going to take a taxi, but since I was there, would I be a good fellow and drive you home.”
He put a bill on the check and waved the waiter away. “Well, the frame worked just as you’d planned it. It also scared the pants off your husband. He called Arthur Mayfield and they came to me. He also told your sister-in-law and she went to call on Geiger with a checkbook.”
“What rot.”
“I don’t think so,” Casey said. “I think Geiger changed his mind and somebody killed him before he could do anything about it. By that time there was a little guy named Marty Bates in the picture. Marty was a very brash and nosy fellow. He smelled something wrong and he sneaked some pictures of his own. He also got in touch with Geiger and tonight somebody put two bullets in the back of his head.”
The statement brought a reaction that was swift and unmistakable. In the act of rising, and with both hands on the table, she stopped and straightened in her chair. The crack in her composure was obvious. There was a startled look in her eyes she could not disguise. Things were happening in her face that Casey could not diagnose and he waited until she said:
“Why do you tell me this?”
“Because I think someone who was involved in that frame-up killed Geiger and Bates. I’ve kept your husband’s confidence about as long as I can. I’ve got a couple of things to do and then I’m going to pay you a visit, all of you. I may have company. After that, the Farrington clan will have to deal with the police and the district attorney.”
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