Blondes are Skin Deep

by Louis Trimble

  A hand fell on my shoulder. Turning my head carefully I saw Chimp’s Neanderthal face. “Hi,” I said. “Where did you get this specimen?”

  Chimp ignored me. He was looking at the clerk, and even though his voice was light and soft it got results. “This is Mercer,” he told the clerk. “Call Hall for him.”

  I let loose of the coat lapel and backed a little away from the desk so the guy would have room to maneuver. I could see that the name Mercer was beginning to mean something to him.

  He plugged in the switchboard and his mouth was hidden behind the mouthpiece, but his eyes were visible and I got their full impact. They were large, peculiarly flat eyes, and of such a faint blue as to be almost colorless. It wasn’t just the color that bothered me; it was the hatred. I almost wished the name Mercer wasn’t going to mean anything to him.

  I said to Chimp, “Who is he?”

  Chimp was unwrapping another stinking cigar. When he had it between his teeth he said, “Don’t do that again, Nick. It isn’t safe.”

  I couldn’t help a skeptical grin. “Safe? When he scares that easily? He doesn’t belong here. He couldn’t handle anything tough.”

  “You got Les by surprise, that’s all,” Chimp said.

  I looked around. He was still at the switchboard. I got the impact of the eyes again and they hadn’t changed a bit. I repeated, “Who is he?”

  “Les Peone,” Chimp said.

  It meant nothing to me. “Chimp, please,” I mocked. “Like he was calling to mama.”

  “He’s not sure of his ground yet,” Chimp said persistently. His voice carried a warning and it was in his dark eyes, too. “He’s only been here a little over a week, Nick. And you got him by surprise. When he’s surprised he gets nervous.” He pushed back the stained brown hat he always wore when on duty and gave himself the scalp test with a fingernail. “There’s something screwy about the guy.”

  “For instance?”

  Chimp was examining his findings. “Need a shampoo,” he said. “Ask Kane about the guy.” He wandered away, still gnawing on his cold cigar.

  Les Peone’s voice came at me. It sounded under control, with the high, absurd bleat gone from it. “Mr. Hall said for you to come up.”

  Those eyes bothered me. I had the feeling I was letting them push me around. Walking to the desk I laid both hands on the top and leaned forward, trying to stare the guy down. But his eyes were veiled now. There was only that opaque, almost colorless blue.

  “Next time,” I said, “remember me.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said, and stepped sideways. I didn’t see it coming. I didn’t see anything but the flick of his coat sleeve. My ears caught a minute singing sound like a gnat going away. It was a good ten seconds before my mind registered what had happened.

  I looked down at the thin sliver of steel that quivered in the desk top. It had gone into the wood where the thumb and forefinger of my right hand were splayed apart. It stood upright, the yellow ivory of the handle catching faint glints of light as the shiver of the blade swung it gently back and forth. I raised my head and stared at Peone.

  “And I’ll remember you,” I said.

  He pulled an inch of knife blade from the wood and the whole thing disappeared into a coat pocket. “Mr. Hall is waiting,” he said.

  I looked back just once as I stepped into the elevator. And got the full impact of those strange eyes as a beam of sunlight struggled in and touched his face. I couldn’t help it; when I closed the door I was shivering.

  At the top floor I stepped from the grubby elevator into that pale blue and white that was so startling. Tien was waiting with the door open and I still had no hat to hand her. I offered a grin instead but she had no answering smile for me. It was the first time that had happened and I didn’t like it.

  “Anything wrong?”

  Tien shook her head and indicated I should go on in. Hall, I thought. He’d been nasty to her again. And yet I had seen her on the verge of tears from his treatment without failing to give me a welcoming smile. No, I didn’t like it at all.

  I found Hall at his desk, ramrod straight in his wheelchair. It was his lunch time and he was eating an omelette again. Tien brought coffee for me and wheeled her little cart from the room, and it was a repetition of two weeks ago. Right down to the staring session between Hall and myself. He won again, as usual.

  “Hear you had a little trouble downstairs,” he commented.

  “Nothing I can’t handle,” I said.

  Hall’s mouth under his gray military mustache quirked up and then smoothed out again. He took a bite of omelette. I said, “I got your wire when I hit Portland. Why the rush?”

  “I’ve got another angle for you,” he said. “Your lead wasn’t panning out.”

  “No.” I rubbed a hand over my face, trying to wipe off some of the weariness. It did no good. It was still there, and so was the bitter taste of defeat still in my mouth. “I’m a hell of a detective.”

  “Moody Irish,” he said. “Ready to quit?”

  “No more than you are.”

  “No sign of Johnny?”

  “No sign,” I said. “No smell. No nothing.”

  “Seen the papers lately?” he asked. I shook my head. I was sick of papers. “Considine’s back to page seven,” Hall said. “They still haven’t found Johnny. But his identification is practically certain.”

  “They’ve been bothering Nelle, then,” I said.

  “She phoned here and said so.”

  I didn’t like having Nelle mixed in this. Johnny and I always kept her strictly away from the business.

  “You’ve spent a lot of time,” Hall said.

  I began to see what was eating him and if anything bothered Hall it would be transmitted to Tien. Bluntly I said, “You know damned well why I’m still on this case. I’m trying to help Johnny. I’m not sticking for your dough. I’m sticking for Johnny.”

  “And Nelle,” Kane Hall said. “Don’t forget Nelle.”

  “All right, and for Nelle.”

  “You must think a lot of Nelle,” Hall said. “Letting her talk you into a ten-day snipe hunt in L. A.” He looked away from me and cut a bite of omelette. I lit a cigaret; I was surprised that my hand didn’t shake. I should have been sore at a crack like that. I should have been except that I was afraid he might have something.

  “Nelle isn’t like that—not with me.”

  “We didn’t think Johnny was like that,” Hall said. “But I sent him down to see about my hundred grand and what happened? Considine got a bullet in the head and the money still doesn’t show. The money’s gone and so is Johnny Doane.”

  He looked at me again and his eyes were bleak; Hall hated being crossed above all things. He paid most of his men well and he expected to be able to trust them. He had to trust them, stuck for life as he was in that wheelchair.

  “It isn’t Johnny,” I said angrily. “Johnny’ll come out of this clean.”

  “Then why is he hiding out?”

  I had an answer to that one. I had spent some time building it up; it was a good answer. “You know cops. What chance would he have if he let them get him. In a strange town. Does he say he’s working for Kane Hall and tip the whole racket? Hell, no. Johnny’s not that kind. He takes a breeze and lays low. So would I. So would you.”

  I felt better after that, even though it apparently made no impression on Hall. “Two weeks,” he said, “and all you did was smell around for Johnny Doane. What about my hundred thousand?”

  He wasn’t greedy; I couldn’t see why he was making such a point of it. Principle again, I supposed. I had mine, too. “Because,” I said, “Johnny Doane is more important to me than your dough.”

  “I hired you to protect me,” Hall said in a too-soft voice. “Not to protect your partner.”

  “I will; I always have.”

  Hall laid down his fork and pushed his plate aside. His thick, beautifully kept hands reached out and selected a cigar. He lit it carefully, making sure it was b
urning evenly. The fragrance was rich, not like Chimp’s soggy two-fors.

  “What if Johnny did it?” he asked, still talking softly. “What do you do then, Nick?”

  I heard a noise and saw Tien standing by the kitchen door. She was watching me with the same expression a police dog would show an interloper. I looked back at Hall.

  It was pretty plain now. This was the nub of the thing. Hall thought it was Johnny, and he thought I thought so, too. His reasoning was good enough. If I had my choice between helping him and helping Johnny, Hall would be out.

  “I don’t think it is Johnny,” I said.

  “That’s no answer.”

  I tried my coffee. It was almost cold and slightly bitter. Now my hand was shaking. I set the cup carefully back. Hall was watching me; so was Tien. They both knew I had never welched on my word.

  I thought about Johnny and his monkey grin, his quick, damned impetuousness that constantly put him on the edge of trouble. And I thought of Nelle and how it would hurt her if it was Johnny. How much more it would hurt her if I turned him up.

  And while I was thinking that, I still couldn’t push out a picture of Considine hanging over the drawer of a filing case, a big hole in his head. Was it Johnny, the guy he had entertained, the guy who had escorted his daughter around; was that the reason for the surprise on his face because it was Johnny Doane leveling a gun at him?

  I thought, too, of a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Johnny had always played it straight before, but that was a lot of cash. It would buy a lot of things. But it was dirty money. Johnny would know how dirty. If he had reached for it then he was done; he had taken the first big step. Even torivate cops have a standard of decency. And if Johnny had taken that dough, had shot Considine, then he was out of bounds.

  “If it is Johnny,” I said to Hall, “I’ll turn him in. I’ll get your dough back and then the cops can have him.”

  “Not the cops,” Hall said. “He’d sing. I want him.”

  It was his only way of protecting himself. I sucked on my cigaret and it was old and dry. “All right,” I said.

  Kane laid down his cigar and leaned back a little. Tien came softly from the kitchen and got my coffee cup. “I’ll get you some hot, Nick,” she said.

  “Thanks,” I said. “I could use some coffee.”

  I thought about the character who had sold his birthright for a mess of pottage.

  6

  “WHILE you’ve been visiting,” Hall said without rancor, “I got a few more facts. Pipelines,” he added.

  He had the kind of pipelines that it takes big money or big influence to get. I just nodded.

  “Considine did make a killing. His fifty thousand went onto his books. The hundred-grand share I was supposed to get …” He blew a cloud of thin smoke. I got the idea.

  “No trace?”

  Hall smiled, but it wasn’t a particularly pleasant expres sion. “The day after you left for L.A. a woman checked into the hotel. She hasn’t left her room since. She takes her meals up there, and she pays her bills by check.”

  I could feel myself rising to the problem. Hall always did, do that to me. “Go on.”

  “She deposited the money in a checking account the day she came. I had—a friend at the First State Bank do a littld looking after she paid her first bill. Her account started ag something over a hundred thousand dollars.”

  My mouth was dry again. “Go on.”

  “The name she uses,’ Hall said, “is Edna Loomis.”

  That was no surprise; but the way Hall handled it was. Building up to something wasn’t his customary approach. I had a feeling he wasn’t through. “Why didn’t you tell me before?” I demanded.

  “You were busy hunting for Johnny,” he said as if that explained it.

  Tien came in, bringing my coffee and a fancy looking dessert for Hall. She smiled her faint smile at him as she set down the dessert and removed his omelette plate. Her hand hovered near his, touching it ever so lightly. He pulled his arm aside in a sudden, obvious gesture. Tien’s smile left her; she turned to me.

  “Can I get you anything else, Nick?”

  “No,” I said. “This is fine.” To hell with it; I had enough on my mind without worrying about Hall and Tien.

  Hall sat placidly, dipping a spoon into his dessert and eating appreciatively. “That isn’t all of it,” he remarked.

  “Give me the rest,” I said. I was feeling brittle now, my face stiff as if I’d been facing a high wind for hours. Hall was building again and I was afraid of what might come out next.

  “I didn’t think much of it,” Hall said. “Not until two days ago. The name Loomis didn’t mean anything to me.”

  The hell it didn’t, I thought. Hall checked every guest in the hotel. None usually came in, as a matter of fact, without his okay. His or Chimp’s. The Oxnan was a refuge for well heeled guys waiting for the heat to come off them. Hall always knew who was in his hotel.

  “Then,” he said, “day before yesterday she cashed her first check to pay her bill.”

  “Get to it.” I got the coffee cup to my mouth and the contents half drunk. It took some doing; my hand was shaking.

  “I still wouldn’t have thought much about it except that she had a visitor,” he said. “Just the one—once.”

  The one—once echoed in my mind. Chimp was efficient at his lobby post. If he said one—once, he meant just that.

  “Nelle Doane,” Hall said. His voice had flattened out.

  “And that’s why you called me back?” I managed to ask.

  “In part,” Hall said. He finished his dessert and picked up his cigar. “But mainly because the—my friend at the bank called me this morning. After making a check on the Loomis account for me he thought I might be interested in the ten-thousand-dollar deposit she mailed in yesterday. It was a check, made out by Nelle Doane.”

  I said, “Nelle hasn’t got ten thousand dollars. She hasn’t got anything but her lousy salary.”

  “She deals at the First State, too,” Hall said. His voice was implacable. He had me crowded in the corner and he was swinging. “She drew out ten thousand. That left her a balance of slightly over fifteen thousand dollars.”

  “Loomis, twenty-five thousand,” I thought. A note in Johnny’s suit. I could feel it burning in my wallet now. And a card that Nelle “discovered” later. The card that sent me on a ten-day goose-chase to L.A.

  Hall was staring at me. “You may not like to hear it, Nick. But it’s a lead.”

  “It might be the lead,” I said. I got up; I was restless. But prowling didn’t help. “I’ll get on it,” I said. The anger was gone. Even though I saw how Hall had boxed me into making a decision before springing this angle, my anger was all used up.

  “Edna Loomis is in room three-twelve,” Hall said.

  “Is that all the information you have on her?”

  “That’s all,” he said. “I told you I didn’t even think much about her until yesterday. Now it’s in your lap.”

  Like hell he hadn’t thought about her. I wondered just why Hall would take the trouble to lie to me.

  ‘I’ll need some money,” I said.

  “It is that time of the month,” Hall agreed. He pressed bell and Tien came into the room. “Write Nick a check,, he ordered. He put his hands on the edge of the desk. “Make out two. He’ll need one for expense money.” He sounded amused. “Nick used up his expense account chasing Johnny.”

  “You’re going to bed now?” Tien asked.

  Hall said, “Yes,” and pushed at the desk with his hands. His chair wheeled backward over the rug. He turned it and rolled toward his bedroom door. A blanket covered him from the waist to the feet. I wondered what being crippled did to the mind of a man as violent as Kane Hall. He was at least fifty and Tien had once told me he became paralyzed over twenty years before. Twenty years was a long time to live in a wheelchair, to know that your brain could do everything but move your legs.

  I said, “Anything else for me,
Kane?”

  Hall laughed. “Don’t sound so bitter, Nick. It isn’t my fault.” He stopped laughing. “Just keep going, and check on Edna Loomis—and why she’s hibernating.”

  “Shall I come and read to you?” Tien asked him.

  Hall swung his head as he started through the door. “I prefer to be by myself,” he answered shortly.

  I said, “Damn him!” as the door shut.

  Tien was behind the desk, drawing out the checkbook. “No,” she said. “He’s bitter at his own helplessness. He doesn’t like to have anyone think he needs waiting on.”

  “He doesn’t have to take it out on you,” I said. “You came here as a secretary, not a nursemaid.”

  “If I’m willing,” she said gently, “then it’s all right, isn’t it?”

  I had no answer to that. Tien had known Hall for ten years, twice as long as I had. If she chose to be his valet as well as his secretary, then—as she said—it was all right.

  I took the checks she handed me, my salary and five hundred for expenses. Tien accompanied me toward the door, her laughter soft as she put a hand over mine.

  “Cheer up, Nick.”

  “After what I just heard?”

  She took her hand away, letting me open the door. “It may not be so bad.”

  “You know what he said?”

  “Yes.”

  “And the way he said it?”

  She said again, “Yes. Kane likes to hurt people.”

  I brought the elevator up and got in. Kane liked to see people sweat, I thought, but even so he wasn’t overemphasizing the situation. He had been laying out facts; there was no reason for him to do otherwise.

  Nelle Doane had sent me on a hunt to Los Angeles. I could see a reason but it didn’t fit Nelle, not the picture I had always carried of her. And Nelle had visited Edna Loomis here, in the city. Nelle lived on the small salary of a lingerie model in a downtown specialty shop. And yet she had twenty-five thousand dollars. Had had twenty-five thousand, I corrected myself. Now Edna Loomis had ten thousand of it. And over a hundred thousand of her own besides.

  Also, a hundred thousand dollars of Hall’s money was missing.

  And so was Johnny Doane. He knew Edna Loomis, had been with her close to the time Considine was killed.