Little Miss Murder

by Michael Avallone

  "Nice people." Monks ignored the flaming wreck and looked back at his own car. "The beautiful half-naked dame is Miss Carr, I take it. And who and what is she, may I ask?"

  "Save that for later, Mike. She's with me, and that's all I can tell you for now. All I can afford to tell you."

  Monks considered the information, digested it, thought it over, and decided it was better than nothing. At least, I wasn't holding out on him completely. There was hope for me yet.

  "Fair enough," he growled. "I'll buy that for now. Rahway won't mind as long as I give them something for their blotter. Especially the stiff you mention back at the farm. He has to be accounted for. I asked about the farm before we got there. Seems it was the property of a traveling salesman named Jennings or something like that. The farm wasn't worked. Just used as a residence. Guess it was just a blind—"

  "You can bet on it." I took out my Camels and lit one. He eyed me almost skeptically again, and a sudden furrow worked its way between his brows. The Rahway cops and his driver were chinning together, animatedly.

  "Tell me something. You're so smart about these things. What the hell do you think happened?" He poked a big thumb down toward the still-smouldering remains of the fancy limousine. Searing heat filled the air.

  "If I told you, you wouldn't believe me in a month of Sundays."

  "Try me," he suggested. "Another of your educated guesses?"

  I took a deep breath.

  "I think Mr. Godlove took a baseball apart to see what was inside of it. I think maybe it was meant all the time that he should do that." I was thinking of an old gray fox who was named Louise Warrington Paul, and I was remembering all that Felicia Carr had claimed for her. I was also remembering that it was Dame Paul who had shown up at the last minute to leave with me an autographed ball that she knew Christian Godlove wanted. Wanted more than life itself. But had she known I was meeting him that morning, and if she had, how had she? That was worth thinking about. No matter that I might not like the answers I came up with.

  Monks glared at me.

  "Come on. What are you giving me? Baseball? What baseball?"

  "At the office," I said. "I'll tell you all about it at the office. Yours or mine, you name it."

  "Ah." He spread his hands disgustedly, "what's the use? The crazier things are, the more likely you are to be involved in it. Right up to your armpits. Okay. We'll let it go at that"

  "Thanks, Mike."

  "Thanks, hell. Go take care of your women. I'll go talk to the Rahway fuzz. I don't want anybody to know what an idiot I am for ever mixing with the likes of you." He stalked off and I took a last look at the mess in the ditch below. There was no danger of the grass catching fire. Godlove's funeral pyre had scorched the earth for yards around. I walked back to Monks' car. Slowly, thoughtfully.

  Melissa smiled when she saw me. There was relief and a touch of happiness in her eyes. She still had Felicia's head pillowed on her shoulder. Like all of life's unexpected miracles, Felicia was asleep. Whatever had happened back at the farmhouse, she had yielded to fatigue, tension, and just plain collapse. The arm in the dirty cast lay stiffly on her lap.

  "You were jealous," I said, staring Melissa in the eye.

  "Uh huh." Her voice was barely a whisper. "I wanted to see what the competition looked like."

  "You ran down from the office after I left, followed me to the Plaza, saw me get into Godlove's car, and instead of going back to your desk like a faithful dumb secretary, you followed me in a cab all the way out here. Tell me. How did you get Monks to drop everything and come running to the rescue?"

  "It was easy," she said, her voice still falling in that damn husky whisper. "He loves you, too. For all the grumbling he does. I told him you were being held by spies in a farmhouse and that they were maybe torturing you to get some information out of you—she's beautiful, Massa Ed. I've never seen a more beautiful woman."

  "Don't call me that," I said softly, "and stop sticking needles in yourself. I'm not worth it."

  She tilted her chin proudly at me and almost hugged Felicia protectively as if she were some forlorn infant who needed mothering.

  "That is your opinion, Mr. Noon. I'm entitled to mine"

  "You're fired," I said. "You talk back too much."

  "I resign," she said. "You don't know how to take care of yourself."

  "Give me ten years' notice?"

  "You got it," she said, chuckling sadly. I looked at her and something got into my eyes. I turned away to brush it out. Melissa's eyes followed me. I knew they did.

  "Thanks," I said. "For everything. Mostly, for being you."

  I couldn't say anymore without falling all over myself, so I went back to where Monks was conferring with the New Jersey coppers. I wanted nothing more than to get back to Manhattan and put the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle all together. There were those loose ends that Christian Godlove had mentioned. He was right. I like to tie them all up together before I close shop. There's no other way to run the detective business.

  About Felicia Carr and Melissa Mercer, I didn't know what to do.

  That would have to come later.

  Much later.

  It was that classic Scottish dilemma, once made memorable by some old poet somewhere: "How happy I'd be with either, 'twere other fair charmer away. . . ." Yeah, Bo.

  Meanwhile, there was the unfinished business of the baseball, the microfilm, Teheran, Garnu Sin, the UN building, and Mrs. Louise Warrington Paul. That old biddy held the key to the whole mess. With all her games and tricks and knitting.

  She had assassinated Christian Godlove né Marcus Strang as surely as if she had pointed a gun at his head and pulled the trigger. It didn't matter that I had been the catalyst for her.

  Or sap, as the case might be.

  Either way, I had to know, one way or another.

  The President, the CIA, Naval Intelligence, and everybody had to know.

  There was a joker somewhere in the ABM stockpile.

  13

  Sacrifice Fly

  Our little party broke up when we saw Manhattan again. By the time we hit the Lincoln Tunnel, barreled on through, and came out in the West 'Forties, the sun had gone down behind the stone canyons of the city. The Empire State building's thousand-and-one windows blazed with a coppery glow. The dirty avenues and streets, always more so on a bright day, never looked more familiar. Monks and I got out of the car at my office. He dismissed Wilson, his driver for the day, and grunted something about seeing him on Monday. Tactfully, Monks did not try to detain the girls. He let Melissa Mercer accompany Felicia Carr back to the Taft Hotel, where she could do something about her ruined clothes and generally revive herself. Felicia barely acknowledged my kiss-on-the-cheek as Mel led her away to a taxicab. Mel had stopped giving me a hard time about her. In fact, both women had already gotten along famously, with that instant rapport that does spring up between two spectacular ladies every once in a hundred years. Dames. I couldn't understand them, but I was too grateful for small favors to complain. Mel said something about phoning as soon as she got Felicia set up, and I let it go at that. I was too busy framing in my mind exactly how much I was going to be able to tell Monks without breaking Security rules. Pal or not, there was just so much I could tell him in the interests of friendship.

  On the car radio coming in, after Monks had made his official report, he had Wilson turn the set off and get some music on a regular station to help cheer up the girls. An on-the-hour news broadcast brought us up-to-date on the world news. The President was flying back from Teheran, following Garnu Sin's state funeral, and the UN disaster had uncovered an incredible plot. The New York Police Department, acting in concert with top CIA agents and the local FBI had netted three plotters. A trio of terrorists, with records, illegally in this country, who turned out to be all native-born Iranians. Talk about Pearl Harbor! It was the same thing all over again. The only cheerful news on the radio before the music came trumpeting back was the happy report that the Mets had
walloped the Giants with a vengeance that afternoon, making up for yesterday's defeat at Marichal's hands. Light-hitting Mets catcher, Jerry Grote, had gone on a tear. Hitting a homer and two doubles and knocking in six runs in a 10-2 rout of the visitors from S.F. That was the story of the New York Mets. A new hero every day, like it had been all season. The championship of the Eastern Division of the National League was getting to look less and less like pie-in-the-sky. More like a cold statistical fact.

  Monks went upstairs to the office with me, and we locked ourselves in, and I opened a bottle of Scotch. We both needed one. Monks had his very weak with lots of water. I had a nice straight shot. Neat.

  It was Saturday, and the building was fairly deserted except for one or two tenants like me who never keep regular office hours. Monks flopped onto the client's chair, flung his hat off to one side, and crossed his legs. When he had finished his drink, he set the glass down on my desk, folded his arms, and looked at me. We were like everybody else in this life. I'd known him for almost twenty years, seen as much of him as one can see anybody, but this was one of the very few occasions we had ever really gotten together for a quiet, intimate pow-wow. The feeling was strange and new, and I liked it, somehow. Sure, it was still an official kind of talk, but the threat of jail and fresh trouble wasn't hanging over the conversation as it usually did in most of our talks. After all, he was still a cop. One of the very best ones. The pride and joy of the Bureau.

  He doesn't start from the top like every one else. He cuts right into the nitty-gritty where most of the facts lie.

  "Who's the nudist?" he asked curtly.

  "Felicia Carr. She works for Naval Intelligence."

  "You're kidding. Woman who looks like that? She ought to be in Hollywood sitting by a swimming pool." He made a shape with his hands.

  "I admire your judgment, but please remember this is all off the record. I'm trying to cooperate, but I'm only going to be able to tell you everything up to a point. Then it's all bets are off."

  "You see a police stenographer in this room taking notes? Be yourself, Ed."

  "Fair enough. But Miss Carr lives in D.C., writes a column for the Washington Post, and doubles in brass for the Navy. More I cannot tell you about her. I just don't know."

  His eyes studied my face. "You're hung on her. I know that look. That sound in your voice. If I called her a dirty name, you'd hang one on my nose, wouldn't you?"

  "I would. She isn't just an acquaintance."

  "Poor Melissa." He sighed. "You're giving her a bad time with this routine, Ed. I hope you know that. You and your love life. You're one of the biggest reasons I believe in bachelors. Not for me." He shuddered. "All right. We'll forget the hearts and flowers. Tell me all about it. From the start. I want to know about Blassingame at the ball park. If you're able to tell me that—"

  I told him, taking it slow, leaving out only the particulars about the President and my red-white-and-blue phone. Monks had seen the phone many times and thought it was just a Pop Art kind of thing. A psychedelic joke. I had never bothered to straighten him out. When I got to the parts about old Dame Paul and the Mustang chase and the murders of Dmitri and Aloyesha, the furrow between his eyebrows threatened to become a half-acre. He uncrossed his legs and leaned toward the desk.

  "We got no reports on two stiffs at Sniffin Court yesterday. Nobody phoned anything in—"

  "Then they're still there. I don't think Godlove would have bothered moving them. I guess Felicia didn't report it to her bosses, either."

  Monks growled. "Why should she? You'd be surprised how easy it is to dummy up on the New York Police Department. Some of the best agencies that ought to know better do." He sighed ponderously. "I'll have to phone it in. But it can wait until you finish your story."

  "There's not much more to tell. I got to be middle-man on delivering a baseball loaded with valuable microfilm. The film is supposed to contain red-hot ABM data of U.S. and British origin. Does it or doesn't it? Can't prove it by me. And Godlove wanted it—this Dame Paul wanted him to have it so it would blow him to Kingdom Come. The way it did in Rahway. But whether or not she delivered a real ball to her confederates and the operation is officially over is beyond me."

  Monks considered that.

  "So this Tommy Blassingame is—or was—a British agent and got killed at the park because he spotted Godlove or just got in the way somehow. That it?"

  "Close enough. But you know how this spy crap goes. Everybody will button down, clam up on details, and we'll never get a straight story from anybody. The CIA can't be forced to break its Security set-up, we certainly can't get the English to open up, and we sure as hell can't ask Felicia Carr to tell us all about it, either. The Navy wouldn't let her. So what have we got left? I was used as a messenger boy, and here I am. Thanks to you, I wouldn't even be here."

  He scowled at me. "That's the part that bugs me. Why you? They didn't pick your name out of a hat. 'Course, you've got a reputation for screwy things that can't be glossed over, but—you're holding out on me, Ed."

  "I am," I agreed. "And that's the one part I can't tell you."

  "Not even me?"

  "Not even you. Sorry."

  He shrugged, looking for the bottle of Scotch again. "Think I'll have one for the road. Mind?"

  "Help yourself. Pour me one, too."

  He didn't make his own drink so weak this time. We stared at each other over the glasses. "Cheers," he grunted. "Up the Mets," I said. We drank. The office was nice and peaceful, and dark shadows had begun to steal in through the windows behind me, so I flicked the desk lamp on. Monks rubbed his eyes and yawned.

  "What about the UN thing, Mike?"

  He shook his head. "Tied us up for hours. Every precinct within shouting distance. Quite a blast. That down-floor looks like London after the blitz. The demolition boys are working around the clock. Glad it's not my headache."

  "No. But it's everybody's Excedrin, one way or another. Three Iranian terrorists. Ouch. With the President in Teheran, that's going to make a real political football. Watch and see."

  "I'm a cop," he said simply. "I leave politics to the politicians."

  I had no argument for that. Anyway, he seemed satisfied with what I'd told him, so he reached for his hat, got business-like again, and used the regular phone on the desk to buzz Headquarters and report in on Dmitri and Aloyesha. I sipped my Scotch slowly. My own nerves and reflexes had begun to back up on me. The post-tension shock had now claimed me. I was very suddenly, very tired. The frame-house horrors, with me chained in the attic, Felicia downstairs with Freddy, and that ugly valentine, Christian Godlove, getting ready to blow up the world with me and everybody else in it. Who the hell had really hired him to get the microfilm baseball?

  When he hung up the phone, my old friend from the Homicide Bureau waved a hand and headed for the door. I watched him go with mingled affection and regret. He was the Organization Man because he had to be, and I was anti-Establishment even though I don't work at it in an anarchistic way. But we had lost a great many things because of the division of our basic approach to the problems of our jobs. A mutual loss.

  "See you, Ed. Don't pick up any more baseballs unless you're going to play a game."

  "Check."

  "Call me if anything new breaks?"

  "That's a promise. Thanks for bailing me out at Rahway, Mike."

  "Big deal."

  "All the same."

  He left, and I was alone with the bottle, the phones, the furniture, and the dying daylight. I sat in the swivel and tried to dope some things out. I was particularly concerned about the whereabouts and status of Mrs. Louise Warrington Paul. The old doll with the Robin Hood hat was still the ham-what-am when it came to getting a clearer picture of Operation Horsehide. She knew where all the bodies were buried—and right then and there, it looked as if she had crawled in with them. I doubted that I might ever see her again. Anywhere in this world.

  The phone on the desk rang, breaking into my woolgatheri
ng. The regular one. I scooped it up. Melissa Mercer's dulcet tones, which any blues singer would have wanted badly, filled the wire.

  "Ed, she took a powder on me—"

  "Come again?" A jolt flashed through my soul.

  "Felicia. She's gone. I never saw anybody disappear so fast."

  "All right. Give me it again. Slow. With details."

  Melissa's sigh was sad. "I got her into a shower, left her for a little while, to go down to the lobby to see about getting some Compoz, and when I got back—poof. She was gone. Didn't take any other clothes, either. Except a small night bag I saw in the room. She left a note, Ed. Want me to read the part that's for you?"

  I wiped at my chin, feeling the stubble starting there. Melissa waited for my answer.

  "Read me everything she wrote. From the top."

  "Okay. Here it is . . . 'Dear Melissa. Thanks a mill. You've been great. Sorry I have to do this. Take care of the Noon Man.' The message is on Taft stationery—some in the desk here in the room. And here's the part for you—'I've been recalled to D. C. Sorry. See you sometime. Take care of Melissa. Love, Felicia.' That's all of it, Ed."

  "Did she have time to get a phone call while you were in the lobby?"

  "Maybe. I might have been gone about a half hour. Heck, I didn't expect her to run out."

  "How does her handwriting look? Free and easy?"

  "Beautiful script. Small, neat, and open-ended vowels. Why?"

  "Doesn't look like she wrote it with a gun at her head?"

  Melissa gasped. "Why—no! I never even thought of that."

  "I have to think of things like that." I sighed. "Okay. Come on over to the office. I'll wait for you. Bring the letter. She probably did get called back. The case is sort of over. Oh, well. Maybe it's nothing. Hungry?"

  "Like a bear."

  "Then bring your appetite, too. We're going to dinner."

  "Give me twenty minutes," she said happily and hung up.