Back to the matter at hand, I told myself. My problem was simple: I needed to follow three men who might recognize me. The solution seemed equally simple: I’d hire a private detective.
I found Townsend in the diner’s telephone directory. His ad wasn’t too big or overblown, but he had one. A short drive later I was introducing myself to his secretary. She was polite and the offices were clean but not ostentatious. Townsend himself was a six-footer in a plain brown suit with strong shoulders, level gray eyes, close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair, and a firm, dry handshake. He was articulate but not chatty, polite but not overly diffident. His office didn’t smell of booze and he didn’t mind working weekends. And he knew what questions to ask. I didn’t play coy with him; I showed him my private investigator’s license and told him what I wanted.
“You don’t want to tail these birds yourself?” Townsend didn’t have an accent, not one I could place, anyway.
“I’m from out of town,” I explained. “You know the city better. Besides, they’ve seen my face.”
“Slip?”
“No, I introduced myself. Using another name.”
He nodded once, looking at the three names he’d written down.
“Rough trade?”
I gave a turned-down smile and shook my head. “These joes are bankers.” I gave him descriptions of the three men, the name and address of the bank they worked at, their home addresses, and what kinds of cars two of them drove. No, there wasn’t anything else I wanted to tell him for now. Just a standard shadow, see where they go, who they talk to. If I needed more later, I’d tell him more later. He caught me looking past his shoulder at the medals on the wall behind him.
“Infantry,” he said. “Thirteen months in the trenches. You?”
“Courier in the Signal Corps.”
“See any action?”
“Not much. More than I wanted to.”
“Didn’t we all.”
Townsend said he had a couple of reliable men he could put on this starting tomorrow, Saturday. We worked out a few other details. If we ran into each other on the street, he was to ignore me unless I approached him. If I did come up to him, he wasn’t to use my name unless I dropped it. We settled on a fee, a little expensive, this being the East Coast, but I got the feeling he was giving me a break just the same. I offered him some money up front. He told me that wouldn’t be necessary. Professional courtesy, I guessed. I shook his hand and told him I’d drop by Monday afternoon to see what progress had been made.
I spent the next few hours breaking bills at the three different banks where the $140,000 had been sent (and immediately cleaned out). There wasn’t a lot to be gained from this, but I’m the visual sort – the more I see, the clearer I can usually think. I didn’t risk trying to pump anyone about the closed-out accounts. Bank examiners might end up doing that soon enough and I didn’t need my mug stuck in someone’s recent memory because I’d walked in off the street asking questions. Asking to break a ten-spot wouldn’t seem out of place. Mostly it was an excuse to look around, see if just maybe there might be a teller I could smooth-talk, set up a potential ally for down the line if the situation became ripe.
“Just visiting,” I said, in answer to the pretty young girl behind the cage. “Any places I shouldn’t miss while I’m in town?” She rattled off a few. There was the Hippodrome, of course. If I was a history buff, I might want to pay a visit to Fort McHenry. A battle there over a century ago inspired what officially became our national anthem a few years back. And say, did I know that Baltimore was the home of the famous writer, Edgar Allan Poe?
“No kidding? You think maybe I could get his autograph?” She saw I was putting her on and laughed.
“Knowing Poe,” she said, “I’d say if you could get any writer to come back from the grave to sign your autograph book, it’d be him.”
“I could put it right next to the postcard I got from Houdini last summer.”
She laughed again and I thanked her politely for her suggestions, tapped my money on the counter, and left. There’s a fairly simple secret to charming strange women: don’t talk to them like they’re stupid. Three banks and I had maybe one ally who wouldn’t connect me to the embezzlers, along with a wallet stuffed with ones and fives.
There was nothing new to be gained by dropping in at Beldham & Morrisey. Besides, if Mr. Shaw made too many visits over a loan that would never materialize, that could make Nathan look like he couldn’t seal a deal. I had a light lunch at the same diner where I’d had breakfast, then went back to my hotel to check for messages. Nathan had called while I was out. I thanked the man behind the desk and went over to the house phone. Mr. Shaw’s call to Mr. Caine was put through quickly.
“Have you found out anything so far?” Nathan asked immediately. Christ, I thought, it’s been what, maybe six hours into the day?
“No, but I’ve put a man on it. We might pick up something over the weekend.”
“You have people in Baltimore?”
“I have people pretty much wherever I need them, Nathan,” I told him. Same as anyone who can read a telephone directory, you mook. “What did you call about?”
Nathan told me that Wiedermann had a dentist appointment for this afternoon at four o’clock. Apparently, the guy was having some real trouble with his choppers lately; this was his fourth dentist appointment in the last month.
“Are you going to follow him?” Nathan asked. “To make sure he’s really going to the dentist?”
“Now there’s a thought.”
“Make certain he doesn’t see you.”
“Thanks for the tip, Nathan.” I hung up the phone.
I drove over to Wyman Park and killed an hour or so mulling on a bench. My profession has made me an analytical man, but you have to be careful when there’s not much in the hopper to analyze. Otherwise, you’ll do so much grinding and sifting you’ll end up turning half-baked theories into facts without even realizing it. I glanced over at the statue of Poe from time to time. Frozen with his head down in an eternal brood, Mr. Nevermore seemed a great deterrent against letting one’s imagination run amok. I considered walking over and asking for his autograph, but that was just an excuse to think about the pretty teller again.
At three-thirty, I drove over to Beldham & Morrisey, parking several spaces down from the entrance. I waited twelve minutes for Wiedermann to emerge, then started my engine as I watched him cross the street and climb into a black Ford. He pulled into traffic and, once I had his direction down, I put the Terraplane into gear and followed him. We drove about three miles. He wasn’t checking his mirror and he didn’t make any sudden turns to shake a tail. The Ford pulled into a small office park next to a residential neighborhood. One of the signs out front boasted: “A. Enright, D.D.S.” I circled the block before pulling into the same lot and grabbing a spot several spaces down from the Ford.
I skimmed the local paper in my rented car until Wiedermann came out forty minutes later. When I was sure the coast was clear, I sauntered up the stairs and into the second-floor reception room. A perky brunette in starched whites smiled up at me from behind a windowed counter.
“Good afternoon. May I help you?”
“I’d like to speak to Dr. Enright if he’s in.”
“Do you have an appointment?” She rubbed the eraser end of a pencil under her lower lip flirtatiously.
“No appointment and no toothache,” I smiled, rapping the wooden counter lightly. “More in the nature of a personal business matter. Just take a minute. And no, I’m not a salesman,” I added, putting my hand up.
“Let me see if the doctor is free just now.” She stood up and walked slowly toward the back, giving me a good view of easily swaying hips. The people in this neighborhood probably had the cleanest teeth in Baltimore. I wast treated to another couple of views, coming and going, as she returned to lead me back to the dentist’s office. A middle-aged man with neatly parted hair and glasses looked up from his clipboard, all business in his whit
e tunic.
“Dr. Enright?”
“Yes? What can I do for you?”
“My name is Devlin Caine,” I told him. “I’m a private detective.”
The slump of his shoulders was slight, sudden, and unmistakable. He sighed and placed the clipboard down on a counter full of stainless steel implements and models of teeth.
“My wife hired you.” It was a statement, not a question, a heavy note of resignation in it. I put the insurance fraud story I’d concocted on the back burner and shifted to a higher mental gear.
“Professional ethics, Doctor, I said. “I can’t reveal the identity of a paying client.” I tried to hit just the right note of caginess that would validate his assumption. Enright sighed again and sat down on a stool near the dentist’s chair.
“I never meant for it to happen,” he said, looking down at a tray of sterilized jabbers and pokers. “You probably hear that all the time.”
I tilted my head in a kind of agreeing nod.
“You know the real irony here?” he asked, looking at me now.
“What’s that, Doctor?” Come on, Doc, I thought, open wide.
“I was going to break it off with her tonight after work. I doubt she’d really be all that upset. Cora’s young and vivacious, as I’m sure you saw for yourself. I’m sure she never had any long-range designs on a man of my age.”
“She seems the friendly sort, all right,” I agreed. “Kind that doesn’t have too much trouble finding company.” My speech was lazy but my brain was working okay. So the dentist was stepping out with his receptionist. He’d had his fun and knew it wouldn’t last, only now his old lady had gone and hired a private dick. Now to turn this to my advantage. I leaned against a counter, still holding my hat and running my fingers absently along the brim.
“I haven’t reported anything to your wife so far, Dr. Enright,” I said truthfully.
He looked up at me, the disdain in his eyes magnified through his glasses.
“How much do you want?”
“I don’t want your money,” I said, sounding hurt.
He blinked once in surprise. “What then?”
Now it was my turn to make with the resigned sighs. I put my hat on the counter and rubbed a hand through my hair.
“I do a lot of this kind of work, Dr. Enright, as I’m sure you can imagine. I don’t like it. I see a lot of marriages go bust. Good ones as well as bad, unfortunately. People get tempted, make mistakes, but real forgiveness seems in awful short supply these days.” I let out another sigh. “Just once I’d like to walk away from one of these things and have nothing come of it.” I pushed out a hollow laugh. “Hell, I could tell a story like that at a Detectives’ Convention.”
I walked up to the dentist chair and put one hand on the armrest, looking down into Enright’s eyes, searching.
“You really mean it that this was an accident, don’t you?”
“I swear it was,” he said, staring me back level in the eye, forcing every bit of sincerity he could muster. The spot he was in, he’d have given me that same look if he’d been swearing he was the King of Spain.
“And you really are going to break it off, aren’t you?”
“This very evening, as God is my witness.” His eyes never wavered, and it really was pathetic, the guilty philanderer suddenly elevated to the status of a man of mercy, doing his part to help restore a beaten-down private eye’s faith in humanity.
“I’ve already been paid,” I shrugged. “Cash, so no one will see a check. Oh, and my rates are quite reasonable, I assure you.”
“I’m sure they are,” Enright answered, still assuming a tone of comforting sincerity.
“What if…” I began, thinking aloud.
“Yes?” He leaned forward eagerly.
“What if Cora was seeing one of your patients? That could go a long way toward explaining a lot of misunderstandings and false impressions. After all, this patient comes in a lot more often than he really needs to – you know, to get to see her more – so you’re having to stay longer hours to accommodate him.” Enright was nodding his head slowly, admiring how it all fit together.
“Anyone would do,” I added. “Hell, who was the last guy you had in your chair?”
Ten minutes later, I had everything Dr. Enright knew about Miles Wiedermann, including the fact that he had two cavities that would need filling soon and a crown that would need replacing in the next six months.
Enright saw me to the door. His receptionist had already left for the day, which was a tough break. Now he’d have to wait till Monday to set her free. Or maybe the day after.
“I want to thank you for this, Mr. Caine,” Enright said, warmly shaking my hand.
“Believe me, Doctor, you’ve helped me as much as I’ve helped you.” Which, like nearly everything else I’d said to him, was the truth.
“Oh, Dr. Enright,” I said, pausing at the door, “I wouldn’t see any point in mentioning to your wife that you and I ever met.” Enright gave me a condescending smile.
“Exactly how dumb do I look, Mr. Caine?”
I smiled back and put my hat on. Just dumb enough, friend, I thought. Just dumb enough.
Dinner at Chez Caine that evening was a succulent roast chicken with mashed potatoes and homemade gravy. How did my brother stay so thin? I wondered. If I had a wife that could cook like this, I’d have to be a longshoreman to keep fit. Conversation around the table was lively, the children showing off for Uncle Devlin but without being brats about it. Billy seemed in good spirits. Evidently nothing had come of his snooping apart from that couple of hours sitting in the corner. More importantly, Mom hadn’t told Dad. He knew he’d had a narrow escape and he also knew to be grateful for it.
“So there I was,” I told the kids, having been goaded into telling them a real, old-fashioned detective story. “Half a block away from the streetcar and not one dime in my pocket!”
“And you had to get that book back to the library!” Mary piped up.
“It was three days past due!” Billy added, picking up the spirit of the thing.
“Four days!” I corrected him. Mary dramatically put a hand up to her mouth and gasped loudly.
“What ever did you do, Devlin?” their mother asked.
“I knew I had one chance,” I continued, speaking like a narrator on the radio. “The streetcar was already moving, but I knew it would make another stop two blocks later. I took off at a dead run down the sidewalk, dodging old ladies and jumping over baby carriages, pumping my legs as hard as I could in the blistering heat.”
“But it was February!” Billy cried out.
“Icy wind whipping at my face!” I corrected. “But you see, years ago I spent four months in deepest Africa, sweltering on a dirty cot in the tent of a traveling missionary, fighting for my life against a bout of malaria. Even today sometimes, even in the bitterest cold, I can still feel that awful, pounding jungle heat. Oh, the horror! The horror!”
Billy and Mary put arms across their foreheads and pretended to swoon.
“I spotted a news stand at the next corner. It was my only chance! I poured on more speed, running through the frozen air, only the memory of the sweltering Congo to keep me warm.”
“Where you got the malarity!” Mary chimed in.
“Malaria!” Billy corrected.
“I got them both, and I beat them both, and I was going to catch this streetcar and return that copy of Tips on Weekend Gardening to the public library or die trying! But there was someone in front of me at the news stand! A short, fat, old woman with wooden dentures and hair on her knuckles.”
Mary shrieked with laughter and Billy asked if I socked her one.
“I never hit a lady,” I told him solemnly, putting one hand over my heart. “I came up behind her, tapped her on the shoulder and said ‘Beat it, Sister! I’m contagious! I got the Spanish Influenza! I got the shingles! I got dry scalp! Save yourself! Run like the wind!’ And she took off down the street like the tax man was after
her. I slapped a dollar down on the counter and told the man I wanted today’s paper. And a pack of smokes. And some gum. And a licorice whip. And one of those penny tin whistles. No, the green one, you ninny!”
“Was this a news stand or a candy store?” Billy asked, laughing.
“I knew better than to ask, Billy. A fellow can get killed asking the wrong kinds of questions in my business. The vendor picked up my dollar with a pair of ice tongs and handed over my change in a fish tank net.”
“He didn’t want to get the malarity!” guessed Mary.
“Or the shingles!” called out Billy.
“Or the Spanish Influenza!” Marie this time.
“Or the dry scalp!” Nathan now, surprising me a little.
“He didn’t want ANY of it!” I yelled, cutting the air in front of me flat-handed. “I scooped up my goods and turned for a quick peek at the streetcar. Thirty feet from the next stop and I had another block to run. I poured on steam like the coal tender on the Rock Island. I came to within a dozen yards of the stopped streetcar and let out a piercing blast on my whistle.”
“That you got for a penny!” Mary called out.
“Give that girl a cigar!”
“I don’t smoke cigars!”
“That’s okay! I’ll take it!” She squealed in laughter and Billy prodded me.
“So you made it to the streetcar?”
“Yes, yes I did,” I said, speaking slowly now, my eyes fogged over with painful memory. “I made it to the library, but when I got there it hit me: I’d used up the last of my change riding the streetcar. And I owed a seven-cent fine for the overdue book.” They all sat around the table, waiting.
“So how did you pay?” Billy demanded.
I leaned back in my chair, folded my arms, and put on a smug smile.
A Shared Confidence Page 10