Where There's Smoke

by Stewart Sterling

  “Something of interest only to me.”

  “It was of interest to your brother or he wouldn’t have had it in his rooms. It was of interest to the laddie who got there before Gaydel and tore the place inside out looking for it.” Was Pedley’s imagination doing nip-ups or had there been a change of light in that bathroom, just now?

  “I don’t know anyone else who’d want it.”

  “What’s in it more precious than rubies?”

  She turned her head away. “Photographs.”

  “Why’d your brother have ’em, if they were yours?”

  “He had a peculiar streak in him. He seemed to enjoy embarrassing me.”

  “Oh. That kind of photos.”

  She looked at him quickly. “There’s nothing really wrong about them. Mostly snaps taken while we were on the road in the act. But there were a few Ned took while I was—sun-bathing.”

  “Oh.”

  “It wouldn’t be so good to have the wrong people get hold of them.”

  “You haven’t any ideas on who does have the case, now?” It hadn’t been a shadow that Pedley’d glimpsed out of the corner of his eye. But something had been moving between the light and the bathroom mirror; it was still there.

  “No. If I’d known there was going to be all this commotion about it, I wouldn’t have asked Chuck to hunt for the case at all.”

  “Gaydel must be a pretty good pal of yours. For you to trust him with intimate pictures like that.” He took a few casual paces toward the bathroom.

  “Chuck’s one of the best—Oh!”

  Her warning came too late. Pedley pulled out his service special, stepped to the bathroom door, leveled the gun close to his hip.

  “Come on out. Let’s have a look at you.”

  Chapter Eleven

  UNEXPECTED REACTIONS

  IT WAS A LOOK worth having. The man who sauntered out was striking in several respects.

  He was about twenty-four or five—darkly handsome, after a gaunt and somewhat haggard fashion. His brown eyes were deep-set, brooding. His nose had the hawklike sharpness of the outdoorsman. His skin was tanned until it was almost a match for his close-cropped hair. There was something the matter with his left hand; he kept opening and closing his fist with a nervous, jerky motion. He wore shaggy gray tweeds, a heavy blue flannel shirt; his shoes were thick-soled brogans.

  He paid no attention to Pedley’s gun, brushed past the marshal so close his coat caught on the revolver’s front sight. He went straight to Leila.

  “Sorry, shugie. I must have made a noise or something for Old Sleuth to get wise.”

  “Be careful, Bill.” She flopped out of the bed and her bare feet fumbled for the fuzzy mules. “Anything you say may be held against you.”

  “Leila,” he said. A slow grin spread over his lean face as he watched her hurry to the closet for something to cover the sheer black net.

  She shook her head in mock reproof. “Pardon my poor emilypost. Lieutenant Conover—meet Mister—?”

  “Pedley,” said Pedley. “I don’t like to intrude on this tender scene. But where do you fit in here, Lieutenant?”

  Conover said, “Uh—”

  “Bill and I are engaged,” Leila filled in, quickly. “It hasn’t been announced yet, but I suppose you’ll fix that, Mister Pedley.”

  “I’m no keyhole snooper.” The marshal slapped Conover’s hips by way of precaution, put his own gun back in the holster. “I’m not interested in anybody’s private life except as it may concern the fire that was touched off at the Brockhurst. I’ll admit to a little curiosity as to why the lieutenant thought it advisable to skulk in the john.”

  “Simple.” Conover slouched, loose-limbed, toward the living-room. “Terry Ross phoned Leila you were hellbent on arresting her. I stuck around to make sure you don’t do it. I figured I’d stand a better chance if it came to telling you where to get off, if you didn’t know I was here. How’s about letting the lady have a little privacy until she’s decent?”

  Pedley followed, turned back at the door. “I don’t know what your doctor’s orders were, Miss Lownes. But if they were to stay in bed, you’d better follow directions on the bottle. You don’t feel the worst of those fumes for a while after you inhale ’em. They anesthetize the throat so you can’t tell how hard you’ve been hit.” Conover was standing, straddle-legged, in front of the fireplace, holding out his hands to the heat.

  Pedley asked, “Mind filling in a few blanks, Lieutenant? Name, status, so forth?”

  “William T. Conover,” the youth at the mantel answered, without turning. “First Lieutenant, Paratroops, U. S. Marine Corps. Honorably discharged nine weeks ago.”

  One of these supertough youngsters, Pedley thought. Kind of kid they trained to do work no man could stand up to. Postgraduate course in the fine art of annihilation. Specialist in sudden death. Now he’d come back to the States and the Lownes girl. Maybe Ned Lownes hadn’t liked the idea of Conover’s marrying his sister. It was something to keep in mind.

  The lieutenant chafed his hands together, affably. “Prometheus’s gift,” he said. “The oldest friend of man.”

  Kim Wasson, at the concert grand, let her fingers fall on the keys in a howling discord.

  Pedley leaned against the stone mantel so he wouldn’t have to talk to the lieutenant’s back. “That the way you feel about fire, Conover?”

  “Naturally I wouldn’t expect a fireman to feel the same way.”

  Here’s another one of these lugs who figure all you need to be a fireman is a strong back and a little luck at pinochle, Pedley. Never stopped to think—these birds whose lives we protect at the risk of our own—that a fireman has to know something about the physics of hydraulic pressure, the chemistry of fire. The scar-tissue on Pedley’s face whitened a little, but the anger didn’t show in his voice. “Feel pretty good about the fire, don’t you, Lieutenant? How you think Ned Lownes felt about it?”

  “I never gave it a thought.” Conover swiveled around to stare blandly at the marshal. “Selfish about it, I suppose. That bonfire saved me a lot of trouble.”

  “Why?”

  Conover balanced on his toes, hunched his head forward truculently. “You never saw Ned chivvy Leila, or you wouldn’t ask. If you’re looking into this thing and are half-smart, you’ll find it out, anyway. So I might as well tell you. I’d threatened to fix Ned’s wagon for keeps.”

  “Did you?”

  “I wouldn’t admit it, if I’d done it—so you won’t believe me if I say ‘no.’”

  “Lownes jealous of your attentions to his sister?” If Pedley had pulled the pin on a hand grenade and tossed it at Conover’s face, it couldn’t have resulted in any more unexpected reaction. The lieutenant recoiled, swung on his heel, strode away from the marshal so rapidly he was almost running. He went swiftly to the concert grand, stood beside it, his face drained of color, his voice shaky. “Play something, Kim! Anything! Loud! Quick!”

  The arranger nodded, poker-faced. Her fingers moved over the keys; the instrument reverberated with a boogie version of “Stomping at the Savoy.”

  With both fists, Conover began to pound on the piano top in rhythm. His face strained up toward the ceiling so the cords in his neck stood out sharply.

  The beat of the music brought Leila. She was wearing lime-colored lounging pajamas of some filmy material; the top was fastened high around the neck but the back was cut so low she was practically naked to the waist. Whatever she wore beneath the pajamas wasn’t enough to hide what showed suggestively through the thin fabric.

  “Bill!” She flew to him. “What’s the matter?”

  He acted as if he hadn’t heard her, kept on with his ferocious fist-banging.

  Pedley rubbed his chin. “I said something that touched the wrong chord. What is he, mental instability discharge?”

  “Don’t use that term!” She spoke bitterly over her shoulder, while she clung to the lieutenant’s arm. “Bill had a nervous breakdown, that’s all. After
twenty-eight months in the Burma Theater, what can you expect!” The music became “St. James Infirm’ry”; the pounding kept on.

  “I might have doped that out.” Pedley wasn’t apologetic. “How long will it take him to tone down?”

  Leila left the lieutenant, came close to Pedley. “What did you say to him?”

  “Asked him if your brother was jealous of him.”

  “Oh, lord! Why didn’t you ask me? Ned never liked any of the men I was friendly with. Terry—or Chuck—or Wes—”

  The fist-hammering stopped abruptly. Kim eased off on the bass; the music trailed softly into a Strauss waltz, stopped. Conover stood relaxed by the piano, mopping a rain of sweat off his forehead.

  Leila hurried back to him. “Want a drink, darling?”

  “Uh, uh. I’m jake.” He stuck the handkerchief in his pocket as if nothing had happened. “I’m afraid I interrupted you, Dick Tracy.”

  Leila put a finger to her lips, pleaded with her eyes. Pedley ignored the appeal. “I was about to ask where you were between, say, three and four-fifteen this afternoon, Lieutenant.”

  “Let’s see.” Conover appeared to consider. “Most of that time I was nickeling the juke box in a hole-in-the-wall called Alfy’s Green Room.”

  “The Fortieth Street hangout? See anyone you know?”

  “Bartenders.”

  “Didn’t go there with anyone?”

  “No.”

  “Didn’t run into Lownes there?”

  Conover shook his head. “I was just lapping up a few beers and waiting until it was time to go pick up Leila. Any other little item you’d like to be wised-up on?”

  “Yair. Where you live?”

  The lieutenant put his arm around Leila, looked down at her affectionately. “Tell him where I live, shugie.”

  She was genuinely startled this time. “Why—on your boat, Bill.”

  Pedley elevated one eyebrow. “In midwinter? What is it? A steam yacht?”

  “Motorboat,” Conover said. “Thirty-eight footer.”

  “In the water, this time of year?”

  “Up on the ways. At Sheepshead.”

  “Must have to sleep in your woolies. Well—don’t take any cruises until I give you port clearance, Lieutenant.”

  Leila made a derisive gesture. “Now you’re being silly. Bill’s the last person in the world to suspect.”

  “You might have a slight emotional bias, Miss Lownes. Your fiancé claims he had his reasons for—”

  “Oh!” Leila cried. “Plenty of others had good reason.” She put the back of her hand up to her mouth, opened her eyes very wide as if something had slipped out unintentionally.

  “As for instance?”

  “Oh—lots of people. Ned could have written a book on How to Make Enemies and Irritate People.”

  “You say lots of people had good reason to hate your brother, Miss Lownes. But you can’t think of their names at the moment. How about this Hal Kelsey who leads your orchestra?” Pedley cocked his head to listen to the piano; Kim Wasson had started playing again. The music was soft but the tempo was being accelerated.

  “Hal Kelsey?” Leila dismissed him with a shrug of her free shoulder. “I guess Hal was practically the only soul in the show Ned didn’t pick a fight with, one time or another.”

  “Just one big happy family!” The marshal recognized the tune that emerged from the elaborate overchords the arranger was devising.

  “Shine, little glow-worm,” tinkled the treble. “Glimmer—Glimmer,” echoed the bass. “Um-dee-dee-dum-dum, da-dum, dee-dum—”

  “Kim! Please!” It was Leila. “I’m tired.”

  “Sorry, Li. I wasn’t thinking.” The piano was silent.

  Conover held out his hand. “Great fun to have met up with you, Mister Pedley. Too bad to cut your visit short. But you heard what the little lady said. She’s a-wearyin’ of you.”

  “Don’t be rude, Bill.” Leila tried a smile. “The gentleman won’t want to pay me another visit.”

  “Oh, I’ll be back,” Pedley said. “Before I come, you might think up some better answers than the ones you’ve been handing me.” He put on his hat, touched the brim in salute. “Or first thing you know, you’ll have me wondering why you two don’t want this firebug caught.”

  Chapter Twelve

  IN SUCH A DITHER

  PEDLEY STOOD BESIDE the phone switchboard in the Riveredge lobby talking to Maginn. He hadn’t finished looking over the list of outgoing calls made from Leila’s apartment when he heard the hum of the descending elevator again.

  The grille clashed, the bronze door slid back. High heels clicked on lobby tile. Around the corner of the screen shielding the switchboard from public gaze, Pedley caught a flash of vermilion beneath a short beaver jacket.

  “Stick with it, Mag. I want to know if she talks to her lawyer.” He flipped a hand at his deputy, got to the sidewalk as Kim was beating a red light at the corner. It was too stormy for many people to be on the street; he had no trouble keeping her in sight until he could climb behind the wheel of the sedan.

  He nursed the car along behind her until she reached Lexington and swung north; he was parked 50 feet away when the drugstore door closed behind her.

  He pretended to inspect the display of cough remedies and hot-water bottles until he saw her mounting a red leather stool at the fountain. Then he went in.

  He hooked a leg over the stool next hers.

  If she was astonished or annoyed, he couldn’t have told it.

  The only other person at the counter was a watchman having his midnight pickup. The soda jerker hardly looked at Kim as he sauntered over, polishing a glass.

  “Ham and swiss on rye,” she ordered. “Plenty of mustard. And a raspberry malted. Sweet.”

  “Old Black Joe,” said Pedley.

  The counterman started to push things around on his cutting-board.

  The marshal leaned on the marble. “You didn’t waste any time following me out.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself.” She was amiable about it. “I didn’t know you were going to hang around and pull a Dan’l Boone on me. I came out because I thought those two had a right to be alone for a while. What’s the idea of shadowing me? You don’t imagine I tried to burn down the Brockhurst?”

  “You might know who did.”

  “I might have some ideas. But that’s all they’d be.”

  “That wasn’t a bad idea—that ‘Glow-worm’ thing you were playing.” The counterman brought the malted and black coffee.

  She showed nice teeth. “I was butchering it. That’s my weakness. When I’m excited about anything, it comes right out on the keyboard. That’s why I’ll never amount to anything as a pianist. Can’t control my emotions.”

  “You’re in the majority. What’re your emotions about Hal Kelsey?”

  “Censored!” She started to devour the sandwich.

  “What’s he done to you?”

  “Nothing beyond the usual chiseling on the special arrangements I make for the show. And the customary battling when I have to take over the eighty-eight to make sure Li gets the right tempo in the production numbers. It’s what he’s been trying to do to her that riles me. And she doesn’t even sense what he’s up to. Maybe I’m talking out of turn.”

  “Long’s you keep on talking—”

  “I don’t know whether you’ll understand.”

  He pointed to his shoes. “No flat feet. No derby. Ditch the idea I’m a detective. Pretend I’m Joe Blow.”

  She laughed. “I’ll try—but I don’t know whether this has anything to do with the fire or not—I really don’t.”

  “Let’s hear it, then maybe we’ll see. Keep on pouring.”

  “Well—the thing goes back a bit. To the time when Ned and Leila were headliners on Pantages and Polis and Keith-Orpheum. The five-a-day is the hard way to come up, don’t let anybody tell you different. One-night jumps from the tanks to the sticks. Playing every whistle-stop in the timetables and some that w
eren’t even on the map. There were plenty of times when they had to hock their overcoats so they could have coffee and cakes. And they did their share of tenting on the old camp ground before they got the breaks. But they finally got ’em. They were never next-to-closing but they were good enough to get by—partly because Ned was terif as an eccentric hoofer, partly because Leila’s looks put over the act when her pipes couldn’t. She hasn’t much of a voice, you know.” She studied Pedley to see if he thought she was being disloyal.

  “I wouldn’t be any judge of that,” he said. “But she has something.”

  “’Deed she has, suh. ’Deed she has. That’s the point. Lownes & Lownes hit the jackpot by getting a fill-in job on one of those Broadway legstravaganzas. It wasn’t such a much of a spot but they made the best of it. The crix went wild about Leila. Not her singing; she had only one number. Just—her freshness, her figure—you know what I mean.”

  “Sexcess story.”

  “Sure. That’s the way she affects you, across the foots. Not all of it comes across on the radio, of course. But enough.”

  “Where’s Kelsey come into this?”

  “Her radio show’s big-time stuff. Top rating. Premium price. They print her pictures in the country weeklies, name bras and race horses after her. So the band that backs her up gets in on this great white glare of publicity. ‘Luscious Leila Lownes with Hal Kelsey and the Gang.’ It’s gone to Hal’s head. He’s had a taste of the big dough for the first time in his lousy life—and now he wants the whole piece of cake. He’d like it to be ‘Hal Kelsey with Luscious Leila,’ instead of the other way ’round.”

  “Then by-and-by it would be ‘Hay Kelsey with Trixie-So-and-so’?”

  “Sure. I know that’s what he’s after. Because he told me so one night when he was high and tried to sell me his idea of romance. I was to come along and help him ease her out of top billing. Step one—to kill Leila’s throaty mike-style—kid her that she can sing anything the gals in the Met can. She’s half ready to fall for it, believe me. And it would ruin her. She’s no Lily Pons. Then Hal might be able to step in and replace her with someone he could control.”