The Bigger They Come

by Erle Stanley Gardner

  ‘No,’ Mrs. Cool said. She scooped the money into a drawer, picked up the telephone, and said to Elsie Brand, ‘When Alma Hunter goes out, give her a receipt made to Sandra Birks for one hundred and fifty dollars.’

  She hung up the telephone and said to Alma Hunter, ‘That’s all.’

  Alma Hunter got up and looked at me. I left the office with her. Elsie Brand had a receipt ready. She tore it from the receipt book, handed it to Alma Hunter, and turned back to her typewriter.

  Alma Hunter looked across at me as we gained the corridor and started down toward the elevator. ‘I want to talk with you,’ she said.

  I nodded.

  ‘And please understand me. I know how you’re feeling. After what Mrs Cool said about having rented you, you feel like a gigolo or a poodle dog or something.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said.

  ‘Sandra told me the doctor would be patching her brother up for almost an hour, and not to come until he was finished.’

  ‘And you decided to kill that hour talking to me?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  The light over the elevator shaft glowed red. ‘Is it too early for lunch?’ she asked.

  I thought of my twenty-five-cent breakfast and followed her into the elevator.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  Chapter 3

  WE SAT in a little, quiet restaurant down on a side street, a little place run by a big German woman. It was a new one on me. Alma Hunter said Sandra had been eating there for five or six months. The food was wonderful.

  ‘Tell me-how long have you been working there?’ Alma asked.

  ‘You mean at the detective agency?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  I said, ‘About three hours.’

  ‘I thought so. And you’ve been out of work for a while?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How in the world did a man of your size decide to become - er - that is - what experience have you had - or perhaps I shouldn’t ask that.’

  ‘You shouldn’t,’ I said.

  She was silent for a moment, then said, ‘I’m going to give you some money for the lunch check. We’ll do that on all meals we eat together. I don’t want to put you in the position of standing by while I pay the checks. As a man, you’ll naturally resent—’

  ‘Don’t worry about me,’ I grinned. ‘All the pride I ever had has been kicked out of me. You’ve seen that for yourself.’

  ‘You mustn’t be like that,’ she protested. Her eyes showed hurt.

  ‘Ever walked the streets,’ I asked, ‘hungry-not able to talk to anyone, because the people you know would cut you and the people you didn’t know would think you wanted a handout? Have you ever been counted out without having had any sort of a trial?’

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t think I have.’

  ‘Try it some time,’ I said. ‘It does a lot for your pride.’

  ‘You mustn’t let it get you down.’

  ‘Oh no, it hasn’t,’ I assured her politely.

  ‘Now you’re being sarcastic,’ she said. ‘I don’t think, Mr. - I’m going to call you Donald. You call me Alma. When people are mixed up in a game such as we’re mixed up in, it seems foolish to stand on a lot of formality.’

  ‘Tell me about the game we’re mixed up in,’ I invited.

  There was a queer expression in her eyes, a pleading perhaps, perhaps a loneliness, and, I thought, just a glint of fear.

  ‘Tell me, Donald, and tell me the truth. You haven’t had any previous experience as a detective, have you?’

  I squeezed the last drops of coffee out of the coffee pot, and said, ‘Lovely weather we’re having, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s what I thought.’

  ‘What is?’

  She smiled. ‘That we’re having lovely weather.’

  ‘That makes it unanimous,’ I observed.

  ‘I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, Donald.’

  ‘You haven’t. My feelings don’t get hurt.’

  She leaned forward across the table. ‘I want you to help me, Donald.’

  ‘You heard what Mrs. Cool told you,’ I said, ‘that you could put me on a collar and lead me around on a leash if you wanted to.’

  ‘Oh, Donald, please don’t be like that. I understand how you must have felt. But don’t take it out on me.’

  ‘I’m not. I’m trying to tell you that this is a business arrangement.’

  ‘I want it to be personal as well-you’re hired to serve papers on Morgan Birks, but there are a lot of things about the case you should understand, and-and I want you to help me a little bit.’

  ‘Go on,’ I said, ‘it’s your party.’

  She said, ‘Morgan was mixed up in this slot-machine business right up to his ears. It’s a sordid story. There’s graft, bribery, and corruption. Those machines were all adjusted so there was a terrific pay-off. They had to be. Morgan had to take care of the police. The places that leased them had to be given a big profit.’

  ‘Nothing particularly unusual about that, is there?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘It’s my first experience with anything of the kind. I was shocked-and Sandra’s changed a lot.’

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since two years ago.’

  ‘Is that when she was married? In other words, since her marriage?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you know Morgan Birks before they were married?’

  ‘No. I’ve never met him. He didn’t like me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I think Sandra used me as a scapegoat. She wrote me long letters after they were married. You see, she was married on her vacation. She’d been saving her money for three years to make a trip to Honolulu. She met Morgan on the boat. They were married in Honolulu. She sent a wire giving up her job.’

  ‘What were you a scapegoat for?’

  ‘Oh, lots of things,’ she evaded.

  ‘Such as what? What’s wrong with the way she acts?’

  ‘Oh, around men. I guess Morgan’s old-fashioned in his ideas, and I guess he’s horribly jealous. He tells Sandra she’s nothing but an exhibitionist.’

  ‘Is she?’

  ‘No, of course not. Sandra’s frank and modern and-well, she doesn’t have any old-fashioned modesty about her body.’

  ‘Didn’t Morgan Birks know that before he married her?’

  She smiled and said, ‘Men like women to be modern with them. It’s when they’re modern with other men that the trouble starts.’

  ‘And Sandra blamed you?’ I asked.

  ‘No. But I think Morgan did. He thought someone had undermined Sandra’s feeling about-well, about things like that, and because she’d been rooming with me, Morgan thinks I’m responsible.’

  ‘And how has Sandra changed?’

  ‘I don’t know. She’s grown sort of hard and watchful and shrewd and calculating. She looks at you, and you get the feeling that she’s hiding behind her eyes.’

  ‘When did you notice this?’

  ‘As soon as I saw her again.’

  ‘And when was that?’

  ‘About a week ago when this thing broke. She wrote and asked me to come and stay with her for a while.’

  ‘You’re working?’ I asked.

  ‘No-not now. I burnt my bridges. I gave up my job to come and live with Sandra for a while.’

  ‘Do you think that was wise?’

  ‘She told me I could get another job here.’

  ‘Where had you been working?’

  ‘Kansas City.’

  ‘And that was where you met Sandra-where you roomed together?’

  ‘No. Sandra and I were rooming together in Salt Lake City. She met Morgan on that Honolulu trip and never even came back for her things. I sent them on to her at Kansas City. Then, after a while, Morgan left and came here, and I drifted back East and had a job in Kansas City, but I wasn’t there while Morgan was and-at least I don’t think I was. I didn’t keep up with Sandra. Morgan, you see, goes t
o places, stays there for a while, and then gets kicked out. Things get hot for him-well, like they are here, only this is the worst it’s ever been.’

  The big German woman came to beam down at us and ask if we wanted any more coffee. Alma said, ‘No.’ I said, ‘Yes.’ She took my coffee pot away to fill it, and I said to Alma, ‘I’m doing about as much talking as you are. If you want to tell me things, why not go ahead and tell them?’

  ‘What,’ she asked, ‘did you want to know?’

  ‘Everything.’

  ‘I used to be simply crazy about Sandra,’ Alma said. ‘I guess I still am, but marriage has changed her a lot, all right, that and the sort of life she’s lived with Morgan Birks.’ She laughed nervously and said, ‘I guess you think it’s a scream. Morgan blaming me for the things he doesn’t like in Sandra, and I claiming that Morgan has been responsible for a change in Sandra. I’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ I said, ‘tell me the truth. What’s the matter with Sandra? Is she on the make?’

  ‘You couldn’t blame her if she was,’ Alma said hotly. ‘Morgan never has been true to her. Within the first few months after her marriage, she found out he was keeping a mistress. It’s been like that ever since.’

  ‘The same girl?’ I asked.

  ‘No. He couldn’t even be true to a mistress.’

  ‘Well, according to your ideas,’ I said, ‘that’s because Sandra didn’t make a home for him, didn’t—’

  ‘Donald,’ she interrupted, ‘don’t be like that. Now stop it.’

  The German woman brought my coffee. I said, ‘All right, I’m stopped, but you do think it’s about six of one and a half a dozen of the other, don’t you?’

  ‘Morgan threw Sandra in with a wild crowd,’ she said. ‘He associates with gamblers and men of that type, and occasionally there’d be some politicians he’d want Sandra to play up to. He’d keep telling her, “My God, don’t be so stiff. Go ahead and use a little sex appeal on this guy. I want him to like you. He’s important to us.” He was after Sandra all the time to be sort of a glamour girl.’

  ‘All right,’ I said, ‘she’s your friend. You won’t say anything against her. There’s no use wasting time trying to argue about it. Now, go ahead and tell me the rest of it’

  ‘The rest of what?’

  ‘The rest of what’s worrying you.’

  ‘I think she’s got some money that belongs to Morgan Birks.’

  ‘Where did she get it?’

  ‘It’s pay-off money. I think there were some safety deposit boxes in her name, or perhaps she’d an assumed name for those boxes. Morgan gave her money to put in there-I think it was money he had been given for bribery or something. I don’t know. But anyhow, Sandra doesn’t intend to let him get that money back.’

  ‘I take it,’ I said, ‘that when she plays marbles, she plays for keeps.’

  ‘Well, can you blame her?’ Alma Hunter asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘yet.’

  ‘Well, what I’m trying to tell you is that I’m afraid.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of everything.’

  ‘Of Morgan Birks?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And is Sandra afraid of him?’

  ‘No, and that’s what bothers me. I think she should be’

  ‘Did you read the divorce complaint?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you notice that she was trying to grab everything in sight? She wants to cash in on the life insurance, have a receiver appointed for the property, collect temporary alimony and attorney’s fees, have a share of the community property awarded to her, and an allowance by way of alimony.’

  ‘That’s what the lawyer put in. Lawyers always do that.’

  ‘Is that what Sandra told you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And what do you want me to do?’

  ‘You’re right about Sandra; when she starts fighting, she fights,’ she said. ‘She was always that way. One night a boy friend wasn’t going to go home. He got rough, and Sandra was going to hit him with one of her golf clubs. She’d have done it, too.’

  ‘What stopped her?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘What happened to the boy friend?’

  ‘He was frightened. I talked him into going home. He wasn’t a friend, just an acquaintance.’

  ‘All right. Go on.’

  ‘Well, Sandra acts as though she were keeping something back from me, and I’m afraid she is. I think she’s trying to take some advantage of Morgan. I don’t know just how or what, and-well, I want you to find out and see what you can do to make her-well, be reasonable.’

  ‘And that’s all?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How about you? Wasn’t there something you wanted?’

  She looked at me appraisingly for a moment, then slowly shook her head and said, ‘No.’

  I finished my coffee. ‘Go right ahead,’ I said. ‘Keep on thinking that I’m a babe in the woods who shouldn’t be trusted out alone after dark. You know damn well that if I’d told you I had two or three years as a detective back of me, you’d have told me what’s really on your mind. The way it is now, you figure I can’t be trusted.’

  She started to say something then, but checked herself just as she started to speak.

  ‘Go ahead,’ I said. ‘Pay the check, and let’s go meet the brother, and see what he has to say.’

  ‘And you won’t tell anyone what I’ve told you?’

  ‘You haven’t told me anything-what did you say the brother’s name was?’

  ‘Thorns.’

  ‘His first name?’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard it. It’s B. Lee Thorns. That’s the way he signs his name. Sandra calls him Bleatie. She always has.’

  I motioned to the German woman to bring us the check, and said, ‘Let’s go see Bleatie.’

  Chapter 4

  IF ALMA HUNTER had a key to the apartment, she didn’t use it. She stood in the hallway and jabbed her gloved thumb against the buzzer at the side of the door. The young woman who opened the door and stood looking out at us was in the late twenties. She was slender around the waist, but had curves, and her dress showed the curves. Her hair was black. Her eyes were big, dark, and expressive. She had high cheekbones and very red, full lips. Her eyes veered away from Alma Hunter to study me, as though I’d been a new horse brought home from the fair.

  Alma Hunter said, ‘Sandra, this is Donald Lam. He works for Bertha Cool’s agency. And he’s going to find Morgan and serve the papers on him. Tell me about the accident. Was it bad?’

  Sandra Birks looked at me with surprised eyes. ‘You don’t look like a detective,’ she said, and gave me her hand.

  She didn’t just extend her hand. She didn’t shake hands, but she gave me her hand just exactly as though she were turning over a part of her body to me.

  As I closed my fingers around her hand, it surrendered in mine. ‘I try to look innocent,’ I said.

  ‘I’m so glad you came, Mr. Lam,’ she said, laughing nervously. ‘It’s imperative that we find Morgan at once. I think you understand why— Come in.’

  I stood to one side and let Alma Hunter walk in first. It was a big room, with dark beams across the ceiling, heavy drapes across the windows, thick carpets underfoot. Lounging chairs were scattered about, with cigarettes and ash trays handy. It was a place that reeked with the feeling of having been lived in, a sensual, human, warm existence.

  Sandra Birks said, ‘Archie’s here. I was fortunate to get him —I don’t think you’ve ever met Archie, have you, Alma?’

  ‘Archie?’ Alma repeated with the rising inflection of one who asks a question.

  ‘Archie Holoman. You know, Dr. Holoman. He was just graduating when I was married. He’s in a hospital and isn’t supposed to take outside cases, but of course Bleatie is different. It’s all part of the family.’

  I saw from the way Alma smiled and nodded that she’d never heard of Archie before, a
nd gathered that Sandra had a trick of producing intimate men friends just as a magician takes rabbits out of a hat.

  ‘Do sit down,’ Sandra Birks said to me. ‘I’m going to see if Bleatie can talk. It was the most awful thing! That car swung around the corner and banged into me before I had an opportunity to do anything. Bleatie swears the driver did it on purpose. It was a big, old car, and it got away. I hung onto the steering wheel. Bleatie lunged forward and went right through the windshield. The doctor says his nose is broken. I didn’t know that when I telephoned you, Alma …. Do sit down, Mr. Lam. Pick a comfortable chair, stretch out, and have a cigarette. I want to talk with Alma for a minute.’

  I dropped into a chair, put my feet up on an ottoman, lit a cigarette, and blew smoke rings at the ceiling. Bertha Cool was getting twenty dollars a day for my time. My stomach had food.

  From a bedroom I could hear the sounds of motion, the rumble of a masculine voice, then a ripping sound as adhesive tape was torn in strips. I could hear Sandra Birks talk rapidly in a low monotone. Occasionally Alma interrupted with a question. After a while, they came back and Mrs. Birks said, ‘I want you to talk with my brother.’

  I ground out my cigarette, followed them on into the bedroom. A young chap with a triangular face, broad across the forehead and eyes, coming down to a weak point at the chin, was putting on bandages with a professional touch. A man lay on the bed, cursing every now and then in a low voice. His nose was built up with splints, bandage, and adhesive tape. His long black hair was parted in the middle and hung down on either side of a sloping forehead. There was a bald spot about two inches in diameter on the top of his head. The adhesive tape, radiating out from the bandages on his nose made it seem as though his eyes were peering out from behind a white, coarse spiderweb.

  The man’s body was heavier than one would have gathered from looking at his face. His stomach bulged prominently against his vest. His hands were small, the fingers long and tapering. I judged that he was probably five or six years older than his sister.

  Sandra Birks said, ‘This is the man who’s going to serve the papers on Morgan, Bleatie.’

  He looked at me then, a peculiarly disconcerting stare from cat-green eyes on either side of the bandaged beak. ‘For Christ’s sake!’ he said, and then, after a moment, ‘What’s his name?’ And the way his voice came through the bandages made it sound as though he’d said, ‘Whad’s hid nabe?’