She turned to look back through the window in the rear of the car, at the traffic. As she twisted her neck free of the high collar of the silk blouse, I saw once more those dark, sinister bruises-the imprints left by thumb and fingers which had clutched her throat.
I said nothing. I had plenty of thinking of my own to do. She deftly swung the car out into traffic and drove to the Milestone Apartments.
‘Well,’ I said. ‘Here goes.’
‘Luck,’ she said with a smile.
‘Thanks.’
I walked across the street, looked over the list of names on the side of the door, and pressed the button opposite the name ‘S. L. Durke, 314.’
I was wondering just what a competent operative would do if Miss Durke wasn’t at home. But before I’d decided on an answer, the door buzzer indicated Miss Durke was home and was willing to see visitors without a palaver through the speaking tube.
I pushed the door as the buzzer released the catch, walked down a smelly corridor to where a patch of pale light marked the location of the automatic elevator. I closed the door, jabbed the button for the third floor, and went up.
As I raised my fingers to knock on the door of 314, a girl in dark blue silk pajamas opened the door, and said, ‘What is it?’
She was a blonde, and I figured her as an artificial blonde. She was somewhere on the sunny side of thirty, with a figure that pushed out at me through the silk of her pajamas. She said again, impatiently, ‘Well, what is it?’
Her voice was the only harsh thing about her.
‘I want to come in.’
‘Why?’
‘I want to talk.’
‘Well, come on in,’ she said.
She’d been polishing her fingernails. The buffer was on a coffee table near a couch. She walked back to the couch, made herself comfortable, picked up the buffer, critically inspected her nails, and said without looking up, ‘Well, what is it?’
‘I’m a detective,’ I told her.
Her eyes flashed up at mine then. For a moment there was a startled look on her face. Then she started to laugh. She quit laughing at the look on my face, and said, ‘You are?’
I nodded.
‘Well, you don’t look it,’ she observed, trying to soften the blow of her laughter. ‘You look like a darn nice kid with ideals and a mother. I hope I didn’t hurt your feelings by laughing.’
‘No, I’m used to it.’
‘All right. You’re a detective. So what?’
‘I’m employed by Sandra Birks. Does that mean anything to you?’
She kept her eyes on the buffer as she polished her nails, apparently giving rapt attention to getting just the right sheen. ‘What’s Sandra Birks got to do with it?’ she asked at length.
‘She might have quite a good deal to do with it.’
‘I don’t know the lady.’
‘She’s the wife of Morgan Birks.’
‘Who’s Morgan Birks?’
‘Why, don’t you read the newspapers?’ I asked.
‘What if I do? Where do I come into the picture?’
I said, ‘Mrs. Birks could be pretty mean if she wanted to, you know.’
‘Could she?’
‘You know she could.’
‘And how am I supposed to know it?’
‘Let your conscience be your guide.’
She looked up at me and laughed harshly. ‘I haven’t any. I had to get rid of that long ago.’
‘Mrs. Birks,’ I said, ‘could drag you into court if she wanted’
‘On what ground?’
‘On the ground of being intimate with her husband.’
‘Don’t you take a lot for granted?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know. Do I?’
‘Go ahead. You’re talking. I’m listening-for a while.’
‘Well, I’m doing what I’ve been hired to do.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘Serve papers on Morgan Birks.’
‘What sort of papers?’
‘Divorce papers.’
‘Why come here?’
‘I think you can tell me where he is.’
‘Well, I can’t.’
‘If you could, there’d be a bit of coin in it for you.’
I saw her eyes light with interest. ‘How much coin? ‘Perhaps quite a bit. It depends.’
‘What does it depend on?’
‘What Mrs. Birks get out of it.’
‘No, thanks. I’m not interested. I don’t think that dodo can get a damn cent.’
‘Her divorce complaint doesn’t read that way.’
‘It takes more than a complaint to make a divorce. It takes a judgment of a court. Mrs. Birks is one of those baby-faced bitches who hide behind a mask of respectability. She’s been cheating on Morgan ever since they were married. If Morgan wanted to tell half of the things he’s got on her— Oh well, you’re talking, I’m listening.’
‘Well, Mrs. Birks can get her divorce.’
‘Can she?’
‘You know she can,’ I said. ‘And if she wanted to be mean she could drag you into it. She’s got all the evidence she needs. The way she treats you depends on the way you treat her.’
‘Oh, that’s it, is it?’ she asked, putting down the buffer and raising her eyes to mine.
‘That’s it,’ I said.
She sighed. ‘You looked like such a nice boy, too. How about a drink?’
‘No, thanks. I don’t drink when I’m working’
‘You’re working now?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m sorry about you,’ she said. ‘You don’t need to be.’
‘Just what does she threaten to do to me?’
‘Threaten?’ I asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Why, nothing. I’m merely telling you things.’
‘Just as a friend, I suppose,’ she said sarcastically.
‘Just as a friend.’
‘Well, just what do you want me to do?’
‘Get Morgan Birks to acknowledge service of this summons or else fix things so I can, make a service on Birks. After all,’ I said, ‘it’s to your interest to have the divorce go through, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t know,’ she countered, and her face was worried. ‘I wish I did.’
I said nothing.
‘How am I supposed to fix it so you can serve the papers?’
‘You make a date with Morgan Birks,’ I said. ‘Then you telephone B. L. Cool at Main 6-9321. I come over and serve the papers.’
‘And when do I get the pay-off?’
‘You don’t get any.’
She threw back he: head and laughed. There seemed to be genuine amusement in her laugh. ‘All right, sweetheart. I wanted to see what made you tick. I’ve found out. Get the hell out of here. Go tell Mrs. Birks she can go jump in the lake. If she wants to mention my name, ask her about her little sweetheart, Archie Holoman. Ask her if she thinks her husband is just a plain damn fool.’
Her laughter followed me out into the corridor.
I went back to where Alma Hunter was waiting for me in the automobile. ‘See her?’ she asked.
‘Uh huh’
‘What sort of a girl is she?’ she asked curiously.
‘Peroxide blonde,’ I said. ‘Easy on the eyes, and hard on the ears.’
‘What did she say?’
‘She told me to go roll my hoop.’
‘Wasn’t that what you wanted her to say?’
‘Yes, in a way, it was.’
‘Why, I thought that was just what you wanted. I thought you wanted her to get hard and kick you out and then lead you to Morgan!
‘I gathered,’ I said, ‘that was the idea.’
‘What was it she said you didn’t like?’
‘There are some things about being a detective which go against the grain. I suppose a detective has to be something of a heel. At any rate, she seemed to think so’
For a long moment, Alma Hunter was silent. Then she asked, ‘Did
she sell you on the idea?’
I said, ‘Yes,’ and climbed in the car to sit beside her. After a while I said, ‘We’d better move the car down to that alley. We can watch just as well from there, and we won’t be so conspicuous.’
She stretched out a neatly shod foot and pushed the starter into action. She drove the car down to the alley entrance, backed it in, found a shady place, and parked. ‘You’re not a heel,’ she said. ‘You’re nice.’
‘Thanks for the reassurance,’ I said, ‘but somehow it takes more than words to take the taste out of my mind.’
‘What did you expect the job would be like?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know as I expected,’ I said.
‘Weren’t you attracted to it because of the idea of romance and adventure?’
‘I was attracted to it because of the possibility of getting two meals a day, and a place to sleep at night. I didn’t even know what kind of a job it was when I answered the ad-and I didn’t much care.’
She put her hand on my arm. ‘Don’t feel bitter, Don. After all, it isn’t as bad as you think. That Durke woman is the worst kind of a gold-digger. She doesn’t care a fig about Morgan. She is just playing him for what she can get out of him.’
‘I know,’ I said, ‘but I just don’t like the idea of being a heel. Not that I’m going to crab too much about it, I just didn’t like it. That was all.’
‘But you did it?’ she asked.
‘I think I made a damn good job of it,’ I said.
She laughed then, a laugh that had a catch in it. ‘You say the most unexpected things, Donald. I guess it’s the way you look at life. Tell me, what happened to you that leaves you so down on the world?’
‘Good Lord! Do I create that sort of an impression?’
‘In a way.’
‘I’ll try to get over it.’
‘But tell me, Don, isn’t it true?’
‘I had a raw deal,’ I said. ‘When you’ve worked for years to get somewhere, overcome all sorts of obstacles, and get what you want, only to have someone knock it out of your hands, you have some readjusting to do.’
‘Was it a woman, Don?’
‘No.’
‘Do you want to tell me about it?’
‘No.’
She sat looking meditatively through the windshield. Her fingers toyed with my coat sleeve.
‘You were disappointed. when you found I wasn’t a veteran detective,’ I said.
‘Was I?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘Why, I didn’t know that I was.’
I turned so I could see her profile. ‘Was it,’ I asked, ‘because someone had been trying to choke you, and you wanted my advice on protection?’
I saw her features twist with emotion, her eyes become startled, her hand involuntarily go to her throat as though to shut off my gaze.
I said, ‘Who tried to choke you, Alma?’
The lips quivered. Tears glistened in her eyes. Her fingertips dug into my arm. I put my arm around her and drew her to me. She laid her head against my shoulder and cried, deep sobbing that spoke of tortured nerves. I slid my left hand up around her neck, put the fingertips under the chin, moved the right hand up along her blouse.
‘Oh, no, no,’ she sobbed, and grabbed at my wrist with both of her hands.
I looked down into her frightened, tear-flooded eyes. Her quivering lips were upturned-slightly parted.
There wasn’t any conscious volition about kissing her. I just found my lips clinging to hers, the taste of her tears salt on my lips. She let go of my wrist then, drew me down close to her, half turned her body with a quick twist so that she was clinging to me.
After a moment, our lips separated. I raised my right hand along her blouse, fumbled with the fastenings at the neck, parted it, and drew away the silk.
She was limp in my arms, making no resistance. The sobbing had quieted.
‘When did this happen, Alma?’ I asked.
‘Last night,’ she said.
‘How did it happen? Who was it?’
She clung to me, and I could feel her tremble.
‘Poor kid,’ I said, and kissed her again.
We sat there in the car, our lips held together, her body close and warm against mine. The bitterness and tension flowed out of me. I ceased to hate the world. A peaceful feeling took possession of me. It wasn’t passion. It wasn’t that kind of a kiss. I don’t know what kind of a kiss it was because I’d never had one before like it. She did things to me-things which I’d never before experienced.
Her sobbing ceased. She quit kissing me, gave a nervous, quivering little gasp, opened her purse, took out a square of handkerchief, and started drying her tears.
‘I’m a sight,’ she said, looking in the mirror on the inside of her purse. ‘Has Sally Durke come out yet?’
The question brought me back to realities with a jump. I peered through the windshield of the car at the entrance of the apartment house. It was forbiddingly inanimate. A dozen Sally Durkes could have come out and gone away, and I’d have been none the wiser.
‘She hasn’t left, has she?’ Alma asked.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I hope not.’
There was something throaty in her laugh. ‘I hope not,’ she said. ‘I feel a lot better. I-I like to be kissed by you, Donald.’
I wanted to say something and couldn’t. It was as though I was seeing and hearing her for the first time. Little cadences in her voice, little tricks of expression were registering with me for the first time. God, I must have been bitter not to have seen her. She had been with me for hours and yet this was the first time I’d really noticed her. Now, all of my attention was concentrated on her presence. I couldn’t think of anything else. I could feel the warmth of her body coming through her clothes where her legs were pressed against mine.
She seemed to have perfect control of herself, making her face over, applying lipstick with the tip of her finger.
Once more I tried to say something and couldn’t. I didn’t even know what I wanted to say. It was like wanting to sing and not being able to.
I turned my attention back to the apartment house, and tried to concentrate on watching for Sally Durke. I wished I had some way of telling whether she’d gone out. I thought of going back to the apartment house and ringing her doorbell. That would let me know whether she was in, but I couldn’t think of anything to say if she was in. Then, she’d know I was shadowing her-or would she? At any rate, she’d know I was hanging around.
Alma raised her hand and started to button the collar of her blouse.
‘Do you,’ I asked, ‘want to tell me about that now?’
‘Yes,’ she said, and then after a moment added, ‘I’m frightened, Donald. I guess I’m an awful baby.’
‘What are you frightened of?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Don’t you think the arrival of Sandra’s brother will make a difference?’
‘No …. That is, I shouldn’t say that. I just don’t know.’
‘What do you know about him, Alma?’
‘Not very much. Whenever Sandra speaks of him, she says they didn’t get along very well.’
‘You mean recently?’
‘Well, Yes.’
‘What does she say about him?’
‘Just that he’s peculiar and very independent. The fact that Sandra’s his sister doesn’t mean a thing to him.’
‘And yet she turned to him when she needed help?’
‘I don’t know,’ Alma Hunter said. ‘I think he came to her. That is, I think he got in touch with her by long distance telephone. I don’t know. I have an idea-tell me, Donald, do you suppose there’s any chance he’s in partnership with Morgan?’
‘What do you mean? On this slot-machine business?’
‘Yes.’
‘There’s a chance of anything,’ I said. ‘What makes you ask?’
‘I don’t know. Just from the way he seems to be acting, and: from a remark
Sandra let drop, and-while you were there in’ the room with him, I could hear a little of the conversation, not all of it, but a word here and there which gave me the general drift.’
‘Morgan is,’ I said, ‘a husband. He’s a defendant in a divorce action. The papers are going to be served on him. Then he’ll. either come into court, or he’ll default and cease being a husband. Therefore, why worry about it?’
‘Because I think you can’t dispose of him as simply as that. I think he’s-dangerous.’
‘Now,’ I said, ‘we’re getting to the point I wanted to talk about.’
‘What?’
‘Those bruises on your neck.’
‘Oh, he has nothing to do with them.’
‘Go ahead. Tell me about it. Who was it?’
‘A b-b-burglar.’.
‘Where?’
‘Someone who broke into the apartment.’
‘When?’
‘Last night.’
‘You two girls were there alone?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where was Sandra?’
‘She slept in the other bedroom.’
‘And you were sleeping in the room with the twin beds?’
‘Yes.’
‘Sandra was sleeping in the room where Bleatie is now?’
‘Yes.’
‘And what happened?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Oh, I shouldn’t tell you about it. I promised Sandra I wouldn’t say anything to anyone.’
‘Why all the secrecy?’
‘Because she’s having enough trouble with the police. They’re trying to locate Morgan, and they’ve been coming in at all hours of the day and night and asking all sorts of questions. It’s been very embarrassing.’
‘So I imagine, but that’s no reason why you should be choked to death.’
‘I fought him off.’
‘How did it happen?’
‘It was a hot night,’ she said. ‘I was sleeping without very much on. I woke up and a man was leaning over the bed. I moved and started to scream. He grabbed me by the throat and I began to kick. I kicked him in the stomach with my heels and got my knees up against his shoulders and pushed with all my might. If I’d slept just a second longer, and he’d got closer to me, he’d have choked me; but when I got my knees up and pushed, I finally broke his hold.’
‘And then what happened?’
The Bigger They Come Page 6