Hoch's Ladies

by Edward D. Hoch

  “How long will you be here?”

  The waiter arrived with a long-stemmed rose for Susan, the only woman in the party. She took it and said, “Just three days. I fly back to New York on Friday.”

  Abidine smiled. “Perhaps I will phone your hotel.”

  The singer Yolanda was wearing a glittery gold gown as the band began its final set. Susan gave the Turkish gentleman a smile without really answering, then followed the others toward the elevator. But Abidine was persistent. “Which hotel are you at?”

  She glanced at her watch and saw that it was 11:30. Tired as she was, it might be better to have a drink with the man now than be pestered with calls for three days. “May I change my mind about that drink?” she asked. “It would have to be a quick one.”

  His smile broadened. “We can stop in the lobby.” He excused himself to go to the men’s room, meeting her five minutes later at the dimly lit lobby bar.

  They spent a pleasant hour over liqueurs, discussing their dinner hosts and the city in general. “They are so geared to the international community,” Susan observed, sipping her drink. “Harrods even has machines for currency exchange, right in the store! You put in your dollars or francs or marks and the correct number of pounds is delivered automatically.”

  “At a small profit, I’m sure.” He lit a dark Turkish cigarette and offered her one but she declined. “You don’t smoke?”

  “I stopped a few years ago.”

  “Married, engaged?”

  She held up the bare fingers of her left hand. “There is a boyfriend, though, back in New York. We live together off and on.”

  Abidine brushed at the tip of his moustache as if curling it like an old rogue. “London can be a very romantic city.”

  “I thought that was Paris. Sorry, Abidine, but it’s time I said good night before I fall asleep.”!

  “Surely I can walk you back to your hotel.”

  She gave him a tired smile. “That won’t be necessary. It’s only a block away.” She rose and held out her hand. “Thank you for the drink. Perhaps well see each other again at Marks & Spencer or one of the other stores.”

  He knew enough not to press it. “I certainly hope so.”

  Susan left him there in the lobby bar and hurried outside. It was shortly after midnight and a light drizzle had set the streets glowing with reflected light. She was staying at the Grosvenor House, more than a block away but not far. As she circled around the rear of the Princess of Wales she heard a sound like a muffled scream. A short man with close-cropped white hair was tussling with a woman against the wall of the hotel. His right hand came up and Susan saw the blade of a knife catch the glow of a street light. Suddenly she was wide awake and running toward them, unmindful of the danger.

  “Let her go!” she shouted. “Help! Police!”

  Susan grabbed for the man’s upraised arm, yanking it away from the woman. He dropped the knife and broke free, dashing away down the slick narrow street. Only then did she turn toward the woman and realize for the first time that it was Yolanda, the singer from the restaurant upstairs.

  “Not the police,” the woman sobbed. “Don’t call them.”

  Susan retrieved the fallen jackknife, snapped it shut, and dropped it into her raincoat pocket without thinking. She tried to help Yolanda to a taxi, but the woman was trembling with fear. “Where do you live?” she asked. “I’ll take you home.”

  “N-no! He’ll be waiting there too!”

  “Who will?” When she didn’t answer, Susan asked, “What about your musicians? Can one of them help?”

  The woman looked up through her tears. “You know me?”

  “I was upstairs for dinner. I heard you sing. Who’s trying to kill you?” But Yolanda only shook her head. “It doesn’t concern you.”

  “It does now,” Susan told her. She introduced herself and explained that she was in London on business. ‘You can’t go home and I certainly can’t leave you in the street. You can spend the night in my hotel room. I’ve an extra bed that’s not being used.”

  “No—”

  “It’s that or I call the police. Take your choice.”

  “Not the police,” she said again.

  Susan hurried her along the narrow street until they reached the courtyard that was the hotel’s entrance. Once safely in the room, Yolanda began to relax for the first time. Her makeup was streaked and tears had washed the mascara from her eyelids. “He was trying to cut my face,” she told Susan.

  “Do you know him?”

  She nodded. “They call him Cargo. He used to be a merchant seaman.”

  “Why would he want to injure you?”

  Yolanda fell silent. After a moment she asked, “Do you have anything to drink?”

  Susan glanced around the room. “I suppose there’s something in the minibar. I haven’t really looked.” She opened the small refrigerator and glanced inside. “Here we go—whiskey, gin, vodka. Also beer and soft drinks. And champagne!”

  “A whiskey and water will do nicely, thanks.”

  Susan didn’t think she could handle one herself and chose a Coke instead. “Now tell me what this is all about.”

  “It’s nothing you want to hear. I appreciate your coming to my rescue like that and offering me a bed for the night, but I can’t involve you in my troubles.” For the first time Susan caught a touch of an accent in her voice. It wasn’t British but she couldn’t quite place it.

  “Are you American?” she asked.

  “I was brought up in New York, but my parents are Spanish. I use Yolanda as my stage name but my full name is Yolanda Delgado.”

  Aware that she was getting herself more deeply involved than might be wise, Susan said, “I have to tell you I overheard part of a telephone call you made during your ten o’clock break. I was in the next booth, calling New York. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop.”

  The young woman seemed startled. “What did you hear?”

  Susan shrugged. “Some business about peacocks. You were refusing to do something for the person on the other end.”

  The singer shook her head as if to clear it of memories. “I did some foolish things when I first came to London. I needed the money but that’s no excuse.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “I was just calling back someone who’d paged me. He offered me a job but I turned it down.”

  “You wear a pager while you’re singing?”

  Yolanda lifted her skirt and revealed a small plastic box strapped to her thigh. “It doesn’t beep. It just vibrates against my skin. Then when I get a chance I return the call.”

  Susan determined not to press her. She didn’t want to know any more. “I have to get to sleep, and I’ll probably sleep late in the morning. If you have to leave, just let yourself out.”

  “Thank you. You’re very kind.”

  Susan went into the bathroom to undress, leaving the door partly open. In the mirror she saw Yolanda dip her right hand into her purse for a pen and write a few words on a slip of paper. She came out wearing a robe and offered an extra nightgown to the singer. “I think we’re about the same size. This should fit you.”

  While Yolanda was undressing in the bathroom, Susan’s curiosity got the better of her and she peeked into the woman’s purse to see what she had written. There was a loose sheet of Princess of Wales notepaper with Y 11 written in purple ink, and then Susan’s name and room number in black ink.

  She awoke from a dreamless sleep feeling refreshed. There was sunlight visible at the edges of the drapes and she knew it was late. Rolling over to look at her watch on the bedside table, she saw that it was nearly eleven o’clock. She’d made up nicely for that missed night’s sleep on the plane coming over. Suddenly Susan remembered the previous night’s adventure and sat up, staring at the other bed. It was empty and unmade, though the sheets and blankets had been straightened somewhat. In the bathroom she found her nightgown, washed out and hung up to dry. A note on the sink said simply,
/>   “Thank you for saving my life!” It was unsigned.

  Luckily Susan had left the morning free to recover from her trip. Her first appointment wasn’t till after lunch. She’d have something to eat at the hotel and walk around London for a bit. At least with the sun shining she wouldn’t need her raincoat. It was at a newsstand on Piccadilly an hour later that she saw the headline on an afternoon tabloid: Gov’t Aide Slain in Hotel Love Nest.

  She was not a reader of tabloid journalism and would have ignored it except for the photograph of the Princess of Wales Hotel beneath the headline. She bought a paper and skimmed the article. A young parliamentary aide named Jonathan Ellis had been found stabbed to death in a room at the hotel. Indications were that the room was being used for some sort of sexual activity and the leadership of the House of Commons was already taking steps to hush up the affair. The body of Ellis, married but separated from his wife, had been found by the chambermaid around nine that morning. The condition of the body and a broken wristwatch the victim was wearing placed the time of death around eleven-thirty the previous night. The murder weapon had not been found.

  Suddenly Susan Holt remembered the knife she’d picked up in the street after knocking it from the hand of Yolanda’s attacker. What time had that been? After midnight, surely. Yolanda’s group had returned for their final set at eleven-fifteen, just as her party was leaving. She’d stopped for a drink in the lobby bar with Abidine and been there about an hour. She must have left the hotel around twelve-fifteen and come upon that man Cargo attacking Yolanda. That timing made sense, because the band’s final set would have ended at midnight or a few minutes after. If Cargo had stabbed this man Ellis at eleven-thirty, he could have gotten downstairs and waited for Yolanda to emerge from the hotel forty-five minutes later.

  And the murder weapon might be resting in Susan’s raincoat pocket back in her hotel room.

  She found a phone booth and called her contact at Marks & Spencer to postpone her two o’clock appointment until the following morning. Then she took a taxi back to her hotel. She wanted to make certain the knife was still in her coat before phoning the police. It was. She handled it with a handkerchief to avoid smudging fingerprints more than she already had. Placing it on the desk by the telephone, she called Scotland Yard and asked for the detective assigned to the Ellis killing. She gave her name and said she might have information about the murder weapon.

  After much switching around, a deep masculine voice identifying itself as Inspector Cheever came on the line. “You’re calling about the murder at the Princess of Wales Hotel, Miss Holt?”

  “That’s correct. Around twelve-fifteen this morning I witnessed a knife attack on a young woman outside the Princess of Wales. The man ran away but he dropped his knife and I picked it up. I have it here in my hotel room.”

  “Was the attack reported to the police?”

  “No. The young woman was uninjured and she did not wish to report it.”

  “And where is your room?”

  “The Grosvenor House, Room Three fifty-nine.”

  “Please remain in your room, Miss. Someone will be there shortly.”

  “Thank you.” She hung up and sat staring at the knife, wondering what

  she had gotten herself into.

  There was a knock at the door ten minutes later but it wasn’t the police. A bellman was delivering a vase of flowers. Susan’s first thought was Abidine, but they were from Yolanda. The note read simply: “Thank you again! Yolanda.” She placed the vase on a table near the window, remembering that the singer had noted her name and room number.

  The next knock at the door was indeed the police, in the person of Inspector Cheever himself, accompanied by a woman constable. “Here’s the knife,” Susan said.

  The constable handled the weapon carefully, placing it in an evidence bag. Then she took out a small tape recorder and, with Susan’s permission, began recording the conversation. “Did you close the blade?” Cheever asked. He was a gray-haired man with cold blue eyes and a square jaw, not at all friendly.

  “I’m afraid so,” Susan admitted. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Don’t worry. This may not be the murder weapon. But I need to know exactly what happened outside the hotel last night.”

  She recounted it in detail, beginning with her business dinner at the hotel. The only things she left out were the overheard telephone conversation and Yolanda’s beeper. “She knew this man who attacked her?” Cheever asked, making a note of the singer’s name.

  Susan nodded. “She said he was called ‘Cargo.’ It was a nickname because he’d been a merchant seaman. Was this man Ellis killed with a similar knife?”

  “We don’t know. The preliminary autopsy report indicates the stab wounds were inflicted by a left-handed killer who took the weapon with him.” He glanced around the room.

  “Yolanda Delgado stayed here overnight?”

  “She was afraid to return to her apartment. She sent these flowers to thank me.”

  He walked over to the flowers and examined the card. “She’s a singer at the Princess of Wales Hotel?”

  “At the roof restaurant.”

  “Had you ever seen her before last night?”

  “No.”

  He went over her story in more detail and said they’d probably want to speak with her again. “How long will you be in the country?”

  “I fly back on Friday.”

  Inspector Cheever got to his feet. “I hope we won’t need to delay your return, Miss Holt. I’ll be in touch.”

  “I know nothing more than I’ve told you.”

  “This killing might have far-reaching implications. Crimes involving government officials are always messy in this country, especially when the tabloids start talking of love nests. I hope you won’t add to the clamor by speaking with the press.”

  She assured him she had no intention of doing so, but he left her wondering if she’d done the wisest thing by calling the police. Suddenly it became very important that she speak to Yolanda again before the inspector got to her. She phoned the dining room at the Princess of Wales and asked how she might contact the singer.

  “The band plays from seven till midnight,” a bored woman responded. “You can see her then.”

  “No, I mean now—this afternoon. What’s her home number?”

  “I’m sorry. We don’t give out that information.”

  Susan hung up, certain they’d have given it out to Inspector Cheever. Then she remembered the vase of flowers. The card with Yolanda’s message also bore the name of the florist. The address was in Chelsea, probably a neighborhood place near where she lived. Susan decided to go there rather than call.

  She took a taxi from the front of her hotel and reached the florist shop shortly after three o’clock. The woman clerk was friendly and chatted while she arranged fresh flowers in a basket. “The vase to Grosvenor House? Certainly I remember it. Did the order myself, just this morning.”

  “I want to call Yolanda and thank her but I’ve mislaid her number. Would you happen to have it?”

  “Don’t have her phone number but we have her billing address in the files. She’s a regular customer.”

  “That would be fine,” Susan assured her.

  The address proved to be on Old Church Street, two blocks away.

  She walked up to the second-floor apartment and rang the bell somehow confident that Yolanda would answer. Of course she didn’t. If she was in there, she wasn’t about to admit it.

  Susan went back downstairs. The building had once been a private house, converted to apartments sometime in the distant past. Hallways led off the main corridor toward rooms in the back. As she walked past one of them, a hand shot out to grab her.

  It was Yolanda.

  “You gave me a fright,” Susan told her, recovering from the verge of a scream.

  “Never mind that. What are you doing here?”

  “We have to talk. There was a murder at the Princess of Wales Hotel last ni
ght.”

  “I saw the papers,” the woman said. “How did you find me?”

  “Through your florist. Thanks for the flowers.”

  “What are you doing here?” she asked again.

  “I still had the knife Cargo used to attack you. I called the police and told them about it. Maybe Cargo killed that man Ellis.”

  “Come in heret” Yolanda ordered, grasping Susan’s arm as she propelled her down the side corridor and into a room. She closed and locked the door behind them.

  Susan glanced around, seeing a modestly decorated flat with inexpensive furniture. “I thought you lived upstairs.”

  “That’s an apartment I maintain for entertaining. I like to stay down here when I’m trying to avoid people.”

  “Like Cargo?”

  “Him and others.” She lit a cigarette. Susan had noticed that more people smoked over here than at home. “What did you tell the police?”

  “That he tried to attack you with the knife and maybe it was the same weapon used in the murder.”

  Yolanda looked unhappy. “They’ll come looking for me, nosing around.”

  “Maybe that’ll keep Cargo away. You’ve got nothing to hide, have you?” She gave a snort. “Everyone’s got something to hide. Before I started getting regular singing jobs I worked for an escort service. Cargo was my boss.” Susan simply stared at her. “You mean he was your pimp.”

  “I don’t like that word, but I suppose it’s true.”

  “That was Cargo on the phone with you last night, wasn’t it?”

  She ground out her cigarette in the ashtray and gave a reluctant nod. “He wanted me for a special client. I refused to go. I told him I had a good singing job and I was out of the game.”

  “I overheard you say peacocks.”

  “You have good ears.” She started to smile but then her face grew somber, as if she was remembering something better left forgotten. “They called it the Peacock Parliament because many of them were young parliamentary aides. Some of the girls said members of Parliament themselves sometimes took part, but one could never be sure. They all wore these fancy masks made of peacock feathers so we could never see their faces. We’d pair off and go