A Swell-Looking Babe

by Jim Thompson

  Kossmeyer must have known that Mr. Rhodes had no money of his own. He must have been aware that Dusty would not, or could not, have authorized the old man’s steady and substantial expenditures. And yet—

  Dusty frowned faintly, the smoothly satisfying chain of his thoughts temporarily unlinked. He didn’t know, of course, that Kossmeyer had gotten any dough from his father. It would seem that he hadn’t, in fact, since Mr. Rhodes had pestered him frequently to send the attorney a remittance. Then, well, then there was the way Kossmeyer had acted a few days ago: there in his office when the subject of fees had come up. He’d brushed it aside as something of no importance. In so many words, he’d offered to work for nothing. He’d been pretty sure, no doubt, that the offer would not be accepted, and, of course, a man as sharp as he was would know when to take it easy and when to put on the screws. But suppose…suppose he had really meant it. Suppose he hadn’t received those hundreds of dollars, as much as fifteen or twenty dollars a week for more than a year.

  Well—Dusty shrugged and resumed his telephoning—suppose he hadn’t? What difference did it make whether the old man had simply wasted the money, let it get away from him, or whether he had given it to Kossmeyer?

  He hung up the phone, and leaned back on the lounge. Fretfully, he lighted a cigarette and leaned forward again.

  …Hundreds of dollars, close to a thousand. And if Kossmeyer hadn’t got it, who had? It didn’t make any difference, of course—how could it?—but still it was damned puzzling. He couldn’t push the riddle out of his mind.

  Squandered? Wasted? Absently dribbled away or lost? The more he thought about it, the more preposterous the theory became. Mr. Rhodes had no vices, nothing he might have spent so much money on. Years of living on a modest salary had made him chronically frugal. He abhorred waste, and had demonstrated the fact frequently and recently. He was absent-minded, true, but not that absentminded. On occasion, he might have forgotten his change from a purchase or lost a bill from his pocket. It was out of character, but he might have. But he would not have done so steadily, consistently, week after week.

  There was only one explanation, then. Kossmeyer. The money had either gone to him, or it simply hadn’t gone. And if it hadn’t…

  Dusty crushed out his cigarette, and stood up. Stepping to the screen door, he looked up and down the street. He stood there in the door for a moment, hesitant, feeling a faint twinge of shame. Then, he turned away purposefully, and entered his father’s room.

  It was as neat as the old man was unneat. The bed was made. The floor appeared to have been recently swept. A handful of toilet articles was tidily arranged on the dresser. Books stood in orderly array upon their several shelves.

  He examined them, the books first. Riffling their pages, shaking them, hastily replacing them on the shelves. Next, after another look up and down the street, came the bed. He jerked off the covers, went over the mattress swiftly but carefully. There was nothing. No smallest slit, nor any place where the ticking had been restitched. He re-did the bed and moved to the dresser. In the bottom drawer he found a small steel file. He lifted it out, and raised the unlocked lid.

  There was nothing here, either. Only old letters, old receipts, old and yellowed newspaper clippings. And a couple of old insurance policies. One, a thousand-dollar policy, carried a twenty-year-old date. The other—ten thousand dollars, double indemnity—was dated some five years ago. Both, of course, named his mother as beneficiary. Both, consequently, would have long since lapsed.

  He returned the file to the drawer. That completed his search of the room.

  The following morning, having sent his father to a picture show, he searched the rest of the house. His findings totaled a dime (under the bathtub) and three pennies (extricated from the cushions of the living-room furniture). That was all.

  Well, he hadn’t actually expected to turn up a horde. He’d been sure all along that Kossmeyer had got the money. He went to bed, more pleased than otherwise, glad that his opinion of the attorney had been positively confirmed.

  12

  He ate.

  He slept.

  He worked.

  He conferred with Tug and his boys several times. He went to extraordinary pains to keep Mr. Rhodes presentable.

  Eat, sleep, work: that was about the sum of his existence. It seemed that there should have been something more, but that was all.

  The days, the nights, slipped by, blending uneventfully one with another. Almost abruptly the day came, that day.

  Two-thirty in the morning of that day.

  13

  At midnight, politely but implacably, the Manton had begun urging its guests toward their rooms. Now, at two-thirty in the morning, with the coffee shop closed, the porters and elevator operator gone, the lobby was almost painfully quiet. It was as though no one had ever walked the sparkling marble floors, sat in the overstuffed chairs and divans. As though no one ever had or ever would. The cleanliness was so forbidding, the silence so sepulchral.

  The silence was contagious; it pressed in on you, demanding silence. Up in the cashier’s cage, Dusty unconsciously lowered his voice. Then, as Bascom squirmed on his stool, he raised it again.

  Five-oh-five, Holloway. Food thirty-eight dollars, tips five, total forty-three. Bar twenty, tips three-fifty, total twenty-three fifty. Newsstand miscellaneous, twelve. C.O.D.’s fifty-two. Valet—”

  “Let’s see.” Bascom held out his hand for the charge slips without turning around. “Hmmm. Living high, but he doesn’t spend a nickel. Could be that he doesn’t have it to spend.”

  “Could be,” Dusty murmured.

  “Well”—Bascom tossed the account to one side—“that’s a headache for the day crew. Let’s have the next one.”

  Dusty continued. Now and then he stole a look at the clerk. Bascom was strangely calm, matter-of-fact, tonight. Not friendly or unfriendly, simply a man carrying out a job that had to be done.

  It was the way he should act, of course; everything had to go on as usual, right up until the time of the holdup. But Dusty wondered at his ability to do it. He, himself, was anything but calm. Now, here right at the last when he needed confidence most, it was suddenly draining away.

  Dusty glanced at the lobby clock. Two-thirty sharp. What was holding them up? They—Tug and the two men who were in on the deal—should have started down the stairs at two-twenty. Ten minutes was more than enough time to get down to the lobby. So unless something had gone wrong…

  Tug had warned him not to leave the cashier’s cage after two-thirty. If there was a room call or an elevator signal at two-twenty-five, or even a minute or so later, fine. He was to take care of it, and get back to the cage as fast as he could. But after that, no. People couldn’t expect prompt service at this hour of the morning. If they did comment on the fact later, nothing could be made of it. The robbery would have been going on, and—

  But it wasn’t going on! It was two-thirty-four, well, two-thirty-three, and nothing had happened. Suppose he got a room call, or the elevator night-bell rang, now. Suppose he stalled on it, and Tug and his boys didn’t show up until three. How would he be able to explain that? And how could he cover up, meanwhile, with Bascom? Bascom wasn’t supposed to know that he was in on the robbery. And Bascom certainly would suspect the truth, if he stalled indefinitely. A few minutes, yes: while they finished a transcript sheet or a series of charges. But a few minutes had already passed—it was already two thirty—and…Where were they? For God’s sake, where were they?

  “Bill…” Bascom spoke with his back still turned. “You made a bad mistake, Bill.”

  “W-What?” Dusty plunged out of fear and into terror.

  “W-when? H-how do you—?”

  “You’ve been making a lot of mistakes. You don’t know what you’re doing. Why don’t you go home? I can say that you took sick, and call for another boy.”

  What was he talking about? The work or the other? Did he know or…?

  “Do it, Bill. Now. B
efore you make a really big mistake.”

  “I—No!” Dusty gasped. “I mean, I’m all right I—”

  “You’re all wrong. But if you leave now, you can still…” Bascom paused, leaving the sentence unfinished. For from somewhere, up there on the echoing darkness of the mezzanine, a door had creaked open, and now there was the rapid pad-pad of feet upon thick carpeting. And then the clatter of those same feet descending the marble steps to the lobby.

  They came down in a group, almost on each other’s heels. One of them hurried up the lobby to the front door, another took up a position at the taxi entrance. And the third, Tug Trowbridge, stopped at the cashier’s cage.

  Something dropped to the desk from his hand, tinkled faintly. Six—no, seven tiny keys. The same hand grasped Bascom by the shirt front, hauled him up against the opening. The other thrust a gun into the clerk’s chest.

  “All right, kid,” he snapped. “Get busy!”

  “B-but—” Dusty stared at him, stupefied. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. Tug had promised to keep him in the clear, with nothing to do but—

  “Goddammit, move! Get the ledger and the other keys. Get them boxes out here!”

  Dusty’s head was swimming. He stammered, “B-but you s-said—”

  “You heard what I said! Now, do it!”

  He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t even move. Then his eyes moved from the gangster to Bascom, and he couldn’t see him full-face, but what he saw was enough. Bascom was startled, too. For him also things were not going as they had been planned.

  “You hear me, Dusty? I have to tell you one more goddamned time, and—”

  And Dusty sprang into action.

  He had left the platform. The plunge was over, and now there was nothing but the short easy swim to shore. This was as it should be. As he must have known it would be. He hadn’t known, of course, or certainly he wouldn’t have agreed to it. He’d had no idea of the real truth. But so long as it was this way…

  He sank deeper and deeper into the water; its pressure was unbearable. And then he was on the bottom—absolute bottom. And amazingly the pressure was gone. Once he surrendered to it fully, ceased to resist, there was no more.

  Sure, he’d known; and he knew what must certainly happen after this. And what the hell of it? All that mattered now was getting to shore…getting away with it.

  Swiftly, he unlocked seven of the little vault doors, yanked out their long steel boxes. He placed them on the desk, to one side of Bascom, and Tug gave him a tightlipped grin of approval.

  “Atta boy! Now, reach around him, kid—I got the bag under my coat—and…Swell. You’re doing fine. Now stuff the dough into it, and—”

  “What about a count on it?”

  “Count!” Tug let out a surprised grunt, then chuckled softly. “A real pro, ain’t he, Bask?” Bascom was silent. “A good idea, kid, but make it fast. Just riffle through it. Don’t matter if you’re a grand or two off.”

  Dusty nodded. He flipped back the lid of the first box, turned through the thick sheaf of bills. They were all hundreds and fifties, with a preponderance of the latter. Large enough to total high without bulk, small enough for easy negotiation.

  “Twenty-seven thousand.” He glanced at Tug. “Okay?”

  “Yeah, yeah! For Christ’s sake, Dusty!”

  There was twenty-four thousand, five hundred in the next box. The third held thirty-eight thousand, fifty.

  The fourth…

  All together there was two hundred and thirty-two thousand. Approximately that much. Tug nodded impatiently as he repeated the figure.

  “Yeah, hell. It’s close enough anyway….Now, you remember the combo on that bag? One turn right from zero, back left to ten, right to forty, and then left to—”

  “I know. All the way, ten, forty, thirty…What about your own box, here? Haven’t you got—?”

  Tug cursed shakily. “Jesus Christ! Forget it, will you? Just get the thing checked and get back here!”

  Dusty snapped the bag shut, spun the knob of the combination lock. He unlocked the cage, and hurried down the long counter, snatching up the checkroom key from the bell captain’s stand.

  He emerged from behind the counter, turned into the alcove which bordered one side of the check stand. The baggage-receiving space opened onto that. He unlocked its long window, vaulted the brass-surfaced counter, and turned on the light switch.

  Two cigar boxes were nailed to the wall immediately below the switch. Dusty took a rubber band from one, and an orange-colored oblong of pasteboard from another. He affixed a check to the bag, shredded its stub into a waste-basket, took a long look at the number as he slid the bag onto the shelf. Four, nine, nine, four. Forty-nine, ninety-four. Forty-nine and reverse. That would be easy to remember.

  He switched off the light, vaulted back over the counter, relocked the window. Hurrying back down into the lobby, swift but sure of himself, unpanicked, he heard the ringing of the bell captain’s phone. And yards away he saw the alarm on Tug’s face, and the sudden uneasiness of the two men at the doors. Why, they were jumpy. They were, and he was not. He was grinning secretly, patronizingly, as he entered and locked the door of the cashier’s cage.

  Everything was all right. It was exactly eight minutes since Tug had thrust his gun into Bascom’s ribs. How much better could they want it?

  “That goddamned phone, Dusty! Maybe you ought to—”

  “Huh-uh. The operator will figure I’m busy. She’ll stop, and call back in a few minutes.”

  “You sure? She won’t—” The ringing stopped, but Tug still looked anxious. “She won’t call someone, tell ’em that she—”

  Dusty shook his head. “What’s the difference, anyway? It’s all over, isn’t it?”

  “Well…well, yeah,” said Tug, almost wonderingly. I guess it just about is, kid.”

  “Bill!” Bascom spoke for the first time. “Listen to me, Bill! It doesn’t matter about me, but you’ve got to prom—”

  Tug’s gun exploded. Bascom reeled backward, clutching his chest, and Tug fired again. And again. The clerk’s body jerked. Slowly, it began to bend at the waist. It sagged down and down, and he was clawing at his chest, now, gasping and clawing—a terrible rattle in his throat. Then, his knees swayed and crumpled, and blood gushed from his mouth, and he pitched forward to the floor.

  The rattling ceased. He lay silent, motionless.

  “All right, kid”—Tug’s gun swerved and pointed at Dusty. “Here’s your story…”

  He spoke swiftly. He said, “Got it?” And then, “Now, just take it easy—we got to make this look good—but just take it easy and—”

  And he fired again.

  Dusty screamed. He staggered and went down, on top of Bascom’s body.

  14

  Instinctively, he had tried to dodge the bullet, and the attempt came close to being fatal. Tug’s aim was thrown off. The bullet went into Dusty’s arm at an angle, and creased a furrow across his ribs. He was not seriously injured but he might have been. It looked as though Tug had tried to kill him.

  So now he was a hero, above dispute and suspicion. A plucky young man who had tried to wrest a loaded gun from a murderer’s grasp. The newspapers carried daily reports on his condition. The hotel, in addition to paying his hospital bills, had given him a check for three hundred dollars. Detectives had taken him back and forth through his story repeatedly, but they were respectful, apologetic, about it. They were at a dead end in the case, had been almost from the beginning. And they had to go through the motions of doing something.

  A detective was with him today, the last of his nine days in the hospital. He had just happened to be in the neighborhood, he explained, rather abashedly. So if Dusty wouldn’t mind, since he’d be going home tomorrow and they wouldn’t be bothering him any more…

  Dusty felt a little sorry for him. He said it was no bother at all. “I don’t think I’ve overlooked or forgotten anything, but I might have.”

  “Well
…Now about the time, then. Were you and Bascom always in the cashier’s cage at two-thirty?”

  “Almost always. Of course, I might have a bell—a call—or Bascom might have to leave for a minute. But we’d almost always be there at that time.”

  “Why that particular time instead of some other?”

  “It was the quietest part of the shift, for one thing. We weren’t so apt to be interrupted. Also, there’d seldom be any room charges after that time. If we tried to do it before that, while the coffee shop was still open and a lot of people were still up—”

  “Uh-huh, sure. But what about the tag end of your shift, say up between six and seven in the morning? You’d start getting more charges, then, wouldn’t you?”

  “A few. Bascom would put them on the room accounts as fast as they came.”

  “Why didn’t you do them all at once? If you’d done that, held up your cashier work until there were other people around…” The detective broke off with a sheepish look. “How stupid can I get, huh? I ask you why you don’t do something when you’d’ve been too busy to do it.”

  “That’s right.” Dusty smiled sympathetically. “I wouldn’t have had time to help. Bascom would have been busy with people checking in and out.”

  “Yeah, sure,” the detective nodded. “Now, what did you think when you saw Tug and his two thugs heading down the stairs? Didn’t that strike you as pretty screwy? I know he was paying the hotel big money and he’d never caused any trouble before. But two-thirty in the morning—three guys hiking down nine flights of stairs at two-thirty in the morning—you must have—”

  “It’s like I told you,” Dusty said. “I figured that the night-bell on the elevator must have gone out of order. They’d signaled and when I didn’t come with the car they’d walked down.”