“Did you get a look at her?”
“Only a flash, Ed. I did lamp a fur coat. And she was in an awful hurry.”
“Good work, Benny. I’ll see that you get another stripe.”
He grimaced and went back to polishing a shot glass. I slapped the bar top and ambled out.
Going up in the elevator, I thought it over. It looked bad for April again. June had been with me when Anton was killed and now Benny had said his piece. A woman in a fur coat running out of the building at just about the right time. I pushed the idea from my mind.
My visitor had to be April. After all, she had hired me by telephone and since that time we hadn’t had a chance to go over anything. I had gone over everything with June right enough so there couldn’t be anything bothering that little bird-brain. Unless of course, something had come up while I was cutting up touches with Monks. But I doubted it.
It had to be April.
It was.
She was waiting in the hall corridor. I was glad she had decided to wait. She had skipped the slacks this time. On her a dress looked good. Her legs were firm, finely chiseled, and I could see they’d been getting some exercise walking impatiently up and down outside my door.
“Hello, again,” I said brightly.
The face that was just like June’s and yet not at all gave me a wonderful boost in morale by looking like its owner was damn glad to see me.
“Ed, it’s seemed like years. I wanted to tell you—”
“Sssh.” I made an elaborate secret of it all. “Mum’s the word. It’s dumb to talk in hallways. Inside.”
“Oh,” she said as if I’d slapped her face.
I piloted her into the mouse auditorium. The joint looked messier than ever. But that was April’s fault. A breath of fresh air like her always made me conscious of my squalid surroundings. When I’m by myself, I love the dump.
“Drink?” I asked. “That chair is pretty comfortable if you don’t move suddenly in it. I’ve always meant to have it repaired—”
“No, thank you. I rarely care for liquors. I’ll sit, thanks.”
“Good girl. I don’t feel like any liquor anyway.” I really didn’t this time. She was intoxicating enough.
I sat down behind the desk and emptied my pockets. I kept my eyes on her while I was doing it to show her I was a gentleman.
I spread the junk out in front of me. Cigarettes, car keys, wallet, some loose change, and two sheets of writing paper. She frowned slightly when she saw the paper.
I smiled at her because smiling at her was the easiest job to come along in years.
“What’s on your mind, April?” I made no move to look at the sheets of paper. “You didn’t come here to tell me how much you care.”
“No, I didn’t!” she snapped. A blush followed because even she realized she had made it sound like an insult. Whereas I was only being my usual jocular self. She had come to understand that much about me.
“Ed, how far have you got with all this? Really, I mean? I somehow get the impression you’re very good at your job but—”
“Worried, is that it?”
“Frankly, yes.” Her blue eyes had violet lights in them. “June has been wonderful about it all. Not saying anything nasty or snide. I’ll admit if I were in her place—”
“You’d say she had a perfect right to be suspicious of you.”
“Well, hasn’t she?”
“Would it make you feel any better if someone tried to kill you? I don’t think so. Then you’d really be wondering about little June. So forget it. Right now all you have to be bothered about is who’s trying to knock her off.”
She put her hands to her eyes. Her shoulders heaved.
“That’s just it—” Her voice muffled out through her fingers. “It’s awful. All these suspicions—these attempted murders. I don’t care about the money. I don’t—!”
I let her have it out by herself. I put all my junk back into my pockets. Except April and June’s answers to my private ten-question quiz.
“You ought to be worried about yourself,” I said softly. “For a prime suspect you’re worrying too much what your sister thinks. You ought to be thinking about what the police think.”
Her hands came away from her beautiful face. Her eyes were dry. I had guessed as much. When you’re supposed to be a man-hater, you’re too hard-boiled to cry.
“Do you think I’m trying to kill my sister?”
I spread my hands. “Take it easy. What I think doesn’t amount to beans. I don’t arrest people. That’s Monks’ department. But just for the record—no, I don’t.”
Confusion made her face lovelier. “Then if you don’t suspect me, who else is there? Surely June can’t be making everything up. And that chandelier—”
I came around the desk to where she was sitting. I looked down at her. She looked up at me. Our eyes met. Met and held. Her mouth, no lipstick and all, trembled slightly because she had run out of words. Her eyes flew to the closed door of the office. Maybe it was instinctive, maybe it was her past catching up with her. But she had suddenly realized she was with me in my office. Alone. Alone with a man. A man who earned his coffee and cake forgetting about the rules.
“Forget all that,” I said, letting my voice fall. It wasn’t all acting though. Biologically, she was everything the girl for me ought to be. But I had to find out things. A fact doesn’t mean anything unless you’ve proved it to yourself.
I reached down, grabbed her by the elbows, and urged her to a standing position. Her lips were doing a rhumba of fear now. That nearly stopped me. But I had already pulled her in close, felt the nervous jerk of her body. A tremor was running through her like a forest fire.
“April, I’ve felt something ever since I saw you—it’s too much to hold back. I’ve got to do this—”
The trembling stopped. She went dead in my arms. She was as cold as fish packed in ice. I put my lips to hers and mashed her to me. But nothing responded. The connection was dead at her end of the line.
She said coldly, “Are you finished?” She twisted her face away as if she were interested in the furniture arrangement, then she galvanized into action. She wriggled, squirmed, her sweet mouth erupting with unladylike noises. I held on, waiting. It came. Her free hand hung one on me. Hung one on me good.
I stepped back, the cheekbone on the right side of my face going to war all by itself. I put my hand to it and felt something warm and sticky. Maybe she never painted them but she had long, sharp fingernails.
She reeled away, gasping. She fell against one corner of the desk, her eyes pinning me with contempt. I felt like one dirty, ugly little cockroach.
“You contemptible, low—”
“Save it, sister. I was just testing one, two—One loves anything in pants. Two can’t stand being made love to. What’s the matter with us? Are we civilized?”
My patter is harder to follow than double-talk. She stared, her eyes unblinking. She shook her head as if to clear it of a hornet that was buzzing around inside.
“I don’t understand you. You talk so peculiar—”
“Do I?” I showed her my teeth because my cheek hurt and I was feeling mean. “April, grow up. All men are not Randall Crandall. So you hit at a foul ball your first time up. Forget it. You get more than one turn at bat.”
“Ed—talk English. I can’t follow you. A minute ago you were like an animal, pawing, fumbling. Now you’re talking about civilization and foul balls and—him.”
“Yeah, him. I know all about him and you. Bad grammar but it’s a lousy combination anyway. Him and you.”
She got red in the face. She could blush faster than any dame I’d ever known.
“For a dame who snapped her pencil on question number ten and has seen Randall Crandall quite a few times, you don’t know much about men. Crandall’s queer. You’re not. It wasn’t hard to figure you falling for him. He’s twice as good-looking as Gregory Peck. But when you don’t stay in love with him, there has to be a reason.
And let me tell you about your sister. She likes men. And when she didn’t like him, there had to be a reason. The little test I worked up just confirmed a few ideas I had, that’s all.”
“Was this a test too?”
I knew what she meant.
“Yes, it was. I wanted to see if you really hated men. Offhand, I’d say you do.”
I said it with such a straight face, rubbing my cheek as I talked, that she smiled slightly.
“What’s so funny, dear lady? You can have your money back any time, you know.”
“You are,” she said. I was kind of pleased to see she had some fire in her. “Falling in love is something special. There are all kinds of love. What you offered me a little while ago isn’t anything to wait and yearn for. Do you know what real love is, have you ever—”
“Dames,” I said wearily. “It’s always your song and dance. Love isn’t something you can talk about.”
That made her mad. “Have you ever been in love? Really in love?”
“Yeah. I was in love, really in love. With a prostitute.”
“Well, then. You should know. What happened?”
“It didn’t take.”
“Why not?”
“I killed her sister.”
“Oh. I’m sorry—”
“Don’t be. Her sister had it coming. But my own real love never could forget I’d killed her sister. End of one perfectly gorgeous romance.”
“Ed, forgive me. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“Don’t blame yourself. Before that I fell in love with a jewel thief. A countess who was a phony countess. Then there was Wanda, a belly dancer—”
Her face took on such an expression of skepticism that I dropped it right there. The truth is always unbelievable when you wrap it up in laughs. That’s the trouble with people. If your grief doesn’t cave your shoulders in, you just ain’t grievin’.
I ignored her a second and opened a desk drawer. I dropped the test papers in it. When I looked at her again, she was at the window, staring down at the street. Beyond her, the blaze of neon was setting the city on fire.
I ripped open a fresh pack of Camels and rode one to my mouth. I lit it in a big silence.
Then we got company. In a hurry. The door swung open and two men shouldered in. I got to my feet slowly, asking myself why all city detectives walk the same way. They never knocked either.
“Well, hello,” I said, pretending it was the greatest pleasure in the world. At the window, April whirled.
They were about the same size but one had the habit of keeping back. The other was the push-forward type. They were both in overcoats. They weren’t going to do anything about their hats either.
The push-forward type had narrow-lidded eyes and an underlip that showed he liked to show it. He thrust it out at me.
“You’re Noon,” he said. “I know you.”
“Sure, you do,” I said. “But I don’t know you. Or do I? You couldn’t be Detective Sergeant Hadley?”
“He could be,” the other dick rasped from the rear, “and he is.”
“Ah. Another state heard from. And what’s your name?”
Hadley made a tight smile.
“How long has she been here?” His shoulder jerked in April’s direction. He didn’t even turn to look at her. His eyelids were narrowing me up and down.
“Long enough,” I said.
“How long has she been here?” he repeated as if he hadn’t heard me.
“Two hours,” I said, knowing I had only Benny’s word for about three quarters of that time. “Why?”
“Yes, why?” April had come from the window to join our little group at the desk. “Has anything happened—is something wrong?”
Hadley squeezed out another grin.
“Yeah, sure. What time did you leave the house today?”
I squeezed out a grin of my own.
“I’m waiting for you, Hadley, to tell her that anything she says will be held against her.” I turned to April. “If he does, don’t be a piker, kid. Say Ed Noon.”
There’s method in my madness. Because Hadley changed color rapidly and made a growl deep down.
“Client, eh? That’s fine. Tell her she’d better have a good idea of her whereabouts at roughly six o’clock this evening. That was slightly better than two hours ago. Maybe she had enough time to get down here to your office. Maybe she didn’t.”
“Stop hamming it up, Hadley,” I said. “If you’ve got a charge to make, make it.”
“All right, wise guy, I will.” He turned to April with an official air. “You won’t be sleeping home tonight, Miss.”
She looked at him helplessly, then at me helpfully. I shrugged. It was his play.
“For one thing,” Hadley went on. “The joint burned down tonight. Down to the ground. Only the bricks are still standing. And not a helluva lot of them either. For the other—”
April had sat down, her face a frozen mask. Her mouth worked, her lips trying to form words, say something. But no noise came.
“—for the other,” Hadley ended off with relish. “There’s no trace of your sister, June. She either died in the fire or…” He shrugged. “Either way, she’s disappeared.”
FIFTEEN
I got between Hadley and his partner and the door.
“Hold on, gentlemen.” I smiled reassuringly at April who was plainly at a loss. “What are the charges? This lady is still my client.”
Hadley grimaced. I could see he made a habit of grimacing.
“Save the lawyer act, Noon. The lady’s coming with us. There’s suspicion of arson for one thing, suspicion of foul play for another—”
“You talk about a lot of things,” I rasped. “What about the stake-out on the Wexler place? He must have seen April leave there when she did. Or was he sleeping on the job too?”
Hadley ignored the crack. He leered at April.
“He’s disappeared, too. That’s something else this young lady will have to account for.”
I shook my head.
“Quit bluffing, Sergeant. You haven’t a thing on her and you know it. What’s Monks say to all this?”
The look on Hadley’s face would have stopped clocks.
“Lieutenant Monks put this investigation in my hands. Understand? Now, get out of my hair and stop interfering with line of duty.”
I made like I didn’t care.
“Suit yourself. But all I can see is what you should do. What you should do is this: Wait until you have some proof. So a house is burned down and June and your stakeout is missing. So what? You haven’t found any bodies yet and for my dough June and the stake-out could have eloped. Or run uptown to see South Pacific. It’s still running, you know.”
“And so is your big mouth, wise guy.” The other dick put his two cents in. “You really make with the jokes, don’t you? The boys keep telling me what a card you are. For my dough, you’re a crum.”
“Such popularity must be deserved,” I said, giving him a look that let him know just how much I loved him. “And who might you be?”
“Sanderson. James T. Want to make something out of that?”
“Ouch.” I winced. “Who writes your stuff?”
Hadley snorted. “Cut all this out. I’m pulling you both in, Noon. You and her. For questioning and anything else I think of.”
“Oh, excellent! Aren’t you going to frisk me to see if I’m carrying some secret data on the A-bomb? Grow up, Hadley. You’re doing this all wrong.”
I never got a chance to hear what his comeback was because April said, “Oh!” in a very strange voice. The next thing I saw was Hadley and his big crony going for their hardware and then freezing into still life. Then somehow their hands were slowly raising to the ceiling.
I turned on my heel easy-like, knowing exactly what a quick start would get me. I kept my hands fanned out from my sides. The behavior of my guests from the police department meant only one thing. I had company again.
The company was the kind you have ni
ghtmares about sometimes and you wake up knowing you’ll never see them in the flesh. The flesh was here this time and all of it was pretty hair-raising.
Two men had eased into the mouse auditorium and closed the door softly behind them. Neither of them had said a word but the guns jutting from their fists had said all that had to be said. Their faces said a whole lot of other things.
Hadley said in a tight voice, “What are you doing in this territory, Doggie?”
The description would have fit either one of them but the taller of the two showed a set of outsize canines and rolled his tongue over his lips. It gave me the willies the way he did it. Because there was a lot more of the animal than anything human in him and his partner. The shorter one had a forehead no higher than a postage stamp and his features put you in mind of a particularly hideous and mean bulldog. “Doggie,” the other one, was all wolfhound. He was long of tooth and jaw and looked twice as nasty.
Doggie laughed. It was more like a bark.
“Whaddya know, Bull?” He meant his partner. Someone had sure caught the boat giving them names. “Hadley’s here. Our old pal.” He couldn’t have made it sound less friendlier if he had tried.
“Friends of yours, Noon?” Hadley bit it out.
“Sorry, I don’t know any dogs.” April gasped out loud. I smiled at her. “April, why don’t you sit down and be comfortable? I’m sure these gentlemen won’t mind.”
She was close to another faint again. Hadley shook his head and rolled his eyes slightly. I didn’t need a diagram. His eyes had said: Soft-pedal the wise talk. These guys are cokies!
The warning had come too late. Doggie was looking at me now. I felt like one large and delicious soup bone.
I tried to laugh it off. “Well, boys, what’s your pleasure?”
“Look who wants to be taken care of first. Did you hear what he said, Bull?”
“I ain’t deaf.” Bull came uncomfortably close. I could smell him now. His eyes were crazy little beacons in his head. The white stuff really had him.
“So you’re better-lookin’ than us.” He shifted his gun to his left paw. “That can be fixed real easy.”
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