Hard Case Crime: Blackmailer Read online

  “Come on,” I said. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Chapter Five

  I was afraid for a moment that I was going to be sick.

  I held Janis’ arm and pulled her into the elevator. I pushed a button at random. I didn’t care particularly where we were going. I just wanted to get away from the sight of Jean Dahl’s body on the floor by the door.

  In a moment the elevator began to move. Downward. I could hear voices at the top of the stairs as the hall disappeared.

  “They killed her,” I said. “My God, they killed her.”

  “The poor kid,” Janis Whitney whispered.

  The elevator came to a stop at the basement floor, and the doors opened.

  “What are we going to do?” Janis Whitney asked.

  “Come on,” I said. I led her out of the elevator. “Look, there’s no reason for us to get involved in this. A thing like this could be bad for you and bad for your studio. What could we do if we stayed? We were together when it happened. We both know we didn’t do it....” I couldn’t bring myself to use the words kill her. “Let’s just stay out of it.”

  “How?”

  I looked around. “There must be a service entrance for deliveries down here. We just leave, that’s all. It’s as simple as that. Nobody in that madhouse upstairs can tell who was there and who wasn’t. Come on, let’s go. If anybody should happen to ask us, we left together the minute the lights went out. Let someone try to prove different. Come on. I think the service door is over this way.”

  It was so easy.

  The service door opened onto the side street, around the corner from Fifth Avenue. We walked east to Madison and then to Park and over to Lexington. And we walked four or five blocks down Lexington before we hailed a cab.

  We walked rapidly all that time. We spoke very little.

  In the cab, I reached over and took her hand. It was icy cold.

  I gave the driver my address. It was force of habit. I wasn’t thinking very clearly.

  Beside me Janis shivered.

  I put my arm around her. We huddled together in the back of the cab.

  When the cab came to a stop, I said mechanically, “Here we are.”

  We got out and I paid the driver. I guided Janis into the building.

  I had not been back home since the night of my visitors.

  It was a shock to see the place when I unlocked the door. In addition to the damage the two men had done, the police had smudged the walls with their fingerprint powder.

  Janis looked blankly around the room.

  “I should have warned you,” I said. “I had a robbery a couple of days ago. The place is a little bit messed up.”

  “My God,” Janis said.

  I pulled two of the foam rubber cushions down to the floor and then I poured a couple of inches of whisky into two glasses and handed one to her. We sat on the rubber cushions in the middle of the debris and sipped it.

  “I was pretty sure we’d meet sometime again,” Janis said. “I didn’t think it was going to be anything like this.”

  “I’ve seen you in pictures a few times,” I said. “I didn’t go to many of them. I couldn’t take it.”

  We were quiet for a while. We finished the whisky and I refilled the glasses.

  “That poor girl,” Janis said.

  “I don’t know what it’s all about,” I said. “She showed up in my office about a week ago. With a book she said she had and wanted to sell. Since I met her I’ve been beaten up once and slugged once. And now she’s been killed. What was it? What kind of mess was she mixed up in?”

  “It happens,” Janis said. “A person can get in over her head.”

  “Janis?”

  “Yes?”

  “You know something?”

  “What, Dick?”

  “I still love you.”

  “That’s not possible, darling.”

  “I didn’t think it was either.”

  “Ten years.”

  “Nine and a half. Ten in March.”

  “Things change. People change.”

  “Not so much. I love you, darling.”

  I reached over and, very gently, ran my hand up the back of her neck and through her hair. She reached out and took my other hand and squeezed it. Then I kissed her.

  “Things don’t change,” I said. “They get worse sometimes. Or better. But they don’t change.”

  Janis put her hands on my shoulders and boosted herself to her feet.

  “Have you got an old shirt and some dungarees?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Let’s fix this place up.”

  “What?”

  “I haven’t done anything like housework in years. Come on. I need the exercise.”

  I found her a T-shirt and a pair of army pants. When she came back out of the bedroom she had them on, with the pants rolled to the knees. She was barefoot, and her lovely hair was tied up in a scarf.

  “You better put something on your feet. There’s a lot of broken glass.”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  “No, really. You’ll lose a toe.”

  I found her a pair of loafers. They were too big, of course, but she put on two pairs of heavy wool socks and that filled them out a little.

  It was a brilliant idea. The hard work was a release.

  For two hours we labored. It was real physical labor. Shoving furniture around. Sweeping, hauling, dumping.

  “No, wait a minute. Don’t fool with that couch. You’ll kill yourself.”

  “Are you kidding? I’m a dancer now. I’m rugged. Feel my muscle.”

  Her arm was slim, but hard as a rock.

  “Hey,” I said. “You should play pro football.”

  We made four trips down to the street with boxes and cartons of broken junk.

  By the time we were through I was puffing and sweating. Her T-shirt was plastered to her back.

  We looked around.

  The place looked pretty good. The upholstery would all have to be redone. And I needed new lamps. But everything was back in place, at least.

  “Now I’m ready for the showers,” Janis said. “A shower and then a drink.”

  “Help yourself. Right in there.”

  “You want to go first?”

  “Ladies first.”

  She went into the bathroom. She did not bother to close the door.

  “I’ve got to scrape this shirt off,” Janis said. “I really lathered it up.”

  In a moment or two I heard the water running. She was in the shower for quite a while. I heard her squeal when she turned on the cold. Then, the water stopped.

  “Hey, do I have to bring my own towel?”

  I went into the bedroom and got a towel out of the closet. I stood in the bathroom door. She was peering out of the shower holding the curtain in front of her.

  I handed her the towel. “You still look like a drowned puppy.”

  This time she laughed.

  The first time I’d told her that she’d gotten mad. But that had been a long time ago.

  I started to leave but I didn’t. Instead I reached in, put my arms around her and kissed her.

  “Dick, please!”

  It seemed perfectly natural. The ten years disappeared.

  “Darling, I love you. Nothing’s changed.”

  “Oh, darling.”

  I picked her up and carried her into the bedroom.

  I put the towel over her head and rubbed her hair dry. Then I reached up and turned out the light.

  I touched her gently, running my hand over her body. She caught my hand at the wrist and sat up.

  “Darling.”

  “Yes?”

  “We can’t...”

  “I love you, darling.”

  “Dick. There’s somebody else.”

  “Oh.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m so awfully sorry.”

  I got up and found cigarettes. I lit one. Then I handed her one and lit it for her.

  “I’m
going to marry him, darling, when his divorce is final. He’s a wonderful guy.”

  “O.K.,” I said tonelessly. “Congratulations.”

  “I’m sorry, Dick.”

  “I know.”

  I went out to the living room and mixed a drink.

  When she came out of the bedroom she was dressed again.

  “You’ve still got a drink coming.”

  “No, thanks, Dick. I don’t feel like one.”

  “I do,” I said. “Come on, I’ll get you a cab.”

  “That’s all right.”

  “No, I’ll get a cab for you. It’s late.”

  “I’d rather walk a little while.”

  “All right. Who is it, darling?”

  “He’s in love with me. And I love him. He’s done everything for me.”

  “Who is he?”

  “You don’t know him.”

  “I know the damnedest people.”

  “My agent. A man named Max Shriber. I’m sorry, Dick.”

  “Forget it. Thanks for the house cleaning.”

  “Goodbye, Dick.”

  “So long, darling.”

  After she was gone I thought of taking a shower but I didn’t. Instead I lay down on the couch with the whisky bottle on the floor beside me.

  The lights were still on and I didn’t bother to take off my shoes.

  I kept pulling at the bottle until I didn’t remember anything any more.

  Chapter Six

  It felt late.

  I was sick and shaky. I was thirsty and needed a shave. My head ached. My hands were dirty. My mouth felt furry. I lit a cigarette and coughed so hard that I threw it away after the first puff.

  My watch said it was a quarter of ten.

  The room was dust-laden and airless. I pulled up the blind and opened the window and stood in front of it breathing the fresh cold air.

  I couldn’t decide whether to have coffee or another drink. To study the situation more thoroughly, I went to the kitchenette. We’d put everything back in place. So coffee was easy enough. Just a matter of filling a pan with water, putting pan of water on stove, finding match, lighting gas, finding cup, finding powdered coffee, finding spoon, getting lid off powdered coffee, getting spoonful of powdered coffee into cup, pouring hot water over coffee, stirring, and drinking. Nothing to it.

  So I went back to the couch, found the bottle of bourbon on the floor. It was about one-third full. I unscrewed the cap, tilted it and drank. I did this several times.

  Then I shaved. Brushed my teeth. Showered. Tilted the bourbon bottle. Got dressed. Then I was ready to make coffee. By that time the coffee tasted wonderful and I had stopped shaking.

  So far I had been moving in a kind of daze. I was standing in front of the mirror in the bathroom combing my hair when the comb hit the lump above my temple.

  It hurt so much that it brought tears to my eyes. Then the haze began to clear. I went over to my pants. There was a gun in one back pocket. The towel Janis had used was lying on the bed. It was still damp and there were lipstick stains on it. The hell with you, Janis Whitney. The hell with you.

  I had two more drinks. I was feeling considerably better. I was actually jaunty. I finished dressing.

  I put the gun into my jacket pocket. It made a bulge. But I was getting used to that by now. I read somewhere that detectives, gangsters and other gun-toting types have their suits tailored so that the gun in the shoulder holster won’t show.

  I grinned and wondered what the fitter at Brooks Brothers would say if I asked him to fix my next suit so that the rod wouldn’t show.

  I blinked at the bright sunlight on the street. I stopped at the newsstand across the street. From the front page of the Daily News a familiar face stared up at me.

  Jean Dahl.

  I picked up the paper.

  “Falls to Death” was the headline on the front page. The story was continued on page three.

  “A gay party in a Fifth Avenue mansion ended in tragedy here tonight when a guest, model Jean Dahl, 25, fell to her death down a long flight of stairs. The lights had been extinguished for a party game of hide and seek...”

  There was quite a long story. It described Walter’s parties in some detail. It suggested that this particular party had been more of an orgy than the previous ones.

  It said two things that interested me.

  It said that Jean Dahl had been killed instantly, her skull fractured by the fall.

  And it said that her body had been found at the foot of the stairs by Walter Heinemann and a guest, literary agent Max Shriber.

  Max Shriber.

  The hell with you, Maxie. The hell with you. And Walter, my good friend Walter. A great little fixer, Walter. With nice friends.

  It isn’t everyone who can give a party where there are two attempted murders and one completed one and still have the whole thing called an unfortunate accident.

  The News story implied that the names of all sorts of celebrated guests were being withheld. It hinted at all sorts of immoral goings-on. But in the end all it could do was call it an accident.

  The Tribune story was even shorter and less sensational. It was printed on an inside page and there were no pictures. It simply noted that a girl had been killed falling down a flight of stairs at a party.

  I reached into the pocket of my jacket for a dime for the papers.

  My hand came upon an unfamiliar object. I pulled it out. It was a lipstick. It was the lipstick that Jean Dahl had dropped into my pocket the night before.

  I held the lipstick in my hand.

  After a minute or so I realized I was shaking again.

  I was shaking because it was all over and settled. It had all been fixed. Jean Dahl had fallen down a flight of stairs in a tragic accident.

  I was shaking because the body hadn’t been at the foot of the stairs at all. I had seen it lying by the front door.

  Not “it.” She. Jean Dahl. Twenty-five years old. Alive. Pretty. Mixed up in some kind of racket. In over her head. I didn’t exactly know how. But when you said it, it didn’t sound personal. And it was personal.

  A human being with memories and hopes, troubles and fears, a person with a life. A person, not an it.

  And someone had struck her down, fracturing her skull. Someone had killed her, deliberately.

  That’s not the kind of thing you should be able to fix.

  Standing there in the blazing sunlight I suddenly realized a basic fact. I’m against killing people.

  I suddenly realized that a human being who consciously and deliberately takes the life of another human being is my enemy.

  I was not exactly sure what I wanted to do.

  But if I was going to do anything at all, there was only one logical place to start.

  I went into the phone booth in the newspaper store and dialed Walter Heinemann’s number.

  The butler answered. I told him I wanted to talk to Mr. Heinemann. He asked who was calling. I told him. He said Mr. Heinemann was not at home.

  I said thanks, hung up and got into a cab. I gave the driver Walter’s address.

  “I want to see Mr. Heinemann,” I said.

  The butler’s face was completely expressionless.

  “Mr. Heinemann is not at home.”

  “When do you expect him back?”

  “I couldn’t say.”

  “I’ll just come in and wait, if you don’t mind.”

  But he minded.

  He was very polite. But very firm. The household was very upset. Mr. Heinemann had left orders that no one was to be admitted. And so on. And so forth. And all the time he stood there, very effectively blocking the door.

  “O.K.,” I said. “I’ll try him again later.”

  I turned and went back down the marble steps.

  I could feel his eyes on my back all the way down. He didn’t close the door until I had turned the corner and headed for Madison.

  I walked about twenty yards toward Madison Avenue and without hesitating,
turned in at the delivery entrance through which Janis Whitney and I had left last night.

  I pushed the button for the elevator and stood there, humming nervously to myself.

  The elevator seemed to take hours.

  When it finally came, I got in quickly and pushed the button for the top floor.

  I had no idea where to find Walter. It was a big house. He could be anywhere. It was even possible that he had gone out.

  I didn’t think so, though.

  I decided to start at the top and work my way down.

  I got off at the fourth floor and began to walk quietly down the corridor. I was not sure now where to start or even why I was there. I didn’t know what I was going to say to Walter when I did find him.

  I stopped, and was about to turn back to the elevator when I heard Walter’s silly, high-pitched giggle. A door, a little way up the corridor, was ajar. I moved toward it, listening.

  Walter was talking and laughing. There was someone with him in the room.

  Then I heard the voice.

  The nasty, derisive, unmistakable voice that I had heard twice before.

  I swung the door open and stepped dramatically into the room.

  Walter was sitting in an armchair balancing a cup of coffee on his knee. He was wearing pajamas and a white silk robe with black and gold Chinese figures. Across from him, on the small sofa, sat a thin, slightly built young man with blond crew-cut hair and hornrimmed glasses.

  I stepped into the room, slamming the door loudly behind me. Walter looked up, startled. An expression of surprise and alarm crossed his face, but he had superb control and it was gone almost before it had appeared. In its place came a bland, friendly, half-amused smile.

  “Why, Richard!” Walter said. “This is a genuine surprise! Have you had breakfast yet? Jimmie, get Richard a cup of coffee.”

  “Listen, Walter, I want to talk to you,” I said.

  “To be sure,” Walter said. “Sugar and cream, or would you prefer it black? Sit down, Richard. You know Jimmie, don’t you?”

  “No, I don’t,” I said. “The voice is familiar but I can’t recall the face.”

  Walter giggled foolishly.

  Jimmie turned from the serving table where he was pouring coffee and looked at me inquiringly.

  “I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jimmie said. His voice was soft and somewhat high-pitched. By no stretch of the imagination could it be confused with the heavy, guttural voice I had heard through the door a moment before.