1954 - Safer Dead (22 page)

‘Keep your hands still,’ he said, ‘and walk in. Make a wrong move and you’ll get it.’

He stood aside.

I walked into a large room with gay curtains, lounging chairs, a table on which stood a bowl of roses, and in one corner was a walnut radiogram playing muted swing music.

Lydia sat on the settee. She didn’t look at me. Her face was as white as a fresh fall of snow except for three red marks on her right cheek where someone, presumably Juan, had slapped her.

‘Back up against the wall,’ Juan said.

He didn’t appear to recognize me, but for all that I was shaken. I backed up against the wall and tried to look more scared than I was.

‘You’ve got me all wrong.’ I began feverishly.

‘Shut up!’ he snarled.

He moved backwards so he could watch the two of us.

‘Will you listen!’ Lydia burst out. ‘This fella pushed his way into my dressing room tonight. I’ve never seen him before. Sam threw him out. He must have followed me back here.’

‘You gave him your address,’ Juan said softly. ‘Sam heard you.’

‘Sam’s a liar and you know it!’ Lydia said hysterically. ‘He’s always trying to get me into trouble. I didn’t give him my address!’

Juan looked at me.

‘What do you want here?’

‘Nothing,’ I said, trying to look scared and sheepish. ‘Not now anyway. How was I to know she wasn’t alone? I thought we might get friendly if I had the chance to talk to her.’

‘Yeah? So you’re just a masher, is that it?’

‘I just wanted to be friendly,’ I said sullenly.

He looked at Lydia and then at me. He didn’t seem so sure of himself.

‘You make me sick, Juan,’ Lydia said, getting to her feet. ‘Throw this punk out and get out yourself. I want to go to bed.’ She crossed to the table, poured a double whisky into a glass and picked it up.

‘Shut up!’ Juan snarled. ‘I think you two are lying. I’m going to find out who this guy is.’

She shrugged and moved away from the table. She kept moving so she passed close to him. I had an idea what was in her mind and I moved a couple of steps towards the door.

‘Hold it!’ Juan exclaimed and swung up the gun to cover me.

Lydia threw the whisky in his face and caught his wrist in both her hands, dragging down the gun and wedging her finger in the trigger guard so he couldn’t fire. I crossed the room in two jumps and slammed a right to his jaw. His head snapped back, and as he fell, I hit him again.

Lydia straightened, holding the gun. Her eyes burned feverishly as she looked down at Juan. I reached forward and took the gun out of her limp fingers. She gave a little shudder, walked unsteadily over to an armchair and sat down.

‘I shouldn’t have done that,’ she said in a small, thin voice. ‘I shouldn’t have done it!’

‘This guy isn’t going to remain quiet for long,’ I said. ‘You’ve got things to tell me. I can take you somewhere where they won’t bother you. Do you want to come?’

‘There’s nothing else I can do now,’ she said, ‘not after this.’

‘Go and pack. I’ll take care of him.’

She got up and went slowly into the inner room.

I opened Juan’s coat, pulled it down over his elbows and fastened his wrists together with the belt I found around his waist. He opened his eyes as I rolled him over on to his back and he began to mumble. I took the Colt and gave him a sharp rap on the top of his skull. His eyes snapped shut and he went limp again. I tied his ankles together with a curtain cord and gagged him with his handkerchief.

Satisfied he wouldn’t make a nuisance of himself for a while, I went into the inner room to see how Lydia was making out. She was tossing garments into two suitcases; her movements showed her growing panic.

‘Take it easy,’ I said. ‘Nothing’s going to happen.’

‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said, her voice shaking. ‘I was a fool to have listened to you.’

‘Relax. I’ll take care of you. Here, let me help you.’

‘No! I can manage.’ She shut the lid of one of the cases and began feverishly to complete the packing of the other. ‘I’ve got to get out of town. He’s been waiting for something like this to happen.’

‘Who’s been waiting? Royce?’

‘Yes.’ She shut the second case. ‘Where are you taking me?’

‘I’ve got a car outside. If you think you’ll be safer out of town, I’ll take you. Have you anywhere you can go?’

‘I’ve friends in Frisco. I should have gone to them before. Can you take me there tonight?’

‘Sure,’ I said, thinking I could talk to her on the way. I moved to the door. ‘While you change, I’ll watch Juan. Don’t be long.’

I went out and shut the door.

Juan was still unconscious. I sat down where I could see him and waited.

After twenty minutes or so, Lydia came out of her room. She was wearing a dark grey suit and she had a fur coat over her arm. Her face was fine drawn and white. She glanced quickly at Juan and then her eyes shifted.

‘Let’s get out of here,’ she said.

I went into her room and collected her two suitcases. As I reentered the sitting room, Juan gave a muffled groan and moved uneasily.

‘He’ll be all right,’ I said. ‘Come on.’

I went to the door, set down the cases, opened the door and stepped into the passage. At the far end I could see the front door. A man’s shadow lay across the glass panel: a short bulky man with shoulders that looked as wide as a house.

I stepped back quickly into the sitting room, motioning Lydia to stay where she was. My warning gesture made her catch her breath sharply.

I peered cautiously into the passage. The front door was opening. I quickly shut Lydia’s apartment door.

‘What is it?’ she whispered.

‘There’s a guy out there.’

Softly I turned the key in the lock and waited, listening.

I heard soft footfalls coming down the passage. They stopped outside the door. Then I saw the door handle turn. Lydia backed away, her face ashen, her hand to her mouth. In the silence of the room, knuckles rapping on the door panel made a loud, startling sound.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I

I
stepped away from the door as knuckles rapped again. Lydia asked in a voice no louder than the rustle of leaves, ‘Who is it?’

‘I don’t know. A short, thickset guy.’ My voice matched hers.

Her eyes dilated.

‘It’s Borg. He won’t be alone.’ She looked around the room wildly. ‘Don’t let him in.’

I saw the door handle turn, and a weight leaned against the door, making it creak.

I grabbed her wrist and pulled her into the bedroom, shut and locked the door.

‘You’ll have to leave your cases,’ I said, going over to the window. I raised it and looked out on to a strip of garden of dark shadows and shrubs. ‘We’ll go this way.’

She joined me. I picked her up and swung her through the window into the garden, then scrambled out after her.

‘My car’s at the corner. Can we get around to it?’

‘Yes. I’ll show you.’

She ran down the strip of lawn to a gate.

‘Let me go first,’ I said, pulling out Juan’s gun.

I opened the gate and stepped into a deserted alley that stretched away into darkness.

I started down the alley, moving quietly. Lydia followed, almost treading on my heels. I could hear her quick, frightened breathing. The end of the alley led out into a side street. At the top of the street I could see the gleam of my parking lights. The street seemed empty. Taking Lydia’s arm and keeping in the shadows, I started towards the car.

‘Who’s this guy Borg?’ I asked her.

‘One of Royce’s men,’ she said. ‘They won’t let me get away.’

‘They haven’t got you yet.’

We reached within twenty feet of the Lincoln, then I stopped.

‘I’ll go first. You wait here. Be ready to move fast.’

I stepped away from her and cautiously moved to the street corner. I looked up Lennox Drive. A big car stood outside Lydia’s apartment house. A man stood by it, looking towards the house. I crossed the sidewalk to the Lincoln, opened the door and slid into the driving seat.

‘Come on!’ I called softly.

I had the engine running as she darted into the car, and the car moving as she slammed the door.

Maybe Benn had looked after the Lincoln, but as soon as I started to feed gas into the engine, I knew I wasn’t going to get much of a performance from it. This wasn’t a car to be in to shake off a fast pursuit.

The driving mirror remained dark: no telltale headlights showed behind me, and I hoped that our getaway hadn’t been spotted.

I swung the car on to the main road leading out of Tampa City and gradually built up the Lincoln’s speed to fifty-five. At that speed the car began to rock.

I took out a pack of cigarettes from my pocket and dropped it into her lap.

‘Light me one and have one yourself,’ I said, my eyes shifting to the driving mirror again to make sure no car was following us.

‘Can’t you go faster?’ she asked.

Her hands were shaking so badly she had trouble getting the cigarettes out of the pack.

‘I might at a pinch, but this is fast enough so long as they’re not following us.’

She lit the cigarettes and gave me one.

‘Let’s talk,’ I said. I didn’t want to scare her, but I wasn’t too sure how much time we had before they came after us. What do you know about Frances Bennett?’

‘What has happened to her? Where is she?’

I gave it to her without gloves.

‘She’s dead. She was fished out of a pond in Welden. Royce stayed with her at a hotel in Welden. She was working at a club there. The night she disappeared, Royce left the town.’

I saw Lydia clench her fists tightly in her lap.

‘So she’s dead. Well, I warned her, the little fool. She wouldn’t listen. I told her Royce was using her for his own convenience. He wouldn’t fall for a stupid little fool like her.’

‘Don’t cut the corners,’ I said. ‘Let me have it from the beginning. What was Royce to you?’

She hunched her shoulders and leaned forward to stare at the two pools of light thrown by the Lincoln’s headlamps as they raced ahead of us.

‘What was he to me? Everything. We were fixed to be married,’ she said in a cold, flat voice, and I didn’t believe her.

‘We were happy; he was crazy about me. Then suddenly it blew up in my face. He started to cool. He wasn’t subtle about it either. I thought at first it was the Van Blake woman. She was always coming to the club. You know the club belonged to her husband?’

I said I knew.

‘But I found out it wasn’t her. It was the Bennett girl. She and Royce were meeting secretly. I had them watched. When he was supposed to be at the club in the morning, he was driving her around. When he told me to go back to the apartment as he had things to do at the club, he was taking her to dinner at Lodoni’s where no one knew either of them.’

‘Was this before Van Blake’s death?’

She turned her head to stare at me. In the dim light from the dashboard I could see her eyes were glittering with unshed tears.

‘What’s Van Blake’s murder to do with her?’

‘I don’t know; nothing perhaps. I was trying to fix the time.’

‘It was just before; two weeks.’

‘You said they were meeting secretly. How secretly? Did anyone know what was going on?’

‘No. I wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t hired an investigator to watch her.’

‘But why should Royce bother to keep it quiet? Was he scared you’d make trouble?’

She laughed; it wasn’t a pretty sound.

‘With the thugs he has to look after him, he didn’t have to be scared of anyone.’

‘Then why keep it secret?’

‘I don’t know. I tried to find out, but I didn’t get anywhere. I talked to the girl. She was crazy about him. I could see that by the way her silly face lit up when I mentioned his name, but she denied ever going out with him. I was fool enough to tell her I had had her watched. That was the worst mistake I’ve ever made.’ Again her fists closed into tight, white knuckled fists. ‘She told Royce. He came back to the apartment, and I could tell by his face it was my finish with him. I thought he was going to kill me. He told me to pack up and get out. I was too frightened even to speak. I think that’s why he didn’t kill me. He stood in the bedroom doorway and watched me while I packed. When I was ready to go, he got hold of my arms and held me while he talked. I had bruises from his fingers on my arms for weeks. He said I was not to leave town. I was to work at the Hey-Day club and I was never to talk about his affairs. He said Juan was going to be my jailer. If I ever talked about him, tried to leave town or came near him, Juan would take care of me. I could see he meant it. That’s how I’ve been living for the past eighteen months. I haven’t seen him to talk to for all that time. He never gave me a thing: not a nickel. And now look what I’ve done. If they catch up with me, they’ll kill me.’

‘They won’t catch up with you,’ I said, urging the car up to fifty-seven. I still had a little in reserve, but not much. The engine was so noisy we were practically shouting at each other now. I drove for a minute or so while I brooded over what she had told me. It hadn’t taken me far. At least, I had a witness now to prove Royce and Rutland were one and the same, and that put Royce in the middle of Fay’s disappearance. That was something, but I knew there must be a lot more to this than I knew. ‘Ever heard of a guy who called himself Hank Flemming?’ I asked abruptly.

She shook her head.

‘No. Why?’

‘He’s hooked up in this. Maybe you’ve seen him. He’s short, thickset with a round, heavy face. The last time I saw him he wore a dirty trench coat and a black slouch hat. Remember seeing anyone like that?’

It was a shot in the dark, but it scored a bull.

‘Andrews saw him.’

‘Andrews?’

‘He was the investigator I hired. He gave me a description of a man just like that.’

‘Where did he see him?’

‘He was at Lodoni’s restaurant one night when Royce and the Bennett girl were there. Andrews spotted this man in a car outside the restaurant. Royce took the Bennett girl past the car and as they passed, he dropped back a little and pointed to the girl. The man left the car after a while and went to the door of the restaurant and watched her. Andrews said it was as if Royce had put the finger on her, but I didn’t believe him. He wasn’t much of an investigator. He was always trying to chisel money out of me. I thought it was just a story he had made up to make me think he was doing more than he was.’