Confidentially Yours (8 page)

Selecting an outfit called Crosby Investigations in Miami and a man named Howard Cates in Houston, I wrote down the addresses and phone numbers and headed for a booth. I put in the call to Miami first, person-to-person to Crosby himself. He was in. I introduced myself, and asked, “Can you handle a rush job that’ll take a couple of men?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. I’ll mail you a cashier’s check for a retainer within the next half hour, airmail special, and you should have it this afternoon. Is $200 all right?”

“Sure thing, Mr. Warren. What is it you want?”

“A confidential check on an employee who used to live in Miami. Her name’s Frances Kinnan.” I gave him a description. “She was born in Orlando, in 1934, went to high school there, and attended the University of Miami for two years, according to the information on her personnel card. Around 1953 she went to work as a salesgirl in the women’s-wear section of Burdine’s, and later became assistant to the head of the advertising department. In 1955 she married a man named Leon Dupre who’d been some kind of minor executive with one of the dress shop chains—Lerner’s, I think—and the two of them opened a shop on Flagler Street. It was called Leon’s, and specialized mostly in resort clothes. In 1958, she and Dupre were divorced, and they sold out. That should be enough information for you to pick up the trail, and what I want to know specifically is whether she’s ever been in any kind of trouble, if there actually was a divorce, where Dupre is now—if possible—and if she ever knew a man named Dan Roberts.” I gave him a description of Roberts. “Can you handle it?”

“With that much to start on, it’ll be easy. How much time do we have, and how do you want the report? By mail?”

“No. Wire it to me at my office in Carthage. By five P.M. tomorrow at the latest.”

“We’ll do it, or break a leg.”

I hung up, dialed the long distance operator again, and put in the call to Houston. Cates’ line was busy and I had to wait five minutes and try again. This time I got him. I told him my name and address, made the same arrangement for payment I had with Crosby, and asked for a report on Roberts. “I don’t know where he lived in Houston,” I said, “or how long ago he moved away, but he still has a brother living there. The brother’s name is Clinton L. Roberts, and he should be in the book, for a place to start.”

“That’ll do,” he said. “And just what is it you want to know?”

“What business he was in there, whether he’s ever been in trouble with the police, why he left, whether he has any known enemies, and whether he’s ever lived in, or been in, Florida. Wire it to me at my office, not later than tomorrow afternoon if you can swing it. Okay?”

“Right. We can do it.”

I went out. At another bank I bought the two cashier’s checks, ducked into a drugstore for airmail envelopes, addressed them and marked them special delivery, and plastered on a bunch of stamps from the vending machine. Dropping them in a mailbox, I headed out Rampart, looking at cheap used cars on lots decorated with whirling orange-colored propellers. It was nearly one
P.M.
now, and I was beginning to feel naked on the street. Picking out an accessory-cluttered and fox-tailed old 1950 Olds, I gave my name as Homer Stites of Shreveport, paid cash for it, and drove it back uptown to a parking lot.

I took a taxi back to the hotel, checked out, and carried the suitcase up the thronged sidewalks of Canal Street, cut over to the parking lot, and locked it in the trunk of the car. It was two-fifteen
P.M.
I couldn’t wait any longer; any time now the police would have men covering the bus station, railroad terminals, and the airport, and they’d know I couldn’t have got away after that. I ducked into a phone booth and called Norman.

“O
H,” HE SAID.
“I wasn’t expecting you quite so soon.”

“I won’t be able to stay in town as long as I’d thought,” I explained. “Have you come up with anything yet?”

“Not much. The man working the hock shops hasn’t got any lead on the coat so far, but I had a call about twenty minutes ago from Snyder, who’s covering the Devore Hotel. So far, of course, all he’s been able to talk to is the day-shift crew, but he has uncovered one or two items. Several bellmen and the doorman remember seeing her in the coat from time to time when she first checked in, but nobody recalls seeing it in the last two or three days. If it was lost or stolen, though, she never reported it to anybody in the hotel or to the police, as far as we can find out. According to the housekeeper on her floor, she stayed in her room every night, and if she ever had a man there nobody ever saw
him
and he didn’t leave any tracks. She apparently had no visitors at all, and the only phone calls anybody can remember were from a woman, probably Mrs. Dickinson. There is one funny thing, though; she was never in the hotel in the afternoon. She always left a call for ten-thirty
A.M
., had breakfast and the newspapers sent up to her room, and then went out about a quarter of one. The doorman always got her a cab, but he never heard what she told the driver. We’ve had the picture copied, and at shift-changing time at four
P.M.
we’ll cover “the garages of all three leading cab companies to catch as many of the day-shift jockeys as we can at one time. There’s a good chance we’ll find somebody who remembers her and where he took her.”

“Good,” I said. “And thanks a lot. I’ll be in touch.”

“We’ll have something definite by tomorrow morning, I’m pretty sure.” He hesitated, and then went on, “Look, Mr. Warren, it’s your business, and you don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to, but it’ll make it a lot easier if you level with us. Were you having her tailed at any time when she was down here?”

I frowned. “No. Of course not. Why?”

“Well, I’ve got a hunch somebody else was interested in what she was doing.”

“Why?”

“Well, these bellmen are a pretty wise bunch, and they don’t miss much. One of ’em hinted he knew something, and when Snyder primed him with an extra fin, he said there was a guy he was pretty sure followed her away from the hotel three or four times. He’d come in around noon and stooge around the lobby chewing a cigar and pretending to read a paper, and when she’d come out of the elevator he’d drift out after her and take the next cab off the stand.”

“You suppose the kid just made it up, for the five bucks?”

“There’s a chance, of course, but I don’t think so. From the way he described this joker, I think I know who he is. He’s in the business.”

“Could you find out who hired him?”

“Not a chance. If it’s the guy I think it is, he wouldn’t tell his mother the way to a fire exit.”

“Could the police make him talk?”

“Sure, or make him wish he had. But you’ve got nothing to take to the police, at least so far. There’s no law against her spending her own money—or even yours, for that matter.”

“Yeah,” I said. I wondered what his face would look like when he saw the evening papers. “Well, keep digging-”

I hung up, dug in my pocket for another handful of change, and dialed long distance. “I want to put in a person-to-person call to L. S. MacKnight, of the MacKnight Construction Co., El Paso, Texas.”

“Thank you. Will you hold on, please?”

Mac was an old friend. We’d gone to the same military school in Pennsylvania and later were classmates at Texas A. and M. We hunted quail together somewhere every year. I hoped he was in the office now. Luck was with me.

“Duke? Why, you crazy devil, where are you?”

“New Orleans.”

“Well, grab some airplane. Let’s go huntin’.”

“I wish I could, but at the moment I’m working the other side of the street.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m in a jam, and I need a little help.”

“Name it, pal.”

“Well, look, I’d better tell you first—you could get your tail in a sling, if they ever proved it—”

He cut me off. “I said name it, knucklehead. Never mind the fine print.”

“I want you to send a telegram for me.”

“Hell, is that all?”

“It’s enough. Let’s see—you’re on Mountain Time there, so send it about eight tomorrow morning, straight wire. Phone it in from a pay phone, so there’s no way they can trace it back to you. Got a pencil handy?”

“Right. Commence firing.”

“
TO WARREN REALTY COMPANY, CARTHAGE, ALABAMA. IMPERATIVE YOU CONTACT LOUIS NORMAN AGENCY NEW ORLEANS PHONE CYPRESS FIVE EIGHT THREE TWO SEVEN REGARDING PENDING DEAL FILE NUMBER W-511 REPEAT WILLIAM FIVE ONE ONE STOP WILL CALL YOU LATER SIGNED WEAVER.”

“Check.” He read it back. “Anything else I can do?”

“No,” I said.
“Gracias, amigo.”

“Por nada.
How bad is this thing, pal?”

“Real bad.”

“Okay. I’m holding it.”

“Hang on.” I dropped the receiver back on the hook, and walked back to the parking lot. The old car ran all right. Beyond Pass Christian, Mississippi, I stopped and bought some sandwiches and a quart thermos which I had filled with coffee. I pulled into a motel, slept until midnight,” and went on. It was three-fifteen
A.M.
when I came into the outskirts of Carthage.

North of the highway in the west end of town is an area of jerry-built houses and old shacks surrounding the cotton gin and ice plant. I turned left at the city limits, went over two blocks, turned right again, and parked near a weather-beaten frame apartment house. A half dozen other cars stood overnight at the curb in the same block, and this one could stay here a week or more before the police wondered about it, even with the Louisiana license plates. I looked up and down the shadowy street; it was deserted, and all the windows were dark. I slid out, grabbed the suitcase, and walked back the way I’d come, in order to cross the highway before it widened into the well-lighted thoroughfare of Clebourne Street.

When I came out to it I could see two or three cars parked before Fuller’s neon sign, six blocks to my left, but nothing was moving anywhere. I hurried across and down the street on the opposite side to the corner of Taylor, turned left, and started toward the center of town, feeling naked and exposed and scared. A dog barked, somewhere inside a house. The street lights suspended over the intersections swayed slightly in the wind, setting up weaving patterns of shadow under the bare limbs of the trees. I looked nervously behind me and down the intersecting streets, watching for Cap Deets on his patrol. My shoes made a grating sound on the sidewalk. Two blocks. Three. I passed the intersection of Mason Street, and midway up the block to my left was the softly glowing sign of the Carthage Funeral Home. I shuddered inside the topcoat, and hurried on. I reached Fulton. It was as empty of life as the rest. All I had to do now was cross it, turn left toward Clebourne, and make the last half block to the alley behind the office. I was in the open, still thirty yards from the mouth of the alley, when I heard the car coming along Taylor Street behind me. I broke into a run. Tires squealed softly as the car began its casual turn into Fulton, its headlights swinging. Just before they reached me, I flung myself into the alley and flattened against the wall behind a utility pole. The car went on past, toward Clebourne; behind the pole, I couldn’t tell whether it was a police car or not.

I remained plastered limply against the wall for a moment while I groped in my pocket for the keys and selected the right one. The alley was dark except for the window at the rear of Fuller’s kitchen, and there was no sound except the humming of the exhaust fan above it I strode over, unlocked the door, and breathed softly in relief as it closed behind me. The door into the outer office at the far end was closed, so the passage was in utter darkness, but I needed no light. To my left was the door to the washroom, and just beyond it, on the right, was the side entrance to my office. I groped my way along to it, stepped inside, and closed it.

To my left, a faint crack of light along the floor marked the location of the door opening into the outer office, facing the front windows and the street. Behind my desk, over on the right, was a small window on the alley. I felt my way back to it and checked to be sure the slats of the Venetian blind were closed, but even then I didn’t dare turn on a light. The glow of the window would be visible in the alley. I rolled my topcoat into a pillow and lay down on the rug in front of the desk. They’d never think of looking for me here. But everything now depended on Barbara Ryan; if she believed I’d killed Frances, she would call the police.

I awoke to gray dimness inside the room and looked at my watch. It was after seven. Taking the toilet kit from the bag, I went across the passage to the washroom to shave, and brush my teeth. After I’d put on a fresh shirt and brushed some of the lint off my suit, I felt less like the tag end of a four-day drunk and ready to face whatever was going to happen. I ate one of the sandwiches, drank a cup of coffee from the thermos, and sat down in the swivel chair behind the desk with a cigarette. She should be here in about ten minutes; she always opened the office at eight, while Turner and Evans, the two salesmen, came in around a quarter of nine. I wrote out a copy of the telegram I’d given Mac, and waited.

The door to the outer office was in front of me, but off to the left; when it was open, anyone passing on the sidewalk outside could see in, but wouldn’t be able to see the desk. I could hear the traffic outside on Clebourne and the rattle of trash cans in the alley as the garbage truck went through. Once in a while, very faintly, there was a clatter of dishes from Fuller’s, just on the other side of the wall to my right. I thought of the twenty, or thirty people who were in there now, eating breakfast, and of what they were saying. Mulholland would be there.

The front door had opened. I heard a desk drawer open and close as she stowed away her purse. There were no voices, so she was alone. A minute or two went by, and then I heard the staccato clicking of the typewriter. I reached out a hand toward the button, but hesitated, aware of the suffocation in my chest. What would she do? Scream? Run into the street? Call Scanlon? Well, as Mac would say, shoot or hand somebody else the gun. I pressed the buzzer.