The Blonde Died Dancing (5 page)

“…what a girl, too bad…”

“…that Waltzer, I’d sure like to get my hands on him…”

“… beautiful, exciting young lady, remarkable person…”

“… brother, she had something…”

None of the gentlemen seemed really to know anything about her. Apparently Anita hadn’t discussed her private life during business hours. None of these students had got to know her well but, for academic acquaintances, they certainly were a fan club.

During my rest and lunch hour, I neither lunched nor rested. I tried to locate Steve by phone. He wasn’t at home. He had been in and out of the office several times, but nobody knew where he was at the moment. Hoping he wasn’t too worried about me, I went back to the grind.

By late afternoon I was on the ropes. At two I had had a two hundred and fifty pound fox-trotter who was dancing to reduce. It was I who did the reducing. Then, in succession, I had two young athletes who thought that dancing was something you did to win. I lost. Rapidly I was becoming a stretcher case.

Then, while I was working on my final pupil of the afternoon session, an enthusiastic, cube-shaped pixie named Ed, I saw something that might turn out to be my first break. Ed was so short that the top of his pointed little head tickled me under the chin. He held me so tight that my head was forced up and back, so that I was looking at the ceiling. It was uncomfortable, it was painful… then, suddenly, it was fine. It was, perhaps, the answer to my prayer.

In the center of the ceiling was a three-foot square of grillwork. It was evidently the ventilator for this windowless room. I couldn’t see through the grill. I couldn’t see if there was space enough above it for a person to crouch, to aim a revolver, to shoot a dancing teacher who stood below. But it might be possible; it had to be possible.

My lesson with Ed finally came to an end and I was free for the next two hours. Casually I began to scout around the Crescent School, exploring its maze of corridors and their cell-like studios. I found what I was searching for in what seemed to be a conference room. In a corner, beyond a long, polished table and its surrounding chairs, was a door that opened on a shallow closet. Fastened to its back wall was a ladder. I closed the door behind me and started climbing.

From the top of the ladder I crawled onto a narrow catwalk. There wasn’t enough room to stand up between the false ceiling that covered the school and the real ceiling above it. On my hands and knees I started forward.

Enough light sifted up through the grills from the rooms below me to see that I was surrounded by a jungle of wires and cables and pipes. That explained the false ceiling, even to the unscientific likes of me. It had been simpler to install wires and pipes overhead than to encase them in the labyrinth of temporary walls that cut the fourteenth floor into dancing studios.

As I crawled along in search of Studio K, I could hear voices in the rooms below me. I heard a male instructor patiently counting out steps for a beginner… “Glide, two and three… glide, two and three…” In another studio, as I crossed it, a man was explaining that as a young one he had been a pretty snappy stepper, but he didn’t know, somehow he had got rusty… In another I heard a man say that as soon as the hour was over he was going to take a chance and go down to Rhinebeck Place. A girl didn’t seem to think that was wise. I didn’t stop to hear who won the argument. If my calculations were right, and I wasn’t lost, Studio K would be the next one.

I was right. Leaning away from the catwalk, my hands on a rafter, I could see down into the room. I saw my purse on the straight-backed chair by the door. This was Studio K and my theory had been correct.

Up here the murderer had crouched, waiting, watching. The moment that Steve had left he had aimed his gun down through the grill, pulled the trigger and shot Anita Farrell to death. It was as simple as that. He might even have still been here when I entered the room, might have watched me as I came upon the body of the dancing teacher.

This wasn’t a pleasant thought. The killer might know by now why I had not reported the murder. He might have figured out that it was I who stole the register, and why… because I was Steve Barton “the Waltzer’s” wife. He might even have guessed why I had finagled my way onto the faculty here, and that I was looking for him.

He had killed once. If he felt I was getting too close to him, he might not hesitate to do me a certain amount of bodily harm which could prove fatal…

I got rid of that idea hastily. There was work for me to do. I had to talk to Steve; I had news for him.

It took only a few minutes to get down off the catwalk. I managed to slide out of the conference room without attracting any attention. After collecting my purse from Studio K and locating a dime, I found that the pair of telephone booths in the corridor were both in use.

I sat down on a sleek curved sofa. I picked up the afternoon paper that lay beside me. The murder of Anita Farrell was still a front page story, but there wasn’t much that was new. The Waltzer was still at large, but the police expected an early arrest, etc. No family or relatives of the victim had been located, etc. The Medical Examiner had ascertained that Miss Farrell had been killed by a thirty-two caliber bullet, etc.

I put down the paper.

I got up to step into a vacated phone booth. Then I sat down again, picked up the paper again. I read once more what the Medical Examiner had to say.

It had been established, from the angle by which the bullet had entered Anita Farrell’s body, that the killer had been standing nine or ten feet behind her when he pulled the trigger. I put the paper on my lap. My theory of the grill had been demolished.

The killer could not have shot his bullet down through the ceiling. The bullet had not been fired by someone crouching over the grill above Anita Farrell. The angle was wrong for that. She had been shot by someone standing in the studio with her, nine or ten feet behind her. I was right back where I started. Only Steve had been in that studio.

I had no news for him, after all. I had spent a whole precious day for nothing, wasted all these hours. I would go home now, wait for Steve, explain my failure. I sat, staring gloomily at the newspaper on my lap, and my eyes caught the words Rhinebeck Place.

There in black and white the newspaper said that the victim had lived at number 11 Rhinebeck Place. Just a few minutes ago I had heard someone say those words, if not that number. A man’s voice, in the room next to Studio K, had said that he was going to take a chance and go down to Rhinebeck Place. A girl’s voice had been against it. Thinking back, I realized her tone did not imply that he was going to Rhinebeck Place to have his hat cleaned and blocked. Unless my memory was cutting up, there could have been nervousness and apprehension in that voice.

I got up. I had to see what teacher was giving what student a lesson in the studio next to mine. But I headed in exactly the opposite direction. An elevator had opened and from it had stepped a man. He was an ordinary, even pleasant looking man in a solid, vigorous vein. The sight of him shouldn’t have alarmed me… except that I had seen him before. In fact, I knew him. Steve and I, Lieutenant Detective Bolling and this gentleman had shared a cab southbound from the Polo Grounds one late afternoon. This gentleman was Bolling’s Homicide squad sidekick, George Hankins. He, too, was a conscientious defender of the law and he would surely feel duty-bound to make Steve Barton’s wife explain what she was doing teaching at the Crescent School of Dancing.

I didn’t dare look over my shoulder to see if the footsteps pounding down the corridor behind me belonged to Hankins. I concentrated on seeming to be a rightful employee of Mr. Bell’s, simply going about my daily chores. I stopped at the first door, Studio B, opened it and closed it behind me. The room was sound-proofed; I couldn’t tell whether the footsteps, too, had stopped or gone on by.

A voice said, “May I help you?”

This was a large studio, used obviously for group lessons, and at the far end of it was a young man. He seemed genuinely anxious to help me. His diffidence, the clear sparkle of his rimless eyeglasses reminded me instantly of a high school history teacher of mine. Mr. Linden’s scholarly diffidence and the clear sparkle of his eyeglasses had made him my first intellectual hero. As the young man came across the studio toward me, I wondered for what demure little chick’s sake he was learning to dance. Then I realized that if he were a student, he would hardly be so solicitous of my welfare.

“Are you a teacher?” I asked.

He smiled at the surprise in my voice. “Yes, I am.”

“Well, so am II I’m just kind of going around and getting acquainted. This is my first day.”

“You’re Hester Frost. I’ve heard about you taking Anita Farrell’s place. I’m Bob Spencer.”

“How do you do, Bob?”

We shook hands.

“Welcome to Crescent,” he said.

“Thanks. Have you been working here long?”

“This is my twelfth year. I started here as soon as I got out of the service.” Again he was amused at my reaction. He said, “You’re surprised that a man could teach dancing that long. Well, maybe I can surprise you even more. I didn’t start working here because I was an actor out of work or a hungry writer or a struggling artist. I took the job because I thought I might enjoy it… and I do enjoy it. Furthermore, I’m interested in the business end of this deal. There’s a lot of money in dancing.”

“I gather. The boss has boys at Harvard, Yale and Princeton.”

“A lot of money,” Bob repeated. “If Mr. Bell doesn’t move me up info an executive job in the next few years, I might start my own studio. I’ve got a few ideas.”

“Well, if you start your own place, don’t forget me.”

“A number of the best teachers here would consider going with me. I get along pretty well with people.”

“I’m sure you do, Bob.”

“People are my main interest. I’ve made a study of them. They fascinate me.”

The gray eyes behind the professorial spectacles seemed suddenly to be delving into my innermost being. I decided that I wouldn’t stick around to be analyzed. Some other day, maybe. But right now I had a more urgent matter to attend to. As I turned away from Bob Spencer the realization flicked through my mind that my new acquaintance couldn’t have been less interested in the life and death of Anita Farrell. In fact, his indifference to the murder was slightly chilling.

Mr. Spencer had, however, served his purpose. The corridor was empty; I had been able to elude my friend, the policeman. I got down the hall, through the reception room and into an elevator without any further trouble. From a phone booth in the downstairs lobby, I called home. Steve was there.

“Connie, what the hell…”

“Darling, listen!”

I had some trouble making him listen. But by talking fast, so that he couldn’t get a word in edgewise, I told him about my job and why I had taken it. The details, I said, I would fill in later. Then I told him about a man and a girl and Rhinebeck Place.

“Steve,” I said, “he might be going down to Anita’s apartment. She lived on Rhinebeck Place, I saw it in the paper. We’ve got to find out who this guy is and what he wants there.”

“Maybe he’s been there and gone by now.”

“No, I think he’s still upstairs. The lesson hour isn’t quite over yet.”

“All right. I’ll come over to the school and we’ll follow him…”

“Steve, we can’t! I don’t know him, I didn’t see him. I only heard his voice.”

“Can’t you pick him up outside the studio he’s in now?”

“No. I can’t go back upstairs. Hankins… you know, Bolling’s pal, is hanging around. And you stay away from here, Steve. Listen, the only thing we can do is go to Rhinebeck Place and watch for a guy who’s interested in Anita Farrell’s apartment. Rhinebeck Place is in the Village, isn’t-it?”

“Off Christopher Street, between Greenwich and Seventh.”

“I’ll meet you there. Right away.”

“Connie, I’ll go alone…”

“No, I’ll meet you there.”

“Connie…”

I hung up.

it took me
about five minutes to find a cab and I was on my way. Steve would probably take the Lexington Avenue Subway to Union Square, then a taxi. That would be fastest for him; he might even beat me there in spite of my eighteen blocks’ head start.

The traffic was brutal. In the garment district of the West Thirties we got tied up so badly, stopped so dead that the driver picked up a newspaper. He shook it out, spread it across the steering wheel. I leaned forward and read the headline:
cops press search for waltzer.

The driver said, “The sooner they get that creep, the better.”

“Yes,” I said.

“The streets ain’t safe with him loose.”

“No,” I said.

“An out-and-out maniac, that Waltzer,” the driver said. “He should be shot on sight like a mad dog.”

“The light is green now,” I said.

“If this was any place but New York City there’d be a posse out after him. He should be strung up on the first pole, hung.”

“The light is green,” I said again.

We got moving. Below Pennsylvania Station we broke into the clear and made some time. I got out at Christopher and Seventh, walked the half block east.

Rhinebeck Place was actually a short street with a dead end. On each side of it were narrow, four-story brownstone houses. The blank wall of what seemed to be a warehouse formed the dead end. It had been painted a fresh gray, some ivy was trying desperately to storm its ramparts.

Steve wasn’t in sight.

Number 11 was the next to last building on the left. In its vestibule I found the name Farrell under one of the eight mailboxes. Anita’s apartment was one flight up, the rear half of the parlor floor of this former one family house.

I stepped back onto the sidewalk. There was still no sign of Steve. I started toward Christopher Street to wait for him there. A young man popped around the corner. He was a young man in such a hurry and with a manner so determined I immediately wondered if his could be the voice I had heard planning a trip to Rhine-beck Place.

He bounced past me, his heels beating a frenetic rhythm on the sidewalk. He was a good looking kid, but at the moment his face was clouded with trouble. It wasn’t a face built for that. This boy looked as though he should have been laughing it up with the crowd at the corner drug store back home. I hoped my hunch was wrong; as I watched him over my shoulder I hoped he would turn into one of the other houses on the block. But it was Anita Farrell’s apartment house he went into.