Homicide at Yuletide (10 page)

Noah Cochrane said, “You interested in being cremated?”

I jumped. Maybe rubber heels were part of the equipment, like cleats for ball players. He was sober and affable in a cutaway coat, striped pants, and a black tie. He went behind the desk, belched, hitched carefully at his trousers, and sat down facing me.

“No,” I said. “Just a visit.”

“Visit? I seem to recollect that it was I who was to visit you.”

“That’s this evening. You coming?”

“You invited me, didn’t you?”

“Sure pop, but I heard you walked out of my place last night in a huff.”

“Huff. Huff.” He reached over and took the lid off a cigarette box, offered one to me and took one for himself. He lit mine with a silver desk lighter and lit his own. “First,” he said, “I was plastered. Second, I’m a beseeching husband sucking around for a reconciliation with a wife who has already instituted divorce proceedings. Have you ever been a beseeching husband, sucking around?”

“No.”

“It’s a lousy spot, young fella, believe me.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“You get oversensitive. You get huffy. You married?”

“No.”

“I’m sorry for you.”

“All the married men say that. Even the ones who are getting divorced.”

“Sorry, but a chap that’s a bachelor, there’s something wrong with him. There’s something wrong with anybody who tries to cut against the grain.” He blew cigarette smoke emphatically. “Every man should be married.”

“Yeah, but three times?”

“Me?”

“Sheldon Talbot.”

“I wasn’t talking about Sheldon Talbot.”

“I am.”

“Now, what the—”

“Did you see him yesterday morning?”

He stood up out of the chair. “You’re insufferable, you—”

“Why?”

“You’re a nervy, nosy, tactless—”

“Sheldon Talbot is dead, Mr. Cochrane.”

“An inquisitive, ineffable, utterly—
what’s that?”

“He was murdered. Not too long after you’re supposed to have seen him.”

“Sheldon? Murdered?”

“Correct. Sheldon, murdered.”

“I read the papers carefully. There’s been nothing.”

“Maybe the papers don’t know about it. Yet.”

“Then how do you know?”

“That’s none of your business, Mr. Cochrane. I am not inquisitive, or ineffable, or utterly. I’m a guy working at his trade, just as you are. I have been retained by the estate to investigate it, plus an additional matter involving a bunch of vanished jewelry. I’m probably here a jump ahead of the riot squad.”

His mouth opened and stayed like that, his tongue quivering like a freshly beached sardine. Then he snapped his mouth shut, sat down, and used the phone.

“Hello,” he said. “Terry? Noah. Noah Cochrane. That man’s here, that Peter Chambers. He says something happened to Sheldon, he says— What?” He listened, color leaving his face like it was running out of a hole in his leg. “Yes, yes, I’m very sorry … yes … very sorry.” He hung up.

He pulled open a deep side drawer and set a bottle on the desk. He brought out two glasses. He said, “Have a drink.”

I had one. He had two.

“What is it you want to know, Mr. Chambers?”

“Were you there yesterday morning?”

“Yes.”

“What time?”

“About nine-thirty.”

“How long you stay?”

“A half hour or so.”

“Would you tell me what it was about?”

“Yes.” He had another drink. “He had seen Gay earlier in the week. About that revocation business. You know about that?”

“Yes.”

“She told him she was breaking up with me. He wanted to talk with me about that.”

“Yes?”

“He wanted my advice on it.”

“On what?”

“The revocation. ‘Revoke and be damned,’ I told him.”

“You sound like Stephan Decatur, or somebody.”

“Never mind whom I sound like. I told him to go ahead and revoke. That if she didn’t have that independent income, perhaps our marriage wouldn’t be on the rocks. He said that she’d said that I was broke, that I had lost my money. I told him that I had had some market reverses, but that I still had a sufficient income to maintain her properly. I told him that I had no objection to the revocation, that she would never be in want, that it would probably be good for her. There are some women who just aren’t geared for financial independence. Especially somebody like Gay. Basically, she’s a bum.”

“What did he say?”

“He said that I was too.”

“What?”

“A bum.”

“Are you?”

“I suppose I am.”

“Then what happened.”

“Where?”

“At Sheldon’s, for God’s sake.”

“Nothing. He smiled, and listened, and pulled at that damned beard.”

“Then?”

“That’s all. I got out of there.”

I pushed the posture chair back on its hind legs and I teetered like a senator straddling an issue. “Thanks on the Sheldon Talbot. Now what about Grace White?”

“Grace White? Grace White?” The color that had come back to meet the drinks ran out of the hole again. His face looked like the top of lemon meringue flavored with jaundice. “Mr. Chambers—I—”

“Grace White. She’s dead. Too.”

“Mr. Chambers, you’re a goddam dirty liar.” He slammed his hand down on the desk, the little glasses bouncing.

“Have I been, up to now?”

“What?”

“A liar?”

“Chambers—”

“At two o’clock this afternoon I was awakened from a siesta.”

“Siesta? Siesta?”

“Siesta. What they do in Mexico. I do it in New York. Though there seems to be a conspiracy against it.”

“Yes, Mr. Chambers.”

“I was asked by the police to come down to the Grace White Enterprises on Jane Street. I was asked because they’d been informed that she was involved in an investigation of mine. I went. The studio had had a fire. Grace White was found there, dead, but it wasn’t the fire. She had been shot first. I was asked a lot of questions. Now I’m asking you.”

“But why me?”

“Because I have reason to believe you know her. Either you, or your wife.”

“Why?”

“They had me look over a stack of old photographs. There was one of Gay, dated about two years ago. And there was a picture of you and Gay, dated last year. These were not night club photos. These were regular photos that had been sat for. That is why, Noah.”

“I see. The police have any comment?”

“The police had nothing to comment upon.”

“But you—”

“I was asked if I recognized any of the photographs. Seems I didn’t.”

I put the posture-chair back on all of its feet and dinched the cigarette in an ash tray shaped like a spade and waited. Noah Cochrane folded his hands, then unfolded them. He pulled open the flat middle drawer of the desk. He came up with a blue, legal-backed, stapled set of papers. He put that to his left, tapping it. Then he dug in again, and came up with another color. Green. Familiar green. He separated a portion from the bulk and put the bulk back.

“Five thousand dollars,” he said.

I took it. “For what?”

“I want you to represent me.”

“Why?”

“I’ll tell you.”

“Okay. I accept. I represent you, but I want to make this clear to both of us. It’s not a bribe. I’m against bribes. Clear?”

“Yes.”

“So now I represent you. So what do I represent you about?”

“I want you to handle this for me. I want you on my side.”

“I’m listening.”

He put a finger against the blue-backed legal papers. “Summons and complaint for absolute divorce. Gay hasn’t been living home. The corespondent is named in the papers.”

I reached. “May I look?”

“You don’t have to look. Grace White.”

“What?”

“The corespondent named in the papers. Grace White.”

“Wow,” I said. “You’re going to have so many cops around here, more than you’ve got stiffs. All right. Give out for your representative.” I put his money into my pocket.

“I met her through Gay.”

“When?”

“A couple of years ago, give and take a few months either way.” He lit a new cigarette off the old one. “A wonderful, exciting little girl. She had her own place then, on Fifth Avenue, before the night club work. She didn’t make much money, but she was an awfully good photographer. Gay used her often, and recommended her to friends. After I met her, she did work for both of us. That’s the pictures you saw.”

“When did she begin to do your work, exclusively?”

“She was a live, exciting girl. She went to work in the night clubs, oh, only about a year ago. More money in it.”

“That’s not what I asked you.”

“She was a fine person, alive, exciting—”

“Okay. Let’s skip the live, exciting details. When’d you see her last?”

“Yesterday. When I left your place. In the huff.”

“Huff, muff, let’s get down to essentials. You didn’t kill her, did you, Noah?”

“No. At your place, I pleaded with Gay to come home. She wouldn’t. I left. I had my chauffeur drive me down to Eddie Nuki’s. Then I sent him home. I picked up Grace, and we did a couple of the after-hours joints.”

“Then?”

“I slept there.”

“Then?”

“I left about eleven o’clock in the morning.”

“Then?”.

“I was very tired. I had breakfast in a cafeteria. I walked. I sat on a bench in Central Park. I went to a newsreel, where I fell asleep. Then I came out here. I had this special ceremony for four o’clock. Generally we’re closed on Christmas. I came here, showered, shaved, and dressed in these clothes. There you have it.”

“You’re talking about alibi time, Noah, my lad. Most of it is not provable.”

“But it’s true.”

“Walked, sat on a park bench, went to a newsreel, fell asleep. I’ll accept it for now.”

“Want to advise on it?”

“It stinks. For policemen, that is. So you had better skip all of that, if they ask. Tell them you slept here. Here. After you sent your chauffeur home, you had a couple of drinks with Grace White, you saw her home, and then you took a taxi to here. You slept here, right here at your place of business.”

“But—”

“No buts. That is, if you’ve told me the truth. If not, I’ll turn you in personally, Noah, my boy—and the five thousand dollar fee for being on your side—I’ll deny it, so help me.” I stood up out of the posture-chair. One section of my buttocks was asleep. “ ‘By, now, Noah. So far I’m on your side. So far. See you for supper.”

I
WENT OUT
, musing.

I opened the door nearest Gene Tiny and I said, “Move over.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I’ll drive.”

“But, Pete—”

“I’m driving, or you can go on back alone.”

“Why?”

“I don’t like the way you drive. I’d rather go back with my heart not in my mouth.”

Please don’t get me wrong. I think women are wonderful. I think women can do anything men can do, and much of it they can do a lot better. Some women. Some women can’t. I’m unprejudiced. But I will not fall into the oldest trap in the world: making a prejudice of being unprejudiced. Even about driving a car. Gene Tiny at the wheel of a jalopy gave me palpitations. I couldn’t use palpitations. I was a tired guy. I needed peace.

I drove.

I made a couple of wrong turns, but she put me back on the right road each time. Neither of us said a word.

Silence, peace, and snowbanks.

Then she said, “You make a left turn at the next crossing, Galahad. Across to the Highway.”

“How do you know, beautiful?”

“It’s written right there in front of you. Can’t you read?” he was going to pass anybody on a lane like Lorimer Boulevard, and beneath that,
Left Turn for the Highway
. I made my left. Lorimer Boulevard was a boulevard strictly under the false license of poetic pretense. It was a narrow, rutty road with more bumps than a grind-girl going crazy in early morning burlesque. I proceeded with caution.

Proceeding with caution grew difficult because of the din of an impatient horn-blower behind me. I scowled up at the rear-view. There was one guy at the wheel of a racy-looking number, wide and low-slung. Not the guy. The car. I did a couple of peeps on my horn, answering him. If he thought he was going to pass anybody on a lane like Lorimer Boulevard, he’d have to sprout propellers and make like a helicopter. He moved up on his cushioned springs and bumped me. Twice.

“What the hell?” I said.

Decorously, I stuck a hand out of the window. Then I pulled up the brake.

Gene said, “Don’t make a scene.”

“No scene,” I said. “A lecture.”

He was out of his car before I had a chance to open my door. He was a short fat man with a wide mustache. He stepped high through the snow and came up alongside of me. I opened the door and swung my legs out.

“It’s impossible,” I said. “So why make an ass of yourself? Nobody can pass anybody on this road. Furthermore, what in all hell is the hurry? Add to that, you got springs, and what I got on this jalopy, you should have.”

He smiled and put his hand in his pocket. It came out a fistful of gun.

“Now wait a minute, mister,” I said. “If it’s that all-fired urgent, maybe we can work something out.”

“Out.”

“Sure we can work something out. It gets a little wider over there—”

“Out.”

“Out?”

“You too, lady. You first, Joe.”

He had a voice like hail on a window. It came to me that he wasn’t interested in passing us. I looked at him, looked at the gun, and got out. He had Gene slide over and she came out the same door. He slammed the door, and lined us up in front of the running board. He was careful opening my coat and tapping me. So far he didn’t take anything. He touched me under the arms for a holster.

“Stick-up?” I inquired, lamenting Noah’s five thousand dollars.

“Shut up.” He moved back slightly. “Okay, lady. You’re next. Step forward.”

He opened her coat and put his hand in.

“Hey, now look—” she said.

He took his hand out. “What do you think I’m digging for, a free feel?”

“Now, listen, you—”

“Shut up.”

He swung the clump of his left fist hard and quick. It caught her on the chin. He didn’t watch as she crumbled. He stepped aside, let her fall, and came at me, gun first.

“What goes, Mac?” I said.

He smiled and he came nearer and he stopped. He smiled wider, the mustache spreading, but it wasn’t a smile. It was teeth on teeth with cracks by crazy eyes. I saw the knuckles around the gun whiten, and I moved because I had nothing to lose. I hit his legs in a laughable tackle, but it worked. He came down like a collapsed tent. We wriggled in the snow, scuffing. I kept moving my arms and legs, but I couldn’t see, because he was on top of me. I heard his cursing and panting, and then my accidental elbow caught him sharp in the gullet and I heard the wheeze as he slackened. Now I was on top, both hands locked around the wrist of his gun hand, trying to shake it loose, and then his legs came up, crossing around my throat, and he squeezed, and a numb buzzing came in my ears. I clung to his wrist, my fingers moving down, feeling the cold of the gun, turning it in on him, and then my breath began to go, and the suffocating blackness began. I wrenched once, wildly. The sound of the gun was a ragged faraway plop.

That’s all.

I don’t know how long I was unconscious, probably moments. I was eating snow, face down on the road. My neck hurt. I heard myself groan and stopped it. I sat up, watching as the scenery whirled back into focus. He lay beside me, on his back, still smiling. There was no blood on the snow. There was a black stain on his coat by the chest. I moved and touched him. He pushed over, rigidly, in one piece, the stain bubbling over and running down the coat and collecting in a bright red patch on the snow. He was still smiling.

I rubbed at my neck, breathing through my mouth. I stood up and bent over him, touching his throat for a pulse, lifting his eyelids.

Then I went to Gene.

She had a blue bruise beneath her chin, bleeding slightly in leaky drops. Her eyes were open, open and up, only the whites showing. She was breathing shallowly, exploding in a little snore at the end of each breath.

I went to his car and looked in. It was clean and empty. The glove compartment had a black automatic, nothing else.

I went back to Gene and sat her up and rubbed snow against her face. I slapped her a few times and then, her eyes came down and she quivered.

“What—? What—?”

“Nothing. Let’s get up.”

“What—?” I put my hands under her arms and helped her up. She leaned against me, rubbing at her chin. Then she giggled. “My God, what did that little man hit me with?”

“A fist. Backed up with that wide ring on his finger. See?”

I pointed and she looked. Then she looked back at me quickly, her hand moving up to her mouth. “Is he—?”

“He is. I might have stood still for a stick-up, I always say a dead hero can’t hear his praises. But that guy was a hophead on a shooting spree, and a guy like that, you’ve got nothing to lose trying to take him. If you stand still, you get killed. So you try. You all right?”

“I think so.”

“Can you drive?”

“According to you, I can’t.”

“No. I mean, are you capable, you know—”

“I know, exactly. And I’m capable, damned capable.”

“Okay. I’ll pile him into his car and I’ll follow behind you. When we get to the Highway, we look for a cop. Check?”

“Yes.”

I took him by his coat collar and dragged him, his heels making two wavering lines in the snow. She started the flivver while I arranged him in a lumpy bundle in back. Then I got behind his wheel and waved to her and our two-car procession bumped along Lorimer Boulevard seeking the Highway.

We found a cop directing traffic through the slush near the bridge. I got out and talked to him and he came back with me and we all went to the nearest precinct. We parked outside and the cop went in for help and they carried the dead man into the station house. Gene and I were taken up to the detectives’ room and we sat around and told our stories to oscillating faces. Then the big shots arrived and we told our stories again, to stenographers and to wire recorders. More big shots arrived; now we produced identification, and told our stories again.

Finally Sam Anderson came, an inspector in Queens, who used to be with Homicide in Manhattan. Sam recognized me, but better, he had recognized our plump cadaver. He was Perry Agufen, a goon from way back. Now we were popular. The faces stopped shaking and began nodding. A young doctor came in and announced that Mr. Agufen was filled to the gills with hop.

Sam Anderson said, “Always was. All right, there’s no use detaining these people.” He shook hands with me. “There’s no explaining a guy when he’s charged. Maybe he got his marbles mixed on what started out to be a hold-up. Or maybe he was showing off, to himself. Or maybe he was real sore at you for not letting him pass. Or maybe he knew exactly what he was doing. Who can figure a guy on the needle? And what’s the difference? I congratulate you. It’s another killer off the streets, and good riddance. If there’s any call on this, we know where to find you folks. Good-by, Pete. Good-by, ma’am.”

Outside, fleece-clouds mottled the sky. The wind was sharp and biting and the beginning of winter darkness was sad. We ran into the car and before I started the motor I kissed her once on the chin.

“What’s that for?” she said.

“Nothing. Just glad to be with you, that’s all.”

“I’m glad to be with you too, Peter.”

I stepped on the starter and we went. She slumped down and dozed. We got back to town early enough, for all the current events we’d helped to create. I parked in front of her house, kissed her on the chin again, and got out of the car. “Cold compresses,” I said, “will have that chin of yours back in shape in no time.”

“See you later, Pete.”

I was a tired guy in a taxicab. I was a tired guy putting five thousand dollars into the dresser drawer in my bedroom. I was a tired guy drooping under a warm shower. Then I took the pillow off an easy chair, buried the telephone, added more pillows, and went to bed.

I tried to think upon the matters that I had been retained to think upon, but I decided, perforce, to save that for a working day. Today was Christmas. I reached for the clock and set the alarm for nine-thirty. Then I spread-eagled and let the ceiling come down on me.

Surprisingly, I slept till nine-thirty. If the phone had rung, the pillows had smothered it. I disinterred the telephone, put the pillows in place, shaved, showered, shampooed, shrugged, and got dressed. Then the doorbell sounded off. Company was early.

Company wasn’t company. Company was Louis Parker, detective-lieutenant, filling the doorway, jamb to jamb, squat, dark, and lugubrious.

“Well,” I said, “the good detective-lieutenant. Welcome, always welcome.”

He opened the fingers of a thick right hand and placed them against my chest and put some weight behind that. I moved back into my apartment, precipitously. He closed the door behind him and threw me his hat and coat, and I hung them away. I hurried with a match for his cigar and I brought him a drink. He drank it and wiped his mouth. Sadly he said, “I’m going to take you in, my boy. I’m going to shove you into the clink and I’m going to let you rot. A lot of people in the Department are going to shake my hand for that. You’re turning out to be, of all things, a son of a bitch. You, of all people.”

“Profanity, professor.”

“How long can a man be an angel?”

“Sit down, angel. Have another drink. It’s Christmas.”

He sat down. He had another drink. He said, “Get your hat and coat. We’re going downtown. I’m going to let some people shove you around, experts.”

“What’s the matter with you, Louis?”

“Fred Thompson. That’s what’s the matter with me.”

“Fred Thompson?”

“A guy in plaid pants and a red beard on Thirteenth Street.”

“Oh. Fred Thompson.”

“Correct. Oh, Fred Thompson. We get a call on that, a couple of hours ago.”

“Have a drink, Louis.”

“No more drinks.”

“Who called?”

“A dame.”

“Name?”

“No name.”

“A dame without a name”

“That’s right. A dame without a name. A dame, anonymous.”

“Good old anonymous.”

“Solves more crimes than all the criminologists, and all the private eyes, and all the police departments put together. Good Old Anonymous.”

“So?” I said.

“We check. He’s dead. Fred Thompson with the wine-red beard. At Thirteen-b West Thirteenth Street.”

“How long dead?”

“Dead more than twenty-four hours. Autopsy fixes it about the time those watches say. You know those watches? A wrist watch and an electric timepiece. Where’s the gun?”

“Gun?”

“Gun, shooting-piece, side-arm, lethal weapon. Yesterday, you had me drop you on Thirteenth and Fifth. A landlady at Thirteen-b West Thirteenth describes you perfectly, only you’re a messenger boy. Guess who your message is for? You wouldn’t believe it. Fred Thompson. Next it’s Alger Shaw combing the night clubs. Who sent him? You. You want to know about a guy with a wine-red beard who was there the night before. We talk to you about it at Grace White’s …
before
we got word on the dead body on Thirteenth. So you throw us Barney Bernandino. You keep chopping it up. Why? What’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing, Louis, honest.”

“Then we get the phone call. We find wine-red. Right away you’re in a pickle. I called you here. No answer.”

“I was sleeping.”

“Don’t interrupt. Let me finish about Fred Thompson. We give him a shave. It isn’t Fred Thompson at all. Guess who he is?”

“How would I know?”

“How would you know, except that one of our people goes up to check Sheldon Talbot’s daughter, because that’s who the guy is after the shave, and the daughter says she’s not talking, but please talk to Peter Chambers, because he is now representing the estate, or something. You wouldn’t know who Fred Thompson turned out to be after the shave, now would you?”

“Please, Lieutenant—”

“Somebody goes to talk to Mrs. Theresa Talbot. She’s not talking either. You want to know why? Peter Chambers. He’s doing the talking for her. He’s doing the talking for everybody. Well, here’s your chance. Talk.”

“It’s complicated, Louis.”

“You were up there yesterday, weren’t you?”

“Yes, Louis.”

“And you didn’t report it, did you?”

“No, Louis.”

“Did you take that gun out of there?”