The Dangerous Ladies Affair

by Marcia Muller

  He glowered at her. There wasn’t a trace of the seductive charm, the predatory lothario he had exhibited in his office at Bradford and Egan; in a sense he stood naked before her, his true vindictive, phlegmatic, self-involved nature revealed in all its unsavoriness. Then, abruptly, he turned on his heel and stomped out.

  Sabina finished fastening her hat with her favorite Charles Horner pin, wondering again how a woman as bright as Amity could be fooled by such a man. She herself had seen through him at their first meeting, although admittedly she had had advance warning. But then, loneliness and physical attraction were powerful temptations that could lead even the most intelligent individual to don temporary blinders.

  She waited long enough to allow Egan to leave the building, then left herself to deliver the Featherstone file to Cornelius Sutton.

  17

  QUINCANNON

  The night’s unexpected events aboard the Captain Weber and a scant few hours of restless sleep combined to put Quincannon in a foul humor come morning. Awake at dawn, he dressed straightaway and left the cabin. The day was dull gray with swarming clouds, the wind blustery and cold again—weather that worked to his advantage, for it allowed him to once more hide most of his bearded face with his high-wrapped muffler and low-pulled cap. Warm beverages and bakery goods were available in the Social Hall, where only a handful of other early risers had gathered, none of them his quarry or her guest. He drank as much coffee as he could hold, then went out on deck and occupied himself in alternately pacing and standing at the starboard rail astern in a pretense of watching their course past long stretches of broad, yellowish farmland and banks thickly grown with willows, tangles of wild grape, and mistletoe-festooned cottonwoods.

  They had come out of the last of the snakelike bends in the river and were on the long reach to Stockton when Buffalo Coat appeared with his possibles bag and entered the Social Hall. Quincannon was close enough to get a better look at him by daylight. His guess of the previous night was accurate: no older than thirty-five, a powder keg of a man with short stubby arms and legs and a large head that seemed to sit squarely on his shoulders. Faugh! Either Pauline Dupree had tastes in men that included the coarse and ugly or he was another of her dupes. Perhaps both.

  It was only when the Captain Weber whistled her final approach that Dupree herself ventured out on deck with her carpetbag. Quincannon spied her as she went to stand at the starboard rail, again wearing the distinctive red-and-gold cape and ostrich-plume hat. She stood looking downriver, paying no attention to him or any of the other passengers now abroad.

  Buffalo Coat emerged from the Social Hall shortly afterward, but instead of joining her he stood at the rail amidships. Not to be seen together in the light of day, evidently. Which would seem to indicate that once ashore they would go their separate ways.

  The Captain Weber docked at the landing at the foot of Stockton’s Center Street, the gangplank was lowered, and the deckhouse passengers began to descend and then to disembark. The actress was among the first group, again refusing a deckhand’s offer of aid with her carpetbag. Buffalo Coat followed at a distance, Quincannon fairly close behind him.

  Horse-drawn streetcars and a line of hansom cabs waited on the street. It was no surprise that Dupree made straight to the cab at the front. Buffalo Coat went to join the queue waiting to board one of the streetcars. Quincannon had the darkly fanciful wish that he could divide himself in two, so that he could follow the man as well as his quarry. He was keen to know what the lad was up to—but even more keen to find out where the actress was bound.

  As her cab drove away, he hurried to the next in line. Feigning breathlessness, he said to the driver, “Dratted woman! Couldn’t wait for me, blast her.”

  “How’s that, sir?”

  “My wife. We had a spat just before landing and off she went in a huff without telling me our exact destination. She handles all the details when we travel, you see. That’s her in the cab that just departed. Would you be so good as to follow? There’ll be an extra half-dollar in it for you.”

  The cabbie, probably married himself, had no objections. He gigged his horse and they clattered out onto Center Street.

  Quincannon knew that Stockton had grown appreciably during the past decade, but since his last trip here four years ago it seemed to be still sprouting. It was now a major transportation and commercial center, its economy driven by flour mills, carriage and wagon factories, iron foundries, farm machinery, and shipyards. Buildings newly erected and in various stages of construction dotted the route into the city center and throughout the downtown.

  Pauline Dupree’s destination turned out to be East Main Street and the Yosemite Hotel. A block square, containing two hundred rooms in two stories set above a gallery-windowed main floor, its roof surmounted by a huge American flag, the Yosemite was considered Stockton’s finest hostelry. She departed from her cab at the main entrance. Quincannon, pretending clumsiness, fumbled coins from his change purse to give her time to enter the hotel before he paid the hack driver and followed.

  Quincannon shook his head at the door porter, rebuffing him as Dupree had, for she still had her carpetbag in hand as she approached the front desk. Casually, as if examining the lobby’s reasonably lavish furnishings, he moved to a vantage point behind one of numerous urn-encased palms and philodendrons distributed about the lobby. As far as he could tell from a distance, Dupree either was engaging a room or had already done so by wire; he watched her complete the registration and receive a key. But instead of heading for the bank of elevators, she carried her bag through the open glass doors to the dining room, where breakfast was evidently still being served.

  Quincannon bought a copy of the Stockton Record from a lobby vendor, then found a velvet plush chair partially concealed by another of the potted plants from where he had an oblique look into the dining room. The actress sat at a dining table near one of the windows, fortunately with her back to the lobby. His mouth began to water as he watched her linger over whatever repast she’d ordered; he made an effort to force his mind away from food.

  Resign yourself, John lad, he told himself. It’s likely to be some while before you’re able to partake of another meal yourself.

  When Pauline Dupree rose after finishing her breakfast, he raised the newspaper above eye level and peeked around its edges as she reentered the lobby. This time, looking neither left nor right, she went straight to the elevator bank. Once she was inside one of the cars with the door closed, he stood quickly and drifted over there. The indicator arm above the door told him her room was on the top floor.

  He resumed his surveillance in a different chair shaded by a different and somewhat larger plant. More than an hour passed, sufficient time for her to have bathed and changed clothes if she intended to go out again. But no, that was not her intention—not yet, at any rate. Another half hour crept away, during which he finished reading the newspaper. Waiting in her room for someone, mayhap Buffalo Coat, or Noah Rideout if he were here in Stockton rather than on Schyler Island. Or for it to be time to keep an appointment elsewhere—

  A voice at his elbow said, “Excuse me, sir.”

  He looked up to see a towheaded uniformed bellboy not long out of his teens. “Yes?”

  “Mr. Potter would like to speak to you.”

  “Mr. Potter?”

  “The desk clerk, sir.”

  Quincannon ambled over to the desk, removing his cap but leaving his muffler wound up over his chin. The clerk, who could barely lay claim to having a chin, gave him a down-the-nose look and then ran his gaze from the muffler down over the buttoned chesterfield.

  “Touch of the grippe,” Quincannon lied.

  “Pity,” the clerk lied. “But the lobby of our establishment is hardly a place to nurse an illness.”

  The comment pricked Quincannon’s temper. He managed to restrain a sharp retort. “That is not why I’m here,” he said.

  “Indeed? Do you wish to engage a room, Mr.…?”

&nb
sp; “Flint, James Flint. I’m not sure yet.”

  “Not sure?”

  “Do you know Noah Rideout? Prominent businessman and farmer on Schyler Island in the delta.”

  “An unusual name. And not familiar to me.”

  Which told Quincannon that the Yosemite was not Rideout’s choice of hotels whenever he had occasion to visit Stockton. What it didn’t tell him was whether or not Pauline Dupree was planning a tryst with Rideout or if she had some other reason for engaging the room.

  He said, “I am supposed to meet Mr. Rideout here today on business, but it wasn’t made clear just when the meeting is to take place. Or if we’ll be spending the night or returning to the delta on the night packet. Would you mind if I waited in the lobby for him?”

  Tiny frown lines radiated from the corners of the clerk’s eyes. “You don’t know where to reach the gentleman?” he asked.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “What time will he be arriving?”

  “Sometime today, that is all I can tell you. Very sketchy plans, I know, but our arrangement was made in quite a hurry.”

  “You wish to remain in the lobby until he arrives?”

  “As long as necessary, yes.” Quincannon produced a silver dollar from his purse and, along with it, a pleading look. “You understand my dilemma, I’m sure. It is really quite important that I meet with Mr. Rideout.”

  The clerk looked disdainfully at the coin. “Really, sir,” he said, but the tenor of his voice and a hint of avarice in his pale eyes belied the disdain.

  Reluctantly, Quincannon added another silver dollar. And then a third, the necessity for which caused his blood pressure to rise—the amount of money he was wasting on tips and bribes offended his thrifty Scot’s nature—before the clerk made the coins disappear and gave his permission.

  Quincannon started to turn away, then reversed himself to ask, “Was that Miss Pauline Dupree who checked in earlier? The statuesque young woman in the red-and-gold cape.”

  “Yes. It was.”

  “I thought I recognized her, being from San Francisco myself. Perhaps she’ll join Mr. Rideout and me for a cocktail this evening. What room is she in?”

  “I am not at liberty to give out that information. Hotel policy, which mustn’t be breached. Not for any consideration,” he added meaningfully. “If you like, I can have a message delivered to her.”

  “Later, perhaps.”

  Quincannon resumed his vigil. Noon came and went. So did various and sundry guests and other individuals, none of them Pauline Dupree. The hotel’s central heating made him uncomfortable in his heavy clothing; he had no choice but to unbutton his coat, lower the muffler, and remove the cap to avoid marinating in sweat. The chinless clerk kept casting disapproving looks in his direction, as if he was thinking of reneging on their bribery pact. That annoyance, along with boredom, restlessness, and frustration, deepened Quincannon’s irascibility. He bought the current issue of the Police Gazette, but the magazine did little to make the creeping passage of time more tolerable. One o’clock came and went. One-thirty—

  Buffalo Coat entered the lobby.

  Quincannon straightened in his chair, watching the man cross to the front desk without so much as a glance in his direction. At some point Buffalo Coat had acquired another piece of luggage, a black leather satchel. He spoke briefly to the chinless clerk, who then, apparently answering a request, provided him with a sheet of hotel stationery, an envelope, and pen and ink. He transferred the satchel to his left hand, as if he was reluctant to set it down, and proceeded to write. The message was relatively brief: he used only one side of the paper. When he was finished he folded the sheet, sealed it inside the envelope, and handed the envelope and a coin to the clerk. After which he quickly left the hotel.

  By Godfrey! That black satchel was similar to the one Titus Wrixton had given to Raymond Sonderberg and, unless Quincannon missed his guess, had similar contents—money extorted, this time from Noah Rideout. The same villainous game worked in the same fashion, with Buffalo Coat assuming the go-between role here as Sonderberg had in San Francisco. But why hadn’t he delivered the payoff to Dupree? Why the writing of the note and a swift exit instead?

  Quincannon itched to follow Buffalo Coat, perhaps to eventually confront him and retrieve the swag, but such would have been a mistake. His suppositions were just that, suppositions. Even if the satchel contained a large amount of cash, he had no proof that it had been nefariously obtained and hence no justification for either confiscating it or yaffling Buffalo Coat. Besides which, his primary quarry was still and to the finish Pauline Dupree.

  He stayed put, watching the clerk summon the towheaded bellboy and hand him the envelope. The bellboy put it on a silver tray and took it into one of the elevator cars. Assuming the message was for the actress, and a probable assumption it was, Quincannon was eager to find out what she would do once she read it.

  Except that as far as he was able to discern she did nothing. The bellboy reappeared shortly, but not Dupree. Not in the next half hour, nor in the next after that.

  Quincannon’s disgruntlement increased twofold. While the clerk was busy with a small group of newly arrived guests, he sought out the bellboy. As with most of the lad’s breed, his tongue was easily loosened by yet another coin from Quincannon’s purse.

  “Yes, sir,” he said, after a covert glance at the front desk. “It was Miss Dupree I delivered the envelope to.”

  “What room does she occupy?”

  “Two-seventy-two.”

  “Were you present while she read the message in the envelope?”

  “On my way out. She seemed kind of upset.”

  “Did she, now.”

  “She made a funny little noise and I heard her say … well, an unladylike word, sir.”

  So the message had upset her, had it? A falling out among thieves? A double cross of some sort, such as Buffalo Coat laying claim to all or part of the loot?

  But still, she remained in her room. An array of women passed through the lobby, among them a pink-outfitted matron leading a mastiff on a gold chain leash and a Catholic nun in full habit, but there was no sign of Pauline Dupree. Four o’clock vanished. The bumptious clerk was replaced by another, apparently without anything having been said about the daylong presence of Mr. James Flint; the new clerk paid no attention to him.

  Five o’clock. Five-thirty. A quarter of six.

  Quincannon was in a lather by then. Lack of food and the enforced sitting had given him a pounding headache, not to mention a sore backside; his body felt as if he’d taken a steam bath with his clothes on, and his brain seethed with impotent fury.

  At ten minutes to six by the Seth Thomas lobby clock, he threw caution to the wind, hoisted himself out of the chair, picked up his valise, and stalked to the elevators. He’d had his fill of this useless game of all cat and no mouse. The time had come to confront Pauline Dupree again, tell her what he knew and suspected about her liaisons with Noah Rideout and Buffalo Coat, and damn the consequences.

  On the second floor he found his way to room 272 and rapped on the door, intending to claim bellboy status and the arrival of another message. The ruse went unused, however, for there was no response from within. He rapped again, then a third time. Silence. And the door stayed shut.

  The hallway was deserted in both directions. Tight-lipped, he took from his pocket the pouch containing his set of lockpicks. It took no more than a minute to trip the tumblers in the door lock.

  The room was empty.

  Empty of not only Pauline Dupree but her carpetbag as well.

  Quincannon unleashed an inventive string of oaths fiery enough to have melted brimstone—but only in his mind. A quick search of the room and adjoining bath revealed none of the actress’ belongings, nor the note she had received from Buffalo Coat; the only signs of her occupancy were the slightly mussed pillows and counterpane on the four-poster bed and the faint lingering scent of lavender perfume.

  The contents o
f the message must have been responsible for her departure. And she must have left the hotel by way of the back stairs. But why? The obvious answer was that she had spotted him somehow, but he was reluctant to accept that explanation. His mastery of the art of trailing a suspect was second to none; at no point last night or today had he done anything to draw her attention. And she had no reason to suspect she was being followed. Unless Wrixton had decided to make one last effort to convince her not to leave San Francisco and had told her of the conversation at the Reception bar … No, the banker had been too resigned, too mired in gloom, to attempt an exercise in further futility. All of his lovesick blandishments had been expended the previous night.

  Whatever her reason for the surreptitious leave-taking, it surely involved Buffalo Coat and that satchel he’d carried. It followed, then, that where she’d gone was where she expected to find him. Elsewhere in Stockton? Kennett’s Crossing?

  Quincannon quit the room, leaving the door unlocked, and went downstairs to the front desk. The night clerk was more accommodating and less greedy than the chinless day clerk, making it unnecessary to part with another bribe in order to obtain information.

  Quincannon’s first question was “Was Miss Dupree’s bill paid in advance?”

  “Why do you ask, sir?”

  “She and I are … acquainted. If she hasn’t paid herself … well, I’m sure you understand.”

  The clerk was no stranger to the discreet affairs of hotel guests. After consulting her account, he said, “You needn’t be concerned. She paid when she checked in.”

  “For one night’s lodging?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  So she hadn’t skipped out on her bill. And the fact that she had booked her room for only one night and now abandoned it indicated that she had no intention of remaining in Stockton. Chances were she had booked passage on one of this evening’s night packets, all of which would have left by this hour. If she was already on her way to Sacramento, he might never track her down. But if her destination was the San Joaquin Delta and Kennett’s Crossing, where Buffalo Coat had kept his rendezvous with her, there might still be a chance of finding her.