Sharon wasn’t there either. As nearly as I could make out, there were only three couples in the room. Two were dancing naked to the low-toned music of the record player, Apple and his youthful partner were leaning against the bar wrapped in each other’s arms. Neither dancing couple was Sharon and Greco, nor Farrell and Isobel.
Giving up the search, I felt my way into the center hall. No one was there. There was a choice of doors leading off the hall, but I assumed the rearmost would lead to the kitchen.
As I felt my way through it, a naked body pressed against me and a pair of plump arms went about my neck.
“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming, honey,” Louise Apple whispered. Then she jammed her mouth against mine.
CHAPTER X
REACHING OUT to push the woman away, I got two handfuls of enormous breast. Now unsupported by a brassiere, they were soft and flabby and must have drooped nearly to her navel. Hurriedly I raised my hands to her shoulders and managed to break the kiss.
“You’ve still got all your clothes on, honey,” she whispered. “Let me help you get them off.”
She began pushing my coat off of my shoulders.
In the darkness I reached out and gave her cheek a tender pat. “Not here,” I said. “Aren’t there bedrooms upstairs?”
She stopped tugging at the coat. “They’re probably all taken. Want to go see?”
“I have a stop to make first,” I said. “Why don’t you wait for me at the bottom of the stairs?”
“A stop?” she inquired puzzledly.
“Isn’t there a bathroom around here somewhere?”
She giggled. Reaching for my hand, she led me across the hall and opened a door. Pushing me inside, she said in a low voice, “The light switch is on the right. Close the door before you turn it on. Otherwise it will shine in the front room.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Hurry, honey,” she whispered. I’ll be waiting.”
“Okay,” I repeated.
I heard her pad away on bare feet. Waiting a few seconds, I slipped from the bathroom and felt my way to the kitchen again. Visibility wasn’t any better there than in the hall, because the moon was in front of the house and didn’t cast its rays through the kitchen windows. The oblongs of a couple of windows and the upper glass pane of a door were outlined against the moonlit outdoors, however. I groped my way to the door, bumping lightly against a table en route.
The rear door was both locked and bolted. I had to use my pencil flashlight to locate the bolt, but finally I got it open. Stepping out onto a small back porch, I blinked the light four times.
The lanky figure of Carl Lincoln appeared from a cluster of trees a hundred feet behind the house. Three other figures followed, and all four soundlessly moved across the grass to the back porch. They halted at the bottom of the steps.
Peering up at me, Carl asked in a whisper, “The front door unlocked, too?”
“Uh-huh,” I said.
Carl issued crisp but low-toned orders. “Ed, get around front and bring the others in the front way. Leave one guarding the door when you come in. We’ll give you forty-five seconds to get organized, then we’ll come in the back way. Smith, you stand by this rear door after the rest of us go in, and don’t let anyone out. Start moving, Ed.”
Ed rounded the corner of the house at a soundless trot. Carl raised his wrist to peer at the luminous dial of his watch and kept his gaze fixed on it, counting off the seconds. Three-quarters of a minute ticked by in silence.
“Okay,” Carl said. “Let’s go in.” Quietly he ascended the steps.
I led the way inside. Carl and his two remaining men followed.
With the aid of my pencil flash I located the kitchen wall switch and flicked it on. Smith leaned his back against the door as the other three of us moved into the center hall. The glow from the kitchen lighted the hall enough to see the switch there. The light from the hall spilled out into the front room. Moving in there in a body, we simultaneously switched on three lamps.
Ed and two other plain-clothes officers appeared from the front foyer. Seeing we had the front room under control, they moved the other way. One planted himself in front of the door, the other two continued on into the dining room.
There was a flurry of activity in the front room. The record player was still playing softly, but no one was dancing. The young man who had been dancing with one of the married woman was now prone on a sofa with her. Bouncing up, he ran to a chair where his clothing was piled and hurriedly began to pull it on, all the time staring at us with a startled expression on his face. For a moment the woman continued to lie on the sofa. Then she slowly rose to a seated position and gave the frantically dressing young man a confused look. She was in such a dreamy state from marijuana and whatever was mixed with the punch, she didn’t seem to notice us. All her attention was centered on trying to understand why her youthful partner had suddenly left her.
Paunchy George Apple and his young companion were on the floor in front of the bar. He leaped up and rushed for his clothing. The girl continued to lie there with her thighs spread. She gave us a puzzled look, then stared at the ceiling and seemed to pass into a coma.
The third couple was all tangled up in an easy chair. Both scrambled erect and ran into the dining room, apparently having left their clothing there. The officer guarding the door watched with amused interest as they sped by.
Louise Apple was standing at the foot of the stairs where I had told her to wait. Apparently she couldn’t remember where she had left her clothing, for she started toward the dining room, changed her mind and wildly darted her gaze about the front room. It didn’t register on her at once that I was part of the raiding party, because she finally rushed over to me with her arms protectively crossed over her sagging bosom.
“What is it, Matt?” she gasped. “Police?”
“Uh-huh,” I said, holding out my open wallet with the badge showing.
For a few moments she gazed at the badge without understanding. Then she slowly reddened. In an accusing voice she said, “You! After all we’ve been to each other!”
Carl emitted a sound which resembled a snicker, but when I gave him a sharp glance, his expression was entirely innocent.
I said to the officer with us, “Take over in here. Carl, let’s see what they bagged in the dining room.”
As we started toward the entry foyer, Big Joe Greco quietly descended the stairs. He was fully clothed. He glanced at the cop on the door, flicked his gaze about the room and crossed to lean an elbow on the bar. He didn’t ask any questions. He knew what was going on.
Carl gazed back at the man thoughtfully, a look of half-recognition on his face. But when I tugged at his arm and said, “Come on,” he shrugged and followed me into the other room.
In the dining room the pair which had run there from the front room was desperately pulling on clothing. No one else was there except the two cops. Neither was paying any attention to the couple, being too busy collecting evidence. One was lifting the remaining brown-paper cigarettes from the dishes on the table, the other was picking brown butts from ash trays and dropping them into an envelope.
“We’ll want what’s left in that punch bowl for lab analysis, too,” I said. “It has some kind of an aphrodisiac in it.”
Ed nodded and Carl and I circled on into the center hall again to check the doors off it. The bathroom was empty. There were two other closed doors. One led to a storage closet, the other into a small study where there was a writing desk and a day bed. The light in here had already been switched on and two people were in the room. One was the second young girl, the other one of the middle-aged men. The activity in the others rooms must have alerted them to what was going on, for both were nearly dressed. The man was just shrugging into his jacket and the girl was slipping on her shoes.
I said laconically, “Police raid, folks. Go on in the front room.”
As they slipped by me with frightened faces, I noticed a neat pile of
clothing on the writing desk. There was an emerald-green formal gown, some black lingerie and a pair of sheer stockings. On the floor alongside the desk stood the transparent plastic slippers I knew Sharon had worn. I picked up the clothing and the slippers.
“Let’s try the second floor,” I said to Carl. “There’s still about a half dozen people to account for.”
Apple and the young man in the front room were completely clothed when we went through this time. Both their companions were too high on the mixture of alcohol, reefers and love potion to comprehend what was going on, however. The two men were attempting to get them dressed, but they weren’t getting much co-operation. The older woman kept trying to put her arms about the young man, the girl with the teen-age body just stood there with the same dreamy expression she had worn when George Apple went through the process of undressing her. The watching police officer wasn’t much help. He seemed to make the men nervous.
The couple we had routed from the study huddled in a corner. Louise had located her clothing somewhere and was struggling into a girdle. She gave me an aggrieved look as we went by.
As we went up the stairs, Carl kept glancing at the pile of woman’s clothing I was carrying. I didn’t bother to explain it.
The upstairs was still dark. I flicked a switch at the top of the stairs which lighted up the hallway. The upper hall ran the length of the house, with three doors off of each side of it. All of them were closed,
I gestured left in indication that Carl should take that side, opened the first door on the right and switched on the light.
In my job you eventually become almost shock-proof, but every so often I still run into something which rocks me back on my heels. What was going on in the room managed to rock me.
Three people were on the bed together, undoubtedly the same three I had seen previously going up the stairs in the dark with their arms about each other. One was the second young man, whose name I recalled was Lester something-or-other. Another was a squat-hipped woman who had been introduced to me as Mrs. Franklin. The third was a man whose name I didn’t recall. They were playing sandwich, with Mrs. Franklin as the meat.
Their first reaction was indignation at being interrupted. Flashing my badge, I growled, “Police raid. Break it up and get your clothes on.”
Their indignation faded rapidly. I didn’t wait to see what their second reaction was. I turned on my heel in time to meet Carl coming from the room across the hall.
“This one’s empty,” he said.
The trio I had interrupted streamed out of the door behind me and fled down the stairs. Carl eyed them curiously, but he didn’t make any comment.
In the second room I found Sharon lying on the bed naked. At least she was alone. She looked up at me vaguely, so high on alcohol and drugs, she didn’t even recognize me.
Tossing her clothes on the bed, I said, “Police raid, Sharon. Get ‘em on.”
She gave me a dreamy smile.
Rolling her over on her stomach, I gave her round little bottom a resounding smack. All this got me was a puzzled frown. Hauling her off the bed, I held her erect as she swayed back and forth.
Carl Lincoln appeared in the doorway grasping Ross Whittier by the arm. The little man still had on his Homburg. He looked terrified.
Carl examined Sharon with interest. Preoccupiedly he said, “I found this hiding in a closet.”
“He’s the ex-husband of the hostess,”I said. “He wasn’t invited to the party. He was just snooping around to see what was going on. Let him go downstairs.”
Carl released his grip and Whittier scurried for the stairs.
Carl ran his gaze appreciatively up and down Sharon’s body again. “This the daughter?” he inquired.
“Yeah,” I said coldly. “Get your eyes back in your head and give me a hand.”
Between us, with hardly any co-operation from Sharon, we managed to get her clothed. I balanced her upright and let Carl pull her clothing on. He was very careful to touch her as little as possible in the process, because he didn’t like my cold tone when I had told him to get his eyes back in his head. Not that he’s ordinarily a feel-sneaker. He just didn’t want to let his hands accidentally touch her anywhere I might resent.
When she was fully clothed, I released my hold on her and she collapsed on the bed again.
The room Sharon was in had a connecting bath with the final room on that side of the hall. It was empty and the door to the next room was locked on the other side. I came back out into the hall just as Carl opened the last door on his side.
“Who are you?” I heard Howard Farrell’s voice inquire from inside.
I walked to the door in time to see Carl flash his badge. Farrell was seated on the bed fully clothed, a pillow to his back. A bed lamp over his head was burning. He was smoking a cigarette.
It wasn’t a brown-wrapped cigarette, but it was obvious he was still high on the reefer he had shared with Isobel downstairs. He realized he was caught in a raid, but he was high enough not to dare. He studied the badge with indifference.
“So you’re a cop,” he said. “Am I breaking some law sitting here?”
“Where’s Isobel?” I inquired.
He didn’t realize I was one of the raiding party. Staring at me owlishly, he said in an affable tone, “That’s what I’d like to know, old man. She stopped by her own room to make some—ah—preparations, then was supposed to join me here. But it seems to me I’ve been waiting some time. Of course it’s hard to tell when you’re on the smoke. Time drifts along at a different pace.”
I said to Carl, “Send him downstairs with the others,” and crossed the hall to the last room.
I found Isobel Whittier there. She lay on her back on the bed without a stitch of clothing on. This seemed to be her own bedroom, for the closet door was open and I could see the flame-red formal she had been wearing hanging in the closet. Her underthings were neatly folded on the seat of a chair.
She didn’t move when I switched on the fight. When I approached the bed, I saw why.
The thin metallic shaft of what appeared to be a letter opener protruded from between her naked breasts.
CHAPTER XI
THE WOMAN’S eyes were wide open and she had no pulse. I dropped her wrist and glanced around the room. There was no indication that there had been any sort of a struggle. I looked back at the body again. The blade was centered exactly between her breasts, with the handle slanting slightly upward, an unlikely angle for suicide. Besides, her arms were at her sides. While it was possible that they might have straightened out in a reflex action after plunging the blade into herself, it was more likely that both hands would have been crossed on her stomach. Stabbing suicides usually push in the blade with both hands.
I had left the door only slightly ajar. Behind me it pushed open and Carl Lincoln said, “He’s gone downstairs. What’s with her? Too much stick and goof juice?”
“Too much steel,” I said.
Carl walked over to look down at her. His eyes widened and he emitted a low whistle.
“Dead?” he inquired.
“Uh-huh.”
He glanced around just as I had done, then looked back at the body. “It wasn’t suicide,” he decided.
“Suicide or murder, we just got ourselves outranked on this case. Let’s go phone Homicide.”
We glanced into each room on the way to the staircase. They were all now empty except for the one Sharon was in. She was quietly sleeping.
We decided to leave her there.
Downstairs we discovered that everyone was now dressed. The other officers had gathered them all in the front room and were taking down names and addresses. There was a phone in the front room, but I didn’t care to broadcast just yet that there had been a death in the house. Recalling having seen an extension in the study, I walked on through to the center hall with Carl trailing after me.
As we entered the study, Carl said, “That guy leaning against the bar, Matt. That bullet head is familiar. Who
is he?”
“He was introduced to me as Mr. Grace,” I said innocently. “Joe Grace, I think.”
Carl frowned in puzzlement, then shook his head, “I’d swear I’ve seen that face somewhere.”
I picked up the phone on the writing desk and dialed Homicide.
It was twenty minutes before a homicide team arrived, which was still pretty fast considering it had to come from clear downtown. With so many cops already on the scene, headquarters didn’t bother having the nearest radio car check in first, as is routine in homicide complaints. While waiting for the homicide boys to show, I went back upstairs to awaken Sharon.
She didn’t want to wake up. I got her on her feet, walked her around, took her into the connecting bath and splashed cold water in her face. Eventually she came alive enough to stand without falling down, but she wasn’t very coherent. She finally seemed to recognize me, because she inquired in a querulous voice what I was doing to her, but she didn’t seem to know where she was.
Supporting her by one arm, I led her downstairs. She wanted to collapse on the sofa in the front room, but I leaned her against the bar and told her to stay there. With her back to it, she rested both elbows on the bar and blearily looked around.
By now everyone but three of the women realized that I was a cop and had blown the whistle on them. Sharon, the young girl who had been with Apple and the woman who had been on the front-room sofa with one of the young men, were still too high to know what was going on. The rest sat around or stood around glaring at me resentfully.
The homicide team which showed up consisted of Lieutenant Robert Wynn and Sergeant Hank Carter. They brought with them a lab technician, a photographer and a medical examiner. I met them at the door and led them straight upstairs without first taking them into the front room.
As Wynn sood looking at the body, I said, “Notice how neatly she’s laid out?”
Bob Wynn is a short, dumpy man of fifty with a cranky expression and disposition to match. His partner, Sergeant Hank Carter, is a sad-looking redhead over six feet tall, but so skinny he tips the scales at only one-forty. He’s sad-looking from working with Wynn for so many years.
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