In a Lonely Place

by Dorothy B. Hughes

  Dix shut the door with a thud. He crushed the card in his fist. Damn snoops. Why should they or anyone care what had happened to Mel Terriss? Stupid, sodden, alcoholic Mel. The world was better off without Mel Terrisses in it. Why should Laurel care? Unless she were trying to get Dix into trouble.

  Let them prove, let them try to prove he didn’t have a secretary. He’d go through the bills and the ads. Send the harmless ones, the ones without purchases after July. He shouldn’t have used the charge accounts, but it was an easy way to do it. So easy.

  It was Mel, fat-headed Mel, who was going to run him out of California. Before he was ready to go. Before Laurel came back. He’d be damned if he would. He’d settle with Laurel before he left. They couldn’t hang a man for using a friend’s charge accounts. Particularly if the friend had told him to make use of them. No one could prove Mel hadn’t told him that.

  He wanted a drink more than ever; he was so angry he was rigid. Again he didn’t dare. At least not until lunch time. It was legitimate then, not before, unless you were a confirmed alcoholic like your friend, Mel.

  He should have asked them about another disappearing client. He should have said: By the by, what’s happened to your client, Laurel Gray? She’s missing too, didn’t you know? Maybe she’s gone to join Mel.

  His face darkened with rage. He flung the crumpled card into the basket. He wasn’t going to sit around and be questioned by any lugs who happened by. He’d dress and get out of here. Quick.

  But the phone stopped him. The silent phone by his bed. He sat down and he dialed Laurel’s number. The sound of ringing went on and on until he hung up. She hadn’t sneaked back in. There was an idea nagging at the back of his mind: it had been there last night; it was there again now. It had to be faced. Laurel could have moved out of the Virginibus Arms.

  He didn’t dare go to the manager’s apartment and ask. The old bag might start thinking up her questions about Mel. He’d had enough of Mel today. He could go up to Laurel’s apartment; that he would dare. But it was pointless; she wasn’t at home. She’d answer the phone if she were; she’d be afraid not to, afraid it might be a business call. He picked up the phone book, then laid it down. He wouldn’t phone the manager from here. Not and chance having the call traced. Go out to a booth, disguise his voice. Not that the manager would know it, but someone might be around who did.

  He was thinking as if it were Laurel the lawyer’s narks were asking about. As if it were Laurel’s life the cops were prying into. He could ask anything he wanted about Laurel. It was perfectly safe. Yet he didn’t pick up the phone.

  He was just starting to the shower when the doorbell buzzed again. His fists clenched. It couldn’t be those two back again. It couldn’t be anything important. Yet he must answer. Slowly he returned to the living room.

  There was only one man on the doorstep this time. And he didn’t look like he’d come from the cops or the lawyers. He was hatless, coatless, an ordinary guy in pants and shirt. “I’m from the telephone company,” he stated.

  Dix had the door half-closed as he spoke, “You have the wrong apartment. There’s nothing wrong with my phone.”

  “Yeah?” The man talked fast before the door was further closed. “There’s something wrong with the lines running into these apartments. We got orders to check.”

  “Come in,” Dix said wearily. “The phone’s in the bedroom.” He led the way, pointed it out. “There.”

  The fellow had a black satchel, like a plumber’s satchel. He was going to rasp and ring bells and yell to Joe somewhere on the line. Dix said, “Listen, I’m late. If you don’t mind, I’ll start getting dressed.”

  “Sure, go ahead,” the man said comfortably. He was already taking the phone apart.

  Dix went into the bathroom, closed the door and locked it. With the shower running he didn’t have to listen to the racket. When he’d finished bathing and shaving, he opened the door. The man was just repacking wire in his little black bag.

  “Find any bugs?” Dix asked.

  “Not here. Thanks. Shall I let myself out?”

  “Go ahead.”

  Dix lit a cigarette. Maybe there’d been something wrong with his phone. Maybe Laurel had been trying every night to get in touch. It was fixed now, if that were it. That was no longer excuse.

  He heard the front door close and at the same time he heard the clip-clip of the gardener outside the window. If he didn’t get out of here, his head would split. He hadn’t noticed the weather, he’d had too much on his mind. It was still gray, but there were splits of blue in it. Clearing. He put on the same tweeds he’d worn last light. He didn’t know where he was going but he’d be dressed for no matter what. He knew the first stop, the cleaners. With the sandy gabardines, and the sweaty clothes in which he’d slept two nights ago, two hundred nights ago. He rolled the bundle of clothes under his arm, left by the back door. The goofy, mustached gardener offered his daily bright saying, ‘”Allo.”

  Dix acknowledged it with a nod, striding on down the alley to the garage. The garage doors were closed. He swung them open. The car wasn’t there. It was shock. And then he remembered; he hadn’t put it up last night. He hadn’t even closed the garage. He began to tremble. With sick anger, sick, frustrated anger. He couldn’t pass the gardener again. He’d smash the man’s stupid face to a pulp if he heard, ‘”Allo.”

  He walked out of the alley, all the way around the long block to the walk in front of the apartment. The car was where he’d left it. He got in. threw the clothes on the floor, and drove rapidly away. He drove too fast to the cleaners on Olympic. He wasn’t picked up. The cops were all out at the beach or hanging around the drive-in. He ought to go up there and eat, see how many he could spot. That would be a laugh. Or out to the beach with the curious.

  He dumped the clothes. He’d forgotten he had others here, now he had to drive around with them hung over the seat. He asked for a special on this load, three-day service. In case he left town soon, he wasn’t going without that new navy jacket.

  He drove on up the boulevard, not knowing where he was going. Not caring. When he saw a corner drugstore he remembered the phone call and drew up at the curb. There wasn’t anyone much in the store, a couple of women at the lipsticks, a few young fellows at the soda counter. Dix closed himself in a booth, looked up the Virginibus Arms number. While he was waiting for the call, he took his handkerchief from his pocket. He didn’t hang it over the phone, someone might look in and wonder. But he held it to his mouth, his back turned to the folding door. It would muffle his voice just enough.

  The manager’s voice was strident to match the strident hennaed head he remembered.

  “I understand you have an apartment to rent,” he began.

  She was as annoyed as if he’d asked for a loan. She not only had all the apartments rented but on long lease. She wondered where he ever got such an idea.

  He said, “A friend of my wife’s understood that Miss Gray’s apartment was for rent.”

  Her voice was suspicious. “Who said that?”

  “A friend of my wife,” he repeated. “She said that Miss Gray was moving.”

  “Well, it’s the first I’ve heard of it. She’s paid up—who is this?” she suddenly demanded.

  He said, “Lawrence. A. B. Lawrence,” reading initials penciled on the wall. He had no idea where the Lawrence sprang from. “Thank you.” He hung up before she could ask more. He had what he was after, information. And no one to know he’d called.

  He came out of the booth, ordered coffee and a toasted cheese sandwich at the counter. It wouldn’t be very good from the looks of the place but it was better than nothing. While he was waiting, he took a morning paper from the rack. He hadn’t had a chance to bring his in from the doorstep.

  The murder was still front-page copy. The police were doing the usual, following every clue. Captain Jack Lochner of the L.A. force was working with the Santa Monica force. Captain Lochner was quoted as believing this was another of
the strangler murders.

  Dix didn’t read all the drivel. The L.A. police were rounding up a maria full of known suspicious characters. The Santa Monica police were rounding up beach bums. There was a lot of questioning going on and no answers. No one had noticed any cars parked along the beach road that night. No one had noticed anything. They never did.

  Dix finished his poor breakfast and left. There was more blue in the sky now. The sun was bringing warmth into the day. It was nothing to him. It was an empty day, a day to be passed, before another night would come. Another empty night, and yet another empty day to follow. He ought to leave town at once, not wait for his clothes to be returned by the cleaner, not wait for a woman who would not come again.

  He swung the car over to Santa Monica Boulevard, drove into Santa Monica. He intended stopping at the Santa Fe office, to find out about railroad tickets east. He’d have to hold out enough money for return fare. But there was no place to park and in irritation he drove away, cutting across to Wilshire. He had no intention of turning west, yet he did. And he followed the avenue to the Incline, down the Incline to the beach road. It didn’t look any different. There were no police lines. There were perhaps more cars than usual parked along the street. Yet perhaps not. With the day warming, the beach regulars would be out in force. Dix didn’t slow the car. He drove on down the road, turned off into the canyon and back to town.

  He didn’t realize that he was being followed until he was held by the light at the San Vicente eucalyptus grove. Until he remembered that the shabby sedan that drew up beside him had been behind him when he turned to the beach. Digging back, he knew it had been behind him when he left the drugstore; uncertainly, he remembered seeing it before then. His hands were cold against the wheel. It couldn’t be.

  And he was right, it couldn’t be. The two men in the sedan were ordinary, and the car didn’t wait for Dix to turn, it headed out ahead of him on the green. It was nerves, induced by the early morning visit of Springer and Yates, by the irritation of the gardeners and the lineman and forgetting where he’d left the car. You couldn’t drive many blocks without running into a shabby black sedan with two men in it, Wilshire was full of like cars right now.

  He wasn’t being followed. Yet he drove back to the apartment. If there’d been anything he wanted to do, he wouldn’t have cared how many cars were following him. But he was tired. Too tired to fight traffic for no reason. He would go home and sleep.

  The front gardener had at last finished with Dix’s side of the patio. He was leaning against a pillar, laying off with a cigarette. If anyone was hanging around, trying to find out what Dix had done with himself this morning, it was obvious. A trip to the cleaners, here was the evidence. A stop at a drugstore and if anyone wanted to know what call he’d made there, he’d have an answer. He’d called to see if Laurel was in. On to Santa Monica to the ticket office but no place to park. The drive down the beach? Simple curiosity. It was legitimate. He wouldn’t be the only man in town with curiosity.

  He picked up his paper off the walk, let himself into the apartment. He’d forgotten the cleaning woman. She was flicking the dust off the living-room tables as he entered. She was no more pleased to see him than he to see her. She didn’t speak, she substituted a surly bob of her head.

  He gave her a like bob as he carried his clothes into the bedroom to hang them. Hoping she would have started with the bedroom but she hadn’t. It was still in ugly disarray. He left it abruptly, wanting to snarl at her, to ask her why she hadn’t done the bed and bath first. Knowing why, because too often he was asleep at this hour.

  Even as he stood there, hating her, the hideous siren of the vacuum cleaner whined suddenly in the next room. He rushed to the doorway. “Get out!” he shouted. She didn’t turn off the infernal machine, she only glanced up at him dully. “Get out,” he screamed. “Take that thing and get out!”

  Her eyes bugged at him then, her slack mouth opened. But she didn’t speak. She pulled out the cord fast, gathered her dust cloths, and scurried out the kitchen way. He heard the door bang behind her.

  He steadied himself for a moment against the wall. He shouldn’t have lost his temper. He was left with a slovenly bed, an unkempt bathroom. He held himself rigid until he had stopped shaking. Slowly he walked into the kitchen and bolted the back door. He knew the front was locked but he returned to it, made sure. He had to have sleep., undisturbed sleep. Slowly he plodded back to the bedroom, drew the curtains against the sun. He was desperate for sleep.

  He tried to pull the bedcovers into some shape but his hands were witless. He did manage to slip out of his jacket and kick off his shoes before flinging himself face down, begging for oblivion.

  He lay there, trying to quiet his thoughts, pleading to any gods who might heed to give him rest. And he heard it begin, clip-clip, clip-clip. Outside his windows, clip-clip, clip-clip. His breath hissed from between his set teeth. It had begun and it wouldn’t stop. It would go on, louder and louder, sharper and sharper. He began to tremble. He wouldn’t dare order the man away, he couldn’t risk having another employee run to the manager with tales. He tried to stop up his ears with his tight fists, he sandwiched his head between the pillows, he tried to will his ears to close. But the inexorable rhythm continued, clip-clip, clip-clip.

  He began to weep. He couldn’t help it, he tried to laugh but tears oozed from his smarting lids. His whole body was shaken. He twisted the covers in his clenched fists. He couldn’t stand it. He’d go crazy if he lay here longer.

  Shaking, he moved into the living room, dropped weakly on the couch. He thought he could still hear the shears but he couldn’t. It was only echo in his brain; it would go away. If he closed his eyes, lay quietly, it would go away. His hand fell on the newspaper; he’d dropped it automatically on the couch when he came in with the cleaning. He didn’t want to look at it. He knew what it said. He knew all about it. But he found himself opening the sheet, staring at the black headlines. He’d read the story once, but he found himself reading it again, reading every word, every tired word. Strength returned to him and he crushed the paper, hurled it across the room. He turned over on the cramped couch, turned his back to the room, clamped his eyes as tightly as his teeth. He must find sleep.

  Even as he turned, the door buzzer began its sickening rasp. He ignored the first three drones. Lying there rigidly, willing whoever it was to go away. The buzz continued, in longer pressings now, like a drill boring into his tortured head. Whoever it was had no intention of going away. Whoever it was knew that he was within. There was to be no sleep. It didn’t matter now. Even the need of it was no longer alive. He got up and padded in his sock feet to the door. He opened it without hesitation. He didn’t care who was outside.

  Two men. Two men in plain suits and hats and shoes, plain faces to match. Two quiet men. Before either spoke, he knew them for what they were.

  4

  He stood aside to let the men come in. He refused to know why they were here.

  One of them said, “Mr. Steele?” “Yes?”

  One of them said, “Captain Lochner sent us to see if you’d mind coming up to the station, Mr. Steele.”

  He had no defenses. He said, “Certainly not.” No matter how pleasantly it was offered, it was a command. “Will you wait while I get my jacket?” He felt naked without his shoes; he was ashamed to mention them.

  “Take your time,” one of the men said. He was the one who moved over to the desk as Dix left the room. The other one moved to the windows.

  He put on the tweed jacket, pushed his feet into the brown loafers, brushed his trousers with his hands. They weren’t badly wrinkled, not as they would have been had he slept. His hair was tousled. He took time—they’d said, take your time—to brush it. Cigarettes, in his pocket. His lighter—it wasn’t his, it was Mel’s, narrow, gold, real gold. No initials, no identification. He slipped it into his pocket.

  The two plain men turned to meet him. They let him lead the way out of the apartment,
walked beside him casually, not one on each side, not clamping his arms. The car at the curb was a plain sedan, not a police car. One of the men said, “Maybe you’d rather follow us in your own car.”

  Dix caught his breath. He didn’t understand; they couldn’t be offering him a getaway. He couldn’t get away. Not in the fastest car made. He could delay them but he couldn’t escape them.

  He said, “It doesn’t matter.”

  “You might as well take yours. You know the way?”

  “Sure.” He didn’t get it. And he didn’t like it. It wasn’t until he was following them up Beverly Drive that he did get it. This wasn’t an arrest. How could it be, they had no charge to place against him. They hadn’t a thing on him. But this did put his car into their hands where they could get their God-damned dust. He had to laugh at that. Little good the dust would get them. And if they took casts of the tires while he was in the office, little good that would do them.

  The laugh had picked him up. Enough so that he felt himself as he parked across from the station. The two plain men had pulled up just beyond him. Not in the police drive. He joined them to cross the street. He didn’t ask what Lochner wanted. He could have now, but it might point up his silence before. Therefore he was silent, going along with them into the flowered grounds, up the stone steps, beyond the door flanked by the great bronze lamps holding green light.

  He showed his ease by knowing the way to the office. He was certain it would be the private office; it was. He was surprised to find that Lochner wasn’t alone, to find Brub there with him. Somehow he hadn’t expected Brub to be in on this. His hands twitched slightly. Why hadn’t Brub come for him instead of sending the two zombies? Nevertheless, he gave Brub a wide smile as he spoke, “Good afternoon, Captain Lochner. You wanted to see me?”

  “Yeah. Sit down.”

  Dix sat down and he calmed down; this wasn’t Brub’s show. Lochner was the boss. Brub looked like a clerk sitting there at the table surrounded with papers. Dix didn’t see the plain men leave the room; he only realized they had gone when they were gone.