by Ben Benson
“No, she had no girl friends here. One Saturday morning she borrowed my car. I have a gray convertible. She said she wanted to use it for a few hours. I let her. I’ve always been a soft touch.”
“Did she ever mention a Helen Toledo?”
His fingers drummed on the counter. “No.”
“You’ve been here over a year, Mr. Boothbay?”
“Fourteen months.”
“You’re a native of Danford?”
“No, I’m from New York.”
“You’re an accountant?”
“I work as an accounting assistant. I have a B. A. in economics. Our Mr. Reece hasn’t. What do you think of the old poop?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Who do you think really runs this office? I do. We’d be better off if the charitable Mr. Staley paid the old poop his salary and told him to stay home. All old Fulton does is clutter up a perfectly good office.”
“That’s Mr. Staley’s business,” I said. “Where do you live now, Mr. Boothbay?”
“In Danford. At 176 Crescent Avenue. It’s an old converted town house. My flat is on the third floor! It’s one of those ancient places with a fireplace in every room. There’s not much better in a crummy mill town like Danford.”
“Thanks,” I said. “That’s all, sir.” It wasn’t really what I wanted to say to him. But the Commissioner was always strict about courtesy.
I came outside and climbed into the cruiser. I picked up the handphone and signaled Troop E that I was back on the air. I started the motor. I was thinking of Manette Venus and of all the lies she had told me in so short a time. I drove through the gate, waving to the guard. Just outside I almost collided with a black sedan coming in. The sedan’s horn tooted twice. I stopped. I saw Ed Newpole step out. He came over to my window.
“You working out here, Ralph?”
“In a way,” I said. “This is one of my patrols.”
He cocked his head sideways like a bird. “Inside the mill?”
“All right,” I said. “So I was in there asking questions.”
“About what, Ralph?”
I told him. When I was finished there was a hurt look on his face. He said, “We do those things systematically, Ralph. If I’d have wanted you to ask questions in there, I’d have told you.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I guess I’m a little overanxious.”
“I know. And maybe it’s my fault for not explaining it to you. From now on we’d better work together. I’m staying at the Hotel Danford Terrace. You’ll check in and take a room there. You’ll move out of the barracks now. I’ve already spoken to Captain Walsh.”
I nodded my head. “There’s something else, Lieutenant. How is she?”
“You mean Ellen?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I saw her in court.” He scratched the end of his nose lugubriously. “It happened. They arraigned her for murder and remanded her to the county jail without bail. You had to expect it, Ralph.”
“I’ve got to see her, Lieutenant.”
“Not yet, Ralph,” he said. “Let it rest awhile.”
“She doesn’t want to see me?”
“Her pride’s been hurt. You walked out on her and took up with Manette. And her folks—well—they kind of blame you for everything that’s happened.”
“They should,” I said bitterly. “I blame myself, too.”
“I’m not so sure where the blame lies. And I’m not too satisfied with the evidence, either.” He smiled cheerily. “We’ll dig into it, you and I and Chet Granger. Maybe we’ll find something.”
“When do I start?”
“You’re real anxious, ain’t you?”
“Yes, sir. More than anxious.”
“All right, you can start with Helen Toledo. I think she knows more than she’s been telling.”
CHAPTER 10
IN Danford, three blocks over from Main, there was a honky-tonk section. Here the varicolored neon signs were lighted in broad daylight. In the middle of the block there was a row of cheap cafés and beer parlors. I parked the black cruiser assigned to me, and went in under the red neon sign that said Starlight Café.
The place was in semidarkness and almost empty. A ceiling fan turned slowly. There was a smell of stale beer and stale cigar smoke and frying onions. A fat, dirty-aproned bartender leaned on a dark, ancient bar, talking to a man in dungarees. The man put down a foam-circled beer glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
Sitting in a corner booth was a buxom girl with flaming, artificially colored red hair. She was wearing a blue waitress uniform. She was leaning forward over the table while a grimy, unshaven man whispered in her ear. Suddenly she threw her head back and laughed raucously.
I came up to the edge of the bar and the bartender moved over to meet me. I said, “I’m looking for Helen Toledo.”
The bartender moved his head slightly. “There in the booth.”
“I’d like someplace where I can talk to her alone.” I took out my badge and showed it. The bartender stared down at it, then his eyes came up unhappily.
“Anything wrong, Trooper?”
“No, sir. I just want to talk to Helen Toledo.”
The bartender wiped damp hands on his apron. “Sure. There’s an office out back. You go in there. I’ll send Helen in. I ain’t going to insult you by offering you whisky. But if you want a nice cold bottle of ale on the house—”
“Just Helen,” I said shortly.
I sat behind a dirty, littered table that served as a desk. I moved a spindle stacked with bills and waited. A shadow moved along the wall and Helen Toledo came in.
“Hi,” she said. “You’re a cop, huh?”
“Ralph Lindsey,” I said. “State Police.”
“Ah,” she said. She surveyed me. She sat down. Her mascara was heavy and her eyelids blued, and she was over thirty years old. She had voluptuous hips and she moved them from side to side as she adjusted her position in the chair. She tugged at her girdle. “Honestly,” she said confidentially, “I must be getting fat. I was built when meat was cheap and I got to watch my weight all the time.”
“You look fine,” I said.
“Thanks, kid. You got a cigarette on you?”
I took out my pack and handed it over. She picked out one, wet it with the tip of her tongue and put it in her mouth. I leaned over and lit it for her.
“It’s a chance to grab a smoke,” she said, taking the cigarette from her mouth and exhaling. “It don’t look good for me to be smoking out there,” she added virtuously. She ran her tongue over the bright carmine of her lips. “So you’re Ralph Lindsey, huh? You was in the papers this morning.”
“I know.”
“Manette used to mention you.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing much—except that she fell for you like a ton of bricks. You fishing for something about her?”
“Yes,” I said. “We want to know where she came from. Her family, her past. Miss Toledo, did she ever talk to you about those things?”
“She never told me nothing.”
“You met her here at the café, Miss Toledo. How?”
She took a deep drag on the cigarette and blew the smoke out. “Manette comes in here alone one night. About a month ago. I serve her an orange blossom. Then she gives me a song-and-dance about being alone in the big city. Me and my big heart, I feel sorry for the kid. So I meet her outside after work and we go to an eating place. Then another time she phoned me and we went to a picture show. A couple of times I went to the house where she lived and we had a hen party. Then last week she meets you. It beats me how quick she changed. Brother, from then on she wants to talk about you all the time. I see she don’t need me any more, so I keep away. That’s all. Last night a cop comes to see me and says Manette was knocked off by some dame. Hey, was I surprised! I hadn’t seen Manette for two-three days.”
“She didn’t phone you or anything?”
“No. She a
lways was a moody kid.”
“Maybe she had a reason,” I said. “Maybe she was in some kind of trouble.”
Helen Toledo was pensive for a moment, the blue tobacco smoke curling up from her nostrils. “Sure, something was eating her the whole time I knew her. But don’t ask me what, because Manette didn’t talk about nothing but you and the weather.”
“Not even Cole Boothbay?”
“Who’s he?”
“Nobody special,” I said. “What’s your home address, Miss Toledo?”
“It ain’t the YWCA.”
I grinned. “I didn’t think so.”
“I live at the Regal,” she said defensively. “It’s cheap but it’s clean.”
“All right,” I said. “Thanks, Miss Toledo.”
“The name’s Helen. Don’t be so damn formal.”
I grinned again. “Okay, Helen.”
She smiled back. “You going to be around town for a while?”
“I’ll be in and out.”
“Where you staying?”
“I’m at the Hotel Danford Terrace.”
“It’s the best dump in this dumpy town. I might look you up sometime, Ralph. If you don’t mind going out with an older girl.”
“I don’t mind.”
“If you’ve got nothing to do some night, I know a few places we can go and get some laughs.”
“Sure,” I said. “Thanks.”
She laughed. “See? I make my own dates. I don’t horse around. If I like a guy I tell him right out. And I like you, kid. I liked you the minute you walked in.” She stood up and tugged at her girdle again. “I’d better get back outside before Gus blows a gasket. Gus is the bartender. He’s boss of this broken-down joint.”
I was in my room at the Hotel Danford Terrace. It was after supper and outside it had grown completely dark. There was a knock at my door and I went over and opened it. Ed Newpole came in. He was carrying a zippered leather portfolio. He took off his hat and sank down in the lounge chair. His face was pinched with fatigue.
“You doing your report?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “But I’m afraid it was a waste of time.” Then I told him about Helen Toledo.
“Nothing’s wasted,” he said. He unlaced his shoes, took them off and wiggled his stocking feet.
“Manette was a sweet, refined kid,” I said. “I just can’t picture her with Helen Toledo. It doesn’t make sense.”
Newpole grunted. His eyes spotted my pipe and tobacco pouch on the desk. “You smoke a pipe?” he asked.
“Whenever I have a little time. I brought it from home this trip.”
He took out a pipe with a discolored meerschaum bowl. “What kind of tobacco do you use?”
“A rough cut.” I tossed him the pouch. He opened it, sniffed, and tamped tobacco into the bowl of his pipe. He lit it and puffed. “Good,” he said. “Sweet as a nut. Sweet like Manette Venus. There’s a sweet, refined kid from Chicago. She was married at eighteen, divorced at nineteen. Suddenly she shows up in Danford for no reason at all. Why an old mill town like Danford?”
“I don’t know, Lieutenant.”
“This sweet, refined girl goes to one of the toughest bars in town and makes friends with a chippy named Helen Toledo. Later this sweet, refined girl goes to another bar and picks up a state cop in civilian clothes. She asks him too many questions. The bartender says the girl had never been in there before.”
“All right, so she went in there deliberately to pick me up. I’ve been thinking that, too.”
“Good. You’re learning.” Newpole stretched his legs. “After the girl gets to know you, suddenly she wants to pull up stakes and leave town. She’s scared of something, and maybe she’s buying herself a little protection in you. The sweet, refined girl carries a gun. She says your life is in danger, too, but she don’t say why. She thinks a man is watching her from a parked car on Glen Road and she almost throws a fit. Finally, she says she’s going to come clean with you. But before she has the chance she’s killed. And that, my boy, is only the beginning.”
He unzipped his leather case and brought out a blue perforated teletype message. “Here’s a TT from the Chicago police. The girl’s got still another name. Her maiden name was Margaret Venable, not Venus.”
“Go on,” I said, my voice clogging in my throat. “I don’t know what to believe now.”
“I have more,” Newpole said. “The girl was married at eighteen to a man named Andrew Fleer. Fleer was twenty-five. A year after they were married, Fleer was convicted of attempted blackmail and got from one to three. Manette, or Margaret, was indicted on the same charge. But she skipped her bail. She went to Juarez, Mexico, and got a quickie divorce from Fleer. Then they lost her trail. The Chicago cops still have a flyer out on her.”
“It doesn’t add up,” I said tonelessly. “If you had known her—”
“This is a positive identification, Ralph. There’s no mistake. Fleer served his year, did his parole stretch and disappeared from Illinois.”
“You said attempted blackmail. What was it?”
“One of the oldest touches in the world. The badger game. The girl meets an older, married man and invites him to her room. Just when they get comfortable, her husband comes busting in. The older man don’t want any scandal, naturally. So he pays off.” Newpole scratched his toes. “But this time the Fleers had an old duffer who didn’t scare. He promised to pay off the next day. When Manette and Fleer went to the meeting place, cops were staked out there. They grabbed the Fleers.”
“Did they have a previous record?”
“Not the girl. Andrew Fleer was a smalltime grifter. He’d been in a few shenanigans, but managed to stay out of jail. I said they were from Chicago. But they weren’t, not originally. They came from the cornbelt. Some small college town in Iowa called Ames. Fleer was a student there, studying under the G. I. bill. Manette was living with an old aunt. The aunt died. Manette—we should call her Margaret—married Fleer and left town. She had no kin. That’s her life, kid. It’s not sweet and refined, is it?”
“No,” I said. I took my pipe from the desk and began to fill it with uncertain fingers. There was a rap on the door. Newpole slipped into his shoes, got up and opened it. Lieutenant Chet Granger came into the room.
He smiled diffidently. “Everybody gets in early except me.” He sat down and crossed his long legs.
“Well?” Newpole asked him. “How are you coming along with the Reeces?”
Granger put a stick of gum in his mouth. “This Fulton Reece might not have any money, but he’s old family and still belongs to the best clubs. There’s one called the Danford Pioneers and they have a dinner once a month. The Reeces were there last night and they’ve got top witnesses to prove it.”
“So?” Newpole said, puffing on his pipe.
“So I went down to Danford Police Headquarters to see if they had a record on Reece. Not that I expected to find anything. He came from a prominent family and nobody in Danford would put him on record anyway.” His jaw moved over his gum for a moment. “I didn’t find anything, so I started to ask around. You know, shooting the breeze with some of the old-time cops. They buttoned up on me. But I did find something. There was an old-timer who did a little talking. Leo Nason. You know him?”
Newpole shook his head.
“An old harness cop,” Granger said. “Now he’s like a custodian. Nason told me he made a pinch about 1902. He was only a rookie cop then in a big helmet and a frock coat.”
“Cripes, what a memory,” Newpole said.
“This the old-timer remembered. He put the pinch on Fulton Reece. Reece was ten, twelve years old then. Reece had killed a horse.”
“A horse?” Newpole asked.
“Not really a horse. A Shetland pony. This Reece was living in a big house in town then. Next door was another big house and a girl lived there about Reece’s age. The girl owned a pony and a cart, and Fulton was jealous. And little girls being little girls, she gave Fulton a bad time
over it. So one night Reece sneaked over there with a big butcher knife and slit the girl’s pony from ear to ear.”
Newpole said, “And he was only ten or twelve years old then?”
“Sure. The girl called the cops and Leo Nason came. He, being a rookie, brought them down to the station, instead of sending the station to them. The whole thing was hushed up quick. The Reece family paid for the pony.”
“Well,” Newpole said, putting his pipe down, “the guy’s a character, all right.”
“Here’s more,” Granger said. “This afternoon I hung around the gate at Staley Woolen. When Reece came out at five I tailed him. He drove out to a plush roadhouse on the pike called Contis. There, in a corner of the foyer, he meets a platinum blond chick. She don’t look more than sixteen. He stays with her a few minutes. Doesn’t even buy a cup of coffee. He leaves her and goes out. I followed him home.” His teeth masticated the gum. “I don’t know what to make of it, Ed. There’s something wrong with the picture. If Reece was a sharp dresser with a waxed mustache and a leer, I could see it. But a sloppy old man like him doesn’t go together with a platinum blonde.”
Newpole was lacing his shoes with a thoughtful expression on his face. He stood up.
“We’ll work tonight,” he said.
I started to put my report away. Newpole said, “Not you, Ralph. Just Chet and I. We’re breaking you in easy at first. You rest up and get some sleep. Check with me the first thing in the morning.”
CHAPTER 11
I went to Ed Newpole’s room early the next morning. There were heavy wrinkles in his face and his eyes were red-rimmed and droopy. He was in his undershirt and trousers. Chet Granger came out of the bathroom. His hair was wet and combed. His face was freshly shaven and there were flecks of talcum powder near his ears.
“We got in only a couple of hours ago,” Newpole said to me. He took out a fresh shirt from a bureau drawer and tore off the blue paper band. He pointed to a large Manila envelope on the chair. There were globs of red sealing wax on it. “There’s the evidence on the Venus case. Chet is bringing it into Boston. Meanwhile, we’ve got a job for you.”
