“Is he your new pusher, Magda?”
“What a stupid idea.”
“I heard Jeff promise to get you a fix, at Cantrell’s.”
“Forget about Jeff Keck.”
“All right, let’s stick with Marianne. What happened? Did she cross you up? Did she stop selling George the stuff for you?”
“No! No! You lie!”
I was caught off guard by her sudden attack. She came at me with terrible force, slapping me down on the bed and pummeling me with her big hands. I fought her off, but I was no match for her solid muscles. She kept mumbling and muttering at me, spitting obscenities at me, grabbing for my throat with insane strength. I felt the breath go out of me and kicked at her madly. She was beyond all sanity, lost in the nightmare world of her own impossible mania. In this mood, her hunger for dope might convert her into a lunatic killer, unaware that she did me damage. She saw me as a personal menace, a roadblock in her quest for the needle. Her breath hissed at me and her hands would not leave my throat. In another moment I would have been leveled. The world was turning black, the room a wild blur above me.
Then, just before the darkness, came the light.
Somebody pulled her off me.
And I fainted.
CHAPTER 17
7:24 P.M. Saturday
“You’ll be all right,” said a man’s voice. “Here, have a sip of water.”
I drank. Magda had almost snuffed me out, but the world was sliding back into focus. I was on the bed and Horace Gordon was feeding me water.
“I warned you there’d be trouble,” he said.
“Ubiquitous,” I replied, holding tight to his hand. “How did you get here, Horace darling?”
“Interesting question. I’ve always thought that Marianne Fry was the delivery girl for a narcotics bigwig. I thought I’d come back again to check the place for a cache of dope. I’ve been watching the place for quite a while today, from across the street in the little restaurant. When I saw Magda Trent follow you in, I thought it might be time to visit you. Did Magda hurt you?”
“Magda should be a lady wrestler.”
“She’s in real trouble, poor girl. She’s an addict.”
“Really, now?” I asked, sliding more securely into his arms. He put me down gently and stood up.
“She’ll be picked up. I’ve phoned Boyer to send a few men after her.”
“You think of everything, Horace. Everything except for little me.”
“I’m sorry, Sugar. Would you like a cup of coffee?”
“A cup of anything with you, darling.”
“Where would you like to go?”
“How about your place?” I suggested.
“I’m fresh out of coffee.”
“I’ll settle for tea.”
“I know a nice little place where we might have dinner,” Horace said. “Are you hungry?”
“Test me.”
He took me to an adorable bistro in the Chelsea area. It was an Armenian type of nook, complete with shish kebab and soft music. It was a delightful interlude, but my brain buzzed with a wild inspiration, an idea that might wrap the whole case up into a neat little package. My mind riveted itself on the cast of characters and only one of them seemed a sitting duck for the entire operation. Only one of them had the proper motivation for murdering both George DeBeers and Marianne Fry. It would have been good to discuss my theories with Horace. Perhaps his orderly brain could help me plan my next move.
“Horace,” I began.
“Yes, Sugar?” he smiled. “Something on your mind?”
“Another cup of coffee. It’s wonderful,” I lied, stalled by the conditioned reflexes of the newspaper business. It was important to break my story first, in my paper, before his steel-trap brain brought him to the same conclusion.
“About Marianne,” Horace was saying. “Who do you think was her boss?”
“Her boss?”
“Come, come, Sugar,” said Horace. “Don’t fence with me. You know as well as I do that Marianne Fry was only a delivery girl.”
“I’ve thought about it,” I said. “But I always assumed that whoever gave Marianne the stuff was outside the group in the Village. I mean, couldn’t he be one of the uptown bigshots, a veteran narcotics peddler?”
“No such animal exists,” Horace insisted. “Her supplier could be almost anybody, any of a dozen nondescript characters in the Village area.”
“An interesting theory. And who did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know. Do you?” he stared at me quizzically. “But this much I do know, Sugar. Find Marianne’s supplier and you’ve caught the murderer of George DeBeers. Obviously Marianne was preparing to leave town. The police found her suitcases packed for a quick getaway. Can you understand why?”
“You think she was fed up with the narcotics deal?”
“I thing she was frightened. I also think that George DeBeers wanted to leave.”
“With Marianne?”
“I doubt it. But I’ve checked with several of George’s drinking companions, male and female. They all admit that George had a strong ambition to go to the south of France to paint for a few years. And he had the money to do it. Now the problem is—where did George get all this money?”
“I haven’t the foggiest idea.”
“He needed lots of cash,” said Horace. “He was buying his lady love, Magda, regular supplies of dope.”
“How did you find out?”
“A little man named Abe Fine. Old friend of mine, Abe. He promised me a lead on anything that happened in the Village, anything close to the DeBeers murder. Well, I found Abe in the hospital today. Seems he got slugged at a beatnik party early in the morning. He was about to follow Magda Trent to a supplier.”
“Really? Tell me more.” He told me, a short and educational lecture on the habits and quirks of seasoned addicts. He had a deep and penetrating understanding of their lives. It was typical of Horace to do a complete research job on anything he was handling. Send him to Africa and he would write you a Mau-Mau novel. Send him to Israel and he would memorize the Dead Sea Scrolls. But his monologue reminded me that he might be exploring the area where I wanted solitude, the neighborhood where I hoped to snare the killer of George DeBeers. It was time for me to bid Horace Gordon good-night.
“I bid you good-night,” I said.
“Where are you going, Sugar?”
“Home to bed. I’m bushed.”
“A little rest will do you good,” he said with a touch of solicitude. “See you around.”
“It’s a date,” I said cleverly.
Gwen and I stood on the corner of Sixty-Ninth Street and Madison Avenue. It was a little after nine and the streets were quiet save for the hum and buzz of an occasional taxi. The sun had died under a blanket of brackish clouds not too long ago. Now a slight breeze rode in from the east, bringing with it a spraying rain, not heavy, but perpetual.
Gwen and I huddled in a doorway, staring down the black at the façade of Jacques Lambert’s house. I had phoned him after leaving Horace. I had given him the telephone treatment, all mush and honey in the voice plus a touch of tenderness. Would Monsieur Jacques let me visit him in his apartment tonight? I pretended to be starting a series of articles on Famous Art Galleries in New York and Jacques fell for my pitch like a ton of hors d’oeuvres. He would be delighted to see me, naturellement. He would be preparing himself for a wild evening with a chick he thought he never could convert into a bed companion.
Gwen grumbled at my side. She was dressed for her part in the adventure. She wore a light raincoat and carried a large pail, loaded with well-oiled rags.
“All set?” I asked her.
“I feel like a two-bit ghoul in a TV horror movie.”
“Got your matches ready?”
“Check.”
“Know what to do?”
“Stop sounding like a Girl Scout leader, Sugar. I’ll review the caper. I follow you inside and sneak in under the stairway in the downstairs hall. I wait about ten minutes and then light the oily rags in the pail. After which I leave and locate the nearest policeman.”
“Correct.”
“Dandy,” she said, irritated with me. “But what in hell’s the reason for the fake fire?”
“Ever read Sherlock Holmes?”
“Not lately.”
“It’s an old Holmes trick,” I explained. “The theory is this—when you set a man’s house on fire, he’s likely to leave with his most valuable possession. It is Jacques’ most valuable possession that I want to see, Gwen.”
“And if he doesn’t play it your way?”
“No harm done.”
“You think you can handle him?”
“I’m sure of it.”
“Watch out for his left hand,” laughed Gwen. “He’s got the sneakiest left hand this side of Memphis.”
“He may lose it if he gets too fresh.”
It was time to move. Gwen was right behind me when I stepped into Lambert’s foyer and buzzed his apartment upstairs. The door clicked open almost immediately. Lambert was on edge up there. The great lover would be waiting for me with open arms. And my heart did a small bounce, half excitement, half dread, as I stepped into the vestibule and started up the circular staircase. When I looked back, Gwen had already stepped out of sight, behind the curve of the stairs.
Jacques was waiting for me at the big door. He wore a Japanese jacket of yellow silk, a startlingly colored shirt and a smile that told me he was ready for bundling.
“Welcome, chérie,” he said politely, escorting me to the small chaise where his cocktails were already mixed. “For you I have made something special, a cocktail I myself invented in Paris, alors. I call it the Lovely Lady.”
“How nice,” I said. “Have you got any rye?”
“You prefer rye to a Lovely Lady?”
“I’m strictly a jigger drinker, Jacques. I gulp down rye and yammer for a beer chaser.”
“Your wish is my command,” he said with a shrug, and hastened to the bar where he quickly poured me a generous few fingers of rye. “That is why I am fond of American women. They are so direct—so honest.”
“No beer? No chasers?”
“I am sorry, alors,” he said sadly. “I abhor the beer. There is not a drop in my whole apartment.” And he sat down alongside me and reached for my hand and began to play patty-cake with it. Up close, Jacques licked his lip and devoured me with his eyes. It occurred to me suddenly that the room had been carefully prepared for my entrance. The lights were inadequate, only the small lamps lit in the area near the windows. Around me, his gallery of pictures faded into the dim; wall. From some hidden cabinet, a hi-fi played something smooth and delicate, a little piano concerto calculated to make my corpuscles hop for him.
And on my right knee, his play a more intimate melody.
“Well,” I said, “I’ll take a chaser of water if you haven’t any beer, Jacques.”
“Of course, water,” he said, pained. “Some club soda, perhaps?”
“Tap water.”
“Ginger ale?”
“Branch water.”
He scooted off toward the kitchen and I wondered how long we had been playing his little sex game. What had happened to Gwen? It seemed hours since I walked into this place. And now Jacques was scampering my way with a glass of water in his hand and an obviously libidinous look in his eye. The little rascal had opened the door to his bedroom on the way back. Through that door I saw my fate—his bed; outlined by a cleverly placed spotlight.
“And now, ma petite,” he whispered, returning his hand immediately to my knee. When he leaned in close I could count the pores on the edge of his nose. He would be coming in for a landing soon. “Have I told you how glad I am to see you?”
“Thanks, Jacques,” I said cleverly, trying for another quick squint at my watch.
“And how much I like you?”
“Well now, that’s nice.”
“Your type has always fascinated me, chérie. You are a woman of mystery, no?”
“Oops. You’re tickling me, Jacques.”
“And your figure, ah! Elegante!”
“How about another drink?”
“Later, chérie.”
“I’m pretty thirsty.”
“It is love that you thirst for.”
“It is?”
“Mais oui, ma petite. Here, let me kiss you.”
“Not there, Jacques.”
“Ah, you will change your mind.”
“You’re tickling me.”
“What a beautiful neck you possess!”
“How about a cigarette?”
“And your legs, charmante!”
“About that article I’m writing,” I said.
“Later, alors. This is not the moment for talk.”
He was strong as an iron vice now that he had me pinned to the couch. The light didn’t allow me a good squint at his face, but I could hear his breath pounding out of him. And his hands? His meandering fingers were playing my shanks like a pianist doing a fugue. It seemed hours since I arrived here. Where in hell was Gwen and the smoke?
I managed to squirm away from him and slide to the far end of the couch. But he was after me like a beagle after a bone. He muttered a small French obscenity when I avoided his exploring hands and slid to my feet. I began a quick retreat to the far end of the room. And then I found myself tripping and falling and rolling to my knees with Jacques alongside me tearing and clawing at my blouse as he mumbled a few Parisian love words. In another tick of time he would have me where he wanted me, flat on my back and gasping for help.
“Ah, I love you American women. So difficult, yet so tender!”
“Fire!” I yelped. “The place is on fire, Jacques!”
“Sacre bleu!”
Billows of black smoke were curling and cascading into the room. He bounded away from me and opened the double doors. A great cloud of noxious smoke billowed in and swept him back, coughing and spluttering. I heard him shout another French obscenity. But he was running back and away from me, toward the kitchen. I didn’t wait to check his whereabouts. Gwen had created a genuine disaster, enough black smoke for a five-alarm fire. The idiot smoke ate at my nose and bit hard at my lungs. It was an effort to reach the stairs. A wave of dizziness swept over me as I started down, a rocking, wracking pain in my chest.
I slid down the last few steps, gasping for fresh air. Then Jacques came flying down the steps behind me, spluttering like a sick Renault. He was carrying a large oblong package. My heart leapt when I saw it. How could I stop him? I rolled over in his path and he tripped and fell headlong over me. The package leaped from his arms and bounced against the wall, a zany piece of action.
Because the package was a picture.
“The Polynesian Widow,” I said.
Jacques didn’t answer me. He had fallen to the right and was staring at the pail of rags behind the stairs, his face a mask of impossible anger. It was a mad tableau. I sat on the bottom step, half dead with smoke poisoning, unable to move, unable to slide an inch toward freedom.
“The fire,” he said slowly. “You did this deliberately, alors?”
“I did, alors.”
“Ingenious, ma petite.”
“It was nothing, Jacques. You’re the clever one, selling Donner the original Gauguin and then stealing it after he hung it in his gallery. You figured nobody would ever challenge the authenticity of the Gauguin once it hung in Donner’s place. That was why you hired George DeBeers to paint you an imitation.”
“Donner is a moron,” Jacques said with Gallic nastiness. “Donner does not deserve so great a
painting. Nor do the stupid visitors to his museum.”
“Donner may not agree with you.”
“Donner will never know.”
“He’ll know,” I said. “Because I’ll tell him.”
“You are an optimist, alors.”
“I am a reporter, also, alors. I intend to report other facets of your strange personality, Jacques. You are somewhat of a French pig, monsieur. You also operated a narcotics business on the side. It was you who employed Marianne Fry to feed the addicts down in the Village. That was why you had to kill her, isn’t it? Marianne was preparing to leave town permanently. You were upset when you discovered this. You were also upset by a discovery at Serena’s office, weren’t you?”
“Continue, ma petite.”
My throat was still scratched and raw from the smoke, but I ignored it and went on. “You found out that your old friend Serena still had an early DeBeers imitative picture—the Hudson River landscape. So you instructed Serena to rob herself—to rid herself of that piece of damaging evidence. You were afraid somebody might tie George in with the Donner swindle. Only you and Serena knew about it, isn’t that right?”
“Serena would not gossip about it,” Lambert said with a sly smile. “Neither will you, alors.”
“Maybe you’re wrong, alors. I love to gossip. I can’t wait to tell the world how you hooked George DeBeers into the fakery. Poor George, he probably was ready to spill the story to the press. That’s why he called me, I’ll bet. So you killed him for two reasons. You wanted the Gauguin secret to remain buried. You also were worried George would find out from Marianne who supplied narcotics for her clientele. That was why you followed her to her room and killed her while I was there.”
“Incroyable,” said Jacques calmly. “How clever you are, Mademoiselle Shannon. And are you clever enough to know what I shall do with you now? Are you clever enough to realize that I shall take you upstairs and abandon you there while I start a real fire? Come, ma chérie—I have work to do.”
He stepped my way and lifted me in his arms. The smoke had leveled me, weakened me so that I could only claw at him feebly. He stood there, scowling, mumbling a rapid fire barrage of French sentiments. In another moment the world would go black around me when he took his first step up the decorative staircase. My ears seemed to ring with mad music, a queasy chorus of dizziness. But before I fainted, Jacques was forced to put me down, suddenly, to face another danger, somebody who leaped at him from across the vestibule. I heard him cry out in rage. I heard him scuffling and swaying as he moved against the stranger.
Sugar Shannon Page 13
