Shamus in a Skirt

by M. Ruth Myers

  “You’re not afraid of me,” he said as I downshifted at an intersection.

  “I’d be a fool not to be afraid of you, Bartoz.”

  “Yet you came tonight.”

  “I do what I need to for my job.”

  “Yes. I also.”

  The car I was following was a Chevrolet, gray as nearly as I could make out in the dark, and with plenty of years on it. It turned into a neighborhood between Warren and Patterson. Things were several steps better than where Polly Bunten had lived, but the area was nonetheless shabby.

  The Chevy stopped in front of a three-story house. A sign in a front yard the size of a table advertised ROOMS. The man who’d met with Perry got out of his car and retrieved a duffle bag of what looked like laundry. Whistling softly, he let himself into the darkened rooming house.

  “Stop here and watch,” whispered Bartoz. “I’ll walk to the corner where I can see the other side. If I start back this way, drive to the corner and wait for me. If not, pick me up there in five minutes.”

  He was out before I could speak, nudging the car door so it closed with a muted click, then vanishing into the shadows. He was good at fast planning, I’d give him that. My heart hammered. The house between me and the rooming house had a light on in a back room. Otherwise, the street was dark.

  My hand closed on the automatic and transferred it to my right hand. I couldn’t see Bartoz at all. I pushed the lock down on my door and cranked the window up. I couldn’t reach the locks on the rear doors at all, and sliding across to the one on the passenger side would make me vulnerable. The rooming house remained dark.

  Then, at the end of the block, a figure stepped into the street and started toward me. I wasn’t sure it was Bartoz. As it came closer, though, the chin raised as his had when he’d signaled to me at the hotel.

  Leaving my lights off, I started the engine. As the car crept forward, the figure ahead veered suddenly to the side with the rooming house and disappeared again. What the devil?

  I drove to the corner and switched my lights on low. In my rearview mirror I could see a light in a third floor window. Had five minutes passed? Was I crazy, sitting here waiting for Bartoz when I wasn’t sure if I trusted him?

  Nothing moved on the street. Nothing I could see. The door across from me flew open. I swung toward it, leveling the automatic.

  “Don’t.”

  It was Bartoz.

  “I ought to. You scared the peewadding out of me.”

  I leaned back and tried to summon saliva. Bartoz slid in next to me and closed the door almost without a sound.

  “The light went on shortly after I stopped to watch. It’s his room, I think. I went into the vestibule thinking there might be postal slots, something with names.”

  “And?” I changed gears and let out the clutch.

  “There was some sort of rack, with things written. But there was no light, and I didn’t have a torch.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  “Good morning, sunshine.” Connelly’s cheer spilled into my unwilling ear through the phone that had wakened me from a sound sleep. “I have an address for you if you’d like to come get it.”

  “Are you nuts, Connelly? I’m still in bed.”

  “Ah, I’d better come up then.”

  I shot upright, fully awake.

  “You’re in the lobby? Please tell me you’re not in uniform.”

  “Pressed and shined with cudgel at the ready. Not in the lobby, though, more’s the pity. I’ll bet you’re a treat with your hair tangling over a pillow.”

  My blood surged harder than it had when Bartoz yanked my car door open the previous night.

  “What did you say about an address?”

  “The one you mentioned you hadn’t been able to find.”

  The flophouse with the unidentified body? It had to be. I hadn’t asked him to find it, though. Since Freeze had refused to give it to me, I’d avoided involving Connelly.

  “Have you something to write it down with?” he asked patiently.

  I reached for the pencil and paper on the nightstand.

  “Thanks, Connelly. I didn’t expect this,” I said when I’d finished.

  “I know. It worried me, you being so down in the dumps you didn’t try some trick to get me to help. Look, Billy let me out at a pay phone and I see him coming to pick me up. Keep safe.”

  * * *

  My first stop of the day was in a pleasant neighborhood at a cottage not much larger than a playhouse. One cheek of the moderately pretty young woman who opened the door looked flushed and sweaty. The other side of her face was fine. The infant whimpering on her hip as she opened the door possibly explained the dichotomy.

  “Mrs. O’Neill?” I asked with a smile.

  “Yes?” She shushed the baby on her hip, looking distracted.

  “My name is Maggie Sullivan. I’m a private detective. I’d like to ask you some questions about your cousin. Nick Perry.”

  Both sides of her face grew equally granite-like.

  “I haven’t seen my cousin for twelve years or more. I don’t know where he is or anything else about him. Try our great-aunt, Mrs. Carlton Drake.”

  She started to close the door. I leaned my shoulder against it.

  “I know where he is. He’s right here in Dayton. And thick as he is with your aunt, I doubt she’d give me the sort of information I need.”

  Part of the hostility in her eyes gave way to interest. Then her kid progressed from whimpering to full-blown fuss. Tears started to spill and he tugged at his ear.

  “I don’t know anything that would help. Excuse me. I have a sick baby.”

  “Then I better come in, hadn’t I? So he’s not in a draft.”

  I knew she wouldn’t risk bumping the kid if we tussled over the door. A second passed, then she stepped aside.

  “Really, I really don’t know what I could— There, there, baby, Mama knows it hurts.”

  “It is a boy, right?” I’d made a stab in the dark.

  She nodded wearily. “He has an earache. Shh, shh, there now.” The baby, who didn’t look quite big enough to walk, pressed his head to her cheek.

  Inside and out, the house I’d entered was neat as a pin, with white walls and lace curtains. It was also tiny, probably just this front room plus a kitchen and bath and bedroom in back. Quite a change from her Aunt Clara’s big place and her cousin’s high living. The neighborhood was good, though.

  “You didn’t seem surprised when I told you I was a detective.”

  “Not when you mentioned Nick in the same sentence. Except for your being a woman, of course. Nick’s parents gave him everything. Our aunt and uncle – great-aunt and uncle, really – adored him. Yet ever since we were children he’s been a bad apple. Not just boyish pranks, bad.” She glanced briefly up from the baby. “You’re not here because you’re trying to help him, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  She hadn’t asked me to sit. I didn’t, even as she settled herself in an armchair and eased what I knew by the shape was a hot water bottle wrapped in flannel between her cheek and the baby’s ear.

  “I honestly don’t know much about him. He’s five years older. We saw each other at family gatherings, parties by our parents’ friends. That was the extent.

  “They moved away, his family did, when I was nine or ten. They came back summers to visit. The last time they came, Nick... stole something.” She swallowed. “From a friend of Uncle Carlton’s....

  “Please don’t ask my husband’s family about it. Aunt Clara is the only relative I have left, and she wants nothing to do with me since I married a Catholic. My in-laws know she disowned me, of course, but not about—”

  “I didn’t intend to.”

  “It never even occurred to me to mention Nick, let alone—”

  “What did Nick steal?”

  Sarah started to shake her head, but remembering the baby, turned one palm up instead.

  “I don’t know. My par
ents whispered. I think Uncle Carlton made things right with the other man, but even young as I was I could see my uncle was heartbroken afterwards. The idea someone related to him would do such a thing, I suppose.”

  “What was the other man’s name?”

  “I’m not sure. Russell? But that could have been his first name. He had bad lungs. They moved to Arizona or one of those dry places. I think it might have been around the time that Uncle Carlton died.”

  She eased herself to the edge of her chair, preparing to stand. The baby whimpered.

  “He has a doctor’s appointment. If you’ll excuse me...”

  “I’ll let myself out so you don’t have to jostle him more than necessary. And thanks.” I took a step, then paused. “It must be tough, being estranged from your aunt after all you did for her.”

  “Actually, it’s a relief. She’s a very difficult person. I don’t believe she appreciated a thing I did for her.”

  To reassure the frazzled young woman she’d be rid of me, I waited until I was at the door to speak again.

  “What about Nick’s friends? Are any of them still around?”

  “I don’t even know what school he attended. When we were at Aunt Clara’s he’d sneak off sometimes with the son of a chauffeur or gardener or something who worked in the neighborhood. But as far as actual friends, I’ve no idea.”

  THIRTY-NINE

  Mothers with young kids got into gear early because they had to. It was why I’d put Sarah O’Neill at the top of my places to go that morning. In contrast, I’d expected someone dabbling in stolen property and keeping late hours like the man I’d followed the night before would be a late riser.

  He let me down.

  When I got within a block of the house with the sign in the front yard advertising ROOMS, I saw a car that looked like the one I’d followed with Bartoz. It was pulling away from the curb. As it passed, I saw the license plate was the same.

  Now I faced a dilemma. With the man who’d met Nick Perry gone, I could check names on the entryway mailboxes without running into him and risking the chance he’d remember me if he noticed me watching him later. Alternatively, I could follow him and see why he was out and about so early.

  Following won.

  He parked a block or so away from the soup kitchen where I’d met Punchy McKenzie. Drunks and derelicts and petty crime abounded here. A woman alone was bound to attract attention unless she was hunting customers or picking through garbage cans. It was early for the first and I wasn’t dressed right for either. Nevertheless, I wanted to see what the man who walked with his elbows out was up to.

  The DeSoto crawled along as slowly as it could without stalling. I passed him. If I parked to watch where he went, I’d stick out. If I looped around the block, I could lose him. At the intersection I swung onto the side street, stuck my arm out the window with frantic hand waggling, and brought the car to a stop. Hopping out, I raised the hood and peered anxiously at the engine. Sometimes acting like a fish out of water is the best way to blend in.

  A car pulled around me, honking to warn me not to step out into the traffic. It was sparse where I’d turned. From my vantage point I could see a block and a half down the street I’d been on. Elbows-Out was still walking.

  “Need some help there, honey?”

  While I’d watched Elbows-Out, a bulb-nosed guy with more flab than muscles under his stained tweed jacket had crept within arm’s grab on the curb side. Hard to say whether he intended to hit me up for money or snatch my purse.

  “Yeah, take a peek under there and tell me what made my car conk out.” I tossed him a quarter.

  He fumbled and almost dropped it but didn’t. His blink suggested he was startled to encounter composure rather than hand-wringing.

  “Sure thing, honey. What’s your name?”

  “Arabella.”

  “Classy. It fits you.”

  The smile he bestowed on me looked more like a leer. I quickly was pegging him as a third-rate hustler instead of a threat. Coming a step closer, he eyed the DeSoto’s engine with pretended earnestness. The Smith & Wesson felt cozy under my jacket. Across the way, Elbows-Out halted in front of a doorway.

  “Looks to me like you have a leak in there, honey. I know a good mechanic.”

  Was Elbows-Out...? Yes. He was unlocking the door.

  “There’s a little place there we could go and have a beer while I called him,” my knight in slimy armor suggested.

  “You know, I bet I just flooded it.” Stepping past him, I slammed the hood, causing him to jump away. “Don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”

  The DeSoto purred at my touch. I rounded the block in record time. As I passed the place Elbows-Out had just unlocked, someone inside turned a card in the single window from CLOSED to OPEN. The lettering on the window said USED BOOKS.

  Dirty books, I wondered as I continued? That would be about right for this neighborhood. The thought of what might have rubbed off on pages of second-hand pornography was more than I could stomach. Regardless of what kind of volumes adorned its shelves, it would make a swell place for stashing stolen goods.

  * * *

  I was curious what went on at the bookstore, but I was equally curious about the man I’d followed there. With his whereabouts accounted for at least temporarily, I could have a quick look around the place where he lived.

  On the way I pulled to the curb and replaced my suit jacket with a gray cardigan I kept in the trunk. I traded my peacock blue hat for a dismal gray cloche. When I got to my destination I parked half a block away and walked to the place with the sign in the front yard that said ROOMS.

  Over one arm I had my muslin shopping bag. It would lend credence to my story of collecting old clothes for the needy if anyone happened along and questioned my presence while I checked the names Bartoz had been unable to read in the dark. No one did.

  The rooming house was clean but utilitarian. Ten wooden pockets for mail, each with a bracket beneath, decorated one wall of its small entry. Numbers painted in black matched each box to a room. Most of the brackets beneath held slips of paper with hand lettered names. Two didn’t. One was on the third floor.

  When I’d climbed the stairs, it was no surprise to find the unidentified room was the one at the back. The one where a light had gone on after Bartoz and I followed Perry’s pal there last night.

  I knocked on the door, then the one beside it, but no one answered. I tried the door across the way and heard a voice call in response. After a moment a brunette in a satin wrapper opened the door a foot.

  “Yeah?”

  “Oh, hello. I’m supposed to pick up some clothes from Mr. Pennington for the parish rummage sale, but he doesn’t seem to be at home.” I gestured toward the door across the way.

  “Pennington?” the brunette said irritably. “The guy over there’s named Rice, and he wouldn’t lift a finger to help anybody.” She slammed the door.

  Rice. At least I had a last name. Maybe.

  I was in such a good mood I decided to head for the morgue.

  FORTY

  On the face of it, nothing connected the man who’d disappeared from The Canterbury to the one who’d died in a fleabag. Nothing except the fact the stiff in the fleabag had turned up a day or two after the one from the fancy hotel went missing. There was also what Smith had mentioned about the man’s hands being callused, though that might mean nothing. Some well-to-do men went rowing and did other things that might give them calluses.

  The coroner was a crusty old guy who cleared his throat and spit a lot. The crowd he hung out with probably didn’t object. I’d been to see him a couple of times, but he acted as if he didn’t know me from Eve. Maybe the disinfectants and such he inhaled every day had affected his memory.

  “A-yeh. Here it is,” he said, unearthing a file. His finger zig-zagged down a page as he read. “Still no name. You and the cops are the only ones to take any interest in him. Male. White. Late forties. Been bumming for some time, judging by s
cars and muscles and such. Looks like he got enough money somewhere to buy himself a couple of quarts of cheap whiskey and used it to wash down a handful of pills. That was that.”

  “And it was deliberate?”

  “The pills say it was. Now and again I’ve gotten one who might not’ve realize how much booze they were pouring down their gullet — probably weren’t intending anything but a good drunk. But mix in pills, especially that many....”

  “Yeah.”

  I’d read about socialites or celebrities dying that way. Unless a note was left suggesting otherwise, those were usually passed off, in public at least, as “accidental”. The thing that stuck in my mind about those was that most had been women.

  “What about his liver and that? Had he been a boozer?”

  The coroner examined his notes.

  “No. I remember now thinking the liquor was probably more toxic because of it.”

  The will-o-the-wisp possibilities that had lured me here kicked into high gear.

  “What else was unusual about him?”

  “Unusual?”

  “Don’t lots of stiffs, especially John and Jenny Does, have something odd about them? Something that makes you wonder what their story is?”

  Maybe the old duffer had no more curiosity than a stone. I was hoping to scratch his professional pride enough to squeeze out anything else he knew. He squinted in thought and drew up his top lip, exposing his teeth so he resembled a groundhog checking conditions before coming out of its hole.

  “Well, he’d had a haircut recently, a good one, and his nails were trimmed. Kinda sad, with the rest of him so scruffy. A-yeh. There was his underwear, too.”

  “What about it?”

  “Looked almost brand new. First quality. His socks too. You don’t see many bodies where the outside clothes are all ragged but the ones underneath are that fine.”

  Unless you’ve been masquerading as a rich guy, and for some reason had to give your outer togs back.

  * * *

  When I got back to The Canterbury, the desk clerk called me over and handed me a message written in tidy script: