The Corpse Steps Out

by Craig Rice

  He paused, paced up and down the floor leaving little piles of cigar ash on the rug.

  “Funny. Not much reason for anybody to shoot him. But somebody did.”

  Another silence, a few more trips back and forth on the floor. In his strolling the little lawyer suddenly noticed the odd-shaped contraption of wood, leather, and rubber lying on the table. He picked it up, idly fiddled with it, half-unconsciously.

  Suddenly the quiet was shattered by the sound of a gunshot. Jake jumped. Helene screamed. Malone dropped the contraption as though it had turned and bitten him.

  “What the hell,” he said dazedly, and again, “what the hell!”

  “You shot off the sound effect,” Jake gasped as soon as words came back to him.

  Malone picked it up, looked at it, experimented with it, and shot it off again, this time with less disastrous results’, and looked questioningly and dubiously at Helene.

  “It’s Krause’s sound effect,” Jake explained. “Helene stole it to conduct an experiment. She’s going to send it back.” He described the experiment and its results.

  “So,” Helene added, “it must have been a gun with a silencer, and that means—”

  “Wait a minute,” the lawyer said excitedly, “wait a minute.” He stared at them a moment, walked to the window and looked out, picked up the sound effect and laid it down again, took out a cigar and lighted it, made two more turns up and down the room.

  “Malone,” Helene said, near-desperation in her voice, “what goes on?”

  “I heard Nelle’s program last week,” Malone said, “and I heard about five minutes of the program that followed it. Jake, what was that program?”

  “True Gang Stories, or some such title,” Jake said promptly.

  “And didn’t you tell me the radio was going full blast in Paul March’s apartment when you walked in and found the body?”

  “It was!” Jake said, a sudden light flickering in his eyes. “Hell’s bells yes, you might be right. Last week’s Gang Stories script was full of shooting. No one would have noticed one more shot. Anyone who heard it would have assumed it was one of Krause’s sound effects coming over the air.”

  Helene said, “Wonderful! What of it?”

  Jake ignored her. “If that’s right,” he said, “it fixes the time of the shooting very nicely. Somewhere in the half-hour right after the Nelle Brown Revue.”

  They stared at each other.

  “But during the audition,” Helene began, “I mean, when Mr. Givvus was killed—how about the sound of the shot then?”

  This time it was Jake who paced the floor. Halfway in the eighth lap he paused suddenly, began looking around the room.

  “Newspapers,” he said, “I want newspapers. Yesterday’s newspapers.”

  Helene unearthed one in the wastebasket. He spread it out on the floor, found the radio page, ran a forefinger down the afternoon’s listings.

  “Just before the audition,” he said slowly, “just a very few minutes before we got the audition underway, The Rider of the Rockies came on the air. The reception-room speaker was probably turned on for it. It—The Rider of the Rockies—has a standard opening.”

  He paused for thought.

  “It opens,” he said slowly, “with an Indian war whoop, a burst of galloping hoofbeats”—he produced a highly realistic sound of hoofbeats by patting his thighs with his cupped hands—“and a regular fusillade of gunshots. Boom-boom-tiddy-boom-boom-boom!” He grabbed the sound effect, shot it off a half-dozen times in rapid succession.

  Before anyone had a chance to speak, there were running footsteps in the hall. Jake opened the door, stuck his head out, said, “It’s all right, Molly, it’s just me shooting at my girl,” and shut the door again. The footsteps went away.

  “All of which means,” Malone said, “it didn’t need to be a gun with a silencer. The sound of the shot was covered in both cases.”

  “Lovely,” Jake commented, “now all we need to know is who fired the shots.”

  Malone sighed. “Here are some more trains of thought. First, that the same person committed both murders. That thought has two subdivisions: (a) that someone committed both murders thinking that Mr. Givvus was St. John, and (b) that someone committed both murders thinking that Mr. Givvus was Mr. Givvus. Then there is the thought that these are two different and totally unrelated crimes, with the same two subdivisions relating to the second murder: (a) that the murderer thought he was shooting St. John, and (b) that he thought he was shooting Mr. Givvus.”

  “And subdivision (c),” Helene said, “that it was Krause thinking Mr. Givvus had stolen his sound effect.”

  No one paid any attention to her.

  “What I want to know now is,” Malone said, looking hopelessly around for his hat, “could this guy have been mistaken for St. John. I’ve seen his picture. I want to see St. John.” He finally located the hat under a crumpled newspaper beside the table. “Get on your horses. We’re going to call on St. John.”

  They were down the stairs, in the car, and halfway down Michigan Avenue before Helene caught enough breath to ask, “But why are we going to see St. John?”

  “I want to get a good look at him,” Malone told her.

  “I’m better-looking than he is,” Jake said coyly.

  “You are not,” Helene said. “St. John is a good-looking guy. Dignified. Impressive. English tweeds and a curved-stem pipe, and a hunting dog curled at his feet before the fireplace.”

  “He has bunions,” Jake said. “Don’t forget St. John believes you’re my confidential secretary.”

  “A confidential secretary,” Malone said scornfully, “in a simple little gray linen dress that’s a Paris import.”

  “How do you know a Paris import when you see it?” Helene asked, turning into Wacker Drive.

  Malone said irritably, “Ask my secretary. She pays my private bills for me out of my personal account.” He sniffed. “Well, if St. John wonders about the clothes Jake’s secretary is wearing, you can think of the answer.”

  “I’ll tell him my lawyer buys her clothes for her,” Jake said.

  The usual collection of hopeful actresses, actors, and script writers were waiting to see the great John St. John, but the red-haired girl at the switchboard beamed at Jake and sent the three in without waiting. St. John seemed pale and very tired.

  “Sleep well?” Jake inquired pleasantly, sinking into a comfortable red-leather chair. He admired the purplish swelling on St. John’s slender and aristocratic nose.

  “Excellently,” St. John said. He didn’t look it.

  Malone looked at him closely, walked around the desk and looked at his profile, walked back and stared at him fullface, then took a folded newspaper from his pocket and stared at a picture of the late Mr. Givvus.

  “No, Jake,” he said, “I think you’re wrong. No one could have mistaken Mr. Givvus for this guy.”

  “Even in a dim light?” Jake asked.

  “Even in the dark,” Malone said. “Look at this guy’s forehead, and then look at Mr. Givvus. St. John here has a wave of hair that comes down this way, and Givvus was half bald. St. John has a long, thin, horsy face, and Givvus was almost round-faced.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” Jake said, “but it was an idea anyway.”

  “They don’t look anything alike,” Helene said. “But there still doesn’t seem to be any motive for anybody shooting Mr. Givvus.”

  St. John cleared his throat delicately. “I don’t mind your using my office for a conference room,” he said pleasantly. “But I was under the impression you came up here to see me.”

  “We did,” Malone said, “it just slipped my mind for the moment. How many people knew that your client, Mr. Givvus, was having a secret audition yesterday?”

  St. John raised his right eyebrow half an inch. “Wouldn’t it be safer to let the murder of Mr. Givvus rest in peace? After all, I’m the only person who seems to have lost anything by it, and God knows, I’m willing to let the whol
e thing drop.”

  “I don’t want to just let it drop,” Malone said. “I want to see it buried. That’s why I asked the question.”

  “Well,” St. John said thoughtfully, “well, there was Nelle—and these two people, of course.” He nodded toward Jake and Helene. “In addition—Oscar, Schultz, and Ross from the broadcasting company’s sales department. Yesterday I told Ross that my client didn’t show up for the audition at the last minute. He sympathized with me and, as far as I know, he believed me.”

  “How about Lou Silver?” Jake asked. “And the band boys and the cast?”

  “None of them knew who the audition was for.”

  “Marvelous,” Jake said. “A scene beautifully set for murder. Just as if it had been planned.”

  “Are you insinuating anything?” St. John asked in a perfectly expressionless voice, raising the other eyebrow.

  “No,” Jake said nastily, “should I be?”

  “Never mind,” Malone said. “Look here, St. John. You’re positive no one else knew he was going to be there? It’s damned important.”

  “Positive,” St. John said wearily, slipping off one shoe under the desk. “I met him at the elevator myself and showed him into the client’s room. Outside of the elevator man, no one saw him, and those elevators are carrying up hundreds of people all day long.”

  “Well then,” Malone said, “it’s fairly certain that no one will find out Givvus was shot in the client’s room, and his body moved to Lincoln Park. That’s all I was worrying about.”

  “Of course,” St. John said icily, “murder is murder, and moving a body may be a serious offense.”

  “So is withholding evidence,” Malone said picking up his hat. “You aren’t in the clear either. But I don’t give a hoot who murdered the guy. I’m not on the police force. My business is keeping or getting people out of trouble. I’m good at it, too. Any time you are involved in a murder, St. John, here’s my card.”

  He nodded to Jake and Helene, and they left together. St. John’s secretary passed them in the doorway, carrying a pile of scripts and a handful of telegrams, and as the door closed, they could hear St. John’s tired and harassed voice saying, “Oh God, why do I have to look after everything—”

  “Poor guy,” Helene murmured.

  “We didn’t find out much,” Malone said, “but we and St. John seem to have each other nicely blockaded. He can’t tell the world about the letters Nelle wrote” Paul March, because if he did, we could tell the world about Givvus being murdered in the client’s room, and get him in a heluva jam. That item also works the other way. So right now nobody can make the first move.”

  “Never a dull moment with the Nelle Brown Revue,” Jake commented. “But it would simplify everything if somebody would shoot St. John. Maybe if we wait long enough, Essie St. John will. Now let’s me and Helene go to Crown Point and get married. This looks like a nice day for it.”

  Chapter 20

  “I’m going home and change my dress first,” Helene complained. “If I’m really going to get married, I’ve got to dress up for it.”

  Malone said, “I can get you married at Crown Point any time up to midnight. Helene can change her dress, we’ll have dinner, and I’ll go along and get you married. I’ll be the best man and bridesmaid all at once. I’ll even buy the gin.”

  “All right,” Jake said with a long sigh, “but I’m beginning to have a feeling the wedding will be held in the old people’s home.”

  They drove back to Erie Street. In Helene’s apartment they found Nelle and Baby sitting side by side on the davenport.

  “The door was open,” Nelle explained, “so we came right in. Helene, this is Baby. Baby, this is Helene. We just dropped in to find out if you were really going to get married today.”

  “That’s the intention,” Jake said. He saw a speculative gleam in the little lawyer’s eye and had an uncomfortable premonition that the plans were due for at least one more postponement.

  “I’m glad you dropped in,” Malone said happily. “There’s just time for us all to have a drink together before taking off for Crown Point.” He and Helene vanished into the kitchenette and began concocting a long, cool drink composed largely of gin.

  Jake settled down in an easy chair and looked at Baby. Thank God, he thought, he wasn’t one of the pretty boys. Good-looking enough, as far as that went. But not handsome. He didn’t seem to care whether he was good-looking or not. Probably didn’t even know. Rather boyish-looking, Jake decided, and wondered if Nelle was the first important romance in the young man’s life.

  “No,” Baby was saying to Helene, “radio doesn’t seem glamorous to me. It’s a lot of hard work. But I like it.”

  Baby would like hard work, Jake thought, and he’d do it, too. He wasn’t another Paul March, with ability, but getting by on the strength of his personal charm. By some miracle, Nelle had picked wisely this time.

  “Did you ever know a man in radio named Paul March?” Helene asked very innocently. “This used to be his apartment.”

  Baby wrinkled his brow a little. Jake was glad he was looking away from Nelle’s too-expressionless face. “Paul March. Yes, I did. I did some work for him on a daytime serial a few months ago. He does nice work. I never knew him very well.”

  It sounded genuine enough.

  Malone led the conversation away from Paul March, and Jake went on thinking about Nelle Brown and Baby. He was trying to foresee how it would end. Baby was taking it hard, that was obvious. A lot of gin would flow under the bridgework, but it would be a long long time before Baby would forget Nelle Brown. Too bad. But what about Nelle? Jake sighed. Somehow he had the feeling that the ending would be very, very sad.

  Malone was talking about the mysterious murder of a Mr. Givvus on a Lincoln Park bench.

  Baby’s eyes brightened. “Say, I used to work for him. Never thought of it before, but he’s the same guy.”

  “Honestly?” Helene said, wide-eyed.

  “Sure thing,” Baby told her. “He had a local program on the air in Philly, and I drew the assignment. But he thought I was lousy, and I got the gate. That’s what sent me here to Chicago.”

  “Well, well,” Jake said, “and it must have been a difficult trick, sneaking up on that park bench to shoot him.”

  Baby grinned. “Oh, I didn’t have any trouble. I snuck up on him, silentlike. You see, I’m really a full-blooded Cherokee Indian, with my hair bleached.”

  “Speaking of hair bleach,” Helene said, “let’s have another drink.”

  If Baby had actually murdered Givvus, Jake wondered, would he be smart enough to know that was exactly the right thing to say? But why the hell would Baby—

  They talked of murder, Mr. Givvus, Philadelphia, radio, and cocktail recipes for the time it took to consume two more of the long, cool drinks. Then Jake had a flash of inspiration.

  “Say, where were you all yesterday afternoon?” he asked Baby. “Oscar was giving a special audition and thought he might have to use you if someone fell out of the cast.”

  “Yesterday?” Baby thought for a minute. “I did a commercial at one-fifteen and I was on a show later in the afternoon.”

  “Was it The Rider of the Rockies?” Jake asked very casually.

  Baby shook his head. “No. I’m in today’s script though.” He looked at his watch. “Got to leave pretty quick, too. Funny my landlady didn’t tell you where to reach me yesterday. I had a couple of hours between broadcasts.”

  “She probably forgot,” Jake said. “But I should have run into you around the studios. I was there all afternoon.”

  “I went back in the announcer’s room and took a nap,” Baby said.

  He declined another drink, explaining that he had a show to do; the rest decided there was time for one more, and while it was being made, Nelle and Helene disappeared into the bathroom. As soon as they were out of earshot, Baby turned to Jake, his young face suddenly grave.

  “Say, is something worrying Nelle?”
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  Jake shook his head. “Not that I know. Why?”

  “I don’t know. I thought she looked tired and a little pale. I guess things are never very easy for her.” He scowled. “I know I’m not very important to her, but I mean to stick around as long as she needs me.”

  “Why?” Jake asked, “if you’re not important to her.”

  “This sounds funny,” Baby said, “but look. Nelle’s going to need me very much someday. It’s like this. I know just how much Tootz means to her. He means a hell of a lot. He’s foundation, if you know what I mean.”

  Jake nodded, and said, “Sure.”

  “Tootz isn’t going to live forever. He’s getting on. When it happens it’s going to be a terrible blow to Nelle. I want to be there to catch her when it comes. Oh, I don’t mean marry her. I’m just another guy to Nelle. But when something like that happens, if somebody like me just happens to be there, if you know what I mean.”

  “Sure,” Jake said again, wishing he had taken either one more drink or one less.

  “Another thing,” Baby said, “this March guy. I didn’t want to say so in front of Nelle, but I knew all about—you-know-what-I-mean—”

  Jake nodded and reflected that radio announcers should always have their personal conversations as well as their scripts written for them.

  “March told me,” Baby went on. “I got to know him better than I told Nelle. One night he got drunk, got to bragging about her, and I popped him one, the sonofabitch. If he ever shoots off about her again, I’ll break his neck. Only I didn’t want Nelle to know that I knew that. Because it would make her feel bad.” He drew a long breath. “It’s like this. I don’t care about anything she’s done in the past, or what she’s still going to do in the future. For this little space in between, she’s my life. That sounds like something from a lousy script, but I mean it just that way. She’s my life.”