A Dog's Ransom

by Patricia Highsmith

  “They’re in Long Island. At our place you could see Marylyn more easily.”

  That was true. “I wouldn’t want to be trouble to you. I’d rather be a help.”

  “Nonsense! I am not so busy.” She was standing up, smiling so that the corners of her eyes as well as her mouth seemed to turn up. “Maybe Ed can telephone you. Cheer you up. We can call you here?”

  “Yes, there’s a phone in the hall.—Thank you for coming to see me, Greta. And for the book and the grapes.” Clarence was sitting up and would have accompanied Greta to the door, except that he felt asinine in his nightshirt.

  She was gone. The walls were pale-blue blanks again, the room empty of her warmth.

  Clarence’s parents, who arrived at 6:30 that evening, were astounded that he was thinking of staying with a family he hardly knew.

  “Not a family, Mother, just a man and wife.”

  Who were the Reynoldses? They hadn’t heard of them until the detective who called at their house mentioned them.

  Clarence explained how he had met the Reynoldses last month. “I didn’t mean I’d go straight to them.” But of course he did want to go straight to them. Astoria held no attractions. “Edward Reynolds works at Cross and Dickinson. He’s a senior editor. They’re very nice people, Mother.”

  “You’ll stay with us first,” said his mother. “You’ll want to be feeling stronger before you visit people you don’t know so well.”

  “We’ll come the same time tomorrow and pick you up in the car, Clary old boy,” said Ralph.

  There was no way out. “I ought to get something from my apartment. Check the mail. Bills, maybe.”

  “Have you got the keys, Clary?” asked his mother. “Shall we go by tomorrow night? But you shouldn’t climb those stairs . . . I’ll bring you some clothes from home meanwhile. You’ve lots of clothes at home and you like those old clothes.”

  Clarence reached for his keyring in the drawer of the bed table. On the ring were Marylyn’s two keys, no longer of any use. “My blue jeans, maybe a shirt or two. Shirts’re in the middle drawer. Not the French cuff shirts, the ordinary ones.”

  “I know,” said his mother, pleased.

  “Marylyn been to see you?” asked his father, “I was hoping we might run into her.”

  Clarence realized that his mother looked younger than Greta, looked very pretty with the fur collar of her black coat still close about her neck and her sturdy face smiling and full of health. But Greta was to him more attractive, even though feature by feature Greta was really uglier. He realized he was a little in love with Greta.

  His father was talking about how lucky Clarence had been. “. . . twenty-one policemen killed so far this year in New York alone . . .”

  The nurse came in. It was time for his parents to go.

  Clarence picked up a book, and felt for a few minutes content. Then he thought of Dannie, of Marylyn on West 11th Street—Marylyn probably cooking his meals, arranging her clothes and her typewriter in his apartment (which Clarence for no real reason imagined rather swank), and he grew tense, and he blinked his eyes. It couldn’t last, couldn’t be anything serious, Marylyn and Dannie. Dannie knew Marylyn was his girl. And Dannie himself didn’t look serious about anything. Clarence had seen him twice. Marylyn could be cool, unfeminine almost, just like another fellow or someone sexless, if she wasn’t interested in a man. Clarence had seen it. And what was so marvelous about Dannie? He was twenty-six and not yet a roaring success. His parents were helping him with his rent, he remembered Marylyn saying. Maybe he even had a roommate, another fellow there. Clarence hoped so.

  As Clarence was staring without interest at his dinner tray, a nurse came in and told him there was a telephone call for him. Marylyn, Clarence thought. He got out of bed as quickly as he could, preparing the most casual of remarks about his injuries. And he could say he hoped life was quieter for her on West 11th Street.

  “Hello. Clarence?”

  Clarence recognized Ed’s voice. “Yes. Hello, Ed. How are you?”

  “That’s what I’m calling to ask you. Greta thought you looked pretty well, considering.”

  “Oh, I’m fine. Out tomorrow. My parents are coming to pick me up.”

  “Greta said you might be able to visit us for a few days. I hope you can. How long are you going to be hors de combat?”

  “Three more weeks, they say. I can get around now. It’s just that I can’t work for three more weeks.”

  Clarence returned to his bed, to the boring tray. He had hoped Ed would mention Marylyn, say something about having seen her Wednesday evening. How absurd it was to grasp like this, Clarence thought, for a word, an impression Ed might have had, assuming Ed had seen Marylyn at all, and possibly he hadn’t. Clarence knew he was being unrealistic, hanging on to hopes that were maybe doomed. Marylyn hadn’t even telephoned.

  22

  On Tuesday evening the Reynoldses awaited Clarence Duhamell. His parents, or his father anyway, was driving Clarence to Manhattan, and the Reynoldses had asked Clarence to bring his parents to the apartment to meet them. Clarence was due around seven. Juliette had been aired. Greta, besides preparing a rather special dinner of roast ducklings, had gone to trouble to make the spare room—really her studio, but her easel had been stuck in a corner and her paints pushed to one end of the long worktable—attractive with a pot of flowering begonia and two or three books, which she thought Clarence might like, on the table by the single bed. She was hoping the Duhamells might stay for dinner.

  The telephone rang and Ed picked it up.

  “Hello, Mr. Reynolds? . . . Patrolman Peter Manzoni here. I’m from the same precinct house as Duhamell. You know him, I think. Clarence.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’d like to see you, Mr. Reynolds. I’m in your neighborhood and I wonder if you’ve got a few minutes?”

  “Tonight I—”

  “Or later after dinner? That’s okay with me.”

  “Tonight isn’t good at all. We have guests. Can I ask what this is about?”

  “Just that I’d like to ask you some questions about Clarence. Nothing complicated.”

  The tough voice irritated Ed. “Questions you can’t ask him?”

  The man laughed. “Not quite. Different questions. How about tomorrow night? Say around six-thirty? Seven?”

  Ed hesitated. “I’d like to know what it’s about.”

  “I can’t tell you over the phone. It’s my job, Mr. Reynolds.”

  It might look worse for Clarence if he dodged the interview, Ed thought. “All right. Tomorrow? About seven? . . . I’ll meet you downstairs in the lobby here.” Ed hung up.

  “Who was that?” Greta asked.

  “That fellow you said Clarence mentioned, Manzoni. Wants to see me tomorrow night.”

  “To see you? Why?”

  “He says he wants to ask me some questions about Clarence.”

  The house telephone buzzed in the kitchen, and Greta turned to go to it.

  Ed was wondering if Clarence’s precinct house knew that he was going to stay with them for a few days? Probably. The precinct house would want to know where to reach Clarence. “I’m not going to tell that guy anything,” Ed said to Greta.

  The doorbell sounded.

  Clarence came in with his father. Clarence stuck his suitcase in a corner of the foyer. “Ed—Greta—my father. Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds.”

  “How do you do?” said Ralph, bowing to Greta, extending his hand to Ed. “I’m very happy to meet you, because my son’s talked quite a bit about you.”

  “Your wife’s not with you?” Ed said.

  “No, she’s got a meeting tonight at eight. She could’ve come, but she didn’t want to make a crowd, I think.”

  They went into the living-room.

  Ed liked
Ralph Duhamell on sight. He looked straightforward, unpretentious, yet sure of himself. His pleasant, full lips Clarence had inherited, but his hair was darker than Clarence’s and he was not so tall.

  “You feeling better, Clarence?” Greta asked.

  “Absolutely all right,” Clarence said.

  Ralph accepted a scotch, but said he could not stay for dinner, when Greta said she was hoping that he would. “Clare told me about your other little dog. That’s a terrible story. And the ransom hoax that went with it. That’s vicious.—Manhattan’s tougher than where we live. No doubt of that. We live in Astoria. Nothing fancy to be sure, but it’s a real home there. Clare was brought up there.”

  Ed knew from the way he spoke that he didn’t know or suspect that Clarence had killed Rowajinski.

  “Clare feels he didn’t do a good job for you,” Ralph said. “He’s said a good deal about that lately.”

  “What could he do?” Ed said. “The dog was dead from the start, I’m afraid.”

  “Yes, I realize.—Clare says you’ve met Marylyn.”

  “Yes, once,” Ed said, glad to change the subject. Greta and Clarence were talking on the other side of the room. “I thought she was very nice. Quite intelligent.”

  “Really?” said Ralph. “Serious?”

  “Oh—yes. Politically.” Ed smiled.

  “Because Clare is quite gone on her. At least she works for a living. Doesn’t take drugs, I gather. Clare says she doesn’t even like smoking pot.”

  Clarence showed his father Greta’s paintings. Ralph seemed to like one seascape immensely. He declined a second drink.

  “Behave yourself, Clare,” Ralph said as he was leaving. At the door he again shook hands with Ed.

  “Come and see your room, Clarence,” Greta said. “Bring your suitcase. Can you carry it all right?”

  “Doesn’t weigh anything. It’s a little suitcase.” Clarence got it and followed her into a hall to the left of the kitchen. His room was on the left with a window on the street side. “It’s a beautiful room,” Clarence said.

  There was a solid dark green rug, a bright orange bedspread, a very practical table, white walls—none of the clutter that ruined most rooms. The Reynoldses had good taste. Clarence hung up a pair of trousers. He had brought little with him, thinking he ought not to stay more than two nights. He washed his hands and face in the blue-tiled bathroom. Greta had showed him his towels. Clarence went back into the living-room, carrying the bottle of Chateau Neuf du Pape that he had brought in his suitcase.

  The dinner was ready.

  Later that evening, when Clarence had gone to his room, Ed stood at the living-room window, looking down at a few brownstones squeezed between taller apartment buildings across the street. Greta was out with the pup. Clarence had offered to air Juliette, but Greta had wanted to do it herself. Ed had some reading to do before going to bed. He was thinking of Manzoni tomorrow evening, dreading it. He’d be calm and brief and factual—factual up to a point. Manzoni would probably say, “I hear Dummell’s staying with you now.” Ed might have started his reading, but he waited until he heard the faint click of the elevator door, Greta’s step in the hall, and he knew she was safely back. He sat down on the sofa with a nine-page mimeographed bulletin called NON-FICTION: COMPARISON OF CURRENT YEAR WITH LAST YEAR. Advertising, sales by area, returns, all itemized compactly. Ed was gratified to see that two books he had fought for had done quite well. But one book he had been against had done even better. That was life.

  “What’re Clarence’s plans for tomorrow?” Ed asked.

  “He wants to help me shopping. And he wants to air the dog.” Greta laughed.

  “I don’t particularly want him airing the dog,” Ed said in a soft voice. “We can do it.”

  “He wants to be helpful. He—”

  “It’s that Manzoni,” Ed interrupted. “I don’t know. He might be watching the house.—I don’t like it.”

  Greta stared at him. “All right, Eddie.”

  “I can tell more about the situation tomorrow.”

  THE NEXT EVENING, Ed was downstairs in his apartment house lobby ten minutes before seven. “Waiting for someone,” Ed said with a smile, by way of explanation to the doorman. Clarence had gone out to a film in the afternoon, but was in now, and he wanted to take Ed and Greta out to dinner. Ed had told Clarence that he had a date with one of his authors in the neighborhood, and would be back in half an hour.

  Manzoni was punctual, and Ed recognized him at once as a cop when the doorman let him in—a man of about five eight, no hat, wavy black hair, a trenchcoat of dark blue, an ambiguous smile on a broad, creased face.

  “Mr. Reynolds?” he said.

  “Yes. Good evening.”

  “Well—we’ll go out somewhere?”

  They found a small bar not far away. Manzoni motioned to a booth at one side. When they had sat down, Manzoni said:

  “I heard today Clarence is staying with you. I spoke with his parents today.”

  “Yes. For a couple of days. He’s just out of the hospital as you probably know.”

  “Dummell should’ve reported where he is. He’s still a cop even if he’s on sick leave. That’s why I phoned his parents. Because his phone didn’t answer.”

  Ed said nothing.

  “Well.” Manzoni smiled. “What do you know about Rowajinski, Mr. Reynolds? That’s why I came to see you, to ask what Dummell said about him.”

  “I only know he was found dead,” Ed said.

  A waiter came. Manzoni mumbled something. Ed ordered a scotch and water.

  Manzoni lit a cigarette. He had pudgy strong hands that went with his face. “You know, Homicide doesn’t know who killed Rowajinski, but they have a strong suspicion it was Dummell. Who else, in fact? What do you think yourself?”

  “I hadn’t thought.”

  “No? Really no?”

  Ed relaxed, and pulled out his own cigarettes. “Why should I enjoy thinking about Rowajinski? I don’t. I haven’t.”

  “What I want to ask you frankly is do you think Clarence did it? Has Clarence talked to you?”

  “No.” Ed frowned slightly, showed the faintest shock at the question, and realized that he was acting, that he had to act. “You know as much as I do and probably a lot more.” Since Manzoni was silent, watching him with the speculative smile, Ed asked, “Are you a detective?”

  “No.—I will be.”

  Their drinks arrived.

  Manzoni took a gulp of his, and ground some ice between his teeth. “It occurred to me, Mr. Reynolds, if Dummell killed that guy, you’d be sort of on Dummell’s side, no? After all, you didn’t like Rowajinski.”

  Again Ed sighed, pretending. “I didn’t hate Rowajinski enough to want him killed. He was a sick man, sick in the head.”

  Manzoni nodded. ‘Whatever Dummell said to you—Look, Mr. Reynolds, we’re sure Dummell did it, and he’s going to have to answer a few more questions from us, see? Sure, he’s just been in the hospital—”

  “Really? You’re so sure?”

  “Dummell had motive. You know that. This Pole was annoying his girlfriend. He’d accused Dummell of taking a bribe. Something that was never proven yes or no!” Manzoni declared, holding up a thick forefinger. “Dummell sucks up to people like you, wants to put on a good act for you. Social climber.”

  Ed shook his head as if he were bewildered.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I have no facts to give you. I know you want to get your man, sure.” Ed downed his drink, not so much because he wanted it as because he wanted to leave soon.

  “Mr. Reynolds, the finger is already on Dummell and we’re going to get him. I don’t know—just how.” Manzoni subsided in a shrug, almost daydreamed for a few seconds. “But it’s not going to be hard.”
>
  Evidently, Ed supposed, he wasn’t quite bold enough to say outright that he, Ed Reynolds, was shielding Dummell. Ed shrugged also, as if to say, “That’s your affair.”

  Manzoni looked hard at Ed, still smiling a little, but with the flinty look that Ed had seen in films and in television plays—the tough detective had reached the point of showdown, of crisis, or maybe challenge of some kind. “What you’re saying is, Clarence hasn’t said a thing to you.”

  “No,” Ed said.

  “He just said he spent that night with his girlfriend?”

  “That night?”

  “The night Rowajinski was killed. Tuesday. That Tuesday.”

  “Yes. He did say that.”

  “Maybe you know his girlfriend dropped him. Marylyn.”

  “Did she?”

  “You didn’t know?”

  “Clarence didn’t mention it.”

  “You know Marylyn?”

  “No. I met her once, that’s all.”

  “Well, she’s fed up. She knows. Nobody thinks Clarence spent the whole night there. His girlfriend says so mainly because she wants to foul up the cops. But she doesn’t want a killer for a boyfriend, oh no.”

  Ed said calmly, “I don’t know a thing about Marylyn. Clarence hasn’t said a thing.” Ed looked at his watch. “If you don’t mind—”

  “Oh, of course not. Gotta be somewhere?”

  Ed nodded. He pulled out his billfold. “Unless you have any other—Something else?”

  “No. Just if Clarence tells you anything, even the smallest thing, let us know, will you? Here’s the telephone number.” Manzoni had his billfold out also, and pulled half a dozen cards from it, and gave Ed one.

  The precinct address and telephone number were stamped crookedly in purple ink on the card. Ed put the card in his overcoat pocket. Manzoni really wanted to pay, but they went dutch, each leaving a sizable tip.

  FOR CLARENCE, THE DAY HAD BEGUN in a princely way. He had awakened at a quarter past nine, when Greta knocked on his door, bringing coffee and orange juice on a tray. Outside, the sun was shining, and Clarence had strolled about the room, barefoot, in pajamas, sipping his coffee, drinking in also the details of the room which was Greta’s workroom—the used but clean brushes in the tall cookie tin, the sketch in dark purple watercolor for a portrait of Ed, a discarded shopping list on which Greta had tried out various shades of yellow. He had heard the hum of a vacuum cleaner and remembered that Greta had said the cleaning woman came this morning.