Stab in the Dark (6 page)

C
ONNIE’S
was the city’s one first class all-night restaurant. In the middle of a district of exclusive shops, it was now surrounded by darkeded store windows. Both the booths and the counter were well filled with after-theater customers and with those who had migrated from the recently closed bar. It took Knox a few moments to find an empty booth at the rear. When he did, he ordered coffee and a sandwich, wanting neither, and sat back with a first edition of the morning paper to wait for Beeker.

There was nothing about Leo Auffer in the paper. The murder might not have occured as far as news was concerned. Beeker had so far done a better job than Knox expected in keeping the affair quiet.

He was scanning the sport page when he heard heavy footsteps. Beeker came up, slid his heavy body into the booth, looked at Knox’s untouched sandwich and coffee and ordered the same. Knox folded the paper and set it beside him.

“All right,” Knox said. “You’re sore. Give it to me straight.”

“I intend to,” Beeker said. “There’s been another murder and Maddy Keehan thinks maybe you had a hand in it.”

The service was quick at Connie’s and Beeker’s sandwich arrived. He took a huge bite and gulped coffee after it. His mouth emptied, he said, “Tell me about you and Jock.”

There was a bad taste suddenly in Knox’s mouth. “Not him, Mel?”

“Him,” Beeker said morosely. He added more sugar to his coffee. “Stabbed in the eye and then in the middle. There’s a carving knife sticking out of his belly right now.”

Knox got mad. He was mad at whoever had done it and he was mad at himself. And he decided to be mad at Keehan while he was about it.

“What makes old rubber hose think I had a hand in it?” he demanded. “Since when have I gone in for knives?”

“You were playing patsy with Jock earlier,” Beeker told him. “We had a man on him, so we know you went to a tavern and pumped him. Then not long ago he’s found dead.” He bit into the sandwich again, not looking as if he enjoyed it too much. “Poor bastard. He was watching TV and went into the kitchen for a beer. His wife was busy looking and swears she heard nothing. She couldn’t have if it’d been a gun what with all the shooting and hollering going on in the program. But she got worried when two commercials went by and he didn’t come back. She found him in the kitchen—the shiv through his chest, the beer spilled all over the floor.

“When was this?” Knox demanded.

“Just before midnight. They were looking at the late show.”

“And where was the man you had on him?”

“Outside in front across the street.” Beeker shook his head. “Hell, we were looking for a contact, if anything. We didn’t think the dope was in any danger. It was easy. Whoever did it came up the alley, went in the back porch, opened the door—which Mrs. Dylan swears she locked tight earlier—and waited. That’s all there was to it. Jock walked right into it.”

Knox’s hand shook a little when he lit his cigaret. “So you and Maddy have it doped out that my interest in him caused it.”

“You sure as hell didn’t hide that interest,” Beeker pointed out. “And remember, you told me Eddie Pillow is around. Is that where you saw him, when you were with Jock?”

Beeker had a good cop’s gimlet eye and he was using it on Knox now. Knox said, “That’s it, Mel.”

“Damn it, why didn’t you come to me for the information? Keehan had him for over an hour this afternoon. He wrung him dry.”

“What a cop gets out of a man and what someone else gets might be two different things,” Knox said. “And then there’s the old one about what you don’t get. You expect something and it doesn’t come. Or a couple of items don’t fit—things like that are sometimes worth as much as a straight answer.”

“Go on,” Beeker said. “And when you get through telling me that, tell me what else you’ve been up to.”

Knox had thought about this on his way down. He knew that Beeker would ask for it, and he wasn’t yet sure just how much information he wanted to hand over. On the other hand, he had to have Beeker’s cooperation.

He said, making himself sound reluctant, “I hate to pass anything on that might waste your time, Mel, but if you want to listen, okay.”

“I
want
to listen—to everything you have to tell me.”

Knox tasted his cold coffee and pushed it aside. Beeker helped himself to Knox’s sandwich, having finished his own. Knox said, “I got the same thing out of Jock that Keehan probably did. Only there were a couple of places that his story didn’t jell for me. Is that the way Maddy felt about it?”

Beeker snorted. “You know him. They’re either guilty or they aren’t. He decided Jock was on the level.”

“All right,” Knox said, “try these on for size. How could anyone without being deliberate about it gouge such a hole in the chair that a little larger sized screw wouldn’t bite and hold? That’s the first point. In other words, why didn’t Jock just get a little bigger screw and put it in.”

“Because the hole was all gouged cockeyed,” Beeker said. “I saw the chair. The girl made a mess trying to fix it herself.”

“Sure,” Knox said. “I saw the chair too.” He shook his head. “Point the second. Jock delivers the chair before he goes to McEwen and reports the murder. That was odd. If he was in such a panic as he claimed, why didn’t he dump the chair when he hit the lobby level and run straight to McEwen?”

“The dame wanted a chair,” Beeker growled in imitation of Maddy Keehan. “The guy had chivalry.” He shrugged and said in his normal voice, “People do funny things under shock, Paul.”

“I know,” Knox said. “I told you it might be a waste of time. But let’s add one more thing. Earlier tonight, I went down to the workshop to look at the chair. I saw what you saw. And then someone turned out the light on me and sapped me. When I came to, that chair was gone and a different one had been substituted. To me, that makes Jock’s little chivalrous gesture seem queer.”

Beeker said, “Sapped you—who?”

“If I knew,” Knox said, “I might have a lead to go on.”

“Just to get a chair?”

“It seems so, doesn’t it.”

“That Deane dame …” Beeker began musingly.

“I had dinner with the Deane dame, as you call her.”

“We know that. You also had a drink with the Tinsleys. And you had the Deane girl in your room.”

“Strictly business.”

“I’m glad to hear that. Then you had a drink with her and left her some hours ago.”

Knox grinned. “Who’s being covered?”

“Both of you,” Beeker admitted. “Maddy put a tail on you.”

“Then you know that I went to my room and worked after leaving the bar. I was there until you called.”

Beeker said irritably, “We know you’re clean, damn it. But now, after what happened to Jock, we’ll have to keep a double check on the girl.”

“What am I, the kiss of death?”

“Could be,” Beeker said. Having nothing more to eat, he sat and moodily tugged at his lower lip. Then, with a sigh as though succumbing to a temptation he couldn’t resist, he ordered more coffee. He said, “This hocus pocus about the chair bothers me, Paul. Maybe the girl didn’t tell us everything she knew.”

Knox had found that in most cases working with the police was an advantage. They had the organization and the facilities to check things no individual could. But there were times when police routine became a handicap. He hesitated now, not sure yet just how this was going to shape up. There were a lot of questions about Cora Deane that he wanted answered, but he wasn’t sure that he wanted the the police to have those answers—yet.

He said, “If she didn’t tell you everything she knew, she didn’t tell me either. I confronted her with the business of the chair. She claimed she did it all with her little screwdriver.”

“And you getting sapped—did you tell her about that?”

“Yes. I don’t think she even believed me.”

Beeker shrugged. “Well, these things take time. I’ve got a good man on her. If she isn’t on the level, she’ll trip up sooner or later.”

Knox was glad to leave it at that. Beeker’s coffee came. He sugared, sipped and then leaned forward. “Paul, frankly, we’re stumped on Auffer and now on Jock. But you came here for the same purpose as Auffer. If there’s anything that will help, I want it.”

“Auffer had all the dope,” Knox reminded him.

“I know. I know. How about the Tinsleys?”

Knox spread his hands. “Nothing yet—if there’s anything there. It may have just been a social acquaintance with Auffer. They’re his kind of people.” He told of his conversation and his bet.

Beeker whistled. “A thousand dollars you toss off—like that!”

Knox said, “If it pans out, I can put it on my expense account.” He paused, considering just how much more to tell Beeker. Finally, he said, “Here’s all I have, Mel. When I took Jock to the tavern, two guys tailed me. One was Eddie Pillow and he drives a late model Ford. The other guy I never saw before.” He described him.

“We have a check on Pillow,” Becker said. “He may be a lead or he may have just been suspicious that you’re back in town.”

“And he may be connected with smut peddling,” Knox said.

“Wouldn’t that mean that someone was on to your reason for being here—if Eddie was put to following you?”

“If that’s it, I’m not very useful,” Knox confessed. “But it’s possible that he was put onto Jock, not me.”

“Then you think Jock was somehow tied up with what you’re here for?”

“It’s possible, if Eddie is.”

“He might be worth a real check then,” Beeker agreed. “And the other one?”

“He was in the bar tonight,” Knox said. “But whether he wants me or Cora Deane now, I don’t know.”

“Probably you,” Beeker said. “Despite the business of you getting sapped over the chair, I can’t see how she’s tangled in with things.”

Knox didn’t see either, but he wasn’t going to dismiss her so lightly. He could not get over the idea that she was playing her cards her own way, and playing them very close to her handsome chest. The result of his scribbles indicated that in more ways than one. The trouble was that he didn’t know which way was the right way. And as he saw it, knowing that could make a great deal of difference right now. The difference between success and failure on this job for Knox himself.

After a pause, Beeker said, “At any rate, I’ll have him checked on.”

Knox was thoughtful. “Why not let him ride a while, Mel? Maybe I can find out more if he’s free to operate.”

Beeker snorted. “Who do you think I’d put on him, someone in uniform? I’ll use Mousy Riley. He was staked out at Jock Dylan’s place but there’s no point in keeping him there now.”

Knox said, “We don’t know for sure, of course, but we have to assume that Jock’s death is connected with the case I’m on.”

Beeker looked puzzled. “I was talking about Mouse Riley.”

“So am I,” Knox said. “If we go on the assumption that Jock was killed because he learned something—or they thought he learned something—then I suggest you keep Mouse Riley on the Dylan house—and add a few men. An outfit like that won’t take any chances, Mel. How do they know what Jock might have told his wife?”

“I hadn’t thought of that one,” Beeker confessed. “Have it your way, Paul.”

Knox felt like hell about Jock, but he felt a little better to know that Mouse Riley—so called because he was a silent nonentity as a shadow—would be watching Jock’s wife. And now that he was alerted for possible physical danger to her, the chances of anyone doing to her what they did to Jock were slim.

“Did she have anythng to say?” Knox asked. “Did Jock tell her anything?”

Beeker gave him a sour grin of understanding. “Meaning, have I been holding out on you. No, not that she told us. She did say that her husband came home full of what happened. That’s natural, of course. He showed her the money you’d given him. The idea of being written up in a magazine had him all puffed up.”

Knox felt worse than ever. “The poor bastard,” he said. “He was getting out of his league.”

Beeker went on, “She said that at the same time he acted a little strange. I guess she knows him pretty well. She thought he might be holding something out on her.”

“He was holding out on me,” Knox said. “Now that he’s been killed, I’m more sure of it than ever.”

Beek er shrugged. “That’s all. About fifteen minutes before he went into the kitchen for his beer, he got a telephone call. He wasn’t gone long and when he came back to the TV show, all he said was the hotel had called. Mrs. Dylan was wound up in the movie and didn’t think much about it.”

Knox said, “Still she made a point of it.”

“Not until we asked her if there had been any calls.”

“Uhm,” Knox said. “How do you figure it, Mel? The murderer called Jock, made a date for a few minutes later, and Jock used the beer as an excuse to go out to the kitchen to see whoever it was.”

“That’s the way I see it,” Beeker said. “The back door was open. Mrs. Dylan swears she locked it, and I imagine she did. It’s one of those lock and bolt affairs that couldn’t be opened except from the inside.”

“Doesn’t that establish pretty well that Jock had found out something?” Knox asked. “He tried to put the heat on someone and got stabbed for his pains.”

“The way I see it,” Beeker agreed. He paused while he looked around for more to eat. Everything was cleaned up. Sighing, he said, “Here’s one more item, Paul. Auffer was stabbed in the belly with an icepick, but it was something else that got him in the eye. Almost like a pick blade but thinner and shorter from what the Doc could tell. And the same instrument got Jock in the eye.”

“Why the eye?” Knox wondered.

“Answer that and we may know a murderer,” Beeker said.

It was a statement that Knox was to remember.

I
T WAS
late when Knox returned to the hotel. The bar was closed; the grill and restaurant were dark. The coffee shop had a skeleton staff and no customers as far as Knox could see. Only the desk clerk and a lone bellhop were in the lobby.

Sleepily, he started for the elevators. He was about to enter the one still in service when the front doors opened and Natalie Tinsley and her father came in. She waved at him. “Paul—Mr. Knox.”

“Paul is fine,” he said when they reached him.

Her father smiled with the faint fatuousness of the slightly inebriated. “Hope you had a better evening than we did. A damned boring party.”

“I just took a turn in the air,” Knox said. “It helps me sleep.”

Natalie Tinsley half pouted, making herself look more like a young boy than ever. “Oh, not yet, don’t go to bed. I’ve been screaming bored all evening. Come and have a nightcap with us and tell us about your …” She broke off.

Knox said, puzzled “My what?”

The elevator doors slid shut and they started upward. “You will stop a minute, won’t you?”

He was a good deal more awake than he had been a few moments ago. Being called Paul by someone like Natalie Tinsley and on such short acquaintance interested him. So did their well-timed appearance. Knox wasn’t ready to go so far as to say that it had been more planned than providence, but he was willing to speculate on the idea.

“I’d be delighted,” he said honestly. He was not only interested in their interest in him but, he had to admit, Natalie Tinsley was nice to look at, very nice, and she wore an intriguing scent. And then a nightcap wouldn’t do any harm.

“Delighted,” he repeated.

The elevator took them to the penthouse, depositing them in a small foyer that had two doors opening from it. One, Knox knew from his study of the floor plan, led to the foyer, the other to a bedroom and bath that could be cut off from the rest of the suite if necessary. The Tinsleys, however, had the entire penthouse—living room, two bedrooms and baths, small dinette, kitchenette, and bar.

The living room Tinsley showed him into was sumptuously furnished but still contained the impersonal aura of a hotel. Their three month’s occupancy had left little impression as far as Knox could see. Knox slipped out of his overcoat and let Tinsley hang it in the closet along with his own and Natalie’s wraps.

Knox said to her, “About my—what?”

Her full mouth worked into a quick, doubtful smile. “Did I talk out of turn? I was going to say, about your being a detective. Or is it a secret?”

Knox shook his head. “If it were, it would be a poorly kept one.”

“Tom Catlin told us.”

“It’s no secret,” Knox said. “I’m just a minor cog in a big machine. It’s something that gives me an excuse to travel and keeps me from getting too bored. Although it isn’t always very exciting work.”

“No international spies?” She was laughing up at him, standing a little distance away. It made a charming pose, one that impressed itself strongly on Knox. Her gown, now that he could see her standing and without a wrap, showed that his previous impression had not been wrong. She was exquisitely proportioned. And with laughter lifting her lips and cheeks and sparkling from her enormous dark eyes, she had a beauty that was partly physical and partly one of personality.

Knox looked toward her father who was at the liquor cabinet. “Hardly,” he said casually. “I work for a private agency. The most exciting thing I do is trace missing persons.”

“I still think it’s exciting, and I want to hear all about it.”

Tinsley came over with drinks. “So do I.” He stifled a yawn. “But I can’t keep up with this younger set.” He drained his glass, a straight shot. “And since we’re flying to California for the races tomorrow, I’ll say good night.”

It was a little too pat. Knox wasn’t sure that he liked being left alone with Natalie Tinsley right now. It must be his weariness, he thought. He seemed to have little ability to handle himself at the moment. She was damned attractive in her unorthodox way.

There was nothing he could do. Murmuring good night to Tinsley, he let Natalie lead him to a divan with a curved coffee table before it. She turned off all the lights but a soft lamp and adjusted the radio to soft music. Then she returned to the couch and picked up her drink. Knox wondered what was in her mind, fixing an obvious set up like this.

He sipped at his drink. It was good rye. “I imagine your friend Catlin would like to be here,” he said.

“Tom? He’s a stick-in-the-mud. All he knows is insurance. He won’t even bet ten dollars with me on the game. Besides, he’s too busy with one of the stenographers that work here. They went up to his room quite late tonight. To do some work, of course.”

He could feel her glancing from the side of her eyes at rum. He said amusedly, “It’s quite possible.”

“I’m not being catty,” she said. “It’s true. All Tom does think of is insurance.”

Knox doubted that, thinking of Catlin when he had spoken to Cora Deane. He said, “You mentioned his not betting. You like to gamble, don’t you?”

She half turned toward him, her lips parted, her eyes shining. She seemed very young at that moment, but at the same time he got the strong feeling that she was anything but a child. He had guessed her before at about twenty or twenty-one. Now he somehow had the impression that she would be nearer twenty-five.

“I love it,” she said. “It’s the fun of life to me. I’ll gamble on anything.”

“Be careful. A broad statement like that can lead to trouble.”

“But I mean it. And I never welch on a bet.”

Knox was puzzled. With most women he could tell when he was being extended an invitation. But with Natalie Tinsley, he wasn’t sure. She might be as ingenuous as she appeared. If it were a come on—which he doubted—it was a little too crass to fit her.

She was still looking at him, her lips parted as if from the excitement of talking of gambling. Taking a cigaret, he put one end between her lips and flicked his lighter into flame.

She inhaled deeply and then took the cigaret away, laughing. “That could have been a beastly trick.”

Knox just grinned and lighted a cigaret for himself. He wanted to bring the subject around to Leo Auffer and he wondered at the best way to provide an opening. But she was obliging; she did it for him.

“I think we have a mutual friend, Paul. You don’t mind my calling you Paul?”

“As old drinking friends, no. Who’s this lucky mutual acquaintance?”

“You must have met Leo Auffer if you were in the Riviera races.”

“Sure, I know him. Not well but enough to admire him. He sails a mean sloop.”

“Dad and I just met him recently—here.”

Knox let himself look surprised. “Leo was here?” He laughed. “What on earth for? He’s a sunshine hound. What’s he doing here in November?”

“What are you doing here for that matter?” She put out a slim, unvarnished finger and touched the tip to his cheek. “From your tan, I’d say you were a sunshine hound, too.”

The touch did things to Knox despite himself. There was electricity in her nearness and downright shock in her touch. He had the feeling that she drew women as well as men. She was that kind of a personality.

He said, “I’m on a job.”

“Detecting!”

He chuckled at her excitement. “In a minor way. I’m on a Missing Persons case. More or less routine, I think.”

“Anyone important? Anyone we might know?”

“If it were, I couldn’t tell you,” he said. “But the answer is no. It’s one of those war bride fiascos.” It was not an improvised story; he had concocted it some time before for just this sort of contingency. “A G.I. married this girl and sent her home to his family. When she knew her way around and had enough of his money, she disappeared. It doesn’t happen often, of course, but there are some who will do it.”

“Oh.” She sounded disappointed.

He said, “But we were talking of Leo. When was he here? I’m sorry I missed him.”

“The last two weeks,” she said readily. “He was here to look over the Hydroplane course for the races next summer. He’s going in for speedboat racing now.”

“And he’ll get himself killed doing it,” Knox said. “I wish now I’d come a few days earlier. I could have seen him. It’s been quite a while.”

“He just left today—I mean yesterday.”

Yesterday was correct, Knox thought. The clock stood at well after three. “Did he say where he was going?”

She made another face, a little girl’s pout of a face. “He didn’t even say good bye. He just left. I called this evening and they said he’d checked out.”

Knox said casually, “That’s Leo. He gets a notion and off he goes. Was he staying here?”

“Of course. Where else is there in this city?”

Knox looked around at the penthouse, lush, out of place in a country that was still not fully out of its log cabin phase. “Where indeed,” he murmured.

He lifted his drink, forgotten for some time. The ice was nearly melted. They sipped in silence for a moment. Then Knox made a move to rise. “I’d better be going. You invited me for a nightcap, not the night.”

“But it’s early yet. I’m not at all sleepy.”

“You have a plane to catch.”

“I can sleep on it.” She stubbed out her cigaret.

“I have work to do,” Knox said. “And I can’t sleep on the plane.” He grinned. “And despite your father’s compliment, I’m not a part of the younger set any more.”

She made no further protest but saw him to the door. “Sometime, mister, can I go detecting with you?”

He looked down into her face, the strangely mature face with the child’s expression. He couldn’t resist it. Lifting his hand, he ran his fingertip gently down her cheek and along the fine line of her chin. He just wanted to touch her, to see if she was real.

“Sometime,” he said. “Good night, Natalie.”

“Good friends call me Nat.”

“Maybe we can get to be good friends.” He closed the door gently behind himself.

Going to the elevator, he moved slowly, considering how much he had learned—if anything. Not a great deal, he decided, but if there was anything here, he wouldn’t find it out too easily. The Tinsleys were not the kind of people to be hurried. Nor the kind, he felt, one could fool easily.

On the other hand, he told himself, they might be wholly innocent. As he had decided before, they were the type Auffer would acquaint himself with. Their coming here in the fall and staying into November could be for a wholly innocent reason. Lots of people did things that were quite difficult for others to understand. That didn’t necessarily make them suspicious.

He had to grin at himself. In a few more moments, he would be writing Natalie Tinsley and her father off as beyond suspicion.

“Careful, Knox,” he murmured aloud, “that girl is dynamite.”

It was a poor analogy, he decided, because when he was with her, he was the one who felt like exploding.

The elevator came and he went down to his floor, laughing at himself. But it was not particularly amused laughter. It had been a long time since he had met anyone who affected him as Natalie Tinsley did. As short as their acquaintance had been, he knew that he was going to be very unhappy if he did find out that she was on the other side.