Till Death Do Us Part (10 page)

My mind asked, Jim Kruse? and again as if she’d read my thoughts, she said, “I suppose you’ve heard stories about me? About San Antonio and how I brought Jim here.”

I said, “It’s none of my business.”

“Yes it is. I want you to know about me. I can’t help being like I am. I guess I’m something like a periodic drunkard. Having to act as I do day after day at this office sometimes gets to much for me and I just have to—to …”

I said helpfully, “You just have to take off your shoes and wriggle your toes.”

“Thank you,” she said with a faint smile. She leaned toward me. The intensity of her expression was embarrassing. “And then you came and tried so hard to help me. Even after I’d been a complete bitch, you tried to help me. I started thinking about you and the first thing I knew, I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

I wondered why two such screwy dames as Rosanne and Amalie picked on me. Amalie with a fire-breathing father complex and Rosanne with the kind of temperament that felt a need to justify a kind of periodic nymphomania by forcing her to fall in love with the man of the moment.

I felt a little sorry for myself. But I felt sorrier for her. With the kind of glands she had operating, she needed a good, healthy pagan philosophy. I looked into her eyes and saw the pleading for understanding there. My mind whispered faintly, Sucker! but my voice drowned it out. I heard myself say, “This has become a little more than a job to me, too.”

I picked up my coffee cup to take a sip. But I had to set it down fast. She came around the table and onto the couch in one quick move. I had been right. Her mouth was hungry. She smelled good, too.

I said finally, “Rosanne, you’re taking a big chance in letting me stay here.”

“Where else can you go, darling?”

I had no answer for that. I said, “Tonight’s the night you’re supposed to pay off. What do you plan to do about it?”

“Pay,” she said. “What else can I do?”

I said, “If I could get a few answers I need, paying off won’t be necessary.”

She squeezed my hand where it rested on her hip. “Let me help you, darling.”

I decided that this was the time to find out just where she stood. I said, “There’s one way you can help me—by answering a question.”

She looked at me expectantly. I told her what Amalie said she had overheard earlier today. I said, “Just what did you want Delman to do for you, Rosanne?”

She said, “It does sound terrible when you tell it like that.” Her expression became puzzled. “I just realized, Amalie has been listening at the door, just like Porter said. Why, Tom?”

I said, “I wouldn’t mind knowing the answer to that myself. But you haven’t told me what you asked Delman to do for you.”

“I asked him to take the money to the Posada tonight,” she said. She twisted about so that she could look into my face. “Is that so terrible? He offered to help me.”

I said, “That isn’t why you asked him, Rosanne. He offered to help you before. Why should you wait until now to agree to his help?”

She moved again, this time so that she was very close to me. She had more on her mind than just the answers to my questions. I waited. Finally she said, “Last night you as good as accused Porter of being a suspect—of possibly being the blackmailer. This morning I thought about that. It seemed impossible. Porter is so horribly honest. But I wanted to help you, and to make sure, I asked him to deliver the money.”

“To get his reaction?”

“Yes, and I got just what I expected to get—outrage.”

“Amalie said you cried after he left.”

“With relief,” Rosanne said. “It would have been horrible to find Porter doing such a thing to me.” She gave a slight shudder. “But it’s all right.” With a smile, she reached out and got my coffee cup and took a sip. Then she held the cup to my lips. I took more than a sip. It was all very cozy.

I said stubbornly, “I’m not as sanguine about Delman as you are.”

She nuzzled my cheek. “Tom, are you jealous of Porter?”

It would hardly be tactful to say no, to tell her that I disliked his type of man so thoroughly that I was almost willing to frame him to have him guilty of this. I said instead, “Maybe I am, a little.”

She loved that. She showed me how much. Finally she backed off and gave me a wicked smile. “And now that I’ve answered your question, am I good security?”

“You’re cleared,” I said. I needed help badly. I had to take a risk one way or another, and Rosanne seemed—at the moment, anyway—to be a fair risk.

“What do I do first?”

I said, “If that clock of yours is right, it’s just after eight. I’m supposed to meet someone at eight-thirty by the latest in the Fronteras Hotel lobby.”

“And you want me to go in your place?”

“That’s right.” I had to say it, but I wished I didn’t. “It’s Arden Kennett. She’s been doing a job for me.”

I could feel Rosanne go stiff all over. Then she relaxed and gave a soft laugh. “You certainly have the women helping you, darling.”

I had the women, all right. I hoped they were helping me. I said, “Then, later, I’d like to snoop in Calvin’s apartment. If I’m still in the dark after that, I’ll go to Rio Bravo and try to meet your blackmailer.”

She got up, reluctantly I thought. She said, “What if Miss Kennett isn’t there by eight-thirty?”

“Then ask for a message at the hotel desk,” I said.

“What is she doing for you?”

“Keeping an eye on Delman.”

Rosanne laughed. “It almost sounds as if we’ve swapped lovers, doesn’t it, darling?”

B
EFORE
R
OSANNE LEFT
, she said, “Honestly, Tom, suspecting Porter is absurd. I’d as soon suspect Jim Kruse.”

I wouldn’t, but while I drank the rest of the coffee and waited for her to come back, I thought about suspecting Jim Kruse. I finally eliminated him simply because he hadn’t been in Fronteras long enough. According to Rosanne, her husband had been blackmailed. He had been dead two years now. And Kruse hadn’t been here a year yet.

I returned to considering Delman.

The time crept. I began to wonder if I hadn’t been wrong. Maybe Rosanne was busily turning me in to the police. But at ten to nine, she returned. She was alone.

She said with a worried frown, “I waited until just a few minutes ago. Arden didn’t show up, and there wasn’t any message.”

I kissed the frown away. That seemed the least I could do to make up for my most recent suspicions. I said, “That leaves Calvin.”

Rosanne nodded. “Wait until he’s gone to the studio. Then you won’t take the chance of his catching you.”

I said, “I hate to sit here over an hour doing nothing.”

“Can you think of a safer place?”

I had to admit that I couldn’t. Rosanne said, “Besides, what makes you think you’ll spend the time doing nothing?” She gave me that wicked smile again. “Just lie down on the couch and get some rest. You could use it.”

I took off my shoes and coat and lay down. But even if I’d dared, I couldn’t sleep. My brain was too busy getting me nowhere. After I’d flipped over for the tenth time, Rosanne came and sat on the edge of the couch.

She said softly, “I tried to be good and let you rest, darling.”

What with one thing and another, ten o’clock arrived very fast. And Rosanne was right. She certainly wasn’t the same woman who sat behind a desk. I lay and smoked and watched her hang up her gray suit and put on a pair of slacks and a shirt and lightweight jacket.

She came to the couch and took the cigaret out of my mouth and put it between her lips. I said lazily, “What’s the best way for me to get to Calvin’s from here?”

“I’ll take you,” she said.

“Just tell me,” I said. “You’ve done enough already.”

She laughed softly and rubbed away a smear of lipstick that was on my cheek. “Not nearly as much as I’m going to do, darling.” She put out a hand and helped me to my feet. “And you won’t get halfway to Calvin’s if you try to walk. The streets are crawling with police.”

I didn’t argue with her.

She was very clever. She acted as if she’d been smuggling men past the police all her life. She pulled her brute of a car into the alley, opened the trunk, and then signalled to me. I slipped out the back door and into the trunk. She closed the lid down on an inch thick stick of wood so I could have some air and took off.

We bounced out of the alley. The soft springing of the car gave me a terrific beating, but I figured that was better than letting Gomez and Goodbody take me. I didn’t complain.

Finally we stopped. When Rosanne let me out of the trunk, I saw that we were in a garage, nose forward. Next to the garage was a three story apartment building.

Rosanne said, “Calvin lives on the top floor. See that dark window at the corner.”

I said that I saw it and followed her into the building. She led me up two flights of service stairs and down a carpeted hall. We didn’t have any trouble at all. When we reached Calvin’s door, she took a key from her pocket, unlocked the door, and we were in.

I said, “What the hell?”

She laughed. “Jealous again, darling? I like that. But you don’t have to be. I own the building. It’s a passkey.”

I stood in the dark room, the door closed, and tried to decide what to do first. Rosanne took the matter into her own hands. She snapped on the light. “If anyone comes,” she said, “I can always say that I’m thinking of redecorating.”

I said, “You’re very clever in lots of …” I stopped. I moved, trying to block Rosanne from seeing what I’d seen. But I was too late.

Her breath rustled in her throat and then gushed out in a retching sound. I caught her and buried her face against my coat. I didn’t blame her. Calvin wasn’t pretty.

He reminded me of Pachuco. He lay half hidden behind his own sofa. And like Pachuco, he was dead. But there was a difference. Calvin’s death had been messy. His throat was laid wide open.

Rosanne said, “I’m all right now. But do what you came for and let’s get away from here.”

I looked around. “Someone beat me to it,” I said.

Someone had. The room was torn all to hell. Drawers dumped on the floor, stuffing ripped from sofa and chairs. The bedroom was just as bad. So were the bath and the closet. I went back to Calvin.

I took a good look. I saw the rope marks on Calvin’s wrists and ankles, and I wondered how he’d been tortured. I found out, and I felt a little sick. Someone had used an ugly, Indian-style method on him. In a way, I was surprised at Calvin. It was obvious from the search that had been made that he hadn’t talked. I wondered what was so precious to him that he would let himself be tortured rather than give it up.

Then I found out why. Calvin’s throat had been slashed, but there was very little blood from the wound. He had died from the shock of the torture. It had been too sudden and too severe for poor, frightened Calvin to fight against.

The telephone began to ring angrily.

Rosanne said, “That’s probably the radio station calling. They may get worried and send someone to investigate.”

I said, “I’ll have to take a chance on that. You get going.”

She said stubbornly, “No. I’ll wait.”

I said, “I don’t know what I’m looking for, but whatever it is, I think it’s still here. If the killer had found it, he wouldn’t have had to tear the place apart like this.”

Rosanne was coming toward me. I got up and turned her aside. I said, “There’s no need for you to look at him.”

She hardly seemed aware of what I said. She was thinking. She said, “You’re assuming that Calvin had something belonging to the person who’s been blackmailing me?” I nodded. She went on slowly, “Then where would he hide it?”

I said, “Where do frightened types like Calvin hide things that are precious to them?” I answered my own question. “Where he could get it quickly when he needed it. Where he’d figure it was safest.”

I was looking at Calvin. I remembered that he had smelled of weed, more as if he carried it than smoked it. I had suggested to Rosanne that he might smuggle it. I thought of Calvin going back and forth across the border to sell advertising. He had probably moved quite freely; a man with his reputation would hardly be suspect.

In my El Paso days, I’d learned a good deal about the angles smugglers use. I went to Calvin and squatted down by his feet. I lifted his left leg and grabbed the heel of his shoe and twisted it. The heel worked on a swivel and it slid away from the shoe itself. A half dozen marijuana cigarets dropped to the floor. One remained, stuck in the hollowed out heel.

I wasn’t interested in marijuana. I tried the other heel. I said to Rosanne, “We can stop looking.” I got up and moved away from Calvin to keep her from getting too close to him.

She looked at the thin, leather bound book in my hand. It was about the size of the kind of address books you buy at the dime store. Calvin’s name was stamped in gold on the cover. Inside, on the first page, was written, “Property of Calvin Calvin, Fronteras, Texas. A substantial reward will be paid to the finder.”

The back of the first page was blank. On the second page was a list of names, each followed by a number. The rest of the book was blank.

Rosanne said, “What in heaven’s name …?”

I couldn’t answer that one. There were eight names on the list: “Vasily Hardas, 11/14; Konrad Schlechter, 11/20; Drobny Dubrovitch, 12/3….” I stopped reading. I said, “They’re obviously people, if that means anything.”

Rosanne shook her head. “I don’t think they mean anything to me. It seems as if they should but they don’t. Not now, anyway.”

I knew what she meant. Some of those names were tugging at my memory too. But there was too much else batting around in my mind. I couldn’t concentrate.

I didn’t have the chance to concentrate anyway. The wail of a siren shrilled up in the near distance. I jammed the book in my pocket, Rosanne turned out the light, and we went out the same way we’d come in. Only this time we went a lot faster. I left Calvin’s shoes with the heels off. I hoped it would give the police something to think about.

I didn’t bother with the trunk this time. I lay down on the floor behind the front seat. Rosanne maneuvered her monster of a car into an alley and jammed on the speed. The sound of the siren grew fainter very quickly.

I thought about the police finding Calvin. There were two, Goodbody and Gomez, who would remember the wanted murderer who had fought with Calvin only a few hours ago.

There wouldn’t be much discussion over who had killed the little man.

We went back to Rosanne’s apartment. My legs were shaking and I sat down quickly on her couch. When she handed me a drink, I found that my hand was shaking too. Taking half the drink at a gulp helped.

I said, “I’ve got one chance left—to get to that Posada and try to catch the one who comes to pick up your money.”

She said, “If only we knew why those names were so important to Calvin.”

“And to his killer,” I said. “They’ll give me something to think about while I’m waiting at the Posada.” I finished my drink. “Let’s make a list for you. Then you’ll have something to think about while you wait.”

“Wait!” She was indignant. “I’m going with you.”

“Not a chance,” I said. I tried grinning at her. “Besides, you’re the only alibi I’ve got in case they catch me and charge me with Calvin’s murder.”

“I’m not much of an alibi,” she said, “unless you can prove he was killed after you came to my place.”

I hadn’t thought of that. It didn’t really matter. If they caught me, they probably wouldn’t wait to ask questions. I was supposedly armed and dangerous. The cops had an open invitation to shoot.

I said, “Just the same, you stay here. It’s a lot safer. And if I do get caught, there’s no reason for you to be charged as an accessory.”

“At least, let me help you across the border,” she said.

“I’ll need help,” I admitted. “The only idea I’ve had is to swim the river.” With all the patrols out, as I was sure they would be, this was no night for a swim. But I couldn’t think of a better way.

“I’ll put you in the trunk again,” Rosanne said. “They never check me.”

“This might be the one night they do it differently,” I said.

“We’ll have to take that chance,” she said.

I figured it was a better risk than trying to play wetback in reverse across the Rio Grande River. We made out the list of names for Rosanne. Then I took a final slug of her rye and went to the car. This time I crawled far to the back of the deep trunk. It was the only time I’d ever found any use for so much luggage space in a family car.

Complete darkness does odd things to the human nervous system. I thought I’d come apart at the seams and have a case of howling claustrophobia. The first stop, at the Fronteras end of the bridge, wasn’t too bad. But the one at the other end was interminable.

When Rosanne finally stopped the car and let me out, I was soaked with sweat and shaking all over. I felt like a malaria case.

She had to help me to the ground. “It’s all right now, darling,” she said.

Darling leaned against a rear fin and gulped in great mouthfuls of Rio Bravo’s finest air. It was actually very ripe air; we were in a dismal back alley. But it tasted and smelled wonderful to me.

When I stopped shaking, I said, “I thought I’d had it at this end of the bridge.”

“They’d heard I hired you to work for me,” Rosanne said. “And they wanted to ask me a few questions. I told them I’d fired you the night of my barbecue and didn’t know where you were.”

I said, “You told part of the truth, anyway. You fired me but good last night.”

She stood on tiptoe and kissed me. “The pun was horrible, but the sentiment was sweet.” She squeezed my hands. “I was so afraid. I knew that if they caught you back there, you’d always think I turned you in.”

I said, “Yes, I guess I would have.”

She kissed me again. “I wonder what it’ll be like—being married to someone so professionally suspicious?”

I wondered too. I wondered why I had to get tangled up with the kind of female who had to justify an urge by pretending it was an undying passion. But I said, “I’ll try to get over being suspicious.” This was no time for arguing the merits of marriage.

Rosanne said, “You have a long wait, Tom. What are you going to do now?”

I said, “Locate the Posada and look it over for a way to get in.”

“I did that this morning,” she said. “It’s a block behind the cathedral. There’s an alley like this one at the rear. An old flight of wooden steps go up to the second floor from the alley. But be careful. The steps are right over the roof of the kitchen porch.”

I started to say that I’d be more than careful, when she broke in with a gasp. She looked at me with a stricken expression. “Tom! Oh, darling, I’m such a fool! I forgot all about the money.”

I said, “What do we need the money for? I’m going to grab the blackmailer as soon as he steps into that room.”

“We have to have it,” she argued. “Don’t you see? What if he’s watching the Posada? If he doesn’t see me go in, he certainly won’t try to pick up the money. He’ll suspect a trap. Besides, what if you get caught? If the money isn’t there, then I—my husband will be exposed. I mean….”

I said, “I know what you mean. And you’re right.” I didn’t like this. I wanted her completely out of the picture when things started to happen. I told her reluctantly, “You’ll just have to bring it, I guess.”

We debated it a while, but there was no other answer. I made her promise that she’d leave the money and take right off for home. Then we wrestled a while and I finally got her to go. I sat down in darkness and tried to relax enough to think clearly.

When the church clock tolled twelve-thirty, I still hadn’t got very far with my mental exercises. I knocked them off, stood up, and started hiking.