Joe. “Not for eight hundred. Can I have that ride now?”
Wishing he could think of comebacks that quickly, Joe just managed to have the door open as she reached it. A last glance back as they went out showed Walworth picking up a bottle again.
“Don’t like him, do you?” Joe remarked, when they had ridden the elevator halfway down.
“Not at a second look.” Carol’s manner had relaxed a little as soon as they got out of the apartment. “Met him last Friday for the first time. Oh, he can come on very strong and decent when he tries. Then last night—that was something else. I’d rather not talk about it.”
“Sure.” The elevator delivered them. The gray-haired doorman smiled and nodded. Joe led her out to the Rabbit in the drive.
She said: “I don’t know what your business with him was, but I got definite vibrations that you don’t like him either. Which is why I took a chance on asking for a ride.”
“You’re right, I don’t like him. So, where shall the ride be to?”
“The Art Institute, if it’s not out of your way. I hear a girl can pick up a better class of man there than in the bars.”
“I suppose they might be better educated, anyway.” He pulled out of the drive and melded into traffic gently, heading south.
After two blocks Carol said: “No, I don’t want to pick up men. One stab at that was plenty. I’m going to have to think of something, though, being entirely out of money.”
“I’m not trying to be funny when I say, how about Travelers Aid? Really. You do have the look of someone who’s some distance from home, and they’ll help you wire someplace for money. Or I’ll advance you a loan myself. But it’ll have to be small.”
“I’m afraid—” Carol’s voice cracked suddenly in the middle, and she had to start it over. “I’m afraid sending out wires isn’t going to do me any good. Thanks for the offer of the small loan. I may just accept. Could we start out with a coffee someplace?”
“Joe’s Coffee Shop and Breakfast Bar is open. That’s my place, which is not terribly far. Or we can go public if you like.”
“Joe’s place sounds fine. It’s got to be a lot nicer than the one I just got out of.”
He turned west for two blocks, then back north. “I’m a little out of the high rent district, as they say.”
There was a legitimate parking spot open only half a block from his front door, so he didn’t have to drive through the alley to his rented garage. While they were climbing the stairs to the second floor of his building, he could hear the muffled sound of his phone ringing, and ran ahead to answer.
“Joe? This’s Charley Snider.”
“What’s up, Charley?”
“Just wanted to bring you up to date. Nothing new on the mystery at the morgue. But, we finally did get a make on the thumbprint on the mirror in Kate’s car. Now don’t get your hopes up. You said you wanted to know anything that happens, and so I’m calling to tell you.”
Joe didn’t feel in any danger of getting too much hope up about anything. “What about the print?”
“Well, the name the FBI files come up with is Leroy Poach. Pee-oh-ay-cee-aitch, as in egg. And now, get this man, I’m not makin’ this up. Murder, armed robbery, kidnapping.” Charley paused, as before a climax.
“Yeah?”
“The thing is, this Poach was hanged in Oklahoma in 1934.”
“Oh, Jesus. Are they crazy in Washington?” By now Carol had come into the apartment, and was standing by in the next room, politely not listening. Joe caught her eye and made gestures toward the kitchen alcove. She brightened a little, and moved in that direction.
“Well,” said Charley’s phone-voice, “there obviously some mistake. If it turned out somehow that he wasn’t hanged, he’d still be about eighty-five by now.”
“Well. I did ask you to tell me everything.”
“Hey, now, don’t quit on us. We’re tryin’.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Sounds from outside the bedroom indicated Carol was filling the coffeepot. “Charley? What does running water mean?”
“Huh?”
“Why was that fellow out at the house running down there into the woods along the creek?”
“I dunno. Oh, by the way, we got his name now. Max Gruner. Has a minor record, sex offenses, larceny. We don’t know what he’s been up to the last six months or so, but it looks like it wasn’t anything good. And the house, you know, where the kid was being held? It belongs to some people who moved away last fall. They’re down south now, and they’ve been paying a couple to come round and look at the place every day. Only the caretakers have just up and disappeared. Sweet setup for a kidnapping hideout.”
Joe asked: “Anything on Corday yet?”
“Seems to have left his things in the motel room and just departed. His bill was paid in advance. We’ve checked with London, and they don’t know him. Hasn’t been practicing medicine in London, not under that name anyway, not legitimately. Might have been living there, of course. His name was listed on a BOAC flight into O’Hare from London a few days back.”
“I bet you don’t find him, Charley.”
“Any ideas where he might be, Joe?”
“I don’t have any sane ideas about any of this right now. If any come to me I’ll pass them along.”
They said goodbye and he hung up and went out into the dining alcove. Carol had set out a couple of paper plates and was scrambling some eggs.
She looked at him. “I couldn’t help hearing. The name Corday and all, that’s been in the news. I think I just had a lot of the air let out of my own troubles, because it just hit me, who this girl is, that you told Walworth you were going to marry. God. Craig knew her too?”
He went to pour boiling water in to the two cups where she had spooned in instant coffee. “Slightly, anyway. Tell me about last Friday night up there at Walworth’s.”
“Oh. That’s when I met him. I was there most of the evening, but I don’t recall any girl who fits my picture of Kate Southerland. Describe her to me?”
When he had done so, Carol shook her head. “No. Unless she could have been there earlier, six o’clock or so.”
“She was still home then.”
The eggs and some toast were ready, and they were just sitting down when the phone sounded again. He went to the bedroom, sat down heavily on the bed, picked it up. “Joe Keogh.”
“Joe?” It was Granny Clare’s voice, sounding tremulous. “Are you—is everything all right?”
“Yeah. Why not? No new disasters, anyway. Why? Is everything all right there?”
There was a small delay before Clarissa answered, but when she did she sounded definite. “Yes. I . . . oh, I shouldn’t have bothered you. I’m sorry. Goodbye.” And she hung up.
Some of the modest portion of food on Carol’s plate was gone when he came back. She had already set down her fork. “I think what I mainly am is tired. I’ve just been through a night you wouldn’t believe.”
“I might.” Joe sat down opposite, took a bite of toast, discovered he was mildly hungry. “I’ve recently been through an unreal thing or two myself.”
She sat with arms folded, looking over his shoulder. “I’m sorry if you don’t want to hear this, but I don’t think I can keep from talking about it after all.”
“Go ahead.” He tried to sound no more than willing.
“I was up there at Walworth’s for a long time Friday night. There was some sex going on, okay? Too kinky to interest me. Somehow Craig gave me the impression then that it wasn’t really his thing either. Then, last night, I went up with him, thinking we were going to be alone. All right, I was planning to spend the night. But what he had in mind was . . . well, nothing I’d consider ordinary, and I don’t think my life has been especially sheltered.”
“How old are you, Carol?” he asked her, almost without meaning to.
“Old enough, in the legal sense.” But he had brought her story-telling to a halt.
“All right, go on, sorry I interrupted.”
“Well. He turned out to be kinkier than I had thought, that’s all. And if wasn’t until after my clothes were off and had been misplaced somewhere that this was fully explained to me. Hell, why am I telling you all this?”
