for money.”
“Why not?”
“Because when this Dr. Hambleton called me up I suggested the hotel safe to him. He wasn’t interested.”
“A type like that wouldn’t have hired you to hold his dough anyway,” French said. “He wouldn’t have hired you to keep anything for him. He wanted protection or he wanted a sidekick—or maybe just a messenger.”
“Sorry,” I said. “He told me just what I told you.”
“And seeing he was dead when you got over there,” French said, with a too casual drawl, “you couldn’t hardly have given him one of your business cards.”
I held the phone too tight and thought back rapidly over my talk with Hicks in the Idaho Street rooming house. I saw him holding my card between his fingers, looking down at it. And then I saw myself taking it out of his hand quickly, before he froze to it. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Hardly,” I said. “And stop trying to scare me to death.”
“He had one, chum. Folded twice across in his pants watch pocket. We missed it the first time.”
“I gave Flack a card,” I said, stiff-lipped.
There was silence. I could hear voices in the background and the clack of a typewriter. Finally French said dryly: “Fair enough. See you later.” He hung up abruptly.
I put the phone down very slowly in its cradle and flexed my cramped fingers. I stared down at the photo lying on the desk in front of me. All it told me was that two people, one of whom I knew, were having lunch at The Dancers. The paper on the table told me the date, or would.
I dialed the News-Chronicle and asked for the sports section. Four minutes later I wrote on a pad: “Ritchy Belleau, popular young light heavyweight contender, died in the Sisters Hospital just before midnight February 19 as a result of ring injuries sustained the previous evening in the main event at the Hollywood Legion Stadium. The News-Chronicle Noon Sports Edition for February 20 carried the headlines.”
I dialed the same number again and asked for Kenny Haste in the City Room. He was an ex-crime reporter I had known for years. We chatted around for a minute and then I said:
“Who covered the Sunny Moe Stein killing for you?”
“Tod Barrow. He’s on the Post-Dispatch now. Why?”
“I’d like the details, if any.”
He said he would send to the morgue for the file and call me, which he did ten minutes later. “He was shot twice in the head, in his car, about two blocks from the Chateau Bercy on Franklin. Time, about 11.15 P.M.”
“Date, February 20,” I said, “or was it?”
“Check, it was. No witnesses, no arrests except the usual police stock company of book-handlers, out-of-work fight managers and other professional suspects. What’s in it?”
“Wasn’t a pal of his supposed to be in town about that time?”
“Nothing here says so. What name?”
“Weepy Moyer. A cop friend of mine said something about a Hollywood money man being held on suspicion and then released for lack of evidence.”
Kenny said: “Wait a minute. Something’s coming back to me—yeah. Fellow named Steelgrave, owns The Dancers, supposed to be a gambler and so on. Nice guy. I’ve met him. That was a bust.”
“How do you mean, a bust?”
“Some smart monkey tipped the cops he was Weepy Moyer and they held him for ten days on an open charge for Cleveland. Cleveland brushed it off. That didn’t have anything to do with the Stein killing. Steelgrave was under glass all that week. No connection at all. Your cop friend has been reading pulp magazines.”
“They all do,” I said. “That’s why they talk so tough. Thanks, Kenny.”
We said goodbye and hung up and I sat leaning back in my chair and looking at my photograph. After a while I took scissors and cut out the piece that contained the folded newspaper with the headline. I put the two pieces in separate envelopes and put them in my pocket with the sheet from the pad.
I dialed Miss Mavis Weld’s Crestview number. A woman’s voice answered after several rings. It was a remote and formal voice that I might or might not have heard before. All it said was, “Hello?”
“This is Philip Marlowe. Is Miss Weld in?”
“Miss Weld will not be in until late this evening. Do you care to leave a message?”
“Very important. Where could I reach her?”
“I’m sorry. I have no information.”
“Would her agent know?”
“Possibly.”
“You’re quite sure you’re not Miss Weld?”
“Miss Weld is not in.” She hung up.
I sat there and listened to the voice. At first I thought yes, then I thought no. The longer I thought the less I knew. I went down to the parking lot and got my car out.
17
