The Best American Noir of the Century

after because that one called her husband after the accident.

Now, since your wife’s obviously alive, Mr. Kane, she’s missing for one of two reasons: either she can’t come home or she doesn’t want to. “Can’t” would mean she’s being held against her will; we’ve nothing to indicate that. That leaves the possibility of her not wanting to come home. What reason would a woman have for staying away from her husband? The more likely one would be that she was either sore at him for something or had left him for another man.

I said a short ugly word and threw my cigarette savagely into the fireplace. Donna would never pull a stunt like that! Hell, we’d only been married a few months and still as much in love as the day the knot was tied.

Yeah? How do you know? A lot of guys kid themselves into thinking the same thing, then wake up one morning and find the milkman has taken over. Or they find some hot love letters tied in blue ribbon and shoved under the mattress.

I stopped short. It was an idea. Not love letters, of course; but there might be something among her personal files that could furnish a lead. It was about as faint a possibility as they come, but at least it would give me something to do.

The big bottom drawer of her desk in the bedroom was locked. I remembered that she carried the key in the same case with those to the apartment and the car, so I used the fireplace poker to force the lock. Donna would raise hell about that when she got home, but I wasn’t going to worry about that now.

There was a big manila folder inside, crammed with letters, tax returns, receipted bills, bankbooks, and miscellaneous papers; I dumped them out and began to paw through the collection. A lot of the stuff had come from Dave Wainhope’s office, and there were at least a dozen letters signed by him explaining why he was sending her such-and-such.

The phone rang suddenly. I damned near knocked the chair over getting to it. It was Chief Deputy Martell.

“Mrs. Kane show up?”

“Not yet. No.”

He must have caught the disappointment in my voice. It was there to catch. He said, “That’s funny…Anyway, the body we found in that car wasn’t her.”

“I told you that. Who was it?”

“This Helen Wainhope. We brought the remains into the Georgia Street Hospital and her husband made the ID about fifteen minutes ago.”

I shivered, remembering. “How could he?”

“There was enough left of one of her shoes. That and the compact did the trick.”

“He tell you why she was driving my wife’s car?”

Martell hesitated. “Not exactly. He said the two women had a date in town for today. He didn’t know what time, but Mrs. Wainhope’s car was on the fritz, so the theory is that your wife drove out there and picked her up.”

“News to me,” I said.

He hesitated again. “…Any bad blood between your wife and …and Mrs. Wainhope?”

“That’s a hell of a question!”

“You want to answer it?” he said quietly.

“You bet I do! They got along fine!”

“If you say so.” His voice was mild. “I just don’t like this coincidence of Mrs. Kane’s being missing at the same time her car goes off a cliff with a friend in it.”

“I don’t care about that. I want my wife back.”

He sighed. “OK. Give me a description and I’ll get out an all-points on her.”

I described Donna to him at length and he took it all down and said he’d be in touch with me later. I put back the receiver and went into the living room to make myself a drink. I hadn’t eaten a thing since one o’clock that afternoon, but I was too tightened up with worry to be at all hungry.

Time crawled by. I finished my drink while standing at the window, put together a second, and took it back into the bedroom and started through the papers from Donna’s desk. At eight-fifteen the phone rang.

“Clay? This is Dave — Dave Wainhope.” His voice was flat and not very steady.

I said, “Hello, Dave. Sorry to hear about Helen.” It sounded pretty lame, but it was the best I could do at the time.

“You know about it then?”

“Certainly I know about it. It was Donna’s car, remember?”

“Of course, Clay.” He sounded very tired. “I guess I’m not thinking too clearly. I called you about something else.”

“Yeah?”

“Look, Clay, it’s none of my business, I suppose. But what’s wrong between you and Donna?”

I felt my jaw sag a little. “Who said anything was wrong?”

“All I know is, she was acting awfully strange. She wanted all the ready cash I had on hand, no explanation, no —”

My fingers were biting into the receiver. “Wait a minute!” I shouted. “Dave, listen to me! You saw Donna?”

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. She —”

“When?”

“…Why, not ten minutes ago. She —”

“Where? Where was she? Where did you see her?”

“Right here. At my office.” He was beginning to get excited himself. “I stopped by on my way from the Georgia —”

I cut him off. “Christ, Dave, I’ve been going nuts! I’ve been looking for her since four-thirty this afternoon. What’d she say? What kind of trouble is she in?”

“I don’t know. She wouldn’t tell me anything—just wanted money quick. No checks. I thought maybe you and she had had a fight or something. I had around nine hundred in the safe; I gave it all to her and she beat —”

I shook the receiver savagely. “But she must have said something! She wouldn’t just leave without…you know…” “She said she sent you a letter earlier in the day.” I dropped down on the desk chair. My hands were shaking and my mouth was dry. “A letter,” I said dully. “A letter. Not in person, not even a phone call. Just a letter.”

By this time Dave was making comforting sounds. “I’m sure it’s nothing serious, Clay. You know how women are. The letter’ll probably tell you where she is and you can talk her out of it.”

I thanked him and hung up and sat there and stared at my thumb. For some reason I felt even more depressed than before. I couldn’t understand why Donna wouldn’t have turned to me if she was in trouble. That was always a big thing with us: all difficulties had to be shared…

I went into the kitchen and made myself a couple of cold salami sandwiches and washed them down with another highball. At nine-twenty I telephoned the Hollywood substation to let Martell know what Dave Wainhope had told me. Whoever answered said the chief deputy was out and to call back in an hour. I tried to leave a message on what it was about, but was told again to call back and got myself hung up on.

* * *

About ten minutes later the buzzer from downstairs sounded. I pushed the button and was standing in the hall door when a young fellow in a postman’s gray uniform showed up with a special-delivery letter. I signed for it and closed the door and leaned there and ripped open the envelope.

A single sheet of dime-store paper containing a few neatly typed lines and signed in ink in Donnas usual scrawl.

Clay darling:

I’m terribly sorry, but something that happened a long time ago has come back to plague me and I have to get away for a few days. Please don’t try to find me, I’ll be all right as long as you trust me.

You know I love you so much that I won’t remain away a day longer than I have to. Please don’t worry, darling, I’ll explain everything the moment I get back.

All my love,