could follow from that that she also knew Carlo, but that wasn't strong enough to convince a jury. Frenzi would swear he had seen Helen and Carlo together, but as she went around with a number of other men while she was in Rome, that didn't amount to much either.
I took out of my wallet the T.W.A. air ticket that I had found in Carlo's desk and examined it. Was this of any value to me? Carlo had been in New York three days before Helen had left Rome. Maxwell had hinted that Helen had left for Rome because she was involved in Menotti's murder.
I suddenly sat bolt upright. Both Maxwell and Matthews, who should know, had said it was practically certain that Setti had ordered Menotti's death. Had Carlo been sent to New York to do the job? Was he Setti's gunman? Menotti had been killed on the night of June 29th. According to the air ticket, Carlo had arrived in New York on the 26th and had left for Rome on the 30th. The dates fitted. What was more, Helen had also left on the 30th, and within four days she was apparently friendly with Carlo. It had puzzled me how she could have got to know him so quickly, unless she had met him in New York.
Was that the hold Helen had on Carlo, always assuming that she had been blackmailing him? Maxwell and Matthews had mentioned a mysterious woman who had sold Menotti out. Maxwell had said it was believed that woman had been Helen. Again this made sense. Suppose Carlo had known Helen was a drug addict, and on his arrival in New York had contacted her. He might have offered her a sum of money or a free supply of drugs to sell Menotti out. She would have let him into her apartment. Later, thinking about it, she may have realized how easy it would be to put pressure on him for more money or more drugs. What better hold could she have had to blackmail him than the threat of the electric chair?
I got to my feet and began to pace up and down. I felt I was at last getting somewhere.
I went over in my mind the conversation I had had with Carlo. He had admitted that he was in Sorrento at the time Helen died. Why had he been there? I couldn't believe he had gone there deliberately to kill Helen. If he had wanted to kill her he could have done it in Rome instead of going all the way to Sorrento. With my mind working like a buzz-saw, I continued to pace up and down. It was several minutes before I remembered the photograph I had seen in Myra's lounge of her in a white swimsuit and which had looked vaguely familiar to me. It was then that I remembered the lone, inaccessible villa built into the cliff face I had seen when I had been looking for Helen. I remembered I had seen a girl, half-hidden by a sun umbrella, who had been sitting on the terrace of the villa. I was sure now that the girl had been Myra Setti.
If Myra owned the villa, Carlo would probably go down there quite often, and that would probably account for the fact that he had been there when Helen had arrived.
I told myself I'd take another look at this villa, after I had attended the inquest.
Feeling I had got as far as I could with Carlo, I aimed my attention to Sarti. There was only one way to make; him hold off, and that was to throw a scare into him, but I didn't kid myself I could do it. If anyone could throw a scare into him, Carlo could, and I suddenly grinned. It seemed to me to be a good idea to play Carlo off against Sarti. It was in Carlo's interest for me to keep clear of the police.
Without hesitation, I dialled Myra's number. Carlo answered the call himself.
'This is Dawson,' I said. 'I want to talk to you in a hurry. Where can we meet?'
'What's it all about?' he demanded, his voice suspicious.
'Our arrangement for Friday can blow up,' I said. 'I can't talk over an open line. We've got competition.'
'Yeah?' There was a snarl in his voice that I wished Sarti could hear. 'Okay. Meet me at the Pasquale Club in half an hour.'
I said I would be there and hung up.
I looked out of the window. It was raining again, and as I put on my raincoat the telephone bell rang.
'There's a call for you from New York,' the operator told me. 'Will you hold on?'
I guessed it was Chalmers and I was right.
'What the hell's happening?' he demanded when he came on the line. 'Why haven't you called me?'
I was in no mood to take anything from him right at this moment. It was because he hadn't bothered to keep any kind of control over his rotten little daughter that I was in this jam.
'I haven't time to keep calling you,' I snapped back. 'But now you're on the line, you may as well know that we're heading for a scandal and a stink that even you won't be able to keep off the front pages of every paper except your own.'
I heard him draw in his breath sharply. I could imagine his face turning purple.
'Do you know what you're saying?' he demanded. 'What the devil …?'
'Listen: I've got a date and I'm in a hurry,' I broke in. 'I have indisputable proof that your daughter was a drug addict and a blackmailer. She went round with degenerates and criminals and was Menotti's mistress. It's common talk that it was she who put the finger on him, and she was probably murdered because she was fool enough to try to blackmail his killer.'
'My God! You'll be sorry for this,' Chalmers bellowed. 'You must be drunk or insane to talk this way to me. How dare you tell such lies! My daughter was a good, decent girl ...'
'Yeah, I've heard that one before,' I broke in impatiently. 'But wait until you see the evidence. I have a list of names of fifteen men with whom she was intimate and whom she blackmailed because she had to have money to buy drugs. This isn't something I've dreamed up. Carlotti knows. There's a private dick who has been shadowing her ever since she arrived in Rome, and he has pages of evidence with dates and details that you can't shout off.'
There was a sudden silence at the other end of the line and, for a moment, I thought we had been cut off but, listening carefully, I could hear his heavy breathing.
'I'd better come out,' he said at last, and in a much milder tone. 'I'm sorry I bawled at you, Dawson. I should have known you wouldn't say anything against my daughter without proof. This is a shock to me. Perhaps it's not so bad as it sounds.'
'This isn't the time to kid yourself,' I said. 'This is a mess and we've got to face it.'
'I'm tied up until Thursday,' he said, all the iron out of his voice by now. 'I'll be in Naples on Friday. Will you meet me?'
'If I can I will, but things are happening so fast, I can't look that far ahead.'
'Can't you talk to Carlotti? Can't we get an adjournment at the inquest? I've got to have time to study this thing.'
'It's a murder case,' I said. 'There's nothing either of us can do.'
'Well, try. I'm relying on you, Dawson.'
I grinned mirthlessly at the opposite wall. I wondered how much longer he would rely on me. I wondered what he would say and do if I told him I was one of the fifteen men who had fooled around with his precious daughter.
'I'll talk to him,' I said, 'but I don't think he'll listen.'
'Who killed her, Dawson?'
'A guy called Carlo Manchini. I can't prove it yet, but I'm going to have a try. It's my bet he killed Menotti and your daughter sold Menotti to him.'
'This is fantastic.' He really sounded as if he had taken a knock. 'Anything I can do at this end?'
'Well, if you can get the boys to dig into Menotti's background,' I said, 'they might turn up something useful. See if they can get anything on Manchini and Setti. I want a hookup between those two. See if they can get any dope on what Helen was up to and if she did go to Menotti's apartment.'
'I can't do that!' His voice rose to a shout. 'I don't want anyone to know about this thing! This has got to be
