Novak palmed the pick and stared at the white-painted door numbers. After a while he heard an engine start and when he glanced around, a blue Dodge with Arkansas plates was pulling away. Novak stepped close to the door and inserted the pick again. Finally the button popped out and the knob turned.
Novak went quickly inside and locked the door handle.
It was a two-room unit, small sitting room, bedroom and shower-bath. Novak clicked on a table lamp and looked around.
There were two suitcases, one open across the seat of a chair. It held some silk shirts, a couple of ties, a pair of alligator shoes with pointed toes, toilet gear and a bottle of rye. The writing table held an almost empty bottle of the same brand, two bottles that had once held ginger ale, a bucket of melted ice and three dirty glasses. He looked at the ashtrays. None of the butts had rouge on them.
The bed had been slept in. The corner held a tumble of dirty laundry. One of the shirts was blue silk, the one Barada had worn last night. In the bureau drawers, nothing but half a dozen monogrammed handkerchiefs.
Novak went back to the sitting room and listened. Then he knelt down and unstrapped the other suitcase. The catch was locked so he opened it with a small pick and unfolded the suitcase on the carpet.
More shirts and ties. Two sharkskin suits. A dozen packs of cards. A leather dice holder and eight ivory dice. A green box of cartridges, some of them missing. Caliber 7.65 mm. That meant Barada was wearing a gun that fired a slug about the size of the one that killed Chalmers Boyd.
Standing up Novak massaged his knees and broke the seal on the bottle of rye. He rinsed a little around his mouth, swallowed and made a sour face. Far from the best available. Recapping the bottle he dropped it back into the open suitcase. Then he turned off the table lamp, fitted himself into an armchair and waited in the darkness.
A car accelerated down the drive, tires squealing as it braked in the distance. Check-out probably. Then silence for a long time.
As he waited his ears grew sensitive. He could hear the whir of a vacuum somewhere in the same wing, goosey laughter from a couple next door, the splash of water in a swimming pool behind the wing.
Sun warming the roof made the joints expand and creak. Now that his eyes were accustomed to darkness, he could make out the furniture from where he sat. Another car idling along the drive. It seemed to slow in front of Number 37, then moved on and Novak let his breathing relax.
His body still pained him, but it was a dull pain today and the liquor was helping. His hands curled over the wooden ends of the chair arms and he flexed his muscles. The door would open any minute, bringing Big Ben Barada.
Then outside sounds seemed to fade away and he could hear only the uneasy creak of the timbers above.
The telephone rasped harshly.
The sound jerked him out of the chair. When he realized what it was he cursed softly and walked toward it. The sound came again, commanding and urgent. He hesitated, then picked up the receiver. Muffling it with his fingers he snapped, “Yeah?”
The voice was a distant disembodied whisper. It breathed, “We’ll have to make it later. No earlier than nine o’clock.”
“Why?”
“I’m being watched. I can’t...” the voice dropped and grew suddenly urgent. “Got to hang up. I’ll call later.” The receiver clicked down.
Novak stared at the receiver in his hand, lowered it and went back to his chair. The call had been meant for Ben Barada. The voice could have been anyone’s. No chance of tracing it.
His eyelids were heavy. He stretched out his feet and yawned. The liquor was making him sleepy. In the warm silent darkness he felt himself drifting away. Closing his eyes he slept.
He woke with a jerk, grabbing at his holster, then heard the car backfire again. A sports car with a noisy muffler. The engine caught, held, and the car
Mary was still out for lunch but she had left a typed message. Credit Central had called back with some information on Dr. Edward Bikel. He had done time in the forties for check altering, beat a federal rap for selling a phony cancer cure, and was last known to be in Chicago operating a health food store. His credit rating was zero. None of it was any surprise to Novak. He folded the sheet into his billfold and idled into the coffee shop. The redhead had gone off duty and the waitress who brought his Salisbury steak had a beak like a crow’s and a face with more lines than a contour map. Novak sipped a pint of homogenized milk, drank a cup of coffee and signed the check. As he walked across the lobby Jimmy Grant drifted over. “She just got back, Pete. About five minutes ago. Anything else?”
Novak shook his head. “That’s all for now, kid. Go hustle some shiny quarters.” He went over to the elevators and rode one to the fifth floor. Stopping at Paula Norton’s door he pushed the bell button.
After a while he heard her muffled voice. “Who is it?”
“Novak.”
“Go away.”
“A couple of words, beautiful.”
The door opened the length of the snub chain. She was wearing a dressing gown and her feet were bare. “What is it?”
“All the way,” he said. “I’m not going to beat you up. I’m not your ex-husband.”
She shivered and the chain rattled free. Stepping back she let Novak enter. When the door was shut he said, “Ben wasn’t there. I waited for him but no show. Only a phone call.” He shrugged. “So much for that. I’m going to talk to fatty now, tell her I braced you for the jewelry but got nothing. That should hold her for now.”
“Such faith in me,” she sneered. “Sure it won’t bend your professional ethics?”
His hands caught her wrists and held them until she stopped struggling. As he drew her to him he muttered, “After what I did for you last night my ethics show more curves than a pretzel. Remember that, beautiful.” He pressed her lips against his and felt her body quiver and go slack. When he opened his eyes he saw that hers were glistening.
Huskily she said, “I had no right to say what I did. I guess I’m half-crazy with worry. Ben, the jewelry, the old lady...What I ought to do is get stone drunk.”
“I’ve heard worse ideas.”
“Can’t I change to another room? Every time I go into the bedroom I think of Chalmers lying there. And the widow across the hall. Good Lord, I’ve never been in a spot like this.”
“Since the police are mildly interested in you they might get even more interested if you changed your room. Waiting’s tough but none of this would have happened if you hadn’t started to exploit that streak of larceny in your beautiful body. At that you’re getting off easy. If staying in your room is bad, think what it would be like down at Police Headquarters trying to explain away a dead lover in your bedroom. And I haven’t even twisted your arms, the way I’ll tell it to Mrs. Boyd. So, between highballs, count your blessings.”
“I will,” she said throatily. “I’ll do everything you say.”
Opening the door, he backed into the hallway.
Crossing to Suite 515, he rang the bell and waited.
Instead of Bikel, Julia Boyd opened the door. Her face registered surprise. “Oh, I thought it would be the police.”
As he closed the door he said, “More questions?”
“Not that.” She shrugged. “They aren’t ready to release Chalmer’s body for burial. I thought once an autopsy was over, the next of kin could claim the body.”
“Not always. Guess that postpones your departure plans.”
She patted the side of her hair with one pudgy hand. “I’m not leaving without my jewelry, Mr. Novak. Oh, no!” Turning she walked further into the room. Her stout legs were clad in bulging slacks. There were fluffy slippers on
