you to ... oh, gee, Mike, I’m sorry. I only work here. Forget it.”
I pinched her nose and smiled. “Work here, hell. I wouldn’t know what to do without you. Now behave yourself and stick near your phone either here or at home. I may need you to pick up a few angles for me.”
Velda gave a little laugh. “Okay, Mike. I’ll watch the angles, you watch out for the curves. Huba huba.”
She was cleaning off my desk when I left.
My first call was to Pat. He wanted to know how I was making out but I didn’t give him much. Later he could know about the Vickers girl, but first I wanted to get in my two bits. I picked a few numbers from the phone book and included the call-house number among them. I held on while Pat checked the addresses for me and passed on the information. After I thanked him, I checked with the phone book to make sure he had given me straight stuff. They checked. Pat was playing it square enough.
In case he fished around with the numbers I gave him, it would be some time before he got to the one I was working on.
This time I left my heap halfway down the block. 501 was the number I wanted, and it turned out to be an old brownstone apartment three stories high. I cased it from a spot across the street, but no one came or went. On the top floor a room was lit up faintly with no signs of life in it. Evidently I was early. The house was flanked on each side by another equally as drab and with as little color to it as the streets of a ghost town.
This was no regular red-light district. Just a good spot for what went on. An old, quiet neighborhood patrolled several times nightly by a friendly cop, a few struggling businesses in the basement apartments. No kids—the street was too dull for them. No drunks lounging in doorways either. I pulled on my cigarette for the last time, then crushed it under my heel and started across the street.
I pushed the button three longs and a short. Very faintly I heard the ring, then the door opened. It wasn’t the frowsy blonde I had expected. This woman was about fifty, all right, but her dress was conservative and neat. She had her hair done up in a roll with only the slightest suggestion of make-up. She looked like somebody’s mother.
“Pete Sterling,” I said.
“Oh, yes, won’t you come in?” She closed the door behind me while I waited, then motioned toward the sitting room off the hall. I went in. The transformation was startling. Unlike the dull exterior, this room was exciting, alive. The furniture was modern, yet comfortable. The walls were paneled in rich mahogany to blend with the redecorated mantel and the graceful staircase that curved down into the far end of the room. I could see why no light shone through the windows. They were completely blocked off with black velvet curtains.
“May I take your hat?” I snapped out of it long enough to hand over my lid. Upstairs a radio was playing, but there was no other sound. The woman came back after a moment and sat down, motioning me to be seated opposite her.
“Nice place you have,” I remarked.
“Yes, we’re very secluded here.” I was waiting for her to ask the questions, but she seemed in no hurry. “You told me on the phone that you had met one of our agents and he sent you here. Which one was it?”
“A little ratty guy. He didn’t make it sound as good as this. I slapped him around some.”
She gave me a tight smile. “Yes, I remember, Mr. Hammer. He had to take the week off.” If she thought she’d catch me jumping she was crazy.
“How did you spot me?”
“Please don’t be so modest. You’ve made too many headlines to be entirely unknown. Now tell me something, why did you choose to come here?”
“Guess,” I said.
She smiled again. “I imagine it can even happen to you, too. All right, Mr. ... er ... Sterling, would you like to go upstairs?”
“Yeah. Who’s up there?”
“An assortment you’ll find interesting. You’ll see. But first, twenty-five dollars, please.” I fished out the dough and handed it over.
She led me as far as the stairs. There was a push button mounted on the side of the newel post and she pushed it. Upstairs a chime rang and a door opened, flooding the stairs with light. A dark-haired girl wrapped in a transparent robe stood in the doorway.
“Come on up,” she said.
I took the stairs two at a time. She wasn’t pretty, I could see that, but the make-up enhanced what she had. A beautiful body, though. I walked in. Another sitting room, but this one was well occupied. The madam had meant what she said when she told me there was an assortment. The girls were sitting there reading or smoking; blondes, brunettes and a pair of redheads. None of them had much on.
Things like this were supposed to make your heart beat faster, only I didn’t react that way. I thought of Velda and Jack. Something was here that I wanted and I didn’t know how I was going to take it. Eileen Vickers was the one, but I never saw her. The alias—Mary Wright. It seemed feasible that she would not use her right name working here and not to evade income taxes either.
Nobody gave me a tumble, so I supposed I was to make the selection. The girl who led me in kept watching me expectantly. “Want someone special?” she asked.
“Mary Wright,” I told her.
“She’s in her room. Wait here, I’ll get her.” The girl disappeared through the door and was back a moment later. “Right down the hall, next to last door.”
I nodded and went through the door and found myself in a long hallway. On either side the wall was peppered with doors, newly built. Each one had a knob, but no keyhole. The next to last door was the same as the others. I knocked and a voice called out for me to come in. I turned the knob and pushed.
Mary Wright was seated in front of a dressing table, combing her hair. All she was wearing was a brassiere and a pair of step-ins. That and house slippers. She eyed me through the mirror.
She might have been pretty once, but she wasn’t any longer. There were lines under her eyes that weren’t put there by age. She had a faint twitch in her cheek that she tried to conceal, but it came through anyway. I guessed her age somewhat in the late twenties. She looked a lot older, but I accounted for that.
Here was a girl that had seen plenty of life, all raw. Her body was just a shade too thin, well fed, but emotionally starved. Empty, like a dead snail. Her profession and her past were etched into her eyes. She was a girl you could beat without getting a whimper out of her. Maybe her expression would change, but another beating more or less would mean nothing. Like the others, she wasn’t too made-up. Far from being plain, but not at all gaudy.
Her hair was a chestnut brown like the irises of her eyes. She must have had some sun lately or spent time under a lamp, for there was a faint tinge of tan covering what I could see of her skin. There was nothing startling about her shape. Average. Not very heavy in the breasts, but her legs were nice. I felt sorry for the girl.
“Hello.” Her voice was pleasant enough. She sat there as though she was getting ready to go out and I was a husband casually looking for a cuff link. “Early, aren’t you?”
“Sort of, but I was getting tired of hanging around a bar.” I got in a quick look around the room, then went to an end table and ran through a set of books. My fingers felt under the table edge before I inspected the walls. I was looking for wires. These places have been rigged for sound more than once and I didn’t want to get snared in a trap. The bed was next. I got down on my hands and knees and looked under it. No wires.
Mary had been watching me curiously. “If it’s a dictaphone you’re searching for, we haven’t any,” she said.
“And the walls are soundproofed besides.” She stood up in front of me. “Want a drink first?”
“No.”
“Afterwards, then.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t come here for that.”
“Well, for goodness’ sake, what did you come for, to make small talk?”
“You hit it, Eileen.” I thought she’d pass out. At first she got deathly white, then her eyes hardened and her
