he had gone out. I was taking a shower when Sergeant Candy picked me up. That’s all I can tell you.”
“He didn’t say what the job was?” Rankin asked.
I shook my head.
“Jack isn’t much of a letter writer. I guess he decided it would be quicker and easier to tell me than to write.”
Rankin brooded for a moment, then said, “Have you got your licence on you?”
I gave him my billfold. He examined the contents quickly and expertly, then handed it back.
“You’ve no idea who employed him here or what the case was about?” he asked.
“No idea at all.”
He gave me a hard stare.
“You’d tell me if you did? “
“Possibly, but as I don’t know, the point doesn’t arise.”
He scratched the side of his face, screwing up his eyes.
“Do you think he kept notes on the case? Progress reports?”
“I doubt it. He wasn’t keen on any paper work. Usually we worked together and I did the reports.”
He rolled his cigar between his lips.
“How is it you go to New York when you’ve an office in Frisco?”
“This happened to be a client I had had dealings with before. He had moved to New York and particularly wanted me to handle the job.”
“Sheppey was off his beat, too, wasn’t he? Think he was working for an old client?”
“Could be, but I don’t know any of them who has moved out here.”
“Do you think he was killed because of something he turned up on this case?”
I hesitated, remembering the reception clerk at the hotel had said Jack had gone out with a woman.
“I don’t know. The clerk at the hotel told me a woman picked him up and they went out together. He chased women: it was his big fault. He’d leave a job flat if he saw a woman who interested him. This may be one of those times and her husband objected. I’m guessing, but he’s been in an awful lot of messes through women in the past.”
Rankin grimaced.
“Did he run around with married women?”
“He didn’t care what they were so long as they had looks. Don’t think I’m knocking him. He was my best friend, but he certainly made me sore sometimes the way he lay down on the job because of some floosie.”
“It doesn’t often happen a husband shows his disapproval with an icepick: that was a professional job.”
“Maybe he was a professional husband. Have you got anyone on your records who uses an icepick?”
Rankin shook his head.
“I don’t know of anyone, but this is a very rich town. There are plenty of boys here on the make, and some of them are dangerous. No one’s ever been skewered by an icepick, but there’s always got to be a first time.” He tapped ash off his cigar. “Can you get a line on this case he’s working on? That’s our first move. I’ve got to be sure his death isn’t hooked up to it.”
“Unless he’s left a record in his room, there’s nothing I can do about it,” I said untruthfully.
I was going to satisfy myself first that Jack’s client was in the clear before I let Rankin know I might be able to get his name. It was a long shot, but it was just possible Ella, our typist, who looked after the office back in Frisco might have a line on him.
Rankin leaned forward and said to the driver, “Okay, step on it now.”
In less than five minutes we pulled up outside the Adelphi Hotel.
We crossed the lobby together to where the reception clerk was waiting, his fat chins wobbling and his eyes bulging with suppressed excitement.
The two old gentlemen in white flannels had been reinforced by their wives, who looked as if they had stepped out of the pages of a Victorian novel. They sat motionless, staring at us, their ears growing out of the sides of their heads.
“Let’s talk where these old crows can’t listen,” Rankin said, pitching his voice so they could hear him.
“Why certainly, Lieutenant,” the reception clerk said, his voice flustered. He took us behind the desk into a small office. “Is there anything wrong?”
“Not here, there isn’t,” Rankin said. “What’s your name?”
The reception clerk looked even more flustered.
“Edwin Brewer.”
“What time did Sheppey leave here?”
“It would be about half past ten.”
“There was a woman with him?”
“Yes. She came to the desk and asked for him. While she was speaking to me, Mr. Sheppey came from the elevator and joined her.”
“Did she give her name?”
“No. Mr. Sheppey appeared before I could ask for her name.”
“Did they seem friendly?”
Brewer licked his lips nervously.
“Well, yes. Mr. Sheppey was pretty familiar with her.”
“In what way?”
“Well, he walked up to her and said, ‘Hello, baby doll,’ put his hand behind her and pinched her.”
“How did she react?”
“She laughed it off, but I could see she didn’t like it. She wasn’t the type I’d care to take liberties with myself.”
“What type was she then?”
“She had a sort of dignity. It’s hard to explain. She just wasn’t the type to take liberties with.”
“And yet he did?”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” I said. “Jack had no respect for anyone. He’d pinch a bishop’s wife if he felt in the mood.”
Rankin frowned.
“Can you describe this woman?”
Brewer rubbed his hands together nervously.
“She was very attractive: dark with a good figure. She wore big sunglasses and a big hat. I couldn’t see much of her face. She had on navy slacks and a white shirt.”
“Age?”
“In the twenties, but I wouldn’t be sure: twenty-five perhaps.”
“Could you identify her if you saw her again?”
“Oh, yes, I’m sure I could.”
Rankin stubbed out his cigar in the ashtray on Brewer’s desk.
“If she wasn’t wearing the big hat and sunglasses, but happened to be wearing no hat and a white dress, do you think you could still identify her?”
Brewer thought for a moment, then looked sheepish.
“Well, perhaps not.”
“You can identify the clothes, but not the woman?”
“Well, yes.”
“That’s not a lot of help, is it?” Rankin said. “Okay, never mind. After Sheppey had said hello, what happened?”
“He said he had to be back in a couple of hours and they had better get going. They went out together and I saw them drive away in his car.”
“Did she leave her car here?”
“I didn’t see one. I think she must have walked.”
“Let me have the key to his room.”
“Shall I call Greaves? He’s our house detective.”
