I heard him muttering, “A raise—honest?” Then he laughed a little, but, cripes, I didn’t mean nothing.
The big house that Droyster had bought for his wife gave me the creeps. It was a huge chunk of stone in the middle of a lot big enough for a park.
The boss paid the hackie who had brought us down and the cab pulled away. I tagged along as the boss opened an iron gate and started up the walk.
He didn’t talk any when we reached the door. He punched the bell and in a few seconds a big-bellied guy in a butler’s get-up opened the door.
“Mr. Smith to see Mrs. Droyster,” the boss said. “She’s expecting me.”
The butler led us in. The inside of the house knocked my eyes out. There were pictures on the walls, rich drapes, and the furniture smelled of the good old mazuma. I went to my ankles in a rug that covered the whole floor. I thought it was no wonder Droyster had gone busted.
The butler tugged a couple of doors open. “You may wait in the library,” he said, giving me a look that made me wonder if my hair—what there is of it—was combed.
I followed the boss and the butler waddled off to find the Droyster dame.
The boss began looking over the books that the walls seemed to be made of. I looked and spotted a big chair. But I didn’t get to sit down. Somebody said. “Hello, Mr. Smith. I’m glad you came right down.”
I turned and got set back on my heels. This was my first close-up of her and it was plenty all right. She had more than enough to go with the voice: a figure that could model bathing suits, a face that would drive a guy to drink, and long hair that was as black as the spots on the ten of spades.
She looked at me, then at the boss. Then she frowned. But everybody does that when they first see me and Smith together. And maybe we are sort of odd. He’s the guy they invented all fancy words like elegant to coin. He’s got his own tailor and his shoes cost twenty-five bucks. To top it off, he’s got a sort of air about him that makes you think of Park Avenue.
And me—well, I’m just Willie Aberstein. It don’t do much good to send my clothes to the cleaners. I guess I’m too short and too broad; a kid once screamed when he ran around a dark corner, smacked into me, and got a gander at my face. But I can’t help that. I was never a daisy and having every pug in the east punch the face hasn’t helped it any.
The boss said, “Mr. Aberstein, my assistant.”
I nodded. “Pleased to meet you.”
She came on in the room, waved us to a chair. I beat Smith to the big chair. She walked back and forth a little. Then she said, “You know why I called you here, Mr. Smith. I’m almost positive poor Mark was murdered.” She tried to make her chin quiver, but it didn’t go off. I marked her down a notch in my book.
“The calling card I mentioned,” she went on after a minute. She reached into the pocket of her green dress and pulled out a white card. “I found this under the bed in my husband’s room this morning.” She held out the card to Smith.
Me and the boss both got up and I got a squint at the card over his shoulder. It was a very loud-talking card. It said:
A. H. Newell, Investments.
Right then and there I patted myself on the back. If Al Newell was mixed up in this, the whole business of Droyster killing himself by blowing off his kink was the bunk. I’d guessed right when I read the papers.
Al Newell owned part of a dog track that Droyster had promoted. I had wondered why the coppers had let the thing slide without so much as a how-do-you-do to Droyster’s corpse. Maybe I knew why now.
Newell sort of had his way in City Hall. He was a slick-haired young guy who could tell people what to do. He had the dames, the dough, and the wrong kind of boys working for him.
The boss slipped the card into his pocket. “The card doesn’t mean much, Mrs. Droyster. Simply that Al Newell was in the room where your husband met his end.” He offered Alicia Droyster a cigarette, but she didn’t take it. The boss lighted a smoke for himself.
“Perhaps Newell was in the room yesterday or even today. When did you find the card, anyway?”
“Just a few hours ago.”
“And who has been in the room? You know, someone might have deliberately planted the card under the bed.”
She shook her head in a very serious way. “No one has been in there. Not even the housekeeper. I haven’t allowed the room to be touched.” She tried the chin quiver again. “You—you know how those things are.”
“Of course, Mrs. Droyster,” the boss said in a nice way. But I could see he thought it was a lot of pap. He knocked his ashes into a metal tray. He was tired of sparring. He said:
“You think Al Newell killed your husband and dropped the card from his pocket when he bent over your husband’s body?”
She didn’t have to force her chin to quiver then. “I didn’t say that! Don’t get me wrong, Mr. Smith. Al Newell—I’m only telling you the facts.”
The boss nodded. “And what about the Great Dane dog you mentioned over the phone?”
She was beginning to twist her fingers. “That was Jackie. He disappeared.”
The boss almost laughed. “I don’t follow you.”
“It does sound silly, I suppose. But it makes me feel afraid somehow. You see, my husband loved the dog almost as well as he—as he did me. Night before last,
