1974 - Goldfish Have No Hiding Place (13 page)

I got to my feet.

“I'll talk to Mr. Chandler. It's time he knew what's going on.”

“Yeah?” He sat back and his thin lips twisted into a sneering grin. “Take another think. Can't you get it into your skull that I am protecting you? You drag the boss into this and you're really in the crap. Now piss off and let me get on with my work!”

I then realised he had the ace against my queen. I'm protecting you. That must mean he knew about Linda and her thieving.

As I went into the outer office, Mavis Sherman, thin, dark and worried looking, handed me a plastic sack stuffed with Wally's notebooks.

Back in my office, I laid the books on my desk. There were fourteen of them. Each book was numbered from one onwards. I found No. 13 was missing. I didn't bother to examine the books. I was sure No. 13 covered the stealing at the Welcome store. Like the Gordy file, it had gone missing.

I sat back and thought about the situation. Webber's warning told me I couldn't go to Chandler. If I got tough with Webber, he could get tougher with me. I was sure someone (Webber?) had thrown a scare into Wally. Maybe this was wrong thinking. The beating Wally had had could have scared him, but I didn't think so. I felt almost sure that Wally had been warned as I had been warned. Keep your mouth shut or else . . .

I decided I would have to see Wally tonight. Maybe if I confided in him, handling him gently, telling him about the mess Linda had landed me in, I could persuade him to talk.

The telephone bell rang and from then until lunchtime I was caught up in the business of producing a magazine.

After lunch, Jean came in to tell me my personal things had been packed and had been taken to the Eastern Avenue apartment.

“You can move in whenever you like,” she said. “It's all ready. I've ordered a stock of groceries: coffee, milk and canned food.”

“You're really wonderful, Jean,” I said, looking at her with an ache in my heart. “I'd like to buy you a very expensive dinner . . . may I?”

“Thanks, but no.”

“This invitation also includes your boyfriend. I would like to meet him.”

She regarded me, her eyes serious.

“Look, Steve, please leave me my private life. It's my job to look after you in the office and at home if I can. May we leave it like that?” She gave me a ghost of a smile, then returned to her room.

Well, I thought, that was final enough.

I was kept busy until after 18.00, then I left Jean to lock up and drove to the hospital. I went to the reception desk and asked if I could see Mr. Wally Mitford.

“You've missed him,” the girl told me.

I gaped at her.

“Missed him? What do you mean?”

“He left with his wife in an ambulance half an hour ago.”

Again I felt that chilly sensation.

“Where has he gone?”

“I don't really know.”

“Is Dr. Stanstead still here?”

“He's in his office.”

I found Stanstead preparing to go home.

“What's all this about Wally? I'm told he's gone.”

He shrugged. He looked weary and harassed.

“I don't approve, but there it is. They've taken him by ambulance to the airport and are flying him to Miami. He wanted to go and he was fit enough to travel . . . so he's gone.”

“Was this something Mr. Chandler arranged?”

“I guess so. Mr. Borg handled it.”

“Shirley went with him?”

“Yes. He's to go to some clinic either in Miami or Palm Beach.”

“You don't know the clinic?”

“No. Look, Steve, I've got more work than I can cope with,” he said impatiently. “I'm sure Wally will be in good hands and the sun will do him good.”

“Yes. Well, see you, Henry,” and I left the hospital, got in my car and sat thinking.

Was there a conspiracy going on? First Gordy's file, the film and the blow-ups had vanished, then the reel of tape, recording Gordy's blackmail threat to me, had been stolen, then Wally's notebook had gone missing and now Wally had been whisked out of reach. I had an uneasy feeling that someone was breathing down my neck.

What to do?

The door now seemed shut. Trying to control a rising panic, I told myself the only thing I could do was to sit it out and hope nothing would develop. Maybe nothing would, but I felt sure, at the back of my mind, I was kidding myself.

I started to drive home. This was a reflex action.

Halfway, I remembered there would be no food in the house so I pulled into the forecourt of the Imperial hotel.

There I had a steak. As I was paying the check, the front man came over to me.

“Mr. Manson?”

“That's right.”

“There's a telephone call for you . . . booth 5.”

Surprised, I took the call. It was Sergeant Brenner.

“Saw your car,” he said curtly. “I want to talk to you. Do you know the Half Moon bar?”

“I don't.”

“It's on 15th Street, next to the drug store. You can't miss it. Take a cab: you can't park anyway. Ask for Jake. See you in half an hour,” and he hung up.

I picked up a cab outside the hotel, leaving my car in the hotel's forecourt.

The Half Moon bar was sleazy and half empty. There were three painted hookers propping up the bar. A couple of coloured men were drinking beer at one of the tables. A dirty-looking youth with hair to his shoulders was sitting at another table, aimlessly picking his nose.

As I walked up to the bar, a beefy man in shirtsleeves flopped a dirty rag in front of me and began polishing.

“You Jake?” I asked.

He eyed me over, nodded, then jerked his thumb towards a door. Watched by the three hookers, I pushed open the door, climbed a short flight of stairs and pushed open another door.

Brenner was nursing a beer. The room was small: a bed, a table and two chairs. A torn blind screened the window. I closed the door.

“This looks like a set for a B movie,” I said, joining him at the table.

“Yeah, but it's safe. Jake owes me a lot. I could have put him away for five years. Sit down.”

I pulled up a chair and sat down.

“Freda Hawes,” Brenner said. “I've checked her out and so has Goldstein. She says nothing, even under pressure. She says she slept with Gordy from time to time, but she knows nothing about him. She's scared and she's lying. She's not opening her mouth to the Law, but she just could talk to you. I could be wrong, but it's worth a try.”

“She could be a blackmailer. She could have the film and the blow-ups. I don't want to tangle with her.”

“I'll be surprised if she is. She's not the type and I know blackmailers. Go take a look at her. She hangs out at the Blue Room on 22nd. You'll find her there any time from now to dawn. She's a drinker. If you think you can handle her, talk to her. When a guy sleeps with a woman, sooner or later, he lets his hair down. I'm pretty sure Gordy has stashed away that film somewhere. He might have told her. That's our only hope, Manson. We've got to get to that film before Goldstein does.”

I didn't like this, but at least, I could take a look at this woman.

“How do I know her?”

“Short, dark, around twenty-five, well built,” Brenner said. “You can't miss her. Her thing is to wear brass bracelets that crawl half way up her arms.”

“Okay, I'll take a look.” I then told him I was moving into the apartment on Eastern Avenue. He wrote down my telephone number.

“Goldstein has talked to Creeden, to Latimer and the rest of them,” Brenner went on. “Kid glove stuff. Very smooth, gentle, just probing, but he's probing. He'll come to you next, so watch it. He is asking have you any idea that there was stealing at the Welcome store? Of course everyone has been open-eyed and saying no, but Goldstein is a damn smart cookie. He digs in the question fast and there is always a blink of the eyes and that is what he is watching for. He's got nowhere so far, but once he gets his teeth into a murder case, he is hard to shake loose.”

“I'll watch it.” I wondered if I should tell him about the reel of tape and about Wally's notebook. I decided not. I had a feeling that I would be better off if I kept my mouth shut from now on and tried to work this out on my own.

“I'll go along to the Blue Room right away. Suppose you call me tomorrow morning at the office? We could meet here again if I have anything.”

“Yeah, but I don't want to call you. Let's meet this time tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

I left him, made my way down the stairs, nodded to Jake who nodded back, then went out onto the busy street to find a cab.

***

The Blue Room was a cellar club on the corner of 22nd and East which placed it near Freda Hawes' pad.

The cabbie who drove me there looked searchingly at me as I paid him.

“It's not my business, buddy,” he said when he saw the size of my tip, “but that joint is strictly not for you. If you're yearning to get mugged you're heading in the right direction.”

“Thanks.”

I stepped back. He stared at me again, lifted his heavy shoulders and drove away.

Looking up and down the street, I saw what he meant and I hesitated. I was wearing a business suit and when I saw the kind of flotsam drifting up and down the street I felt as conspicuous as a bishop in a brothel.

While I had served in the army, I had taken a combat course. Not like Wally Mitford, I kept in shape. I was confident I could take care of myself. It would have been better to have gone home and changed into less conspicuous clothes, but now I was here, I was damned if I was going home, to change and come all the way back.

There was a small neon sign that read: BLUE RO M.

The second O was missing.

I went down a long steep stairway, and as I descended, the noise of swing and the smell of unwashed bodies increased until I reached a tiny lobby.

A big Negro sat on a stool, staring into space. He showed only the whites of his eyes. A second look told me he was turned on and wouldn't know if he was on this earth or on the moon.

A red curtain screened the entrance and I lifted it aside and looked in.

The big room was packed with dancing figures and dark enough to make them weaving silhouettes. The noise of the four-piece band exploded against my eardrums. The smell of unwashed feet, dirt and reefers was choking.

To walk into that inferno, dressed as I was, would be to invite suicide. I dropped the curtain, deciding I would go along to Freda Hawes' pad and wait for her there. As I started up the stairs two youths started down.

I stopped and so did they.

In the dim light, I could see they were around twenty years of age. Their filthy hair reached to their shoulders.

Their white, dirty faces were pinched and their little eyes had the glitter of junkies.

“Look who's here,” the taller of the two said. “A snout poker. What do we do to snout pokers, Randy?”

“Stomp him,” Randy said. He was weaving a little: either drunk or drugged. “Let's get him up on the street, Heinie. Don't want to wake up old Sam.”

Heinie beckoned to me.

“Come on, creep, unless you want to be cut.” A flick knife jumped into his hand.

I started up the stairs and they slowly retreated until they moved out onto the street. I had three more stairs before I joined them in the open. I jumped those stairs, hit Randy a chopping blow on his neck, weaved around Heinie, grabbed his wrist and heaved him judo-style over my back.

He crashed down on the sidewalk.

I walked fast around the corner onto East Street, kept moving and told myself I was crazy to have come to this district dressed the way I was. The encounter with these two junkies showed me the red light. I had to get out of here fast. I looked around for a cab, but cabs kept clear of East Street.

Then out of an alley, three long-haired youths who must have been watching my approach, burst out and grabbed me. I was dragged into the alley, off balance and unprepared.

I went limp. My weight took them by surprise and the two holding me collapsed with me onto the evil-smelling concrete. I threw them off, kicked out at the third figure, silhouetted against the open alley, a bottle raised in his hand. I caught him in the crotch and he went over, screeching. One of the others heaved himself on me and we went down with a thud. I chopped the side of his neck hard and he flattened out. The last one lost his guts and ran.

I leaned against the wall, getting my breath back, then I moved onto the street, stepping over the one I had kicked who was screwed up, holding himself and mewing like a cat. I knew I must be in a mess. My sleeve was torn. I could smell the refuse sticking to the back of my jacket.

Keeping in the shadows, I walked down East Street. I remembered Freda Hawes' number. When I came to her block, I climbed five steps and entered a dimly lit lobby. The mailbox told me she was on the fourth floor. There was no elevator. I climbed, walked down a corridor to a door at the far end. There was a tatty card pinned to the door that read: Miss Freda Hawes. By appointment. Tel. East 44S6.

I thumbed the bell and waited.

Somewhere on the second floor a woman screamed: “No! I tell you no! Keep away from me!” Then silence.

I heard heavy footsteps pound up the stairs, but they stopped on the third floor. Looking over the rail, I saw a thickset man entering one of the apartments.

I thumbed the bell again.

While I waited I took off my jacket and shook off the potato peeling, the dead cabbage leaves and other horrors that had been sticking to me.

It became obvious that Freda Hawes was not at home.

This presented a problem. If she was at the Blue Room she could jive until three or four in the morning. I couldn't stay out in this exposed corridor for some six hours. I would also be risking my neck if I appeared on the street. I had to get to a telephone and get a cab to pick me up. Where was the nearest telephone?

I looked at the door and the card. She had a telephone.

Maybe the lock was brittle. I turned the handle and was startled when the door swung open.

I paused. The chilly sensation began to crawl up my spine. Was I going to have a repeat performance? Was I going to find Freda Hawes shot to death?

As I stood there, I heard a soft moaning sound that made the hair on the nape of my neck bristle. Then I heard someone coming up the stairs. Hurriedly, I stepped into the dark room and shut the door.