Dial Me for Murder (15 page)

I spun around and dashed after her. “I guess you’re Jocelyn,” I said, catching up at the elevator.

“Good guess.” She gave me a quick glance, then pushed the UP button. “Let’s go to the café and have a cup of something.”

“Okay,” I said, as the elevator doors opened and we stepped in.

The car was full of well-dressed shoppers, so we remained silent until we reached the eighth floor. Jocelyn led the way to the café and asked the hostess for a table for two near the window.

The minute we were seated and alone, Jocelyn craned her neck toward me and snapped, “You aren’t too smart, are you? Why did you come to see me at work?” She brushed a wave of beige hair off her cheek and fixed her intense green eyes on my face. “Surely it occurred to you that I couldn’t talk openly at my place of employment.”

“Yes, that thought did cross my mind,” I admitted, “but I had to ignore it. My time isn’t my own, and I have to make every free minute count.” I pulled Abby’s Pall Malls out of my purse and offered her one as a peace offering. She took it, and we both lit up.

“Well, you’d better get cracking,” she said, spewing smoke toward the ceiling. “My free minutes are dwindling fast.”

Glad for the excuse to skip the small talk, I took a deep breath and dived right in: “Okay, how long had you and Virginia been friends?”

She gave me a puzzled look. “Who’s Vir—? Oh! You mean Melody!”

“Right.”

“She was the best friend I ever had. We were tight for two years. As close as sisters. I miss her desperately.” Her demeanor was cool and her words were curt, but I believed she meant what she said.

“Did you tell each other everything?”

“God, no!” She tossed her head and laughed. “That would have been the end of our friendship for sure.”

“Did she ever tell you why she became a call girl?”

“No. I asked her about it once, and she pulled the clam act on me. I didn’t bring the subject up again. Melody was a very private person, and so am I. We respected each other’s boundaries. We never even told—”

Jocelyn cut her sentence short when the waitress arrived to take our order. “Just a cup of coffee for me,” she said, without looking at the menu. “What do you want, Paige?”

“I’ll have coffee and the soup of the day.” I really wanted the turkey and stuffing special (well, I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, you know!), but I thought I’d better conserve my (I mean, Abby’s) money. Who knew what expenses the rest of the day would bring?

“Where were we?” I asked as soon as the waitress disappeared. “You were saying . . . ?”

Jocelyn patted her pageboy and took another drag on her cigarette. “I was saying that, as close as Melody and I were, we never told each other our real names. She knew me only as Candy, and I knew her only as Melody. That’s one of Sabrina’s strictest rules, and we both honored it.”

“Did you ever discuss your clients with each other, or does Sabrina have rules about that, too?”

“Sabrina is a very smart woman,” Jocelyn declared. “She knows we have to talk about our johns with
somebody,
so she allows us to gossip, complain, give tips, and share information among ourselves. We are, however, strictly forbidden to discuss the clientele with anybody
else.
That’s a crime punishable by death.”

“Death?” I croaked, wondering if I’d dug up my first real clue. I could feel my eyes popping out of their sockets.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” Jocelyn said with a derisive smirk. “Don’t be such a dope! That’s just a figure of speech. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

The waitress returned and saved me from further embarrassment. While she served our coffee, I smoked and stared out the window at the heavenly view. Soaring and glistening in the late afternoon sun, the spires of St. Patrick’s seemed close enough to touch.

“I’ll be right back with your soup,” the waitress said, yanking me back down to earth. She tucked her tray under her arm and plodded off toward the kitchen.

Jocelyn sighed and snuffed her cigarette in the ashtray. “I can’t stay while you eat. I’m expected back in four minutes.” She poured enough cream in her coffee to cool it, then began gulping it down.

“So I’ll ask the big question now,” I said, putting my cigarette out, too. “Do you have any idea who killed Vir—I mean, Melody?”

“I have my suspicions,” she said, clapping her empty cup back in its saucer. “
Strong
suspicions.” Her pretty face turned stormy and her eyes flashed like lightning. “It was either Sam or Tony. I’d stake my life on it.”

“You mean Sam Hogarth and Tony Corona?” I asked, taking note that she’d used their first names.

“They’re both devils in disguise!” she spat. “I know it’s shocking—Sam being the DA, and Tony being such a big star— but from all the dirt I’ve heard, either one is capable of murder.”

“What dirt?” I spluttered. “What have you heard? Who did you hear it from? Did Melody say anything? Do you or any of the other girls have any incriminating information? And what about Oliver Rice Harrington? He was one of Melody’s regulars. Did you ever hear anything about him?” My tongue was having convulsions.

“I can’t go into all of that now!” Jocelyn slapped her hand on the tabletop. “Too many questions and too little time. I have to get back to work!” She jumped to her feet, opened her purse, and tossed some change on the table. “It’s your own fault, you know. You shouldn’t have come to see me here. I have my job, my reputation, and my employee discount to protect.”

“Then can I meet you later, after you get off work? I could come to the Barbizon,” I said, naming the women’s hotel where she lived.

“Not tonight,” she said. “I’ve got an early dinner date.”

“Anybody I know?” I probed, wondering if Candy had inherited one (or all) of Melody’s top three clients.

She nodded, winked, and gave me a cryptic smile.

“Who?” I begged. “Who is it?” My curiosity was killing me. But more than that, I was panicked about her safety. “Have you lost your mind?” I cried. “Do you have a psychotic death wish? How could you accept a date with a man who may have murdered your best friend?”

“Oh, keep your shorts on, Sherlock,” she teased, taking pleasure in my crazed discomfort. “I’m not meeting a john. I’m dining with Sabrina.”

Chapter 14

IF I’D HAD MY WITS ABOUT ME, I WOULD HAVE chased Jocelyn to the elevator and wangled an invitation to join her and Sabrina for dinner. I might have learned a lot from such a cozy confab. As it was, though, I
didn’t
have my wits about me (or anywhere else, for that matter). All I could see or think about was the lovely bowl of corn chowder the waitress had put down in front of me. It was hot, creamy, fragrant, and hearty— and it came with a basket of rolls and three pats of butter.

Five minutes later every corn kernel, bread crumb, and butter pat was gone.

And five minutes after that,
I
was gone—busting out of Saks, dashing down Fifth Avenue to 45th Street, then heading west toward Ninth Avenue and the Hell’s Kitchen tenement where Ethel Maguire—otherwise known as Brigitte—lived. It was a quarter to six. With any luck, Ethel’s classes at the nursing school would be over for the day, and she’d be at home taking care of her crippled husband.

I climbed the cracked and worn cement steps to the front door of Ethel’s building and, seeing that the lock was broken, let myself in. The hallway mailbox for apartment 3B was labeled MAGUIRE, so I darted across the dingy foyer and scrambled up the creaky wooden stairs to the third floor. The odor of boiled cabbage was strong, and a baby was crying somewhere overhead.

I shifted my unwieldy bag of office effects to my other arm, took a deep breath (which was a big mistake, since the smell of cooked cabbage makes me gag), and knocked on the door of 3B.

“Just a minute!” cried a female voice from the other side of the battered wooden door. “I’ll be right there!”

Suddenly overcome with exhaustion from the many physical and emotional ordeals of the day, I whined out loud, leaned my back and shoulders against the wall, and waited. . . .

A short while later a young woman opened the door. I knew it was Ethel: She was wearing her uniform, and—even with little to no makeup and her blonde hair pinned up under her student nurse’s cap—she was a dead ringer for European sex goddess Brigitte Bardot. “Yes?” she said, brown eyes widening as she wondered who I was and why I was there.

“Hi, Ethel,” I said. “I’m Paige Turner. I believe Sabrina told you I’d be coming by. I have a few questions I’d like to—”

“Shhhhh!” she hissed, holding one finger up to her lips and hurriedly stepping into the hall. She pulled the door partially closed behind her. “My husband’s sitting in the living room! He’ll hear every word you say!”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, “but Sabrina said I could—”

“Who is it, Ethel?” a man called out. “Who are you talking to?” His voice was rough and booming—like Broderick Craw-ford’s in
Born Yesterday
.

A stormy cloud fell over Ethel’s striking face. “We can’t talk here!” she said to me. “Quick! Go downstairs and wait for me on the stoop. I’ll be down as soon as I can.” She ducked back inside her apartment and firmly closed the door.

 
I TRUDGED DOWN TO THE FIRST FLOOR AND WENT outside. It was beginning to get dark. The sun was sinking fast below the Hudson River horizon, and there was a distinct chill in the air. The people on the sidewalks, presumably making their way home from work, were hunching their shoulders and tucking their chins inside their coat collars. Wobbly with fatigue, I propped my bag against the metal railing and collapsed on the top step of the cement stoop. So what if the seat of my skirt got dirty? I was too tired to care. And I couldn’t bear the agony of my sadistic stilettos for one more second.

When Ethel finally came downstairs and out on the stoop, I didn’t even try to get up. I just sat there like a stump until she ventured over and sat down beside me.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” she said, putting her purse in her lap and tucking the hem of her navy blue coat tight around her knees. “He’s always so suspicious. It took me all this time to convince him that you came to see somebody else in the building and knocked on our door by mistake.”

“What excuse did you give him for coming downstairs?”

Ethel sighed. “I said I had to pick up some chops at the butcher. For our dinner. When the subject turns to food, he’s always more agreeable.”

I laughed. “So the fastest way to a man’s heart really
is
through his stomach.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” she sniffed. “Most of the other men I know prefer a more southern route.” Her expression was so grim, I knew she wasn’t trying to be witty.

“Speaking of other men,” I said, leaping into the opening but keeping my voice as soft and supportive as possible, “do you have any dates tonight?”

She gave me a puzzled look. “Just one. At ten. Why?”

“I need to know if the man you’re meeting was ever one of Melody’s clients,” I said, switching to a firmer tone. “Because if he
was,
he may be a prime suspect in her murder. And if that’s the case, I don’t want you to go out with him.” I was challenging Sabrina’s authority, I knew, but I didn’t give a good goddamn.

Ethel shook her head. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that, Paige. The man I’m seeing tonight is one of my regulars, not Melody’s. And you shouldn’t be concerned about me, anyway. Sabrina is very protective of me; she loves me like a daughter. She would
never
fix me up with a violent man.”

“Are you sure about that?” I asked, thinking poor Melody had probably felt the same way.

“I’m positive,” she said. Her expression was adamant, and her jaw was set in stone.

I took my cue and moved on. “Does your husband know how you spend your nights?” (I don’t know why I asked that question—it had nothing to do with the murder. I guess pure nosiness was to blame.)

“Of course not!” she gasped. “His legs are crippled, but his arms are strong. If he ever finds out what I’ve been doing, he’ll tear me limb from limb.”

“But how have you kept him in the dark? He must see you get all dolled up and go out. Where does he think you’re going?”

“He thinks I’m a hostess at a fancy nightclub—that I’m paying all our bills and putting myself through school with my salary. Ha! He’s so out of touch he doesn’t realize that a hostess makes even less than a busboy—no matter how fancy the nightclub is. It’s a man’s world.”

“Tell me about it,” I said, thinking how all the guys at
DD
made much more than I did, and how—if I really had been fired—I’d soon be making
nothing.

Ethel turned up her collar and buttoned it tight around her neck. “It’s getting cold, Paige,” she said. “And I have to go to the butcher before I hurry back upstairs. If you have any more questions for me, you’d better ask them fast. I can’t sit here much longer.”

“Okay,” I said, “I’ll make it quick. First question: Why did Melody become a call girl? I realize she must have needed money, but do you know what she needed it
for
?”

“No, and I always wondered about that. She certainly didn’t spend much on herself. And her job at the accounting office paid enough to take care of her rent and expenses. She wanted to be a successful singer and songwriter, but that’s not something you can buy. Maybe she was saving up for something special—a house or a car or something like that.”

“A mink jacket was found with her body,” I said, “and also some diamond jewelry. Do you know if she bought those items herself?”

“I doubt it,” Ethel replied. “Melody didn’t care about things like that. They were probably gifts from her clients.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“I wouldn’t know,” she said with a shrug. “She went out with a number of wealthy men. It could have been anybody.”

“Sam Hogarth or Tony Corona, for instance? Or Oliver Rice Harrington?”