Murder by Proxy (2 page)

She thanked him and found the key that fitted in the ignition. The motor purred smoothly and she pulled carefully away from the curb into traffic.

There was only one bartender on duty in the cocktail lounge at the Beachhaven Hotel at seven o’clock that evening. The earlier rush had slackened and there were only half a dozen dawdlers at the bar, a couple of the booths were occupied and there were perhaps a dozen couples at the small tables more interested in having another drink than getting into the dining room.

The bartender was called Tiny. He was six feet tall and four feet around the middle. He wore a size twenty collar and weighed slightly more than three hundred pounds. He had been a professional wrestler for a period, but found tending bar less arduous and a lot more fun. Particularly in a cocktail lounge like the Beachhaven. Anything could happen any time. And most evenings something did.

Take like this stacked blonde, now, coming into the dimly lighted lounge through the door that opened directly into the hotel parking lot.

She was a new one, and, by God, she was a honey. That vivid red cocktail dress was something! Slashed all the way down in front to here, and filled out plenty good on each side of the spreading vee. But there was an elegance about her, too. The way she held herself… proud and sure. The way she took her time looking the joint over. Studying the empty booths and tables, then letting her wide-eyed gaze drift speculatively to the row of empty bar stools and finally to Tiny’s face as he watched her. She smiled as though in recognition, although Tiny was positive she had never been in the lounge before. She moved along the bar with flawless grace and stopped behind the row of empty stools in front of Tiny.

“Is there any rule about an unescorted lady not sitting at the bar?”

“There sure isn’t. Make yourself right to home.”

She slid easily and competently onto the leather stool and rested both elbows on the bar, cupping her chin in her hands after removing a pair of white gloves. “I’ve always wondered just why it’s considered proper at some places for a lady to sit alone at a table, but not at the bar.”

“Nobody cares in Miami. All nice and informal down here. Your first trip?”

“Yes.” She sighed slightly and lifted her long lashes to widen her blue eyes at him in an intimately appealing way. “What do you recommend I should drink?”

“Well, now. All depends on what you like.”

“I don’t drink very much at home. My husband doesn’t approve of it. But I feel tonight calls for it. I want to… sort of… cut loose. Not really, you know, but…” With a touch of defiance, “Well, why shouldn’t I?”

“No reason at all, Lady. You just name it.”

“A daiquiri?” She tilted her blond head charmingly. “Isn’t that the one you make with rum?”

“Right you are. One daiquiri coming up.” Tiny turned to lift down a bottle of Bacardi and put ice and lemon juice in a silver shaker. She opened her bag and took out a cigarette which she placed between her lips. She fumbled further in her bag and a pleasant masculine voice spoke from just behind her, “May I?”

A lighter snapped and flame moved toward the tip of her cigarette from her left. She glanced up into the mirror behind the bar and saw the reflection of a lean-jawed, smiling face beside hers in the glass. He was deeply-tanned and brown-haired, and had very white teeth. She turned her head slightly so the tip of her cigarette met the flame, and drew in deeply. Expelling smoke, she murmured a polite, “Thank you.”

He said, just as politely, “You’re quite welcome,” and he sat on the stool beside her, widening his smile at her reflection in the mirror.

She lowered her lashes composedly and snapped her bag shut. Tiny set a brimming, wide-topped, tall-stemmed glass in front of her on a paper napkin. The man sitting beside her said, “Bourbon and water, please, Tiny.”

“Coming up.” Tiny’s voice sounded grumpy.

She said delightedly, “Did you call him Tiny?” and turned her head to look at the man beside her.

He grinned in response. “Sure. On account of he ain’t.”

She said, “I see,” and took a sip of her cocktail sedately. “It’s delicious,” she told Tiny as he turned back to shove a highball glass in front of the man. “Just exactly what I needed.”

“For what?” the man asked with interest.

“For what ailed me. A… sort of lost feeling, I guess you might call it. A sort of wondering what-shall-I-do-next feeling.”

“Why not just have fun? That’s what Miami Beach is noted for.”

“I
want
to.” There was something almost plaintive in the way she emphasized it. “I’m not sure that I know how.” She took another and longer drink from her glass. “But I do believe this is going to help.”

“Perhaps I could help too,” he suggested. “I don’t want to seem forward, but… my name is Gene Blake.”

“I don’t think you’re being forward at all. I’m Ellen Harris. Mrs. Herbert Harris,” she added quickly.

He drank deeply from his glass and twirled it between his fingers on the bar. He didn’t look at her as he asked, “Where is Herbert tonight?”

“Back in New York. He,” she told Gene Blake with a faint note of rancor in her voice, “thinks that husbands and wives should get away from each other once in awhile.”

“I agree with him,” said Gene. “Especially if you’re the wife. I think I approve of Herbert. Very definitely. Why not try the rest of your daiquiri… Ellen?”

She said softly, “I think I had better. Before I run like hell.”

“Where would you run to?”

“Away from you.”

“Back to Herbert?”

“Oh, no. I couldn’t. Not for two whole weeks.”

“Two weeks?” He turned his head to study her face as she emptied her glass. “Wasn’t there a book once, called
Three Weeks?
Elinor Glynn, wasn’t it?”

“I don’t remember. Why?”

Gene tossed off the rest of his highball. He said to Tiny, “Two more, please.”

And to her, he said, when Tiny had turned his back to mix the drinks, “It just came to me like a flash of inspiration that I’ll bet if you and I put our minds to it we could cram as much into the next two weeks as her characters managed in three weeks in the novel.”

“As much of what?” she asked, narrowing her eyes and sucking in her lower lip as though she wasn’t at all sure she cared for the trend the conversation was taking.

“Fun,” he told her. “Isn’t that what you’re down here for? Plain, unalloyed, pure, old get-away-from-it-all fun?”

Tiny set their drinks in front of them. Gene reached for his billfold and said, “One check, Tiny.”

“Oh, no. You mustn’t. I can pay for my own drinks, thank you. And yours, too.”

“But I want to.”

“Give me the check, please.” She held her hand out imperiously to Tiny who handed it to her after a lifted eyebrow glance at Blake.

She said, “And a pencil, please,” and then explained to Gene. “This is
my
hotel. I’ll feel better if I sign it. I’m sure
Herbert
will feel better if I sign it.” She took the pencil from Tiny and carefully signed, “Mrs. Herbert Harris. # 326.” She took half her daiquiri down in one gulp. “I’d feel like some sort of a B-girl if I let you buy my drinks,” she explained. “You can see that, can’t you?
You
can see what I mean, can’t you, Tiny?” she appealed to the bartender.

“Well, sure, Ma’am… I guess.” Tiny held the signed barcheck between huge thumb and forefinger.

“Next time,” she said, “at
your
hotel…
you
can sign. Isn’t that fair enough?” She emptied her glass and set it down hard. “Where’s all the gambling and nightclubs and excitement?” she demanded. “I’d just as well be on Park Avenue as here.”

“You want to do some gambling?”

“I’d love to do some gambling. A lot of gambling. You know where to go?”

Gene Blake told her, “I know every place on the Beach.” He slid a half dollar tip on the table beside his empty glass. “Only trouble is, my car is laid up in the garage for repairs. We’ll have to get a taxi.”

He slid off the stool, avoiding Tiny’s half-admiring, half-accusing gaze, and put his hand firmly on the rounded smoothness of her left arm just above the elbow.

She finished her drink and smiled sweetly at the bartender. “Good night, Tiny. Or
au revoir.
Or something.”

And to Gene Blake, she said as she slid off the stool and stood very close beside him, “We don’t need a taxi. I’ve got a car. Cute little convertible. Rented it this afternoon for the whole two weeks.”

Tiny grunted sourly as he watched them move away together toward the rear exit onto the parking lot.

That Gene, he thought, angrily and enviously. He’s got it made, by God. And what a dish! Loaded with money and sex appeal… and a jerk of a husband back in New York paying the bills. Good enough for him, Tiny thought viciously. He’d heard her remark to Gene about her husband thinking couples should be separated now and then. Like as not, Tiny thought, Mr. Herbert Harris had a private piece of his own that he was rolling in the hay tonight while his wife was vacationing in Miami.

So, what the hell? Why shouldn’t she make out with Gene?

He wondered how soon he’d see Mrs. Harris around again.

Martha Hays thoroughly enjoyed her job as a maid at the Beachhaven Hotel. She had been on the third floor for six months, and the work never did get monotonous. The population of the hotel was ceaselessly changing. Rich people from the North coming and going; mostly staying for a week or two, long enough to get to know the smiling and helpful colored maid who cleaned their rooms and was always eager to perform any small, extra task for the comfort or convenience of the guests. Mostly they were real nice when they departed and left fairly substantial gifts for the maid whom they’d got to know in a week or so; mostly a bill left on the dresser, often augmented by articles of clothing which refused to fit into the suitcases that were overstuffed with new purchases made on Lincoln Road during their stay.

It was always an adventure for Martha to unlock and enter the room of a guest who had just departed, and she was always eager for her first inspection of a room that was newly occupied.

In six months’ practice, Martha had learned that, if you were smart about it, you could tell a whole lot about the occupants just by looking at their belongings, how they had arranged them, the way they left the bathroom and the room itself when they went out in the morning.

She liked to have single men best, but she didn’t get many of those at the Beachhaven, and unmarried couples next. She did get quite a few of those. Many whom she could tell right off were unmarried, and others whom she came to suspect of an extra-marital relationship after cleaning up their room and observing them for a few days.

Best of all from Martha’s viewpoint was the combination of a middle-aged, very wealthy man and a younger woman who had never known real wealth. They were the best tippers. The man because he was happy and guilty, and wanted to impress his younger companion, and the woman because it was all going to end in a few days or weeks and it did something for her ego to be prodigal with money that didn’t belong to her.

The poorest bets of all were the single women who arrived at the Beachhaven in droves to spend one or two weeks of their vacations in the unaccustomed luxury of an expensive resort hotel. Most of them had saved up for a whole year to be able to afford the trip, and had come to Miami Beach with roseate dreams of meeting some wealthy, attractive, unattached male and making a conquest which might or might not eventuate in marriage.

Disappointed in the end when they departed (because there just weren’t that many wealthy, attractive and unattached males hanging around) they weren’t inclined to waste any large portion of their remaining funds on a gratuity to the hotel maid.

Martha knew when she knocked on the door of 326 that morning that the new occupant of the room was a married lady named Mrs. Harris from New York who had reserved the room for two weeks. The maids were all furnished this information on new arrivals as a PR policy on the part of the management. It was a little after eleven o’clock when Martha got to 326, and her knock on the door was perfunctory while she inserted a key in the lock. It was her first morning in Miami Beach, and Mrs. Harris was extremely unlikely to be still loitering in her room at this hour.

She turned her key, when there was no response from inside the room, and opened the door. She was surprised, but not too surprised, to note that neither one of the twin beds had been slept in the night before. This sort of thing happened often enough in a resort hotel like the Beachhaven to occasion little surprise. It didn’t displease Martha because it meant less work for her; and also, if Mrs. Harris was the sort to start sleeping out the very first night after she reached the Beach, it probably meant she wasn’t a dissatisfied penny-pincher who would go back to New York two weeks hence feeling that she had spent more money than she could afford without getting much out of it.

Martha stood just inside the doorway and surveyed the empty room with a practiced eye. Neither one of the beds had been touched. Not even sat upon. An open suitcase lay spread out on a luggage rack in front of a closet, and Mrs. Harris hadn’t even bothered to unpack. Some of the things were turned back in one side of the case, and Martha thought she had probably taken out a dress to change into for the evening because the jacket of a blue silk suit lay on the foot of a bed, and the skirt of the same suit had been discarded on the floor near the bathroom. An overnight bag stood unopened on the floor beside the suitcase, and the top of the dressing table was completely bare of any toilet articles. The windows were closed, and the air-conditioner was not turned on. Just to one side of the bathroom door a pair of beautiful blue spike-heeled pumps lay on their sides. From the doorway there was no other visible evidence that Mrs. Harris had ever been in the hotel room.

Martha left her little cart of cleaning things and fresh linens standing in the doorway, and walked across to the bathroom door. She stooped and picked up the blue shoes and caressed them gently, admiring the soft leather and fine workmanship, and momently visualizing the small, high-arched feet that had kicked them off so carelessly.

She set the pumps carefully just inside the empty closet, went back to pick up the blue jacket and skirt and hang them neatly in the closet.

Inside the bathroom, a white silk blouse lay crumpled on the floor. Only the lavatory had been used by Mrs. Harris. There was a wet washcloth and a damp fluffy hand-towel, and a cake of soap had been removed from its hotel wrapper and was in the soap dish.

Martha wiped up the bathroom thoroughly, and picked up the blouse from the floor and hung it on a hook in the closet. She got a dusting rag from her cart and spent at least three minutes wiping off the telephone and the ashtray beside it which held cigarette ashes, and desultorily flicking the cloth around on other surfaces that were already immaculate.

She placed a fresh towel and washcloth in the bathroom, and closed the door of 326 behind her not more than ten minutes after she entered it. She wondered, greedily, where Mrs. Harris had spent the night, and hoped, unenviously, that it had been enjoyable.

Then she went into 328 which was occupied by a young couple from Baltimore on their honeymoon and found the same sort of mess they left for her every morning. But she didn’t mind the work cleaning it up because they were a sweet young couple, obviously very much in love with each other and obviously thoroughly enjoying every moment of their honeymoon. It was a pleasure to make the room neat and comfortable for a nice young couple like that, and Martha didn’t mind at all that she anticipated receiving a tip of not more than a dollar when they left after a two-week stay.

She thought no more about Mrs. Harris and the unused condition of 326 until she went off duty at two o’clock that afternoon and mentioned it in a brief report to the housekeeper which the hotel rules required her to do.

Robert Merrill, Chief Security Officer of the Beachhaven Hotel, read Martha Hays’ report on the unused condition of Room Number 326 at five o’clock that afternoon. It consisted of a few typewritten lines near the end of two typewritten pages of somewhat similar reports which Merrill received in his office each afternoon. Most of them were no more important and meant no more to the management of the hotel than Martha’s report on 326. Yet, you never could be sure. It was Robert Merrill’s job to read this daily report on the doings and activities of guests in the hotel, and carefully evaluate each item. He didn’t really care, and the hotel management didn’t care, who was sleeping with whom, or what sort of wild parties were being thrown in which suite, so long as the decorum for the hotel and the sensibilities of other guests were not endangered…
and
so long as the credit rating of a guest did not come under suspicion. This was the most important part of Merrill’s job. He was hired to see, and it was his duty to see, that fraud was not successfully practiced on the Beachhaven by departing guests.

Thus, anything whatever out of the norm was noted by each employee of the hotel and eventually reached Merrill’s desk. Very few hotel guests realize the type of surveillance they are subjected to every hour of the day. If they did realize it, most of them would protest honestly and vigorously against what they would consider an invasion of privacy, yet such protests would avail them nothing. If they managed to remain reasonably discreet during their stay and paid their bill in full on departure, they were rated as “Xlent” by the hotel and were welcomed as favored guests any time they wished to return.

Thus, when Robert Merrill noted that the maid on the third floor reported that Mrs. Herbert Harris from New York had not occupied her room the preceding night, he was only mildly interested. It was something that had to be checked, but nothing to get excited about. There could be dozens of legitimate reasons why Mrs. Harris had decided to spend the night elsewhere, and certainly she was under no obligation to inform the hotel of her intention or reason for doing so. The only important question was whether she could reasonably be expected to pay for the room she had not occupied.

Merrill had Ellen Harris’ registration brought to him with her bill to date, and he glanced at the cryptic notations on the card before referring to her bill. Reservation had been made by letter from her husband in New York, ten days previously, European Plan. The daily rate for 326 was $18.00 single. Husband’s New York business address was a brokerage house which appeared legitimate. A notation from the desk clerk when he checked her in indicated that her appearance and baggage were correct. Her bill was guaranteed by a Carte Blanche card in the name of Mrs. Herbert Harris. She had rented an Avis U-Drive-It car which had been delivered to her.

Nothing to worry about there. Merrill didn’t care whether she spent fourteen nights or none in 326 so long as Hilton guaranteed payment. Save the hotel fresh linens if she did continue to sleep out.

He glanced casually at the first day’s bill to see there was nothing out of the ordinary. A person-to-person call to her husband in New York soon after she checked in. A bar bill for four drinks from the cocktail lounge later in the evening. Nothing else.

Robert Merrill shrugged and put a small check mark against Martha’s notation, and went on to the next item in the daily report which dealt with cumulative evidence that a homosexual was occupying one of their more expensive suites and was strongly suspected of luring youthful males into the rooms for purposes of blackmail in a variation of the badger game. This required Merrill’s serious attention and careful plan of action. Mrs. Harris and her non-occupancy of 326 her first night in Miami Beach were forgotten.