Murder for Two (15 page)

“I guess you've got a right to be bitter,” he said and then, taking a chance that he could needle this youth out of the morass of self-pity with which he had surrounded himself, he said, “But why do you have to take it out on a girl like Karen Harding?”

That did it. John Perry jumped up. “What the hell do you mean? What has Karen—”

“She was in love with you, wasn't she? She still is, I guess—though damned if I can see why—but you won't even—”

“What do you expect? I've been in prison, haven't I? I've got a record. How could I speak to a girl like that? Her old man never liked me and he made it pretty plain when I was in prison what he thought about it. He wrote me a letter.” Perry laughed, a harsh, unpleasant sound. “At that I guess he was right.”

He came up to Casey and some of the vehemence went out of his voice. “That's the trouble. The jail business. I'm on parole now. You know what that means. The formula Lawson stole—well, that's gone. I can forget that, but until I can get clear of this other—”

“How do you know you won't?” Casey cut in. “You don't have to mope while you're waiting, do you? You're a smart guy. You're a chemist. You got one formula; get another.”

“How do you know I haven't?”

Casey blinked. “Yeah? Is it any good? What's it do?”

“If it tests out the way I hope it will, it will make better retreads out of re-claimed rubber than anyone ever made before. They have things now like Dimethylamine to make rubber tougher and more resistant to heat and sub-zero cold. Well, this thing of mine is along that line but it's especially for re-claimed rubber. I had it practically worked out before I went to jail.”

“Then what're you waiting for? It's just what the country needs, ain't it?”

Perry's enthusiasm flickered out. “Nobody is going to gyp me out of this,” he said. “I've got to get a little backing, but—”

“Look,” Casey said bluntly, “act your age. Not everybody is a Matt Lawson. You can get backing. Go see the managing editor of the
Express
. His name's MacGrath. Tell him what you've told me. He knows people and if anybody can do you some good, he can. I'll tell him about you. I'll tell him you're coming down.”

“Of course he'll invite me right in,” Perry said.

“He will if I ask him to,” Casey said. “And I'll ask him.” He opened the door. “The only thing is, go in and see him like a man. He doesn't like guys that cry on his desk.—As for Byrkman, we'll get him. We might even get Lawson before we get through.”

He slammed the door and went down the dingy stairs. When he got out on the sidewalk and saw the sunshine he decided he felt pretty good. He decided it was a half hour well spent. Not only did it look more and more as if Lawson was behind Rosalind Taylor's murder, but there was also that business about the re-claimed rubber. Suppose the kid had something? “Would that be
something
,” he said, and started on down the street.

Chapter Thirteen

I
N THE
B
ACK OF THE
H
EAD

C
ASEY STOPPED FOR LUNCH
before he went back to the office and when he arrived, Finell was holding down the studio anteroom. He wanted to know if there was anything new on the Taylor murder and Casey remembered the picture of Byrkman he had taken the night before and had promised to Logan. He said there was nothing new on the murder as far as he was concerned and dug the film-holder out of his drawer.

“Take this in and develop it, will you?” he said. “And make me an eight by ten.”

Finell went into the darkroom corridor whistling and Casey slipped off his coat and hat and sat down. He looked through the assignment basket, found nothing that needed his attention and leaned back to smoke and think. It took about ten minutes of this before he remembered the page he had torn from Byrkman's telephone book and when he pulled it out he drew the telephone to him and asked for the first number.

“Hello,” he said when a woman answered, “is this Johnson's Market?”

“You must have the wrong number,” the woman said. “This is Hall's Pharmacy.”

Casey said, “Sorry,” and hung up.

The next call gave him a tailoring establishment, the second a grocery store, the third a laundry. He was down to the last three numbers, having been in touch with the gas company, the electric company, and a milkman, when he heard a commotion and the sound of women's voices in the corridor. By the time he could turn, they were upon him, three women in the uniforms of the American Women's Voluntary Services.
Oh, my God!
he thought when he recognized them as members of his class in photography, and then he had stumbled to his feet and was backing away.

“Oh, Mr. Casey,” they said.

Casey swallowed, mumbled a good afternoon, and watched them stop in the center of the room. One of them was young and sort of cute. He remembered her name—Brown. He recalled that she was married and had two kids. The other two were merely familiar as to face, one being tall, with the build of a wrestler, and the other plump and middle-aged, with short bobbed hair and glasses.

“Oh, isn't this cute?” the tall one said, looking about. “I told you we'd find him, girls.”

“I hope we're not intruding,” the cute one said.

“Oh, no,” Casey said, the perspiration beginning to itch along his hair line. He wondered if he could get away with the one about just going out and decided he couldn't.

“We did so want to see where you worked,” the tall one went on. “We thought you might let us see your equipment.”

“We wanted to see how a real professional works,” the short one said. “It's all right to tell us but it's so much more interesting when one can see for herself, don't you think?”

Casey said he guessed so. He said there really wasn't much to see.

“Oh, but I'm sure there must be,” the tall one said. “Now you go right ahead with what you were doing, and we'll just tiptoe around and see for ourselves.”

“And we thought you could tell us more about focusing,” the cute one said. “I never did get it straight. Was it thirteen feet or eighteen feet you are supposed to set your camera at? You know,” she said when Casey hesitated. “You said there wasn't always time to use a built-in-focuser, even if you had one, and until we got used to judging distance we could just—”

“Yeah,” Casey said, and took a breath. He had told them that in taking pictures of people walking on the street it was easier to set the focus and then watch the subject through the finder, forgetting about distances but pressing the shutter release when the subject was full length to the eye, leaving just a little rim of space at top and bottom.

He explained again. He said it was just an approximation but with a camera set at an ordinary stop and with a reasonable depth of focus, it wouldn't matter if you missed a foot or so one way or the other, though with practice you could generally hit it on the nose.

They went into the depth of focus again. He got out his camera and let them practice judging how much thirteen feet was. When they got tired of this they wanted to see the darkrooms, so he took them into the printing-room and listened wearily to their cries of wonder and delight.

“And this is your developer?” the tall one said, pointing to the large tray near the sink. “And your fixing-bath? But they're enormous. My poor little tray—”

“We do a lot of pictures here,” Casey said.

“Of course,” they said and inquired into the mechanism and theory of the ferrotyper. When at last they had had enough, one of them thought about film development.

“Yes,” the cute one said. “We would like to see the darkrooms—if it isn't too much trouble.”

Ordinarily he liked this cute one but now— “There's nothing to see,” he said a little desperately. “It's just an alley full of dark cubbyholes with a couple of trays.”

It was no good. The tall one was already on her way and Casey followed the others out of the room, down the short corridor. Here at the end there was a narrow doorway to the right, and beyond this nothing but the alley of darkness. The tall one took the turn and stopped.

“Oh,” she said. “It's so dark. Why, it's positively spooky.”

And then, out of the stygian blackness, came a low, sepulchral voice in a one word answer.

“Booh!” it said.

The tall one let out a shriek; then she jumped backward three feet down the hall, her mouth open but no more sounds coming out.

She looked at Casey, her eyes bulging. She swallowed and he thought:
That damned Finell!
and tried to keep a straight face.

“There was someone in there.”

The tall one had one hand at her ample bosom now and she looked to her companions for confirmation.

“I heard him.”

“Yes,” they said.

“Yes,” Casey said. “He's developing something. He's in there most of the time. I guess it's making him goofy.”

The cute one looked at him, a doubting grin at the back of her eyes. The fat one was suspicious. The tall one brushed past, flushed now and trying to regain her composure. Before she could speak, the phone rang and Casey leaped for it.

It was Tom Wade. He said he was over in East Boston and was there anything else he had to do over there before he came in.

“No,” Casey said, and then, hurriedly: “Yes, sir, right away.”

“What?”

“Absolutely.”

“What is this?” Wade yelled. “Are you nuts?”

“Yes,
sir
,” Casey said. “I'm on my way now.”

He started to put down the instrument but he heard most of the next remark. “The guy,” Wade said, talking to himself, “has blown his top. Hey, Casey—”

Casey dropped the phone. With feverish haste he grabbed hat, coat, and plate-case.

“I'm sorry,” he said over his shoulder. “Rush assignment. Got to run. See you in class, girls.” And then he was gone, his last view showing the three of them standing there gaping at him.

He ran all the way to the stairs and started up. At the landing he slowed down and when he reached the floor above, he stopped to put down his plate-case and mop his face. He put his hat and coat on one of the benches outside the city-room railing and sat down to get his breath, reminding himself that he owed both Wade and Finell a drink.

When he had a cigarette going he slapped through the gate and stopped to slide a thigh over the corner of a desk. Engle, a rewrite man, looked up from a piece of copy and asked how he was.

“Did you hear about the reward?” he asked.

“What reward?” Casey said.

“On this Taylor thing. Five thousand bucks. Not bad, huh?” He lit a cigarette and threw the match on the floor. “It was a cinch they'd do something like that. You know how it is with newspapers, always protecting their own. I understand the
News
and
Standard
are chipping in. It reads good for home consumption. The good fight. Loyalty. The sanctity of the Press. Remember that guy Lingle in Chicago, and the one in Ohio.”

Casey rubbed his nose and said he remembered. “And could it be that I detect a note of cynicism in your remarks?” he said.

“Could be.” Engle gave him a crooked grin. “But don't mind me. I was just talking. I'd like to get a piece of that reward myself—as if anybody but a bunch of cops would.”

Casey shoved off the desk and moved in the direction of MacGrath's office. He knocked tentatively and went in. MacGrath was tipped back in his chair, staring out the window, and when he saw who his caller was he went back to his staring.

“Nice shot you turned in last night,” he said.

“Yeah,” Casey said. “Only it wasn't mine.”

MacGrath turned slowly, rolling his unlighted cigar to the corner of his mouth. “Say that again.—Whose was it then?”

“Karen Harding's,” Casey said, and explained how she happened to get it and how the
Express
eventually received it.

MacGrath said, “Well, I'll be damned,” and lapsed into silence. Casey watched him a moment, seeing now the harassed lines about MacGrath's eyes. Ordinarily the managing editor would have had more to say on the subject but he let it ride. Casey knew how troubled he was.

“I understand there's a reward,” he said. “I understand the
News
and
Standard
are in on it.”

MacGrath said that was right. “It wasn't my idea,” he said. “They wanted to get in on it. I didn't think we should let them. On a thing like this I think we should go it alone. But the Old Man said to go ahead and let them in.” He removed his cigar, looked at it, replaced it.

“You were there last night. You saw her yesterday afternoon. What did she want? What do you know about it that I don't?”

Casey told him about Byrkman and John Perry. He made his report brief, but he did tell about his talk with Perry that morning. “I told him to come see you,” he said. “I thought if that rubber business he says he's got is anything, we ought to do something about it.”

“Sure,” MacGrath said. “I'll see him. But this Taylor thing has got me whipped. We talked with the Commissioner and the District Attorney. They say they're doing all they can—and I guess they are because they know the publicity is going to be bad if they don't. Taylor wasn't any thirty-a-week reporter—though if she was we'd still yell—she was a name, a personality.”

He swiveled his chair and leaned forward, sliding his thick forearms across the desk. “What about you?” he demanded. “And don't give me that innocent eye. I'll lay you three to one you know more about the case than you've told me. You cameras are all alike when it comes to talking. You'd rather be secretive until you can come in and slap something hot on the desk, and that's okay. I don't give a damn what you tell me, or what you know. What I want is the lad that shot Rosalind Taylor.”