Richard Marsten: Vanishing Ladies

‘So you kept quiet?’

‘I kept quiet. Was that wrong?’

‘That was very right. Then what?’

‘Then we went to the train station. We walked right down the main street. I guess we attracted quite a bit of attention. Stephanie bought two tickets to Davistown. The redhead and I got on the train when it pulled in. She still had the gun in her hand, under the stole.’

‘What time was this?’

‘About nine-thirty or so.’

‘Go ahead.’

‘When we got to Davistown, we took a cab here. This man Joe tied me up. Blanche said she was going back to Sullivan’s Corners.’

‘Have you got any idea why you’re here?’

‘No,’ Ann said. ‘But they haven’t harmed me in any way. I mean, except for Joe’s hands...’ Ann paused. ‘He’s got hands,’ she said.

‘It’s the company he keeps,’ I told her. ‘Did you happen to run into a girl named Lois?’

‘No.’

‘I didn’t think so.’ I paused, thinking, ‘How’d you know who I was?’

‘There was a phone call earlier tonight. Joe took it. I heard him say ‘Who?’ and then he said, ‘Tony Mitchell? No, I don’t know any Tony Mitchell.’ When they brought you in... well, Phil’s described you so many times.’

‘I see. That phone call accounts for the knock on the head. They knew who I was the second time around.’

‘What’s going on, Tony? Do you know?’

‘I’ve got an idea,’ I said. ‘I just hope that Phil gets the same idea.’

‘Do you think—?’

The door opened. Stephanie Barter and her husband came into the room. A tall thin man was behind them. He had blue eyes and brown hair, and he was grinning.

‘How’s your head, Detective Mitchell?’ Stephanie asked.

‘Still on my shoulders, thanks,’ I said.

‘Hez should have hit you harder,’ Barter said. ‘We didn’t know you were a cop when he hit you. We didn’t find that out until we went through your wallet.’

‘And now that you know?’

‘It depends on how much you know, Mitchell.’

‘I don’t know anything. I came here to help a friend find his girl. I’ve found her.’

‘You also found a lot of trouble.’

‘None that I can see. Let us go, and then you can go back to your damn whorehouse.’

‘I don’t like profanity,’ Stephanie said.

‘The hell with that. I don’t like getting hit on the head by—’

‘Watch the way you talk,’ the tall thin man said.

‘You’re Joe, I take it.’

‘I’m Joe,’ he said.

‘Your trip last night can cause you a lot of accessory-after trouble, Joe.’

‘Accessory after what? ’ Stephanie asked.

I smiled. ‘The fact, naturally.’

‘What fact?’

‘I have no idea,’ I said.

‘I’ll bet you don’t,’ Barter answered. ‘It doesn’t make any difference anyhow. You’re in this too deep already.’

‘In what?’

Barter turned to Stephanie. ‘In a damn stupid setup that was none of my—’

‘Shut your foul mouth,’ Stephanie snapped. ‘You’re as much to blame—’

‘If you hadn’t—’

‘Shut up!’

Barter clamped his mouth shut. He was either afraid of Stephanie, or afraid he was about to say too much in my presence.

‘All right,’ he said at last. ‘They’re your guests. What do we do with them?’

‘We wait for the other two,’ Stephanie said.

‘And then what?’

‘You know what.’

‘That’s what I don’t like about this,’ Barter said. ‘All because -

‘Shut up!’

‘I won’t shut up. Goddamnit, why should...?’

Stephanie slapped him suddenly and fiercely. ‘You’re filthy,’ she said. ‘You’re filthy and slimy.’ She came closer to him, and Barter shrank away as if he were expecting another blow. ‘Get out of here. Get out of this room. I haven’t forgotten, you slimy...’

‘Take it easy, Steph,’ Carlisle said.

‘Get him out of here,’ she answered. Her voice was a deadly cold whisper. Carlisle took Barter’s elbow and led him to the door. At the door, Barter turned as if he wanted to say something. Then he shook his head and went out, Carlisle after him.

‘You shouldn’t have played games with me, Mitchell,’ Stephanie said.

‘How do you know I was playing?’

‘And don’t play with me now!’ she snapped. There was anger in her eyes, and impatience. Together, they were a fearful combination. The lady had something eating her, and she wouldn’t be happy until the last bite was swallowed.

‘When does the party begin?’ I asked.

‘As far as you’re concerned,’ she said, ‘the party’s over.’

‘Who are the other two we’re waiting for?’

‘You guess.’

‘Offhand, I’d say Phil Colby and a fellow named Simms.’

‘That’s right,’ Stephanie said somewhat proudly. I didn’t know whether she was proud of my deductive ability or of her own scheming.

‘And when they get here?’

‘You tell it. You tell stories beautifully.’

‘You kill us,’ I said simply.

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Why?’

Stephanie didn’t answer. She kept watching me with a small smile on her mouth.

‘You’re going to a lot of trouble for a simple thing like abduction, aren’t you?’

‘There’s a little more than abduction involved,’ Stephanie said. ‘Just a little more than that.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like a million-dollar business. Do you know how much a million dollars is? In a hick town like Sullivan’s Corners? I can’t let that be washed away.’

‘Who’s going to wash it away?’

‘Any number of people,’ she said. ‘But especially you four.’

‘What could we do?’

‘There’s a district attorney in this state,’ Stephanie said. ‘A smart cop would know where to find him.’

‘A smarter cop could know when the quiet payoff is due. A cop like that might want to trade his life for silence.’

She looked at me steadily. ‘Only one thing wrong there,’ she said.

‘What’s that?’

‘You’re not that kind of a cop.’

‘Try me,’ I said.

‘And wind up with another broken contract? Sorry.’

‘You’d rather do murder, huh?’

Stephanie didn’t answer.

‘You’d be wasting your time, anyway,’ I said. ‘The lieutenant at my precinct knows the whole story.’ Actually, he didn’t know the whole story, but Stephanie didn’t know that, and I was grabbing for straws.

‘Let him come after you,’ Stephanie said.

‘He’s a stubborn guy. He’s just liable to do it.’

‘Let him. He’ll find an automobile accident.’

A what?’

‘A car that skidded into the lake or over the gorge. A car with four occupants. You, the girl, Colby, and Simms.’

Ann drew in a sharp breath.

‘It’d never work,’ I told Stephanie.

‘I’ll chance it. You don’t throw away something you’ve worked for all your life, Mitchell. You hold onto it.’

‘There’s just one thing I’d like to hold onto,’ I said.

‘What?’

‘My life.’

Stephanie smiled. ‘You can be cute. It’s a shame.’

‘It’s a damn shame,’ I agreed.

‘If you’re going to start swearing,’ Stephanie began, and I said, ‘Oh, shit!’

The smile dropped from her mouth.

‘They’re looking for the other two now,’ she said tightly. ‘It shouldn’t be too difficult to find them.’

‘It might be a little more difficult than it was with me.’

‘Why?’

‘Those two haven’t been bitten by snakes.’

That’s the end of Tony’s deposition except for the ‘Sworn to before me on this seventeenth day of July’ business at the end, which I won’t read.