James Chase - Miss Callaghan Comes to Grief

He went away, leaving them still standing in his bedroom.

June 6th, 10.30 a.m.

JOHNSON, THE desk sergeant, chewed the end of his pen and regarded Jay with an unfavourable eye. He never had much use for crime reporters. They were always bobbing up at the wrong time and always asking embarrassing questions. Jay was no exception to this. In fact, he showed a lot of talent for being a nuisance.

Jay, with his hands full of petty and uninteresting crimes, was feeling irritable. He wanted a free hand to work on the Mendetta affair. The fact that Poison had warned him to lay off did not deter him. He was as determined to go ahead and find out what had happened to Fletcher’s sister as he had been before hearing Poison’s threat of dismissal. He knew he was good as a reporter and he knew he wouldn’t have far to look for another job. What did rile him was the number of small cases that had suddenly arisen during the night which he was bound to cover, and now he found himself chained by the leg to the station house, awaiting fresh evidence. It looked like he’d be there all the morning. Then he had to write up his two columns, so Fletcher’s sister would have to wait until the evening.

Johnson sighed. “It’s a pity your paper can’t find you a job of work to do,” he said sourly. “I’m gettin’ tired of seein’ you loafin’ around this joint. Why don’t you go out an’ take a little exercise?”

Jay put his feet up on the wooden bench and closed his eyes. “Leave me alone,” he said. “I’m sick of breathin’ the same air as you, but this is what I’m bein’ paid for, so leave out the cracks.”

The sergeant grunted and began to write laboriously in the charge book. “Well, there ain’t much about,” he said, blotting his neat writing carefully. “You guys live pretty soft, I must say.”

“It’s when there’s nothin’ about that we work hard,” Jay told him. “Look what we’ve got today. Petty thieving, an embezzlement, and a small−time forger. How would you like to make a column out of that little lot? What I want is a nice rape or a good murder. Somethin’ that’ll take my column on the front page.”

Johnson scowled. “Horrible lot you newspaper guys,” he said.

“Do you know how many girls have been reported missing this year?” Jay asked.

Johnson shook his head. “Not my department,” he said promptly. “You want the Missing People’s Bureau.

You lost someone?”

Jay shook his head. “I was wonderin’, Johnson, if there’s anythin’ in this White Slave rumour I’ve heard about.”

Johnson laughed. “Not a word,” he said. “You think about it for a moment and you’ll see that there can’t be anythin’ in it.”

“You tell me. It’ll save my energies.”

Johnson spread himself over his desk and folded his arms on his blotter. “It’s like these rape cases we get,” he explained. “It ain’t possible to rape a woman against her will. In the same way, it ain’t possible to keep a woman in prostitution against her will in a big city like this. Sooner or later we should hear complaints. Guys that go to these houses would report that a woman was being held against her will. But we never hear of them.

Obviously, the women are in the game for what they get out of it, and the stories we hear about Slaving is so much junk.”

Jay considered this. “Suppose these women were terrorized?” he said. “How about that?”

Johnson shook his head. “Too risky,” he said. “We’d give them protection if they wanted to squawk. All they have to do is to walk in here, lodge a complaint, and we’d look after them until an investigation’s been made.”

“Suppose they can’t get out?” Jay persisted.

Johnson frowned. “What you hintin’ at?” he demanded. “Do you know anythin’?”

Jay shook his head. “Nope,” he confessed; “but I’m interested. I believe that a woman could be terrorized into prostitution, and I’m lookin’ into it from this angle. I may be wrong, but if I ain’t, I’m going to keep you mighty busy bookin’ the heels who run the racket.”

“You’re wasting your time,” Johnson said. “What you want is an excuse to play around with undesirable floosies. I bet part of your investigation will be meetin’ and talkin’ to these dames.”

Jay shook his head. “I’m serious, Johnson,” he said. “You wait and see. If I do strike on anythin’ you’d better get ready for some heavy work.”

A police officer came in, followed by Benny Perminger. The officer went up to Johnson. “This guy thinks we’ve got his wife in gaol,” he said. “Will you speak to him?”

Johnson looked at Benny doubtfully. “What’s the trouble?” he demanded.

Benny was looking scared. “I’m Ben Perminger,” he said. “I want to see my wife.”

Johnson closed his mouth into a thin line. “I ain’t stoppin’ you,” he said coldly. “She ain’t here.”

“Well, where have you taken her?”

“What is all this?”

Benny began to look bewildered. “Well, I don’t know,” he said. “I found this note when I got home.” He gave Johnson a slip of paper.

Jay sat up on the bench and watched all this with interest. He smelt a news story.

Johnson read the note and handed it back. “There’s no one of the name of Perminger booked last night. We didn’t pull anyone in from that address. I guess she’s havin’ a game with you.”

Benny stood staring at the note. “Maybe they didn’t bring her here. Could they take her anywhere else?”

“There’s the station on West 47th Street. I’ll ask them.” Johnson pulled the phone towards him and put the enquiry through. After a short wait he shook his head and hung up. “No, they don’t know anythin’ about it.”

Benny began to sweat. “What am I goin’ to do?” he asked.

Johnson was getting bored with him. “It’s your wife, buddy,” he said. “Most like she’s havin’ a little game with you. You go back home. You’ll find her waitin’ for you.”

Benny turned away from the desk and moved slowly towards the door.

Johnson looked at Jay. “That guy’s got a leak in his conk,” he said under his breath.

Jay got up and followed Benny out of the station house, ignoring Johnson’s yell for him to come back.

Benny walked down the street in a daze. He didn’t know what to make of it. Surely Sadie wouldn’t pull a stunt like this if it didn’t mean anything? She had said that she was being taken down to the station house as a witness and would Benny come at once.

Jay overtook him at the comer. “Hey, Perminger,” he said, “what’s all this about your wife?”

Benny blinked at him. “Where the hell did you spring from?” he said, shaking hands.

“Come over an’ have a drink,” Jay said, taking him by his arm and steering him into a near−by bar. “I overheard what you were tellin’ Johnson. What’s happened to Mrs. P.?”

Seated at a small table away from the bar and assisted by a large iced beer, Benny unburdened. He told Jay how he had quarrelled with Sadie and how he’d left her during the night. “Well, I felt a bit of a heel this morning,” he went on, “so I thought I’d get back and make it up. When I got in I found all the lights burning and a note on my pillow saying she’d been taken down to headquarters as a witness and would I please come.”

He paused to pull at his beer.

Jay puzzled. On the face of it, he thought, Sadie might be just teaching this guy a lesson, but his instinct for news was not satisfied. Why should she use such an odd way of scaring him? Why a witness? A witness of what? No, it didn’t quite add up.

“I thought the police were supposed to help you,” Benny grumbled. “The way that guy went on, you’d think I was crazy.”