Фредерик Браун - Ed McBain’s Mystery Book, No. 3,1961

Liddell held his hands up. “That’s what I wanted to know. I’m sorry if I upset you. I was just trying to earn a fee.”

The blonde studied him, seemed to be seeing him for the first time. “I’m sorry, too. It’s just that — well, I don’t like the insinuations. I don’t like the way the insurance company is trying to twist this thing around.” She dropped her voice. “But that’s no reason for me to take it out on you.” She indicated the bar. “Would you like a drink? I could use a Scotch.” She walked over and perched on the arm of a chair.

Liddell walked over to the bar, dropped ice into two glasses, spilled some Scotch over them. He brought one back to the blonde.

She smiled up at him. “I’m not always this inhospitable.” She brought the glass to her lips with a shaking hand, spilled most of it down the front of her gown. “Damn!” she exclaimed. She swabbed at the wet portion with a hopelessly inadequate wisp of linen, stood up. “Pardon me while I get into something dry.” She headed for the bedroom.

Johnny Liddell took his drink, wandered to the picture window, stared down at the river below. The blonde had made no attempt to hide the unsavory past Lee Devon had indicated, but what the insurance man apparently didn’t take into consideration was the woman’s contention that it was she, not Abner Kyler, who wanted the divorce. He sighed, took a deep swallow from the glass. If she could make that stand up, it would be understandable that Kyler might have got himself boxed out, especially in view of her statement that he was a secret drinker. It could even be suicide, if she could project the picture of an old man who felt things closing in on him. Liddell swore under his breath. Either way, Lorna Kyler wasn’t the type to do too much leaning on.

He had finished his drink and was building a refill when the door to the bedroom opened and the blonde reappeared. She had changed into a loose, nile-green dressing gown.

“Sorry to be so long.” She smiled at him. “I promise not to be so clumsy if you’ll make me a new one.” She walked to the couch, dropped down onto it, watched him make a second drink. “Why can’t we be friendly instead of tossing implied threats at each other?”

“I’d prefer it that way,” Liddell conceded. He brought her drink over to the couch, dropped down alongside her. “Like I said, I’m only earning a fee.”

The woman took a deep swallow from the glass, nodded. “I’ll tell you the whole story.” She leaned forward, set her glass on the coffee table, turned the full power of the slanted eyes on him. “That is, if you’re sure you won’t be bored.”

He wasn’t.

It was growing dark when Johnny Liddell walked out of the Cathedral Arms and waved down a cruising cab. He gave the cabby the address of the redheaded secretary, leaned back against the cushions, speculated on what Lorna Kyler had been trying to tell him in her rambling story of a small-town cigarette girl who’d married an elderly millionaire. He finally gave up.

Fifty-one Perry Street was a brownstone building nestling anonymously in a row of identical brown-stones. Liddell climbed four steps from the sidewalk level, pushed his way through the vestibule door. A highly polished brass letter box supplied the information that Gita Ravell occupied street floor rear. He followed the dimly lit hallway to the rear apartment, knocked.

When there was no response to his second knock, he tried the knob. It turned easily in his hand. He pushed the door open and stepped into the small vestibule. The room beyond was in darkness accentuated by drawn shades.

As he closed the hallway door behind him, he was aware of an oddly familiar smell pervading the room — a sickly smell that made his nostrils twitch, the hair on the back of his neck rise.

He fumbled for the light switch, spilled light into the room beyond.

Gita Ravell sat in a chair facing the doorway. Her hair was a thick coppery pile on the top of her head; her eyes were half closed, her lips parted as though she were on the verge of saying something.

The ugly, gaping wound in her throat made it improbable that she would ever finish what she had started to say.

Johnny Liddell stared at her, swore under his breath. He walked over to the chair, laid his hand against her cheek. The skin was beginning to cool. He reached down, caught her sleeve, lifted her arm. Clutched clumsily in her fist was a long-bladed knife, its edge red-tinged.

Liddell straightened up, looked around the apartment. There was no sign of a struggle, no evidence to support his conviction that the girl’s fingers had been wrapped around the handle after her throat had been slashed. He bent over the body again, examined the gaping wound. It was a clean slash, no sign of the hesitation marks, the telltale little scratches that invariably precede the lethal cut in a suicide. It satisfied him that the girl had been murdered, but the district attorney might require more proof.

Liddell stared at the face of the girl, once undoubtedly pretty, now caricatured by death. He wondered why it would be necessary to murder her, tried to imagine what she could have known that made her dangerous. In his mind’s eye, he reviewed everything he knew about the case. Gita Ravell had insisted Kyler was murdered, but she had nothing to prove her contention. Or did she have something she wasn’t aware of? Something the killer was afraid she’d remember or find?

Suddenly, as he studied the face of the dead girl, things began to fall into place. He again checked the warmth of the dead girl’s cheek, made a fast estimate of the time of death. It was a hunch that would require checking in the morning — but for the first time, things were beginning to make sense.

It was after midnight when Tim Davis stalked into the lobby of the Cathedral Arms. He ignored the night man behind the desk, headed for the elevator bank, pushed the button for the tenth floor.

Lorna Kyler opened the door in response to his knock, drew in her breath sharply when she recognized the private detective. “What are you doing here?”

“Let me in. Or do you want me to discuss our business from out here?”

The door swung open. Tim Davis pushed through, closed it behind him.

“You should know better than to come here at this hour,” the blonde stormed at him. “You gone crazy?”

“No. But maybe you have. If you’re trying to pull something.” He pulled an edition of the News from his pocket, shoved it at her.

She stared at him, dropped her eyes to the front page of the tab, walked into the living room, held it under a lamp. After a moment, she looked up, wide-eyed. “Gita Ravell was murdered last night You?”

“That’s not the point She was discovered by Johnny Liddell. The same Johnny Liddell you were supposed to be keeping here until I had a talk with Ravell. A few minutes earlier and he might have walked in on me.” He caught the blonde’s arm, squeezed it cruelly. “If I thought you tried—”

Lorna Kyler shook her head. “I didn’t. I kept him here as long as I could. I thought you were only going to reason with her.”

“She knew too much. The canceled checks came back today. One of them was made out to me. Signed by Kyler.” He dug his hand into his pocket, brought out a check. “It could blow hell out of our story.”

The color drained from the blonde’s face, leaving her make-up as garish blobs on the pallor. “And now?”

Tim Davis tore the check into pieces, dropped them into an ash tray, touched a match to them. “I fixed it to look like she did the Dutch.” He looked up from the ash tray. “They’ll figure she was so upset about the old man dying, she cut her own throat.” He grinned crookedly. “But I guess this changes our deal.”