James Chase - Strictly For Cash

I opened the door and looked up the alley. Iron gates stood open at the far end. Beyond them I could see a main street. There was no one guarding the gates.

I started off down the alley towards the street. I had no idea where I was going or what I was going to do. I hadn’t any money. There was nothing in my pockets, not even a handkerchief. But I didn’t care. At least I was getting away from Riskin, the hospital and Ricca. That would do to get on with.

A big yellow moon threw amber light over the sea. There was a car parked on the sand, its lights out. The man and the girl, on either side of the car, began to undress. I was near enough to hear their voices, but not what they were saying.

This part of the beach was lonely and deserted but for these two and the car. I had lain hidden in the mangroves for the past three hours, then suddenly the car had arrived. It came just when I was giving up hope.

I watched the two of them run down to the sea and splash in. As soon as they were swimming I moved out of my hiding-place and headed for the car. I found his coat. My fingers closed around a wallet in his inside pocket. I hauled it out, and went around to the back of the car where they couldn’t see me if they looked this way. The wallet was stuffed with money. I could scarcely believe my luck. I took a hundred and fifty dollars in small bills. That still left him enough to buy her a slap-up supper. I slid the wallet into the pocket and tossed the coat into the car, then I ran back to the darkness of the mangroves.

During the three hours I had remained hidden I had made a plan. Riskin would expect me to clear out of Miami as fast as I could. I had told him I had a talent for hitchhiking. He’d probably cover every truck and car going out of town, and watch every road. I had decided my safest bet was to remain in Miami, and hole up somewhere. I had to find myself a quiet hotel, spin them a yarn I was waiting for my baggage, and hope they’d give me a room.

There should be dozens of suitable hotels if I could only find them. I’d have to be careful. My description was bound to be out now, and every patrolman would be looking for me: Ricca would probably be looking for me too.

I started off towards the bright lights of the waterfront. I moved slowly. I was tired. I had walked miles since I had left the hospital. My head ached too. While I had been hiding I had taken off the bandages. They had shaved my head, but from the feel of it the wound was healed.

At least my hat fitted me now, and didn’t bother me.

Ahead I could see the waterfront and the harbour, the shops and cafés and saloons.

As I walked along the congested sidewalk I kept my eyes open for a patrolman, but I needn’t have bothered. No patrolman could have spotted me in that teeming crowd.

A few minutes’ walking brought me to an hotel. It seemed the kind of place I was looking for. It was dingy and quiet, and looking through the double swing-doors I saw the lounge was deserted.

I pushed open the doors and walked in.

Ahead of me was the reception desk. A little guy in a black alpaca coat was propping himself up against the desk. He was bald and wrinkled, and his deep-set eyes were bored.

“I’d like a room,” I said.

“Ten bucks deposit,” he said briefly. “For how long?”

“A couple of days, if I like it, maybe a week.”

He scratched the top of his head with one finger. “Don’t see your baggage.”

“It’s at the station.”

“We like baggage, mister. We could collect it for you.”

I fished out two tens and dropped them on the desk.

“I’ll get it in the morning. Let’s have a room.”

He reached for a key from the rack behind him, shoved the register at me and a pen.

I wrote John Crosby on the line he indicated with a dirty finger. My slight hesitation didn’t fool him.

“Any relation to Bing?” he asked with a small sneer.

“Why, yes,” I said. “I’m his sister. Where do I find the room?”

He gave me a cold, hostile look, stuck his thumb into a bell push and turned his back on me.

After a while a middle-aged bellhop materialized and took the key. He was a rat-faced guy with close-set eyes and a thin, hard mouth. His blue uniform and pillbox hat shone like a nickel plate.

“Second floor,” he said. “No baggage?”

“No baggage,” I said.

I tramped up the stairs after him. Eventually we came to a door which he unlocked and pushed open. He reached inside and turned on the light.

“The bathroom’s at the end of the corridor. Don’t use the shower. It don’t work.”

I went past him into a box of a room with a bed, a table, a chest of drawers and a strip of worn carpet.

“Just like Buckingham Palace,” I said.

“A little more roomy, if anything.”

He put the key on the chest of drawers and looked me over expectantly. I gave him a dollar. He nearly dropped in his tracks.

“Anything you want, mister?” he said eagerly. “How about a little company? I have a list of telephone numbers as long as my arm.”

“Dust,” I said.

“If you change your mind, call the desk and ask for me. My name’s Maddux.”

“Beat it!”

When he had gone I sat on the bed and took off my hat. I was so tired I could scarcely keep my eyes open. The bed felt as if it had been stuffed with golf-balls, but that didn’t worry me. I could have slept right then on a bed of nails.

I sat there, yawning and turning the hat around in my hand, my mind empty. As far back as I could remember I had kept a ten-dollar bill behind the sweatband of any hat I happened to own. I’d stick it there and forget about it. Then when I was broke I had something to fall back on. I wondered idly if the owner of this hat had the same idea. I turned down the sweatband and looked inside.

My fingers hooked out a thin ribbon of paper, and as I unfolded it I realized I wasn’t surprised to find it there. It was almost as if I had known it would be there before I looked for it.

I smoothed it out. It was a left-luggage receipt, and written in pencil across the top were the words:

John Farrar

Seaboard Air-Line Railway,

Greater Miami

Under the heading, Description of Articles, was written One suitcase.

I was fully awake now, the longing for sleep washed right out of my mind. Then this hat, and obviously the clothes, did belong to me! I looked for the date on the receipt. There it was: September 6th! The time the suitcase was handed in was also there: 6.5 p.m.

For some minutes I sat staring down at the threadbare carpet. I felt like a sceptic in a haunted house who suddenly sees a horrifying apparition. There could be no doubt now. I must have lost my memory for forty-five days, and during that time, if I was to believe Ricca, I had murdered two men and a woman.

Ricca might be lying. If I were to remain sane I’d have to find out what had happened during those forty-five days. It started with the smash, five miles outside Pelotta. I would go to the scene of the accident and with any luck I might be able to trace my movements from there. I had been thrown out of the Bentley and had injured my head. From that moment until I had recovered consciousness in the hospital I had been going around with a blacked-out mind.

I flicked the receipt with my fingernail. Maybe this suitcase contained the key to those missing forty-five days. According to the receipt the suitcase belonged to me, and I must have checked it in. I had no idea where the Seaboard Air-Line Railway was, but I had to get the suitcase tonight. I wouldn’t sleep or rest until I had it.

I reached for the telephone.

“Send Maddux up here,” I said to the reception clerk. “I want a packet of cigarettes. Tell him to hurry.”