A. Fair - The Bigger They Come

‘Your wife?’ he asked.

‘My wife,’ I said.

‘Oh, I see.’

‘And here’s one other thing. I want a gun.’

His eyes lost their friendliness. ‘What sort of a gun?’

‘A small gun that fits in the pocket nicely, preferably an automatic. And I want a box of shells for it.’

‘You’re supposed to have a police permit in order to get a gun,’ he said.

‘And when you have a police permit, you buy your gun at a store and pay about fifteen dollars for it,’ I said. ‘What the hell do you think I’m paying twenty-five bucks for a gun for?’

‘Oh, you’re paying twenty-five bucks for it?’

‘That’s what I said.’

‘I’ll see what I can do.’

I didn’t give him any chance to tip off the room clerk, but walked directly to the desk. The clerk handed me a card, and I wrote, ‘Donald Helforth and wife,’ and gave a fictitious address ‘Something at about seven dollars a day, Mr. Helforth?’ the clerk asked.

‘What do you have on the sixth floor? I don’t want to be to high, and yet I want to be far enough above the traffic to keel the street cars out of my ears.’

He looked at the chart and said, ‘I could give you 675.’

‘Which end of the house is that?’

‘The east.’

‘What do you have on the west?’

‘I could give you 605, or I can give you 620.’

‘What about 620?’

‘Twin beds and a bath. The rates are seven and a half double.’

‘Can’t you make it seven?’ I asked.

He looked me over, and said he’d make a special concession.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘My wife will be in later with my baggage but I’ll pay for the room now.’

I gave him the money, took a receipt, and went up to the room with the bell captain. ‘You can’t get a new gun for twenty five bucks,’ he objected.

‘Who said anything about a new gun? You’re getting one from a second-hand store somewhere. Twenty-five is my limit and don’t try to chisel too much profit. Get one that costs a least fifteen.’

‘I’d be breaking the law,’ he said.

‘No, you wouldn’t.’

‘Why not?’

I took from my pocket the authorization Mrs. Cool had signed for me. ‘I’m a private detective,’ I said.

He looked it over, and the perplexity left his face. ‘All right, boss. I’ll see what I can do.’

‘Make it snappy,’ I told him, ‘but don’t go out until my wife comes in. I want her to be taken right up here.’

‘Right,’ he said, and went out.

I looked around the room. It was an ordinary twin-bed affair in an ordinary hotel. I went into the bathroom. It was designed so that 618 and 620 could be opened up together as adjoining rooms with the bath in between. I tried the knob on the connecting door slowly and carefully. The door was locked. Listening, I could hear the sounds of someone moving around in the adjoining room. I went back to the telephone and called Sandra Birks. When I had her on the line, I said, ‘Everything seems to be okay. I’ve followed her to the Perkins Hotel. She’s in 618, registered, under the name of Morgan, and has left word at the desk her husband is joining her. Alma and I are here at the hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Donald Helforth in 620.’

‘Mr. and Mrs.?’ Sandra Birks asked with rising inflection.

‘Yes. Alma wanted to be in on it.’

‘In on what?’

‘On the service of the papers,’ I said.

‘Well, I want to be in on it, too. I hate to interrupt your honeymoon, but Bleatie and I are coming up.’

‘Now, look here,’ I objected, ‘if Morgan Birks should happen to be hanging around the hotel and sees you drive up, it’ll just be too bad. We’ll never get a chance to serve him again.’

‘I understand that,’ she said. ‘I’ll be careful.’

‘You can’t be careful. You can’t tell whether you’ll run into him in the lobby, in the elevator, or in the corridor. He may be watching the place now for all you know. He—’

‘You shouldn’t have let Alma share the room with you,’ Sandra Birks said in a dignified voice. ‘After all, you know, Mr. Lam, this thing may come up in court.’

‘Bosh. I’m simply serving papers,’ I said.

‘I’m afraid,’ she cooed, ‘you don’t understand. Alma simply can’t afford to have her name in the papers. Bleatie and I will be right up. Good-by.’ And the telephone clicked.

I hung up the receiver, took off my coat, washed my face and hands, sat down in the chair, and lit a cigarette. Someone knocked on the door. Before I could get up, the bellboy opened it and said, ‘Here you are, Mrs. Helforth.’

Alma came in, saying, in a voice she tried to keep casual, ‘Hello, dear. I thought I’d better park the car before I came in. They’re going to deliver some packages for me later on.’

I walked over to the bellboy whose expression showed that Alma’s amateurish attempt at domestic deception was giving him a quiet laugh. ‘Some other people are coming in,’ I said. ‘They’ll probably be here within ten or fifteen minutes. I want that gun before they get here.’

‘I’ll have to have some money. I—’

I gave him the two tens and a five. ‘Make it snappy,’ I said, ‘and don’t forget the shells. Have it done up in brown paper. Don’t give the package to anyone but me. Get started.’

‘On my way,’ he said, and shot out of the door.

‘What gun are you talking about, the one you were getting for me?’ Alma asked.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Sandra and Bleatie are coming up here. Your friend Sandra seems to think I’ve irrevocably ruined your good name in letting you in on this. She refers to it as “sharing my room.” ’

Alma laughed. ‘Good old Sandra,’ she said, ‘is so scrupulously careful about protecting my good name, yet she—’

‘And yet she does what?’ I asked as her voice faded out like a ä distant radio station.

‘Nothing,’ she said.

‘Come on, let’s have it.’

‘No, nothing. Honestly, I wasn’t going to say anything.’

‘Much,’ I said. ‘I’d like to know what Sandra does.’

‘It isn’t important.’

‘Anyway, she’s coming up here. Before she arrives, I want to take a look at your neck.’

‘At my neck?’

‘Yes, at those bruises. I want to see something.’

I stepped forward and slid my left arm around the back of, her shoulder, fumbled with the silken loop which circled some ornamental buttons on the collar of her blouse.

‘No, no,’ she said. ‘Don’t. Please—’ She raised her hand to push me away, but I slipped the loop over the button and opened her blouse. Her head came back. Her lips were close to mine. Her arm slid over my shoulders, and I pulled her to me. Her lips were warm and clinging. This time there was no taste of salt tears. After a while, she drew away and said, ‘Oh, Donald, what must you think of me?’

‘I think you’re swell,’ I said.

‘Donald, I don’t usually do this. I have been feeling so lonesome and all alone — and from the first time I met you—’

I kissed her again. After that, I gently slid the blouse away from her neck and looked at the bruised marks. She stood perfectly still. I could feel her even, regular breathing, but a pulse in her neck was throbbing rapidly.

‘How big was this man who tried to choke you?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know. I tell you it was dark.’

‘Was he big and fat, or small and thin?’

‘He wasn’t fat.’

‘His hands must have been small.’

‘Well — I don’t know—’

‘Look here,’ I said, ‘there are little scratches on the skin which could have been made by fingernails. Now, are you certain it wasn’t a woman?’

She caught her breath at that. ‘Scratches?’ she asked.