A. Fair - The Bigger They Come

I went down the stairs in a rush. I heard her scream and run after me. I must have beat her to the lobby by a matter of seconds. I started through the door. A car was parked in front of the place with two men seated in it. They weren’t the two plain-clothes men who had been there earlier. The way in which they looked up as I came out showed what they were.

I pretended not to see them, crossed to an automobile, got in, and stepped on the starter, leaning forward as I did so, so that my head was lowered almost below the line of the windows.

She came dashing out to the street, looking up and down, her face showing puzzled bewilderment as she saw I was nowhere in sight. She started to run toward the corner. The officers exchanged glances. One of them climbed leisurely from the car. ‘Looking for something?’ he asked.

She turned to look at him — and knew.

‘I thought I heard someone yell fire,’ she said. ‘—Is there a fire?’

The officer said, ‘You’re dreaming, sister.’

To my surprise the ignition wasn’t locked. The motor of the car I was in throbbed to life.

I straightened up. She caught sight of me then, and stood there with the eyes of the officer on her, powerless to do anything.

I’ll hand it to her. She played the one card that would have got her by. Her lips quivered, and she said, ‘I’m awfully n-n-nervous this morning. My husband was m-m-murdered.’

I saw tension go out of the officer’s frame. ‘That,’ he said sympathetically, ‘is too bad. May I see you up to your apartment?’

I drove away.

I registered at the Perkins Hotel as Rinton C. Watson of Klamath Falls, Oregon. I got a room with a bath and asked the bellboy to have the captain step up to the room for a minute.

The captain had that smirk of simulated deference which characterizes pimps, panderers and procurers the world over. He thought he knew what I wanted before I’d said a word.

‘You aren’t the one I want,’ I said.

‘I can do anything for you that any of the others can.’

‘No, it’s not that. I want to see a man, an old friend.’

‘What was his name?’

‘I think,’ I said, ‘it’s been changed.’

He laughed. ‘Tell me what it was, and I may know it.’

‘You would if I told you,’ I observed, letting him see suspicion in my eyes.

He quit laughing. ‘There are three of us on duty,’ he said.

‘Live here in the hotel?’ I asked.

‘I do. I have a room down in the basement. The others live out.’

‘This man,’ I said, ‘is about twenty-five, with very thick black hair. It comes down low in the center of his forehead. He has a short, stubby nose and slate-colored eyes.’

‘Where’d you know him?’ he asked.

I deliberated for a while before I said, ‘Kansas City.’

The answer registered. The bell captain made a gesture of cooperation. ‘That’s Jerry Wegley. He comes on duty at four this afternoon and works until midnight.’

‘Wegley,’ I mused.

‘That the name you knew him under?’ the captain asked curiously.

I hesitated perceptibly before saying, ‘Yes.’

‘I see.’

‘Where could I reach him?’

‘Here, after four o’clock.’

‘I mean now.’

‘I might find out his address — perhaps you’d like to talk with him over the telephone.’

‘I’d have to see him,’ I said. ‘I was going under another name when he knew me.’

‘I’ll see what I can do.’

‘Do that,’ I said, and locked the door as he went out. I took the money corset out of my belt and started taking out fifties and hundreds. There was eight thousand four hundred and fifty dollars in all. I put the bills in four rolls, distributed them in my trousers pockets, and rolled the corset-belt into a compact bundle.

The bellboy came back. ‘It’s Brinmore Rooms,’ he said. ‘If Jerry isn’t glad to see you, don’t tell him where you got the information.’

I gave him a fifty-dollar bill. ‘Could you,’ I asked, ‘bring me forty-five dollars in return for this?’

His face broke in a cheerful grin. ‘Surest thing you know,’ he said. ‘I’ll be back with the forty-five in five minutes.’

‘Bring me a newspaper, too,’ I told him.

When he returned with the forty-five dollars and the newspaper, I wrapped up the corset-belt and walked out of the hotel. I went to the Union Depot, sat down on one of the benches for a few minutes, then got up and walked away, leaving the newspaper-wrapped parcel on the seat.

From the branch post office I purchased a stamped envelope and a special delivery stamp. I addressed the envelope to Jerry Wegley, Brinmore Rooms, tore a page of newspaper into strips, folded some of the strips into the envelope, sealed it, and took a taxicab to the Brinmore Rooms.

The Brinmore Rooms consisted of a door on the street level, a flight of stairs, a little counter with a call bell, a register, and a fly-specked pasteboard placard with the words ‘Ring for Manager’ printed on it. I rang.

When nothing happened, I rang again. After another ten seconds, a thin-faced woman with a gold-toothed smile came out to see what I wanted.

‘Special delivery letter for Jerry Wegley,’ I said. ‘You want to take it in to him?’

‘No, he’s in 18, straight down the hall,’ she said shortly, folding her lips back down over her gold teeth and slamming the door of her room behind her as she turned back.

I went on down to 18, knocked three times gently on the door, and got no action. I tried to insert a knife blade along the side of the lock, and decided after five minutes that I was a failure as a burglar. I walked back down the threadbare carpet to the counter with its bell and register, lifted up the hinged gate in the counter, and looked around on the inside. There were a half dozen bundles of laundry, three or four magazines, and a pasteboard suitcase. I kept looking around and finally found what I wanted, a nail with a big heavy wire loop hanging on it. A chain hung from the loop, and the key dangled at the end of the chain. I took care to keep the chain from jingling against the wire as I took the key and walked back down the hall.

The passkey opened room 18 without any difficulty.

The bird had flown the coop.

There was some dirty underwear on the floor of the closet, a sock with a hole in the big toe, a rusty safety razor blade, and the stub of a lead pencil.

The bureau drawers yielded nothing but a frayed necktie which had begun to pull apart in the center, an empty gin bottle and a crumpled cigarette package. The bed hadn’t been slept in since it had last been made, although the sheets and pillow cases looked about ready for the laundry.

The place was dingy, smelly, dejected, and deserted. The mirror over the cheap pine bureau threw back a faded, distorted reflection of my face.

I went back to the closet and looked the underwear over for laundry marks. I found an old X-B391. It was pretty well faded. The same number had been written more recently and in a different handwriting on the waistband of the shorts.

I made a note of the number, left the room, locked the door, and paused long enough in front of the counter at the head of the stairs to slide the wire hoop down under the counter where it would look as though it had fallen off the nail.

Jerry Wegley had the last laugh. I’d paid him twenty-five dollars to slip me a gun which was hotter than a stovelid. Wegley went on duty at four o’clock in the afternoon and was off at midnight. He probably went to bed as a rule around two or three o’clock in the morning. This time he hadn’t gone to bed. Had it been because he’d learned what had been done with the gun he’d passed off on me?