Макс Коллинз - True Crime

“I think my wife is cheating on me.”

Imagine that.

“Go on,” I said.

“I’m a salesman. Traveling salesman. Selling to feed and grain stores in a two-state area. That keeps me on the road much of the time. Weeks at a time, at times.”

“I see.”

“And Polly... well, Polly’s always been a little free-spirited. Very independent.”

“How long have you been married?”

“Just over a year. A few months ago, I got this new territory — it was a big opportunity for me, how could I pass it up? Only it meant... being gone for longer stretches of time than before. And, well, she didn’t seem to mind. I guess I wish she would have minded. Then last week I found out she’s been working at a café. Took the job without even telling me. I confronted her about it, asked her why, why on earth she was doing this, didn’t I make good money, didn’t I do right by her, and she said she was just bored — and that ‘a girl can use a little money of her own.’”

“Do you have any children, Mr. Howard?”

“No. None. Not yet. I hope to...”

“I see. Is it so wrong for her to have a job, a little something to keep her busy?”

“I suppose not.”

“Extra money, in times like these, is that anything to be angry over?”

“Perhaps not...”

“Wouldn’t some husbands be grateful for the extra income?”

“Possibly...”

“If that’s all the more reason you have to be suspicious, I’d have to advise you — much as I hate to lose a prospective client — to leave well enough alone.”

Outside, the El rumbled, rattled; he glanced at it, like the world passing him by. I waited for the noise to go away before getting back into this — with the open windows, there was no other choice.

Then, when silence filled the room again, he looked at me and said, “She should have told me.”

“Told you what?”

“That she was working! She should have asked me.”

“Asked your permission, you mean?”

“Well of course! I’m — I’m the husband, aren’t I?”

“Somebody’s got to wear the pants,” I said, keeping the sarcasm to myself, I hoped.

“That’s not the most disturbing part.”

“Tell me what is.”

He looked away from me, as if he couldn’t bear to make this admission and eye contact at the same time. “She’s working under her maiden name. Hamilton. Not her married name.”

That seemed curious, but not necessarily sinister.

“She’s just asserting her independence,” I said.

“But she’s a married woman!”

“Married women have a right to an identity of their own. Or anyway that’s what a lot of ’em think.”

He spoke barely moving his lips. “She may be asserting more than just her independence.”

“You think she’s seeing other men, then?”

“That’s what I’d like you to find out.”

“You have no other reason to believe this other than your wife using her maiden name to get a job.”

“There’s another reason.”

“Well?”

He sighed, heavily; looked out at the El. “It’s personal.”

“Getting cuckolded is personal, Mr. Howard. Convince me I wouldn’t be wasting your money by taking on this job.”

“It’s the way she is... way she acts... in bed.”

“Cold, you mean?”

He looked at me, the slate eyes very sad. “Not at all. Just the reverse.”

“What’s wrong with that?” I should have this guy’s problems.

“She’s doing things I didn’t teach her.”

“Oh. Maybe she’s imaginative, or has a girlfriend who’s been around who shared some secrets.”

“Or read a sexual manual. Or was more experienced before our marriage than she at first let on. Yes, I’ve thought of those things. But she’s trying too hard , in bed; it’s as if — as if she’s trying to allay any suspicions I might have. Besides. A husband senses when a wife has been unfaithful, don’t you know that?”

Actually, I knew the opposite to be true in many cases; but why argue with money?

“I’ll be glad to look into this, Mr. Howard. For one reason only — to ease your mind. I’m inclined to think your wife will come out of this smelling like a rose.”

“I pray you’re right, Mr. Heller.”

He gave me the particulars — the address of the café, 1209½ West Wilson Avenue, which was in the neighborhood known as Uptown, so called because that was where the El ended; and their apartment, in the Malden Plaza Hotel, a few blocks from where she was working. He also gave me a snapshot of her, a pretty, apple-cheeked girl who seemed innocence personified.

I gave him some particulars, too — assured him that I would shadow his wife without her knowing; that if I did find she had a lover or lovers, I would make no direct confrontation. That sort of embarrassment, that sort of complication, he pointedly did not want. I assured him that his wife — and any lover — would not know I was there. That was my job.

He didn’t want photos; he wasn’t looking for evidence for a divorce case.

“I just want the truth, Mr. Heller.”

“That’s a scarce commodity, Mr. Howard,” I said. “And this is Chicago...”

I asked him for a twenty-five-dollar retainer and he stood and drew five tens from a fairly well-stuffed wallet.

“Since I’ll be on the road, and you won’t be able to reach me,” he said, spreading the five bills on my desktop like a poker hand, “I’d prefer to pay you for a full week’s work, now.”

I managed not to stutter. “Fine. If I need to go beyond a week...?”

“Do it. I’ll be in touch soon.”

With a final tight mirthless smile, he extended his hand and I stood behind the desk and shook it.

“I appreciate your help, Mr. Heller.”

“I hope I can be of help, by proving to you you’ve a good, loyal, loving little wife at home.”

“I pray so,” he said. “I pray so.”

Then he was gone, and I put his money in my pocket, and wondered where I’d seen the pretty, apple-cheeked girl in the snapshot before.

I started the job the following Monday, which was the day the heat wave really started taking itself seriously. At 7:00 A.M. I caught the El — Uptown was six miles north of the Loop — and already it was sweltering; every man on the train was in his shirt sleeves, with suit-coat over arm or left the hell home. The only men I saw that day with their coats on were the old gents sitting on benches in front of the El station, where I got off at Wilson and Broadway; they seemed to be unchanging fixtures of the landscape, a part of the ornate, carved-stone station, like the marble arch with the clock in its grillwork belly that hovered above the front entryway.

The terra-cotta El station — patterned, so they said, after New York’s Grand Central — was typical of the Uptown district’s naïvely grandiose opinion of itself. Though few of the buildings were taller than three stories — the exceptions being a couple of hotels and a few high-rise apartment houses and the occasional office building — Uptown fancied itself a miniature Loop, and with some justification. The gingerbread on the buildings bore the influence of that other Chicago world’s fair, the Columbian Exposition of ’93, where the hodgepodge beaux arts style of pseduo-European/classical architecture reigned; and in Uptown to this day a fairlike atmosphere prevailed. There were movie palaces like the Riviera, dance halls like the Aragon, specialty shops, department stores, banks, drugstores, delis, tearooms; restaurants from Russian to Polish to Greek, as well as chop suey joints and a Swedish cafeteria.