James Chase - An Ace up my Sleeve

He’s mad, she was thinking and she was tempted to replace the receiver, but before she could make up her mind, he went on. “Mrs. Rolfe, you are in deadly danger. Don’t talk… listen. I’ve just got out of jail. I’ve been locked up for a week. I’ve been pretty busy but this afternoon I’ve been going through the newspapers for the past week to check on the political scene.”

“I really can’t see what this has to do with me,” Helga said sharply. “What do you mean… deadly danger?”

“Stop yacking! I’m wasting good money on this phone talking to you! In six German newspapers, published the day after I went to jail, there are photographs of Larry!”

“Why tell me? I know he’s an Army deserter. I…”

“Can’t you stop yacking and listen? He’s not an A deserter! He’s an escapee from a Military prison where lie was being held, waiting to be flown back to the States and to be put away for life in an asylum for the criminal insane!”

A wave of ice water seemed to run down Helga’s spin.

“I - I don’t believe it!”

“Why should I care? Don’t believe it!” The voice was now a snarl of impatience. “I’m telling you! The papers call him the Hamburg Strangler. He’d strangled five tarts before the cops caught up with him. He was tried and found guilty. It’s all here in the papers. He escaped while waiting transport back to the States.”

She lay back on the pillow. Her heart was now beating sluggishly and she felt dreadfully cold.

“Oh, God!” she whispered.

“They say no one should go near him,” the voice went on. “He’s dangerous.”

She took hold of herself.

“But it was you who told him where to get the passport.”

“Sure… he seemed a nice kid to me. I’ve only just read this goddamn thing! When he phoned me and told me about blackmail stunt I used my influence to help you… and I don’t want your goddamn thanks. But when I read this in the papers, although I think you’re worse than nothing, I had to warn you.”

Helga shivered.

“I’m alone here… he’s in the next room!”

“Here’s what you do. Lock yourself in… call the police and hope they get to you fast. So long, Mrs. Rolfe. I’m not sorry for you. Rich women with hot pants bore me and if Larry wrings your neck I won’t cry. Call the police!”

The line went dead.

With a shaking hand, Helga replaced the receiver.

The Hamburg Strangler!

Helga’s mind flashed back to three uneasy nights she had spent in New York when another strangler had bet large: a young man with a beguiling appearance who had picked up rich, lonely women in hotel lobbies, had persuaded them to take him to their rooms and who had left them strangled and mutilated. She remembered reading the horrifying details in the tabloid press. She had been there on business and had been yearning for a man, but when she had read the news that this killer was at large, she had become so nervous she had shunned every man who looked at her.

And now this!

She lay still.

A homicidal killer in her home!

Then she realized there was a complete silence in the villa. For a moment she couldn’t understand why, then she realized that Larry had turned off the television set!

Her heart hammering painfully, she looked towards the door. The key was in the lock. Terror held her in a paralysing grip. She must lock the door! her mind screamed at her. She must call the police! But she found she was incapable of moving. She lay in the bed, cold, shaking and her breath coining in quick, short gasps.

Then she heard slow footfalls, muffled by the carpet in the corridor, but unmistakable.

She had told him to come to her room!

She stared at the key in the door and yet she still couldn’t move. He was probably one of those awful sex maniacs who killed only when his lust was satisfied! She would be raped and then strangled!

She saw the door handle turn and she knew she had left it too late. A scream inside her began to build up but died as the door opened.

Larry stood in the doorway. She stared up at him from her bed in horror. Terror misted her eyes. She could only make out his menacing bulk: his face was out of focus.

“Ma’am… don’t be frightened of me. Please, ma’am. I can explain. Please listen to me.”

She made the effort and fought down her terror. His face swam into focus. Fear, misery and despair made him look helplessly immature and childishly harmless.

She lay there, staring at him, unable to form any words.

“When the phone went,” he said, “I picked up the receiver. I did it automatically, ma’am. I wasn’t spying. I heard what Ron said. It’s all lies. I swear everything he told you are lies! Please believe me.”

“Go away,” Helga said huskily. “Go away.”

Instead, he moved into the room, keeping away from the bed and he went over to an armchair by the window and sat in it. Then he put his hands to his face and began to cry. His soft blubbering lessened her terror. She wondered if she could get to the door, take out the key, get out and lock him in, but she decided that wouldn’t be possible. She knew how quickly he could move.

“Stop it!” She tried to harden her voice. “Please leave my room!”

“I don’t know what I’ll do if you won’t believe me, ma’am,” he mumbled. “You’ve been so kind to me. I’m so unhappy. You don’t know how unhappy I am!”

The Hamburg Strangler! she thought. Five prostitutes! Yet, seeing him crouched in the chair, his hands covering his face, he looked so defenceless she began to gain confidence. He had said he was grateful to her, she reminded herself. Why should he harm her if she didn’t show fear or irritate him. She would have to be very careful how she behaved to him and she must somehow get him out of the room so she could lock the door.

“I didn’t know you were so unhappy, Larry,” she said gently. “Will you tell me why?”

He took his hands from his face. Tears had made his face puffy and his misery touched her.

“I’ve been snowing you, ma’am… all this time. After what you’ve done for me, I wanted to keep your respect.” He hesitated, then lowered his head so he didn’t look at her. “You’d better know the truth now… I don’t go for girls…” He paused and mumbled something that Helga couldn’t hear. “What did you say?”

He gripped his knees with his huge hands.

“Larry… what did you say?”

“I go for men.”

Helga regarded him unbelievingly.

“For men?”

He nodded miserably, not looking at her.

“But you said a girl took your money,” she said after a long pause. “Archer told me when ho first met you you were trying to pick up a tart.”

He looked up then and she saw the shame and misery in his eyes.

“It wasn’t a girl who took my money… it was a man.” He spoke so quietly she could scarcely hear him. “That other girl… I was trying to get her boy friend from her.”

Helga suddenly understood. This was, of course the answer to his indifference to her. In a perverse way what he was telling her pleased her. It meant that she hadn’t lost her sex appeal, but she instantly dismissed this trivial thought. It would also explain why he had murdered five prostitutes. Certain homosexuals loathed prostitutes.

“You see, ma’am, Ron and I were close.” Larry looked away from her. “He’s like me. He wanted me and I wanted him, but I guess I’m restless. I don’t like anything permanent… I don’t want to be tied down. A week with Ron was enough. I did desert from the Army, but what he told you were spiteful lies. I’ve never killed anyone.” He thumped his knees with his big fists. “I guess I’m stupid. When you said you would pay my fare to New York and give me five thousand bucks, I just had to tell Ron. He had sworn I would come crawling back to Hamburg because I wouldn’t be able to live without him. I wanted him to know I wasn’t coming back and why. I told him how kind you had been to me and is going back to the States and about the money.” He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “That was stupid of me, ma’am. Ron flipped his lid. You see, ma’am, he just hated the idea you were helping me and he couldn’t. He got in this terrible rage and he called me names. He was yelling and swearing at me. He said he would fix me. I couldn’t stand listening to what he said so I hung up on him.”