Ed McBain - Doll

‘The house cost forty-two thousand five hundred dollars. They paid for it in cash.’

‘Who’d they buy it from?’ Willis asked.

‘Well, you probably wouldn’t know her, but I’ll bet your wife would.’

‘I’m not married,’ Willis said.

‘Oh? Aren’t you?’

‘Who’d they buy it from?’ Brown asked.

‘A fashion model named Tinka Sachs. Do you know her?’

If they had lacked, before this, proof positive that the man in the wrecked automobile was really Ernest Messner, they now possessed the single piece of information that tied together the series of happenings and eliminated the possibility of reasonable chance or coincidence:

1) Tinka Sachs had been murdered in an apartment on Stafford Place on Friday, April ninth.

2) Ernest Messner was the elevator operator on duty there the night of her murder.

3) Ernest Messner had taken a man up to her apartment and had later given a good description of him.

4) Ernest Messner had vanished on Monday night, April twelfth.

5) An incinerated body was found the next day in a wrecked auto on Route 407, the connecting road between Middlebarth and York, in Mavis County.

6) The medical examiner had stated his belief that the body in the automobile had been incinerated in a wood fire elsewhere and only later placed in the automobile.

7) There was only one house on Route 407, five and a half miles from where the wrecked auto was found in the gravel pit.

8) There had been a recent wood fire in the fireplace of that house, and the premises smelled of burned flesh. There were also heel marks on the floor, indicating that someone had been dragged to the fireplace.

9) The house had once been owned by Tinka Sachs, and was sold only last October to its new owners.

It was now reasonable to assume that Tinka’s murderer knew he had been identified, and had moved with frightening dispatch to remove the man who’d seen him. It was also reasonable to assume that Tinka’s murderer knew of the empty house in Mavis County and had transported Messner’s body there for the sole purpose of incinerating it beyond recognition, the further implication being that the murderer had known Tinka at least as far back as last October when she’d still owned the house. There were still a few unanswered questions, of course, but they were small things and nothing that would trouble any hard-working police force anywhere. The cops of the 87th wondered, for example, who had killed Tinka Sachs, and who had killed Ernest Messner, and who had taken Carella’s shield and gun from him and wrecked his auto, and whether Carella was still alive, and where?

It’s the small things in life that can get you down.

Those airline schedules kept bothering Kling.

He knew he had been taken off the case, but he could not stop thinking about those airline schedules, or the possibility that Dennis Sachs had flown from Phoenix and back sometime between Thursday night and Monday morning. From his apartment that night, he called Information and asked for the name and number of the hotel in Rainfield, Arizona. The local operator connected him with Phoenix Information, who said the only hotel listing they had in Rainfield was for the Major Powell on Main Street, was this the hotel Kling wanted? Kling said it was, and they asked if they should place the call. He knew that if he was eventually suspended, he would lose his gun, his shield and his salary until the case was decided, so he asked the operator how much the call would cost, and she said it would cost two dollars and ten cents for the first three minutes, and sixty-five cents for each additional minute. Kling told her to go ahead and place the call, station to station.

The man who answered the phone identified himself as Walter Blount, manager of the hotel.

This is Detective Bert Kling,’ Kling said. ‘We’ve had a murder here, and I’d like to ask you some questions, if I may. I’m calling long distance.

‘Go right ahead, Mr Kling,’ Blount said.

‘To begin with, do you know Dennis Sachs?’

‘Yes, I do. He’s a guest here, part of Dr Tarsmith’s expedition.’

‘Were you on duty a week ago last Thursday night, April eighth?’

‘I’m on duty all the time,’ Blount said.

‘Do you know what time Mr Sachs came in from the desert?’

‘Well, I couldn’t rightly say. They usually come in at about seven, eight o’clock, something like that.’

‘Would you say they came in at about that time on April eighth?’

‘I would say so, yes.’

‘Did you see Mr Sachs leaving the hotel at any time that night?’

‘Yes, he left, oh, ten-thirty or so, walked over to the railroad station.’

‘Was he carrying a suitcase?’

‘He was.’

‘Did he mention where he was going?’

‘The Royal Sands in Phoenix, I’d reckon. He asked us to make a reservation for him there, so I guess that’s where he was going, don’t you think?’

‘Did you make the reservation for him personally. Mr Blount?’

‘Yes, sir, I did. Single with a bath, Thursday night to Sunday morning. The rates—’

‘What time did Mr Sachs return on Monday morning?’

‘About six a.m. Had a telegram waiting for him here, his wife got killed. Well, I guess you know that, I guess that’s what this is all about. He called the airport right away, and then got back on the train for Phoenix, hardly unpacked at all.’

‘Mr Blount, Dennis Sachs told me that he spoke to his ex-wife on the telephone at least once a week. Would you know if that was true?’

‘Oh, sure, he was always calling back east.’

‘How often, would you say?’

‘At least once a week, that’s right. Even more than that, I’d say.’

‘How much more?’

‘Well… in the past two months or so, he’d call her three, maybe four times a week, something like that. He spent a hell of a lot of time making calls back east, ran up a pretty big phone bill here.’

‘Calling his wife, you mean.’

‘Well, not only her.’

‘Who else?’

‘I don’t know who the other party was.’

‘But he did make calls to other numbers here in the city?’

‘Well, one other number.’

‘Would you happen to know that number offhand, Mr Blount?’

‘No, but I’ve got a record of it on our bills. It’s not his wife’s number because I’ve got that one memorized by heart, he’s called it regular ever since he first came here a year ago. This other one is new to me.’

‘When did he start calling it?’

‘Back in February, I reckon.’

‘How often?’

‘Once a week, usually.’

‘May I have the number, please?’

‘Sure, just let me look it up for you.’

Kling waited. The line crackled. His hand on the receiver was sweating.

‘Hello?’ Blount said.

‘Hello?’

‘The number is SE — I think that stands for Sequoia — SE 3-1402.’

‘Thank you,’ Kling said.

‘Not at all,’ Blount answered.

Kling hung up, waited patiently for a moment with his hand on the receiver, lifted it again, heard the dial tone, and instantly dialed SE 3-1402. The phone rang insistently. He counted each separate ring, four, five, six, and suddenly there was an answering voice.

‘Dr Levi’s wire,’ the woman said.

‘This is Detective Kling of the 87th Squad here in the city,’ Kling said, is this an answering service?’

‘Yes, sir, it is.’

‘Whose phone did you say this was?’

‘Dr Levi’s.’

‘And the first name?’

‘Jason.’

‘Do you know where I can reach him?’

‘I’m sorry, sir, he’s away for the weekend. He won’t be back until Monday morning.’ The woman paused, is this in respect to a police matter, or are you calling for a medical appointment?’