Ed McBain - The Empty Hours

He backed out of the room.

He found a pay telephone in the main building, and from there he called Theodore Watt.

Blanche sat on the edge of the bed in room 105, shivering inside her gown, her robe, and a blanket which had been thrown over her shoulders. Theodore Watt leaned disjointedly against the dresser, puffed on his cigar, and said, “Now you want to tell me exactly what happened, Miss Colby?”

Blanche sat shivering and hunched, her face pale. She searched for her voice, seemed unable to find it, shook her head, nodded, cleared her throat, and seemed surprised that she could speak. “I ... I was alone. Cotton had gone down to see what ... what the noise was.”

“What noise, Hawes?” Watt asked.

“A grinding wheel,” he answered. “Downstairs in the ski shop. I heard it last night, too.”

“Did you find out who was running the wheel?”

“Tonight, it was a guy named Helmut Kurtz. He’s an instructor here, too. Claims he was nowhere near the shop last night. But he did see a light burning after midnight.”

“Where’s he now?”

“I don’t know. Sheriff, he was with me when the girl was killed. He couldn’t possibly have ...”

Watt ignored him and walked to the door. He opened it, and leaned into the corridor. “Fred,” he said, “find me Helmut Kurtz, an instructor here.”

“I got that other guy from down the hall,” Fred answered.

“I’ll be right with him. Tell him to wait.”

“What other guy?” Hawes asked.

“Instructor in 102. Larry Davidson.” Watt shook his head. “Place is crawling with goddamn instructors, excuse me, miss. Wonder there’s any room for guests.” He shook his head again. “You said you were alone, Miss Colby.”

“Yes. And I ... I thought I heard something down the hall ... like ... I didn’t know what. A loud sudden noise.”

“Probably the bathroom door being kicked in,” Watt said. “Go on.”

“And then I ... I heard a girl’s voice saying, ‘Get out of here! Do you hear me! Get out of here!’ And ... and it was quiet, and I heard someone running down the hall and down the steps, so I ... I thought I ought to ... to look.”

“Yes, go on.”

“I went down the ... the hallway and looked down the steps, but I didn’t see anyone. And then, when I ... when I was starting back for the room, I ... I heard the water running in the bathroom. The ... the door was open, so I ... Oh Jesus, do I have to?”

“You found the girl, is that right?”

“Yes,” Blanche said, her voice very low.

“And then you screamed.”

“Yes.”

“And then Hawes came upstairs, is that right?”

“Yes,” Hawes said. “And I called you from the main building.”

“Um-huh,” Watt said. He went to the door and opened it. “Want to come in here, Mr. Davidson?” he asked.

Larry Davidson came into the room hesitantly. He was a tall man, and he stooped as he came through the doorway, giving an impression of even greater height, as if he had to stoop to avoid the top of the door frame. He was wearing dark trousers and a plaid woolen sports shirt. His hair was clipped close to his scalp. His blue eyes were alert, if not wary.

“Guess you know what this is all about, huh, Mr. Davidson?” Watt asked.

“Yes, I think so,” Davidson answered.

“You don’t mind answering a few questions, do you?”

“No. I’ll ... I’ll answer anything you ...”

“Fine. Were you in your room all night, Mr. Davidson?”

“Not all night, no. I was up at the main building part of the time.”

“Doing what?”

“Well, I ...”

“Yes, Mr. Davidson, what were you doing?”

“I ... I was fencing. Look, I didn’t have anything to do with this.”

“You were what, Mr. Davidson?”

“Fencing. We’ve got some foils and masks up there, and I ... I was just fooling around. Look, I know Helga was stabbed, but ...”

“What time did you get back here, Mr. Davidson?”

“About ... about ten-thirty, eleven.”

“And you’ve been in your room since then?”

“Yes.”

“What did you do when you got back here?”

“I wrote a letter to my wife, and then I went to sleep.”

“What time did you go to sleep?”

“About midnight.”

“Did you hear any loud noise in the hall?”

“No.”

“Did you hear any voices?”

“No.”

“Did you hear Miss Colby when she screamed?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I guess I was asleep.”

“You sleep in your clothes, Mr. Davidson?”

“What? Oh. Oh, no. Your fellow ... your deputy said I could put on some clothes.”

“What were you sleeping in?”

“My pajamas. Listen, I barely knew those girls. I only joined the school here two weeks ago. I mean, I knew them to talk to, but that’s all. And the fencing is just a coincidence. I mean, we always fool around with the foils. I mean ever since I came here, somebody’s been up there fooling around with…”

“How many times did you scream, Miss Colby?” Watt asked.

“I don’t remember,” Blanche said.

“She screamed twice,” Hawes said.

“Where were you when you heard the screams, Hawes?”

“Downstairs. In the ski shop.”

“But you were in your room, right down the hall, Mr. Davidson, and you didn’t hear anything, hmmm? Maybe you were too busy ...”

And suddenly Davidson began crying. His face twisted into a grimace, and the tears began flowing, and he said, “I didn’t have anything to do with this, I swear. Please, I didn’t have anything to do with it. Please, I’m married, my wife’s in the city expecting a baby, I need this job, I didn’t even look at those girls, I swear to God, what do you want me to do? Please, please.”

The room was silent except for his sobbing.

“I swear to God,” he said softly. “I swear to God. I’m a heavy sleeper. I’m very tired at night. I swear. Please. I didn’t do it. I only knew them to say hello. I didn’t hear anything. Please. Believe me. Please. I have to keep this job. It’s the only thing I know, skiing. I can’t get involved in this. Please.”

He lowered his head, trying to hide the tears that streamed down his face, his shoulders heaving, the deep sobs starting deep inside him and reverberating through his entire body.

“Please,” he said.

For the first time since the whole thing had started. Watt turned to Hawes and asked his advice.

“What do you think?” he said.

“I’m a heavy sleeper, too,” Hawes said. “You could blow up the building, and I wouldn’t hear it.”

On Sunday morning, the church bells rang out over the valley.

They started in the town of Rawson, and they rang sharp and clear on the mountain air, drifting over the snow and down the valley. He went to the window and pulled up the shade, and listened to the sound of the bells, and remembered his own youth and the Reverend Jeremiah Hawes who had been his father, and the sound of Sunday church bells, and the rolling, sonorous voice of his father delivering the sermon. There had always been logic in his father’s sermons. Hawes had not come away from his childhood background with any abiding religious fervor — but he had come away with a great respect for logic. “To be believed,” his father had told him, “it must be reasonable. And to be reasonable, it must be logical. You could do worse than remembering that, Cotton.”

There did not seem to be much logic in the killing of Helga Nilson and Maria Fiers, unless there was logic in wanton brutality. He tried to piece together the facts as he looked out over the peaceful valley and listened to the steady tolling of the bells. Behind him, Blanche was curled in sleep, gently breathing, her arms wrapped around the pillow. He did not want to wake her yet, not after what she’d been through last night. So far as he was concerned, the weekend was over; he could not ski with pleasure anymore, not this weekend. He wanted nothing more than to get away from Rawson Mountain, no, that wasn’t quite true. He wanted to find the killer. That was what he wanted more than anything else. Not because he was being paid for the job, not because he wanted to prove to Theodore Watt that maybe big-city detectives did have a little something on the ball — but only because the double murders filled him with a sense of outrage. He could still remember the animal strength of the man who’d attacked him on the mountain, and the thought of that power directed against two helpless young girls angered Hawes beyond all reason.