Dan Marlowe - Doorway to Death

“He was, for a fact.”

“Now I'll tell you something you didn't know. The guy on the floor was registered into 1421 here last night under the name of Dumas. He was visitin' a guy named Lustig up in 938 early this morning; I brought him up some beer. Dumas checked out at nine thirty this morning. Lustig turned out to be a no-pay; room clean and no sign of him.”

“You can see why I thought he might be useful, Jimmy,” Lieutenant Dameron said briskly. “He has a nose for trouble.”

“He also has a nose for facts; he laid out a pretty straight story.” Rogers frowned down at his notebook. “The bar boy heard the first two shots and started right in here. On the way he heard a pop-pop; silencer on the second gun, evidently. He ran right back out when he got a look around and says he didn't pass anyone either way.”

“How do you figure the second bird got out of here, then?” Lieutenant Dameron asked him.

“Same key he came in with, I'd say, sir. Mighty cool character. Changed horses at flood tide and never batted an eye.” He closed his notebook. “I'll talk to a few more of the help now, if we've finished here.”

The ruddyfaced man stood up slowly. “You go ahead; I'm running along. Begins to look like one of those things around here; this is the second stone wall we've hit.”

Johnny looked at Detective Rogers. “Manuel tell you what Dutch said?”

The slender man nodded and looked at the lieutenant. “The kid said that the chef said something that sounded like 'clocks.'”

“Clocks?” The big man circled the room with his eyes and stopped at the big kitchen clock. He pointed to it. “Have the lab boys dismantle that and go over it. There won't be anything to it, bat we might as well make a noise like we knew what we were doing, especially since it doesn't look like the rush of witnesses is going to knock us down.” He led the way out to the bar, stopped, and turned to Johnny. “You have a key to this thing?”

“Yeah, but Willie's a little fussy who he sets them up for.”

The apple cheeks darkened, but the lieutenant bit off any reply he might have been going to make. He turned and strode out through the lobby, his heels hitting heavily, — and Jimmy Rogers shook his head disapprovingly at Johnny. “What does it get you, man?”

“A little satisfaction.”

“He'll wear you out, if he takes a notion.”

Johnny looked at him. “I don't work for him, kid. He'll play hell gettin' an angle on me. And when I was workin' for him, I'd leave it up to him who wore who out.”

Detective Rogers laughed. He started to say something and then broke off as Ronald Frederick emerged through the swinging doors from the lobby, in pajamas and plum colored robe. He came directly to them. “A dreadful accident, dreadful.”

“Accident?” Jimmy Rogers' tone was amused.

“I meant to say-that is to say, not an accident, most assuredly not, but a shocking-ah-occurrence. They woke me to let me know.”

The sandyhaired man nodded. “If we could have three minutes' conversation now it might save fifteen or twenty in the morning,” he suggested.

“Certainly,” Ronald Frederick acceded promptly. **We can use my office.” He turned to Johnny. “You'll take care of-ah-things?”

“Yeah.” He looked at the sandyhaired man. “I got something for you I wouldn't give that lardhead just walked out of here. There's an automatic pilot elevator touches on that kitchen; we use it for room service. The kitchen outlet is supposed to be locked at ten every night, but for a client with keys it's the easiest route.”

“Where does it go?” Detective Rogers demanded.

Johnny grinned at him. “Only to the sixteenth floor.”

The slender man grimaced. “I already had no appetite for breakfast; now I'm losing it for lunch.”

“The kitchen outlet can be locked either from the kitchen side or the elevator side,” Johnny suggested.

“So?” Jimmy Rogers began, and then his eyes narrowed. “Then whatever floor that elevator is on now is where the guy got off?”

“If he used it,” Johnny amended. “And if he was cute enough not to get off at his own floor you won't have lowered the odds a nickel's worth.”

“Give me your keys,” Detective Rogers said briskly. “I'd like to start lowering the odds around here even a little bit.”

“I have mine,” Ronald Frederick said interestedly, and produced them from a pocket of his robe. “May I accompany you?”

“You two go ahead,” Johnny told them. “I haven't checked the front in an hour.” He watched the oddly matched pair pause in the service door entrance to the again darkened kitchen while Rogers flipped on lights; when the door swung shut behind them, Johnny left the bar for the lobby. He glanced over at Sally's switchboard; and regretted it immediately; she beckoned imperiously, but he shook his head. Making a circle of thumb and forefinger of each hand, he lifted them to his eyes, and then pointed upward. Sally shook her head in a furious negative, but Johnny grinned at her and headed for the elevator.

As he started upward, he could hear the impatient, persistent ringing of the unanswered bell captain's phone.

If he was afraid of anything in this world, he was afraid of confinement. Johnny could feel his nostrils thinning in anticipatory rejection as he knelt before the heavy walnut desk in his own room and from the right hand bottom drawer removed flashlight, screwdriver, and icepick. On his way back to the door he could see in the mirror the hard line of his lips as he carefully patted bulging pockets to make sure he had forgotten nothing.

In the corridor he passed the exit door with its prim red overhead light, and stopped at the door beyond it with its neatly lettered metal sign, Maid. He opened this door, groped around behind the mops and the broom handles and removed a short stepladder whose bulk had effectively sealed the narrow opening behind it.

Johnny drew a deep breath, took a final look along the deserted corridor, and squeezed into the closet; he reached back a long arm and carefully closed the door upon himself. The warm, humid darkness closed in upon him, and he listened. Somewhere off to his right water dripped steadily, and the monotonous repetition set his teeth on edge.

He removed the flashlight from his hip pocket and experimented with its sharp finger of light upon the white plastered inner walls which enclosed him. He could feel the almost physical restraint of the tightly walled envelopment with its airless, fetid odor, and without giving himself time to think he inched sideways into the cramped passageway which would not admit the breadth of his shoulders.

Step by step he advanced, crabwise, feet always in the same relative position as he placed them carefully in the path delineated by the flashlight's slender beam upon the white walls which seemed now to stretch narrowly away before him to infinity. He pressed onward with body rigidly braced to withhold contact from the thin shell of plaster on either side of him.

Mentally he counted rooms in his slow progress, hoping he was keeping track correctly. He came to a stop finally, and ineffectually tried to shrug the clinging shirt from its moist contact with his neck and shoulders. He restored the flashlight to his pocket and removed the icepick. Selecting a spot head-high in the darkness which had again enveloped him, he gingerly inserted the point of the pick. Locking his wrist and arm solidly, he exerted a steady, unhurried forward and downward pressure as the needle point attacked the yielding plaster. Patiently he guided its fractional advance until a tiny jolt warned him of the breakthrough.

He removed the pick carefully, and a pinpoint of light rewarded him; he grunted softly as he applied his right eye to the minute aperture and tried to focus on the swirl of color in the room before him. A cream-colored wall reflected light so successfully that his eye watered involuntarily; he blinked it impatiently as he waited for his vision to adjust. The tiny peephole strained his sight intolerably; the left eye ached in sympathy with the staring right. Details of the room filtered through to him in agonizing flashes of recognition: the kneehole desk in its center, the small, neat bookcase in the corner, the imitation-leather easy chair, the partly opened door to the lighted bathroom beyond.