“Didn’t you hear any shots some time before that?”
“So a car backfired,” said the janitor. “So what? That’s like I asked the cops. I asked am I expected to go about having premonitions about a murder?”
“And you never saw or heard of Jimmy Legg before?”
“Nope. Not even for a sawbuck.”
“Well, he must have been visiting somebody here and I’ve got to get a line on it. Start telling me about the tenants.”
“We got five floors and six big apartments on each,” began the janitor. “In 1-A we got a nice old couple. They’re vegetarians. Next to them in 2-A is a family that’s vacationing. Then—”
“Forget that. No families. Legg must have been visiting a dame or a man. What single tenants are there?”
“Only three because the apartments are pretty expensive for one guy. In 2-D we got an old maid.”
“No good. Next.”
“Then there’s a guy with a Vandyke beard in 4-C. He owns a few oil wells and he hides under his bed all day and drinks.”
“No good. Who’s the other?”
“A blonde that’s something. Her body ain’t ersatz either. She’s strictly the wrong side of the tracks but you got to have sugar to live here so I guess she’s got it.”
“That’s a good bet,” said Cellini eagerly. “What’s her name?”
“Winnie Crawford in 4-E.”
“Who’s keeping her?”
“This’ll kill you — nobody!”
“Are you sure?”
“So help me. She don’t like men and it’s sure a waste because if I ever seen production for use she’s it. It’s ridiculous!” The janitor sounded offended.
“It’s impossible,” said Cellini, “and I’ll check right now.”
Cellini leaned on the button and heard the chimes sounding inside of 4-E. A husky contralto yelled: “Relax. I’m not deaf.”
A moment later the door was opened by a woman in her late twenties and Cellini could see what the janitor had meant. She was something that the Hayes office would have banned even in a burlap bag. At the moment, however, she wore a form-clinging, silk dress that would have caught male eyes in a nudist colony.
“Who asked for you?” Her hands rested aggressively on her hips and she seemed surprised to see him.
“Are you Winnie Crawford?” Cellini asked.
“Uh-huh. Spring it.”
“It’s about Jimmy Legg. He’s not coming.”
“Why not?”
Cellini grinned. This was the right party. He walked by her through a short foyer and found himself in the living-room. He wondered if there was anyone else around and toured through kitchen, dinette, bedroom, bath, and dressing alcove but drew a blank. He returned to the living-room to find Winnie Crawford leveling a huge revolver at him with both hands.
Cellini sighted some bourbon on an end table and poured himself a stiff drink. He said: “That thing you got in your soft, white, creamy hands. You’d better put it down.”
“What’s the idea smelling around this place?” she countered. “What are you looking for?”
Cellini tasted the drink. It was good liquor. “I was just wondering if you were alone, Winnie — whether you had a couple of boy friends in the Frigidaire or something.”
“I got no boy friends and I’m alone and I can take care of myself. You better tell me what you want. Make it quick.”
“And you’d better ditch that rod,” said Cellini casually, “if it happens to be the one that killed Jimmy Legg this morning.”
Winnie Crawford sat down heavily on a divan. Cellini gave silent approval of the exposed legs. He walked over, removed the revolver from her unresisting fingers, and broke it. It was fully loaded and didn’t smell as if it had been recently fired.
He tossed the revolver aside, half-filled a glass with straight bourbon, and handed it to her. Her face was white and drawn and her fingers trembled. He decided that Jimmy Legg must have meant a lot to her.
She drank deeply and seemed to regain control of herself. “I never got anything but trouble from that chiseling heel,” she muttered.
Cellini decided, on second thought, that Jimmy Legg meant nothing to her and that she was worried about her own skin. “Did you kill him?” he asked.
She registered a look of disgust and pulled her skirts over her knees. She was her normal self again. “Where did it happen?”
“Downstairs in the alley at the side of this building. He was sneaking up the back way to see you.”
“What gives you the ridiculously fantastic idea that he was visiting me?” Her head went back and the nose up in what she hoped was a chilling, regal look.
He grinned. “Too late to backwater now, Winnie. Get down to the monosyllables. You’re more at home there.”
She regarded him speculatively for a moment, then sighed resignedly. “All right. Tell me about it and especially what your racket is.”
“My handle is Cellini Smith and I’m a private op. Legg phoned me to meet him in the back alley but when I got there he wasn’t receiving. So I cher-chez-ed the dame and here I am.”
“What did he want you for?”
Cellini shrugged. “Something about the cops and a safe-cracking job. At the Lansing Investment Company, I think it was.”
“I know all that. How come they didn’t hold him?”
“That’s exactly what Mr. Legg wanted me to find out.”
“Oh. Listen, Smith, you know I didn’t kill Jimmy. I’m just not the type.”
“Perish the thought,” he said. “Go on.”
“But I got other reasons for wanting to be kept out of this mess,” Winnie Crawford continued. “Good reasons. Get out of here, Smith, and just forget all about me.”
“Not a chance. The shams are down on me because they think I know more than I do and I’m not the kind of hero that’ll get in a mess to save the name of some fair twist. Besides, Winnie, you forget the cops’ll get around to you just as easily as I did.”
“I guess that’s so,” she admitted. She drained her glass and nervously poured more bourbon.
“Of course it’s so. Loosen up, Winnie, and tell me what you know about all this.”
“Nothing. Jimmy phoned that he was coming up here. That’s all. I was surprised, too, they let him go.”
“Why was Jimmy Legg coming here? This is a pretty classy place you’ve got — not the kind of thing Legg could afford.”
She drew herself up. “I beg your pardon?”
“Oh, come off it, Winnie. You know as well as I do that you look like a love captive in a penthouse.”
“Get this, you louse! I’m nobody’s keptie. Just because I’m beautiful and there ain’t no cockroaches in the kitchen is no sign I am.”
“All right. Simmer down. Your dimples disappear when you get angry. If you’re not doing light housekeeping for a male, then who pays for all this?”
“Men,” pronounced Winnie Crawford, “are beasts.”
“Sure — the cads — but Jimmy Legg was still liquidated right outside this building,” he reminded her, “and the cops will be here in a little while.”
“I’m not worried about the cops. I was up here all the time and it’s no crime if Jimmy was visiting me.”
“That kind of weasel talk doesn’t jell,” he hammered. “I’ve got to get some kind of lead on this and I think you can cupply it. So come across.”
She chewed at one of her long, vermilion nails. “Listen, could you tell me why Jimmy was killed?”
“Holy mother of hell!” he exploded. “What do you think I’m trying to find out?”
“Well, when you do find out you’ll tell me, won’t you?”
“Sure and I’ll pass out a ten dollar bill with each syllable,” he replied not too subtly.