“Molly Davis died at five minutes after—”
“What was the cause of her death?”
“The doctors won’t know till after the post mortem. But they think it was bad booze. What difference does it make what she died from?”
Farnsworth closed the book slowly.
“According to Starr’s records,” he said. “The name of the night woman on the fifth floor is, or was, Molly Davis.”
Chapter VII
The Day Superintendent
Farnsworth, a long conversation with headquarters concluded, hung up the receiver of the telephone in the dingy lobby of the Tremont Building and made several entries in his little black book,
Darwin, his stiff hat on his knees, his graying black hair tousled, his dusty brown suit badly out of press, slouched in Starr’s chair near the elevator, his chin nearly touching his chest and his lips parted.
Farnsworth stepped over and touched Darwin on the shoulder. The detective’s head came up with a jerk, and his eyes snapped wide open.
“Wasn’t asleep,” he asserted, the thickness of his voice belying his words. “Only waitin’ for you to get through phonin’.” He sprang to his feet and jammed his hat on his head.
Standing side by side, the contrast between the two was marked. Farnsworth was more than six feet, Darwin, several inches shorter and though not fat, much heavier; Farnsworth with long, narrow, nervous hands, the profile and brow of a student, concealing his dynamic nature as well as the enormous energy and persistence of his youth; Darwin with short, pudgy hands, on his heavy face, along with the imprint of years, the marks of many rough and tumble encounters, and his jaw thrust forward as though inviting physical combat.
“The day superintendent’d oughta be—”
“He’s coming now.”
A large, raw-boned, red-headed man in his middle thirties, puffed through the door with a newspaper clutched in a big red hand.
“Thought I’d find you here, Inspector Farnsworth,” he panted. “I’m Pat Dow, superintendent of the Tremont Buildin’. I just read about this in the papers. I double-timed. Late, anyway. Didn’t get to bed very early last night.”
“What time did you get home?” asked Farnsworth casually.
“After 2 A.M.,” replied Dow. “Heard plenty ’bout it, too. You get what I mean if you’re a married man.”
“I get you all right,” announced Darwin.
“Never saw cards run like they done last night. Nothin’d stand up. Had fours beat three times. But gimme the low down on this murder. Couldn’t read and run at the same time.”
A short, dark youth entered, hesitated and would have gone on, but Dow signalled to him with a jerk of his head.
“Come here, Bennett,” he said. “Inspector Farnsworth wants to talk to you. You can tell him all ’bout that dead girl up in Mr. Thompson’s desk.”
“Whatta you tryin’ to do, gimme the razzberry?” demanded Bennett, staring at Dow with defiant brown eyes.
“You’ll get plenty razzberries tryin’ to explain to the inspector why you murdered that girl, Bennett,” answered Dow, with a wink at Farnsworth.
“What dead girl—”
“Have you read the morning papers?” asked Farnsworth.
“Nah. Hadda hustle down here and get on the job.”
“How old are you?”
“Who wants to know?”
“You damn little shrimp you’d better answer the inspector,” advised Dow.
“Nineteen — I’m nineteen next month,” replied Bennett, looking at Farnsworth with a sullen expression on his dark face.
“Take us up to the sixth floor,” ordered Farnsworth.
“I ain’t got my uniform on yet.”
“You don’t needa stop for that,” declared Dow. “And you don’t needa stop to shave either.”
Bennett flushed and drew on gloves which he took from his coat pocket and stepped into the elevator without replying.
The car creaked its way to the top floor and stopped. Bennett had to make two attempts before he could open the door.
“Kinda weak this mornin’, ain’t you?” asked Dow, rubbing the boy’s thick, wavy brown hair with his knuckles.
Bennett, as if angered too much for words, glared at him.
“Want Billy to wait for us, inspector?” asked Dow affably.
“It isn’t necessary,” replied Farnsworth.
“Good thing, inspector. Some of the old-timers get here early and kick if they have to wait for this rattle trap elevator longer’n usual. Get on down to the basement, kid, and change duds. Don’t let the rats bite you!”
Bennett’s fingers went to his nose. Dow reached for him, but the door of the elevator clanged shut too quickly and immediately the car began a creaking descent.
“How long has he been working here?” asked Farnsworth, starting down the corridor.
“’Bout two months.”
“Does he ever run the car nights?”
“That punk? The rats’d make a bum outta him. He shivers whenever he sees one. Tries to act hard, but he’s only a kid. Get that expression on his map when I accused him of murderin’ that girl?”
“He’s fresh,” said Darwin. “Gimme a lotta lip the last time I was in here. Got a night boy, too?”
“No. Starr runs the elevator nights. S’pose you busted in the door to Thompson’s office?”
“We used Starr’s key,” replied Darwin.
“That’s damn funny!”
“What’s funny?”
“Nobody’s supposed to have a key to Thompson’s office; there’s a special lock on the door. If any of the help goes in there, they get fired.”
“How about the cleaning women?”
“Outside for them, too, unless Thompson sends for ’em.”
“Where is Thompson?”
“How should I know where Thompson is?”
“You’re the superintendent of his building, aren’t you?”
“Sure I’m superintendent and porter and electrician and repair man and a lotta other jobs, too. But that don’t make Thompson and me buddies. He ain’t never spoke to me yet. I ain’t seen him for two months, mebbe three months.”
Darwin unlocked and threw open the door of Thompson’s office. Dow gazed about him with inquisitive eyes.
“Looks just like I thought it would,” he declared.
“Haven’t you ever been in here before?” asked Farnsworth.
“Nope. I been learned how to obey orders.”
“Didn’t you come up here when Thompson hired you?”
“Thompson didn’t hire me. Cyrus Conroy, his agent, put an ad in the paper and I went to his office to answer it. He hired me and give me my orders. I ain’t broke ’em. I wanta keep my job. It ain’t much of a job for money, but jobs is scarce and it feeds me and the old lady and keeps a roof over our head.”
“You’ve been superintendent of the Tremont Building for some time, haven’t you?”
“I’m here a little more’n a year. I took Terence Gallagan’s place. He was here ever since the Tremont was turned into offices ten or ’leven years ago. Before that he was head porter of the hotel.”
“Where is Terence Gallagan now?”
“That’s ’nother question I can’t answer. I don’t know the kinda life Terence led.”
“He’s dead?”
“Dead, God rest his soul. That’s why I’m superintendent of the Tremont. If he wasn’t dead, he’d be hang-in’ onto his job. He hung onto everything else he ever had, so I’m told.”
Dow raised the hand which, all the while he had been answering Farnsworth’s questions, had been resting on the glass table top. Farnsworth glanced at Darwin and he changed his position only slightly. Dow was forced away from the table.
“Where is Conroy?” asked Farnsworth as if the question had just occurred to him.
“Mr. Conroy left town a week ago. He’s on his vacation, and when he’s on his vacation, even his office can’t reach him. He goes way up in the Canada woods fishin’ and stays a month. Goes there every year. Makes it tough for me. I gotta let everythin’ slide. Still, it don’t make so damn much difference — I gotta do that mosta the time. Thompson won’t spend no money on this buildin’. We’ve lost a lotta tenants; we’ll lose a lot more on account of this murder.”