"But eventually somebody will miss her," said Hackett reasonably, "and start asking questions. There was the fiance, she must've had friends who knew where she was going here."
" De veras. Eventually. By God, I'd like to know what the hell is behind it, Art."
"These Daggetts. Do you think they were paid to tell the tale?"
"I'm damned sure of it, and they're probably regretting it now, but they're stuck with the story, and, condenacion, I should've let them think we'd swallowed it until there's something concrete to throw at them."
"If there ever is," said Hackett.
Nothing had come in from Chicago. It was too early to expect it. The lab sent up the photos Mendoza had requested, full face and profile, close-ups of the lovely dead face, queerly more dignified in death.
Hackett looked at them and admitted it wasn't a face you'd forget. "But these Daggetts-what possible connection with a French girl?"
"How should I know? I don't think there is any. I think the Daggetts and the talkative widow are-mmh-just background. Put in for verisimilitude as it were."
"How?" asked Hackett.
"For the nice money. The setup cost a little something, if not much. The clothes, the stock of food, the cash on hand, enough to bury the poor silly suicide, so maybe we wouldn't try so hard to trace her back. And in a city the size of Chicago, how many Ruth Hoffmans? How many living in the bosom of families not listed anywhere? Those two letters, even minus the envelopes, a plausible substitute for a suicide note."
"Very neat," agreed Hackett. "If you hadn't just happened to have seen her before, it would've gone into a routine report and got filed away. Well, wait and see what may turn up."
"I want to ask some questions about that library card," said Mendoza.
JUST BEFORE NOON Landers came in with one of the two pharmacists on that Bryan killing. He had unexpectedly picked out a photograph down in Records, identified it positively as one of the heisters. The pedigree on file backed him up.
Joseph Bauman, Caucasian, six one, black and brown, one-seventy, twenty-four two years ago. He'd been charged with one count of armed robbery and prior to that with assault and possession of controlled drugs. He'd got a one-to-three on the robbery count. Landers got a statement from the witness and called the Welfare and Rehab office to find out what they knew about Bauman. The address in Records was two years old. A sergeant at that office looked up their records and said Bauman was on parole since three months ago. He was living at an address on Madera Avenue in Atwater and he had a job at a chain fast-food place on Sixth Street.
Hackett went out with Landers to find him.
The manager at the fast-food store told him he hadn't laid eyes on Bauman in a week. "And good riddance. That probation officer talked me into hiring him. I didn't like the idea so good, and that Bauman, he just doesn't want to work so hard-all the time goofing off."
So they tried the place on Madera in Atwater, which was I a modest frame house, neatly maintained, on the narrow side street, and showed the badges to the fat, nondescript middle-aged woman who answered the doorbell. She looked at them, and first she looked alarmed and then resigned.
"He's in trouble again, is he? I just don't know why. I tried to bring him up right. It was hard without my husband. Joe's father got killed in an accident when Joe was only four, but I tried. Lord knows I didn't spoil him. Tried to teach him right from wrong."
"Is he here?" asked Hackett.
"Yes, he's not up yet. He got in pretty late last night. He said he was out playing pool with some pals." She stepped back, tacitly inviting them in.
Bauman was still in bed in the back bedroom, looking as if he had a hangover. He was dirty and unshaven. He snarled when he saw the badges, and he said exactly what they'd expected him to say. "I haven't done nothing. The fuzz got no call to come picking on me." It was automatic. Hackett told him to get dressed. The woman said she didn't mind their looking around, but they'd wait for a search warrant. He wasn't likely to get sent up for a long stretch within the courts in the state they were, but they'd take no chance on making the charge stick.
They took him in to the jail and applied for both warrants. Landers called the lab and talked to Scarne. "Oh, I was just about to make a report on it," said Scarne. "Yeah, the coroner's office sent the slug over and I was just having a look at it. It's out of an old beat-up S. and W. thirty-two. Probably hasn't been cleaned in years, it's a miracle the damn thing fired at all. Yeah, we can match them if you ever pick it up."
The search warrant came through after lunch. Hackett and Landers went back to Madera Street. At least Hackett's Monte Carlo was air-conditioned; it was up to ninety-four or so, humid and muggy. Madera Avenue was paved with blacktop and it looked as if it were ready to melt; it felt sticky to their feet. "Why anybody lives in this climate-" said Landers.
They hadn't questioned Bauman yet, just stashed him in jail. The witness had been very positive on the identification. The woman let them in silently, looked at the warrant. They started to hunt around Bauman's bedroom and within five minutes Landers came across a beat-up old S. amp; W.. 32 under a pile of clean socks. It was unloaded. There was a box of ammunition for it in the next drawer down. Landers said sadly, "And some people think it's a glamorous job, or that you've got to be big brains to do it."
"And in all the brainy arch-villains," rejoined Hackett.
"All I can say, Tom, is that I hope to God some soft-headed judge doesn't give him a slap on the wrist and six months in the joint."
"I won't hold my breath," said Landers.
They poked around some more but didn't come up with anything interesting. So they started back to the jail to talk to Bauman. When he knew they had the nice evidence, he might be inclined to tell them who the other heister had been on that job, and they were both aware, as certain as death and taxes, that Bauman would claim it was the other fellow who fired the gun and the other fellow-if they picked him up-would claim it was Bauman.
The job wasn't glamorous, but it was often discouraging.
"OH, DEAR ME, I couldn't say at all," said Mrs. Marsh blankly. She stared at the glossy eight by ten enlargement.
"She looks sort of dead."
"She is," said Mendoza. "You've never seen her?"
"I just don't know." Mrs. Marsh was thin and sharpnosed, about forty, with pale blue eyes and over-large round glasses. She was one of the assistant librarians at the big main library on Sixth Street. She looked back at the library card and shook her head.
"Who would be the one to issue cards?" asked Mendoza,
"Any of us. Anyone on duty at the check-out desk." She had laid the photograph down hastily, pushing it toward him. "It would depend who was on duty when-when the person requested a card. I don't think anybody would remember. I mean I don't think anybody would recognize that-any photograph."
"Why not?" asked Mendoza.
She wet her lips. "Well, we have a lot of people in. It's a big library, and we issue a lot of new cards. Unless the person was a regular, who came in a lot-they're just faces. If you see what I mean. And at least I can tell you that the girl wasn't a regular. I don't think I ever saw her in my life."
It was what he had expected, a slight gratification. "But whoever took out the card, it's not so long ago. If we can locate the librarian who issued it-"
She was still shaking her head. "You mean, maybe to tell you what she looked like. Oh, I shouldn't think so. You just don't realize, we're always pretty busy. We get a lot of students in, you know, and we're always issuing new cards. It's-it gets to be automatic. Like filing or checking books in and out. And it doesn't take five minutes-you know. You get the name and type it on the card and put in the date and that's that."