"Well, suppose you tell us about it, and we'll see if it has to come out," said Mendoza. "Things don't, always. You'd be surprised how many little things-and sometimes big-come into a case that don't get aired in court. I've got some idea of what you're going to tell me, I think, and it's possible that it needn't come into the legal end. I'd say even probable, barring one or two little bits that may serve to confirm times and so on. I can't say for sure, and of course I can't guarantee that a smart lawyer wouldn't get hold of it and bring it up to confuse the issue-but if it's what I deduce, to do with the late Mr. Twelvetrees' blackmailing operations, well, that's got nothing to do with the murder-I don't think, anyway."
They all looked at him. "I see," said Pickering interestedly. "You know who it was, and you think it was-another reason? I see… But all the same, I suppose you want the loose ends tied up." He got I out cigarettes, gave her one, lit both with an angry little snap of the lighter. "I can't say I feel vindictive toward whoever killed the bastard."
"Vindictive, possibly, no," said Mendoza, "but it's a funny one, an offbeat one, Mr. Pickering-if it's what I'm beginning to think. Let's save a little time. I think Miss Marner was being blackmailed by our late friend?"
"Attempted," said Pickering. "Just attempted, Lieutenant. I saw to that. I don't think there's any necessity to go into details-"
"I think maybe we'd better," she said quietly. "Maybe not in a formal statement, if we've got to make one, but you'll want to know enough to-add it up, won't you, Luis? I don't mind. I mean, it was-in a way-the sort of thing that might happen to anybody, though I don't excuse myself. It was-oh, well." She shrugged; her tone was even but her hand shook as she raised the cigarette to her mouth. "And a legal charge too-I wouldn't like to go to jail for it now-I don't know how that kind of thing works, if you could-"
"I think it would be a question of a fine, that's all," said Pickering, "but if the press get hold of it there'd be a little mess, and while it wouldn't make any difference to my position, anything like that-and the hell with it if it would-we'd just as soon that didn't happen. But if you think we'd better come out with the whole thing, hon, O.K., we're in this together."
"I do, Toby. Well, I don't want to bore you, Luis, but I guess you'd better have a little background-not that I'm trying to excuse myself, as I say. I got married a while after we knew each other, and it didn't it turn out so well. To make a long story short, he was a drinker and I got to drinking too, and by the time I'd got the divorce, well, I wasn't much good for anything. I'd lost a lot of jobs, and the agencies got to know I wasn't-very reliable, and finally I couldn't get any jobs. It's all right, I don't mind talking about it now-I pulled myself up and used some common sense, got back on an even keel. But it was while I was-down-that way, and pretty desperate-I hadn't any money and I had to do something-I ran into this Shorter. He had a photography shop, a little hole in the wall, but it seemed he did a nice side business in-in feelthy peectures, if you see what I mean. Well, he offered me good money and I took it. I did two series for him-six shots apiece-and maybe you can say the whole business was what-pulled me up, because I loathed it, and I got to thinking, how low can you get? I used that money to live on while I got myself back in some kind of physical shape, and after a while I got a decent job, in a department store. As a clerk really, but when they found I'd had modeling experience they used me for that too, sometimes, at the fashion shows. I just quit there last week, because Toby and I are going to be married.
"Well, every once in a while I'd think about those pictures, and I didn't like the idea of them floating around. Shorter had the negatives, of course. About two years later, when I'd saved some money, I went and saw him and asked if he'd sell the negs to me, and he just laughed and said for five hundred apiece. I didn't have that kind of money.
Well, about a year ago I was introduced to this Brooke Twelvetrees at a party. A couple of girls I know do extra work, bits in TV mostly, and it was in that crowd I met him, he was a hanger-on, I gathered. I didn't think much of him one way or another, you know-I saw him maybe three or four times in this crowd, at parties, that's all-it just came out of the blue when he-approached me." She took a breath, leaned forward to put out her cigarette.
"You take it easy now," said Pickering, and she smiled at him.
"It's O.K., Toby, I don't mind really… You see, I-I got to know Toby, and we'd been going around some together, and of course there'd been a little smart talk-you know-gossip. And when I read in the paper one morning, about three weeks back it was, that Shorter had been arrested and all his-stuff-confiscated, I nearly died of fright. I mean, there'd have been those things I posed for in with the others, and identifiable as me, if the c-the police-"
"I thought the name Shorter rang a bell," nodded Mendoza. "I remember."
"I figured out," Pickering broke in, "from a couple of things that bastard, Twelvetrees I mean, said, that he was responsible for that. D'you know whether that was a-so to speak-routine investigation, or if they had anonymous information? Do the police act on that kind of thing?"
"Not my department, but I can find out about the arrest from Vice. Yes, certainly, Vice and Narcotics especially, the anonymous tip often sets the ball rolling. Sometimes it turns out a dud, sometimes not."
"Well, what I think happened was this," she went on. "Twelvetrees knew Shorter, that came out when he approached me with these negs. He said-because naturally I asked how he got them-he said, in a jeering sort of way, not as if he expected to be believed, you know, that Shorter'd had a premonition about being arrested and had handed over had some stuff for safekeeping. But later on he started to say something else, about how he and Shorter had been together inside-and caught himself up. I think he might have been in prison, and met Shorter there. And it's just a guess, but I think Shorter showed him some of his-things-and Twelvetrees recognized me in those pictures, either then or later. He didn't do anything about it because I couldn't do anything for him then, you see? I mean, he wasn't interested in me any other way but-for money. It's a funny thing to say, but when it came to girls to-go around with, well, I gathered from what Netta said-she's in the crowd that knew him best-he was a little nervous of anything from the right side of the tracks. You know? He didn't feel at home with the kind who-oh, likes ballet and cocktails instead of the amusement arcade and beer.”
"Very much in character."
"That I believe," agreed Pickering. "You let me carry on, hon. The way I figure it, Lieutenant, when he heard on the grapevine that it was a serious thing with Marian and me, then he saw how he could do himself some good. Maybe you know he had-time out to laugh-movie ambitions. That-! Well, I think he stole those negs from Shorter and then ‘shopped' him, as our British friends say, before he could find out or retaliate."
“Quite possible."
"Anyway, he showed up at Marian's place-"
"On that Tuesday evening, maybe?" said Mendoza. "Evening, because you'd be at work all day, he couldn't have a private talk with I you. And it wasn't Wednesday because he was elsewhere that night. Or was it Thursday? On Wednesday night he was hinting joyously that some good fortune was coming his way."
"He told someone? My God, he-? Is that how you-?"
"No, he was too canny for that. And while we're clearing up details, how we got onto you was that he had a snapshot of you in his wallet. Why?"
"So that's what happened to it," she said slowly. She sat back, looking angry. "May I have another cigarette, Toby, please… Netta told me he'd asked her for one. She was looking through some she'd just had finished, and he was there and asked if he could have the one of me. She refused, but he must have taken it anyway when her back was turned, she said. I think-maybe he wanted it to check against-those others, to be sure. She said it wasn't a very good one, but it was full-length, and you know people photograph differently sometimes from the way they really-though with those-well, I don't know. And maybe he just stuck it away and forgot it-or more likely kept it as window dressing, he was the kind who liked to have you think he had a raft of girl friends… It was Tuesday he came, Tuesday the twenty-seventh. He had one of the negatives with him, and-and prints of the rest. He-" She broke off, trying to control her shaking voice.