Hawes was silent.
“It’s an old one,” Kramer said.
Hawes was still silent.
“David Copperfield,” Kramer said.
“Oh, sure,” Hawes answered.
“I know thousands of them,” Kramer said enthusiastically. “I can reel them—”
“What about those pictures of Lucy Mitchell?”
“What about them?”
“Did she say why she wanted them?”
“She said only that she was sure someone had them. She thought that person might be me. I told her I was not the least bit interested in her or her pictures. In short, Mr. Hawes, I played Taps for her.” Kramer’s face grew brighter. “Here’s a dozy,” he said. “Listen.”
“I’d rather—”
“ ldquo‘When he finished packing, he walked out on to the third-floor porch of the barracks brushing the dust from his hands, a very neat and deceptively slim young man in the summer khakis that were still early morning fresh.’” Kramer beamed. “Know it?”
“No.”
“From Here to Eternity. Jones packs a hell of a lot into that first line. He tells you it’s summer, he tells you it’s morning, he tells you you’re on an Army post with a soldier who is obviously leaving for someplace, and he gives you a thumbnail description of his hero. That’s a good opening line.”
“Can we get back to Lucy Mitchell?” Hawes said impatiently.
“Certainly,” Kramer said, his enthusiasm unabated.
“What did she say about Sy Kramer?”
“She said he had once had the pictures, but she was now certain someone else had them.”
“Did she say why she was certain?”
“No.”
“And you’ve never seen these pictures?”
“Mr. Hawes, I veritably cut my way through a cheesecake jungle every day of th—” Kramer stopped, and his eyes lighted with inner fire. “Here’s one!” he said. “Here’s one I really enjoy.”
“Mr. Kramer…” Hawes tried, but Kramer was already gathering steam.
“The building presented a not unpleasant architectural scheme, the banks of wide windows reflecting golden sunlight, the browned weathered brick façade, the ivy clinging to the brick and framing the windows.”
“Mr. Kramer…”
“That’s from The Bl—”
“Mr. Kramer!”
“Sir?” Kramer said.
“Is there anything else you can tell me about Lucy Mitchell?”
“No,” Kramer said, seemingly a little miffed.
“Or Sy Kramer?”
“No.”
“But she did seem certain that someone else now had those pictures?”
“Yes, she did.”
“Had you ever met her before today?”
“Never.”
“Okay,” Hawes said. “Thank you very much, Mr. Kramer.”
“Not at all,” Kramer said. He shook hands with Hawes, and Hawes rose. “Come again,” Kramer said.
And then, as Hawes went through the opening in the partition, Kramer began quoting, “‘Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. It seemed to me I stood by the iron gate…’”
IT SEEMED TO HAWES that several things were obvious at this stage of the investigation.
To begin with, there was no doubt—and there had never been any—that Sy Kramer had been extorting five hundred dollars a month from Lucy Mencken. It was obvious, too, that Kramer extorted the money on the threat of releasing the cheesecake photos that had somehow come into his possession. Lucy Mencken had stated that her husband was a politician who would be running for the state senate in November. In the hands of the opposing party, or even in the hands of a newspaper campaigning against Charles Mencken, the photos could be used with deadly results. It was understandable why Lucy Mencken wanted to suppress them. She had come a long way from the farm girl who’d taken off her clothes for Jason Poole the photographer. Somewhere along the line, she’d married Charles Mencken, acquired an exurban estate, and become the mother of two children. Those pictures could threaten her husband’s senatorial chances and—if he, too, did not know about them—could even threaten the smooth fabric of her everyday existence.
There were thirty-six pictures, Patrick Blier had said.
The $500 payment came every month, as did the $300 payment from Edward Schlesser, and the $1,100 payment from a person or persons unknown. Whenever Schlesser had delivered his check, Kramer had in turn sent back another photostated copy of the letter. Schlesser had hoped the photostated copies would eventually run out. Perhaps he had not realized that it was possible to make a photostat of a photostat and that Kramer could conceivably have milked him for the rest of his life. Or perhaps he did realize it, and simply didn’t give a damn. According to what he’d said, he considered the extortion a bona fide business expense, like advertising.
But assuming that Kramer had followed a similar modus operandi with Lucy Mencken, could he not have mailed her a photo and negative each time he received her $500 check? Thirty-six negatives and prints at $500 a throw amounted to $18,000. It was conceivable that Kramer had hit upon this easy payment plan simply because $18,000 in one bite was pretty huge for the average person to swallow. Especially if that person is trying to keep something secret. You don’t just draw $18,000 from the bank and say you bought a few new dresses last week.
Then, too—in keeping with Kramer’s M.O.—could he not have been planning on a lifetime income? In the same way that he could have had a limitless number of copies of the letter to Schlesser, could he not also have had a limitless number of glossy prints—all capable of being reproduced in a newspaper—of the Mencken photos? And could he not, when the last negative was delivered, then say he had prints to sell at such and such a price per print?
Had Lucy Mencken realized this?
Had she killed Sy Kramer?
Perhaps.
And now there was a new aspect to the case. Lucy Mencken was certain that someone else had come into possession of the photos. She had undoubtedly learned this during the past few days, and the first thing she’d done was to visit Blier and then Kramer, the magazine editor. Did someone now hold those photos, and had this someone contacted Lucy in an attempt to pick up the extortion where it had ended with Sy Kramer’s death? And who was this someone?
And—if Lucy had caused the death of Sy Kramer—could not this new extortionist provoke a second murder?
Hawes nodded reflectively.
It seemed like the time to put a tap on Lucy Mencken’s phone.
THE MAN FROM THE telephone company was colored. He showed telephone-company credentials to Lucy Mencken when she opened the door for him. He told her they’d been having some trouble with her line and he might have to make minor repairs.
The man’s name was Arthur Brown, and he was a detective attached to the 87th Squad.
He put bugs on the three telephones in the house, carrying his lines across the back of the Mencken property, where they crossed the road and fed into a recorder in a supposed telephone-company shack on the other side of the road. The machine would begin recording automatically whenever any of the phones was lifted from its cradle. The machine would record incoming calls and outgoing calls indiscriminately. Calls to the butcher, calls from relatives and friends, angry calls, personal calls—all would be recorded faithfully and later listened to in the squadroom. None of the recorded information would be admissible as court evidence.