“When he opened the door and saw who it was he tried to shut it again, but I pushed my way in and belted him one. He wasn’t wearing the gun and holster, of course, because he was off duty, but he was a long way from being a pushover. He was a little heavier than I am, and he could really punch. We made a hell of a mess out of his living room. The apartment-house manager started pounding on the door and saying he was going to call the police. We were both pretty well banged up and winded after about five minutes of it. When I went out Stedman was on his knees in the middle of the living room trying to get up, and I wasn’t in much better shape myself. I was groggy from some of the punches I’d taken, and I had blood on my hands and clothes from some of the cuts I’d opened on his face. The manager was gone from the hallway, but I met two tenants who knew me, at least by sight. I went back to the Sidelines, but before I got there I heard the siren and saw the police cruiser pull up in front of the Wakefield. At the bar, I went on through to the washroom to clean up. It took three or four minutes to get the blood off and straighten out my clothes, and then I heard some cops come in the front looking for me. I ducked out the back way into the alley. I didn’t want to spend the night in jail and take a chance on missing my ship in the morning. I figured that by the time I got back from the next trip it’d have blown over and at the most I’d just have to go in and pay a fine. It was starting to rain by then. I ducked into a movie.
“It was around one in the morning when I came out I called the Sidelines and asked Red Lanigan if the dust had settled enough so I could come back and have a drink, and that’s when the roof started to fall in. He pretended I was somebody else and said Stedman had died of a knife wound and that the police were taking the city apart trying to find a sailor named Foley. I thought he was kidding, but before I could say anything else he hung up on me. I called Stedman’s apartment. A man answered without saying who he was, and it wasn’t Stedman’s voice at all. It still didn’t make any sense, but I was beginning to be scared. I flagged a cab, thinking I’d ride by the apartment house and see if there were police cars in front of it. But the driver kept watching me in his mirror. At first I thought it was because of the shiner and the bruises on my face, but then I began to wonder. Maybe the police had broadcast my description. I paid him off and got out, high-tailed it in the other direction, and ducked into an alley, and in less than two minutes the corner where I’d got out was surrounded with police cars. I guess I lost my head completely then. They almost got me twice in the next hour, and the last time was near the railroad yards. I lost them in the dark and the rain. Then I saw a freight pulling out. I ran and got aboard and climbed down into a gondola.”
She shook her head. “That’s probably the most fantastic story I ever heard.”
”Right,” I said. “So I ought to give myself up and try it on them for laughs?”
“There wasn’t any knife involved in the fight? And you didn’t see one?”
“No,” I said.
“And he was on his knees, still alive, when you went out?”
“That’s right. He might have had just a shade the worst of the fight, but he wasn’t badly hurt, any more than I was. He was a pretty tough boy.”
“Did you close the door when you went out?”
“I suppose so. I was pretty groggy, but it would be the natural thing to do.”
She nodded. “You say the manager was gone, presumably to call the police, but there were other people in the corridor?”
“That’s right. There was a woman about half out of the doorway of the next apartment. She’d probably already called the police. At least, according to the radio news I heard, it was somebody next door. I don’t know what her name was, but I knew her by sight, and I suppose she knew me. She ducked back when she saw me come out of Stedman’s door. And then I met another tenant on the stairs—”’
She gestured with the cigarette. “That’s not what I mean. Apparently there’s no question of identification. But when -you came out, this woman couldn’t have seen into his living room? And verified that he was still alive?’
“Not a chance,” I said. “She was in her own doorway, on the same side of the corridor.”
“And how long do you suppose it was from the time you left and the police got there and found him dead?
“I don’t know.” I said. “Somewhere between three and five minutes, probably. I walked down a flight of stairs and out the front of the building, and I was about a block away when the cruiser pulled up at the entrance. They had to find out which apartment, and then force the door—”
“How do you know they had to force it?”
“That’s what the radio said.”
She nodded. “Then you must have closed it, and it was self-locking.”
”Probably. Unless he closed it, or somebody else went in or out after I did.”
“No,” she said. “That woman wouldn’t have given up her ring-side seat. She’d have stayed right there watching the hall until the police arrived. If anybody else had gone in or out, she’d have said so.”
“Then there had to be somebody else already in the apartment when I got there.”
“How would he get out?”
“Through the kitchen and down the back stairway that leads to the garage in the basement. There’s an exit to the alley on the ground floor.”
“Hmmm,” she said. “But you didn’t see anybody else in the apartment:”
“No. But I was only in the living room.”
“You didn’t see a coat, wrap, hat, or a purse, or anything?”
“No. I wouldn’t have noticed, though, if there had been one. I was boiling, and all I saw was Stedman.”
“If there were somebody there, why would he suddenly decide to kill Stedman? Presumably, it would be a friend or acquaintance.”
“Or one of his girl friends. I don’t know. All I know is that he was all right when I went out of the room, and less than five minutes later he was dead.”
“Do you think anybody will ever believe it?”
“Of course not. Why do you think I ran?”
“It does have one thing in its favor,” she said. “It’s stupid enough to be true. Anybody could make up a better story.”
I shrugged and got up to prowl restlessly around the room. Light was fading now inside the house. I turned, and her eyes were on me. This time she didn’t look away. She shook her head musingly.
“I keep trying to decide whether you look more like a Roman gladiator,” she said, “or some raffish medieval monk who got caught in the wrong bedroom.”
“Well, my clothes will be dry in a little while.”
“Oh, I don’t mind. It’s a fascinating combination—a cassock and a black eye.”
There was something provocative in her tone, and when I turned quickly to look at her I saw the same thing in her eyes. I walked over beside her. She moved over almost imperceptibly, and I sat down on the edge of the chaise.
“Can’t we have a fire?” she asked teasingly.
“No.”
“Think how cozy it would be,” She smiled. “An open fire and the sound of the rain.”
“And the police kicking in the doors.”
“Maybe I’d send them away.”
“Sure you would,” I said.
“You don’t think so?” She ran a finger gently along the bruise on my jaw. “Does that hurt?”
“No,” I said. I kissed her. Her lips parted and her arms tightened fiercely around my neck. Then she was whispering against my mouth. “It’s the way you look in that garment. I haven’t been able to keep my eyes off you.”
I kissed her again. She made a little whining sound in her throat, but then she twisted away from me and stood up. Her face was flushed and her breathing ragged as she eluded my hands and ran toward the next room. I caught her beside the bed.