“At my hotel.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
The woman smiled for the first time since she had entered the office. A nervous, worried smile.
“Maybe I’ll make it after all,” she said.
“You’ll be on the Chief when it leaves tomorrow morning,” O’Neill said. “That’s a promise.”
Chapter II
The girl’s hotel was the Metropolitan, about a half dozen blocks from O’Neill’s office. They drove there in a cab.
The girl got her key from the desk and they rode up to her room, which was on the eleventh floor. They were alone in the car.
The elevator operator, a fresh faced young kid, in a neat blue and gold uniform with a discharge button on the lapel glanced down at the girl’s black, ankle-strap sandals and let his gaze wander slowly up to her blonde hair. His eyes stopped there briefly, then went on innocently to the ceiling. He began to whistle soundlessly.
The car came to a soft stop at eleven, the doors opened silently.
The elevator boy grinned at O’Neill, a we’re-a-couple-of-men-of-the-world grin.
O’Neill said, “Control your imagination. I’m going to help her put down a rug.”
He followed the girl down a quiet carpeted hallway to room 1124. The girl opened the door with her key, went in and snapped on the light. 1124 was a suite, with a small living room, a bedroom and bath.
“Mind if I look around?” O’Neill asked.
“Please go ahead. I’ll fix a drink. Do you like it with or without?”
“Without,” O’Neill said. “And a little of the with on the side.”
He took off his hat and walked into the bedroom. There were two windows, opening on a fire escape. There were tan curtains, wooly looking drapes. Both windows were locked. The vanity was three-mirrored and on its top were several bottles of perfume, a nail kit in a leather case with the initials E. M. stamped on it in gold, a jar of cold cream and a long silver compact.
He looked at himself in the mirror, caught a glimpse of his profile and decided he didn’t like it. He smoothed his hair down and went into the bathroom.
There was a shower there, inclosed in a glass closet, a small radiator that wasn’t turned on, and no window. A pair of nylon stockings hung on a rack behind the door.
He went back to the living room. It was carpeted in gray and the furniture had the smooth, unused look of most hotel furniture. There were two windows from which he got a good look at the Loop. They were also locked.
He took off his coat, tossed it on a chair.
“Sit over here,” Estelle Moran said.
She was sitting on a small sofa before the fireplace. The sofa was covered with something that looked stiff and there was no fire. She had poured two drinks and set them on a shiny coffee table in front of the sofa.
O’Neill sat down beside her and twisted sideways enough to look at her. It was worth the effort. She had taken off the hat and veil. Her face was oval but the way her hair swept back from her temples gave it a pointed, interesting look. The hair was dramatic and while the blonde luster was phony, it was the kind of phoniness that took about eight hours of somebody’s time to create. It swept back in a kind of winged effect from her temples and then curled into a thick long pageboy. Her eyes were light blue with startlingly clear irises. The purple shadows under them, O’Neill decided, was half make-up and half worry. Or something else.
She had crossed her beautiful legs in a way that displayed them to the best advantage. And the slight twist of her body did a lot of interesting things to her hips and waist and breasts. O’Neill wondered if the room was getting a little warmer. He looked at her again and decided it wasn’t the room.
She was looking at him, her crimson mouth parted a little.
“Bernie told me about you,” she said, “but he didn’t mention those shoulders.”
“Yous are nice too,” O’Neill said. “But let’s leave sex out of this. Who do you think is trying to kill you?”
“It doesn’t seem important now that you’re here,” she said. “I don’t mean just that. I mean I feel safe. I know you’ll take care of me.”
She picked up one of the drinks, a stiff one, and handed it to O’Neill. Their finger touched briefly. It might have been accidentally.
O’Neill drank his drink. It tasted almost as good as the liquor ads claimed. Strong, smooth and smoky. The girl took the glass, refilled it and handed it back.
“You’re not drinking,” he said.
She picked up her drink, smiled slowly. “Now I am.”
“Then let’s talk,” O’Neill said. “You like my shoulders, I like your liquor. We’re doing fine. Let’s try again. Who’s trying to kill you?”
The girl sipped her drink, then made a despairing little gesture with her hand. There was a frightened, tense look in back of her clear eyes.
“I’m not sure,” she said. “They tried twice. Once in New York, and then when I started here they tried again. A car tailed my cab in New York one night for almost a mile. I told the driver to lose him but he couldn’t. This was about two in the morning. We were on Riverside Drive, at about a hundred and seventeenth street when they pulled alongside. There were three men in the car, it was a black Packard. They swerved into us and the driver had to pull aside to avoid a collision. We crashed into a fire plug and tipped over. The Packard kept going.”
“Were you hurt?” O’Neill asked.
“No, I was lucky, I guess.”
“What happened the next time?”
The girl reached for O’Neill’s glass. He was mildly surprised to find it empty. She filled it, handed it back, then took a sip from her own.
“The next time was in Pittsburgh. I left New York for the Coast, but I thought a man was following me on the train. At Pittsburgh I got off. It was about two in the morning. I don’t think anyone saw me. But that morning about six someone tried to get into my hotel room. I heard someone at the door, trying the knob. I got up and turned the lights on. I hadn’t double-locked the door, but I did then. I snapped the second lock on and then stood at the door listening. A few minutes later I heard someone walk away from the door. I waited about five minutes, then I opened the door. The corridor was empty.”
“Did you talk to the elevator men?” O’Neill asked.
“Yes. One of them remembered bringing a man up to my floor around five thirty or a quarter to six. He described him to me, but it didn’t sound like anyone I ever knew.”
“Who has any reason to want you dead?” O’Neill asked.
“I don’t know,” the girl said. “Unless—” She stopped and looked at the glass in her hand. “How much do you know about Bernie, Mr. O’Neill?”
“Bernie Arhoff? Just the usual talk. That he’s got a stack of cash salted away somewhere. That he took the rap and didn’t drag anybody else into trouble. Why?”
“That’s about all there is to know. Naturally there are a lot of people interested in the money. One of them is Eddie Shapiro, Bernie’s partner. Do you know him?”
O’Neill said, “Just barely. I’ve met him, talked to him a few times, but I wouldn’t say I know him. Why? Do you think he’s trying to kill you?”
“Yes, I do,” the girl said. She said it quietly, without any particular emphasis.
“Why?” O’Neill asked.
“I don’t know. But I’m sure of it.” O’Neill tried to recall what he knew of Eddie Shapiro. Shapiro was a small dark man with a passion for gaudy clothes and a scarred face. He was reputed to be smart, hard and dangerous. He had been Arhoff’s partner for several years and it was generally understood that if Arhoff had talked Shapiro would have taken a trip also. But Arhoff hadn’t talked and Shapiro was still in business. And still smart, hard and dangerous. That was all O’Neill knew about him.