Chapter Four
The conductor was sympathetic, overworked, and immersed in so many troubles that the death was merely one more straw on an overloaded camel’s back. They found a vacant drawing room into which they could move the body temporarily and then, some time later, unloaded it at Indio.
The passengers gathered in morbid little groups, huddled against the terror of a death which had appeared in their midst, very much as young chickens scuttle for safety at the threatening shadow of an approaching hawk.
Hazel Deering seemed particularly influenced by what had happened. She kept very much to herself, staring moodily out of the window at the gray monotony of the desert as it clicked by.
My genial, paunchy friend, on the other hand, became even more talkative, made it a point to accost me when I entered the men’s room.
“Tragic, wasn’t it?” he asked.
“Very.”
“Beautiful, young girl. Noticed her particularly at dinner last night.”
“Did you?”
“You weren’t aboard the train last night, were you?”
“No.”
“Got on sometime during the night?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Tucson.”
He chuckled. “Lucky thing for us it wasn’t a violent death.”
“Why?”
“Because you and I were the first up this morning. Everyone else was sleeping. You know, ample opportunity and all that. Damned nuisance to be questioned by the police.”
“It was a natural death?” I asked.
“Apparently. Heart failure or something.” He pushed his hand out at me. “Name’s Rendon,” he said, “Herb Rendon. Real estate.”
I shook hands gravely. “Glad to meet you, Herb.”
“What did you say your name was?”
“Sabin.”
“Los Angeles?”
“San Francisco mostly.”
“Terribly tragic. Can’t get over it. Keep thinking about it. Lucky for us it was a natural death. Hate to be questioned by the police, myself,” he said, shaking his head solemnly.
“I can imagine it might well raise the devil with a man’s plans,” I said, and escaped back to the silent companionship of Hazel Deering.
The last part of the trip seemed interminable as the long line of tired Pullmans snaked its way through the pass between San Gorgonio and San Jacinto.
Then, almost immediately, the character of the country changed. The train picked up speed as it started on the long down slope toward Los Angeles. The desert gave way to well-kept orange groves where golden fruit and snowy blossoms splotched against the dark green of glossy leaves, with snowcapped mountains seeming to hang suspended in the blue distance like well-rounded dishes of celestial ice cream.
When we were pulling into Los Angeles, I managed to avoid both Hazel Deering and Herb Rendon by moving up three cars. I caught the Lark for San Francisco that night. And, after a leisurely breakfast, strolled into the Golden Lotus Petal for my appointment with Ngat T’oy.
I wasn’t certain whether Ngat T’oy would read of Betty Crofath’s death in the paper, but when Betty Crofath failed to register at the Pelton Hotel, that would be Ngat T’oy’s signal to meet me at the Chinese restaurant. So I ordered a bowl of tea and some of the bent rice fortune cakes and settled back to a period of waiting, knowing that Ngat T’oy would be right on the minute.
But Ngat T’oy wasn’t right on the minute. I frowned at my watch as she became five minutes, then ten minutes late. Surely something was wrong.
I waited anxiously for another five minutes. Then I thought for the first time to send a boy out to a stand where I knew he could get a Los Angeles paper.
It took me a few minutes search to find what I wanted. I located it on a third page under the heading “TRAIN DEATH MAY BE SUICIDE.”
From this account, I learned that the death of a young woman found in a Pullman train between Tucson and Indio had apparently been caused by an overdose of sleeping tablets. The body had been tentatively identified as that of a Miss Daphne Strate of New Orleans.
Miss Strate had, it seemed, left New Orleans rather hurriedly and under somewhat suspicious circumstances. She had been employed as secretary for a wholesale chemical company. The manager of her department had admitted to police that Miss Strate had left there without any notice whatever. More than that, he declined to say. He did state, however, that it came as a distinct surprise to him to learn that she had taken a west-bound train. Other employes in the office had remembered that, for a few days, Miss Strate had seemed rather moody and preoccupied.
I rushed through the few paragraphs in the newspaper, then made a dash for the Pelton Hotel.
“You have a Miss Crofath registered here?” I asked.
“Yes, in 309. Shall I ring?”
“She’s expecting me,” I said. “Tell her Mr. Smith is on his way up.”
I left the elevator, walked down the third floor, tapped on the door of 309.
“Who is it, please?” a woman’s voice asked.
“Smith,” I said, keeping my voice low and guttural.
Hazel Deering opened the door and then recoiled with a gasp of startled surprise as she saw me standing there.
“Good morning,” I said, and moved on past her into the room.
She moved back to let me by, leaving the door swinging wide open, her eyes, wide with consternation, following my every move. There was no sign of Ngat T’oy in the place. A small trunk was in the middle of the room, a suitcase on a baggage stand.
“Close the door,” I said.
She hesitated a moment then closed the door.
“All right, Hazel, why did you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Kill Betty Crofath.”
“Kill her!” she exclaimed. “I kill her? You’re crazy. I’m Betty Crofath!”
“Then why the Hazel Deering?”
“It’s a name I took so I wouldn’t be annoyed while I was traveling.”
“Let’s see your driver’s license.”
“I don’t have to.”
I simply stood, waiting, exerting silent pressure on her.
She hesitated a moment, then went to her purse, opened it with hands that were trembling, took out a driving license and handed it to me with an air of proud defiance.
The description fit. Betty Crofath, age twenty-seven, height five feet four and a-half, weight a hundred and thirteen pounds, eyes blue, hair light.
I said, “All right, so you’re Betty Crofath. You pulled a slick dodge. Now, what do you want?”
“What do you want? Why did you come here?”
“On business.”
“What sort of business?”
I kept my back to the door, trying to hurry through this before Ngat T’oy’s knock would complicate the situation. “You came here to meet someone, didn’t you?” I asked.
“What if I did?”
“I’m the person you were to meet.”
“You can’t be.”
“I am to take you to that person.”
“You’ll have to show me.”
“Okay, but first I’ll need something more than this,” and I indicated the driving license I was still holding.
“You will! I’m the one to be shown.”
I merely smiled.
She said, “You’ve had some preliminary contact with me. Tell me just what it was. Describe all the details.”
I kept smiling and let it go at that.
“What’s wrong with that?” she asked.
“Everything.”
“Tell me one thing that’s wrong with it,” she insisted.
“It won’t work.”
“That’s what I was afraid of. You aren’t the proper person for me to talk to. You’re simply — simply chiseling, simply homing in on this thing. You... you followed me here to this hotel. You met me on the train and followed me.”