BUtterfield 8 (29 page)

“No, I wouldn’t say it was.”

“That’s what I think. There’s something screwy about this whole thing. I’ve read enough detective stories to know that a young girl, pretty and all that, she doesn’t pack her bag the way Gloria did just to knock herself off. That was a love trip, if you don’t mind my saying so. One more question, Mr. Brunner.”

“You said that a minute ago.”

“This is important. I just want to show you I’m not a complete dope. Have you been in communication with the family since yesterday?”

“No. I tried to get them by phone but they wouldn’t answer. I guess the phone—”

“Has been disconnected. I thought you’d say that. And so has yours been disconnected. And you weren’t out to get a paper today. So how do you know about this?”

“Say, you’re not trying to—”

“Just giving you a sample of what you’ll get from the boys and girls on the tabloids. Multiplied by fifty and you have an idea.”

“Well, my phone isn’t disconnected, so you’re wrong.”

“Yes, and you’re lying. Oh, don’t worry. I don’t think you did it. Come on, I’ll take you away from the wolves.”

“Will they really break open the apartment?”

“Oh, probably not. I’m just taking you uptown as a friendly act. They aren’t interested in you as much as in some elderly guy. That’s all I know about him, and that’s all they know. He was part of her past. A very big part, I should say. Coming?”

“All right.”

“I’ll buy you a drink. Jesus, guy, you don’t think I like this, do you? Have you heard any of the new Louis Armstrong records?”

“No new ones. What ever happened to the little dame you had that played the piano?”

“Married. That’s what we all ought to do. You too.”

“I’m going to.”

“I have a novel almost finished. As soon as I finish it and get the dough and stay on the wagon three months. You better lock your windows just in case.”

“I’m preparing a paper on New York newspapers,” said Joab Ellery Reddington. “Will you reserve a copy of all the papers for me every day?”

“Yes, sir. We don’t get them all, but I can order them for you if you tell me how long you’ll want them.”

“A month. Shall I pay you every day?”

“That’ll be all right,” said the newsdealer.

And so every afternoon Dr. Reddington would go from his office in the high school building, down to the railroad station, and back to his office. He would open each paper so that the financial page was on the outside, and he would sit and read every word about the Wandrous case. With fear and trembling he watched the beginning, the growth, and the decline in references to an older man, a middle-aged man, an elderly man. Dr. Reddington still had in cash the money he was going to pay Gloria for her promise never to mention his name, and he carried this money with him all the time. He never knew when he was going to have to use it. He did not know where he would go, but he would go somewhere. Then one, then two, then all the papers described the man. A Major in the Ordnance Department during the War, whose name police refused to divulge. The police were good and sick of the case and only kept it open because one of the tabloids would not let it die down. The police said they only wanted the Major for questioning.

Then one day the police announced that the Major had died in 1925 of a heart attack on a train between St. Louis and Chicago. The body had been cremated and the urn reposed in a Chicago funeral home. After that Dr. Reddington continued to read the New York papers, but there were no more references to an elderly man, and in late August the doctor stopped the papers and joined his family, who were vacationing in New Hampshire. The Reddingtons always went to a hotel where the women guests were not permitted to smoke.