The Chinese Doll полностью

I walked across the street to Thompson’s for a cup of coffee. A little knot of gawkers stood in the window, watching the crowd in the street. The coffee tasted flat and lifeless; I said as much to Judy across the counter. She dismissed the complaint without batting a heavy eyelash.

“Same coffee we always have, dollink.”

Some of the people standing at the window began looking my way with silly questions written on their faces. I got out of there and went back to the office.

After a delay of several minutes the attorney came on the wire.

“It’s snowing here,” I said into the broken mouthpiece of the telephone after I had introduced myself by name and profession. In one brusque growl the attorney indicated he had never heard of me.

He snapped, “Are you spending money to tell me that? What of it? It’s also snowing here.”

“I’m not spending my money,” I informed him. “I’m spending yours. Didn’t the girl tell you I reversed the charges? Well, it’s snowing pretty hard here, but not enough to block vision. Not hard enough and fast enough to cover up the tire tracks before I saw them.”

“Are you crazy?” He was somewhat annoyed. “What tire tracks? What are you gibbering about?”

I pushed back in the chair and let him have it.

“I’m talking about the tracks of the tires of the car that killed Harry Evans a short while ago.”

That stopped his protestations like an abutment stops an automobile. I heard him suck in his breath and hold it, as a man does when he gets an unexpected blow around the belt.

When he spoke to me again it was in a vastly changed, curiously stark voice. He was frightened. Shocked, too, but frightened.

“Tell me about those tire tracks,” he said.

I did. “It’s snowing here,” I repeated for the effect and because he was paying the toll charges. “Evans left my office and started across the street in the middle of the block. It isn’t such a busy street, although it’s downtown. I think he was on his way back to the hotel.

“He didn’t get there. He had taken maybe five or six steps from the curb when this sedan smacked him down. A Studebaker sedan with a supercharger attachment on the hood. The sedan was traveling pretty fast for a snowy, downtown street. It didn’t try to stop before it hit him; it didn’t stop after it hit him.”

The attorney let out his breath. “Like that, eh?”

“Like that. After the car struck the body and had passed partly over it, the driver began to apply the brakes. Just began to apply them. A barest hesitation. And then the sedan picked up speed and disappeared. The tire marks told the story but the story isn’t there any more; it’s still snowing.”

“Do you think that... think that...?”

“Why not? It’s a reasonable guess. I’m sure.”

“You — are?”

“Yeah. Didn’t he tell you why he came to see me?”

“He did not. I didn’t know he had need of a detective. I knew only that he was there on business. I wondered how you knew to call me.”

“What is — I mean, what was his business?”

The attorney hesitated. Finally he said, “Stock and bonds, grains. He was an investment broker.”

“No doubt,” I shot back dryly. “And he gave me five hundred dollars to bail him out of jail because he was anticipating a market crash. What was his business?”

At first my only answer was a lengthy silence from the other end of the wire. I listened to see if the attorney was calling someone else, or had his hand over the mouthpiece, but he was still there, breathing into my ear. Finally I could hear him drumming on his desk, impatiently.

He said curtly, “I’m not at liberty to tell you.”

“All right. I’ll find out here.”

“Tell me,” he asked in an eager voice, “why did he hire you?”

I drummed on my desk and after a short pause said: “I’m not at liberty to tell you.” I wished I could have been watching his face, and at the same time I wondered if I had made a mistake in mentioning the bail and jail business.

He punctured the mutual silence with a, “Well?”

“Look, mister, I’ve got five hundred dollars I never had a chance to earn. It belongs to Evans. Do you want me to send it to you?”

“No.”

“I’m happy. Give me the word.”

“The word?”

“The go-ahead, certainly. You are his lawyer, aren’t you? You don’t want this glossed over and forgotten as just another hit-and-run case, do you? You do want me to look into it, don’t you?” High pressure salesmanship. I wanted to keep that five hundred.

“Oh... yes, yes. Certainly. By all means.” He ran the words together in a babbling effect. I wondered if he was hysterical. “Get right on it. Find out who did it. Find out—”

I cut in on him.

“Take it easy. I’ve already found out something. There was a little delay in getting through to you, so I checked with City Hall while I was waiting. The only thing they have so far is that it was a Studebaker sedan, driven by a girl.”

“A girl?”