Part 10 (1/2)
There, in the waiting-roo woman who frowned and asked: ”Where in the hell have you been at?”
Passing the man's reply was pitched too low for hi woether in a deserted end of the waiting-room, so that Alec Rush could not have approached the wo estured with the ugly, deft hands of a skilled reeable She was short, square, as if carved economically from a cube Consistently, her nose also was short and her chin square She had, on the whole, now that her earlier displeasure was passing, a nacious, rich-blooded face that advertised inexhaustible vitality That advertisement was in every feature, fro pose of her feet on the ce Her clothes were dark, quiet, expensive, but none too gracefully worn, hanging just the least bit bunchily here and there on her sturdy body
Nodding vigorously several tith tapped his cap-visor with two careless fingers and went out into the street Alec Rush let hi slowly out to the iron train-shed gates, along the woly man was behind her He was still behind her when she joined the four o'clock shopping crowd at Lexington Street
The young wo else on her mind In the second depart at a display of laces while heshoppers would perray-haired wo for soht of stairs
”hello, Alec!” she said when he touched her arm, and her humorous eyes actually looked with pleasure at his uncouth face ”What are you doing in my territory?”
”Got a booster for you,” he irl in blue at the lace counter Make her?” The store detective looked and nodded ”YesThanks, AlecYou're sure she's boosting, of course?” ”Now, Minnie!” he corowl ”Would I be giving you a bum rumble? She went south with a couple of silk pieces, and it's ot herself some lace by now” ”Um-hmm,” said Minnie ”Well, when she sticks her foot on the sidewalk, I'll be with her”
Alec Rush put his hand on the store detective's arain
”I want a line on her,” he said ”What do you say we tail her around and see what she's up to before we knock her over?”
”If it doesn't take all day,” the woirl in blue presently left the lace counter and the store, the detectives followed, into another store, ranging too far behind her to see any thieving she ht have done, content to keep her under surveillance From this last store their prey went down to where Pratt Street was dingiest, into a dingy three-story house of furnished flats
Two blocks away a police a corner
”Take a plant on the joint while Iget the copper,” Alex Rush ordered
When he returned with the police in the vestibule
”Second floor,” she said
Behind her the house's street door stood open to show a dark hallway and the foot of a tattered-carpeted flight of steps Into this disray cotton, saying whiningly as she came forward, ”What do you want? I keep a respectable house, I'll have you understand, and I -”
”Chunky, dark-eyed girl living here,” Alec Rush croaked ”Second floor Take us up”
The wo into startled lines, faded eyes wide, as ifthe harshness of the detective's voice for the harshness of great emotion
”Why - why - ” she stammered, and then reement - never to stand in the way of the police ”I'll take you up,” she agreed, and, hitching her wrinkled skirt in one hand, led the way up the stairs
Her sharp fingers tapped on a door near the head of the stairs
”Who's that?” a casually curt feirl in blue, without her hat now, opened the door Alec Rushfoot forward to hold it open, while the landlady said, ”This is her,” the police,” and Minnie said, ”Dearie, ant to coirl ”There'd be just as much sense to it if you'd all jumped out at me and yelled 'Boo!'”
”This ain't any way,” Alec Rush rasped, o in where we can talk it over”
Merely byhis loose-jointed bulk a step this way, a half-step that, turning his ugly face on this one and that one, he herded the little group as he wished, sending the landlady discontentedly away, irl's rooot no idea what this is all about,” said the girl when they were in her living-rooht with red without ever co with, and if you think this is a nice place to talk about whatever you want to talk about, go ahead! But if you're counting on , dearie,” Minnie said, leaning forward to pat the girl's ar? Is that the idea?”
”Yeah Exactly Uh-huh That's what” Alec Rush left her no doubt on the point
The girl narrowed her eyes, puckered her red ht withthe rap on ot nothing to say Take lyto beat you out of it But do you mind if I look around your place a little first?”
”Got anything with a judge's name on it that says you can?”
”No”
”Then you don't get a peep!”
Alec Rush chuckled, thrust his hands into his trouser pockets, and began to wander through the rooms, of which there were three Presently he caraph in a silver frairl
”Try and find out!”
”I a bum!” said she ”You couldn't find water in the ocean!”
Alec Rush laughed with coarse heartiness He could afford to The photograph in his hand was of Hubert Landow
Twilight was around the gray stone church when the owner of the deserted coupe returned to it The chunky girl - Polly Vanness was the naed in a cell in the Southwestern Police Station Quantities of stolen goods had been found in her flat Her harvest of that afternoon was still on her person when Minnie and a police matron searched her She had refused to talk The detective had said nothing to her about his knowledge of the photograph's subject, or of herht on either of these things
Having eaten his eveningback to his car, Alec Rush now drove out to Charles-Street Avenue Lights glowed normally in the Landow house when he passed it A little beyond it he turned his coupe so that it pointed toward the city, and brought it to rest in a tree-darkened curbside spot within sight of the house
The night went along and no one left or entered the Landow house ” '
Finger nails clicked on the coupe's glass door Acould be said of hie, and that to have escaped the detective's notice until now he must have stealthily stalked the car fro open
”Got a match?” the man asked
The detective hesitated, said, ”Yeah,” and held out a box
A e nose, high cheekbones: the young nition, when it was voiced, was voiced by the dark young ht it was you,” he said siarette ”Maybe you don't know me, but I knew you when you were on the force”