The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK™: 23 Classic Mystery Stories
- Автор: Деминг Ричард
- Год: 2016
- Язык: английский
- Год: Wildside Press
- ISBN: 9781479423507
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK™: 23 Classic Mystery Stories». Краткое содержание книги:
The bell captain, a trim, middle-aged man with an alert expression, said, “Evening, Mr. Ross. Hello, Lieutenant.”
“Take a look at this woman,” Ross said without preliminaries. “Ever see her before?”
The bell captain had already looked her over thoroughly as she approached. He nodded without hesitation.
“She’s been in and out of seven-o-seven all week,” he said. “So have a million other women, but I couldn’t forget this one. Not with those... uh... she’s an exceptionally good-looking girl, and I couldn’t help noticing her.”
The redhead said icily, “What’s this supposed to prove? Any law against ladies attending parties in this hotel?”
Ross grinned at her. “It proves this. You’re one of Big John Quinnel’s girl friends. One among dozens. Now let’s go upstairs and see Big John.”
Chapter 12
The door to suite seven-o-seven was cautiously opened by the sunburned man with the missing earlobe. When he saw Clancy Ross his face turned startled and his right hand darted toward his armpit. Then he saw Lieutenant Redfern behind Ross, and froze in that position, his hand halfway out of sight.
“Little jumpy, aren’t you, Horton?” the gambler asked dryly.
Redfern pushed forward then, shoving the door wide open so that the bodyguard had to step back to avoid getting it in the face. As the lieutenant strode inside, Horton looked sullenly from him to Ross, then spotted Renee Desiree still standing in the hall, and his expression turned wary.
Ross motioned the girl in, pushed the door shut and pointed after the lieutenant, who had stopped in the center of the room and was looking inquiringly at the closed doors on either side.
“Where’s Quinnel?” he asked the bodyguard.
Horton crossed to the door on the left and discreetly knocked on the panel. Renee Desiree seated herself in an easy chair. Ross and the lieutenant remained standing.
A heavy voice from within the other room called, “What the hell you want?”
“Lieutenant Redfern’s here,” Horton called back. “With Clancy Ross and some dame.”
There was the sound of creaking bedsprings, a lengthy silence, then the door opened. Big John Quinnel came out buttoning his coat. Under it he hadn’t bothered to button his shirt and he wore no tie. His oily hair was mussed and there was a streak of lipstick on one check.
After surveying the trio of visitors silently, he turned and growled back into the bedroom, “Hurry it up and scram. Looks like I got business.” Another few moments passed before a vivid blonde with a body nearly as interesting as Renee Desiree’s came from the bedroom. Her hair was a little mussed too, but apparently she had taken time to put her makeup in order. As she came into the room she was pulling a fur coat on over a flaming red evening gown.
With an embarrassed glance around, the blonde went straight to the door, pulled it open and then looked back at Quinnel.
“Call you tomorrow,” the big man said heavily.
As the door closed behind the blonde, Quinnel said to Larry Horton, “Get the other one out too.” The bodyguard crossed to the second door, opened it, looked in and crooked his finger. A lissome brunette, fully dressed including a fur coat, came out.
“Party’s over,” Horton said. The brunette didn’t look around embarrassedly as the blonde had. She walked out without a glance at anyone.
When the door had closed behind the second woman, Quinnel nodded to the lieutenant, barely flicked his eyes over Clancy Ross, then looked at the redhead without a sign of recognition.
“Pretty good act,” Ross commented. “But we already established downstairs that she’s been popping in and out of this place like a jack-in-the-box all week.”
The big man looked at the redhead again. “Has she?” he asked without interest. “So damn many dolls been in and out of here the past week, I wouldn’t recognize half of them.”
“You recognize this one,” Ross assured him. “She’s the one you paid to claim she saw Helene Stoneman shoot her husband.”
Chapter 13
Quinnel looked at the woman steadily and she said in an urgent voice, “He’s shooting at the moon, John. I didn’t even tell him I knew you. He got that from the bell captain.”
Without heat Quinnel said, “Clam up and stay that way.” Then he looked at Redfern. “What’s on your mind, Lieutenant? I don’t have to answer any questions by this tinhorn, but you got anything to ask, go ahead.”
Ross said, “I wasn’t planning on asking questions. Quinnel. I’m going to do all the talking.” He turned to the lieutenant. “Remember how Quinnel, his two bodyguards and three women all swore alibis for each other for the time of the shooting?”
Redfern nodded.
“This guy,” Ross said, pointing at Larry Morton, “walked out of the Rotunda not fifteen seconds ahead of Benny Stoneman. Sam Black can testify to that in court.”
Lieutenant Redfern scowled first at the sunburned man, then at Ross. “You waited a nice long time before dropping this bit of news.”
Big John Quinnel said suavely, “I guess we shouldn’t have held out on you, Lieutenant. It’s true Larry saw the shooting. But he couldn’t give any description of the killer except that she was a woman. He wouldn’t of been much help to you, and getting himself tied up as a murder witness would of loused up our whole vacation. I’ll admit we was wrong in rigging him an alibi, but it wasn’t because he had anything to do with the shooting. I just wanted him to keep his nose clean.”
Lieutenant Redfern’s face was like a thundercloud, but Ross held off the storm with an upraised palm. “You didn’t coach Horton well enough, Quinnel. He should never have admitted to me that he saw the woman.”
When the big man merely looked at him without expression, Ross said to the lieutenant, “Horton here is one of Quinnel’s personal bodyguards. If the woman he claims he saw kill Benny Stoneman was Helene Stoneman, he couldn’t have helped recognizing her the minute he saw her. She used to be his boss’s mistress. That’s why Stoneman moved here from Chicago. To break up the affair. Horton must have seen her dozens of times.”
Horton said uncertainly, “It was dark that night...” then clamped his jaw shut at a look from his employer.
“The motive for the killing was the one I first suggested to you, Lieutenant,” Ross went on cheerfully. “But Quinnel wanted a patsy to take the rap, because if the killing went unsolved, suspicion would point straight at him. He probably picked Helene Stoneman because he wanted to get her out of his hair anyway. Helene is the kind of gal who hangs on to a man long after he wants to shake her. Matter of fact she’s so persistent, she’s been to psychiatrists in an attempt to get herself cured of running after her lovers so hard. She was still chasing Quinnel the day after her husband died. I saw them come out of the bar downstairs together. Probably that’s when he planted the gun. He took her home that day, and it would have been simple to slip into the bedroom and plant it while Helene was in the kitchen mixing drinks, or repairing makeup in the bathroom.”
Quinnel snorted, “You’re talking through your hat,” and Redfern said dubiously, “The gun was registered to Stoneman.”
“With this guy’s influence in Chicago, he could get any record fixed,” Ross said. “All he had to do was pick up a phone. He practically runs the political machine up there.” While the lieutenant thought this over, Ross went on, “Every bit of evidence points to Quinnel ordering the killing and Horton pulling it. Five shots placed in a circle you could cover with your hand. No one but a professional gunnie is that good. Point two: Quinnel tried to have me bumped after I pounded an admission out of Horton that he’d seen a woman kill Benny. He wouldn’t bother to finger me just in revenge for bouncing around his bodyguard. He wanted me cut down because he’s smarter than Horton, and he knew the minute the story of Helene’s arrest came out, I’d recognize it as a frame because Horton should have been able to recognize her if she’d actually been the killer. Point three: Quinnel had a strong motive both for the kill and the frame-up. Point four: his gunnie was right on the scene and later rigged an alibi.”