Read Online 1 The Hollywood Detective by Martha Steinway - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Martha Steinway
Ads: Link
far as two.
“And they agreed to speak to you? Let you see their patients and corpse? Just some strange dame who walked in off the street?”
“Naturally I showed them your card. That seemed to suffice.” She pulled one of my calling cards from her purse and waved it at me.
I snatched it out of her hand. Beneath my name she had written: “Associate, Rose Randall”.
“Jeez, will you quit? I can’t have you steaming into places, letting them think you’re some kind of… lady P.I., goddammit.” I got to my feet and started pacing the room.
“But they were quite happy to speak to me.”
“That is not the point!”
She started relaying what she’d discovered at the hospitals but I was too het up to listen to her.
I stopped pacing.
“This isn’t going to work out,” I told her. “I need you to leave. Right now.”
“Oh come on, Spencer. Don’t overreact. Don’t get mad at me for showing some initiative. There’s a girl missing and you expect me to do nothing?”
“I expect you to file.” I shook my head. “And answer the phone when it rings. Take messages.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Keep the place clean and tidy. You know—what a secretary is supposed to do!” I banged a fist against the file cabinet. “Dammit, Red, you don’t work with me, you work for me. There’s a big difference. I need someone who’ll stay in the office.”
“Yes—I think you’ve made that quite clear.”
“Obviously I’ll pay you for today but—”
She turned away and grabbed her purse from the desk. “Don’t insult me with your money. I wouldn’t take it if I were hungry and homeless.” She picked up her hat from the coat stand and marched toward the door.
I bit my lip. I’d done nothing I needed to apologize for. So why was she making me feel as if I should? She opened the door and hesitated for a moment on the threshold. “Good day, Mr McCoy.” And with that, she left.
I listened as her heels clicked and clacked their way down the stairs. I heard her open the door onto the street and listened as the traffic noise rose up with stairwell. Then I heard the door slam shut behind her.
Probably for the best, I told myself. I mean, I really couldn’t have some broad who didn’t know the first thing about investigations setting off fires all over town. Fires that I’d have to put out. I guess I shouldn’t have let her walk out like that, but she had wound me up so tight that telling her to leave felt like the only option I had. I just knew I should have been a bit nicer about it.
Annoyed at myself, I turned to the pieces of paper Red had left on my desk. She’d made meticulous notes of her conversations with every hospital admittance officer in the county. She’d listed the name of every female patient between the age of fifteen and thirty who’d been admitted between ten o’clock on Sunday, when Benny Bowers had said they’d arrived at Powell’s place, and ten o’clock the following night. Where the information had been recorded by hospital staff, Red had even bothered to add the names of the people accompanying the sick and injured girls. I couldn’t accuse her of not being thorough. I was left with a whole heap of names on my desk, names of girls that meant nothing to me. I sifted through the sheets and found the guest list from the party. It took me a while to realize that Red had cross-referenced all the names from the hospitals with the ones on the guest list.
It seemed she’d found a match.
She’d circled just one name on the list: Eddie Mannix.
13
The next morning, I arrived at the office just after nine. I heard the phone ringing from downstairs as I opened the door, so I rushed up to the second floor in double time, in the hope of answering before the caller rang off. I reached the office and fumbled with the keys, unlocked the door and dashed over to my desk.
“Spencer McCoy,” I said, trying not to pant too heavily into the mouthpiece.
“Hello Spencer,
“And they agreed to speak to you? Let you see their patients and corpse? Just some strange dame who walked in off the street?”
“Naturally I showed them your card. That seemed to suffice.” She pulled one of my calling cards from her purse and waved it at me.
I snatched it out of her hand. Beneath my name she had written: “Associate, Rose Randall”.
“Jeez, will you quit? I can’t have you steaming into places, letting them think you’re some kind of… lady P.I., goddammit.” I got to my feet and started pacing the room.
“But they were quite happy to speak to me.”
“That is not the point!”
She started relaying what she’d discovered at the hospitals but I was too het up to listen to her.
I stopped pacing.
“This isn’t going to work out,” I told her. “I need you to leave. Right now.”
“Oh come on, Spencer. Don’t overreact. Don’t get mad at me for showing some initiative. There’s a girl missing and you expect me to do nothing?”
“I expect you to file.” I shook my head. “And answer the phone when it rings. Take messages.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Keep the place clean and tidy. You know—what a secretary is supposed to do!” I banged a fist against the file cabinet. “Dammit, Red, you don’t work with me, you work for me. There’s a big difference. I need someone who’ll stay in the office.”
“Yes—I think you’ve made that quite clear.”
“Obviously I’ll pay you for today but—”
She turned away and grabbed her purse from the desk. “Don’t insult me with your money. I wouldn’t take it if I were hungry and homeless.” She picked up her hat from the coat stand and marched toward the door.
I bit my lip. I’d done nothing I needed to apologize for. So why was she making me feel as if I should? She opened the door and hesitated for a moment on the threshold. “Good day, Mr McCoy.” And with that, she left.
I listened as her heels clicked and clacked their way down the stairs. I heard her open the door onto the street and listened as the traffic noise rose up with stairwell. Then I heard the door slam shut behind her.
Probably for the best, I told myself. I mean, I really couldn’t have some broad who didn’t know the first thing about investigations setting off fires all over town. Fires that I’d have to put out. I guess I shouldn’t have let her walk out like that, but she had wound me up so tight that telling her to leave felt like the only option I had. I just knew I should have been a bit nicer about it.
Annoyed at myself, I turned to the pieces of paper Red had left on my desk. She’d made meticulous notes of her conversations with every hospital admittance officer in the county. She’d listed the name of every female patient between the age of fifteen and thirty who’d been admitted between ten o’clock on Sunday, when Benny Bowers had said they’d arrived at Powell’s place, and ten o’clock the following night. Where the information had been recorded by hospital staff, Red had even bothered to add the names of the people accompanying the sick and injured girls. I couldn’t accuse her of not being thorough. I was left with a whole heap of names on my desk, names of girls that meant nothing to me. I sifted through the sheets and found the guest list from the party. It took me a while to realize that Red had cross-referenced all the names from the hospitals with the ones on the guest list.
It seemed she’d found a match.
She’d circled just one name on the list: Eddie Mannix.
13
The next morning, I arrived at the office just after nine. I heard the phone ringing from downstairs as I opened the door, so I rushed up to the second floor in double time, in the hope of answering before the caller rang off. I reached the office and fumbled with the keys, unlocked the door and dashed over to my desk.
“Spencer McCoy,” I said, trying not to pant too heavily into the mouthpiece.
“Hello Spencer,
Similar Books
