Read Online The Case of the Murdered Muckraker by Carola Dunn - Free Book Online

what’s all this about you overhearing Carmody at your hotel? Where are you staying?”

    â€œThe Hotel Chelsea. It’s …”
    â€œFull of bohemians.” The sergeant did not appear thrilled by the prospect of having to interview the Chelsea’s residents.
    Daisy told them of the sounds of altercation she had heard through the walls. “The first time it was just one other man, I’m pretty sure. The second time there was a woman and another man.”
    Gilligan brightened. “So there’s a dame involved! That’s the answer, you betcha.”
    â€œBut you didn’t hear what they were saying?” Rosenblatt asked.
    â€œNot most of it. Then I went out onto the balcony for a breath of air. Carmody’s window was open.”
    Once again Rosencrantz and Guildenstern—Blast! Daisy had been trying so hard not to think of them like that. If she wasn’t careful she would address them as Hamlet’s friends. They might not recognize the reference, but it would not raise their low opinion of her wits— Rosenblatt and Gilligan leaned towards her.
    â€œI heard the woman call him by a rude name, and she said she would not return to him if he had a million dollars. And he said that if he made a million dollars, she still wouldn’t squeeze one …” Daisy hesitated. “I think she said ‘red cent.’”
    â€œThat just means a penny,” Lambert explained.
    â€œHe said she wouldn’t squeeze one out of him.”
    â€œBlackmail!” cried Gilligan. “Say, listen, this is how I figure it. This dame is Carmody’s frail, and she’s gotten the goods on him. She knows sumpin he done that if she told the right people, they could put pressure on him to stop
writing about them, and then kablooey goes his career. And they break up, see, and she finds this other guy and tells him, and they put on the screws.”
    Rosenblatt frowned. “Could be, but a blackmailer doesn’t usually kill his victim. It’s the other way around.”
    Gilligan was only momentarily taken aback. “O.K., so maybe it is the other way around.” He turned to Daisy. “You sure it was Carmody said that? About not a red cent?”
    â€œPretty sure. I heard him speak later, in the elevator and then down in the lobby. But there was some traffic noise, a tram—streetcar—going past.”
    â€œSo it coulda been the other guy. Carmody finds out sumpin about him. That’s his business, after all, digging up the dirt. Whatever it is, he figures it’s worth more to keep quiet than to sell it to the noospapers, so he puts the screws on this guy. And the dame’s this guy’s wife and she finds out and she leaves him, so that’s another count against Carmody!”
    â€œBut she left with the other man,” Daisy protested. “I saw them going down in the elevator together.” Then she recalled that while she had assumed the pair she saw had been in the room next door, she had no proof. The lift had stopped at her floor, but perhaps the woman in it had come from a higher floor.
    They had been standing much closer together than strangers would, though. Daisy was sure enough of her guess, and reluctant enough to admit that it was a guess, to let her statement stand.
    â€œSo the dame was talking to Carmody,” Gilligan reasoned. “She just found out he was a dirty blackmailing skunk, and she left with this other guy he was blackmailing.
It was him talking next, refusing to pay up. Now we just gotta find this dame, and she’ll lead us to the guy, and there’s our murderer.”
    â€œCould be,” Rosenblatt said with more enthusiasm. “In which case, there’s no federal angle.”
    â€œSo sonny boy here can run along home,” said Gilligan with a triumphant glare at Lambert.
    â€œI still have to keep an eye on Mrs. Fletcher,” Lambert said stubbornly. “Besides, Mr.