“Don’t worry about me,” I said, pretending a tad (okay, a lot) more courage than I felt. “I’ll be careful. And once Dan knows all the facts and recruits the rest of his department in a wider, more intense investigation, I’ll be off the case and in safe hands. In the meantime,” I added, feeling a serious surge of adrenaline (and a stupid gush of Brenda Starr bravado), “I’ve got a story to write.”
THE INSTANT I CLICKED OFF THE LINE WITH Sabrina, I dialed Jocelyn’s number at the Barbizon. I knew she wouldn’t be there-Sabrina had said she usually didn’t get home from her regular Friday night date until two or three in the morning-but I simply had to do something! I was desperate for more information-about O’Connor, Hogarth, Corona, and what went on at the Copa after I left-and Jocelyn was the only one who could provide it. I must’ve let her phone ring a thousand times.
By the time I hung up, I was feeling a bit more composed (i.e., less like a runaway train and more like a ticking time bomb). I was still crazy with worry about Dan, and dying to know how he got involved in the Virginia Pratt case, and struggling to think of a way to ensure his safety, but I was also determined to keep my emotions and actions under tight control-to stay locked in my apartment until I heard from him, just as he’d told me to do.
I rose from the couch and headed into the kitchen, grabbing my cigarettes out of my purse and a Dr. Pepper out of the fridge. Then I darted upstairs to my bedroom. Setting the soda and ciggies on my dresser, I wriggled out of Abby’s tight black dress and somehow freed myself from her horrid push-up bra. After peeling off my girdle and stockings, I put on a normal bra, a fuzzy white sweater, a pair of black capris, and my new ballerina flats.
It was almost one o’clock in the morning. I could have skipped the clothes and gone straight to bed, but with my tangled thoughts and jangled nerves, I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep. And if Dan came back, I reasoned, I should be decently dressed and fully alert and perfectly prepared to tell him everything I knew about the murder.
Plus, I wanted to get a head start on my story.
Giving my wig-matted hair a quick brush-out, I snatched the soda pop and cigarettes off the dresser and took them into the tiny spare bedroom I had turned into an office. I switched on the gooseneck lamp, sat down at my battered wood desk, and tuned my little white plastic radio to a popular all-night station (The Platters were singing “Only You”). Then I rolled two pieces of paper and a carbon into my baby blue Royal and began typing like a madwoman, making notes on everything that had happened to me since Wednesday morning (just two and a half days ago!), when I first read the reports of Virginia’s death and received the fateful phone call from Sabrina inviting me to lunch.
One empty Dr. Pepper bottle and an ashtray full of burned-out L &M filter tips later, I had produced a seventeen-page list of notes for my story-plus a carbon copy for Dan, which I figured he could use as a reference in his soon-to-be expanded investigation. I had also typed up a quick prologue to the based-on-fact “novel” I was determined to write about the murder, and-hurrying to get the details down while they were still fresh in my mind-written a few pages of chapter One. (To say that I was charged up would be like calling Jerry Lewis perky.)
It was three-fifteen in the morning. Nat “King” Cole was singing “When I Fall in Love” on the radio, and I was still aching to talk to Jocelyn, who, I figured, would be home from her date by now. Seizing my cigarettes and the carbon copy of my story notes, I turned off the lamp and the radio, bounded out of my office, and headed downstairs for the phone. Tossing the notes on the kitchen table as I scurried by, I leapt into the living room, scanned the lavender list for Jocelyn’s home number, snatched up the receiver, and dialed it.
There was no answer.
I clicked the button and dialed again.
Still no answer.
I slammed down the phone and darted to the living room window. Prying a peephole in the blinds, I peered down into the street, searching (and praying) for some sign of Dan. Both the sidewalks and the street were totally deserted. And as far as I could tell in the dim light from the streetlamp, all the parked cars were empty. Where was he? Was he okay? Would he come back tonight? Would he ever come back? Was he sleeping like a log in his Murray Hill apartment or-God help me!-floating like a log in the East River?
I whisked back to the phone and dialed Dan’s home number. No answer. I called him at the station house after that, but the officer manning the desk said he hadn’t been there all night and hadn’t called in to report his whereabouts. Skin crawling and nerves jumping, I got a new line and tried Jocelyn again. Even after eleven rings she didn’t pick up. Why didn’t she answer? Where the hell could she be?
The suspense was killing me. Literally. And as much as I truly wanted to follow Dan’s directions and stay locked inside my apartment, I couldn’t stand it for another second. Grabbing my jacket and red beret out of the closet and putting them on, I snatched my purse off the living room chair, burst out into the hall, and scrambled down the stairway to the street.
The sky was black, the air was cold, and the vacant street was dead quiet. Running as fast as I could toward Sixth Avenue, all I could hear were the loud huffs of my steamy breath and the scrapes and scuffs of my ballerina slipper soles against the pavement.
When I reached the corner of Bleecker and Sixth, however, I detected another sound. It was the rumbling engine of the Checker taxicab that was speeding uptown in my direction. Knowing the subway trains would be few and far between this time of night (I mean, morning), I pounced out into the avenue and flagged the cab down. Then I hopped inside, gave the driver an address, and told him to step on it.
Sixteen minutes later, we reached my destination: 140 East 63rd Street. I gave the driver two dollars (the meter fare plus a thirty cent tip), jumped out of the taxi onto the sidewalk, and lunged like a beheaded chicken into the lobby of the Barbizon Hotel for Women.
Chapter 33
THE SMALL, DIM, ART DECO LOBBY HAD A sickly, greenish cast. Whether it was because of the early morning gloom or the faded colors of the walls and aging furniture, I couldn’t tell. Luckily, a garish orange Tiffany lamp was glowing at the reception desk, or I might not have been able to find it.
The man sitting behind the desk was large, bald, and dressed in a rumpled brown suit that looked as old as the furniture. He was also sound asleep. His head was lolling against the back of his chair, and his mouth was hanging wide open. He was snoring loudly.
“Excuse me,” I said, knocking my knuckles on the ornate wooden desk to rouse him. “I’m here to see one of your residents. Can you help me?”
The man started, snorted, and shot up straight in his chair. Rubbing his doughy, pink face with his nail-bitten fingers, he shook himself awake and aimed his unseeing gaze in my direction. “Umph! Wha-? What did you say?”
“I’m here to see one of your residents,” I repeated. “Jocelyn Fritz. Is she in?”
“Fritz…? Uh, yeah,” he mumbled, clearing his throat and turning to look at the clock on the wall behind him. “She came in a while ago. But it’s kinda late to be gettin’ visitors now, ya know.” He swiped his hand over his hairless noggin and eyed me suspiciously. “Is she expectin’ you?”
“No, but she’ll be glad to see me. Would you be kind enough to ring her suite and tell her Paige Turner is here?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah… sure,” he said, picking up the phone and dialing three numbers. While he was waiting for Jocelyn to answer, he gave me another distrustful look. “Paige Turner, huh? That a trick name or somethin’?”