As he opened the door to the lobby he muttered to himself, “Well, you promised Mother you’d have a white-collar job,” and closed the door quietly.
Novak’s heels clicked across lobby marble as he walked toward the hotel exit. Beside him Jimmy Grant materialized. “Gee, Pete, what a dish that Miss Norton, huh?”
“Sure is. Now get the gleam out of your eyes, sonny.”
“New luggage, Pete. Had that store smell. And heavy. Boy, them bags musta had a dozen gold ingots apiece.”
“Legit?”
The hop shrugged. “Could be. No ring and not a society broad.”
“Why not?”
“She slipped me two bucks. Them’s that really got it don’t paper the streets with the stuff. Not this year.”
Novak tapped his cheek lightly. “You might make an investigator at that.”
Jimmy grinned. “Boy, did you look funny holding that pup she shoved at you. I didn’t hear no fast comeback, neither.”
“There’s a time for throwaway dialogue and a time to hold silence. That’s life, kiddo.” He moved on and out to the sidewalk. He turned down K Street, bought a Star from the kid on the corner and flagged a passing cab.
Between courses at the ristorante italiano out on New York Avenue he thumbed through the evening paper. Mama brought over a chianti bottle wrapped in straw and said, “I like you to try, Pete. Just offa the boat.”
“I don’t go much for wine, Mama. Been kicked in the belly too much.”
“Si, but this different.” Uncorking it she filled a small glass, poured another for herself. It had the thin clear taste of good red house wine. Novak said so. Mama smiled. “Beats anything French, Pete. Here, you keep the bottle.”
“Some other night, Mama.”
“Okay.” She corked it. “This your bottle, remember.”
“I’ll remember.”
“And bring a girl.” Her eyebrows furrowed. “Alla time you come alone. Why you never bring girl? Food not good enough?”
Novak managed a laugh. “Hell, it’s the best food in town. A girl? I had a girl once. Maybe once was enough.”
Mama frowned. Her lips opened to say something but a waiter hurried up with a steaming plate of scaloppine. Novak tucked a napkin under his chin and started in. When he looked up again Mama was back at the cash register watching the bartender thoughtfully.
No movies he wanted to see, no fights in town. Not even an automobile show at the Armory. Too early in the year for open-air concerts at Watergate. Nothing to do but go back to his apartment and read, or clean his .38. As he walked along the sidewalk he decided he ought to return to the hotel and write a file memorandum on Murky MacDonald for circulation to the hotel protective association. Mary could cut a stencil and have it mailed by mid-morning. Then he could sleep late and to hell with the Tilden.
A legless bum was propped against a lamppost, formless as a battered trash can. Novak dropped a quarter in the reaching hand and passed on, setting his lips at the husky thanks. A hustler strolled furtively in the shadows, shiny patent-leather purse, a ruby glow tipping her cigarette. He shrugged her aside and walked on. From a bar came raucous laughter, the drone of a TV program turned up too loud, the stench of stale beer hugging the spring night.
At the corner he piled into a cab and rode back to the Tilden. Percy was still at the desk. When he saw Novak he waved his pen like a conductor’s baton and shrilled, “Thank goodness you’ve come, Mr. Novak. The most terrible thing has happened!”
Novak pushed back his hat. “Beetles in the flower shop, Percy?”
The clerk flushed and made a distracted gesture with one hand. “Please, Mr. Novak, this is no time for joking.”
“For me it is,” Novak said sourly. “I went off duty hours ago.” He turned and scanned the lobby. “See? I’m not even here.”
“Of course you’re here. And the guest in 515 needs your services. Oh, very badly. All of her jewels are missing.”
2
Suite 515 drew thirty-five dollars a day plus District tax and it had been redecorated at a time when Mayan motifs were all the rage among the decorator set. The furniture was angular wood-and-metal, and around the rust-colored carpet crawled a feathered serpent calculated to resemble a frieze of gray volcanic stone. What the place lacked in fireside comfort it made up in tony design.
Mrs. Chalmers Boyd was a tinted brunette in the mid-forties with bon-bon jowls and arms like rolls of biscuit dough. Her fleshy feet were jammed into pointed slippers two sizes too small and her face was heavily powdered to improve an uncertain complexion. The registration card put her and her husband from Winnetka, Illinois, with a double-A rating marked by the credit office. For a lady who was missing a small fortune in jewels, Mrs. Chalmers Boyd had herself under perfect control. No smelling salts, no house physician administering sedatives. Nothing. She looked as placid as a brewer’s wife.
Novak said, “Suppose you tell me what happened, Mrs. Boyd.”
The button nose wrinkled and she said, “They’re all insured. Everything. I guess it doesn’t matter, does it?”
“The insurance company might be glad of any assistance you could render.”
“Oh, yes, I suppose so. Well, I reported the theft to the desk as soon as I discovered it. I’d been shopping, you know—Garfinckels, Rizak’s, the usual places. Then when I came back here to dress for dinner I had a sort of a funny feeling about them. Normally I wouldn’t have opened the box until I was dressed and ready to select something to wear, but this time I went straight for the jewel box.”
“It was kept where, Mrs. Boyd?”
“Why, in one of my suitcases. There, on the luggage rack.” A fat arm gestured indifferently.
“Locked?”
The pudgy face moved slowly, negatively. Little eyes glinted mischievously. “I’m afraid not. No...I always tell Chalmers, what’s the use of having jewels if you have to keep them locked up all the time? So they’re insured. Heavily insured. Why, the annual premiums are a disgrace.”
“I can well imagine.” Novak got up and walked over to the luggage rack where a heavy rawhide suitcase lay open. One side held frilly nightclothes, the other, twenty or thirty pairs of stockings. As he rumpled through the nylon, Mrs. Boyd said, “Would you care for a drink, Mr. Novak?”
“Thanks, no. You go ahead, though. I bet you could use a bracer about now, Mrs. Boyd.”
“Julia,” she purred. “Yes, I think I could. All the makings are in the fridge, Mr. Novak. Would you mind terribly?”
“Promise not to tell the bartenders’ union,” he said and walked into the kitchenette. From the refrigerator he extracted ice cubes, a split of ginger ale and a badly abused bottle of rye. Her voice called, “Not too much ginger.”
Novak frowned, built a two-ounce highball and carried it back. Fingers like pale cigars curled around the glass. Her tongue dipped tentatively, Julia Boyd nodded in satisfaction and she suggested that Novak sit down.
He said, “Lost jewelry isn’t really my line, Mrs. Boyd, so I won’t shake down the place. Naturally the Tilden wants you to have your jewelry back, and if one of our employees is involved we’ll do all we can to have it returned. The hotel is insured, of course. By the way, what coverage have you got?”