Riding to the fifth, Novak slumped wearily in the corner, opening and closing his hands. His belly ached where the muscles had bunched from Barada’s low punch. If he let himself concentrate on it he could probably get sick again. If he tried.
The doors slid apart, and Novak stepped into the fifth floor hall. Walking to Bikel’s room he keyed the door and went inside. He turned on the lights and stared around. Bikel’s bag was still there, packed and waiting for the absent owner. Might as well check him out and free the room. Novak hooked onto the bag, carried it out to the corridor and locked the door. Then he walked further down the hall. As far as Suite 515. Thirty-five skins a day, plus District Tax. Now single occupancy. The widow of the late Chalmers Boyd. Novak pressed the door button and waited.
Far down the corridor a door opened and shut. Low voices threaded through the heavy air. From inside 515 no sound.
Novak pressed the button again. Longer this time. It made a thin muffled sound. Like a dog whining in a cellar.
Pressing his ear to the door panel he listened, got out the master key and opened the door.
In the sitting room a single lamp cast a subdued glow against the naked wall. Enough to show a woman sitting on the sofa, face turned toward the dark window. As he closed the door the click of the lock seemed to rouse her. The eyes turned toward him, and he saw the pudgy doll-face, the heavy arms, the mountainous bosom. One hand covered something on the cushion beside her thigh. The light was too indistinct to show him what it was.
As Novak walked toward her, dull eyes regarded him unblinkingly.
He lowered the bag, chose a chair not far from the sofa and settled into it heavily. Pulling off his hat he tossed it onto the table. Moistening his cracked lips he said, “Full circle, Julia.”
Her mouth opened and closed. The lips formed no words.
“Back where it all started,” he said in a thick voice. “Barada’s dead—along with the hood who called about your jewelry. I thought you’d be interested to know.”
“You killed them?’
“Barada was shot by Pike Hammond—a gambler Barada owed sixty-five thousand dollars to. Hammond’s from St. Louis. Possibly you’ve heard of him.”
Her head moved. Yes.
“I killed the other. He took one gun from me, forgot to look for another. The mistake was fatal.”
She said, “You are an evil man. A wicked man. You disrupt peoples’ lives. You kill without compassion.”
Novak laughed dryly. “They would have killed me, Mrs. Boyd. Entirely without pity. And the girl as well.”
Her body moved forward slightly. “The slut—where is she?”
“Safe, Mrs. Boyd. And far from here.”
“She wronged me,” the voice said vacantly. “She wronged me grievously.”
“Your husband wronged you. And long before he met Paula Norton.”
Her head nodded pensively. The fingers of her left hand twitched. The lips said, “I was a young girl once. I had a normal body. There were many who thought of me as beautiful. Then I became unhappy. My body grew until it became this bloated thing.” Her tone filled with disgust. “Chalmers was to blame. It was his fault that I became the ugliness I am.”
“He’s paid for it,” Novak observed. “The account’s settled. And you have your jewelry. You must have wanted it badly.”
Her head moved negatively, her body shifted slightly. From the city beyond the window drifted the low purr of night traffic in the streets, the whistle of the night steamer to Old Point Comfort.
Julia Boyd said, “He gave it to me on our twenty-fifth anniversary. I wore it once and put it away. It made me look even more grotesque. I hated it. Then he gave it to the woman he admired. He thought I didn’t know, but I did. I found out, and I challenged him, insisted he get it back.”
“What else did you find out?”
Her shoulders moved disdainfully. “Chalmers was a coward. He was afraid to ask her for it. So he had copies made. He gave them to me. It was supposed to deceive me. But the detectives told me.”
Novak nodded. “By then Paula had broken with him, making the return of the real jewelry even more difficult. Because her husband was out of prison and in need of money. He had lost sixty-five thousand dollars to Pike Hammond, probably as much to others. His luck had gone bad. To Barada your jewelry meant a stake, last chance to pull himself out of a narrow hole. I think Paula would have returned the jewelry when she found out it was yours—only Barada wouldn’t let her. Maybe you learned that too.”
“He was a desperate man,” she said heavily. “His kind will do anything for money.”
“Even murder,” Novak said. “I learned that tonight.” He sucked in a deep breath. The bedroom doorway was dark. From somewhere outside came the whine of a vacuum cleaner. A late check-out. Readying the room for anonymous guests. A transient place. A hotel never sleeps.
Novak said, “You thought by reporting the jewelry as stolen you could put more pressure on Paula for its return. But out of some sense of loyalty to Paula, Chalmers refused to make the report. Or he could have felt that paying for it was the easier way. When he came back here after talking to me you must have been furious with him. He was ready to pay Paula the sum Barada was asking. I was with her when he telephoned to arrange a meeting.”
Her eyes narrowed. In the dim light they were without color, without depth. Holes in a white mask. She said, “It was my money. Everything that Chalmers owned belonged to me.”
“Not an ideal arrangement,” Novak said dryly. “No man would like that kind of arrangement for long.”
“He had no choice,” she said scornfully. “Without me he was nothing. A shirt-sleeved bookkeeper in my father’s bank. That was how Chalmers started. It was what he would have had to go back to if I threw him out.”
“Lovely people,” Novak muttered. “Pillars of suburban society.”
Julia Boyd touched one finger to the corner of her mouth, lowered her hand absently. Novak said, “I heard Paula refuse to meet Chalmers the night he was killed. Her ex-husband had given her a beating and shown her what he really was—a vicious hoodlum. She was shocked, confused; she wanted time to think. So she told your husband she would talk to him the next morning, then went out for a long walk. But by next morning your husband was dead, and Paula was under suspicion. Only she didn’t kill him.” He stared at the white face. “The body was found here, Mrs. Boyd, not in Paula’s room where it was supposed to be found. That was the second thing that went wrong.”
A frayed sigh came from her lips. Novak’s throat grated like emery paper. He swallowed, said, “We haven’t discussed Dr. Bikel yet. The ubiquitous medicine man and herb specialist. The guy who brews mescaline and vends it in his little shop. The guy who gave you the sympathy and understanding you never got from your husband.”
Her eyes moved. She looked slowly at her hands, then stared at a point on the wall over Novak’s shoulder.
“The police have Eddie. They wanted to talk to him, Mrs. Boyd. About the way his wife died. Did she kill herself, or did he recommend an overdose of something to calm her nerves? Bikel was a small-timer, Mrs. Boyd. An old chiseler settled down in an ostensibly respectable business. Married and leading a shabby life where pennies counted. Then somehow he hooked onto you. I see him studying your case and seeing in it a chance to be big-time and legitimate. His last chance. It wouldn’t take much intuition to guess the relationship between you and Chalmers. Or you may have told him about Paula and your husband. That could have encouraged his idea of marrying you eventually. But of course he was already married.
“His wife must have known his plans. I can see him talking over the future with her matter-of-factly, pleading for a quiet divorce and promising to provide for her afterward. Even handsomely. But when he planned this trip with you I can see her getting desperate, threatening to destroy his scheme by revealing to you that Bikel had a wife. In any case, the day he checked in here he sent a telegram. It told her not to come to Washington and promised he’d arrange things to her satisfaction. But she came anyway. Yesterday after noon in Bikel’s room they had a nasty scene, and she ran out crying. From there she scurried to the chapel. To pray, Mrs. Boyd. In your set prayer isn’t overly fashionable, I imagine. Prayer from the heart, anyway. And this morning she was dead. A shabby, wizened little creature. Bikel’s wife and helpmate. No one to trot around in moneyed circles. Just an embarrassment to the doctor.” His hands curved stiffly over his knees. “But she’s dead now, and Bikel’s free. Do I get an invitation to the wedding?”