I called Martha back. I never really believe that receptionists pass out messages as liberally as they are paid to do. And with someone like Martha Tracy, I wouldn’t be surprised to find people holding out on her in little ways. I was right. She was at her desk.
“Martha?”
“Who wants her?”
“Cooperman.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so in the first place. I just got back from drinking my lunch. Has something happened?”
“Nothing you haven’t read about. But I wanted to ask you about a girl who used to work in your office: Elizabeth Tilford. Does that name ring a bell?”
“I only wish they’d stop. Sure I remember her. I put her up after she came to work for us. She stayed six months and left owing me two months’ rent. I can scarcely manage the mortgage as it is, and she leaves like that without a word.”
“Exactly when did she come to work at the office?” I could hear the loud sounds of finger arithmetic for a few seconds.
“I think she started around the end of July last year. She moved in with me a month after that. I had the back room empty anyway, and I thought the company might be cheerful.”
“When did you see her last?”
“I told you, two months ago. End of February.”
“I hear she was good-looking.”
“What do you expect me to say? She had all the right equipment in just the right proportions. Red hair, long legs, smart but cold. Not what you call a good mixer. Not one to go off in a romantic fog and marry the third assistant to the boss in the mailroom. She was after big game.”
“You mean Ward?”
“For a little guy, you get around, don’t you? Yeah, she picked out her man the first time she set eyes on him, and she didn’t want a second or third string to fall back on. They were a hot number for a couple of months. She played him smart, like a trout fisherman. He never saw her drool once; he thought it was all his idea. That kind of smart.
“And it went on until she left?”
“M’yeah. Without a word to anybody. At first we thought she’d been fired. I remember that Mr. Yates spent part of a day talking to her in her office. That was the last day or near it. I thought she’d come out with a pink slip and a letter of recommendation. That’s the way Mr. Yates did things.”
“You’re serious about her disappearing? I mean, she didn’t just vanish, did she? Somebody must know where she went. Ward for instance.”
“Ask him if you dare.”
“I may have to do that. But I can’t get over this business of her lamming out of there without anybody raising a fuss. She owed you money …”
“I’m just soft in the head, trusting people. I should be put away.”
“Didn’t anybody get in touch with the police about it?”
“Well, Mr. Ward wouldn’t have been the one to call them in. Chester asked me if I thought that we should report her as a missing person, but, hell, she didn’t seem to me to be the sort of girl that got herself raped or murdered. The other way round maybe. I thought more than likely she’d just gone off somewhere. She didn’t leave much behind her. Not many clothes, no furniture, just a few books. And if you dragged me to court, I’d have to admit that even the back rent wouldn’t add up to much in real money. Still, she could have said goodbye.”
“What was she like?”
“When she wasn’t out with Mr. Ward, she stayed home reading. She didn’t have much fun, didn’t like jawing like I do, or drinking, like I do, or even watching TV. She didn’t even smoke. She was too serious for me. I don’t know what Mr. Ward saw in her, apart from the obvious. Chester liked her too. She played up to him, and he licked it up like cream.”
“Martha, you don’t miss much. Be talking to you. Goodbye.”
“Cooperman, come back here! What’s she got to do with all this?”
“If I find out, Martha, you’ll be the first to know.”
TWELVE
I locked up the shop early. It was the first night in quite a few that I wouldn’t be burning the midnight oil. With spring in the air, I wasn’t anxious to hang around pretending I had honest work to do. Tomorrow, or one of these days, I’d have to finish my income tax. It was a month late, but as I tried to explain to the authorities in a letter, the tax must wait upon the income, not the other way around. With the longer days and warmer nights, I could see the divorce business beginning to flock in. I never liked standing under windows in the winter. People who get separated in the winter deserve to stay married. I remember once I was following this guy who took his girlfriend out for a boatride down at Port Richmond. He spent the whole day out there with her, just gliding under the low-hanging willows. They ate their lunch out of a wicker hamper. It was almost like he was treating me to a day off. Even though I didn’t have a hamper, I’d been sharp enough to realize that I might need something to eat, so I was carrying a sandwich with me just in case. The lettuce and celery were wilted, but the egg was fresh. Next time, I promised myself to have travelling sandwiches toasted. They don’t get as soggy.
Frank Bushmill’s light was still on, but I wasn’t much in the mood to talk to him. He saw me leaving though, and pulled me into his dank office for “a drap of the creature.” He knew I didn’t drink much, but he seemed unable to talk about anything but feet without a glass in his hand.
“How are you and the Russians getting along?”
“Too busy to do any reading, Frank.”
“Too busy to live, then. Here’s a book now. The Third Policeman, Flann O’Brien.”
“I don’t read mysteries,” I lied.
“Read this. You won’t regret it. That’s an autographed copy, I want it back.”
“You can have it right away. I never finish books these days. I keep dozing off.” I should have seen luck when it was looking at me. Here was a chance to get away with only a book.
“Read it.”
“I will. I’ll start on it at once. Good night.”
For Frank’s sake I honestly tried, but I couldn’t get the hang of it at all and I gave up about page twelve.
Wednesday dawned bright and fresh. Or I guess it did. I slept away until eight, got up, showered and shaved, and went out to get my breakfast at a restaurant near the hotel called “Bagels.” They have rolls of all kinds, muffins, rye bread both light and dark, but never, never bagels. They just ran out, they didn’t come in today, they didn’t come in yet. For other people there were bagels, but not for me. I tried not to think of it as a conspiracy.
“Morning, Sid. I’ll have lox and cream cheese on a bagel.”
“Have to be on rye or kaiser roll. I’m out of bagels.”
“Maybe you’re not ordering enough.” He looked at me like I said his wife was fooling around with the bus-boy.
“If I got more bagels, I would have left-over bagels. Nobody likes to eat left-over bagels. Nightmares you are trying to give me, Benny.”
I opened up my office door on the sun stealing across my desk drying up the water in the plant I was trying to grow. I moved it to the shade again and pulled the blinds, which made it necessary to turn on the lights. Already I could see it was going to be one of those days. I said a silent prayer, hoping that it might help to get the season’s divorces started. Once the weather brightens up and the hockey disappears from television, a lot of people take up divorce. And I had a whole filing cabinet to accommodate their business.
I jumped to a wrong conclusion. Any day that begins with mail can’t be all bad. The first envelope contained a cheque for two hundred dollars signed by Myrna Yates. The second envelope contained the list of appointments that Martha had sent me from two blocks away three days ago. With a push it could have found me by itself in that time. It was a lined piece of foolscap with jottings in black Pentel. I decided to try the third envelope to see if I’d won the Provincial lottery.
The third envelope was a stiff one with Dr. Zekerman’s name and office address in the upper left-hand corner. It gave me the blue devils opening communications from the grave, or at least the morgue, so I tore it open with more than my usual number of thumbs. From inside tumbled out onto my desk a photograph, three pages of notes, nearly indecipherable, and a folded photo copy of a newspaper clipping.