“Ten dollars on account,” Peabody corrected.
“All right, ten dollars on account. Anyway, I didn’t come up in the elevator until nine-twenty-five. I was in here six or seven minutes before you pounded on the door.”
Rook looked steadily at Johnny for a moment, then walked to the stand between the beds and picked up the phone.
“Desk,” he said, then: “This is Lieutenant Rook of the Police Department. I’m up here in Room 821 with Mr. Peabody the manager... Fletcher, who occupies this room claims he stopped at the desk this morning and paid something on his bill... What time was that...?” He scowled at the phone. “You’re sure?” He nodded unhappily. “All right.”
He put the receiver back on the hook, looked down at it for a moment, then suddenly whirled on Sam Cragg. “You... you were here in your room, all morning...!”
“So were about two hundred other people in the hotel,” cut in Johnny, coming to Sam’s aid.
“Fletcher,” Rook said ominously, “I didn’t like you when I first came into this room. I’m liking you less every minute.” He turned back to Sam Cragg. “You can talk, can’t you?”
“Yes,” snapped Sam. “And I can read and write too. And I went clear through long division in school and was starting on decimals.”
Johnny, glancing through the window, gave a sudden start. “Hey!” he cried. “I thought you said it was the girl...” He rushed to the window.
Rook followed him.
Seated in a chair in the room across the air shaft was a girl — not Marjorie Fair, but a girl who looked very much like her, who was, if anything, even more attractive.
“It’s her sister,” Rook said. “She found the body.” He turned away from the window, looked at Johnny Fletcher and Sam Cragg, then shook his head. Then he started for the door. Peabody darted after him. At the door, the lieutenant turned.
“Don’t go taking any sudden trips,” he said and went out. Peabody followed him. Sam Cragg opened his mouth to say something, but Johnny gave him a warning shake of the head. He went to the door, listened for a moment, then opened the door suddenly. There was no one out in the hall and he closed the door again. He exhaled heavily.
“Now, what do you know about it, Sam?”
“Just what I told you... nothin’...”
Johnny went to Sam’s bed and pulling back the covers, brought out the metal disk. Sam crowded over. “I thought phonograph records were made out of wax or some kinda plastic,” he said.
“They are, but this is a master record.”
“It says Mariota on it.”
Johnny gave Sam a quick, chiding look. “That’s the name of the record company. A master record is the — the record from which all the others are made. I guess.”
Sam was reading the circular centerpiece on the record. “Con Carson: say, he’s all right!”
“He was all right,” Johnny corrected. “He was killed two days ago in that airplane crash in Nevada.”
“Zat so?” Sam whistled a note or two, off-key. “I guess this must have been his last song. I never heard it. Mmmm, Moon on the Desert... wonder what it’s like?” Then suddenly he looked at Johnny, wide-eyed. “Say, d’you suppose the girl across the way...?”
“Threw this over here? You’re sharp, Sam, awfully sharp today... I guessed that about nine and three-quarters minutes ago...”
Sam winced. “Then why didn’t you give it to the flatfoot?” Alarm came into his tone. “Johnny, you aren’t figuring on playing detective again — not when I haven’t even got a pair of pants...?”
“You’ll have your pants this afternoon, Sam; stop worrying. And your coat, too.”
“The maid’s due to clean up...”
“You’re not feeling well today, you thought you’d stay in bed,” Johnny suggested the alibi. “I’ll go down again to Mort’s.” He started for the door, but Sam called him back.
“What about my breakfast?”
Johnny pointed to the phone. “Room service. Here’s a buck.” Johnny tossed a crumpled bill on the bed. That left him with seventy-five cents.
Chapter Three
Down in the lobby, Johnny encountered the bell captain, Eddie Miller, as slick a little man as ever shook down a hotel guest. Eddie was built like an overgrown jockey and he knew all the answers and practically all of the questions.
“I hear you’re gonna be with us another week, Mr. Fletcher,” he said, cynically.
“That’s right, Eddie, I got in just under the wire.” He took the bell captain’s arm and led him to one side. “Look, what’s the dope on the business up on the eighth floor?”
“Jeez, are you mixed in that?” Eddie exclaimed.
“I’m one of the chief suspects,” Johnny said, proudly. “The only trouble is, I have a sweet alibi.”
“Then what’re you worried about?”
“I’m not worried. Just curious. The girl was about my size and I would have been doing something about it except that I’ve been a little short of what it takes.”
Eddie Miller chuckled. “Ain’t that normal for you?”
“What do you mean?” Johnny exclaimed indignantly. “I’m almost never broke. Why, two months ago I was worth fifty thousand bucks.”
Eddie grinned cynically. “I’m only the bell captain, you don’t have to sell me a bill of goods. Anyway, broke or rich, I’m on your team, Mr. Fletcher. I always have been.”
“All right, then tell me about the little lady who got—” Johnny finished the sentence by drawing a finger across his throat.
Eddie Miller shook his head. “Uh-uh, choked.”
“Then it wasn’t suicide.”
“Oh, no. It’s murder and whoever done it almost got caught in the act.” Eddie looked surreptitiously around the lobby. “Her sister tried the door and it was locked. Then she came downstairs and got Peabody to go up with a key. By the time they got there — the door was unlocked...”
Johnny exclaimed. “You mean, the killer was inside when the sister was up the first time?”
“That’s right. He snuck out while the girl was getting Peabody.”
“Wait a minute,” Johnny said, “there’s something screwy about this. You say the sister went up and tried the door and when she found it was locked she went down and got Peabody to let her in; she must have been suspicious to do a thing like that, otherwise, why wouldn’t she think her sister had gone out for breakfast or something?”
“ ’Cause she just got in from out of town and didn’t have any place to wait.” Eddie Miller rubbed his chin with the back of his hand. “Funny thing, the Fair dame was in the same spot as you — she was gonna get the French key at noon.”
“She was broke?”
Eddie nodded. “She owed three weeks’ rent.” He shook his head. “A girl with her looks!”
Johnny groaned. “If I’d only known!”
“Yeah, you’d a put her bill on yours,” Eddie said, sarcastically.
“I can always raise money if I have to,” Johnny said.
“Well, you raised some this morning.”
“And I’m going to get some more before night — a lot more.” He looked at the clock in the lobby. “I’d better be starting.”
Eddie Miller looked wistful. “I’d give something to go around with you and watch you raise that money.”
Johnny grinned. “Work out your own routines.” He winked at Eddie and left the hotel. Outside he walked a half block to Seventh Avenue and turned left to Times Square.
He descended to the subway level and was just in time to catch an express. A few minutes later he got out at Fourteenth Street and climbing to the street walked back to Sixteenth Street.