"This?" he asked, and indicated a birthmark the size of a pin-head on the foreskin, an inch or so below the glans.
"Yes," Marie said softly.
Blaney let the penis drop.
The detectives were trying to figure out whether or not all of this added up to a positive ID. No face to look at. No hands to examine for fingerprints. Just the blood type, the scars on belly and leg, and the identifying birthmark—what Marie had called a beauty spot—on the penis.
"I'll work up a dental chart sometime tomorrow," Blaney said.
"Would you know who his dentist was?" Hawes asked Marie.
"Dentist?" she said.
"For comparison later," Hawes said. "When we get the chart."
She looked at him blankly.
"Comparison?" she said.
"Our chart against the dentist's. If it's your husband, the charts'll match.'"
"Oh," she said. "Oh. Well… the last time he went to a dentist was in Florida. Miami Beach. He had this terrible toothache. He hasn't been to a dentist since we moved north."
"When was that?" Brown asked.
"Five years ago."
"Then the most recent dental chart…"
"I don't even know if there is a chart," Marie said. "He just went to somebody the hotel recommended. We had a steady gig at the Regal Palms. I mean, we never had a family dentist, if that's what you mean."
"Yeah, well," Brown said.
He was thinking Dead End on the teeth.
He turned to Blaney.
"So what do you think?" he said.
"How tall was your husband?" Blaney asked Marie.
"I've got all that here," Hawes said, and took out his notebook. He opened it to the page he'd written on earlier, and began reading aloud. "Five-eleven, one-seventy, hair black, eyes blue, appendectomy scar, meniscectomy scar."
"If we put a head in place there," Blaney said, "we'd have a body some hundred and eighty centimeters long. That's just about five-eleven. And I'd estimate the weight, given the separate sections here, at about what you've got there, a hundred-seventy, a hundred-seventy-five, in there. The hair on the arms, chest, legs, and pubic area is black—which doesn't necessarily mean the head hair would match it exactly, but at least it rules out a blonde or a redhead, or anyone in the brown groupings. This hair is very definitely black. The eyes—well, we haven't got a head, have we?"
"So have we got a positive ID or what?" Brown asked.
"I'd say we're looking at the remains of a healthy white male in his late twenties or early thirties," Blaney said. "How old was your husband, madam?"
"Thirty-four," she said.
"Yes," Blaney said, and nodded. "And, of course, identification of the birthmark on the penis would seem to me a conclusive factor."
"Is this your husband, ma'am?" Brown asked.
"That is my husband," Marie said, and turned her head into Hawes' shoulder and began weeping gently against his chest.
The hotel was far from the precinct, downtown on a side street off Detavoner Avenue. He'd deliberately chosen a fleabag distant from the scene of the' crime. Scenes of the crime, to be more accurate. Five separate scenes if you counted the head and the hands. Five scenes in a little playlet entitled "The Magical and Somewhat Sudden Disappearance of Sebastian the Great."
Good riddance, he thought.
"Yes, sir?" the desk clerk said. "May I help you?"
"I have a reservation," he said.
"The name, please?"
"Hardeen," he said. "Theo Hardeen."
Wonderful magician, long dead. Houdini's brother. Appropriate name to be using. Hardeen had been famous for his escape from a galvanized iron can filled with water and secured by massive locks. Failure Means a Drowning Death! his posters had proclaimed. The risks of failure here were even greater.
"How do you spell that, sir?" the clerk asked.
"H-A-R-D-E-E-N."
"Yes, sir, I have it right here," the clerk said, yanking a card. Hardeen, Theo. That's just for the one night, is that correct, Mr. Hardeen?"
"Just the one night, yes."
"How will you be paying, Mr. Hardeen?"
"Cash," he said. "In advance."
The clerk figured this was a shack-up. One-night stand, guy checking in alone, his bimbo—or else a hooker from the Yellow Pages—would be along later. Never explain, never complain, he thought. Thank you, Henry Ford. But charge him for a double.
"That'll be eighty-five dollars, plus tax," he said, and watched as the wallet came out, and then a hundred-dollar bill, and the wallet disappeared again in a wink. Like he figured, a shack-up. Guy didn't want to show even a glimpse of his driver's license or credit cards, the Hardeen was undoubtedly a phony name. Theo Hardeen? The names some of them picked. Who cared? Take the money and run, he thought. Thank you, Woody Alien.
He calculated the tax, made change for the C-note, and slid the money across the desk top. Wallet out again in a flash, money disappearing, wallet disappearing, too.
"Did you have any luggage, sir?" he asked.
"Just the one valise."
"I'll have someone show you to your room, sir," he said, and banged a bell on the desk. "Front!" he shouted. "Checkout time is twelve noon, sir. Have a nice night."
"Thank you."
A bellhop in a faded red uniform showed him to the third-floor room. Flicked on the lights in the bathroom. Taught him how to operate the window air-conditioning unit. Turned on the television set for him. Waited for the tip. Got his fifty cents, looked at it on the palm of his hand, shrugged, and left the room. What the hell had he expected for carrying that one bag? Rundown joint like this—well, that's why he'd picked it. No questions asked. In, out, thank you very much.
He looked at the television screen, and then at his watch.
A quarter past nine.
Forty-five minutes before the ten o'clock news came on.
He wondered if they'd found the four pieces yet. Or either of the cars. He'd left the Citation in the parking lot of an A&P four blocks north of the river, shortly after he'd deep-sixed the head and the hands.
Something dumb was on television. Well, everything on television was dumb these days. He'd have to wait till ten o'clock to see what was happening, if anything.
He took off his shoes, lay full length on the bed, his eyes closed, and relaxed for the first time today.
By tomorrow night at this time, he'd be in San Francisco.
CHAPTER 6
Eileen came out of the ladies' room and walked toward the farthest end of the bar, where a television set was mounted on the wall. Quick heel-clicking hooker glide, lots of ass and ankle in it. She didn't even glance at Annie, sitting with her legs crossed at the cash-register end of the bar. Two or three men sitting at tables around the place turned to look at her. She gave them a quick once-over, no smile, no come-on, and took a stool next to a guy watching the television screen. She was still fuming. In the mirror behind the bar, she could still see the flaming imprint of his hand on her left cheek. The bartender ambled over.
"Name it," he said.
"Rum-Coke," she said. "Easy on the rum."
"Comin'," he said, and reached for a bottle of cheap rum on the shelf behind him. He put ice in a glass, short-jiggered some rum over it, filled the glass with Coke from a hose. "Three bucks even," he said, "a bargain. You be runnin' a tab?"
"I'll pay as I go," she said, and reached into her shoulder bag. The .44 was sitting under a silk scarf, butt up. She took out her wallet, paid for the drink. The bartender lingered.
"I'm Larry," he said. "This's my place."
Eileen nodded, and then took a sip of the drink.
"You're new," Larry said.
"So?" she said.
"So I get a piece," he said.