The doorman mulled that over. He was not ecstatic about the idea. Alder took a bill from his pocket, folding it carefully so that the denomination (a twenty) showed.
“If you will wait here, I’ll do my best, sir,” the old one finally said.
He stepped into the elevator. The door closed and Alder watched the indicator as it moved to four and stopped. It was at four for a long time. A tenant came into the building, rang for the elevator and it came down to the lobby.
The doorman was not in it. The elevator went up to eight, returned almost to the lobby, then stopped and went back up. It stopped at four. Then it came down.
The doorman stepped out. “You may find Mrs., ah, Mrs. Delaney a bit irregular.”
“Irregular? Peculiar?”
“I would rather not use that word. All right, Theodore.”
Theodore, the other oldster, was the elevator operator. He did not speak to Alder at all. When the elevator stopped at the fourth floor, Alder got out.
A door stood open near-by and he went to it. He could see into the apartment, but there was no one in sight. He pushed the door buzzer. A very old Negro finally appeared. His short, kinky hair was completely white and his face was like ancient, well-dyed Cordoba leather.
He said, “This way, please.”
Through a long hall, a musty old living room furnished in antique furniture, through it to a small sitting room at the front of the building. The shades were down almost to the sills, the Venetian blinds were arranged so that only a modicum of light seeped into the room. The room was virtually airless; the windows had not been raised since their weekly cleaning, which was at least six days ago.
Mrs. Delaney sat in a straight-backed, mohair chair. A heavy cane was in her right hand; it reached out, touched the floor. She did not wear high lace collars because the wearing of such was a generation ahead of her. She did, however, have a lace edging about the neckline of her dark blue dress and there was a cameo brooch at her throat.
She was perhaps sixty-five years of age. Possibly less.
Alder said, as he bowed: “Mrs. Delaney.”
Her eyes searched his face, drifted to his body and back to his face.
Finally she said, “You’re not what I expected.” With the hand that was not holding the cane, she reached to a stand beside her and picked up a small silver bell. She tinkled it.
Feet slithered on the thin carpeting behind Alder. He did not look over his shoulder, but he knew that the Negro had entered the room.
“Tell Hugo he will not be needed,” Mrs. Delaney said.
The Negro left and Mrs. Delaney said to Alder: “Hugo is my chauffeur. His driving does not take up much of his time, but I keep him here because I have felt it necessary to have a man here — Arthur is too feeble.”
“I will keep Hugo in mind,” said Alder.
“That is why I told you about him. Now, then,” she raised the white card from her lap. “If you will explain this.”
“Will you read it, Mrs. Delaney?”
“I have read it. That is why I permitted you into this room. I know that you are a scoundrel and possibly worse. Your handwriting is firm, bold I would even say. It indicates a certain strength of character. My late husband was a very strong man. But there wasn’t a dishonest bone in his body. And you, sir, you are not only a scoundrel, but you are a liar.”
She suddenly flipped the card toward Alder. It fell at his feet. He looked down at it.
“Pick it up!”
He stooped. Straightening, he read from the card: “Your daughter is alive.”
“You know nothing about her. You wanted to see me and you chose that scurvy way of gaining entry.”
“Mrs. Delaney, do you believe that your daughter is alive—”
“Of course she’s alive. If she were dead I would know it.”
“You believe in extrasensory perception?”
“A charlatan approached me with that drivel twenty years ago. I am disappointed in you.”
“I do not believe such things myself. I merely asked if you believed?”
“I do not. I know my daughter is alive, because if she were dead I would have heard from her.” Mrs. Delaney snorted, or came as close to snorting as an old woman could. “My daughter may not communicate with me while she is alive, but I am certain that she would leave a note, a message, in her effects that would be forwarded to me after her death. There’s nothing extrasensory about that.” She brought her cane in a few inches, leaned forward and put some of her weight onto it. “I am waiting to hear your excuse for writing what’s on that card!”
“Mrs. Delaney, what do you think happened to your daughter twenty-two years ago?”
“I want your answer!”
“Will you let me tell you in my own way?”
“I have not invited you to sit down because I have not yet decided how long I will permit you to stay.” Mrs. Delaney regarded him fiercely. “Sit down, Mr. Alder!”
Alder moved to the closest chair.
“Bring the chair here. I want to see your face. I shall know if you are lying.”
Alder carried the chair to within four feet of her. He set it down carefully and seated himself. “Thank you, Mrs. Delaney.”
He drew a deep breath.
“Two days ago, in Los Angeles, California, a woman was murdered — no, not your daughter — an older woman. Her name was Julia Joliet. She was a fan mail secretary to motion picture stars. The murder was a rather brutal one and I must go into some, well, rather intimate details.”
“I am old enough to be told of sordid things!”
“Thank you. The woman was savagely beaten. Knocked unconscious. Her brassiere was torn from her body. It was not, however, what the police call a sex murder. She was not attacked.”
“Raped, you mean.”
“Yes. Then why was her brassiere ripped from her body? Because women, some women, use their brassieres as a receptacle for hiding things. It is a natural thing with them. Hide something on the spur of the moment — in the brassiere.”
“You were not mincing words, Mr. Alder, when you said the details would be rather intimate. Go ahead. This woman was murdered because of something she had concealed in her brassiere.”
“That is my belief. Now exactly what she had hidden and what was taken from her, I do not know. Mrs. Joliet handled the fan mail of several actors. Could the thing she was killed for pertain to one of these persons? I do not know, but in her room, which was ransacked thoroughly by the murderer, the police found clippings from a newspaper containing the name of your daughter Doris Delaney.”
The eyes of the woman became mere slits. She did not speak, however. Merely made a sideward movement with her cane for him to continue.
“My occupation, Mrs. Delaney, is searching for missing heirs.” Her eyes opened wider, but she continued to hold her silence. He went on. “The Doris Delaney case is a classic case. I have always been intrigued by such things — the Dorothy Arnold case, the Judge Crater disappearance.”
“You are losing my interest,” Mrs. Delaney said abruptly.
“I will try to regain it. I have a friend on the Los Angeles Police Department. The mention of your daughter Doris had aroused my interest. I discussed it with my policeman friend. I was prepared to drop it, but I could not. A little thing happened. It could have been a coincidence, except that another small coincidence occurred immediately afterward. I do not believe in a sequence of coincidences, trivial though they may be. Julia Joliet was nothing, a miserable woman, eking out a paltry existence. There was no reason for her to be murdered. Robbery was not the motive — at least it did not appear to me that way. Why, then, was such a woman slain — and her person molested? For something she had? Something she knew possibly? An important name was injected into the case. An important name to millions of people who enjoy motion pictures. Had he, this important personage, killed Julia Joliet? I began an investigation of the man.”