I reached out, picked up my glass and finished my whisky.
“How is it you know so much about Helen Chalmers?” I asked.
“I’m not blind and I’m not stupid. I’ve known her for some years. I’ve seen the men she associated with. Her behaviour was notorious.”
There was more to it than that: I was sure of it, but I didn’t say so.
“This puts me on a spot,” I said. “Mr. Chalmers has told me if I don’t uncover the facts, I won’t get the job. Now you tell me if I do, I still won’t get it. So what do I do?”
“Don’t uncover them, Mr. Dawson. Delay things. After a while, my husband will get over the shock of her death. At the moment he is furious and revengeful, but when he gets back to New York and is caught-up once more in his work, he will calm down. In a couple of weeks’ time you can safely report no progress. I can assure you he will let the matter drop. I can promise you, if you don’t start an investigation you will get the foreign desk, but if you do, I am sure my husband, when he learns the truth about Helen, will never forgive you.”
“So you suggest I sit back and do nothing?”
Just for a moment her fixed smile slipped. Into her eyes jumped a staring fear that startled me. It was there for a split second, then the smile came back, but I had seen her fear all right.
“Of course you will have to make out to my husband that you are doing your best, Mr. Dawson. You will have to send him reports, but no one can blame you if you don’t discover any worth-while information.” She leaned forward and put her hand on mine. “Please don’t check up on Helen’s life in Rome. I have to live with my husband. I know how he would react if he knew the truth about Helen. It was I who persuaded him to let her go to Rome, and he would blame me, so it’s not only for your sake I’m asking you to do this, it’s for mine as well.”
I was sitting facing the reception hall and I saw Chalmers come out of the elevator and go over to the reception desk. I pulled my hand from hers and got to my feet.
“Here’s Mr. Chalmers now.”
Her mouth tightened, and she turned to wave to Chalmers who came over. He carried a light overcoat on his arm and a despatch case in his hand.
“Hello, Dawson, did you want to see me?” he asked as he put down his case. “We haven’t much time.”
I had intended to tell him about the missing films and about the Renault that had followed me, but now, having listened to June Chalmers, I decided I needed some time to think over what she had said before I committed myself. I was suddenly stuck to explain what I was doing here.
But June wasn’t.
“Mr. Dawson brought Helen’s camera,” she said. For a moment I wondered how she knew the camera was Helen’s, but glancing at the case, I realized she had spotted Helen’s initials on it. All the same this show of quick-wittedness told me she was a lot smarter than I had imagined. Chalmers scowled at the camera.
“I don’t want it. I don’t want any of her things,” he said curtly. “Get rid of it.”
I said I would do that.
“Did you find anything up at the villa?”
I caught June’s anxious eyes. I shook my head.
“Nothing helpful.”
He grunted.
“Well, I expect results. We’ve got to find this punk fast. Get some men on the job. I expect to hear something by the time I get back to New York… understand?”
I said I understood.
He took from his pocket a Yale key.
“The police gave me this. It’s the key to her apartment in Rome. You’d better arrange to have her things collected and sold. I’ll leave it to you. I don’t want anything sent back.”
I took the key.
“We should be going, Sherwin,” June said suddenly.
He looked at his strap watch.
“Yeah. Okay. I’ll leave this to you, Dawson. Just find this punk and let me know the moment you’ve found him.”
He nodded, and, picking up his despatch case, he began to move out of the bar towards the reception hall.
June gave me a steady stare as she followed him.
I saw them into the Rolls.
“I want to know what you plan to do,” Chalmers said through the open car window. “Don’t be afraid of spending money. Get as many as you need on this. The quicker you clear it up, the quicker you’ll be working at the foreign desk.”
I said I’d do the best I could.
As the Rolls drove away June Chalmers looked back at me through the rear window. Her eyes were still anxious.
II
I reached Rome around six o’clock.
During the run I had looked out for the Renault, but I hadn’t seen it. Leaving the Lincoln in the parking lot, I walked up the private stairway that led directly to my apartment.
I unlocked the front door, carried my suitcase into my bedroom then, returning to the lounge, I mixed myself a whisky and soda and then sat down by the telephone. I put a call through to Carlotti.
After a little delay he came on the line.
“This is Dawson,” I said. “I’ve just got back.”
“Yes? Il signer Chalmers has returned to New York?”
“That’s right. The coroner seems satisfied it was an accident.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” Carlotti said. “The inquest isn’t until Monday.”
“Chalmers has talked to him. He has also talked to your boss,” I said, staring at the opposite wall.
“I wouldn’t know about that either,” Carlotti said.
There was a pause but as he seemed determined to act cagey, I went on, “There’s something you can do for me if you will. I want information about the registration number of a car.”
“Certainly. Let me have the number and I will call you back.”
I gave him the number of the Renault.
“I won’t keep you long.”
I hung up and settled myself more comfortably in my chair. I held my whisky and soda in my hand while I stared down at the swirling traffic that made circles around the Forum.
I sat like that for ten minutes, not thinking, letting my mind remain a blank until the telephone bell rang.
“Are you sure you haven’t made a mistake about that car number?” Carlotti asked.
That was one thing I was sure of.
“I don’t think so… why?”
“There’s no such number registered.”
I ran my fingers through my hair.
“I see.” I didn’t want to raise his curiosity. “I’m sorry about that, Lieutenant. Come to think of it, I could have made a mistake.”
“You have a reason for asking? It is something to do, perhaps, with la signorina Chalmers’s death?”
I grinned without any humour.
“It was a guy who ran me pretty close. I thought of reporting him.”
There was a short pause, then Carlotti said, “Never hesitate to ask for my help when you need it. It is what I am here for.”
I thanked him and hung up.
I lit a cigarette and continued to stare out of the window. This business was becoming complicated.
Although June Chalmers’s argument that Chalmers could rum on me if I showed him the kind of daughter he had been doting on made sense, I knew that she wasn’t thinking of me when she had asked me to lay off an investigation: she was scared something that would affect her would come to light.
I knew too, that if I did lie down on the investigation, Chalmers would know. He would get rid of me and put someone else on the job.
I knew also that if Carlotti suspected that Helen had been murdered, no one, let alone Chalmers, would stop him hunting for the killer.
I levered myself out of my chair and went over to the telephone.