“Probably about as well as I did,” I said. “I don't know much about him.”

  “We'll get to that later. And Jerry's making the rounds of the other roomers here to see if he can get any dope, either on Dell in general or his movements today.”

  I said, “I don't think there's any doubt of his movements up to half past six when I talked to him on the phone. I was with him this morning around nine and then he went to work in his territory. I presume you'll check that, but I think you'll be able to trace what calls he made.

  “And he came home at five because I saw him then. He'd already eaten and he started right in on casting horoscopes. Presumably he kept at it until about twenty-five after six when he phoned the agency—as it happened, at the same time I phoned there from Chez Julliard. And presumably he left right away—he'd have to, because the body was found at seven-twenty and a good half hour's drive from here. Allowing some time for him to be picked up and killed, he couldn't have been around here very long after I talked to him on the phone.”

  Bassett nodded and reached for another hamburger. He said, “One thing new. We got a report on the car. It was stolen from only a block from here. Don't know exactly when; the owner parked it at five and didn't miss it until eight. What do you know about this Chester Hamlin?”

  “Not much,” I said, “except that he's a salesman of some kind and does photography for a hobby. And he's in the clear on Karl Dell. He was eating dinner with Mrs. Brady at the time the killer was abandoning the car on Howard Avenue, damn near ten miles away. If he's telling the truth—and I don't see any reason to doubt it—he got home fifteen minutes or so after Karl left here. But even if that's not true, his alibi is still perfect.”

  “Wonderful filet mignon,” Bassett said. “Well, I've been through everything in this room, including the handwriting on the wall, and it all adds up to the fact that Karl Dell was an insurance salesman with astrology for a hobby. From what correspondence we found, his nearest relative is a maiden aunt in Detroit. And that checks with what information Harrison Mutual has on him; we got the branch manager to go down to the office and meet a man we sent over there for a look at Dell's application.”

  “Get anything else from it?”

  Bassett shrugged. “Nothing that matters. You underguessed his age; he was thirty-four. Never been married. Got a fair-sized chunk of savings in the form of ten- and twenty-year endowment policies in his own company. The aunt in Detroit's the beneficiary, so she's the only one who gains by his death. And I doubt if she killed him.”

  “So do I,” I said.

  “Especially as she's in Detroit. Headquarters called her up long-distance to notify her. She's coming here, incidentally, to take care of funeral arrangements and stuff. What time is it, Ed?”

  “About a quarter after nine,” I told him. And that reminded me; Starlock had been going to stick around the office until nine; I'd forgotten to call him and keep him posted. He didn't even know that Karl Dell had been killed.

  I told Bassett what I was going to do and went downstairs and called the office. Jane answered and when I asked about Starlock she said, “Maybe he's home by now, Ed. I got down at half past eight, half an hour sooner than I was supposed to, and he left when I got here. If he went right home, he'd be there by now.”

  I called Starlock's home phone and he answered. I told him about Karl Dell. He said, “I was just getting ready to cut off my underwear and take a bath, Ed. If there's nothing hot to follow up, Ed, I'll go ahead and take that bath before I come down and—

  “Why should you?” I interrupted him. “I mean why should you come down, Ben? There's nothing you can do—at least nothing that Bassett and the police aren't doing. Bassett's in charge and has men helping him.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Just getting in Bassett's way, I guess.”

  “Then why don't you grab a cab and come out here, Ed? At least I want to hear all the details before I turn in, so I can sleep on it. We'll talk it over and if we can't think of anything constructive to do tonight, then I'll get some sleep.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I'll tell Bassett and be right out.”

  “While you're talking to Frank, Ed, tell him there's one new development—on the negative side. Richard Bergman's in the clear—as far as Am's concerned.”

  “Who says?” I asked.

  “Judge Haberman. Bergman was down at the courthouse yesterday afternoon arranging bail for a couple of numbers peddlers that got pinched. He often fronts for the boys he represents on things like that; part of the way he earns his money.”

  “How'd you happen to find that out?”

  “Joe Streator. Joe tailed him around from the time he left the hotel this noon till about three-thirty he lost him in the courthouse; he was back there again doing the same thing. But he went in an office through one door and came out another in another hallway and Joe lost him. He doesn't think Bergman knew he was being tailed or shook him off deliberately; it was just one of those things that can happen.

  “But while he was tailing him Joe saw that Bergman knew a lot of people at the courthouse and Joe knew some of the same ones. So when he lost Bergman he figured he might as well ask questions about him, and he came up with the fact that Bergman was there yesterday afternoon too. And at about the same time Am was being collected, so that lets him out completely.”

  I said “I'll tell Bassett—not that he thought Bergman had anything to do with it anyway. And I'll see you in half an hour if I can get a cab right away.”

  I went up and told Bassett what we'd learned about Richard Bergman and he said “Good. I didn't want to waste time on him anyway, and I guess I'd have had to ” He laughed without any humor. “You know what's wrong with this business, Ed is that everybody's got an alibi. And a good one; none of them look like the rigged-up ones. I don't see how this numbers business ties in anyway; I think we're on a wild-goose chase. There's no motive in it, Ed. We won't get to first base until we find somebody that had a reason for—for doing something to Am.”

  “Unless it's a psychopathic fiend,” I said.

  “Psychos aren't that fancy, usually. I mean that Ambrose Collector angle. Unless—God damn it, unless somebody picked up an idea from this Charles Fort and really is collecting Ambroses. Hell, it's the nearest thing to a motive we've come across yet.”

  “Ben Starlock wants me to go out to his place and talk things over,” I said. “That okay by you?”

  “Sure, Ed. I don't know anything else you can do. Going over to the Blue Crocodile tonight?”

  “Probably. Unless something better comes along. If I go, I'll go right from Ben's place. And I'll keep in touch with the agency—there'll be someone there all night—so if anything comes up will you get in touch with me through them?”

  He said he would and I left. I caught a cab over on State Street and got to Starlock's place a few minutes before ten.

  He'd had his bath and was in slippers and pajamas, ready to turn in. He looked dead tired.

  “Want a drink, Ed?” he asked me.

  I did, but I said that I'd probably end up at the Blue Croc and have to have some drinks there as an excuse for hanging around so I'd better save my capacity.

  “That's smart. Well, I'm going to have one. Did you buy Frank a good dinner?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Hamburgers. He ate four of them and by that time he was so hungry they probably tasted better than a steak would have at six.”

  He laughed and poured himself a drink from a bottle on the table. He carried it across to a chair and sat down, throwing his legs of over the arm of it. His pajamas were black silk ones and they made him look more than ever like a benevolent Buddha.

  He must have noticed I was looking at them and he smiled. “I didn't buy them, Ed. They were given to me. But let's get going. Start with the time you left the office.”

  When I finished, he sat staring at the ceiling for a while and then he looked at me. He said, “Ed, it doesn't look good. You know what I mean.”

  I nodded. I knew what he meant all right. He meant that it looked like one chance in a hundred that we'd ever see Uncle Am again, alive. Karl Dell's being killed meant that someone was playing for keeps.

  He said, “It's thirty hours now, and we haven't got a lead left, not a one. All we've managed to do is eliminate just about every possibility we've managed to think of. We're starting over again—except that we don't know where to start.”

  “There's one thing new now,” I said. “The cops are in it with both feet. They've got a murder, and if they solve it they'll find Uncle Am in the process. Karl got killed by whoever kidnapped Uncle Am.”

  Starlock said, “Let's face it, Ed. Am wasn't kidnapped—any more than Karl was.” He took a swallow from the drink in his hand. “It's going to hurt you less when he's found than if you won't believe it until then.”

  “I'll admit the probability. But if Uncle Am was killed and his body hasn't been found, it was hidden pretty well. And if the killer went to the trouble of hiding one body, why didn't he hide Karl's so that would look like just disappearance too?”

  “The horn button, Ed. I think he was taking Karl's body to dispose of it, probably the same way he disposed of Am's, and the horn button on the car he was using got stuck so he had to pull it to the curb and get away quick.”

  That made more sense than I wanted to admit. I asked him, “Anything new come up at the office?”

  “Nothing important. Art Wheelan came back after digging in newspaper morgues all day. The only guy named Ambrose who'd disappeared that he found was an Ambrose Guerry of Indianapolis, six months ago. I phoned the police there and found the guy had been located and brought back—it was just an abandonment case, it turned out. And this gal who was on the switchboard at the Gresham yesterday afternoon and then went to Racine is back in town and I talked to her. She didn't remember anything about calls to or from Bergman's room. A complete blank—not that it matters since we know now that Bergman was at the courthouse at four. And I canvassed the other detective agencies in town to see whether Grane and Dagon had approached them to do the work I turned down from them. They had been to one agency and were turned down there too. That was before they came to me and they probably gave up then on the idea of getting a legitimate agency to handle it. Anyway, it makes it look more like the deal was on the level if we weren't the first agency they came to. Ed, I can't see any tie-in with Auggie Grane or Toby Dagon.”

  “Neither can Bassett,” I said. “Neither can I, for that matter. But I'm going to the Blue Croc just the same when I leave here, unless you've got some better idea for something I can do.”

  “

  Guess I haven't, Ed.

  I stood up realizing I'd stayed too long already. Starlock must be dead for sleep.

  He drank the rest of his drink and got up too. He asked, “Got a gun with you, Ed?” I shook my head. He went over to a cabinet and got out a thirty-two automatic in a shoulder holster. He said, “Put this on, Ed.”

  “But I won't—

  “Put it on ” he said. “Karl Dell would probably have liked to have one sometime early this evening. And you might get an idea, Ed. Like the one Karl Dell got.”

  I took off my coat and put on the shoulder holster.

  Chapter 10

  THE BLUE CROCODILE was a medium-sized night club, medium expensive. Not the best in Chicago, but a long way from being the worst. On a Thursday night, it wasn't crowded but there was enough business so you didn't have to feel sorry for Augie Grane. There were seventy or eighty people in a place that would hold a hundred comfortably and held half again that many on big nights. There was a five-piece combo—Harry Hart's outfit; I had some of his records—playing pretty fair stuff and there were about a dozen couples dancing.

  When the headwaiter walked up to me as I came in, I said, “Table for two. My friend will be here later.” If he noticed me after that, he'd think I was being stood up, but that was better than attracting attention by being a lone wolf. He led me to a table for two that was probably the worst table in the place; it was farthest from the dance floor and a post blocked view of the combo, but that was all right with me. I hadn't come to hear the music. Come to think of it, I didn't know why I had come at all, unless it was just to see Estelle.

  And she must have seen me come in, for she came toward me the minute the headwaiter left. She looked beautiful as hell in an evening gown that had, I'd guess, a dozen square yards of material in the skirt and a scant square foot of it above the waist. It was a beautiful gown and it had cost money. I wondered if she'd had it before or if it had come with the job. Or if Augie had bought it for her. But since they'd met only that afternoon, either he or she had worked pretty fast if that was the case. Then I caught her eyes and felt ashamed of myself for wondering.

  As she reached my table she made her eyes and smile impersonal and said, “Cigarettes, sir?”

  I had a fresh pack and didn't need any; I started to say no, and then noticed that she had a package of them in her hand, held just above the tray, and that there was a folded slip of white paper that she was holding against the under side of the package with her finger; she tilted the pack slightly so I could see the note.

  So I nodded and put a dollar bill in the tray and she put the cigarettes down on the table with the note under them. She said “Thank you, sir” without even asking if I wanted any change and walked away.

  I shoved the cigarettes into my coat pocket and palmed the note but I couldn't read it just then because the waiter came up. I ordered a whiskey and soda and a club sandwich; my trip to the mortuary had killed my appetite temporarily and I'd eaten only one hamburger to Bassett's four, and now I was getting hungry again. I also asked him to direct me to a phone booth; I figured I'd better call the agency and let Jane know where I was.

  In the phone booth, the first thing I did was to unfold Estelle's note. There were only two words: “Hi, Eddie.” I didn't know whether to laugh or swear.

  I put the note in my pocket and called the agency. I told Jane where I was but told her not to try to reach me there unless it was very important, that if she should want me she should ask for Estelle and Estelle would get word to me.

  Then I called home and found that Bassett was still there, in Karl's room. He came to the phone.

  “Getting anything?” I asked him.

  “Not a damn thing, Ed. I've been over that room twice now, and I'm calling it a night. You calling from Starlock's home?”

  I told him where I was. I said, “You got cheated on that dinner tonight, Frank. Why not come to the Croc and let me make it up to you on some drinks, and see a floor show?”

  “Like to, Ed, but it's pushing one o'clock and I'm dead tired. And tomorrow's another day. I want to get an early start.”

  “Any plans?”

  “I'll start out from Karl's office, find out what calls he was scheduled to make on his insurance route and see if he made them. I'll try to account for all his time up to when he got home and you saw him at five. You say he said then that he'd already eaten something? Got any idea where he usually ate?”

  “There's a barbecue place on Clark just south of Ohio,” I told him. “Estelle used to work there. He ate there fairly often, but maybe just because Estelle was there; I don't know. But it's the only place I can suggest.”

  “Sounds like a fair chance. If he ate that early, he wouldn't be eating a heavy meal, and a barbecue sandwich sounds likely. I'll check there anyway. How are things at the Blue Croc?”

  “Quiet,” I said. I told him about Estelle passing me a note and what the note had said. He laughed.

  He said, “Oh, by the way, Ed, does the number four-twenty mean anything to you?”

  “Not that I can think of. Why?”

  “That's the last thing Karl wrote down on the paper he was doing his astrology homework on. Starts with a chart at the top and then a lot of stuff, mostly in symbols and '420' was the last thing he wrote down. Exactly what was it he told you about a number over the phone?”

  “He said it was important and that it wasn't astrology exactly. I asked what he meant, and he said he hit a lucky number—in his figuring, I guess he meant—and that it was lucky because it made him remember something. And that's all he said about it; he wanted to know where we were, and I gave in and told him Chez Julliard.”

  “Then I guess four-two-oh is the lucky number he was talking about. What do you suppose it is, a hotel room?”

  “Damned if I know. Or maybe it's a lucky number to play in the numbers game. But it must have some significance besides that if it made him remember something.”

  “Well,” Bassett said, “it couldn't have been a lucky number for him. Another thing I'll do tomorrow is have an expert on astrology look over what Karl was doing and see what he can make of it. There might be a lead there, although I don't see how.”

  “Nothing to lose trying,” I agreed. “Say, Frank, when I left the mortuary the coroner's physician was expected any minute but hadn't got there yet. Have you heard from him?”

  “Sure. Nothing we didn't know. Except that he was hit twice in almost exactly the same spot. First one probably killed him, but the killer made sure with an extra one. And from the size and shape of the wound he thinks it was the butt of a revolver—oval shaped, not narrow and rectangular like the butt of an automatic or round like a hammer. No other marks on the body.”

  “Okay, thanks,” I said. “Sure you don't want to come here for a drink or two?”

  “I'll take a rain check, Ed. Want to be on the job by nine tomorrow and if I go there now I won't get home till three or four. Give my love to Estelle. And to Augie, if you talk to him. Is he there? Or Toby?”

  “Haven't seen Augie, but I've been here only a few minutes. Toby Dagon I don't know.”

  “Be careful if you do meet him. He's a tough boy, Ed. Well, I'll see you sometime tomorrow. 'Night.”