MacCullagh’s eyes were suspiciously wet. He dabbed at them with the handkerchief.

  “Ralph here saved my life. I owe him.”

  “Shucks. You’re embarrassing me.”

  Elizabeth glanced at Kaminsky who didn’t look in the least bit embarrassed—in fact, he looked positively proud.

  * * *

  —

  “Marino’s not telling us the whole story,” Kaminsky said as they left Marino’s office.

  Elizabeth didn’t answer but walked ahead of him with her chin in the air.

  Kaminsky caught up with her as they were leaving the station house.

  “Say, you’re not sore with me or anything, are you?”

  Elizabeth debated not replying, but the look on Kaminsky’s face made her change her mind.

  “Yes, I am sore with you, as you put it,” she said, stopping and facing Kaminsky. “I didn’t appreciate your using me to get an interview with Marino.”

  Kaminsky pulled out his Camels and shook one out. He lit it, puffed until the tip glowed red, then let the smoke out in a stream that caught the slight breeze and floated away on the air.

  “Biz.” He shook his head. “Everything’s fair game when a reporter is going after a story. You know that.”

  “Yes, but I guess I didn’t expect to be on the receiving end.”

  Kaminsky didn’t say anything but began walking again.

  “Where are we going now?”

  “Off to see Joey Dorman. The fact that he’s been released is a big story, but probably every paper in town will cover it.” He tapped his pocket. “But not everyone will have Dorman’s address. If we interview him, we’ll scoop all those other papers. And,” he added, “make the editor one happy guy.”

  Chapter 14

  Eighty-sixth Street was relatively quiet when Elizabeth and Kaminsky emerged from the steamy confines of the Lexington Avenue subway station. Housewives scurried down the street, swinging their shopping bags, occasionally stopping to look in a window.

  The door to Schaller and Weber swung open, and the scent of savory sausage and plump bratwursts briefly filled the air.

  “Looks like Dorman lives above the Lorelei,” Kaminsky said, pointing to a door set alongside the dance hall. “It must get pretty noisy at night, although I suppose the rent is cheap enough.”

  They climbed the stairs to the apartment MacCullagh had indicated. Kaminsky paused for a moment to catch his breath then knocked on the door.

  “Coming,” they heard someone behind the door shout then the sounds of someone fumbling with the locks, and finally the door was flung open.

  “Yes?” A woman stood there.

  She looked faded as if life had drained all the color from her complexion, but Elizabeth thought she must have been quite pretty at one time. She had blond hair threaded with gray and blue eyes with laugh lines fanning out from the sides.

  “Could we speak to Joey Dorman, please?” Kaminsky said, fumbling for his press pass.

  The woman’s face paled even further.

  “What do you want with Joey?”

  “We’d like to ask him a few questions—get his side of the story. Is he home?” Kaminsky said.

  “Ja, ja, he is home. But I am afraid he is in the toilet.”

  “We’ll wait, if you don’t mind.” Kaminsky smiled. “Mrs. Dorman?”

  “Ja, I am Frau Dorman.” She twisted her apron in her hands. “Please come in.”

  She led them into a small, dim parlor. The room was spic and span, although the furniture was clearly old and worn.

  Elizabeth sat on the sofa and tried not to squirm as one of the springs had come undone and was nearly poking through the cushion. She looked around the apartment. As far as she could tell there was only the parlor, the kitchen, and one small bedroom. Did Joey have to sleep on this uncomfortable sofa?

  “My poor Joey. He wouldn’t hurt anyone. I told that to the police officer, but they wouldn’t listen to me.” She squeezed her hands until the knuckles cracked. “This has been an albtraum…a nightmare.”

  They heard the sound of the toilet flushing and a squeak as a door opened.

  “Who’s this? What’s going on?” Dorman said as he walked into the room.

  He was still wearing the T-shirt and overalls Elizabeth had seen him in when he’d been arrested at the World’s Fair. His hair was rumpled and his eyes looked swollen as if he’d been sleeping.

  Mrs. Dorman jumped up from her chair and patted the seat, indicating that her son should sit down. She disappeared into the kitchen where they could hear the water running.

  Dorman ran his hands through his hair, leaving it even more disheveled. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. His hands looked too big for his frame. Blond fuzz grew on their backs and the knuckles were rough and raw looking. Elizabeth found herself imagining those hands pulling a pair of nylons tight around Flo’s neck.

  Kaminsky introduced himself and Elizabeth. Dorman barely reacted—lifting his head briefly only to drop it into his hands again.

  “Do you want to tell us your side of the story?” Kaminsky said.

  “Why?” Dorman said, finally looking up. “The police didn’t believe me. They only let me go because they didn’t have enough evidence to keep me.” He gave a miserable laugh. “But they made it clear they weren’t going to stop looking.”

  “All the more reason for you to tell us your side of the story,” Elizabeth said gently.

  Dorman let out an enormous sigh. His shoulders slumped, and his mouth turned down.

  “I didn’t do anything.” His voice cracked. “I found her in the swimming pool and I pulled her out. I thought maybe I could save—” His voice caught in a sob. “But she was dead. Some bastard had killed her.”

  “Do you have any idea who might have done it?” Kaminsky said.

  “How should I know?” Dorman said. “I didn’t even know her.”

  “Yet you followed her around.” Kaminsky made it a statement not a question.

  “But I didn’t,” Dorman cried. “I just happened to sometimes be…” He shook his head as if to clear it. “Okay.” The anguish in his voice was clear. “I did occasionally try to be somewhere where I would see her. But I didn’t mean any harm.” His voice rose.

  “People said you were following her around. Stalking her even.” Kaminsky said quietly.

  Dorman shook his head vigorously. “I wasn’t. Not really. I was trying to get up the nerve to tell her…to tell her that she looked like Barbara Stanwyck. Ever since I saw Miss Stanwyck in Stella Dallas…well, I thought she looked like her. And I thought she’d like to know.”

  “Were you trying to ingratiate yourself with Miss Grimm?”

  Dorman looked confused.

  “Flo Grimm. The woman who was killed.”

  Dorman’s face cleared. He shook his head. “Was that her name? No, nothing like that. I just thought she’d…she’d like to know, is all.”

  “Miss Grimm claimed to her friends that when she ended her shift at the DuPont exhibit, you would be waiting for her.”

  “That’s not true.” Dorman wrung his hands. “I wasn’t waiting for her, honest.”

  “Then what were you doing?”

  “My girlfriend worked at the DuPont exhibit. She wasn’t like Miss Grimm. She didn’t do the demonstrations or anything. She worked the looms where they made the…the hosiery for the ladies.” His face colored.

  “Who is this girlfriend?” Kaminsky said, although Elizabeth knew they already had the girl’s name.

  Dorman’s face cleared slightly and a half smile played around his lips.

  “Elsie. Elsie Schultz. She’s really swell.”

  For a moment he looked like the young man he was—his forehead smooth, the furrow between his brows temporarily erased.

  “Look,” Dorman said, clasping his hands between his knees. “I’m really sorry if I scared Miss Grimm. I didn’t mean to, honest. But that doesn’t make me a killer. I would never have hurt her. I would never hurt anyone.” His voice trembled.

  Mrs. Dorman came out of the kitchen wiping her hands on a towel. “My Joey is a good boy,” she said. “He helps old Mrs. Lewis upstairs—carries her groceries for her and walks her dog when the weather is bad. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

  “I’m sure he wouldn’t,” Kaminsky said smoothly.

  “You will tell people that my Joey didn’t do it, won’t you?” She looked at Kaminsky, a desperate look in her eyes.

  “We aim to print the truth,” Kaminsky said as he stood up. “Thank you for your time.”

  * * *

  —

  “I’m starved, how about you?” Kaminsky said when they were back out on the street. “I could go for some bratwursts and a cold beer, and Germantown is the place to get the best. How about you?”

  “That does sound good,” Elizabeth said, suddenly realizing that she was hungry.

  “How about this place?” Kaminsky said, his hand on the door to the Heidelberg Restaurant.

  The interior of the restaurant was dim with tables shrouded in pristine white cloths and the walls covered with pastoral murals.

  “It smells heavenly in here,” Elizabeth said. Her stomach rumbled again.

  A waiter in lederhosen led them to a table and handed them menus.

  “I recommend the sausages,” he said in a German accent. “We get them from Schaller and Weber.”

  “So what did you think of Joey Dorman?” Kaminsky said after the waiter had taken their order.

  “He seemed terribly sweet. I can’t picture him hurting anybody.”

  “So you believed Mrs. Dorman and all that helping-old-ladies-cross-the-street stuff she told us.”

  Elizabeth took advantage of the brief pause as the waiter put their dishes in front of them.

  “Well…” She tried to reassess the interview with a more cynical eye. “I suppose it could all have been an act.”

  “Sure could have.” Kaminsky cut into his bratwurst and juice squirted out. “Not that I’m saying it was, mind you. But right now we can only go with the story we have. Dorman thought Flo looked like Barbara Stanwyck, and he wanted to tell her that. It will tug at some feminine heartstrings, I’m sure.”

  “What about the others?” Elizabeth sliced a piece of her weisswurst and stabbed it with her fork.

  “You mean Flo’s boyfriend, stepfather, and boss?” Kaminsky ticked them off on his fingers. “And I suppose we shouldn’t forget that gal Dotty Howard. She seemed to have it in for Flo.”

  Elizabeth frowned. “It’s so confusing. They all have a good reason for wanting Flo dead.”

  Kaminsky picked up his stein and took a big draft of his beer. It left a mustache of foam on his upper lip.

  “Our job is to report the stories as they come to us,” he said. “Not that I wouldn’t love to crack this case and be the first to reveal the killer.” He chuckled. “That would kill Markowitz, and I wouldn’t mind that one bit.”

  * * *

  —

  The newsroom was quiet when Elizabeth and Kaminsky got back. There was no light on behind the frosted-glass door to the office of the society editor, Estelle Draper, the typewriters on all the desks were shrouded, and the only sound was the hum of traffic through the open windows.

  Kaminsky took off his jacket, flung it over the back of his chair, and without even pulling his chair all the way in, put his fingers on his typewriter keys. Their staccato rhythm echoed around the newsroom, a sound that Elizabeth found oddly soothing.

  She sat down at her own desk, unpinned her hat and took it off. Sun was coming in the newsroom window and the breeze barely ruffled the photographs on her desk. She lifted her hair off her neck wishing she had taken the time to put it up.

  She flipped through the stack of black-and-white pictures she’d recently developed and separated them into categories. Most related to the murder at the World’s Fair, but she had a small pile of the ones she’d taken at the pub where the sailor had been found stabbed.

  The clacking of Kaminsky’s typewriter keys stopped suddenly, and he whistled in Elizabeth’s direction.

  “Biz, do you have the photographs you took of that murdered sailor?”

  “Yes. I’ve just been going through them.”

  “Let’s see them.”

  Elizabeth grabbed the stack and took them over to Kaminsky.

  Kaminsky picked up his coffee-stained mug, took a sip, and put it down on his desk where a series of rings discolored the top. He began going through them.

  “There’s more than one way to skin a cat,” Kaminsky said, tapping the pictures with his index finger. “I’m thinking that if we take a photograph of the sailor over to the docks, someone should be able to identify him. And maybe if we take the photograph around the area, we can get a sense of what he was up to.”

  “I don’t know,” Elizabeth said. “His head is turned to the side and his face isn’t completely visible.”

  Kaminsky sighed and dropped the stack on his desk. “True, but it’s worth a shot.”

  “Maybe we can get an artist to do a sketch based on the photos,” Elizabeth said. “Police sketch artists do that all the time, and they usually have nothing to go on but the victim’s description.”

  “I like that idea.” Kaminsky tapped a finger against his lips. “And I think I know just the right person.” He pushed away from his desk. “I’ll be right back,” he called over his shoulder as he headed for the door to the newsroom.

  When he returned, he was holding a newspaper. He spread it out on his desk and pointed to an article.

  Elizabeth read the headline. artists join federal art project. A grainy black-and-white photograph of a young man against a backdrop of a large painted mural accompanied the article.

  “The Trumpet did an article on this fellow.” Kaminsky tapped the photo. “Lucas Vere. He’s working with Reginald Marsh on the murals at the Alexander Hamilton Custom House down on Bowling Green.”

  “How can we get in touch with Mr. Vere?” Elizabeth said.

  Kaminsky folded the newspaper and tucked it under his arm. “Crocker did the story. His notes should be in the morgue. I’ll go check.” He started toward the door. “We’ll go see Mr. Vere as soon as I have his whereabouts, so put on your hat.”

  Elizabeth did as she was told, anchoring her hat securely with two Bakelite hat pins.

  * * *

  —

  Lucas Vere, as it turned out, lived on the top floor of a row house on Perry Street in the West Village. Perry Street was quiet compared to the hustle and bustle of midtown Manhattan. Trees shaded the sidewalk and Duke Ellington’s dreamy “Mood Indigo” came from an open window.

  Halfway up the stairs to Vere’s studio they had to stop when Kaminsky became wracked with a bout of coughing. He held on to the bannister as if for dear life, bent nearly double by the force of the coughing spell.

  “Should you see a doctor?” Elizabeth said.

  Kaminsky wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’m fine. Stop fussing.”

  Elizabeth was about to say that he didn’t look or sound fine, but she bit her tongue.

  They knocked on the door to Vere’s studio. The radio was playing and Elizabeth recognized Debussy’s “Clair de Lune.” The music stopped suddenly and the door was flung open.

  Lucas Vere was in his thirties with longish black hair threaded with strands of gray that was brushed back from a high forehead. He was thin with hollowed-out cheeks and the merest shadow of a beard. His fingers and dungarees were paint stained and there was a slash of cadmium scarlet on his cheek.

  He wasn’t movie star handsome, but Elizabeth found his looks to be quite absorbing, especially when he smiled.

  “You must be the reporter who called from the Daily Trumpet,” he said, pulling the door wider. “Come in.”

  The corners of the studio were dim, but sunlight came through the dusty skylight and illuminated the easel standing in the middle of the floor. The canvas on it was striking—splatters of different vibrant hues of color. Elizabeth recognized the scarlet paint as the same shade that stained Vere’s cheek. It was a new technique Elizabeth had recently read about. She’d dismissed it at the time as a passing fad, but seeing this painting, she was no longer so sure. There was vibrancy and a force about the composition that Elizabeth found as compelling as the artist himself.

  A wooden trestle table sat next to the easel and was littered with half-used tubes of paint oozing color out of their tops and a palette smeared with a rainbow of hues.

  “How can I help you?” Vere said, leading them to a sagging velvet settee piled with art books. He quickly removed the books and offered them a seat.

  Kaminsky handed Vere one of the photographs of the sailor.

  “We’re hoping you can do a drawing for us. We need to identify this man, but part of his face is hidden.”

  Vere looked at the photograph and shuddered. “Poor fellow. What happened to him?”

  “He was stabbed behind a pub in Hell’s Kitchen.” Kaminsky shifted on the lumpy sofa.

  Elizabeth leaned forward and gestured toward the photograph in Vere’s hand.

  “Do you think you can decipher what he must have looked like full face?”

  Vere nodded slowly. “Yes, I think I can.” He looked up at them. “It won’t be exact, mind you, but it should be good enough for someone to recognize him.” He walked over toward the table next to the easel. “Let me get my sketch pad and a bit of charcoal, and I’ll see what I can do.”