The Fourth Postman Read online

  “See what I mean?” the bartender said as he walked away.

  Malone sighed and said, “Maybe we just better talk about the hoax.”

  “You must have read about it,” Jake said earnestly. “The beautiful red-haired French singing star, the toast of Paris, the toast of Rio, the toast of Australia, the toast of Honolulu—”

  Malone did remember it, vaguely. The girl had been a brief—but very brief—sensation, and then vanished from sight.

  Jake turned to Gilda, “If you’d just told me you were only fifteen at the time,” he said savagely, “it would have saved a lot of bother.” He lit a cigarette and flipped the match halfway across the room. “Of course,” he added, “there was the fact that she couldn’t sing, and couldn’t speak French.”

  “To you, as a press agent,” Malone said, “those things would not have been handicaps.”

  “No,” Jake admitted, “but just after we’d finished having her coached and I’d arranged her first appearance at the Chez Paris, what did she do? She went off and got married.”

  “And had twins,” Malone said gloomily. “Six twins.”

  “Tell it your own way,” Jake said. He lapsed into an insulted silence.

  Gilda gazed into his eyes and said, “Mr. Justus, you know something? My name isn’t really Gilda—”

  Malone rose with great dignity, picked up his beer with one hand, took Helene’s elbow with the other and said, “I suggest we adjourn to the bar, where there’s a chance that we may be able to enjoy some intelligent conversation.”

  The mutt rose, shook himself, yawned and followed Malone to the bar.

  “Two beers in glasses, and one in a saucer,” Malone told the bartender. He turned to Helene and said, “Suppose you give me the low-down on these people, including the six twins.”

  Helene said, “The important thing is Gilda’s personality.”

  “Let’s don’t be catty,” Malone said hastily.

  “Gilda,” Helene said, “has always been an impulsive child.”

  Malone reflected that impulsive might he stretched to fit Gilda’s personality.

  “Her family had millions of dollars,” Helene said, “millions and millions. The first time I saw her she was three years old. My mother went over to call on her mother, between divorces. My mother’s divorces, I mean. The Lacy family doesn’t believe in divorce unless they can benefit by it. She had two nurses and one of them made me wash my hands and face before I could play with her. They finally permitted her to go to a very select school for little girls, but her governess brought her there and called for her.”

  “Sounds dull,” Malone said.

  “Not for Gilda,” Helene assured him. “There was a public school just around the corner and Gilda used to sneak out the gymnasium window at recess time and go play in the public school yard. But eventually her family began complaining about skinned knees and elbows, mud on the pretty little white dresses, and occasional visitations of insect life in the pretty little red curls. After the inevitable investigation, there was a new governess and Gilda stayed home from school. I could describe her career in boarding school, but I think you can guess.”

  Malone nodded. “And then her family lost all their money. I remember that.” His eyes narrowed. “Her father, who must have been a swell guy if he named his daughter after Gilda Gray, and Abby Lacy’s husband, who evidently was one of the same, were brothers. Both of them lost every blessed cent they had in a crooked stock market deal. Gilda’s uncle had a rich wife, but all Gilda’s father had was an open window in a forty-four story building.”

  “I thought you’d remember,” Helene said softly.

  Malone relit his cigar. “Then came the hoax,” he said.

  “She didn’t want to be dependent on Abby Lacy,” Helene said, “so she decided to earn a living. But Kenneth Fairfaxx came along and didn’t want the girl of his dreams to earn a living, and they ran off to Crown Point and got married.”

  “The family must have loved that,” Malone said. He took a fresh cigar from his pocket and began unwrapping it. “How old did you say she was then?”

  “I didn’t say,” Helene told him, “but she was sixteen. The family started to arrange for an annulment right away. Abby Lacy was her guardian and trustee.”

  Malone nodded solemnly and said, “Trustee for the money which Glida, pronounced Gilda, didn’t have any of. Did the annulment take?”

  “The annulment,” Helene said, “was called off abruptly.”

  “I know,” Malone said, “twins.” He signaled to Lew Browne and prayed that Jake would offer to pay for the drinks.

  “They settled the young couple in a charming little bungalow in the suburbs,” Helene said. There was bitterness in her voice. “Abby Lacy’s lawyers found Kenneth a job of sorts as an assistant to an assistant of a vice-president. And Abby Lacy helped out by coming out every day to help Gilda with the management of the little cottage, and to see that the dishes were clean, the beds made and the groceries ordered. If they weren’t, she very kindly explained to Gilda just what mistakes she was making and how to avoid them in the future. The impediment to the annulment finally arrived and Abby Lacy was outraged. No one in any of the associated families had ever had twins, and she considered it a disgrace.”

  “Whereupon,” Malone said, “two years later, Gilda had another pair of twins, probably just to spite Mrs. Lacy.”

  “That shows how much you know about women,” Helene said scornfully. “Gilda adores children, and she adores her husband—ex-husband—I mean.”

  “That brings up another point,” Malone said, “How did husband become ‘ex’?”

  Helene scowled. “I’m not sure of the details,” she said slowly. “I just know that somehow Kenneth discovered his pretty young wife was running around with other men, drinking heavily, and losing a lot of his hard-earned money at the races. For some reason, Gilda refused to defend herself. The last set of twins was born after the divorce. Kenneth hasn’t any money, you know, but I don’t think she’d have taken a cent from him if he’d been the richest man in the world. She refused any support from the Fairfaxx family or the Lacys. Even before the last twins were weaned, she had a job and she’s kept it ever since.”

  Malone gazed across the room at the red-haired girl and said, “What kind of a job?”

  “She’s a hat-check girl,” Helene said. “She owns a flock of concessions now, and has half a dozen hat-check girls working for her. She works at the Casino herself, and she’s made enough to buy a little house in Wilmette and take damned good care of the twins. And she’s still madly in love with Kenneth Fairfaxx, and what are we going to do about her?”

  Malone gazed dreamily at the fly-specked mirror. “I have a feeling,” he said, “that Gilda can handle her problems without any help from us. Furthermore, I have a faint hope she’s going to be a great help in handling some of our problems. The main one of which is Mr. Rodney Fairfaxx.”

  He rose, and flicked ashes from his cigar. The mutt rose, too, and stood wagging his tail and watching Malone. “Much as I hate to leave you charming people,” the little lawyer said, “I have a few trans-Atlantic telephone calls to make.”

  “You’ll run into von Flanagan,” Helene reminded him.

  “If I do,” Malone prophesied, “he’ll be very, very sorry.” He waved a finger under Helene’s nose and said solemnly, “I’m not at all satisfied with the evidence in this case. There’s more to the eye than this meets.”

  “You mean an eye for an eye and this for a that,” Helene said. “Malone, you’re drunk.”

  “And about time, too,” Malone agreed. He added earnestly, “Before I talk to you again, think of everything you know about all the Fairfaxxes and all the Lacys and Gilda.”

  “Anything in particular you want to know?”

  “Yes,” Malone said, “I’d like to know who would go so far as to murder three inoffensive postmen in order to keep old Rodney Fairfaxx from finding out that his long-lost sweetheart Annie
was still alive and writing to him.”

  7

  Malone tried his office door. It was locked.

  He breathed a long sigh of relief. Maggie had gone home early.

  He looked down at the mutt and said, “Best luck I’ve had today.”

  Maggie would never have approved of the telephone calls he was about to make. Not with finances in their present state. He doubted that she would have approved of the mutt, either.

  He opened the door, switched on the lights and said to the mutt, “Make yourself at home.”

  There was a folder on his desk, marked “MR. MALONE. IMPORTANT.” He opened it, glanced at it, saw the words “Mr. Malone, the building agent called about the office rent and …” He closed the folder and stuffed it in a desk drawer. The mutt curled up at his feet and went to sleep. Malone sighed, picked up the phone.

  Nearly an hour later he pushed the phone away, rose and walked to the window. The snow had stopped falling and had given way to a mist that was turned a lurid orange by the reflected light from electric signs. He looked at a dismal vista of roof-tops and wondered if there was a moon, somewhere too far away to be seen.

  There was something about this case he didn’t like, and he didn’t know for sure what it was.

  “The trouble with me,” he said to the mutt, who had come over to look out the window with him, both front paws on the sill, “is that I hate to see unpleasant things happen. Even to people.”

  Unpleasant things were going to happen, and he knew it. To people he liked.

  At that moment the mutt gave out with a long, sorrowful howl.

  “Damn you,” Malone said. “Let’s don’t both of us be superstitious.”

  He turned away from the window, thinking. There was nothing, now, he could do till morning. Except, of course, go home and get a good night’s sleep. He looked at the desk clock a friend in the city hall had given him last Christmas. Too late for dinner, and too early to go to bed. Not enough cash on hand to get into a poker game.

  The mutt looked up at him and whined hopefully.

  “Don’t worry,” Malone told him reassuringly. “We’ll go somewhere and do something.”

  It occurred to him that perhaps if he explained his prospects to Joe the Angel, he still might be able to manage that poker game. Not that right now he felt like engaging in a poker game. But it would be something to take an unpleasant premonition out of his mind. And besides, with only reasonably good luck, he wouldn’t need to worry about his retainer from the Fairfaxx family until another day.

  The night elevator man said, “Say, Malone, there was a cop here looking for you.”

  “I hope he found me,” Malone said. He walked through the lobby, past the closed magazine stand, and paused just inside the door to the street.

  Von Flanagan was looking for him. Malone wasn’t sure just why. But he didn’t want to become involved with the police department right now. Not until he’d had a good night’s sleep.

  He pushed open the door, glanced out into the street, and drew back.

  He felt a sudden sense of fear, a feeling of terror. Through the glass doors he could see the pale snow beginning to fall again. Out there was a street he had seen a hundred, and a thousand, and a thousand-thousand times before. Now, suddenly, it frightened him.

  The mutt whimpered.

  “Are you a dog or a mouse?” Malone asked indignantly. He kicked the door open and strode out into the white-streaked darkness. For just a moment he paused, then he turned in the direction of Washington Street. The mutt, complaining softly about the snow underfoot, followed close at his heels.

  Half a block later the mutt let loose a low, ominous growl. Malone slowed down, glanced in a reflecting store window. He walked on, glanced in another window. As he reached a third window, there was another low-pitched growl from the mutt.

  There was no doubt about it. He was being followed.

  The fourth reflecting store window revealed that he was being followed by a man or woman who was extremely tall and extremely thin, and clad in black. Malone walked a little faster, and the mutt scuttled in front of him.

  “Perfect nonsense,” Malone told the mutt. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  Another glance in a store window showed a black-clad monster moving through the gently falling snow. About nine feet tall, Malone estimated. He quickened his steps. The mutt began to trot. The monster kept right up with them.

  Malone made a quick turn into an alley near the Sherman Hotel to see if the following monster would pass by. He waited there a good five minutes, the mutt quivering at his heels. Then he poked his head gingerly around the corner. There was a dark shadow down the street.

  Malone nudged the mutt and said, “Let’s go!” It wasn’t far to Joe the Angel’s.

  The something followed. Experimentally Malone slowed down. The something slowed down with him. Malone speeded up, and so did his follower.

  The lights were bright on LaSalle Street, and people were walking and chattering on the sidewalks. Malone reminded himself that he had been followed before, by experts with lethal intent. But never before by a thing.

  He didn’t dare look behind him.

  At last he turned one more corner, saw the lights of Joe the Angel’s bar, and ran like a rabbit.

  The mutt was ahead of him by the time they reached the door. Malone slammed it shut behind him, caught his breath, slid onto a barstool and said, “Joe, I’m being followed.”

  Joe the Angel leaned over the bar and said, “By the dog-catcher?”

  “By a monster,” Malone said, still breathing hard. He closed his eyes for a moment.

  Joe slid a drink in front of him and said, “By the cops, too.” He added, “Nice little dog. Where you steal him?”

  “He stole me,” Malone said. He gulped his drink and said, “Give him a saucer of beer. On me.”

  “On me,” Joe said. “For the little dog, a drink on the house.” He patted the mutt and said, “I would like a little dog like that. Malone—”

  “We’ll talk about it later,” Malone said. He shoved his glass across the bar. “And Joe, will you see if there is anyone—outside?”

  Joe nodded reassuringly, refilled Malone’s glass, walked to the door and peered out. Suddenly he slammed the door shut and hurried back to his post behind the bar.

  “Someone standing,” he told Malone.

  “Standing?” Malone said.

  “Watching,” Joe the Angel said. “Big. Tall.”

  “How tall?” Malone asked, not really wanting to know.

  Joe the Angel stretched his arm up and said, “So tall.” He poured a drink for himself and said, “All black. Malone, you go home now, and I will take care of the little dog.”

  “I will not go home now,” Malone said, “and I will take care of the little dog.”

  “The police, too,” Joe the Angel said. “They want to know—” He looked around the bar, made sure that no one was listening, and said softly, “You are in trouble, Malone.” He nodded toward the phone booth where a very ordinary-looking man in a tan overcoat was making a phone call.

  “That’s no novelty,” Malone growled. He too had recognized the man in the tan overcoat, who obviously was now calling von Flanagan to say “Malone is here.”

  Joe the Angel poured beer in the mutt’s saucer and said, “Malone, I am your friend. Drink up and go home.”

  “See if the tall someone is still outside,” Malone told him.

  Joe took a quick look, and nodded. He glanced anxiously toward the phone booth.

  “I wish I knew why von Flanagan wants me,” Malone said. He downed his drink and said, “Or maybe I’m glad that I don’t know.”

  “When he was here looking for you,” Joe volunteered, “he says you stole something from the scene of a crime.”

  Malone scowled. He couldn’t remember stealing anything from the scene of a crime, or from anywhere else.

  At that moment the man in the tan overcoat emerged from the telepho
ne booth and sat down in the back room, next to the rear door. Malone and Joe the Angel looked at each other helplessly.

  The mutt chose that instant to snap at the ankle of a stranger who was lingering over a short beer. The stranger aimed an inaccurate kick at the mutt. Malone promptly aimed an unpleasant and possibly accurate name at the stranger, who immediately hurled the remains of his beer at Malone.

  Thirty seconds later Joe the Angel’s City Hall Bar was the scene of a small-sized riot, with every customer joining in impartially and joyously. The man in the tan overcoat rushed back to the telephone booth, and Malone seized that opportunity to escape through the rear door.

  He paused to pat the mutt and say, “Nice quick thinking, chum,” and then headed down the alley.

  Von Flanagan was looking for him. It was something that could be straightened out in a hurry, but he didn’t feel like wasting time with von Flanagan right now. And out in front of Joe the Angel’s a monster, probably eight feet tall, was waiting for him. Or, if not a monster, a someone. Right now, either one was bad enough. The little lawyer had no idea why anyone should be following him, but at the moment he didn’t want to know.

  He decided that the safest place to head for right now was Jake and Helene’s apartment.

  At the end of the alley he hailed a passing cab, got in fast and said, “The Ambassador West.”

  8

  “I feel perfectly all right,” said Jake indignantly. “All I need is a few minutes rest before dinner.” He sneezed. “Perhaps a gargle would be a good idea.”

  “I am going to call the doctor,” Helene said.

  “You make a move toward the phone and I’ll reach it first and call my lawyer.”

  “Your lawyer,” Helene told him, “is probably sleeping in the back end of a saloon somewhere.” She looked at him, her eyes softened, and she said, “Would you like an aspirin, darling?”

  “No,” said Jake. “I told you I’m perfectly all right. Or I would be if you’d let me alone.” He cleared his throat with difficulty. “Do we have any aspirin, dear?” He lifted himself on one elbow and said, “Stay away from that telephone.” He sneezed again. Then he coughed. Then he said, “Helene, would you fix a gargle for me?”