She opened the door, made a choked, frightened sound in her throat, and backed away from me, holding both hands to her open mouth.
“Miss Helen Albury?” I asked.
She shook her head violently from side to side. There was no truthfulness in it. Her eyes were crazy.
I said:
“I’d like to come in and talk to you a few minutes,” going in as I spoke, closing the door behind me.
She didn’t say anything. She went up the steps in front of me, her head twisted around so she could watch me with h r scary eves.
We went into a scantily furnished living room. Dinah’s house could be seen from its windows.
The girl stood in the center of the floor, her hands still to her mouth.
I wasted time and words trying to convince her that I was harmless. It was no good. Everything I said seemed to increase her panic. It was a damned nuisance. I quit trying, and got down to business.
“You are Robert Albury’s sister?” I asked.
No reply, nothing but the senseless look of utter fear.
I said:
“After he was arrested for killing Donald Willsson you took this flat so you could watch her. What for?”
Not a word from her. I had to supply my own answer:
“Revenge. You blamed Dinah Brand for your brother’s trouble. You watched for your chance. It came the night before last. You sneaked into her house, found her drunk, stabbed her with the ice pick you found there.”
She didn’t say anything. I hadn’t succeeded in jolting the blankness out of her frightened face. I said:
“Dawn helped you, engineered it for you. He wanted Elihu Willsson’s letters. Who was the man he sent to get them, the man who did the actual killing? Who was he?”
That got me nothing. No change in her expression, or lack of expression. No word. I thought I would like to spank her. I said:
“I’ve given you your chance to talk. I’m willing to listen to your side of the story. But suit yourself.”
She suited herself by keeping quiet. I gave it up. I was afraid of her, afraid she would do something even crazier than her silence if I pressed her further. I went out of the flat not sure that she had understood a single word I had said.
At the corner I told Dick Foley:
“There’s a girl in there, Helen Albury, eighteen, five six, skinny, not more than a hundred, if that, eyes close together, brown, yellow skin, brown short hair, straight, got on a gray suit now. Tail her. If she cuts up on you throw her in the can. Be careful–she’s crazy as a bedbug.”
I set out for Peak Murry’s dump, to locate Reno and see what he wanted. Half a block from my destination I stepped into an office building doorway to look the situation over.
A police patrol wagon stood in front of Murry’s. Men were being led, dragged, carried, from pool room to wagon. The leaders, draggers, and carriers did not look like regular coppers. They were, I supposed, Pete the Finn’s crew, now special officers. Pete, with McGraw’s help, apparently was making good his threat to give Whisper and Reno all the war they wanted.
While I watched, an ambulance arrived, was loaded, and drove away. I was too far away to recognize anybody or any bodies. When the height of the excitement seemed past I circled a couple of blocks and returned to my hotel.
Mickey Linehan was there with information about Mr. Charles Proctor Dawn.
“He’s the guy that the joke was wrote about: ‘Is he a criminal lawyer?’ ‘Yes, very.’ This fellow Allaury that you nailed, some of his family hired this bird Dawn to defend him. Albury wouldn’t have anything to do with him when Dawn came to see him. This three-named shyster nearly went over himself last year, on a blackmail rap, something to do with a parson named Hill, but squirmed out of it. Got some property out on Libert Street, wherever that is. Want me to keep digging?”
“That’ll do. We’ll stick around till we hear from Dick.”