“That reminds me,” I said, “didn’t anybody hear all this shooting? A .32’s not a shotgun, but somebody ought to’ve heard it.”
“Sure,” he said disgustedly. “The place is lousy with people that think they heard things now, but nobody did anything about it then, and God knows they don’t get together much on what they think they heard.”
“It’s always like that,” I said sympathetically.
“Don’t I know it.” He put a forkful of food in his mouth. “Where was I? Oh, yes, about Wynant. He gave up his apartment when he went away, and put his stuff in storage. We been looking through it–the stuff–but ain’t found anything yet to show where he went or even what he was working on, which we thought maybe might help. We didn’t have any better luck in his shop on First Avenue. It’s been locked up too since he went away, except that she used to go down there for an hour or two once or twice a week to take care of his mail and things. There’s nothing to tell us anything in the mail that’s come since she got knocked off. We didn’t find anything in her place to help.” He smiled at Nora. “I guess this must be pretty dull to you, Mrs. Charles.”
“Dull?” She was surprised. “I’m sitting on the edge of my chair.”
“Ladies usually like more color,” he said, and coughed, “kind of glamour. Anyways, we got nothing to show where he’s been, only he phones Macaulay last Friday and says to meet him at two o’clock in the Plaza lobby. Macaulay wasn’t in, so he just left the message.”
“Macaulay was here,” I said, “for lunch.”
“He told me. Well, Macaulay don’t get to the Plaza till nearly three and he don’t find any Wynant there and Wynant ain’t registered there. He tries describing him, with and without a beard, but nobody at the Plaza remembers seeing him. He phones his office, but Wynant ain’t called up again. And when he phones Julia Wolf and she tells him she don’t even know Wynant’s in town, which he figures is a lie, because he had just give her five thousand dollars for Wynant yesterday and figures Wynant’s come for it, but he just says all right and hangs up and goes on about his business.”
“His business such as what?” I asked.
Guild stopped chewing the piece of roll he had just bitten off. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to know, at that. I’ll find out. There didn’t seem to be anything pointing at him, so we didn’t bother with that, but it don’t ever hurt any to know who’s got an alibi and who ain’t.”
I shook my head no at the question he had decided not to ask. “I don’t see anything pointing at him, except that he’s Wynant’s lawyer and probably knows more than he’s telling.”
“Sure. I understand. Well, that’s what people have lawyers for, I guess. Now about the girl: maybe Julia Wolf wasn’t her real name at all. We ain’t been able to find out for sure yet, but we have found out she wasn’t the kind of dame you’d expect him to be trusting to handle all that dough–I mean if he knew about her.”
“Had a record?”
He wagged his head up and down. “This is elegant stew. A couple of years before she went to work for him she did six months on a badgergame charge out West, in Cleveland, under the name of Rhoda Stewart.”
“You suppose Wynant knew that?”
“Search me. Don’t look like he’d turned her loose with that dough if he did, but you can’t tell. They tell me he was kind of nuts about her, and you know how guys can go. She was running around off and on with this Shep Morelli and his boys too.”
“Have you really got anything on him?” I asked.
“Not on this,” he said regretfully, “but we wanted him for a couple of other things.” He drew his sandy brows together a little. “I wish I knew what sent him here to see you. Of course these junkies are likely to do anything, but I wish I knew.”