Might as Well Be Dead Read Online Free Page A

For a couple of months after that experience I never went out on a business errand without making a point of checking my rear, and by that time it had become automatic, and I’ve done it ever since without thinking of it. That Tuesday afternoon, heading for Ninth Avenue, I suppose I glanced back when I had gone about fifty paces, since that’s the routine, but if so I saw nothing. But in another fifty paces, when I glanced back again automatically, something clicked and shot to the upper level and I was aware of it. What had caused the click was the sight of a guy some forty yards behind, headed my way, who hadn’t been there before. I stopped, turned, and stood, facing him. He hesitated, took a piece of paper from his pocket, peered at it, and started studying the fronts of houses to his right and left. Almost anything would have been better than that, even tying his shoestring, since his sudden appearance had to mean either that he had popped out of an areaway to follow me or that he had emerged from one of the houses on his own affairs; and if the latter, why stop to glom the numbers of the houses next door?
    So I had a tail. But if I tackled him on the spot, with nothing but logic to go on, he would merely tell me to go soak my head. I could lead him into a situation where I would have more than logic, but that would take time, and Freyer had said the jury was out, and I was in a hurry. I decided I could spare a couple of minutes and stood and looked at him. He was middle-sized, in a tan raglan and a brown snap-brim, with a thin, narrow face and a pointed nose. At the end of the first minute he got embarrassed and mounted the stoop of the nearest house, which was the residence and office of Doc Vollmer, and pushed the button. The door was opened by Helen Grant, Doc’s secretary. He exchanged a few words with her, turned away without touching his hat, descended to the sidewalk, mounted the stoop of the house next door, and pushed the button. My two minutes were up, and anyway that was enough, so I beat it to Ninth Avenue without bothering to look back, flagged a taxi, and told the driver Centre and Pearl Streets.
    At that time of day the courthouse corridors were full of lawyers, clients, witnesses, jurors, friends, enemies, relatives, fixers, bloodsuckers, politicians, and citizens. Having consulted a city employee below, I left the elevator at the third floor and dodged my way down the hall and around a corner to Part XIX, expecting no difficulty about getting in, since the Hays case was no headliner, merely run-of-the-mill.
    There certainly was no difficulty. The courtroom was practically empty—no judge, no jury, and even no clerk or stenographer. And no Peter Hays. Eight or nine people altogether were scattered around on the benches. I went and consulted the officer at the door, and was told that the jury was still out and he had no idea when it would be in. I found a phone booth and made two calls: one to Fritz, to tell him I might be home for dinner and I might not, and one to Doc Vollmer’s number. Helen Grant answered.
    “Listen, little blessing,” I asked her, “do you love me?”
    “No. And I never will.”
    “Good. I’m afraid to ask favors of girls who love me, and I want one from you. Fifty minutes ago a man in a tan coat rang your bell and you opened the door. What did he want?”
    “My lord!” She was indignant. “Next thing you’ll be tapping our phone! If you think you’re going to drag me into one of your messes!”
    “No mess and no dragging. Did he try to sell you some heroin?”
    “He did not. He asked if a man named Arthur Holcomb lived here, and I said no, and he asked if I knew where he lived, and I said no again. That was all. What is this, Archie?”
    “Nothing. Cross it off. I’ll tell you when I see you if you still want to know. As for not loving me, you’re just whistling in the dark. Tell me good-by.”
    “Good-by forever!”
    So he had been a tail. A man looking for