The Case of the Chased and the Unchaste by Thomas B. Dewey

Author:Thomas B. Dewey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: mystery, detective, crime, sleuth, murder
Publisher: Wildside Press LLC
Published: 2015-08-12T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

It was an old development, high up over the city. The houses looked well-kept and expensive. They were very large houses, bordered and screened by adult trees and foliage. The air was cooler than down below, even a little raw, but that could have been my emotional condition.

“That’s quite a story,” Gimpy said cheerfully.

“It’s the best I can do,” I said.

Lieutenant Holland lit a cigarette, broke the match, held it till it stopped smoking and tossed it out the window.

“Bernie Wolf had a cleaning woman—came in twice a week,” he said; “colored girl name of Ruth. Seemed to have it in her head that Bernie had a girl-friend.”

“Only one?” I said. “He was a good-looking bachelor and he made good money. He had a lot of glamorous contacts.”

“One particular girl-friend,” Holland said, “very hush-hush.”

“What was her name?”

Gimpy chuckled. “Man, I tell you, these P.I.s are thinking all the time. We were going to ask you that very question,” he said.

“I didn’t know Bernie that well,” I said.

“Tonight, when you left Porter’s,” Holland said, “Mrs. Porter left too. It looked as if Porter was cleaning house altogether.”

“I wasn’t watching as close as you,” I said.

“I spent a lot of time the last few days thinking about Bernie Wolf,” Holland said. “I see a guy in a good spot. Besides the high pay—which he earned it—he gets certain other advantages. Like he gets Julie’s Cadillac every year when Julie gets a new one. Probably half-price he gets it. Then a big man like Julie, he gets a lot of loot at Christmas—cases of whiskey, champagne and a lot of stuff, all of which he can’t use completely. So Bernie gets some of that—like hand-me-downs, see?”

“I don’t doubt it,” I said.

“So there are maybe other types of hand-me-downs and a fella like Bernie would be a sucker not to take advantage of them. Certain types of women might come under the heading of hand-me-downs. But that would have to be hush-hush, because a sensitive fella like Bernie couldn’t let it out that he was sleeping with his boss’s former wives or girl-friends.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Bernie was good enough to do his own hunting. But so if you’re right?”

“So tonight, when Julie Porter threw you out, how come he threw Carol out too?”

Gimpy giggled. “Maybe she was a private eye too,” he said. “Female type.”

His timing was a little off on that one and Holland looked unhappy. It had come off as comic relief rather than needling.

“Exactly what happened,” I said, “was this. I was in bed. Julie was out somewhere. Carol knocked at my door and came in. She said she had to talk to me. I asked her to get dressed and I’d meet her downstairs. She was upset. We argued about it. I finally won the argument. I was showing her out, when Julie came upstairs. He blew his stack. Very normal reaction. A couple of days, he’ll probably get over it.”

“Because naturally,” Gimpy said, “there was nothing to it.

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