A Dog's Ransom (8 page)

“It seems to me it’s dangerous for you.”

“Me?” Clarence said.

“He might have friends. Aren’t you the only one who knows about him now? You and the Reynoldses? He might try to waste you, Clare.”

Clarence was pleased by her concern. “I’m not worried. Don’t you worry.” He stood up. “I’d better take off, my sweet. On duty at eight.”

“Cuppa before you go? Instant?”

“No, but—Can I phone the Reynoldses? I ought to.”

“Go ahead.”

The Reynoldses’ number had gone out of his head, and he had to look it up. He felt Marylyn watching him.

Mrs. Reynolds answered.

“This is Clarence Duhamell. Is—is Mr. Reynolds there?”

He was. He came on. “Hello.”

“Mr. Reynolds. Some bad news. When I went back to Rowajinski’s house—just now—he’d cleared out. I don’t know where he is now.”

“Cleared out?”

“He may still telephone you about the dog, but of course I can’t be sure about that. Will you let me know at the station house if he tries to get in touch with you? I go on duty at eight tonight, but tomorrow, just tell the station house.”

“Well—no. If he gets in touch, I don’t want the police in on it till I give it a chance with the dog. You surely understand that.”

“Mr. Reynolds—we
will
do our best.”

Edward Reynolds fairly hung up on him. Clarence felt awful. He turned to Marylyn and said, “Mr. Reynolds doesn’t want the police in on it, in case this guy contacts him. Jesus!”

“Oh, honey!” Marylyn sounded sympathetic, but she didn’t drop her sewing, didn’t say anything more.

She didn’t understand the importance of it, Clarence thought. “I’ve got to go. I’ll see you later, darling.” He meant after 4 a.m. “I’ll be quiet coming in.”

“Don’t take it so hard, Clare! You act like it’s the end of the world!”

7

K
enneth Rowajinski, at twenty minutes to 6 p.m. on Monday evening, had lugged his suitcase up the steps of Mrs. Williams’s house, and treated himself to the first taxi he saw. “In trouble with the police! You’re a creep, a nasty old man, Mr. Rowajinski!” Mrs. Williams had screamed after him. The bitch had four days’ worth of his money besides, because his rent was paid through Saturday.

Kenneth had thought there were some inexpensive hotels in the University Place district, so he told the driver to go to University Place and Eighth Street. This area turned out to look rather swank, so he walked uptown towards 14th Street, and at last found what he wanted in the Hotel George, a dark grayish corner building some seven stories high. Rooms were twelve dollars per night. Seventy-two dollars per week if one paid by the week, which was more than Kenneth had expected. He said he would pay by the day, because he was not sure he would be here more than two or three days.

“Can we have the three days now?” asked the man rudely.

“
Two
days maybe?” Kenneth could bargain as well as the next.

The man accepted two days’ money, twenty-four dollars.

“Want to fill this out?” He shoved a registration form towards Kenneth.

Kenneth wrote after Name: Charles Ricker. Home address: Huntington, Long Island, a town that sprang to Kenneth’s mind for no reason that he knew.

“Street address there? For Huntington?”

Kenneth invented one, and wrote it.

A colored bellhop took him to his room on the fifth floor and carried his suitcase. Kenneth did not tip. Service was supposed to be included.

Then with his door closed, the extra button flicked so no one could open the door with a key from outside, Kenneth felt better, safe, even a trifle elegant. He had a private bath, a big white tub with shower, a clean basin with a little cake of soap wrapped in green paper. Kenneth opened his suitcase, made sure his money was still there, then he had a shower and shaved. He had nine hundred and twenty-odd dollars in his suitcase, and tomorrow he’d have a thousand dollars more. What was he worried about? That young cop? He’d shaken him.

Kenneth was hungry. He’d have to go out for something. He thought of putting his roll of money in the bed, but would they open or do anything to the bed tonight before he came back? Kenneth pulled the dark red, not exactly clean bedspread back, and saw that the two pillows were fresh. Better here than in his suitcase, he thought, and he took the money and shoved it deep into a pillowcase, and replaced the bedspread neatly.

At Howard Johnson’s on Sixth Avenue, Kenneth had a delicious hamburger with French fries and coffee. Then Kenneth went to a telephone booth on a corner and looked up Reynolds’s number. He’d looked it up for curiosity days ago and forgot it. He put a dime in and dialed.

A woman’s voice answered.

“Can I speak with Mr. Reynolds?”

“Just a minute.”

Kenneth could tell she knew who he was. “Hello, Mr. Reynolds. I’ve got your dog. Lisa.”

“Where is she—please?”

“She is in Long Island. Absolutely okay. Now Mr. Reynolds, I would like another thousand dollars. My sister insists on it, see? So tomorrow night at eleven, same place, same—small bills, all right? Then you will get your dog an hour later.”

“All right.—But what guarantee can you give me? Can I speak with your sister? Where is she?”

“In Long Island. No, you can’t speak with her. She wants nothing to do with this. And listen, Mr.—Reynolds, no one with you tomorrow night. No one following me. Okay? Because if that happens—you won’t get any dog. You understand?”

“Yes, of course.”

“I have your promise?”

“Yes. —Where are you calling—”

Kenneth hung up. He was smiling, feeling triumphant.

The money was still in the pillow when he returned to his hotel room.

The next morning around nine, Kenneth left his room with a hundred and eighty dollars in his pocket, and walked to 14th Street in quest of clothing. His gray overcoat was pretty shabby, and he could afford to throw it away, he thought. Kenneth bought a suit for forty-nine dollars and ninety-five cents, and an overcoat of brown tweed for sixty-three fifty. He would have to come back in the afternoon for the suit, because the sleeves had to be shortened. Then he bought black shoes for eight ninety-five. The tweed overcoat was handsome, and stiff with newness. With his new coat and shoes on, his contempt for the people around him began to flood him again—a strong and reassuring emotion. They were all human cogs in a machine, never thinking about anything, just working, eating, sleeping, breeding. In another shop Kenneth bought a hat. He liked to wear hats and felt unprotected without one, and his old dark gray hat looked disgraceful in comparison with the overcoat.

Kenneth bought the
Times
and the
Post
and returned to his hotel to read, perhaps snooze, until he became hungry again. But with the future in mind he had bought a frankfurter on a roll at a stand-up coffee-shop, slathered it with mustard and relish, and wrapped it in a couple of paper napkins. In the lobby of the Hotel George, Kenneth had looked around for a policeman—or the young cop in uniform or not. He saw no one who seemed interested in him. Maybe the young cop had torn up his old room at Mrs. Williams’s, looking for the money, looking for clues as to where he was. Lots of luck! And it would certainly annoy Mrs. Williams.
Good
! Then Kenneth realized that Mrs. Williams would have to forward his monthly compensation checks to him somewhere. Or should he give the government office his savings bank address? Time enough to think about that, another two weeks till it was due. But it was a problem. Awkward. Because the police could trace him if he ever stepped into his savings bank (where he kept his bank book), if the police had troubled to find out that he had an account at the Union Dime Savings at 40th Street and Sixth Avenue. The police could ask the bank to detain him, and there was always an armed guard in the bank. But fortunately there was not much money there, and he could live on the ransom money for quite a time.

As the day wore on, Kenneth became a little nervous. Seven p.m. now. He wanted to leave his hotel, feeling that he’d be safer on the loose, walking around, and yet the walls of his room offered a kind of protection, too, and it was raining slightly. By five minutes to ten, Kenneth could stay in his room no longer, and he put on his old raincoat, which he had carried over his arm when he left Mrs. Williams’s. He had gone back to the clothing shop at 4 p.m. for his new suit, but because it was raining, he wore his old clothes.

He imagined the young cop having to tell Mr. Reynolds—last night—that Kenneth Rowajinski had disappeared from his apartment. Mr. Reynolds must have known this when Kenneth spoke to him. If so, it hadn’t seemed to influence Edward Reynolds about coming up with the money. Kenneth took a crosstown bus on 8th Street to First Avenue, then an uptown bus. He got off at the 57th Street stop.

The rain still dribbled. On York Avenue, Kenneth walked slowly, looking everywhere for enemies, as he had done on Friday night. But he didn’t think Reynolds would have allowed the police to come, really. Reynolds wanted his dog back. At 59th Street, Kenneth turned west, intending to make a circle to the north and approach the spot on York Avenue from uptown at, say, ten minutes past eleven. On 59th Street, Kenneth actually passed a pair of strolling cops. The cops paid him no mind.

But now Kenneth imagined cops converging in a ring on the York Avenue spot. It
wasn’t
true, he told himself, but no harm in imagining, because it made him more cautious. If he saw a single figure that looked suspicious in that area, he intended to walk away.

But so far no one looked suspicious. Kenneth could not trust his wrist-watch, so he peered into a bar, then a grocery store—closed but he could see the clock on the wall—and saw that it was five minutes past eleven. Kenneth crossed to the east side of York and walked downtown. The high fence, sunk into a cement base a few feet high, came into view, then Kenneth was walking along it, limping as little as possible. His small gray eyes darted in every direction. Reynolds should have come and gone. Kenneth tried to count the pikes off, but there was no need, because he saw the pale bundle from a distance of ten feet. He reached out and took it, not even coming to a complete stop. The bundle was thicker, perhaps because Reynolds had put more paper around it against the rain. Kenneth carried it with his right hand inside his raincoat. He crossed 60th Street, then 59th Street, looking for a taxi. He passed only two people on his side of the Avenue, a young man whistling and walking fast, a woman who did not glance at him.

At 57th Street, Kenneth found a taxi.

“Hotel George,” Kenneth said. “University Place. Just below Fourteenth Street.”

He was safe. The clicks of the taxi’s meter were counting off the fractions of miles between him and the danger uptown. Kenneth put the bundle in his lap while he paid the driver, then put the bundle back under his raincoat. He walked into his lobby. Again all was tranquil.

“You’ve been out in the rain,” said the black elevator operator as they rode up.

“A little walk,” said Kenneth non-committally. Kenneth disliked chumminess.

Kenneth went into his room and again double-locked his door with the button on the inside. Then he removed his shoes, also his socks, which were damp, and put on other socks. An idea had come to him in the last minutes, a protective idea. He could put the thumbscrews on the young cop, in case he ran into him again. After all, the cop had let him
go
, hadn’t he? Kenneth’s idea was to say the cop had agreed to let him escape, if he got some of the money of the second ransom payment. This idea was a bit fuzzy in Kenneth’s head, but he sensed that essentially it was sound. To make it sounder, Kenneth intended to burn some of the money, destroy it. Kenneth was staring at the damp bundle on the round wooden table as his thoughts jumped this way and that. He was also prolonging the moments before he had the pleasure of looking at the money. At last Kenneth washed his hands in the bathroom, dried them on a fresh towel, and opened his package. There it was again, stacks and clumps of greenbacks, all tens, five bundles of twenty tens each!

He intended to burn five hundred dollars. It was a shocking thing and above all strange, but before he could think too much about it (because he was sure he was right), Kenneth slipped the rubber bands off two bundles and counted off ten ten-dollar bills from a third bundle. He tried it first in an ashtray, but it went slowly, and he decided on the basin.

The bills were surprisingly resistant to fire, but at last he could get five or six going at once in the basin, and soon he had to pause and collect the ashes in pieces of newspaper. It took him nearly a quarter of an hour to burn them all, and it was curiously exciting, all that money, that power, that
freedom
going up in smoke, turning to nothing. He rinsed the basin, and opened both the window in his bathroom and the window in the bedroom to get the smoke out. He had been enjoying the smoke, but he didn’t want the hotel people to think a fire had broken out.

This possibility made him rush to the remaining money on his table and stow it away with the other money in case anybody insisted on coming into the room. He had stuck the money now in a folded sweater in one of the drawers, since he thought women might come in to fuss around with the bed while he was out. But when he slept, he thought it wisest to keep the money in a pillowcase.

Now it was five past midnight. He imagined Edward Reynolds waiting at York and 61st Street, waiting for the dog. In the rain. How long would he wait? Kenneth smiled a little, feeling no mercy at all. Let the snob buy another dog. He could afford to. Reynolds was really a dope to have paid
two
thousand dollars. That made Kenneth feel superior. He might not have as much money as Reynolds, but it was plain that he had more brains.

8

C
larence’s new 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. shift gave him Tuesdays and Wednesdays off for the next three weeks. Tuesday noon, he rang his precinct house to ask if there had been any message from Edward Reynolds. The Desk Officer, whose voice Clarence didn’t recognize, said no.

“Are you sure? It’s about a dog theft. A ransom.”

“Absolutely not, my friend.”

Clarence was at Marylyn’s apartment. She had gone out at 10 a.m. for a dictation job on Perry Street. He had no plans with her for the day, because she said she wasn’t sure she would have any time for lunch. Clarence made some scrambled eggs for himself. He walked around the Village, up to 10th Street, finally took a Sixth Avenue bus uptown, and stared out the window all the way, looking for a short, chunky, limping type like Rowajinski. Clarence rode to 116th Street, then walked to his precinct house. He asked what they had found out about a sister of Kenneth Rowajinski.

A young patrolman whom Clarence had seen only once or twice before looked it up for him and said: “One sister named Anna Gottstein. Lives in Doylestown, Pennsylvania.”

Clarence wrote down her address and telephone number which was under her husband’s name, Robert L. Gottstein. “Thanks very much,” Clarence said.

Pennsylvania now, not Long Island.

Clarence took the subway back downtown, looking over all the passengers, everywhere. What else could he do?

He thought of ringing Edward Reynolds at his office around 4 p.m. to ask if he had heard yet from Rowajinski, but he was afraid Mr. Reynolds would think he was meddling too much: after all, Mr. Reynolds had made it plain that he didn’t want police in on the affair even if Rowajinski contacted him and asked for a second thousand.

A little after four, Marylyn’s telephone rang and Clarence answered it.

“My mother wants to see me tonight, Clare,” Marylyn said. “You know—I told you I might have to go out. I called her but I really can’t get out of it.”

She meant she had to go to Brooklyn Heights. Tuesday evening was her regular evening to have dinner with her mother, so Clarence could hardly complain. But he was disappointed and felt cut adrift.

At 6:30 p.m., Clarence rang his precinct house again. Lieutenant Santini was there, and Clarence spoke with him. Santini said there had been no message from an Edward Reynolds.

Again Clarence repressed his urge to ring up the Reynoldses’ apartment. But maybe Rowajinski hadn’t dared ask for the second thousand. But if so, how was he going to get the dog to the Reynoldses? Or was the dog alive?

Marylyn wasn’t coming back to her apartment, but was going directly from an afternoon job to Brooklyn Heights. She’d be back before midnight, she had said, and she expected him to be there, but he wrote a note around seven to her, saying.

Darling,

Am worried about tonight and the Reynolds situation. I don’t know what will happen. I will call you between 11 and 12. I bought Ajax. Message by telephone for you.

All my love XX

Clare

He left the note on her pillow. The telephone message was from a woman who had a rental service in the Village. She needed a typing job.

Clarence walked up Eighth Avenue to 23rd Street, had a hamburger and coffee, and went to a film on the same street, mainly to kill time. It was after eleven when he came out. He went to a sidewalk telephone booth and rang up the Reynoldses.

A woman’s voice, not Greta Reynolds’s, answered. “Who is this, please?”

“Patrolman Duhamell. Can I speak to Mr. Reynolds if he’s there?”

“Oh—you’re the policeman who came to see them? . . . They’re not here now. I expect them back—after midnight.”

Clarence knew what that meant: the Pole had made the date and the Reynoldses had kept it. “I’d like to see them,” Clarence said painfully but with determination. “Can I phone again—after midnight?”

“Yes. Sure.”

“They went to get the dog, didn’t they?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you,” Clarence said. “I’ll ring again.”

The woman hadn’t sounded very friendly.

Clarence walked west to Eight Avenue, then uptown. It was raining slightly, and he was wearing his overcoat, not his raincoat, but he didn’t care. At ten of twelve, he telephoned Marylyn. She was in.

“Honey—you saw my note? . . . Are you all right?”

She was all right. “What’s with the Reynolds situation?”

“They made the second date—apparently. At eleven tonight. I’m only hoping the dog is delivered at midnight. I want to find out.”

She understood. They had a date tomorrow evening. To see a play. No, Clarence wouldn’t forget.

“Where are you? . . . Are you coming down later?”

“I don’t know. Can I leave it that way?”

“Sure, darling, sure. Look out for yourself.”

Clarence was grateful. She understood. He went into a bar for a beer, and to go to the toilet. And to kill time. He killed time until a quarter to 1 a.m. Now, he thought, he could telephone the Reynoldses. Either they had their dog or they hadn’t.

Again the strange woman’s voice answered. “They’re not back yet. Greta phoned around twelve—a little after. They were going to wait a while.”

Clarence sank. “All right, I’ll be up. Tell them I’ll be up—now.” He hung up before she could protest.

Because he saw an uptown bus at once, Clarence took it. What was the hurry? Now, Clarence thought, the thing to do was face Mr. Reynolds, admit he’d done the wrong thing in consulting him and giving Rowajinski a chance to escape, and do his best to put things right—to find Rowajinski and get the dog, if she were still alive somewhere, and hopefully get most of the money back, too. By 2 a.m., Clarence thought Mr. Reynolds might agree to let his precinct open up on the case, alert all the cops in New York to look for Rowajinski, not to mention looking for his sister.

A white doorman at the Reynoldses’ apartment house opened the glass front door with a key. Clarence gave his name and said he was expected by the Reynoldses.

“Yeah, they just came in.” The doorman picked up the house telephone.

“Did they have their dog with them just now?” Clarence asked, unable to repress the question.

“No.—The dog? The dog’s lost.—Mr. Reynolds? There’s a Mr. Dummell—Okay.”

Clarence took the elevator.

Mr. Reynolds opened the door. “Come in.”

“Thank you. I just spoke with the doorman. You didn’t get your dog.”

“No.”

There were two other people in the living-room besides Mrs. Reynolds—a tall man with gray hair, and a slender dark-blond woman of about forty, who Clarence supposed was the woman who had answered the phone.

Greta Reynolds introduced them. “Lilly Brandstrum. And Professor Schaffner. Eric. Officer Duhamell.”

“How do you do?” said Clarence. “Mrs. Reynolds, I am sorry.”

Mrs. Reynolds said nothing. She looked about to weep.

“You left money again?” Clarence asked Mr. Reynolds.

“Yes, and it was taken again. I waited about an hour after midnight.”

“I told Ed he should have allowed the police to be
there
,” said the tall man, who was standing, restless, by the front windows.

“Well—Mr. Duhamell—he’s a policeman,” Ed said. “He wanted the police there, Eric. The kidnapper said no police.”

“When did Rowajinski speak with you?” Clarence asked Ed.

“Last evening around—after seven. After you called me. He made arrangements for the money. I couldn’t get anything else out of him.” Ed gave a shrug.

“I found out Rowajinski has one sister named Anna Gottstein. She lives in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, not in Long Island. But I can have the Pennsylvania police look her up and search her house. The dog might be there. Rowajinski, too. Did it sound like a long-distance call?”

“No,” said Ed. “All right—” He felt hopeless and tired enough to drop. “What’s there to lose? But I’m pretty sure our dog’s dead. Meanwhile—can I offer you a drink? What’ll it be?”

“This creep,” the blond woman said, looking at Clarence. “If you knew his name and what he looked like, is it so difficult to find him in New York? He’s even got a limp, I hear.” She looked at Clarence with obvious hostility and contempt.

Clarence shook his head at the scotch bottle Mr. Reynolds was holding. “No, thanks, sir.” Then to the blond woman, “It shouldn’t be difficult now. I couldn’t put my precinct on to it, because Mr. Reynolds was afraid the dog would be killed if the man was picked up.”

“That dog is dead,” Lilly said.

“All right, get the police on to it,” said Ed, as if Clarence weren’t the police, or not very good as one. “He may do the same thing to someone else—with this success.”

“How anyone,” the blond woman said, “could find where the guy lives even and then let him escape like that beats me. And what a great dog Lisa was! She didn’t deserve
this
.”

“I can’t say how sorry I am,” Clarence said to her. “My mistake was to leave this fellow yesterday for one minute—for twenty minutes while I spoke to Mr. Reynolds. That’s when he got away.”

“Yes, I heard the story,” said Lilly.

“In this city, anything can happen,” the tall man contributed. He was still on his feet like Ed, like Clarence. “What a life! Nobody is safe. And yet on the street, in stores these days, all you see is policemen!”

“Isn’t it true!” said Lilly.

“No, Lilly, I don’t think it’s his fault—Officer Duhamell’s,” said Greta. “He told us we had no guarantee that Lisa was still alive. We just took a chance. And we lost.”

“Oh, it’s not the money, let’s forget that,” Ed Reynolds said. “It’s the goddam shame of it, the unnecessary—”

“Sit down, Eddie,” said his wife. “Sit down, Mr. Duhamell.”

“Thank you,” said Clarence, not sitting down. “If I can use your telephone, Mr. Reynolds—”

“Go ahead.”

Clarence telephoned his precinct. “Captain MacGregor, please. Patrolman Duhamell here.” MacGregor was available, and Clarence said, “I would like to start a search—put out a search for Kenneth Rowajinski, sir. I can give you—”

“The one Santini said you were talking about at noon? Come in tonight if you’re all steamed up about it. Where are you?”

Clarence said he would come in tonight.

“Well, that’s something at least,” said Lilly, who was plainly feeling her drinks.

Clarence looked from Greta to Mr. Reynolds. “If I—If you don’t mind, sir, I think it wouldn’t hurt now to try the sister in Doylestown. Of course if she’s
got
the dog—” She might kill it at once, Clarence thought. But he was curious. More than curious, he wanted to accomplish something, round them up, get the Pennsylvania police on to it at once, if necessary.

Ed Reynolds again made a casual gesture towards the telephone.

Clarence fumbled out his paper with the sister’s telephone number on it. He dialed the number, preceded by a 215, and the others in the room began talking again while Clarence waited for the telephone to answer.

“H’lo?” said a sleepy male voice.

“Hello. I would like to speak with Mrs. Anna Gottstein, please.”

“Who’s this?”

“Patrolman Clarence Duhamell, New York Metropolitan Police.”

“What’s the trouble?”

“I’m not sure, sir. May I please speak with your wife?”

“Just a minute. It’s a hell of an hour—”

Now the others in the room had begun to listen, and absolute silence surrounded Clarence.

“Mrs. Gottstein? I am sorry to be calling so late. It’s about your brother.—Have you had any news from him lately?” Behind him, Clarence heard Lilly groan with deliberate disdain.

“My brother? Paul?”

“No, Kenneth. In New York.”

“Is he dead? What’s he done now?”

“No, he’s not dead. Do you know anything about a dog?”

“Whose dog?”

“When did you last hear from Kenneth, Mrs. Gottstein?”

“Listen, is this a joke? Who’re you?”

Clarence identified himself again, and repeated the question.

“I haven’t heard from Kenneth in more than two years. And I don’t expect to hear from him. He owes us money. He’s a good-for-nothing. And if he’s done anything wrong, it’s not our responsibility.”

“I understand. I’m—” But she had hung up. Clarence put the telephone down, and turned to the room. “I really think she knows nothing about it. Hasn’t heard from her brother in two years.”

Mr. Reynolds nodded, uninterested.

Clarence did not dare now to extend his hand to Mr. Reynolds. “Good night, sir. I’m going direct to the precinct house.” With difficulty, Clarence faced the woman called Lilly and said, “Good night,” and also said it to the tall old man, and with less difficulty to Greta. “Good night, ma’am. I’ll be in touch tomorrow.”

“Oh, why bother?” Lilly said.

“Lilly!” Only Greta was kind enough to walk with Clarence to the door.

Clarence felt awful. Catch the bastard Pole, he thought. That would make it up a little bit. He could show the Reynoldses that he cared, at least, that he wasn’t like what they thought the majority of the New York police force was like. But like Lilly, Clarence had no real hope for the dog’s life.

MacGregor was at his desk, neat and alert at 2 a.m. Manzoni was also in the office, in civvies, maybe just going off duty. Manzoni was always smirking, and Clarence hated to tell his story in Manzoni’s presence.

“So what’s up?” MacGregor asked. “That Rowinsk—What’s he done exactly?”

“He’s the one who kidnapped the dog of Edward Reynolds. If you remember Saturday, sir. Mr. Reynolds came in to see us. Well, I found the man Monday and he got away.”

“Got away?” asked MacGregor. “With the dog?”

“I don’t know where the dog is, sir. Mr. Reynolds paid a ransom—”

“Oh, yes! The thousand-dollar ransom. You found the man how?”

“I was looking for odd-looking people in this neighborhood. I happened to hit it right. I asked him to print something, so I know he’s the fellow who printed the ransom notes. But he—”

“Got away how?”

“Well, sir, he told me he wanted another thousand from Mr. Reynolds before he’d produce the dog. He said the dog was with his sister, but he wouldn’t give me her address. I went to check with Mr. Reynolds who lives just a couple of blocks away, and Mr. Reynolds agreed to pay another thousand, but when I went back to Rowajinski’s room, he’d cleared out. This was Monday around seven p.m.”