The Follower (6 page)

‘The former and celebrated Miss Eleanor Ross? As a matter of fact, I have.’

‘When?’

‘About four — no, five days ago.’

‘Did she say anything about going away?’

‘Yes, she did.’

‘Did she tell you where?’

Arlene shook her head.

‘You’re sure?’

She just said she was so tired of the terrible, terrible climate and was going to flee away to the sun. Really, she said, why do all these foolish people insist on rotting away in these dreary New York winters?’

‘That’s all she said?’

‘What do you expect her to have done? Given me a map with little flags stuck in it marking every rest room she’d hit between here and Topeka, Kansas?’

Careful to seem casual, he asked, ‘Has anyone else been here asking for her?’

Arlene was quick. She always had been. That was a dangerous question, but he had to make sure that Victor hadn’t got on to this lead.

She said: ‘Why should anyone ask me about her? I’m no intimate friend. I’m just a face-fixer.’

She was dry-eyed now and watching him quizzically. At least she was trying to be quizzical, but the emotion was still pent-up in her ready to break out. He could tell that.

She smiled brightly. ‘So she’s walked out on you, glamour boy. The two-month wonder wedding.’

He wouldn’t get angry. There wasn’t any point. ‘I got back from Venezuela early. I told you. I should have cabled.’

‘You certainly should have cabled. Homecoming husbands should always cable — particularly the husband of the former and celebrated Miss Eleanor Ross.’

‘Just what the hell do you mean by that?’

Arlene glanced over her shoulder at the glass doors. The receptionist had not come back. She sat down on the arm of a chair. Her hips bulged. An incongruous memory came of her twelve years ago at the Knights of Pythias Ball at Providence High School Auditorium in her sister’s evening gown — pretty as a candy stick.

With sudden heat she blurted: ‘You’d better watch out for that wife of yours.’

‘So?’

‘Yes, it’s about time somebody told you.’

‘Told me what?’

‘The truth. She’s tangled up with a crummy bunch, the worst bunch in New York, drunks, million-dollar bums, gamblers, hopheads.’

‘Who’d you expect her to pal around with? The Busy Bee Needlework Club of Passaic?’

Arlene clutched at his arm. ‘Why did you marry her, Mark? She’s a tramp. You know that. Just a junior miss tramp. And because she tramped out of the Social Register you were smitten. Haven’t you any sense?’

He felt an uprush of anger, but he checked it. This was just Arlene’s spite showing. He’d thrown her over. He hadn’t been nice about it. Okay. He had this coming to him.

‘Know what she’s been doing?’ Arlene’s voice was hard now with an undercurrent of hysterical triumph. ‘Almost from the moment you went away she’s been up at the Lorton Club all the time. I’ve got a friend who’s a hat-check girl there. She told me. Running around all the time with Victor D’Iorio. He’s the lowest, most vicious character in New York. He’s not just a racketeer, a gambler; he peddles dope; he … She’s been at the Lorton Club all the time.’

‘So she’s been at the Lorton Club all the time.’

‘Don’t you understand anything, Mark?’ Arlene was crying now. The mascara was smudging under her eyes. ‘Victor’s Ellie’s sort of person. She belongs in that bunch of stinking rich degenerates that hang around Victor. You think she really loves you? Don’t make me laugh. She just had a mood. She thought she was tired of all that filth. She thought she wanted to get away from Victor and all those characters. How wonderful to marry a decent, clean boy and turn over a new leaf. That’s what she thought. But she knew she’d never make it. She’s in too deep. She couldn’t stay in love with you any more than she could stay in love with Corey Lathrop. She …’

‘Shut up.’

He was so angry now that he was almost frightened of himself. He gripped her arms. He could feel his fingers dig into the soft, unresisting flesh.

‘Mark,’ she whimpered. ‘Mark, don’t … ‘

‘Do you or don’t you know where Ellie is?’

‘I don’t, Mark. I told you I didn’t.’

‘Okay.’

He pushed her away, picked up his hat from the pile of magazines by the daffodils and headed for the door.

She came running after him. She caught at his arm.

‘Mark…’

‘Get the hell away from me.’

‘If you really want to know where she is.’

Mark swung around. Her face was red and swollen.

‘You know?’

‘No, no I don’t.’

‘Then
      
‘

‘I just remembered. She was talking about a suit she’s having made at Derain’s.’

‘And …?’

‘And she said it wouldn’t be ready by the time she left. She said she was going to have them send it after her. They’d have the address.’

Suddenly Mark was on level ground again. ‘Derain’s?’

‘Yes.’

‘Thanks.’

He turned away from her and went to the door.

Behind him her voice trailed thinly:

‘Mark, I’m sorry. Please, Mark, darling. Don’t go like this. Please…’

He pulled open the door and stepped out into the snow.

DERAIN’S was only a couple of blocks down the Avenue. He pushed his way through the struggling throng of shoppers, thinking: ‘I’ve got the lead at last.’ He felt confident, almost cheerful, and Arlene’s self-revealing spite dwindled into insignificance. Yes, he had the lead and he was still ahead of Victor. He was almost sure of that.

Rockefeller Center heaved solid stone up into the air and then melted into the grey-white snowstorm. A travel agency blared a vivid poster, splashed with Mexican women in red skirts and great lace head-dresses. ‘Come to Mexico, the Land of Sun.’ A group of Salvation Army lasses were clanging their bells on a corner. ‘Give for Christmas… Give for Christmas…’

He reached Derain’s. Its façade was chichi as a French poodle. He’d been there a couple of times with Ellie. She said their suits were as well-cut as Mainbochers and cheaper, so she’d buy four instead of three.

‘Darling, it’s the most wonderful bargain, like drug-stores when they give you an extra tube of toothpaste free.’ .

He entered a reception room which made Maurice’s look provincial. There were angled modern statues, tall delicate screens. Lengths of imported tweeds were tossed around with thoughtful nonchalance. Classical music played softly from a concealed phonograph. Three women with suits and pearls were fingering and chattering. A salesgirl came up to Mark. She was young and slim, with dark hair to her shoulders. She was disguised in a black suit and pearls to be an almost perfect imitation of the customers. But Mark, who had learned to cover his own beginnings, could see the background showing through.

She was haughty and offhand, as if she were a girl he was meeting at a cocktail party. That was the Derain line.

‘Yes?’ she said, not looking at him, putting a hand to the pearls.

He said: ‘I’m Mr Liddon. My wife’s having a suit made here.’

The name identified him and her quick smile made him an accepted customer.

‘Yes, Mr Liddon.’

‘She wants me to pick it up if it hasn’t been shipped out.’

‘One moment, Mr Liddon.’

She went away and came back with an older girl, a well-built assured blonde in a grey suit. The blonde smiled the Derain smile and said:

‘Good morning, Mr Liddon.’

The first girl loitered by them, fingering her pearls and looking abstracted again.

Mark said to the blonde: ‘My wife had to leave town earlier than she expected. She wants me to bring the suit along to her unless it’s already been sent out.’

‘It has been sent out,’ said the blonde. ‘We mailed it yesterday.’

‘To our home address?’

‘No, Mr Liddon. We sent it after Mrs Liddon the way she asked us to.’

‘That’s fine. Then she’ll be getting it in a couple of days.’ With studied casualness he said: ‘By the way, she did call and explain, didn’t she?’

‘Call, Mr Liddon?’

‘We changed our vacation plans at the last minute. She meant to call you and give you the new address. Didn’t she do it?’

‘No, Mr Liddon. She didn’t call.’

It was almost certain that Victor hadn’t been here, but he would have to check. ‘And she didn’t send anyone else in to pick it up?’

‘No, Mr Liddon.’

‘Then where did you mail the package?’

The blonde was definitely less cordial now. ‘Where is Mrs Liddon now?’

‘Palm Beach,’ Mark extemporized.

He saw the blonde’s face pull down its shutters against him. The smile was still there, but it meant nothing.

‘Then it has gone to the wrong address. But if you give me the new one I’ll see that the package is forwarded the moment it comes back.’

She was gazing at him challengingly. She was smarter than he had imagined. There was nothing for it now but to try the ‘frankly charming’ approach. He grinned at her.

‘This is kind of embarrassing. Maybe I should have come out with it from the start. The truth is I’ve been away and came back unexpectedly early. There was no chance of letting my wife know. She’s away for Christmas. I remembered the suit and thought I could maybe locate her through you.’

The blonde was implacable now. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Liddon. It’s against our policy to give out our clients’ addresses.’

‘But I’m her husband.’

The little dark salesgirl glanced at him under her lashes.

He suppressed an impulse to jump on the blonde, shake her and force the address out of her. There was a better way of handling this.

The blonde was saying: ‘I’m sorry, Mr Liddon. I wish we could help you.’

He glanced quickly at the other girl. The lashes drooped lower. That’s okay,’ he said to the blonde. ‘Sorry I troubled you.’

‘It’s no trouble, Mr Liddon. I hope it will all work out. Merry Christmas.’

The dark girl moved with bored languor at his side to conduct him off the premises.

As she opened the door for him she ran a hand behind her dark hair, shaking it away from her neck. ‘Goodbye, Mr Liddon,’ she said in the elegant Derain accent. ‘Merry Christmas, Mr Liddon.’

It was eleven-thirty. There should be a good half-hour before the Derain employees started going for lunch. His bank was just around the corner. He went to it and drew out a thousand dollars. As he left the bank, he passed a news-stand where an old canvas awning shielded the papers from the snow. Even if the greatest calamity had happened and Corey’s body had already been discovered, he knew there could be no announcement yet. But he bought a paper and searched through it methodically.

He found nothing, tossed the paper into a trash container and returned to Derain’s. He skirted the block and located the employees’ exit. He crossed the street. There was a book store, its window decorated with red paper wreaths, green paper bells and tinsel snow. He stepped into the doorway, turned down his coat collar and waited.

An occasional employee straggled out of the exit. At exactly twelve-thirty the blonde appeared. She was wearing a Persian lamb coat and tall fur overshoes. She looked like a competent Valkyrie. She turned towards Fifth Avenue and disappeared into the throng of shoppers. It was five minutes later that the little dark salesgirl came out. She’d put on a simple black coat and a fur cap. She glanced up at the falling snow and then across the street. He moved over and joined her.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘what a coincidence.’

She looked sidewise at him under long black lashes. Her eyes were very big and dark; her face was well-made. He thought she probably thought she looked like Hedy Lamarr.

‘Kind of treacherous weather,’ he said. You don’t want to catch cold. How about a warm, refreshing drink?’

She shrugged. ‘Why not?’ She played with the fingertips of her gloves. ‘I often drop into Twenty-One at this hour for a cocktail.’

‘Fine.’

He hailed a cab. When they joined the flood of traffic on Fifth Avenue she took a cigarette from her bag and put it in her mouth. He lit it for her.

She said: ‘Found your wife yet, Mr Liddon?’

‘No,’ he said. Crazy, isn’t it?’

‘Work around Derain’s a while. You won’t think anything’s crazy.’

She flicked the ash from her cigarette on the cab’s floor. ‘Alone for Christmas, eh? That’s a hell of a note.’

‘Yes.’

Her leg moved slightly. He could feel the faint pressure of her calf against his. The taxi drew up in front of Twenty-One Club.

They found a table in a corner. The girl was playing it blasé. All she needed was a pair of sunglasses to be a star of stage, screen, radio and television. She dropped the coat from her shoulders and peeled off her gloves.

‘What’ll you have?’

‘I think a champagne cocktail would be bearable.’

He thought of asking whether she always found a ‘champagne cocktail bearable’ at this hour.

After the waiter had brought the drinks, he said: ‘It’s on the level, you know. I’m not trying to get any dirt on my wife.’

She sipped her cocktail, watching him steadily over the glass-lip. ‘You’re not?’

‘It’s just a crazy accident. We crossed each other.’

‘Yes,’ said the girl.

‘Do you know her?’

‘Mrs Liddon? I’ve seen her a couple of times in the store and her picture’s in
Harper’s Bazaar
this month.’ Under the table her foot touched his and stayed there. She was looking over his shoulder as if interested in people at the next table.

Mark said: ‘You know where she is, don’t you?’

‘No, I don’t.’ She picked up one of her gloves and ran it through her fingers. Mark took out his wallet, opened it, and looked intently at the thick wad of bills. She said, ‘I could find out, though.’

‘That’s the girl,’ said Mark. He folded the wallet and put it away.

‘Won’t take me a couple of seconds to run up to the shipping department now Ester’s off for lunch.’ She put down the glove and turned the big, expressionless eyes on him. ‘You’re my type, Mr Liddon.’

‘That’s a break for me.’

She finished her champagne cocktail. ‘Let’s go.’

Mark paid the check. Another taxi took them back to Derain’s.