The Empty Hours by Ed McBain Page B

and deposits at several hotels.”
     
    “Hotels where?”
     
    “In
Paris and Dijon. And then another in Lausanne, Switzerland.”
     
    “She
was going to Europe?”
     
    “Yes.
From Lausanne she was heading down to the Italian Riviera. I was working on
that for her, too. Getting transportation and the hotels, you know.”
     
    “When
did she plan to leave?”
     
    “September
first.”
     
    “Well,
that explains the luggage and the clothes,” Carella said aloud.
     
    “I’m
sorry,” Miss Feldelson said, and she smiled and raised her eyebrows.
     
    “Nothings
nothing,” Carella said. “What was your impression of Miss Davis?”
     
    “Oh,
that’s hard to say. She was only here once, you understand.” Miss Feldelson
thought for a moment, and then said, “I suppose she could have been a
pretty girl if she tried, but she wasn’t trying. Her hair was short and dark, and
she seemed rather — well, withdrawn, I guess. She didn’t take her sunglasses off all
the while she was here. I suppose you would call her shy. Or frightened. I don’t
know.” Miss Feldelson smiled again. “Have I helped you any?”
     
    “Well,
now we know she was going abroad,” Carella said.
     
    “September
is a good time to go,” Miss Feldelson answered. “In September the tourists have
all gone home.” There was a wistful sound to her voice. Carella thanked her for
her time and left the small office with its travel folders on the cluttered
desk top.
     
    * * * *

 
     
    12
     
     
    He was running out of checks
and running out of ideas. Everything seemed to point toward a girl in flight,
a girl in hiding, but what was there to hide, what was there to run from? Josie
Thompson had been in that boat alone. The coroner’s jury had labeled it
accidental drowning. The insurance company hadn’t contested Claudia’s claim,
and they’d given her a legitimate check that she could have cashed anywhere in
the world. And yet there was hiding, and there was flight — and
he couldn’t understand why. He took the list of remaining checks from his
pocket. The girl’s shoemaker, the girl’s hairdresser, a florist, a candy shop.
None of them truly important. And the remaining check made out to an
individual, the check numbered 006 and dated July eleventh, and written to a
man named David Oblinsky in the amount of $45.75. Carella had his lunch at
two-thirty and then went downtown. He found Oblinsky in a diner near the bus
terminal. Oblinsky was sitting on one of the counter stools, and he was
drinking a cup of coffee. He asked Carella to join him, and Carella did.
     
    “You
traced me through that check, huh?” he said. “The phone company gave you my
number and my address, huh? I’m unlisted, you know. They ain’t suppose to give
out my number.”
     
    “Well,
they made a special concession because it was police business.”
     
    “Yeah,
well, suppose the cops called and asked for Marlon Brando’s number? You think
they’d give it out? Like hell they would. I don’t like that. No, sir, I don’t
like it one damn bit.”
     
    “What
do you do, Mr. Oblinsky? Is there a reason for the unlisted number?”
     
    “I
drive a cab is what I do. Sure there’s a reason. It’s classy to have an
unlisted number. Didn’t you know that?”
     
    Carella
smiled. “No, I didn’t.”  
     
    “Sure,
it is.”
     
    “Why
did Claudia Davis give you this check?” Carella asked.
     
    “Well,
I work for a cab company here in this city, you see. But usually on weekends or
on my day off I use my own car and I take people on long trips, you know what I
mean? Like to the country, or the mountains, or the beach, wherever they want
to go. I don’t care. I’ll take them wherever they want to go.”
     
    “I see.”
     
    “Sure.
So in June sometime, the beginning of June it was, I get a call from this guy
I know up at Triangle Lake, he tells me there’s a rich broad there who needs
somebody to drive her Caddy back to the city for her. He said