1954 - Safer Dead Read Online Free PDF

one told me to go in.
    I turned the door handle and gently pushed. The door swung inwards.
    Jake Hesson lay across the bed. His dirty white shirt had a crimson patch just below where his heart was. Growing out of the patch was the handle of a knife. From the look of his waxen, yellowish face, he had been dead some hours.
     

CHAPTER THREE
     
    I
     
    L ieutenant Marshall of the Homicide Squad, a big, red-faced man with a neat moustache and a jutting, aggressive chin, stuck a cigarette on his lower lip and set fire to it. He looked across at me as I leaned against the wall, keeping out of the way of the fingerprint men as they worked in the small room. All that now remained of Jake Hesson was a splash of blood on the dirty bed cover.
    ‘Tom Creed will want to take care of this,’ Marshall said. ‘If what you say is right, it starts from his end.’
    ‘Who’s he?’ I asked.
    ‘Captain of police, Welden. Last year he asked us to check the Swallow Club where this girl Benson was supposed to have worked, but we didn’t turn up anything.’ Marshall gave me a hard smile. ‘Looks like you’ve managed to make a monkey out of me this time.’
    I had worked with him in the past and I had a certain respect for his intelligence and capabilities.
    ‘I should have said your father was more responsible for that than I am,’ I said gravely.
    Marshall laughed. He turned to Sergeant Hamilton, his second in charge.
    ‘I’ll leave you to it, Dick. Me and the bright boy will go and talk to Creed. Drive over when you’re through. You can take me back.’
    Hamilton nodded.
    ‘Okay, Lieutenant.’
    ‘Come on,’ Marshall said, taking my arm. ‘You can run me to Welden. Creed will be interested to hear your story. He was worked up about the girl’s disappearance, but as he didn’t find a body, he had to drop the case.’
    ‘Let me have a photograph of the remains,’ I said to Hamilton. ‘I’m staying at the Shad Hotel.’
    Hamilton looked at Marshall for confirmation.
    ‘Let him have it,’ Marshall said. ‘I’m in the picture too. It’ll be good publicity.’
    ‘Don’t rely on it,’ I said. ‘Fayette may block you out. We have to be careful how much horror we print.’
    ‘Come on - you!’ Marshall said, and we went down the stairs together.
    On the way to Welden, I went over my story again so Marshall could be sure he hadn’t missed a point.
    ‘Well, we seem to have a few new leads to work on now,’ he said when I was through. ‘I always thought there was something phoney the way Farmer died. Where does this Nichols girl fit in?’
    ‘I wish I knew,’ I said. I swerved past a truck, then went on, ‘What’s Creed like? Think he’ll let me work along with him?’
    Marshall shrugged.
    ‘I guess so. There isn’t a cop on the coast who doesn’t want his picture in your rag. He’s a good guy, but he doesn’t like being kept out of things. You should have seen him before you went after Hesson.’
    ‘For the love of Mike!’ I exclaimed. ‘I only arrived yesterday. I was going to see him as soon as I had talked to Hesson.’
    ‘Just watch your step with him. By the way, you still working with that fat script writer from Hollywood?’
    ‘I wouldn’t call it working. He’s still drinking at the magazine’s expense.’
    ‘He’s a smart guy. You’d have thought he could have done something better than hack for Crime Facts.’
    I laughed.
    ‘Everyone thinks that. It’s just the way his head’s shaped.’
    It was around eight in the evening when I pulled up outside the Welden police headquarters.
    ‘I expect Creed will have gone home by now,’ Marshall said, getting out of the car. ‘Let’s see.’
    But the desk sergeant said the captain was still in his office, and after he had put through a call, he told us to go on up. Police Captain Tom Creed was a tall, powerfully built man in his late fifties with a strong, hard face, piercing blue eyes and a shock of greying hair.
    He shook hands with