start on the top floor and search any empty room he found until he discovered the girl.
A few seconds later, he was standing rigid, sweat on his face, as he stared down at Lucille Balu’s dead body. She lay on her back, her legs bent, her skirts above her knees. There was a look of frozen terror on her blood-congested face that sent a chill up Joe’s spine. Around her throat was the mark of a cord that had been pulled brutally tight, leaving a deep impression on her brown, tender skin. Her long slim fingers were hooked in agony; her eyes, starting out of her head, were fixed in the impersonal stare of death.
Joe felt a sudden thump of pain at his heart as he looked at the dead girl. The pain made him giddy and faint. He took a step back, grimacing. For some moments he stood motionless, aware that the shock had been a dangerous one and that his heart, which he had suspected for some time, had reacted badly. Then, making an effort, he turned and started a slow, shambling retreat down the corridor to the stairs.
The night clerk who sat the reception desk, idly turning the pages of Paris-Match, was surprised to see Joe lurch down the stairs and cross unsteadily to the revolving doors that led out
to the Croisette. He recognized Joe and grimaced. He supposed that Joe had been somewhere upstairs sleeping off a bout of drinking and he watched him manoeuvre himself through the revolving doors with a feeling of relief that Joe wasn’t going to make a nuisance of himself.
Joe kept walking: his brain frozen and numbed.
It wasn’t until he had reached the Beau Rivage hotel, a fifth-rate hotel in Rue Foch, where he was staying and had got up to his bedroom that he recovered sufficiently from the shock to begin to analyse what he had seen.
Twenty years ago, Joe had been the crime reporter on the New York Inquirer. During the four years he had worked on the paper, he had photographed innumerable bodies, murdered violently. He had become hardened to the horrors he had had to see. Also, he had been able to tell at a glance how the unfortunates he had had to photograph had died.
He knew that Lucille Balu had been strangled by a cord that had been looped around her throat and then pulled tight. From her congested face, the marks around her throat and her expression of agony, he had no doubt that she had been murdered.
His first and immediate reaction was to talk to Manley. A story as big as this needed cooperation and he was about to reach for the telephone to put through an unheard-of-expensive call to Hollywood, when he paused. An idea dropped into his mind and he leaned back to consider it.
Floyd Delaney was a millionaire four or five times over. In Joe’s Rolliflex was incontestable evidence that Lucille Balu had entered Delaney’s suite at four o’clock. Any police surgeon worth a damn could tell within a half an hour when she had died and Joe was pretty sure the girl had been murdered between four and four forty-five, when Jay Delaney had been in the suite.
That meant either young Delaney or Sophia Delaney had murdered her and Joe thought it wasn’t likely that Sophia had done it, but obviously she was an accessory.
Here then was a situation that could be turned into profit.
Why call Manley? Why bother to write the story? All Joe had to do was to talk to Delaney, come to a financial understanding with him to keep his mouth shut and he would be on easy street for the rest of his life.
Joe’s raddled face lit up at the thought and he shifted the grimy pillow at his head, making himself more comfortable. Delaney might be persuaded to part with half a million.
With that Joe could retire and settle somewhere on the French Riviera. He could buy a small villa, get a housekeeper to look after him and give up the struggle of competing with the smart young punks who were trying to push him out of his job. What a terrific kick he would get out of telling Manley to go jump in a lake!
He frowned, stroking his red, raddled
A few seconds later, he was standing rigid, sweat on his face, as he stared down at Lucille Balu’s dead body. She lay on her back, her legs bent, her skirts above her knees. There was a look of frozen terror on her blood-congested face that sent a chill up Joe’s spine. Around her throat was the mark of a cord that had been pulled brutally tight, leaving a deep impression on her brown, tender skin. Her long slim fingers were hooked in agony; her eyes, starting out of her head, were fixed in the impersonal stare of death.
Joe felt a sudden thump of pain at his heart as he looked at the dead girl. The pain made him giddy and faint. He took a step back, grimacing. For some moments he stood motionless, aware that the shock had been a dangerous one and that his heart, which he had suspected for some time, had reacted badly. Then, making an effort, he turned and started a slow, shambling retreat down the corridor to the stairs.
The night clerk who sat the reception desk, idly turning the pages of Paris-Match, was surprised to see Joe lurch down the stairs and cross unsteadily to the revolving doors that led out
to the Croisette. He recognized Joe and grimaced. He supposed that Joe had been somewhere upstairs sleeping off a bout of drinking and he watched him manoeuvre himself through the revolving doors with a feeling of relief that Joe wasn’t going to make a nuisance of himself.
Joe kept walking: his brain frozen and numbed.
It wasn’t until he had reached the Beau Rivage hotel, a fifth-rate hotel in Rue Foch, where he was staying and had got up to his bedroom that he recovered sufficiently from the shock to begin to analyse what he had seen.
Twenty years ago, Joe had been the crime reporter on the New York Inquirer. During the four years he had worked on the paper, he had photographed innumerable bodies, murdered violently. He had become hardened to the horrors he had had to see. Also, he had been able to tell at a glance how the unfortunates he had had to photograph had died.
He knew that Lucille Balu had been strangled by a cord that had been looped around her throat and then pulled tight. From her congested face, the marks around her throat and her expression of agony, he had no doubt that she had been murdered.
His first and immediate reaction was to talk to Manley. A story as big as this needed cooperation and he was about to reach for the telephone to put through an unheard-of-expensive call to Hollywood, when he paused. An idea dropped into his mind and he leaned back to consider it.
Floyd Delaney was a millionaire four or five times over. In Joe’s Rolliflex was incontestable evidence that Lucille Balu had entered Delaney’s suite at four o’clock. Any police surgeon worth a damn could tell within a half an hour when she had died and Joe was pretty sure the girl had been murdered between four and four forty-five, when Jay Delaney had been in the suite.
That meant either young Delaney or Sophia Delaney had murdered her and Joe thought it wasn’t likely that Sophia had done it, but obviously she was an accessory.
Here then was a situation that could be turned into profit.
Why call Manley? Why bother to write the story? All Joe had to do was to talk to Delaney, come to a financial understanding with him to keep his mouth shut and he would be on easy street for the rest of his life.
Joe’s raddled face lit up at the thought and he shifted the grimy pillow at his head, making himself more comfortable. Delaney might be persuaded to part with half a million.
With that Joe could retire and settle somewhere on the French Riviera. He could buy a small villa, get a housekeeper to look after him and give up the struggle of competing with the smart young punks who were trying to push him out of his job. What a terrific kick he would get out of telling Manley to go jump in a lake!
He frowned, stroking his red, raddled
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