Reardon Read online

  Reardon

  A Lieutenant Reardon Mystery

  Robert L. Fish

  This Boole Is Gratefully Dedicated

  to

  Chief Thomas J. Cahill

  &

  Lt. William Osterloh

  and the many other officers of the

  San Francisco Police Department

  whose co-operation made this book

  possible.

  CHAPTER 1

  Tuesday—6:15 P.M.

  Through the porthole-like view furnished by the binoculars, the thick cables of the Golden Gate Bridge glinted, their edges truly golden, silhouetted against the lowering sun dipping into the Pacific in the background. The stepped towers held the thick strands like some giant cat’s cradle, casting elongated shadows across the still-bright waters of San Francisco Bay. The foreshortened view offered by the powerful glasses made the heavy traffic on the bridge appear almost frozen, inching in both directions. The girl holding the glasses shook her head impatiently at the view; an architect herself, she considered the Golden Gate Bridge towers a design disaster, ruining what should have been the most beautiful bridge in the world. Grauman’s Chinese mixed with male Gothic, she thought, and wrinkled her tiny nose.

  She dropped her field of vision to the waters beneath the bridge, searching for more interesting fare and suddenly caught her breath. An ocean liner, startling in its white symmetry, was slowly entering the harbor, barely moving as it awaited the immigration cutter. The small speedboat was visible in the field of vision, bouncing across the slightly choppy waters. A ship’s ladder angled sharply from the purser’s deck to just above the whitecaps of the bay, providing access for the officials when they arrived.

  Through the high-powered lenses the clean lines of the ship stood out sharply; the slightly tilted funnel breathed faint wisps of smoke, the wide bridge jutted in sentinel position above the sloping smooth wooden decks. The polished railings were lined with passengers dressed for disbarking, their luggage visible behind them, piled against the outer wall of the main salon. The brown hills of Marin County formed a background for the ship; to the right Sausalito and Tiberon edged the bay with tiny blocks of houses. The girl sighed at the beauty of the scene, drinking it in.

  Lieutenant James Reardon of the San Francisco police, emerging from the bedroom of his small bachelor apartment, drew his turtleneck sweater over his head and used his fingers to comb his tousled red hair, still damp from his shower, into some semblance of order. He was a stocky man in his early thirties; he had a rugged yet remarkably sensitive face with sharp, intelligent gray eyes. At the moment he was smiling affectionately at his girl friend, Jan, sitting cross-legged, yoga fashion, on the kitchen table wearing one of his summer robes with the sleeves rolled up to accommodate her shorter arms, her feet shod in a pair of his bedroom slippers, and her forehead wrinkled in concentration above the arched eyepieces of the binoculars. Reardon straightened his turtleneck to a more comfortable grip around his thick neck, walked over and lightly ran his finger down Jan’s back, feeling the smooth familiar skin beneath the thin silky cloth, and also feeling, as always, the slight tenseness that gripped him at touching her.

  “What I like about you, my darling,” he said, making his voice sound policeman-tough, “is your complete brazenness. People get arrested for the Peeping Tom bit, you know, and doing it in front of a police lieutenant doesn’t make it any less of a crime.”

  Jan wriggled a bit under the finger investigating her back, but kept the glasses glued to her eyes. “I suppose you keep these binoculars here to keep an eye on suspicious neighbors.”

  “Of course,” Reardon said righteously. “You never can tell when a young lady undressing might reveal something of a criminal nature.” He grinned and stared down at Jan with the pride of possession.

  She was a small girl in her late twenties who objected to being called a girl; it didn’t seem to fit with the success she had already found in her profession. Her face was pert; her hair cropped in a style that seemed almost careless but was the result of long hours by a meticulous hair stylist. She had a quick, sharp, gamin-type intelligence coupled with a keen sense of humor; she also had a small pug nose and wide-set hazel eyes, which at the moment were concentrating solely on the scene before her. She sighed prodigiously and handed the glasses over her shoulder, continuing to watch the ship without the benefit of the binoculars.

  “Look,” she said simply.

  Reardon took the glasses from her and swung them to rest on an apartment building half a block down the hill on Larkin, only a block from his own apartment on Chestnut and Hyde. He changed the focus slightly, bringing them to bear on one particular window.

  “Damn!” he said with mock disappointment. “It’s dark. Not one of the girls—I mean, the suspects, is home.”

  “No, you idiot!” Jan grinned at him affectionately and tugged him around. “Just coming into the bay, near the Golden Gate—the ship. Isn’t it lovely?” Her face became serious for a moment. “Jimmy, why can’t we take a trip on a ship like that? To Hawaii, or perhaps down along Lower California? To Acapulco, maybe. When you get your vacation? I can arrange mine to suit.”

  Reardon turned obediently in response to the urging on his arm, adjusting the focus as the view changed to Russian Hill park, then the roofs of homes below, sparkling in the late afternoon sun, then the Hyde Street Pier, and finally the blue waters of the bay. He swung the glasses slowly and finally located the slow moving boat. The block buildings of Fort Mason formed the foreground now. The immigration cutter was just releasing its officials; one was already swaying his way up the ladder. Even as Reardon watched, the last one sprang for the bobbing platform and the little dispatch boat skidded off, heading back for shore.

  The eyes of the binoculars mounted the side of the vessel, skipping the parallel rows of portholes, jumping to the promenade deck where the passengers remained lined up like multicolored silhouettes in some shooting gallery. The damp-haired lieutenant scanned the deck slowly, pleasurably. A trip with Jan on a ship like that would be very nice—except for one thing. He studied the empty swimming pool, protected with heavy rope netting, led the view along the salon wall with its stacks of luggage and piles of deck chairs lashed for the port stay, moving toward the prow of the ship. Here a gang of seamen were readying the power winches, rigging the davits in preparation for unloading the forward hatches of their cargo. He was about to lower the glasses when a girl, dressed in what seemed to be some type of uniform came out onto the forward deck. Through the glasses he saw her settle herself in the niche formed by the railing and the deck housing, staring at the city. Reardon tightened the focus of the binoculars, studying her.

  She was lovely; tall and straight with high, full breasts straining against the soft white of her dress; she appeared to be an employee of the ship taking a few moments from her work to enjoy the incomparable beauty of the sprawling, hilly city climbing out of the bay. Her shoulder-length hair whipped about her face, responding to the brisk breeze sweeping the choppy waters. Reardon touched the knurled knob of the glasses the merest bit, happy he had not stinted in purchasing the finest of optical equipment. Her face, he saw, was broad with a high forehead and slightly oriental features. It turned in his direction and for one brief instant her large dark eyes seemed to be looking directly into his, as if she could see him with equal clarity. He became aware that Jan was talking to him; he answered without lowering the glasses, almost absently.

  “Yes, honey?”

  “I said, would you mind taking a trip on that?”

  His eyebrows rose. “Are you serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious.”

  “I have a feeling it would be quite an experience,” he said, straight-faced. The girl on the ship had turned slightly;
her hands seemed clasped before her tightly, her profile was almost Grecian, edged with the gold of the setting sun. “Yes,” Reardon said with relish, “I’m sure it would be very worth while …”

  Jan studied him mischievously, one eyebrow cocked.

  “And what did you see that I missed? Or rather, who—or is it whom?—did you see that I missed?” She reached over, her small, strong hand demanding. “I have a feeling, sometimes, that you’re not to be trusted with binoculars. Let me have them.”

  Reardon handed them over obediently. Jan took very few seconds to locate her target; she fiddled with the focus a moment and then studied the girl as impersonally as she could.

  “For a lecher you’ve got good taste, I’ll say that,” she admitted frankly. “But I’ve always said that.” She grinned, trying to sound impersonal. “This one’s too tall for you, I think.”

  “The bigger they are—”

  “The harder you fall. I know.” She leaned forward a bit, as if it might aid her vision. “Wait a minute—”

  “What is it?” He reached for the glasses. “Let me see.”

  “Down, boy!” Jan twisted away. “I hate to smash a budding romance but it looks like you have competition. A tall handsome officer in a lovely blue uniform and nice broad shoulders, has just joined your fair one on deck …”

  “He wouldn’t dare!” Reardon said with mock indignation.

  “He has dared,” Jan said flatly. “Apparently he feels safe from you at this distance.” She adjusted the glasses. “Anyway, either she is furtively handing him something below the railing where I can’t see—or they are romantically holding hands. Take your choice.”

  “I choose the furtiveness, obviously,” Reardon said stoutly. “She would never hold hands with another man with me waiting steadfastly and faithfully for her on shore.”

  “I know,” Jan said sympathetically. “Here you are, straining your eyes through wind and rain and dark of night, searching for the first sight of her forecastle waving in the breeze—”

  “Watch your language!”

  Jan brought the glasses down, laughing. “Here. Look to your heart’s content. Her boy friend has gone back inside. I’m going to take a shower and get dressed.”

  Reardon put the binoculars aside, grinning down at her. “Right. And then we’ll go out and have a few drinks and then dinner. Where would you like to eat? I’ll call and make a reservation.”

  “Little Tokyo,” she said without hesitation. “We haven’t had sukiyaki for a long time. And we don’t need reservations there, certainly not this early. All right?”

  “Fine.”

  “And you can fix us martinis while I’m getting ready. All right?”

  “Fine, once again.”

  “And last—or rather, first—you can help me down from this table. All right?”

  “Even better,” he said, and picked her up, enjoying the warm feeling of her very-much woman’s body against his. He set her lightly on her feet, bent down, and kissed her tenderly on the forehead. She pulled back, giving him her gamin grin.

  “You’d have trouble picking up your girl friend from the ship. And it’s terrible being awkward about those things.”

  Reardon laughed. “I’d see she didn’t climb on tables.”

  Jan made a face and padded off toward the bathroom, the big slippers flopping on her tiny feet. Reardon sighed and looked about. Martinis, eh? He turned to the cupboard.

  The lower shelf furnished an almost full bottle of dry vermouth and a completely full bottle of Bombay gin; the refrigerator yielded ice cubes and a lemon for lemon peel twists. There was a Mason jar back of a milk bottle with the remains of some mysterious, colorless liquid in it. Reardon frowned at it, picked it up and checked it for odor, and then with a shrug decanted the unknown contents into the sink. He rinsed the jar well, filled it with ice cubes, added a carefully measured teaspoonful of vermouth, and began pouring in the gin. When he judged he had sufficient, he stirred the affair with a butter knife, and then tilted the jar over two large cocktail glasses, smiling proudly as each was filled to the brim with no excess in the jar. A peel of lemon in each glass added the final touch of professionalism; he rinsed the jar and turned it upside down on the sink to drain. The two glasses were placed in the refrigerator to maintain their chill. Someday, James Reardon, he told himself approvingly, you’re going to make some woman a fine bartender!

  Satisfied that the immediate chores were under control, Reardon picked up the binoculars again and returned to a study of the ship. It took him several minutes to locate it in the bay; it had advanced much farther, running at half speed now that the customs officials were aboard. The island of Alcatraz now furnished the background, with Hyde Street Pier in front. The ship’s ladder had been retrieved; the white vessel was approaching North Point moving in the direction of the China and Central Basins. Beneath the thin, high prow white-capped sheets of water folded back, dissolving into green foam. The foredeck was bustling with activity now; the hatch covers had been removed and the davits, working in tandem, were leaning over the cavernous holds, hooks dangling, ready to extract the contents. But the girl was no longer in sight.

  How it goes! Reardon thought philosophically, and started to bring the binoculars down when he remembered the apartment down on Larkin and the four girls who made up its tenancy. Unfortunately, the windows remainded dark. Life! he thought with a grin, and put the binoculars back into their leather case, dropped into a chair, lighting a cigarette, waiting for Jan to appear.

  Tuesday—7:45 P.M.

  Mr. Sessue Noguchi of the Little Tokyo restaurant bowed with pleasure to his old friends and long-time customers, the stocky gray-eyed police lieutenant and his very pretty young lady. He waited politely while they paused in a small alcove and removed their shoes, and then led them personally to a low table in a corner beside the large second-floor front window looking down on Fisherman’s Wharf and the Aquatic Park to one side. He waited while they sat, knees bent, and then took their order for martinis, but before he could hand the scribbled slip to their waitress, a second kimona-clad young girl appeared at his side. She whispered into Mr. Noguchi’s ear and slipped away. Mr. Noguchi bent over the table, truly apologetic.

  “The telephone, Lieutenant.”

  Reardon frowned his annoyance. Less than an hour before, he himself hadn’t known he’d be at the Little Tokyo, so who could be calling? He shrugged his apologies across the table, came to his feet, and walked to the cashier’s counter and the telephone there. He picked up the waiting instrument, staring down at his stockinged feet as he answered. And only pure luck, he thought, accounted for the fact he had put on a pair of socks without holes.

  “Hello?”

  “Jim? This is Dondero. You’re supposed to be—”

  “How the devil did you know where I was?”

  “I’m a detective, remember? It says so on my rating card,” Dondero said. “I figured it was about time for Jan to be getting the urge for sukiyaki, and where would she drag you to get it?” He laughed. “No; to tell the truth, this is about the tenth place I called. All the fancy bars in town first, naturally. Anyway, like I was saying, you’re supposed to be at some sort of meeting here at headquarters, and Captain Tower isn’t too overjoyed at your absence. He said—”

  “Damn!” Reardon snapped his fingers in annoyance. “I forgot all about it! I had this afternoon off and the thing completely slipped my mind. What’s it all about?”

  “The meeting? How should I know?” Dondero sounded mystified. “Clock punchers, janitors, and hired help in my grade don’t get invited. Me, I’m just a messenger, and now I’ve passed along the good word I’m checking out and heading for home. I already put in my forty-eight hours for today.” He paused as a thought struck him. “Hey, Jim—if you want I can tell the captain I couldn’t find you.”

  “That would be real smart, wouldn’t it?” Reardon frowned at the telephone as if it had somehow contributed to the position he was in. “No; I’
ll make it. I’ll tell you what you can do, though, Don. Forget about going home, come over here and keep Jan company until I get back.” He smiled. “You can even have the five-course special. On me.”

  “Aw, gee, thanks, mister,” Dondero said. “It’ll mean missing ‘Superman’ on television, but for you—plus the five-course special—I’ll do it. The only thing is, what does a cop like me talk to an architect about? Especially a lady architect?”

  “Lady architecture, naturally,” Reardon said dryly and hung up. He walked to the small bamboo-lined alcove, slipped into his loafers, and went back to the table. Jan had been staring across Jefferson Street, watching the street vendors on the Wharf, and the colored lights bobbing on the masts of fishing boats tied up to the pier. She turned at his approach, smiling; one glance at the shoes he wore and the smile disappeared. Her wide hazel eyes studied his face with sudden coldness.

  “Well, Lieutenant Reardon? What now? Duty calling?”

  “A meeting I forgot all about, honey.”

  “A meeting you forgot about?”

  “Well, I was pretty occupied this afternoon, remember?” Reardon grinned at her. His grin being rewarded with a blank look, he straightened his face. “Sorry. I had a notice on my desk when I checked out this noon, but I guess I forgot it. The meeting was for seven-thirty. I don’t know what it’s all about, but it shouldn’t last long.” Her expression was one of mild curiosity, as if wondering why he was bothering to explain. “Anyway,” he added, almost defensively, “Don will be over in a few minutes and he’ll have dinner with you. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “Which would be wonderful if I were in love with Sergeant Dondero,” Jan said calmly. “Instead of you. Unfortunately, that just isn’t the way it is.”

  “I’m sorry, Jan. I’m really sorry, honey, but there isn’t anything I can do about it.”

  “There are a number of things you could do about it,” Jan said steadily, her large eyes studying his face impersonally. “But you won’t. That’s the pity of it.” She sighed and shrugged, looking even smaller than her small self, but also looking very strong and self-possessed. “Well, Lieutenant, what am I supposed to say? Hurry back?”