Sir Lancelot’s Crime Wave

Jamison frowned slightly. Before he could speak, the girl said:

“I know what you’re thinking. That he got tired of me and sick of the job and just moved away. But I know that isn’t so. It couldn’t be!”

“Mind telling me why not?”

She lifted her chin. “I’m not the most fascinating creature in the city, Lieutenant, but I know that John Kiern was in love with me. It wasn’t a case of my being fooled by a line. If you want me to put it plainly, Lieutenant, he was on the hook.”

“I can’t exactly write that in a report, Miss Dobbs. How about relatives?”

“That was one of the things we have... had in common, Lieutenant. Both of us are completely alone. I have an older sister that I heartily dislike. She is in Alaska with her husband. He has two cousins in Omaha, but they weren’t in touch and he’s never seen them.”

“How long have you been with Ballou and Stark?”

“Three years. I reported for work there the day after my twenty-first birthday.”

“Tell me just why you came here.”

For the first time she lost her crispness. “Johnny was hard up, Lieutenant. And... and suddenly he seemed to have money. He didn’t report for work on a Monday, two weeks ago yesterday. The previous Saturday night he took me to a nightclub, and I know the evening cost him close to forty dollars. We had a Sunday afternoon date and he told me he was thinking of buying a car. He cancelled our Sunday night date because he said he had to see some people. I think, maybe because I always suspected he was a little weak, that he found some crooked way to get money. And I think he’s dead.”

Isaac Jamison raised one dark eyebrow.

“Dead?”

She didn’t sniffle and dig around in her purse for a handkerchief. She kept those blue-gray eyes on him while tears gathered in the lower lids, broke free, rolled down her cheeks.

“When you love somebody, Lieutenant, it makes sort of a bond between you. Lots of people know when somebody they love is in trouble. I woke up after midnight Sunday and I had been crying in my sleep. I went down to work in the morning and I knew that something bad had happened.”

“But you didn’t go to his place for three days?”

“Stupid pride, Lieutenant. I know that now. But he checked out early Sunday evening. It wouldn’t have done any good if I had gone.”

“Again, Miss Dobbs, there’s nothing I can put in a report.”

She quickly wiped her cheeks. “Does that mean that you won’t investigate?”

He shrugged. “I can take a description and turn it over to missing persons. Do you have a picture?”

She took it out of her purse. A snapshot, hand tinted. Jamison saw a fairly heavy young man smiling up at him out of the picture. He was blond, with a ruddy complexion, hairline beginning to recede. Though he didn’t look over twenty-six, it was easy to see what he would look like at fifty. The young man’s mouth was too small.

“What does turning this over to missing persons accomplish?” she asked.

“A description goes out on the wires. And the data is filed for comparison with any unidentified bodies that show up.”

“But there wouldn’t be an investigation?” There was resignation in her voice. But she still sat bravely, her shoulders squared.

He said, “Not on the basis of what you’ve given me. If there were more facts to go on.”

With a touch of anger she said, “I thought it would be this way.”

“The department is not exactly overstaffed, Miss Dobbs. If we were having a lull right now, I might wrangle an assignment of one man to do legwork on it.”

She stood up with a quick movement. “Sorry to have wasted your time, Lieutenant. May I have the picture, please.”

Jamison groaned inwardly. This was borderline. Less than borderline, actually. The girl was sincere and she had a strong conviction But Ringold would laugh at her two major premises.

He ran a strong hand back through his coarse dark hair. “Sit down, Miss Dobbs. Can you keep a secret?”

She gave him an odd look. “Of course!”

“Well, I’m just a dummy official set up here to comb out the cranks and please the public. I’ve been sitting at this desk for a month. If I try to refer this case for investigation, they’ll pat me on the head and tell me I fell for a pretty little package with a tale of woe.

“Look — I work from nine to five. At five I’m my own man. The deputy chief would hack off my ears with a dull knife if I went out officially on a case without his okay. But maybe I can dig up a little to add to your story. Then I give you the facts I find and you come in here and tell me those facts and maybe we get some action.”

Her voice was soft. “I don’t know how to thank you.”

“Remember, I’m no cop on this job. I’m a curious friend helping you get data for the cops.”

“It will be so good to have someone help, Lieutenant.”

“Can you take time off from your job?”

“A girl can have a headache.”