CHAPTER 41

Anna took the trolley to the apartment building formerly inhabited by Samuel Grayson and knocked on the manager’s door. Having a rich and powerful father had been useful when soliciting help from the community, but she hadn’t realized the extent of its utility until it was gone. She did, however, have a brass star, and at least she no longer resembled an orangutan. When the door opened, the apartment manager loomed on the threshold. He had inky black hair and a tiny head. Anna smiled her most charming smile. “Good afternoon.” She carefully enunciated, “I am police matron Anna Blanc from the LAPD.” She bobbed a curtsy.

He cocked his tiny head and looked at Anna. “So, what’s that then?”

“I’m basically a detective. I have authority. That’s why they gave me this badge.” She puffed out her chest and pointed to the matron’s badge pinned to it. She cocked an eyebrow.

The man stared at her chest.

Anna quickly unpuffed her chest and frowned. “I’m here to investigate the murder of Samuel Grayson and I need to ask you a few questions.”

He directed his words to her bosoms. “Why don’t you come in and sit down.”

Anna hesitated. The pin-headed manager made her feel ill at ease and slightly queasy. Still, she had an important job to do and Georges’s life depended on it. Thus, when he opened the door wider, Anna entered his apartment. He closed the door behind her.

The apartment had a similar layout to Samuel Grayson’s abode, but the furniture was neither as new nor as dramatically ugly, though it was ugly enough. It smelled of stale cigarette smoke and cat urine. The manager motioned for Anna to sit on a love seat. She sat, and he sat rather too closely beside her. Anna popped back up again. “I prefer to stand. It helps me think.” She began to pace. “Did anyone ever come to visit Samuel Grayson or inquire after him? Anyone? Anyone at all?”

“Well, let me think.”

Anna paced to the end of the room and turned around to find the man standing right behind her, like her own shadow. Anna tried to move around him, but he cornered her between the wall and a large chair. He leered.

His face reminded her of a stinkbug.

She wished to stomp on his foot but now was not the time. Instead, she leered back, trying to make a stinkbug face of her own so that he would see her as his equal. It seemed to do the trick.

He stepped back and his mouth dropped open.

She pushed the wedding photograph in his face. “Did this man come here?”

“Uh. No. A lady came. I saw her knocking on his door and I threw her out. No ladies allowed. That’s my policy. He wasn’t home so she slid a letter under his door.”

“Are you sure this man never came inquiring?”

“If he did, I never saw him.”

This answer displeased Anna, even if it were true. But Mr. Edmands could have tracked Samuel down, lured him to a meeting in the park, and the stinkbug manager simply didn’t see him. The stinkbug could have been sleeping or petting his cat. He never would have seen Anna if she hadn’t banged on the door. Maybe Mr. Edmands had engaged a lady to draw Samuel out.

“What did the lady look like? Old? Young?”

“ Young.”

“Plain? Pretty? Beautiful?” “A peach.”

Anna sighed. “Did she have golden hair or raven locks?”

“Her hair was brown.”

Samara Flossie was quite peachy, her hair was light brown, and she had said she’d written Samuel a letter telling him to leave her alone. But Samara Flossie would never draw Samuel out on behalf of her homicidal father. She was hiding from him. He had to have found Samuel another way. Perhaps Samuel Grayson did write Samara Flossie’s family. Anna tapped her lip. “When was this?”

“Five, six weeks ago.”

“About the time Samuel Grayson disappeared.”

“Yeah. Just before. Because I saw him that night and wondered what a girl like her wanted with a guy like him. I suppose he had fancy clothes.”

Anna grimaced. “You can probably have his clothes. The police don’t want them.”

“Yeah, looks don’t mean anything. Take me for instance. Guys without money don’t get girls. He had money and he didn’t. You know what I mean.”

“No.”

“Well, he lived here.” He was speaking to her bosoms again and edging closer with that stinkbug leer.

Anna had all she needed and all she could take from the lecherous and inarticulate manager. “I think a female bug might like you.” She slipped past him, flung open the door, and ran.