دستگیری به خاطر قتل

Chapter eight

Arrested for Murder

I moved around the room and carefully cleaned everything I had touched. I didn’t want to leave any fingerprints. There was nothing in the room to connect Benny Greep with Elaine Garfield. I picked up the telephone and asked for the police.

‘I’m speaking from Apartment 507, 5314 Arivieda Street,’ I said. ‘There’s a dead man in the bath.’

‘Right,’ said the policeman at the other end of the telephone. ‘What’s your name?’

I told him.

‘Don’t touch anything,’ the policeman said, ‘and stay where you are. A police car will he there in a few minutes.’

I put down the phone and sat down to wait. Three minutes later, I heard the police car coming. The car stopped outside the building and I could hear heavy feet running up the stairs.

Two policemen walked into the apartment. They were both wearing ordinary clothes and looked hot and tired. One was about twenty-five years old, the other about forty.

The older policeman came up to me and showed me his police papers.

‘Where’s the body’ he asked.

I pointed to the bathroom. Both policemen went into the bathroom to have a look. The younger one came back first, shaking his head.

‘All right,’ said the younger policeman, ‘why did you do it?’

‘Do what’ I asked in surprise.

‘Why did you kill your friend in the bath’ said the young policeman.

‘He wasn’t my friend,’ I replied.

‘I don’t care if he was your friend or not,’ said the policeman. ‘Tell me why you killed, him.’

‘I didn’t kill him,’ I said calmly.

‘Then what are you doing here’ asked the older policeman, coming in from the bathroom.

‘My name’s Lenny Samuel,’ I explained. ‘I’m a private detective and I came here to talk to Benny Greep. The door was open and so I came in. I looked in the bathroom and I found the dead man in the bath, so I telephoned the police. The dead man is Benny Greep.’

‘Why did you want to talk to Benny Greep’ the younger policeman asked.

‘I’m sorry, I can’t answer that,’ I replied.

‘Who are you working for’ asked the older policeman.

‘I’m sorry, I can’t answer that either,’ I said. ‘As far as I know, Benny Greep’s death doesn’t have anything to do with the person I’m working for.’

‘Tell me who you are working for,’ shouted the younger policeman angrily.

‘Take it easy,’ said the older policeman to the younger one. ‘You stay here until the other police arrive. I’m going to take Mr Samuel down to the police station.’

I kept quiet and followed the older policeman out of the room and down the stairs. Outside the building, we got into my old Chrysler. The policeman drove. We were soon at the police station, where the policeman locked me in a small room. I sat down on a hard, wooden chair in the locked room and tried to sleep.

It was no use getting angry or upset at being arrested for murder. That is something you have to get used to, if you are a private detective. It happens all the time.

But I could not sleep. I was thinking about all the things which had happened since I had met Helen Garfield the day before. I couldn’t sleep, because several things were worrying me. But I couldn’t remember what those things were.