Random Killer Read Free

had been registered in 3406 for four days, and Mrs. Veach couldn’t recall any in-coming phone calls. Certainly there had been no calls for Geoffrey Hammond, who wasn’t supposed to be there.
    None of this, you understand, was particularly unusual. The fact that Hammond was registered under his manager’s name was noted on the registration card. It was not a secret kept from the front desk or from Chambrun, for that matter, who had seen the card the morning after Hammond was registered. We had covered up for famous people like this time and time again.
    Roy Conklin was going to have to be found and notified that his distinguished client was dead. That could wait, however, until Lieutenant Hardy was in charge, which would be very shortly.
    Jerry Dodd’s office would have notified the various command posts that we had a disaster. My job was to fend off the outside world for the moment. The minute I hit the lobby I sensed that Mr. Atterbury on the front desk, Johnny Thacker, the day bell captain, and his crew were aware of what was up. No one asked me what was new, but the question was on half a dozen faces.
    I was looking for the unwanted sign that the press was in attendance. It was only a little after ten, which is normally early for news people who are just looking for scraps of gossip. They usually don’t appear until the lunch hour when the famous and notorious gather for the first martini of the day. Today, worse luck, was different. The oil company executives were meeting in the Palm Room, and where there is oil in this day and age there is news. Half a dozen reporters who weren’t gossip collectors were watching the corridor that led to the Palm Room, among them Dick Barrows of the Times, who is a very shrewd operator indeed. He spotted me as I stood there wondering how to keep them occupied when Hardy arrived. All they had to do was get a glimpse of the Homicide man and we had trouble.
    “Hi, Mark,” Dick Barrows said. “What’s new?”
    “It’s the third of May nineteen seventy-eight,” I said. “It’s the first time it’s ever been that.”
    “Ho, ho, ho!” Dick said. He is a pleasant-faced, sandy-haired guy with very direct grey eyes. “Kid me not, friend. I have an instinct for the offbeat.”
    “Oil prices are going up—or down,” I said.
    “Screw oil prices,” Dick said. “I see one of your security people report something to Atterbury on the front desk, and Mr. A promptly goes into shock. I see the same security man report to your bell captain, who passes it on to his boys, who all suddenly take on the look of CIA agents who have blown their cover.”
    “Tip on the feature race at Belmont,” I said. “They’re all anticipating making a fortune on a long shot. The security man is the hotel bookmaker.”
    Dick was looking past me across the lobby. “And I now see a well-known homicide detective wandering toward the elevators as though he was looking for the men’s room. What room is he really looking for, Mark?”
    “Keep those other guys distracted and I’ll give you the inside track,” I told him.
    He was watching Hardy disappear into an elevator. “I trust you with my life but not with my career,” he said. He was watching the floor indicator move upward outside the shaft of the elevator Hardy had taken. It would stop at thirty-four and that would be that. “Who collected what, Mark?”
    “We need a little time for Hardy to get plugged in,” I said.
    “Who?” Dick said, still watching the indicator.
    I had to play ball with him or have the whole army down on us. “Special to the Times,” I said, “in return for keeping it strictly to yourself.”
    The elevator indicator had stopped at thirty-four. Dick gave me a twisted little smile. “Scout’s honor,” he said.
    “Geoffrey Hammond,” I said.
    Dick shook his head. “I share nothing with that bastard,” he said.
    “You’re not listening,” I said. “Hardy is here to investigate Geoffrey Hammond’s