Schneider caught my shoulder, spun me to face him. “Whaddya mean, no?”
“No can do. Day-side staff’s off duty. Shift quits at six. Most of ’em’ll be out painting the town, nice Saturday night. Some of ’em won’t be in tomorrow, either. Day off.” I let him pull me around enough so it could have been accidental that my heel ground on the toe of his shoe. I didn’t apologize. “Thing is, you DAides don’t know anything about how a hotel is run. If you started fine-combing our bellmen and floor maids, you’d panic everybody by spreading rumors a murderer’s prowling the corridors!”
Schneider was working himself up to taking a sock at me. But Hacklin growled, “Leave him alone, Charley. Go on down, phone the office. Ask Frank and Bailey to drop everything, get over here. Muncey, too. We’ll get around to Smart Stuff here, later on.”
“That’ll be the day.” Schneider left.
Hacklin rubbed his chin. “Herb was a friend of Charley’s.”
“Put me down for flowers, too.” If I sounded caustic, it was the way I felt. “But don’t expect me to help you make your next blunder. You want something out of the staff, ask me. Do what I can to get it for you. Start chivvying them on your own, I’ll buck you from here to Albany.”
I went out before he decided maybe I wasn’t going to toss Auguste to the lions, after all.
When I knocked at 2ICC, Ruth Moore opened the door before my knuckles hit the second time.
“Shouldn’t do that,” I told her. “Open the door to anybody who knocks.”
“I was sure it was you.”