THE SIMPLE ART OF MURDER by Raymond Chandler Copyright ...

over his cheekbones looked like leather. He had short, curly, black hair, utterly steady eyes, the small set mouth of a quick thinker.
He went into a dim, dirty bathroom, stepped into the tub and turned the shower on. The water was warmish, but not hot. He stood
under it and soaped himself, rubbed his whole body over, kneaded his muscles, rinsed off.
He jerked a dirty towel off the rack and started to rub a glow into his skin.
A faint noise behind the loosely closed bathroom door stopped him. He held his breath, listened, heard the noise again, a creak of
boarding, a click, a rustle of cloth. Pete Anglich reached for the door and pulled it open slowly.
The Negro in the purple suit and Panama hat stood beside the bureau, with Pete Anglich's coat in his hand. On the bureau in front
of him were two guns. One of them was Pete Anglich's old worn Colt. The room door was shut and a key with a tag lay on the carpet
near it, as though it had fallen out of the door, or been pushed out from the other side.
The Smiler let the coat fall to the floor and held a wallet in his left hand. His right hand lifted the Colt. He grinned.
"Okey, white boy. Just go on dryin' yourself off after your shower," he said.
Pete Anglich toweled himself. He rubbed himself dry, stood naked with the wet towel in his left hand.
The Smiler had the billfold empty on the bureau, was counting the money with his left hand. His right still clutched the Colt.
"Eighty-seven bucks. Nice money. Some of it's mine from the crap game, but I'm lifting it all, pal. Take it easy. I'm friends with the
management here."
"Gimme a break, Smiler," Pete Anglich said hoarsely. "That's every dollar I got in the world. Leave a few bucks, huh?" He made his
voice thick, coarse, heavy as though with liquor.
The Smiler gleamed his teeth, shook his narrow head. "Can't do it, pal. Got me a date and I need the kale."
Pete Anglich took a loose step forward and stopped, grinning sheepishly. The muzzle of his own gun had jerked at him.
The Smiler sidled over to the bottle of rye and lifted it.
"I can use this, too. My baby's got a throat for liquor. Sure has. What's in your pants is yours, pal. Fair enough?"
Pete Anglich jumped sideways, about four feet. The Smiler's face convulsed. The gun jerked around and the bottle of rye slid out of
his left hand, slammed down on his foot. He yelped, kicked out savagely, and his toe caught in the torn place in the carpet.
Pete Anglich flipped the wet end of the bathtowel straight at the Smiler's eyes.
The Smiler reeled and yelled with pain. Then Pete Anglich held the Smiler's gun wrist in his hard left hand. He twisted up, around.
His hand started to slide down over the Smiler's hand, over the gun. The gun turned inward and touched the Smiler's side.
A hard knee kicked viciously at Pete Anglich's abdomen. He gagged, and his finger tightened convulsively on the Smiler's trigger
finger.
The shot was dull, muffled against the purple cloth of the suit. The Smiler's eyes rolled whitely and his narrow jaw fell slack.
Pete Anglich let him down on the floor and stood panting, bent over, his face greenish. He groped for the fallen bottle of rye, got the
cork out, got some of the fiery liquid down his throat.
The greenish look went away from his face. His breathing slowed. He wiped sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.
He felt the Smiler's pulse. The Smiler didn't have any pulse. He was dead. Pete Anglich loosened the gun from his hand, went over
to the door and glanced out into the hallway. Empty. There was a passkey in the outside of the lock. He removed it, locked the door from
the inside.
He put his underclothes and socks and shoes on, his worn blue serge suit, knotted a black tie around the crumpled shirt collar,
went back to the dead man and took a roll of bills from his pocket. He packed a few odds and ends of clothes and toilet articles in a
cheap fiber suitcase, stood it by the door.
He pushed a torn scrap of sheet through his revolver barrel with a pencil, replaced the used cartridge, crushed the empty shell with
his heel on the bathroom floor and then flushed it down the toilet.
He locked the door from the outside and walked down the stairs to the lobby.
The bald-headed clerk's eyes jumped at him, then dropped. The skin of his face turned gray. Pete Anglich leaned on the counter
and opened his hand to let two keys tinkle on the scarred wood. The clerk stared at the keys, shuddered.
Pete Anglich said in his slow, husky voice: "Hear any funny noises?"
The clerk shook his head, gulped.
"Creep joint, eh?" Pete Anglich said.
The clerk moved his head painfully, twisted his neck in his collar. His bald head winked darkly under the ceiling light.
"Too bad," Pete Anglich said. "What name did I register under last night?"
"You ain't registered," the clerk whispered.
"Maybe I wasn't here even," Pete Anglich said softly.
"Never saw you before, mister."
"You're not seeing me now. You never will see me--to know me--will you, Doe?"
The clerk moved his neck and tried to smile.
Pete Anglich drew his wallet out and shook three dollar bills from it.
"I'm a guy that likes to pay his way," he said slowly. "This pays for Room 349--till way in the morning, kind of late. The lad you gave
the passkey to looks like a heavy sleeper." He paused, steadied his cool eyes on the clerk's face, added thoughtfully: "Unless, of course,
he's got friends who would like to move him out."
Bubbles showed on the clerk's lips. He stuttered: "He ain't--ain't--"
"Yeah," Pete Anglich said. "What would you expect?"
He went across to the street door, carrying his suitcase, stepped out under the stencil sign, stood a moment looking toward the
hard white glare of Central Avenue.
Then he walked the other way. The street was very dark, very quiet. There were four blocks of frame houses before he came to Noon
Street. It was all a Negro quarter.
He met only one person on the way, a brown girl in a green hat, very sheer stockings, and four-and-a-half-inch heels, who smoked
a cigarette under a dusty palm tree and stared back toward the Surprise Hotel.
TWO
The lunch wagon was an old buffet car without wheels, set end to the Street in a space between a machine shop and a rooming
house. The name Bella Donna was lettered in faded gold on the sides. Pete Anglich went up the two iron steps at the end, into a smell
of fry grease.
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