Don't Look Behind You Read online

  I just said, “Don’t you know what hospital, Pat? I’d think a detective of your caliber would have learned that by now.”

  “A detective of your caliber, which is .45, should know he’s right on the edge of an obstruction of justice charge. If that sticks, you’re out of the P.I. business. You won’t be able to get a license to sell hot dogs.”

  “Why, is my fly open?”

  He slammed a fist on his blotter and everything on his desk jumped. “You won’t be able to get a hunting license for goddamn ducks!”

  We sat and glowered at each other, and I let my smoke exit in his general vicinity. Then an almost attractive policewoman who could use some make-up delivered our coffee. We thanked her. She said you’re welcome and left.

  “Let’s try this again,” I said. “This time with me asking a few questions.”

  He sighed, let some coffee roll down his throat, said, “Why not?”

  “Who do you make for the target on that street corner tonight?”

  He gave me the you’re nuts look. “What do you mean? You were.”

  “Something I’ve always wondered,” I said, sitting up. “Do you keep separate files on all your cases? You know, so there’s no chance of one case brushing up against another and contaminating it.”

  Only somebody who knew me as well as Pat would have read the sarcasm in my easy tone. His eyes tightened and he leaned forward.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’m an idiot.”

  I gestured with an open hand, as if to say, No argument.

  “Billy was the target,” he said, and bounced a fist off his desk. “It’s that hit-and-run he saw! He’s the only witness who can identify the driver. Damnit. I’m an ass.”

  I gestured with the open hand again.

  Then he pointed a finger at me, a prosecutor indicating the defendant. “But everybody’s going to read this thing as another hit attempt on you. The odds of you being involved in three tries on your life and an attempt on someone else’s life are infinitesimal… Mike, if I look into this as if Billy is the target, I’ll get laughed off the force.”

  “If you don’t do that,” I said, “you don’t deserve to be on the force.”

  “Do you have a suspect?”

  I nodded. “Borensen.”

  His eyes widened, but soon he was nodding. “Makes sense. Really makes sense. Hell, he could have set you up for the kill twice!”

  So I emptied the bag on his desk, gave him everything from Hy’s background on Borensen’s youthful drug-dealing activities through his mob money laundering past and present.

  “And you’re convinced,” Pat said, “that Borensen put a high-priced hit out on you to clear a safe path to removing Billy.”

  I leaned back, folded my arms. “Is that too big a leap for you, old buddy?”

  He shook his head. “No. Not at all. You’d have stepped right up to the plate with a big bad bat in your hands, if they murdered that little guy. What kind of shape is he in, anyway?”

  “I don’t know. He was still out cold when they loaded him in the ambulance.”

  He frowned. “I don’t get it, Mike. Why not leave Billy to us?”

  “Let’s just say I want him in my protective custody. Think about it. To everybody but you in this department, Billy will be an unfortunate little guy who took some bullets meant for Mike Hammer. How long can you arrange a twenty-four-hour police guard for that?”

  “I have some influence.”

  “Okay. So maybe hiding Billy away somewhere isn’t necessary. Maybe Billy would be just as well off or better out at Bellevue under police protection. But have you considered I might have another agenda?”

  “Such as?”

  “Such as someone we both care about.”

  His eyes flared. “…Velda.”

  I nodded. “Pat, I want her out of here, away from my side. I’m entering into a very dangerous sort of competition, and I don’t want to see her get between me and the next bullet triggered my way.”

  He was sitting forward. “What do you mean… dangerous competition?”

  I told him, in some detail, about last night’s phone call from the self-styled greatest of all contract killers. Pat frowned through much of my account, occasionally shaking his head.

  “Mike, this guy is worse than just some professional killer. He’s a lunatic. A madman.”

  “Maybe that’s why he identifies so closely with me.”

  “It’s not funny, but… I get it, where Velda’s concerned. You know she wouldn’t leave town or in any way lay low, if you just asked her to, for her safety. You had to give her a job that got her out of harm’s way.”

  “That’s right. Pat, I have a suggestion.”

  “I’m not surprised. What is it?”

  “The Martin Foster suicide. That wasn’t your case.”

  “No. That was out on Long Island.”

  “Well, get whatever you can on it from the local PD out there. Look at everything. Crime scene photos, autopsy report, the works.”

  He was frowning. “You think Borensen staged it?”

  “Very possible. Whether he knew his prospective father-in-law had cancer or not is immaterial. What likely happened is Dick Blazen told Foster the truth about his son-in-law-to-be. Which meant they both had to go.”

  “Why, because Borensen loves the girl?”

  “Well, it would be easy enough to. But you might start with all the money she’ll inherit.”

  “Okay. Can I assume you’re working this from your own end?”

  I saluted him with my coffee cup. “You know, when I get to the finish line before you—and I will get there before you, Pat—how would you like me to drop Borensen right in your lap?”

  “And not just kill his ass?”

  “Well, no promises, but… yes, if he doesn’t pull anything. With his connections, a live Viking might be very useful to your department in putting some worthy mob slobs in the Graybar Hotel.”

  “Agreed.” Pat went deadpan on me. “Now you’ll tell me what you want from me.”

  “I assume you weren’t working that hit-and-run.”

  He nodded. “Vehicular homicide isn’t my bailiwick.”

  “Well, round up everything the department has on that crime.” I dug in my trenchcoat pocket and found the three slugs from earlier and tossed them on the desk. “And you’re going to want these. I dug ’em out of Billy’s jacket tonight.”

  “What the hell did you take them for?” His face got a little red.

  “Just wanted to make sure they got to you. Didn’t want to leave them to the uniforms, and I planned to get Billy out of there before any plainclothes showed.”

  The red faded but he was still annoyed. “You’re tampering with crime scenes now?”

  Really I’d been tampering with crime scenes for a long time, but I said, “You have a decent chain of evidence. I’m an officer of the court, after all, and I preserved material that might have been lost in the shuffle, and instead turned them over to the Captain of Homicide.”

  “Where would I be without your help?”

  I chose to treat that as a rhetorical question, since the answer might embarrass him.

  “Look, Pat, assuming Billy is just unconscious, and not in a coma or anything, what we really need on Borensen right now is an ID. You had a police photographer at the Waldorf suite this afternoon. You were interviewing Borensen while your guy was snapping shots. Think it’s possible that our suspect might be in the background of one?”

  Pat was already reaching for the phone. He got the crime lab and made the request.

  After he hung up, he said, “I can see why we need a photo for Billy to identify, since Hy says shots of Borensen are as scarce as honest P.I.’s. But what would make the man feel he had to get rid of Billy? All the bastard needed to do was stay away from Billy’s corner. It’s not like we’d haul Borensen in for a line-up, or that Billy would turn him up in our mug books. Back when you say he was dealing drugs, Borensen was never even arrested.�
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  “Let me answer you with a question. What do guys who run newsstands do when things get slow?”

  Pat shrugged, thinking about it. “Well, they sure don’t read the girlie mags. They could get hauled in for that, and it would discourage female customers. And they don’t read the funny books, because it just doesn’t look good. I suppose they read the papers. Each day’s papers.”

  I gave him a big sunny smile. “And what will be in the paper, one day soon? Not on the sports page. Not on the editorial page. Not in the funnies. But the—”

  “Shit,” Pat said. “The society page.”

  “Wedding photos,” we said.

  CHAPTER NINE

  As I rolled down the hill in my black Ford, the trio of three-story white-washed stucco buildings, as alike as Monopoly houses, seemed to give off a ghostly glow. Some of that came from security lighting, the rest from moonlight making its way through the misty night.

  Valley Vista Sanitarium dominated a dip between rolling hills a few miles south of Newburgh. You had to catch a look at the complex coming down, as the private facility had a seven-foot brick wall and a big wooden gate. The well-spaced-out cluster of buildings on tree-dotted grounds worthy of a country club perched on the Hudson River side, providing patients with a nice view and the hospital with another discreet method for patient arrival and admittance. The river was just a black ribbon with shimmering ivory highlights.

  I’d left Pat’s office around two a.m. and by three-fifteen was pulling into the short drive up to the imposing Valley Vista gates with their welcoming signs: PRIVATE—KEEP OUT. I got out, .45 in hand, tugged down my hat brim and, leaving the car running, crouched on the driver’s side. I was waiting to see if I’d been right that I hadn’t been followed here. For a full five minutes, nobody came in either direction, indicating my abilities to spot a tail remained undiminished by time.

  So I put the big gun back in the shoulder rig and went over to use the intercom and announce myself. I’d called ahead and was expected. As the mist’s ambitions rose into a light rain, I waited some more, until a beefy orderly in white walked down the much longer, slightly sloping drive to open the gates for me.

  The Valley Vista was generally known as a sanitarium for the mentally ill. The middle building was for patients who were receiving therapy after being committed and who would, in time, be released. The building at left was for seriously chronically deranged souls who were humanely store-housed here and would likely never see sunshine on the other side of the brick wall.

  The third identical building, at right, was something else again. This was a hospital where patients who needed discreet care could come, and that included the occasional movie star recovering from plastic surgery, a politician drying out, or unsavory types who needed a bullet wound or other illegal-work-related injury tended to without the notification of the authorities.

  Only a select few among the citizenry were in the know about the services that third building offered—that it was a cross between Switzerland and a fortress. The orderlies were bruisers and the security team consisted of former Green Berets and other Special Forces types. In its thirty years of existence, Valley Vista had served as neutral territory. Rival gangland bosses were safe here. And it was the one place in this state where Mike Hammer would not kick down a door to get at some mob slob who needed killing. Or anyway the need for that had never come. Valley Vista stopped short of hiding out wanted men, after all, and had made a very handy resource for Michael Hammer Investigations, from time to time. I’d been here twice recuperating from gunshot wounds that back in the real world would have made me vulnerable. And in my business you sometimes had to hide a witness from the bad guys. Or the cops.

  At reception the nurse was giving my ID the onceover twice when Dr. Benson came out from his office and granted me his benediction. Also, his permission not to check my weapon, though I did hang up my raincoat and hat. They could use drying off.

  Billy was on the third floor, the doc said, and gave me the room number.

  “How serious?” I asked him.

  Benson was in his fifties, and had been a medic in the Korean hostilities. He was an average-looking face-in-the-crowd guy except for his prematurely white hair and very light-blue eyes.

  “Mr. Batson broke two of his ribs,” the doc said. “No sign of internal hemorrhage. When I last looked in, he was still unconscious, but not in a coma. Still, there are often special medical considerations with these little people, and I’d like to keep him here for at least a few days.”

  I told him that it might be longer. That my friend could be a target for a dangerous but as yet unidentified assassin, and he thanked me for the information. I might have told him someone left their car lights on in the parking lot.

  A hospital at night is an eerie place—the beeps and boops of monitoring equipment, the low-key lighting, the nurses floating down corridors like occasional ghosts, plus the usual antiseptic smells. The place was asleep, but fitfully.

  In this unique hospital, certain floors had armed guards seated outside doors, big men in light blue uniforms with big revolvers on their hips. Their only concession to the time of night was to sit in wooden chairs as old as the building, and nobody was reading or snacking much less napping. These were men trained in jungles to stay alert in darkness waiting for any snap of a twig to signal an approaching enemy capable of exploding the night into a daylight of orange muzzle discharge and the silence into a symphony of screams and gunfire.

  The guard on the door was already on his feet when I turned down the corridor. Just outside the room, he looked me over, but his walkie had already told him to expect me.

  He had a naturally sleepy-eyed look, like Robert Mitchum, but he was as alert as hell. Very softly he said, “I believe they’re both sleeping, Mr. Hammer.”

  “Thanks,” I said, but I’d have to wake Velda if necessary.

  But it wasn’t. She was leaned back in a recliner, resting, with the .32 automatic on her lap, but very much awake. Across from her, a light on in the john, its door cracked, provided just enough illumination not to disturb the patient. She had changed into a black jumpsuit—I could see her overnight bag peeking out from behind the chair—and looked like a commando, although I never saw a commando built like that.

  Billy, seeming very small, lay on his back in the hospital bed, asleep, breathing hard but not snoring and in no apparent discomfort. They had an IV going.

  As soon as I came in, Velda sat up, put the .32 on the table by the recliner, and got to her feet. With a wide smile, she came over into my arms and punched me in the mouth with those pillowy lips of hers.

  Then, still in each other’s arms, we stared at each other, as if making sure we were both real and not just wishful thinking.

  “I’ve been so worried,” she whispered.

  Quietly, with a nod toward Billy, I said, “He hasn’t woken up yet?”

  “No. They’ve got a morphine drip going, and that may keep him out a while.”

  I tipped my head toward the door. “We need to talk, kitten.”

  She nodded.

  We made our way to a little waiting area with a couple of chairs and a couch and a low-slung table with the same magazines as the last time I was here, six months ago. Not even the best hospital has a cure for that condition.

  I sat in a chair and she sat nearby on the couch. They let you smoke down here and I did. I told Velda I’d filled Pat in and that, after some pissing and moaning, he was onboard with our investigation. Then I got a folded manila envelope out of my inside suit coat pocket.

  “Pat rounded up some very interesting art studies for us,” I said.

  I handed her two crime scene photos from the aftermath of the bridal-shower shooting that clearly showed Borensen talking to Pat in the background.

  “The elusive Leif,” she said with a smile.

  “You keep those for when Billy wakes up.”

  She shook her head and all that raven hair danced. “I can’t be
lieve it’s so damn tough to find photos of Borensen.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t think the lack of photos was on purpose. He just wasn’t somebody who, despite working in show business, generated much press, or anyway pics. But he knew that marrying Gwen Foster meant wedding photos in the papers, even though the nuptials were going to take place in Hawaii.”

  “The specialness of that,” Velda said, “means even bigger coverage. Anyway, he’s poised to go on to bigger things. As the producer, and husband of the star, of a new Broadway musical, he’ll be a celebrity himself.”

  I nodded. “And he couldn’t risk Billy seeing any of that splashed all over the papers and other media.”

  I took out three more photos and handed them to her. Each was an angle on a man slumped over a desktop with a hole in his right temple. His right arm was flung on the desk, his hand palm up, and nearby was a little automatic.

  “Smith and Wesson Escort,” Velda said. “A .22.”

  “Small but it did the job. The dead guy is Martin Foster.”

  “I figured as much. Is that his gun?”

  I nodded again. “Registered to him, yes. I’m going to guess he carried it with him for protection in the theater district. He was a well-known, successful man, and a strong personality who wouldn’t put up with a mugging or robbery without a fight.”

  “A strong personality,” Velda said, “who killed himself.”

  “He had lung cancer, and he knew it.”

  “Leave any note?”

  “No.”

  “No note to his daughter?”

  “No. You see any red flags?”

  She looked from photo to photo. “I don’t think so. Do you, Mike?”

  “Not a red flag maybe, but… the fatal wound is side to side, entry wound in one temple, with the expected powder burns and stippling, exit wound through the other temple. To do that, Foster would have to sit down, raise his arm straight, with the elbow out, and fire. A ninety-degree angle.”

  “That’s not impossible.”

  “Not impossible,” I granted. “It might reflect a kind of firing squad mentality. But it’s more common, when a suicide sits at a table or desk, for the arm to be at a forty-five degree angle, with the exit wound out the top of the head on the opposite side. Some lean on their elbow and do it.”