The Mike Hammer Collection, Volume 3 Page 18

  It took ten minutes of cold wet towels and a lot of shaking to wake him up. His eyes still had a whiskey glassiness and he didn’t know what we wanted at all. He was unintelligible for another thirty minutes, then little by little he began to come around, his face going through a succession of emotions. Until he saw Bayliss he seemed scared, but one look at the old man and he tried on a drunken grin, gagged and went into a spasm of dry heaves. Luckily, there was nothing in his stomach, so we didn’t have to go through that kind of mess.

  Hy brought in a glass of water and I made him sip at it. I said, “What’s your name, feller?”

  He hiccoughed. “You—cops?”

  “No, a friend.”

  “Oh.” His head wobbled, then he looked back to me again. “You play chess?”

  “Sorry, Red, but I had a friend who could. Richie Cole.”

  Markham squinted and nodded solemnly, remembering. “He—pretty damn good. Yessir. Good guy.”

  I asked him, “Did you know about the girl on the ship?”

  Very slowly, he scowled, his lips pursing out, then a bit of clarity returned to him and he leered with a drunken grimace. “Sure. Hell of—joke.” He hiccoughed and grinned again. “Joke. Hid—her in—down in—hold.”

  We were getting close now. His eyes drooped sleepily and I wanted him to hang on. I said, “Where is she now, Red?”

  He just looked at me foggily.

  “Damn it, think about it!”

  For a second he didn’t like the way I yelled or my hand on his arm and he was about to balk, then Bayliss said, “Come on, Red, if you know where she is, tell us.”

  You’d think he was seeing Bayliss for the first time. “Pepper,” he said happily, his eyes coming open.

  “Come on, Red. The girl on the Vanessa. Richie’s girl.”

  “Sure. Big—joke. You know?”

  “We know, but tell us where she is.”

  His shrug was the elaborate gesture of the sodden drunk. “Dunno. I—got her—on deck.”

  Bayliss looked at me, not knowing where to go. It was all over his head and he was taking the lead from me. Then he got the pitch and shook Red’s shoulder. “Is she on shore?”

  Red chuckled and his head weaved. “On—shore. Sure—on shore.” He laughed again, the picture coming back to his mind. “Dennis—Wallace packed her—in crate. Very funny.”

  I pushed Bayliss away and sat on the edge of the cot. “It sure was a good joke all right. Now where did the crate go?”

  “Crate?”

  “She was packed in the crate. This Dennis Wallace packed her in the crate, right?”

  “Right!” he said assuredly, slobbering on himself.

  “Then who got the crate?”

  “Big joke.”

  “I know, now let us in on it. Who got the crate?”

  He made another one of those shrugs. “I—dunno.”

  “Somebody picked it up,” I reminded him.

  Red’s smile was real foolish, that of the drunk trying to be secretive. “Richie’s—joke. He called—a friend. Dennis gave him—the crate.” He laughed again. “Very funny.”

  Hy said, “Cute.”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Now we have to find this Dennis guy.”

  “He’s got a place not far from here,” Bayliss said.

  “You know everybody?”

  “I’ve been around a long time, Mike.”

  We went to leave Red Markham sitting there, but before we could reach the door he called out, “Hey, you.”

  Bayliss said, “What, Red?”

  “How come—everybody wants—old Dennis?”

  “I don’t—”

  My hand stopped the old guy and I walked back to the cot. “Who else wanted Dennis, Red?”

  “Guy—gimme this pint.” He reached for the bottle, but was unable to make immediate contact. When he did he sucked at the mouth of it, swallowed as though it was filled and put the bottle down.

  “What did he look like, Red?”

  “Oh—” he lolled back against the wall. “Big guy. Like you.”

  “Go on.”

  “Mean. Son of a—he was mean. You ever see—mean ones? Like a damn Indian. Something like Injun Pete on the Darby Standard—he—”

  I didn’t bother to hear him finish. I looked straight at Hy and felt cold all over. “The Dragon,” I said. “He’s one step up.”

  Hy had a quiet look on his face. “That’s what I almost forgot to tell you about, Mike.”

  “What?”

  “The Dragon. I got inside the code name from our people overseas. There may be two guys because The Dragon code breaks down to tooth and nail. When they operate as a team they’re simply referred to as The Dragon.”

  “Great,” I said. “Swell. That’s all we need for odds.” My mouth had a bad taste in it. “Show us Dennis’s place, Bayliss. We can’t stay here any longer.”

  “Not me,” he said. “You guys go it alone. Whatever it is that’s going on, I don’t like it. I’ll tell you where, but I’m not going in any more dark places with you. Right now I’m going back to Benny Joe Grissi’s bar and get stinking drunk where you can’t get at me and if anything happens I’ll read about it in the papers tomorrow.”

  “Good enough, old-timer. Now where does Dennis live?”

  The rooming house was a brownstone off Ninth Avenue, a firetrap like all the others on the block, a crummy joint filled with cubicles referred to as furnished rooms. The landlady came out of the front floor flat, looked at me and said, “I don’t want no cops around here,” and when Hy handed her the ten-spot her fat face made a brief smile and she added, “So I made a mistake. Cops don’t give away the green. What’re you after?”

  “Dennis Wallace. He’s a seaman and—”

  “Top floor front. Go on up. He’s got company.”

  I flashed Hy a nod, took the stairs with him behind me while I yanked the .45 out and reached the top floor in seconds. The old carpet under our feet puffed dust with every step but muffled them effectively and when I reached the door there was no sound from within and a pencil-thin line of light seeped out at the sill. I tried the knob, pushed the door open and was ready to cut loose at anything that moved wrong.

  But there was no need for any shooting, if the little guy on the floor with his hands tied behind him and his throat slit wide open was Dennis Wallace, for his killer was long gone.

  The fat landlady screeched when she saw the body and told us it was Dennis all right. She waddled downstairs again and pointed to the wall phone and after trying four different numbers I got Pat and told him I was with another dead man. It wasn’t anything startling. He was very proper about getting down the details and told me to stay right there. His voice had a fine tone of satisfaction to it that said he had me where he could make me sweat and maybe even break me like he had promised.

  Hy came down as I hung up and tapped my shoulder. “You didn’t notice something on the guy up there.”

  “What’s that?”

  “All that blood didn’t come from his throat. His gut is all carved up and his mouth is taped shut. The blood obscures the tape.”

  “Tortured?”

  “It sure looks that way.”

  The landlady was in her room taking a quick shot for her nerves and seemed to hate us for causing all the trouble. I asked her when Dennis’ guest had arrived and she said a couple of hours ago. She hadn’t heard him leave so she assumed he was still there. Her description was brief, but enough. He was a big mean-looking guy who reminded her of an Indian.

  There was maybe another minute before a squad car would come along and I didn’t want to be here when that happened. I pulled Hy out on the stoop and said, “I’m going to take off.”

  “Pat won’t like it.”

  “There isn’t time to talk about it. You can give him the poop.”

  “All of it?”

  “Every bit. Lay it out for him.”

  “What about you?”

  “Look, you saw what happened. T
he Dragon put it together the same way I did. He was here when the boat docked and Richie Cole knew it. So Richie called for a friend who knew the ropes, told him to pick up the crate with Velda in it and where to bring it. He left and figured right when he guessed anybody waiting would follow him. He pulled them away from the boat and tried to make contact with Old Dewey at the newstand and what he had for Dewey was the location of where that friend was to bring the crate.”

  “Then there’s one more step.”

  “That’s right. The friend.”

  “You can’t trace that call after all this time.”

  “I don’t think I have to.”

  Hy shook his head. “If Cole was a top agent then he didn’t have any friends.”

  “He had one,” I said.

  “Who?”

  “Velda.”

  “But—”

  “So he could just as well have another. Someone who was in the same game with him during the war, someone he knew would realize the gravity of the situation and act immediately and someone he knew would be capable of fulfilling the mission.”

  “Who, Mike?”

  I didn’t tell him. “I’ll call you when it’s over. You tell Pat.”

  Down the street a squad car turned the corner. I went down the steps and went in the other direction, walking casually, then when I reached Ninth, I flagged a cab and gave him the parking lot where I had left Laura’s car.

  CHAPTER 12

  If I was wrong, the girl hunters would have Velda. She’d be dead. They wanted nothing of her except that she be dead. Damn their stinking hides anyway. Damn them and their philosophies! Death and destruction were the only things the Kremlin crowd was capable of. They knew the value of violence and death and used it over and over in a wild scheme to smash everything flat but their own kind.

  But there was one thing they didn’t know. They didn’t know how to handle it when it came back to them and exploded in their own faces. Let her be dead, I thought, and I’ll start a hunt of my own. They think they can hunt? Shit. They didn’t know how to be really violent. Death? I’d get them, every one, no matter how big or little, or wherever they were. I’d cut them down like so many grapes in ways that would scare the living crap out of them and those next in line for my kill would never know a second’s peace until their heads went flying every which way.

  So I’d better not be wrong.

  Dennis Wallace had known who was to pick up the crate. There wouldn’t have been time for elaborate exchanges of coded recognition signals and if Dennis had known it was more than just a joke he might conceivably have backed out. No, it had to be quick and simple and not at all frightening. He had turned the crate over to a guy whose name had been given him and since it was big enough a truck would have been used in the delivery. He would have seen lettering on the truck, he would have been able to identify both it and the driver, and with some judicious knife work on his belly he would have had his memory jarred into remembering every single detail of the transaction.

  I had to be right.

  Art Rickerby had offered the clue.

  The guy’s name had to be Alex Bird, Richie’s old war buddy in the O.S.S. who had a chicken farm up in Marlboro, New York, and who most likely had a pickup truck that could transport a crate. He would do the favor, keep his mouth shut and forget it the way he had been trained to, and it was just as likely he missed any newspaper squibs about Richie’s death and so didn’t show up to talk to the police when Richie was killed.

  By the time I reached the George Washington Bridge the stars were wiped out of the night sky and you could smell the rain again. I took the Palisades Drive and where I turned off to pick up the Thruway the rain came down in fine slanting lines that laid a slick on the road and whipped in the window.

  I liked a night like this. It could put a quiet on everything. Your feet walked softer and dogs never barked in the rain. It obscured visibility and overrode sounds that could give you away otherwise and sometimes was so soothing that you could be lulled into a death sleep. Yeah, I remembered other nights like this too. Death nights.

  At Newburgh I turned off the Thruway, drove down 17K into town and turned north on 9W. I stopped at a gas station when I reached Marlboro and asked the attendant if he knew where Alex Bird lived.

  Yes, he knew. He pointed the way out and just to be sure I sketched out the route then picked up the blacktop road that led back into the country.

  I passed by it the first time, turned around at the crossroad cursing to myself, then eased back up the road looking for the mailbox. There was no name on it, just a big wooden cutout of a bird. It was in the shadow of a tree before, but now my lights picked it out and when they did I spotted the drive, turned in, angled off into a cut in the bushes and killed the engine.

  The farmhouse stood an eighth of a mile back off the road, an old building restored to more modern taste. In back of it, dimly lit by the soft glow of night lights, were two long chicken houses, the manure odor of them hanging in the wet air. On the right, a hundred feet away, a two-story boxlike barn stood in deep shadow, totally dark.

  Only one light was on in the house when I reached it, downstairs on the chimney side and obviously in a living room. I held there a minute, letting my eyes get adjusted to the place. There were no cars around, but that didn’t count since there were too many places to hide one. I took out the .45, jacked a shell in the chamber and thumbed the hammer back.

  But before I could move another light went on in the opposite downstairs room. Behind the curtains a shadow moved slowly, purposefully, passed the window several times then disappeared altogether. I waited, but the light didn’t go out. Instead, one top-floor light came on, but too dimly to do more than vaguely outline the form of a person on the curtains.

  Then it suddenly made sense to me and I ran across the distance to the door. Somebody was searching the house.

  The door was locked and too heavy to kick in. I hoped the rain covered the racket I made, then laid my trench coat against the window and pushed. The glass shattered inward to the carpeted floor without much noise, I undid the catch, lifted the window and climbed over the sill.

  Alex Bird would be the thin, balding guy tied to the straight-back chair. His head slumped forward, his chin on his chest and when I tilted his head back his eyes stared at me lifelessly. There was a small lumpy bruise on the side of his head where he had been hit, but outside of a chafing of his wrists and ankles, there were no other marks on him. His body had the warmth of death only a few minutes old and I had seen too many heart-attack cases not to be able to diagnose this one.

  The Dragon had reached Alex Bird, all right. He had him right where he could make him talk and the little guy’s heart exploded on him. That meant just one thing. He hadn’t talked. The Dragon was still searching. He didn’t know where she was yet!

  And right then, right that very second he was upstairs tearing the house apart!

  The stairs were at a shallow angle reaching to the upper landing and I hugged the wall in the shadows until I could definitely place him from the sounds. I tried to keep from laughing out loud because I felt so good, and although I could hold back the laugh I couldn’t suppress the grin. I could feel it stretch my face and felt the pull across my shoulders and back, then I got ready to go.

  I knew when he felt it. When death is your business you have a feeling for it; an animal instinct can tell when it’s close even when you can’t see it or hear it. You just know it’s there. And like he knew suddenly that I was there, I realized he knew it too.

  Upstairs the sounds stopped abruptly. There was the smallest of metallic clicks that could have been made by a gun, but that was all. Both of us were waiting. Both of us knew we wouldn’t wait long.

  You can’t play games when time is so important. You take a chance on being hit and maybe living through it just so you get one clean shot in where it counts. You have to end the play knowing one must die and sometimes two and there’s no other way. For the first tim
e you both know it’s pro against pro, two cold, calm killers facing each other down and there’s no such thing as sportsmanship and if an advantage is offered it will be taken and whoever offered it will be dead.

  We came around the corners simultaneously with the rolling thunder of the .45 blanking out the rod in his hand and I felt a sudden torch along my side and another on my arm. It was immediate and unaimed diversionary fire until you could get the target lined up and in the space of four rapid-fire shots I saw him, huge at the top of the stairs, his high-cheekboned face truly Indianlike, the black hair low on his forehead and his mouth twisted open in the sheer enjoyment of what he was doing.

  Then my shot slammed the gun out of his hand and the advantage was his because he was up there, a crazy killer with a scream on his lips and like the animal he was he reacted instantly and dove headlong at me through the acrid fumes of the gunsmoke.

  The impact knocked me flat on my back, smashing into a corner table so that the lamp shattered into a million pieces beside my head. I had my hands on him, his coat tore, a long tattered slice of it in my fingers, then he kicked free with a snarl and a guttural curse, rolling to his feet like an acrobat. The .45 had skittered out of my hand and lay up against the step. All it needed was a quick movement and it was mine. He saw the action, figured the odds and knew he couldn’t reach me before I had the gun, and while I grabbed it up he was into the living room and out the front door. The slide was forward and the hammer back so there was still one shot left at least and he couldn’t afford the chance of losing. I saw his blurred shadow racing toward the drive and when my shadow broke the shaft of light coming from the door he swerved into the darkness of the barn and I let a shot go at him and heard it smash into the woodwork.

  It was my last. This time the slide stayed back. I dropped the gun in the grass, ran to the barn before he could pull the door closed and dived into the darkness.

  He was on me like a cat, but he made a mistake in reaching for my right hand thinking I had the gun there. I got the other hand in his face and damn near tore it off. He didn’t yell. He made a sound deep in his throat and went for my neck. He was big and strong and wild mean, but it was my kind of game too. I heaved up and threw him off, got to my feet and kicked out to where he was. I missed my aim, but my toe took him in the side and he grunted and came back with a vicious swipe of his hand I could only partially block. I felt his next move coming and let an old-time reflex take over. The judo bit is great if everything is going for you, but a terrible right cross to the face can destroy judo or karate or anything else if it gets there first.