Primal Spillane Read online

  A faint creak of the stairs came to him. He waited until the person reached the top, then in a mad dive raced down the hall and hit the figure in a vicious flying tackle. The leader’s head cracked the floor and was still. Dick lost no time disarming him and tossing him with the rest in the closet. Two desks and an iron trunk made the door secure. He went into the office and dialed the phone.

  HAWLEY held out his hand. “You did fine, Dick, a first class piece of detective work. We ought to make the pistols-in-the-pant’s-leg gag part of our equipment.”

  Dick grinned. “It’s too bad it was all over a dummy case though, I would have felt better if I really carried the stuff.”

  “You would have, eh?” Hawley said. “Well, the joke is — You did! The cases got switched in the office somehow and the bonds were with you all the time! A swell detective agency we would have turned out to be if it hadn’t been for you!”

  ***

  A Case of Poison Ivy

  “JERRY, hop over to the Wilkins Hotel. Someone just knocked off Big Tom Slade!”

  The young reporter at the desk dropped his pencil and snatched his hat from the rack. “Big Tom, eh?”

  Jerry’s thoughts were racing as he dashed for the elevator, scratching an itch on his back. Slade was just out of prison, where he spent a couple of years on an income tax evasion charge. Rumor had it that Slade had salted a nice pile of cash away to start over when he got out. No doubt the killers were after that.

  At the hotel Jerry didn’t wait for the clerk to call up. He spied two cops heading for the elevator, and scratching as he went, got in with them.

  “Say,” he asked, “what’s the story on the Slade killing?”

  The cop glared at him.

  “Who’re you?”

  “Reporter from the Chronicle.” He flashed his press card. The cops looked at each other.

  “I don’t know how it got to the papers so fast. He’s only been dead an hour or so. From what we see, Slade was killed by an unknown assailant by a bullet through the head. His place was untouched, so the robbery motive is out, and he had no enemies that we know of. Any that had reason to kill him are in the pen.”

  “Any trace of that dough Slade was supposed to have bunked ever show up?”

  “Naw, I think that’s a lot of hooey. He had plenty of it at one time, but he spent it pretty fast, too. He might have salted some of it away, but if he did it was hidden very neatly. No word of it ever came over the grapevine!”

  Jerry rubbed his back against the elevator wall trying to get rid of a crawling sensation along his spine.

  “Well if there’s no other motive, then the hidden dough angle ought to be a good bet to try anyway!”

  Stopping at the eighteenth floor the door opened and they stepped out. Jerry was on friendly terms with the captain in charge so no one objected when he ducked into the room. One look around showed him that the room was in order. The body was sitting in an armchair with a neat bullet hole in the middle of the forehead, and the legs were crossed as if death were the last thing in his mind when the killer struck.

  Jerry frowned, perplexed. If he were to scoop the other papers he had to clean this thing up fast. Some very puzzling thoughts were buzzing around in his head, and whenever that happened he knew he’d soon stumble on a clue to the crime. Quickly, he went through the drawers in the dresser and desk, but outside of a few hundred dollars in ten dollar bills he found nothing.

  Sitting down in a chair facing the corpse, Jerry did some tall thinking. Robbery was out, as the cop had said, unless the murderer was after bigger stuff. Maybe there was something in that rumor, after all. If Big Tom had a half million hidden away as he was supposed to have, then the stakes would be high enough for anybody. From the position of the body, Slade must have known the intruder. Jerry scratched his neck. Doggone itch, he thought.

  Suddenly a possibility flashed into his mind, Jim Collins. Slade’s former aide. He jumped up to go but something on the floor caught his eye. A match, bent double as though the person had lit it the trick way one does, with one hand, bending the match back against the striking surface. That was it. The one who lit that match must have had a gun in the other hand! He stuck the thing in his pocket.

  He scratched all the way to Collins’ apartment, mentally reminding himself to get something to relieve the itch. The door was opened by a thin looking mug with eyes that were a cold grey. “What do yer want!”

  “I’m Jerry Harper from the Chronicle, I wanna know if you got anything on the Slade killing.”

  Collins’ jaw dropped open.

  “Slade dead?” he gasped out. Jerry nodded, scratching his leg. He had hoped to trap Jim, but evidently he didn’t know about the murder since it wasn’t in the papers yet. Acting on a hunch, Jerry pulled out a cigarette and lit it with one hand. He ripped the match off and threw it to the floor; significantly Collins watched him, but said nothing.

  “I guess that’s all then.”

  Jerry turned down the hall as the door slammed behind him. The next stop was at Mike Bedloe’s office. He was Big Tom Slade’s lawyer, and his shady reputation was not beyond suspicion. Bedloe’s secretary admitted him to the inner chambers. The lawyer was a mean looking man, with a short mustache and close-cropped hair.

  He sneered at Jerry. “I guess you want some dope on Slade, eh? Well, I haven’t anything to say!”

  “How do you know about his death?” Jerry spat out. “It hasn’t been in the papers yet!”

  “Captain Carter called me ten minutes ago. Now scram!”

  Jerry felt like taking a poke at him, but he was too busy scratching. Instead he lit a match exactly as he did at Collins’ place, then walked out. A taxi took him to Slade’s old gambling house, now owned by “Whitey” Alpin. On the street the newsboys were screaming out the headlines. Nerts, he thought, he wouldn’t be able to trick Alpin into anything now that the story was out.

  From now on he’d have to trust to luck, and if he ever uncovered the killer it would be a surprise to him.

  Jerry’s hand slapped against his leg. The fingers clawed at an itchy spot, raking over it with sharp nails. Jerry looked at the roof and groaned. “Why did this have to happen to me? If I didn’t go to the country for a weekend I wouldn’t have caught this blasted poison ivy. On top of all my troubles I gotta get that!”

  He fished in a pocket for the fare, paid off the driver and stepped out.

  THE COPPER CLUB was running wide open when the reporter got there. Smoke hung lazily around the tables, and waiters that looked more like football players were everywhere. Whitey met him with a smile, his ever present cigar in his mouth. “So you’re on the Slade case! Too bad about Big Tom — he was a nice guy.”

  Jerry scratched as he spoke. “What’s in the rumor that Slade had a pile of dough hidden away? Know anything about it?”

  “Nope. That is, I think he had it all right, but I don’t know where.”

  Jerry gabbed awhile, then pulled the match trick. No response. Well, his leads had petered out. He’d have to try a new approach. He climbed into bed at his bachelor apartments and pulled the covers over his head.

  It might have been a sixth sense that awakened him, but he knew that someone was in the room with him. No light came in the window, leaving the place so dark you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. He itched violently, but dared not betray the fact that he was awake by scratching. The tension was unbearable. A neon light in the street flashed periodically, and for a brief second he saw the glint of a knife! He knew that in a moment the killer would be on him, unless he acted.

  The light blinked again, and Jerry’s hand shot out. He caught the wrist that held the weapon and twisted it furiously. The steel fell to the floor! But the battle was not over. There in the dark he stood toe to toe with the would-be murderer, slugging left and right. They tripped over chairs and fell with a crash. A roundhouse right caught his assailant, knocking him against the wall. Outside, feet were clumping on the floor, and a han
d knocked at the door demanding to know what was going on. Before he could answer a fist got him square on the jaw and the lights went out.

  Jerry came to ten minutes later. A crowd of people were in the room gaping at him. A glance at the window told him that his midnight attacker had fled down the fire escape. A second look proved that he’d taken his weapon with him. He got rid of the people to sit down to think and scratch. One thing he knew — his ruse had been successful! One of the three men he pulled the match trick on got wise and tried to finish him.

  As usual, his head was jammed with thoughts, racing back and forth trying to come to a conclusion. Try as he might he could not piece them together. He sat there until morning, alternately thinking and scratching. The sun was climbing in his window when he saw what was bothering him.

  “Why it’s easy,” he said softly, “simple as eating pie!”

  He picked up the phone and dialed police headquarters. “Hello, Captain Carter? I think I have something on the Slade murder.”

  “What! Shoot it to me.”

  “Not so fast, Captain. I want you to get Collins, Mike Bedloe and Whitey Alpin together in three days. Let’s see, today is Monday. How about Thursday night at eight.”

  “Why Thursday?”

  “What I have in mind will take three days to develop!”

  “Okay. But you better have something good, or we’ll have our heads handed to us, especially yours.”

  “Don’t worry. It’ll be good!”

  THURSDAY NIGHT the three suspects, Captain Carter, Jerry and four plainclothesmen gathered in Slade’s death room. There was a little trouble getting them together, with Bedloe screaming about false arrest, but Carter managed. They all sat around a table, and Jerry went into the story of the killing. Carefully he eyed their every move as he spoke, and as the story drew to a close he saw Whitey Alpin’s hand come up and start to scratch his neck.

  With a bound Jerry cleared the table, and had him on the floor. His movement was so sudden that the others had no time to move.

  “Here’s your man, Captain. When he jumped me that night in my apartment, he was infected with that blasted itch I have. I knew he was the one as soon as he started scratching. He must have found out where Slade hid his dough and killed him so he wouldn’t get to it.”

  Jerry laughed at the killer. “It’s too bad about that itch, old man, but the electric chair will cure it pretty soon!”

  ***

  Clams Make the Man

  DOPEY FOOZ of the Snooty Detective Service was “rocking the cradle’ with his yo-yo top when Stephen Smirch, the boss, stormed in.

  “Fooz! Whatcha doing with that thing?” he bellowed. “I thought I told you to get down to Tony’s place to find out who was swiping all his silverware!”

  “Aw, Smirch, I’m a manhunter, that’s what. A guy with my reputation can’t afford to go chasing down spoon swipers.”

  Smirch tore out a handful of hair and stuffed it in his pocket. Very deliberately he picked up a desk by the leg and waved it over his head.

  “If you don’t git — !”

  Dopey got. When Smirch started whizzing desks around, he was pretty sure to hit something, and that something was not going to be named Dopey Fooz. He grabbed his benny on the run and made for the hall. The elevator door was open and he headed that way on the double. S’too bad that nobody told him there wasn’t an elevator there, but fortunately, he was only on the tenth floor.

  Dopey picked himself up from the bottom of the shaft, dashed out, and hopped in a cab. Tony’s place was a combination delicatessen, eat shoppe and dance hall, which all the riff-raff, with less than a million fish in the bank, kept going with their orders of clams on the half shell. When his cutlery started to disappear, he called in the S.D.S. to investigate.

  Tony was so fat you couldn’t get near enough to him to shake hands, so Dopey slid up on his port bow and mitted him. “I’m Fooz, of Snooty Service. Hear ya got some trouble.”

  Tony grinned through his six chins and led the detective inside.

  “Trouble is what I got plenty of! Alla time spoons go, till I have to serve soup with straws. That I don’t mind, but when the customers start blowing clams through straws at my pictures on the wall, then it’s gotta stop!” The recollection of this last situation turned Tony’s face a dangerous purple.

  Dopey said, “Ummmmm,” and got down to business. However, he could see why any sane person would want to smear up the pictures — they really were awful. He even felt like blowing a clam at them himself. Fooz sat down to think. Spoons were silver, and silver made coins. Ah! Counterfeiters!! Now all he had to do was find out what ex-con came in here, and then put the finger on him!

  He didn’t have long to wait. Danny Koople strolled in about seven with two rough-looking citizens who might have come out of a zoo. No sooner did they sit down than Dopey laid a trembling hand on Danny’s head.

  “I hereby arrest you in — ”

  “WHAT? Why you apple head! I’ll break your bones! I’ll mash your head! I’ll – I’ll – !” Dopey got out of there under a full head of steam. He crawled under a table and stayed there until the shaking stopped. That Koople was no man to mess with. Neither were the individuals with him. He got from under the table and began to inspect the unlucky customers who were slurping clams by the dozen. They sounded like a herd of elephants wallowing in mud.

  THE kitchen was next. Fooz ducked around piles of clams and coffee tables right into the chef’s breadbasket, just as the chef was gingerly tasting hot chowder out of a soup ladle. Wow! The stuff seared down his neck and he came at Dopey, red-faced, with a cleaver! Poor Dopey! He couldn’t move an inch. The chef was preparing to split him down the middle, when a deep voice boomed out.

  “Up wit ’em! You, Cookie, cut out d’ nonsense en’ fix me some chowder.”

  Dopey almost passed out with joy. That kitchen ax wasn’t an inch from his hair when the ruffian walked in. The burly boy had a pop-gun in his paw that should have had wheels on it. Fooz took one look, then started to shake again.

  “Say,” he gulped, “ain’t you Killer Gilroy?”

  “Yeah, but what of it? When I git done wit me chowder, you won’t blab to d’ cops, ’cause you two are gonna be a couple of dead boids.” His face split in a gruesome grin.

  The chef dug up a bowl of clam soup and the Killer grabbed it out of his hands and poured it into his stomach.

  “More, blast ya! I ain’t et for t’ree days, so I’m gonna eat now! More!”

  Cookie jumped to the command.

  Dopey reached around for something to protect himself with, but all he could get his hands on was a round box. Gilroy saw him. “T’row dat away!”

  Fooz threw, and it landed in the soup, all over Cookie! The chef looked like a lobster from being boiled by his own cooking. The top had come off the box, and the red, powdery stuff soaked into the soup.

  Cookie dished out the chowder, and the killer put it away in a gulp. Then — WOOSH! His face got beet-red. He hopped and he howled, fanning his mouth with both hands. “Red pepper! Help!”

  Dopey grabbed a clam and let it ride. It conked the Killer on the dome and both he and the clam raced to the floor. But Gilroy won, cold as a herring.

  Dopey Fooz shoved the killer in a corner with a pile of shells and tied him up good. Shucks, this wasn’t getting the spoons back. Outside the crowd was getting noisy, and even in the kitchen Dopey could hear the clams splatting against the wall pictures. He ducked through the bombardment, and went over to Tony.

  “Why don’t you take those pictures down?”

  “Are you batty, chum? The only reason people come here is to blow clams.”

  Dopey couldn’t stand it any more. He raced around the wall yanking the clam-smeared pictures from the wall. Everybody thought it was a joke and cheered wildly. He got them in a big pile and carried them into the hall.

  “STICK ’em up, bud!”

  “What, again? I’m getting tired of getting stuck up.”r />
  “Never mind that stuff, just hand over those pictures. Got wind of what we were after and tried to beat us to it, eh? Tough luck, stupid. Give!”

  Dopey gave with a wild swing that sent pictures and toughies all over the floor. He yanked off a shoe and let them have it on the noggin. A window curtain provided a rope, and with a whip and a zip, the erstwhile crooks joined the Killer in the kitchen among the clam shells.

  Dopey Fooz was puzzled. Why was everybody picking on him? He went back to the pictures that were all over the hallway. What was this? Some of the paint was rubbed off by the gooey clams, and there was another picture underneath! Dopey picked some more of the paint off. Why, these were the paintings stolen from the gallery last year!

  He called the police, and gave them the dope, then sat back and waited. But the crowd in the dining room wanted their targets back, and were hollering their heads off. With no targets, they were shooting clams at each other. The place smelled like a fishing pier. Dopey stacked the paintings behind a curtain and took a seat in the big room. Maybe he could get a clue on the stolen spoons. It wasn’t long before Tony came over.

  “Hey. Whatssa matter? You’re supposed to find my spoons, but what do you do? Clutter up my kitchen with killers, gunmen and what-not.”

  “Look, spoons is spoons. They are pretty hard to find. Killers and gunmen, yes, but spoons, no. It takes time!”

  “And what didja do with my pictures?”

  “Here come the police, ask them.”

  Tony jumped in his tracks. The bulls pushed him into his office to do some explaining, but Dopey knew he wasn’t responsible. Tony had bought the place from Danny Koople a month before, and the pictures were here then. But the scare would make him lose some weight, anyway.