The Mike Hammer Collection, Volume 1 Page 25

  The cup stopped halfway to his mouth. “Now, that’s a hell of a question to ask me. If I tell you, it implies that I’m crooked and I’m looking the other way. If I don’t, I look stupid for not knowing what goes on.”

  I gave him a disgusted grunt, then: “Pat, there are certain things that are going to happen in every town no matter how strait-laced the citizens are or how tough the cops are. It’s like taxes. We got ‘em and we can’t get rid of ’em. And who likes taxes except the small group of bureaucrats that handle the mazuma?”

  “Now you’ve made me feel better,” he chuckled. “There isn’t too much I can tell you because those outfits are good at keeping things to themselves. We rarely get complaints because their clientele isn’t in a position to lay themselves open to criticism by entering a complaint. However, the police are well aware of the existing situation and try to enforce the letter of the law. But remember one thing. Politics. There are ways of bogging the police down and it’s a hurdle hard to jump.

  “Then there’s a matter of evidence. The higher-ups don’t run houses or keep books where they can be found. It’s a matter of merely suggesting to someone just who is available and letting him do the rest. I think the girls come across with a cut of the take or the proper persons aren’t steered in their direction. They may get shoved around a little, too. In fact, there have been several deaths over the years that point suspiciously in that direction.”

  “That they got shoved too hard, you mean?” I asked.

  “Exactly.”

  “How did the coroner call them?”

  “Suicides, mainly ... except for Russ Bowen. You know about him ... he was the guy who ran a chain of houses and tried to buck the combine. We found him shot full of holes a couple of months ago and his houses closed out. We never could get a line on the killing. Even the stoolies clammed up when we mentioned his name. Yes, Russ was murdered, but the others were all called suicides.”

  “And you?”

  “Murder, Mike. The cases are still open, and someday we’re going to nail the goons that are behind them. Not only the hired hands that did the dirty work, but the ones that run the organizations. They’re the ones we want ... the ones that turn decent kids into a life of filth and despair while they sit back and collect the big money. The ones that can kill and get away with it and sit back and laugh while the papers call it suicide!”

  His face was a mask of hate. My eyes caught his and held for a long moment. “Suicide ... or accident, Pat?” I queried.

  “Yes, both. We’ve had them that looked that way, too, and....”

  Now the hate was gone and his face was friendly again, but there was something different about the eyes that I had never seen before. “You’re a bastard, Mike. You set me up very pretty.”

  “I did?” I tried to play innocent, but it didn’t work.

  “Cut it and get to the redhead. Nancy, I believe her name was. What are you handing me?”

  I took my time about finishing the Danish. After it soaked long enough in the coffee I fished it out and ate it, licking the sugar from my fingers. When I lit a butt I said, “I’m not handing you a thing, Pat. You just told me something I’ve been trying to tell you right along. I’ve always said Red was murdered, now what do you think?”

  Pat wrapped his fists into hard knots and pressed them into the table. He had a hard time talking through clenched teeth. “Damn your soul, Mike, we had that case nicely wrapped up. She was killed accidentally beyond a shadow of doubt, and I’m positive of it. I’m so positive of it I’d bet my right arm against a plugged nickel I couldn’t be wrong! Maybe people make mistakes but the sciences of the laboratory don’t!”

  It was fun watching him beat his head against the wall. His words turned into a torrent of sharp sounds and he leaned against the edge of the table with fire leaping from his eyes. “I saw the evidence. I checked on the evidence. I’m certain of the evidence as is everyone else concerned with the case. In the beginning you had me dancing on hot coals because I thought that maybe you were right. Then I knew what had happened and I knew you were wrong. Mind you, I didn’t say think ... I said knew! And right now I still know you are wrong and I’m right.”

  “But ...” I prompted.

  “But you, you bastard ... you’ve got me all crazied up again and I’m thinking I’m wrong even when I know I’m right! Why don’t you drop dead!”

  It had been a long time since I had seen Pat like that. I grinned at him and blew a wreath of smoke around his head. The draft made a halo of it and I said, “The smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.”

  “What?”

  “Excerpt from the ‘Night Before Christmas.’ You probably can’t go back that far.”

  Pat ran his fingers through his hair and shook his head. “You give me the pip. Maybe I’m nuts. What makes me get all excited about things like this? Ordinarily I’m cool, calm and collected. I run my office with precision and great efficiency, then you come along and I get like a rookie on his first beat with a gang war going on in the back alleys.”

  I shoved the deck of Luckies toward him and he stuck one in his mouth. When I thumbed a match and lit him I said very quietly, “Pat, offices like yours are great things. You take one lousy little clew and make a case out of it and somebody pays society for a misdeed. Sure, you serve justice. You do more good than a million guys working separately, but there’s one thing you miss.”

  “Tell me what.” He was getting sarcastic again.

  “The excitement of the chase, Pat. The thrill of running something down and pumping a slug into it. Right now you are so damn fond of indisputable proof you can’t figure an angle any more. Since when can’t murder be made to look like an accident?”

  “She was hit by the car, Mike. The driver admits he hit somebody but he was too fuzzy to remember who. The lab found traces on the car. They found traces on her. We had witnesses who saw her staggering down the street dead drunk a little while before she got it. The guy that hit her is ordinarily an upstanding citizen with no underworld connections. We checked.”

  I nodded. “Yet now you’re beginning to entertain doubts. Right?”

  He said something obscene. “Right is right; entertain is no word for it. You have me refuting everything I ever learned and I’ll wind up being a stupe. Do you know why?”

  “Yeah, but tell me again, Pat.”

  This time he leaned on the table and practically hissed through his teeth. “Because right in here ...” he tapped the side of his head, “you’re a sharp article. You could be a good crook but you’re a better cop. You get something and hang on to it longer than anybody else and make something of it. You got a brain and the sense to use it and you have something I haven’t got which is a feeling for things. Damn it, I’d like to poke you in the ear.”

  “Stop hating yourself. You were going to tell me something. Who’s behind the racket?”

  “I wish I knew. All I know is a few names of the guys we suspect of having a hand in it.”

  “They’ll do.”

  “Oh, no. First let’s hear what you have. Remember, please, that I’m the one who should know things. Of all the crazy things that happen, imagine a cop and a private eye chumming up like we do. Give out, Mike, sing me a song.”

  It was going to take a while, so I ordered some more coffee for us both, and when it came I started at the beginning and didn’t stop until I brought Pat up to date. All but a few of the more intimate details. He didn’t bother to jot anything down; his mind was filing away each item for future reference and I could see him laying the facts side by side, trying to make something of them.

  When I finished he put a cigarette in his mouth and sat back thinking. When he fully absorbed everything he said, “You have a nice accumulation of events, Mike. Now theorize.”

  “I can’t,” I told him. “There’s no place to start.”

  “Start with Red.”

  “She was killed. That means she was killed for a reason.”

  �
�The same reason she had for being in the racket?”

  “Maybe ... or maybe the reason developed afterward. What would a girl in her position have that would make it worth while being killed, blackmail? I’ve thought of that, but it doesn’t fit. Who would take her word in court? Maybe she had proof of someone’s misconduct, but I doubt it. That’s a tough racket and she wasn’t mingling with anybody who counted. If she was playing against small stuff that same small stuff was tough enough to take care of her clean and simple without a lot of dummying. I have that feeling, as you call it, that the reason was a big one. I’m mad at somebody, Pat, and that person is going to answer to me for her death.”

  “Find the motive and you find the murderer,” Pat said. “What about this Feeney Last character?”

  “To me he looks like a punk. When he hit the city he went off on a spree and wound up in Red’s neighborhood. He’s the kind of a guy that would pull off a blackmail stunt all right. He said Red swiped his pay-off material and as long as she was what she was I wouldn’t put it past her. But there’s always another angle to that. He could have lost it, or whoever was being blackmailed paid off to see that it was destroyed. If Red was paid enough she might have lifted it from him while he was with her.”

  “Could he have killed her?”

  “Sure, but not with any fancy trimmings. Feeney’s no artist. He likes knives and guns. The only trouble is ... he doesn’t seem to expect to run into any opposition. No, Feeney didn’t kill her. If he did, Red would have died quick and messy.”

  Pat dragged on the cigarette again. “What about your client, Mike?”

  “Berin-Grotin? Hell, he couldn’t have a hangnail without the papers knowing about it. He’s from another generation, Pat. Money, position, good manners ... everything you could expect of a gentleman of the old school. He’s fiercely proud of his name; you know ... constantly alert that nothing should cloud the escutcheon of his family. The old boy’s no fool, either. He wanted protection so he hired Feeney, but he was ready to get rid of him as soon as the jerk got himself in trouble. It seemed to me that he was a little leery of Feeney anyway. I got the impression that he was happy over what had happened up there in the cemetery.”

  “Which brings us to Lola. What there?”

  “Nothing. She knew Red.”

  “Come on, Mike, she wasn’t a complete nonentity, was she?”

  “You can say that again.” I let out a little laugh. “Marvelous personality, Pat. A body that’d make your hair stand on end. Lola’s another of the decent kids that went wrong you were speaking about. Only this one wised up in time.”

  “Okay, then let’s go back a step. You told me the guy in the hash house and that Cobbie Bennett were afraid of something. Think around that.”

  “It doesn’t think right, Pat. Shorty was a con and he was more than anxious to stay away from murder. Cobbie’s in a racket where nothing looks good except dough. Anything could scare him. Both those guys scare too damn easily, that’s why I can’t attach too much significance to either one. I’ve thought it over a dozen times and that’s how it shapes up.”

  Pat grunted and I could feel his mind working it over, sorting and filing, trying for an answer. When none came he shrugged his shoulders and said, “The guys I know who may be part of the game are small fry. They run errands and do the legwork. I’ve made my own guesses before this, but I won’t pass them on to you, for if I do you’ll go hog wild and get me in a jam. Yourself too, and like I said, they were only guesses with nothing to back them up.”

  “You usually guess pretty good, Pat. I’ll take them.”

  “Yeah, but you’re not going to get them. But I will do this ... I’ll see if I can make more out of it than guesses. We have ways of finding out, but I don’t want to scare off the game.”

  “Good deal. Between the two of us we ought to make something of it.”

  Pat snubbed the butt out and stared into the ash tray. “Now for the sixty-four-dollar question, Mike. You got me into this, so what do you expect me to do?”

  “You got men at your finger tips. Let them scout around. Let them rake in the details. Work at it like it was a murder and something will show up. Details are what we need.”

  “All right, Mike, my neck is out so far it hurts. I’m going against everything I know by attaching a murder tag to this and I expect some cooperation from you. All the way, understand?”

  “You’ll get it.”

  “And since I’m putting men on it, what can I expect from you?”

  “Hell,” I said, “I have a date with Lola tonight. Maybe she’s got a girl friend.”

  CHAPTER 5

  It was nice to get back to Lola. I found her apartment on West Fifty-sixth Street and walked up two flights to 4-C. Even before I could get my finger off the buzzer she had the door open and stood there smiling at me as if I were somebody. She was dressed in black again and there was no plunging neckline. There didn’t need to be. It was easy to see that not even calico or homespun could be demure on her.

  Her voice was soft as kitten’s fur. “Hello, Mike. Aren’t you coming in?”

  “Just try to keep me out.”

  I walked into the foyer, then followed her into a tiny living room that had been dressed up with all the gimcracks women seem to collect when they live alone. The curtains were starched stiff and the paint was fresh enough to have a lingering smell of turpentine. When I slid into an overstuffed chair I said, “New place?”

  She nodded and sat down opposite me and began mixing highballs from a miniature bar set. “Brand new, Mike. I couldn’t stay in ... the old place. Too many sordid memories. I have a surprise for you.”

  “Yeah, what?”

  “I’m a model again. Department store work at a modest salary, but I love it. Furthermore, I’m going to stay a model.”

  There was a newness about her as well as the apartment. Whatever she had been was forgotten now and the only thing worth looking at was the future.

  “Your former ... connections, Lola. How about that?”

  “No ghosts, Mike. I’ve put everything behind me. What people I knew will never look for me here and it’s a thousand-to-one chance they’ll run into me anywhere else. If they do I can pass it off.”

  She handed me the drink and we toasted each other silently. I lit up a Lucky and threw the deck to the coffee table and watched her while she tapped one on a fingernail. As she lit it her eyes came up and caught me watching her.

  “Mike,” she said, “it was nice last night, wasn’t it?”

  “Wonderful.” It had been. Very.

  “But tonight you didn’t come up ... just for that, did you?”

  I shook my head slowly. “No. No, it was something else.”

  “I’m glad, Mike. What happened was awfully fast for me. I—I like you more than I should. Am I being bold?”

  “Not you, Lola. I’m the one who was off on the wrong foot. You got under my skin a little bit and I couldn’t help it. You’re quite a gal.”

  “Thanks, pal,” she grinned at me. “Now tell me what you came up for. First I thought you were only fooling about coming to see me and I got kind of worried. Then I thought maybe I was only good for one thing. Now I feel better again.”

  I hooked an ottoman with my toe and got it under my feet. When I was comfortable I dragged in on the butt and blew smoke out with the words. “Nancy was killed, Lola. I have to find out why, then I’ll know who. She was in the oldest racket in the world. It’s a money racket; it’s a political racket. Everything about it is wrong. The only ones who don’t give a damn whether school keeps or not are the girls. And why should they? They’re as far down as they can go and who cares? So they develop an attitude. Nothing can hurt them, but they can hurt others very easily ... if they wanted to. I’m thinking of blackmail, Lola. Would Nancy have tried a stunt like that?”

  Her hand was shaking so she had to put the glass down. There were tears in her eyes too, but she managed a rueful smile and brushed them away. “Th
at was rough, Mike.”

  “It wasn’t meant for you, kid.”

  “I know, I’m just being silly. No, I don’t think Nancy would do that. She might have been a ... been no good, but she was honorable. I’d swear to that. If she wasn’t what she was she could have been a decent woman. As far as I know she had no vices, but like I told you, she had a reason for doing what she did. Perhaps it was money. I don’t know. It is a quick way to get rich if you have no moral scruples.”

  “Supposing money was her reason. Any idea why she might have needed it?”

  “That I can’t tell you. We had no confidences, merely a bond that held us together.”

  The circle was getting me dizzy. “Look, let’s go back further. Go back to the call-girl system. Who ran it?”

  For the first time her face went white. She looked at me with fear in her eyes and her lips tight against her teeth. “No, Mike!” Her voice was barely audible. “Keep away from them, please.”

  “What’s scaring you, honey?”

  It was the way I said it that made her shrink back into her seat, her fingers digging into the arms.

  “Don’t make me tell you things I don’t want to remember!”

  “It isn’t things you’re afraid of, Lola. It’s people ... what people? Why does it scare you to think of them?” I was leaning forward now, anxious, trying to make something out of every word she spoke. She was hesitant at first, turning her head from side to side as though someone else could be listening.

  “Mike ... they’re vicious. They don’t care what they do. They ... wreck lives ... as easily as they’d spend a dollar. If they knew I ever said anything they’d kill me. Yes, they would. It wouldn’t be the first time either!”

  It might have been Pat talking. The fear left her face and anger took its place, but there was still a quiver in her voice.

  “Money is all they’re after and they get it. Thousands ... millions ... who knows. It’s dirty money, but it’s good to spend. It isn’t like the houses ... it’s bigger. One tight little group has it so organized nobody else can move, and if you try to operate alone something happens to you. Mike, I don’t want anything to happen to me!”