Lady, Go Die! Read online

  Soon we were back on the beach where she had kicked off her sandals and was lifting her skirt to wade in the tide, her gaze on the expanse of blue that a world away joined the other expanse of blue above. The wind was making lovely dark streaming tendrils of her long raven hair, as if she were underwater. Who needed mermaids?

  I started off with Poochie at my heels.

  When we were out of earshot of Velda, I said, “Show me where that lady lives—the one with the yellow hair.”

  As we rounded a dune, he pointed between a number of trees that stood in a row, like a tall fence designed to keep one half of the beach away from the other.

  “Right up there, Mike. That’s where she lives. You’re not gonna go up there, are you?” He seemed fearful.

  “No, Poochie, not now.”

  I took in the place from a better angle. It was a magnificent home, built like an old colonial mansion right down to the twenty-foot pillars surrounding the entire structure. Set back a few hundred yards from the ocean, it commanded a superb view from the top of a slight rise. Earth must have been shipped in to make a terrace on either side, as its color was the bright green of lawn grass and not the duller shade of the sand variety.

  From the rear of the house that faced the water, a flagstone path curved down to the trees and ended abruptly at a gazebo whose latticework was covered with ivy.

  A little warning sign was tacked to the tree nearest the sandy beach. Poochie stayed behind, nervous, as I walked up for a better look. It read:

  PRIVATE PROPERTY

  KEEP OFF!

  E.J. WESLEY

  I grinned. Now I knew who the lady with the yellow hair was.

  Sharron Wesley.

  You probably read about her yourself—the infamous, two-timing ex-chorus tomato that stood charges for murdering her millionaire husband and got off scot-free when an all-male jury paid more attention to her legs than the testimony.

  I remembered that case well, though I knew it strictly from the spectator seats. Because of Sharron, two husbands had died. Even before she married Wesley, she had spent a term in the big house for manslaughter of hubby number one: a glorified pimp of a manager that she claimed beat her. Well, he hadn’t been beating her when she smothered him in his sleep. But the tabloids had loved that yellow hair and those long chorus-girl gams that she wasn’t shy about showing off only to jurors—reporters got in on the fun, as well.

  Still, what the hell her second husband ever saw in her was more than I could see. There are plenty of good-looking fluffs around Manhattan that don’t smother their hubbies in bed. Of course, Wesley had died due to his bad heart, right? That digitalis overdose was just an accident on curvy Sharron’s part.

  And ever since, she had been using his dough to support a revolving door of gigolos and a gambling habit and a general party-girl good time. I knew her a little, and she had tried to make me more than once, but I’d sooner sleep with a snake. Last time I saw her, at the Zero Zero Club, she was crocked to the gills.

  According to Pat, the D.A. had plenty to hang her with, but the shyster she had pleading her case did a fine job of screwing up the facts. The scandal sheets went crazy over the angle shots of her legs and the jury was drooling half the time. The judge who sat on the case almost blew his top at the verdict, telling that jury he’d never seen a greater miscarriage of justice in his courtroom, shooing them out in disgust.

  If these fancy beach-side digs were any indication, Mrs. Wesley must have inherited her husband’s money intact and decided on this modest playpen instead of her penthouse on Central Park to establish a residence.

  Only now she was gone.

  A missing person.

  And last night Dekkert had damn near crippled a nice simple-minded joe just to squeeze out any morsel of information about her whereabouts. No doubt Dekkert figured that the Wesley dame would have been seen, if she had taken off through town. Her car would be well known in this vicinity. Otherwise, beachcomber Poochie was in a fine spot to see anything and everything that went on at the mansion, even if he didn’t pay particular attention to it.

  But why was Dekkert interested?

  Sharron had a perfect right to go where she pleased. So what if she took off by boat, or with some out-of-towner in a strange car that wouldn’t raise any notice rolling through sleepy Sidon? She’d been gone a week. And a week wasn’t so long as to warrant an investigation when there were no suspicious circumstances.

  Or were there?

  The only thing I was sure of was that something foul was in the ocean breeze and I was going to find out what. I had tangled with Dekkert before and was not about to let him get away with making a punching bag out of an innocent schnook like Poochie.

  Velda had fallen asleep on the sand when I got back. She had spread out that light sweater and was nestled down on it, her sweet, sultry face turned to one side. I gave her gentle prods with my toe until she looked up at me sleepily.

  “Time to get up already?” she purred, stretching her arms.

  “Rise and shine,” I said. “We have to go.”

  “Where?”

  “Town. I have a date.”

  “Do tell!”

  “With the police chief.”

  She got to her feet in an instant. Her eyes narrowed, and the pretty mouth got as ugly as it could, which wasn’t very ugly.

  “I get it, you louse. You’re going to work. I can see myself already, chasing all over Sidon doing your legwork. Well, if you think—”

  “Aw, kitten, take it easy. I only—”

  “You ‘only’ nothing. When you get that look on your face, it means trouble. We came up here for a vacation. You’re here for a rest, not to make an arrest.”

  “You’re imagining things.”

  “If we are not here for rest and relaxation, big boy, I am going home.”

  She turned and started to walk away, but I put out my hand and stopped her, turned her to me. She had tears in her eyes.

  “Mike, don’t ruin this...”

  “Hey, kid, I’m not drinkin’, am I? I’m just curious about what’s going on out here in the sticks.”

  “Leave the curiosity to those scraggly cats, why don’t you?”

  Poochie edged up near us and said, “Golly, Mike, why do you make the nice lady cry when you like her so much? I can tell you do.”

  When he realized what he had said, he turned his head and blushed. It was so silly and cute that both Velda and I wound up grinning at each other.

  Then her expression turned serious and her dark eyes took on a sensual cast. “Do you, Mike?”

  “What?”

  “Like me... so much?”

  I looked at her. She was as pretty as anything I had ever seen. Tall, jet black hair, always in that sweeping pageboy that I so admired. Big and beautiful with more curves than a mountain road...

  She was warm under my hands. I tilted her chin and bent my head. Her mouth found mine and she trembled under me as our mouths surrendered to each other.

  When I held her away from me, she was gasping. “That was the first time you ever did that, Mike.”

  “I’ve wanted to for a long time,” I told her roughly.

  “Why?” Her eyes were soft and inviting. I ran my fingers through her hair.

  “You know why. A dame works for a guy, and it gets out of hand, and all of a sudden—”

  “Shut-up and kiss me again.”

  I did, but then Poochie was right there watching us with a big smile plastered on his baby-face mug. The kiss turned into a mutual laugh, and then I tugged at her arm.

  “Let’s go, Velda.”

  She just nodded.

  We were already walking when I called back, “So long, Poochie!”

  “So long! You’ll come see me again, won’t you?”

  “Sure will!” we said together.

  As we glanced back, we saw him dash into the shanty and come out with a shell. He rushed to us and handed it to Velda.

  “A pretty present for
the pretty lady,” he said with a shy grin.

  Velda took it, looking pleased. It was his latest, the Nativity scene.

  “Why, thank you, Poochie,” she said. “It’s beautiful.”

  When we were walking back to the car, she squeezed my arm and lay her head against my shoulder. “I like Poochie, too, Mike. Maybe we shouldn’t leave Sidon until we know he’s safe.”

  “Yeah.” I lit up a Lucky. “I have to make sure that Dekkert character isn’t a threat to him.”

  “You’re a softie, underneath it all, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah. All squishy.”

  “If it weren’t for Poochie back there, I’d still be thinking you were just an old so-and-so.”

  I blew a cloud of cigarette smoke and broke out my lopsided smile.

  “Kitten,” I said, pretending to be shocked. “Watch your language.”

  * * *

  They were waiting for me when I ambled into the police station. I hoped they’d enjoyed themselves, speculating on what they’d do to me.

  There was a counter at right, but otherwise this was a fair-sized bullpen of half a dozen desks. Everybody from last night was there—the athlete, the scarecrow and Dekkert, of course. But today they were in police uniforms. Somebody reached for a phone while I stood there jamming a butt in my sneer and firing it up.

  Then a fat slob in a too-small uniform and a too-large cap squeezed out through a wood-and-pebbled glass door that said CHIEF OF POLICE. His face was a bloated red mask of fury; all the purple veins in his nose had dilated until it looked like a cross section of a Martian landscape. His thick lips were working with anger at the thought of anyone flaunting his authority.

  “Morning, Chiefie,” I said with a respectful nod.

  Chief Beales said nothing. Just froze between his office and me.

  Dekkert was sitting behind one of the front two desks with veins popping on his forehead and cords standing out on his neck, but most of his face was hidden behind a swathing of bandages. If he wore an expression I couldn’t see it. Not that I gave a damn.

  He pulled his bulk from the chair and got to his feet, fists clenched into a pair of hams. The cops on either side of him tried to keep him back behind that desk, with hands on his shoulders.

  “Let him go,” I said, with a dismissive wave.

  They did.

  He came out and around the desk, moving at me as though he were going to beat my brains out. Maybe he thought last night was a fluke. If he did, he changed his mind in a hurry.

  I never moved.

  He stopped in front of me, breathing heavily in my face. No onions this time. Tabasco on his morning eggs, maybe.

  The big man seemed almost insane with anger. “I ought to kill you, Hammer!”

  “Dekkert, I told you a long time ago, back in the city,” I said casually, “you are welcome to try it. Any time.”

  Every word I spoke must have gone through him like a knife. He just stood there, his huge chest rising and falling to where his badge might pop off. I could see him trying to force himself to make a move.

  I laughed in his face. “You’re not going to try anything, Dekkert.”

  His teeth were clenched and his eyes showed white all round. “I’m not? And why is that, Hammer?”

  “Because you’re yellow.”

  I put my mitt in his puss and shoved. As he stumbled back against his desk, everybody in the room stopped breathing. Except me.

  The bastard’s eyes made narrow slits.

  I grinned at him.

  His hand streaked for the gun at his hip. I let him get it out before I bothered to move. But when I did, it was faster than his eyes could follow. I fired from a crouch and his gun spun out of his hand and clunked to the floor, while from the corner of my eye I saw wood chips fly from the desk, barely a foot away from the chief.

  Dekkert was looking at his gun hand, and the ragged red groove carved there, amazed.

  I got to my feet, the .45 still in hand, waiting to see if any of these other fine officers of the law had anything to say or do about what just happened.

  They didn’t. They were too busy standing there shaking like somebody opened a door and let in a cold damn wind.

  Finally I shoved my gun back under my shoulder, sauntered over to Dekkert and grabbed a handful of his shirt. With the back of my free hand, I smashed him across the bridge of that nebulous nose. He tried to pull away, but he wasn’t that big. I hit him twice again, until blood stained the bandages on his face.

  “You forgot something, Dekkert,” I informed him, his shirt in my fist holding him up, depriving his feet of the floor. “You forgot that I practice with my rod and can get it out in a fraction of a second. And you forgot something else. I never take it out unless I intend to use it. The next time you pull a on gun me, I put one between your eyes.”

  I turned to the rest of them, moving from one face to another. “That goes for the rest of you goof-offs. Spread the word to any off-duty brothers in blue.”

  I pushed Dekkert away. He was holding his gauze-covered face, peering at me from between his fingers, like a child afraid Daddy would get out the razor strop next.

  Somewhere along the way I’d lost my smoke. I got out my Luckies, jammed a fresh one in, let the Zippo set fire to the tip, and turned casually toward the fat florid chief. “Now, what was it you wanted to see me about, Chiefie? You said to stop in.”

  The chief tugged at his coat and backed away, looking toward the athlete and scarecrow for assistance, but they didn’t know quite what to do. Cops, they called themselves. Cops hell. I wished Pat Chambers of the New York Homicide Bureau had been here to see this travesty.

  Somehow Beales managed to clear his throat. He pointed toward whence he’d come. “In my office, Mr. Hammer.”

  “No, Chiefie. Right here is fine.”

  He was trembling, too.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake, relax. I’m not going to bite you.”

  The fatso finally backed himself up against the desk where Dekkert had been sitting. Sidon’s police chief was sweating profusely. I walked over next to him and parked on the desktop, picking splinters from the spot where my bullet clipped it.

  “Now you look here,” he spluttered, “this is a police station. You can’t waltz in here and intimidate my men! Pulling a gun and firing it here—are you insane, man?”

  I didn’t bother pointing out that Dekkert had gone for his gun first.

  “That’s pretty much what I told Dekkert last night,” I remarked dryly. “Not to bother trying to intimidate me. Let’s hear something new.”

  There was silence for a few seconds, then, “I could have you arrested.”

  “Go ahead,” I invited, “and see what happens. My one phone call won’t be to my attorney, though. I’ll ring up the State’s Attorney’s office. They don’t have to be told that you and your punks aren’t cops, just political appointees. They know all about these small towns. Like I do.”

  The chief decided he’d carry on his questioning from a chair between his two men, and got behind Dekkert’s desk to do so. He pulled a cigar from his pocket and bit the end off nervously. The scarecrow provided a flame. The chief got the stogie going, his eyes moving with thought as he searched for a way to handle me.

  Right then I figured I’d let them know just where I stood. I spoke between drags on the Lucky.

  “Let’s get something straight, ladies. I came here for a vacation, that’s all. I wasn’t on any case, I knew nothing about the fun and games going on in Sidon lately... until now. But for your information I’m going to cut myself a slice of this cake. I don’t know what’s really shaking around here, but if Dekkert has his nose in it, it must be dirty.”

  Dekkert, who was plopped in a rear chair, as far away from me as he could get, said nothing.

  “I wasn’t born yesterday,” I reminded them, “so stay out of my way. You try any funny business and I’ll have a slew of reporters from the city down here and they’ll tear this town wide open. Or
if you really get tough, you’ll find some connections of mine ripping into you with everyone from the governor on down behind them. Follow?”

  Chief Beales swallowed. And nodded.

  “Good. Now that we have that straight, let’s get down to cases. Why did you want to see me?”

  Beales made an indignant sniff. “You know why, Mr. Hammer—what is your interest in a certain local woman’s disappearance?”

  “I told you on the phone last night. These overgrown members of the Hitler youth here were playing kick the can with your local beachcomber filling in as the can.”

  “And you broke it up. Fine. But why did you take that dimwit back to your hotel room last night?”

  I hopped from the desk ready to smack his teeth down his throat, but the two cops were covering him, hands on the butts of guns at their sides. I leaned my nose in till it was almost touching the chief’s.

  “You louse,” I told him. “What did you want me to do, let him lie there and bleed? Suppose I came along and you were in trouble, and did the same thing to you? Not that it wouldn’t be a pleasure.”

  I backed away a little.

  He licked his lips again. “That’s not the point, Mr. Hammer.”

  “The hell it’s not. When you couldn’t get what you wanted out of Poochie, you gave him the iron boot. Why? Just to warn him to keep his mouth shut? What a community. Either the citizens here are blind or just plain stupid. If Poochie had enough sense, he’d hire a lawyer and drag your sorry tails into court so fast it would make your heads swim.”

  “Look, Hammer—”

  “Not Mister Hammer anymore? Don’t worry, chum, that score isn’t settled yet. I’m going to cover that little guy if no one else will. Anything happens to him, I’ll give each of you sons of bitches the kind of questioning that you gave Poochie... only worse. Dekkert already got his, Chiefie... push me, and you’ll get yours for letting it happen.”

  Dekkert let out a low rumble from the back of the room. The bandages were more red than white now, good and soaked, but the bleeding from his smashed nose had stopped. Whether that rumble was a nonverbal comment or just some pain finding its way out, I couldn’t say.

  But Dekkert was one guy I was going to have to keep an eye on. He’d be out to get me, and he wouldn’t come at me fair next time; but he wasn’t going to get the chance. Not if I could help it.