The Tough Guys Page 5

  You could barely hear her voice. “Mr. Simpson wanted… something special. On different nights… he’d take one of us. He made us undress… and he had whips. He said… it wouldn’t hurt.” She almost choked, remembering. “I screamed and tried to get away, but I couldn’t!” She buried her face in her hands.

  “You went back, Ruth?”

  “I… had to. The money. It was always there. Then there was Lennie. Then I had to because… my supply was gone… I needed a shot bad. I… what’s going to happen to me?”

  “You’ll be taken care of, Ruth. Tell me something… are any girls up there now?”

  “Yes… yes. The ones who are usually there. But there will be more. Mr. Simpson likes… new ones. Please… you’ll have to let me go back.”

  The voices were miles away now. Sleep was pressing down on me and I couldn’t fight it off.

  It was daylight. I cursed and yelled for somebody and the door opened and McKeever was trying to push me back on the cot. Behind him was Sonny Holmes.

  I managed to sit up against the pressure of McKeever’s hand. My mouth was dry and cottony, my head pounding. A tight band of wide tape was wound around my torso and the pain in my side was a dull throbbing, but it was worse than the hole in the fleshy part of my arm.

  “I haven’t seen anything like you since the war,” McKeever said.

  From the door Cox said, “Can he talk?”

  Before McKeever could stop me I said, “I can talk, Captain. Come on in.”

  Cox’s arrogant smile was gone now. Like everybody else in Pinewood, he had a nervous mouth.

  I said, “I made you big trouble, boy, didn’t I?”

  “You had no right…”

  “Tough. You checked my prints through, didn’t you?”

  He couldn’t hide the fear in his eyes. McKeever was watching me too now. “I’m a federal agent, laddie, and you know it. At any time my department has authority to operate anywhere and by now you know with what cooperation, don’t you?”

  Cox didn’t answer. He was watching his whole little world come tumbling down around him.

  “You let a town run dirty, Cox. You let a worm get in a long time ago and eat itself into a monster. The worm got too big, so you tried to ignore it and you played a mutual game of Let Alone. It outgrew you, buddy. I bet you’ve known that for a long, long time. Me happening along was just an accident, but it would have caught up to you before long anyway.”

  Cox still wouldn’t put his head down. “What should I do,” he asked.

  I got up on the edge of the bed, reached for my pants, and pulled them on. Somebody had washed my shirt. Luckily, I could slide my feet into my moccasins without bending down.

  I looked hard at the big cop. “You’ll do nothing,” I said. “You’ll go back to your office and wait there until I call and tell you what to do. Now get out of here.”

  We both watched Cox shuffle out. His head was down a little now. McKeever said, “Can you tell me?”

  I nodded. “I have to. If anything happens to me, you’ll have to pass it on. Now I’m going to guess, but it won’t be wild. That big house on the hill is a front, a meeting place for the grand brotherhood of the poppy.

  “It isn’t the only one they have… it’s probably just a local chapter. It’s existed, operated, and been successful for… is it ten years now? Down here, the people maybe even suspected. But who wants to play with mob boys? It wouldn’t take much to shut mouths up down here. To make it even better, that bunch spread the loot around. Even the dolls could be hooked into the action and nobody would really beef. Fear and money were a powerful deterrent. Besides, who could they beef to? A cop scared to lose his job? And other cops scared of him?

  “But one day the situation changed. Overseas imports of narcotics had been belted by our agencies and the brotherhood was hurting. But timed just right was the Cuban deal and those slobs on the hill got taken in by the Reds who saw a way of injecting a poison into this country while they built up their own machine. So Cuba became a collection point for China-grown narcotics. There’s a supposedly clean businessman up there on the hill who owns an airline in Florida. The connection clear?”

  I grinned, my teeth tight. “There’s an even bigger one there, a Russian attaché. He’ll be the one who knows where and when the big delivery will be made. There’s a rallying of key personnel who have to come out of hiding in order to attend a conclave of big wheels and determine short-range policy.

  “It’s a chance they have to take. You can’t be in the business they’re in without expecting to take a chance sooner or later. Lack of coincidence can eliminate chance. Coincidence can provide it. I was the coincidence. Only there was another element involved… a Mr. Simpson and his peculiar pleasures. If he had forgone those, chance never would have occurred.”

  It was a lot of talk. It took too damn much out of me. I said, “Where’s Dari?”

  The doctor was hesitant until I grabbed his arm. When he looked up his face was drained of color. “She went after Ruth.”

  My fingers tightened and he winced. “I put Ruth… to bed. What I gave her didn’t hold. She got up and left. The next morning, Dari left too.”

  “What are you talking about… the next morning?”

  “You took a big dosage, son. That was yesterday. You’ve been out all this time.”

  It was like being hit in the stomach.

  I stood up and pulled on my jacket.

  The doctor said, “They’re all over town. They’re waiting for you.”

  “Good,” I said. “Where’s Sonny Holmes?”

  “In the kitchen.”

  From Sonny’s face, I knew he had heard everything we had said. I asked him, “You know how to get to the lake without going through town?”

  Sonny had changed. He seemed older. “There’s a way. We can take the old icecart trail to the lake.”

  I grinned at the doctor and handed him a card, “Call that number and ask for Artie. You tell him the whole thing, but tell him to get his tail up here in a hurry. I’m going to cut Dari out of this deal, doc.” The look on his face stopped me.

  “She’s gone,” he said. “She went up there as guest… She said something about Ruth Gleason saying they wanted girls. She had a gun in her pocketbook. She said it was yours. Kelly… she went up there to kill Simpson! She went alone. She said she knew how she could do it…”

  And that was a whole day ago.

  Sonny was waiting. We used his car. My rented truck was gone. Ruth Gleason had taken it and the silenced gun I had used was in it.

  Mort Steiger said, “I was waiting for you.”

  “No fishing, pop,” I told him.

  “I know what you’re going to do. I knew it all along. Somebody had to. You looked like the only one who could and who wanted to.”

  I turned to Sonny. “Call the doc, kid. See if he got through to my friend.”

  Mort held out his hand and stopped him. “No use trying. The phones are all out. The jeep from the hill run into a pole down by the station and it’ll be two days before a repair crew gets here.”

  “Sonny” I said, “you get back to Captain Cox. You tell him I’m going inside and to get there with all he has. Tell him they’re my orders.”

  Mort spit out the stub of a cigar. “I figured you right, I did. You’re a cop, ain’t you?”

  I looked at him and grinned. My boat was still there where I had left it. The sun was sinking.

  The guy on the dock died easily and quietly. He tried to go for his gun when he saw me and I took him with one sudden stroke. The one at the end in the neat gray suit who looked so incongruous holding a shotgun went just as easily.

  An eighth of a mile ahead, the roof of the house showed above the trees. When I reached the main building I went in through the back. It was dark enough now so that I could take advantage of shadows. Above me the house was brilliantly lit. There was noise and laughter and the sound of music and women’s voices and the heavier voices of men.


  There could only be a single direct line to the target. I nailed a girl in toreador pants trying to get ice out of the freezer. She had been around a long time, maybe not in years, but in time you can’t measure on a calendar. She knew she was standing an inch from dying and when I said, “Where is Simpson?” she didn’t try to cry out or lie or anything else.

  She simply said, “The top floor,” and waited for what she knew I’d do to her. I sat her in a chair, her feet tucked under her. For an hour she’d be that way, passed out to any who noticed her.

  It was another 20 minutes before I had the complete layout of the downstairs.

  What got me was the atmosphere of the place. It was too damn gay. It took a while, but I finally got it. The work had been done, the decisions made, and now it was time to relax.

  My stomach went cold and I was afraid of what I was going to find.

  It didn’t take any time to reach the top floor. Up here you couldn’t hear the voices nor get the heavy smell of cigar smoke. I stood on the landing looking toward the far end where the corridor opened on to two doors. To the left could be only small rooms because the corridor was so near the side of the building. To the right, I thought, must be almost a duplicate of the big room downstairs.

  And there I was. What could I do about it? Nothing.

  The gun in my back said nothing.

  Lennie Weaver said, “Hello, jerk.”

  Behind Lennie somebody said, “Who is he, Len?”

  “A small-time punk who’s been trying to get ahead in the business for quite a while now. He didn’t know what he was bucking.” The gun nudged me again. “Keep going, punk. Last door on your left. You open it, you go in, you move easy, or that’s it.”

  The guy said, “What’s he doing here?”

  I heard Lennie laugh. “He’s nuts. Remember what he pulled on Nat and me? They’ll try anything to get big time. He’s the fink who ran with Benny Quick and turned him in to the fuzz.”

  We came to the door and went inside and stood there until the tremendously fat man at the desk finished writing. When he looked up, Lennie said, “Mr. Simpson, here’s the guy who was causing all the trouble in town.”

  And there was Mr. Simpson. Mr. Simpson who only went as far as his middle name in this operation. Mr. Simpson by his right name, everybody would know. They would remember the recent election conventions or recall the five percenters and the political scandals a regime ago. Hell, everybody would know Mr. Simpson by his whole name.

  The fleshy moon face was blank. The eyes blinked and the mouth said, “You know who he is?”

  “Sure.” Lennie’s laugh was grating. “Al Braddock. Like Benny Quick said, he picked up something some place and tried to build into it. He wouldn’t have sounded off, Mr. Simpson. He’d want any in with us for himself. Besides, who’d play along? They know what happens.

  “What shall we do with him, Mr. Simpson?” Lennie asked.

  Simpson almost smiled. “Why just kill him, Lennie,” he said and went back to the account book.

  It was to be a quiet affair, my death. My hands were tied behind me and I was walked to the yard behind the building.

  “Why does a punk like you want in for?” Lennie asked. “How come you treat life the way you do?”

  “The dame, pal,” I said. “I got a yen for a dame.”

  “Who?” His voice was unbelieving.

  “Dari Dahl. She inside?”

  “You are crazy, buddy,” he told me. “Real nuts. In ten minutes that beautiful broad of yours goes into her act and when she’s done she’ll never be the same. She’ll make a cool grand up there, but man, she’s had it. I know the kind it makes and the kind it breaks. That mouse of yours won’t have enough spunk left to puke when she walks out of there.” He laughed again. “If she walks. She may get a ride back to the lights, if she wants to avoid her friends. A guy up there is willing to take second smacks on her anytime.”

  “Too bad,” I said. “If it’s over, it’s over. Like your two friends down at the lake.”

  Lennie said, “What?”

  “I knocked off two guys by the lake.”

  The little guy got the point quickly. “Hell, he didn’t come in over the wall, Len. He came by the path. Jeeze, if the boss knows about that, he’ll fry. The whole end is open, if he’s right.”

  But Lennie wasn’t going to be taken. “Knock it off, Moe. We’ll find out. We’ll go down that way. If he’s right or wrong, we’ll still fix him. Hell, it could even be fun. We’ll drown the bastard.”

  “You watch it, Len; this guy’s smart.”

  “Not with two guns in his back and his hands tied, he’s not.” His mouth twisted. “Walk, punk.”

  Time, time. Any time, every time. Time was life. Time was Dari. If you had time, you could think and plan and move.

  Then time was bought for me.

  From somewhere in the darkness Ruth Gleason came running, saying, “Lennie, Lennie… don’t do this to me, please!” and threw herself at the guy.

  He mouthed a curse and I heard him hit her, an open-handed smash that knocked her into the grass. “Damn these whores, you can’t get them off your back!”

  Ruth sobbed, tried to get up, her words nearly inaudible. “Please Lennie… they won’t give me… anything. They laughed and… threw me out.”

  I just stood there. Any move I made would get me a bullet so I just stood there. I could see Ruth get to her feet and stagger, her body shaking. She held on to a stick she had picked up. I could see the tears on her cheeks.

  “Lennie… I’ll do anything. Anything. Please… you said you loved me. Tell them to get me a fix.”

  Lennie said two words.

  They were his last.

  With unexpected suddenness she ran at him, that stick in her hands, and I saw her lunge forward with it and the thing sink into Lennie’s middle like a broken sword and heard his horrible rattle. It snapped in her hands with a foot of it inside him and he fell, dying, while she clawed at him with maniacal frenzy.

  The other guy ran for her, tried to pull her off, and forgot about me. My hands were tied. My feet weren’t. It took only three kicks to kill him.

  Ruth still beat at the body, not realizing Lennie was dead.

  “Ruth… I can get you a fix!” I said.

  The words stopped her. She looked at me, not quite seeing me. “You can?”

  “Untie me. Hurry.”

  I turned around and felt her fingers fumble with the knots at my wrists until they fell free.

  “Now… you’ll get me a fix? Please?”

  I nodded and hit her. Later she could get her fix. Maybe she’d made it so she’d never need one again. Later was lots of things, but she’d bought my time for me and I wouldn’t forget her.

  The little guy’s gun was a .32 and I didn’t want it. I liked Lennie’s .45 better, and it fitted my hand like a glove. My forefinger found the familiar notch in the butt and I knew I had my own gun back and knew the full implication of Lennie’s words about Dari.

  She had tried for her kill and missed. Somebody else got the gun and Dari was to get the payoff.

  This time I thought it out. I knew how I had to work it. I walked another 100 yards to the body of the gray-suited guard I had left earlier, took his shotgun from the ground and four extra shells from his pocket, and started back to the house.

  Nothing had changed. Downstairs they were still drinking and laughing, still secure.

  I found the 1,500-gallon fuel tank above ground as I expected, broke the half-inch copper tubing, and let the oil run into the whiskey bottles I culled from the refuse dump. It didn’t take too many trips to wet down the bushes around the house. They were already season-dried, the leaves crisp. A huge puddle had run out from the line, following the contour of the hill and running down the drive to the front of the house.

  It was all I needed. I took two bottles, filled them, and tore off a hunk of my shirt tail for a wick. Those bottles would make a high flash-point Molotov cocktail, if I could
keep them lit. The secret lay in a long wick so the fuel oil, spilling out, wouldn’t douse the flame. Not as good as gasoline, but it would do.

  Then I was ready.

  Nothing fast. The normal things are reassuring. I coughed, sniffed, and reached the landing at the first floor. When the man there saw me he tried to call out and died before he could. The other one was just as unsuspecting. He died just as easily. Soft neck.

  Mr. Simpson’s office was empty. I opened his window, lit my wick on the whiskey bottle, and threw it down. Below me there was a small breaking of glass, a tiny flame that grew. I drew back from the window.

  I had three more quarts of fuel oil under my arm. I let it run out at the two big doors opposite Simpson’s office and soak into the carpet. This one caught quickly, a sheet of flame coming off the floor. Nobody was coming out that door.

  Some place below there was a yell, then a scream. I opened the window and got out on the top of the second floor porch roof. From there the top floor was blanked out completely. Heavy drapes covered the windows and, though several were open for ventilation, not a streak of light shone through.

  I stepped between the window and the draperies, entirely concealed, then held the folds of the heavy velvet back. It was a small theatre in the round. There was a person shrouded in black tapping drums and that was all the music they had. Two more in black tights with masked faces were circling about a table. They each held long thin whips, and whenever the drummer raised the tempo they snapped them, and sometimes simply brought them against the floor so that the metal tips made a sharp popping sound.

  She was there in the middle, tied to the table. She was robed in a great swath of silk.

  From where I stood I could see the town and the long line of lights winding with tantalizing slowness toward the hill.

  Down below they were yelling now, their voices frantic, but here in this room nobody was listening. They were watching the performance, in each one’s hand a slim length of belt that could bring joy to minds who had tried everything else and now needed this.

  She was conscious. Tied and gagged, but she could know what was happening. She faced the ring of them and saw the curtain move where I was. I took the big chance and moved it enough so she alone could see me standing there and when she jerked her head to keep anyone from seeing the hope in her eyes I knew it was the time.