Killer Mine Read online

  “Sure. He thought he was all set. You gotta get that one, Joe.”

  “There’s nothing to get.”

  “No?” He gave me a curious look. “Then ask that Al Reese. That fat bum, he knows. He shoves everybody. He always looking for his bite, that bum. He hooked into René, because I seen René pay him off,” he confided.

  I finished my beer and nudged Marta to do the same. “Okay, Tony, maybe. Just maybe, remember? I’m out of my district and I don’t want to make trouble around here.”

  “Screw you, Joe. When you and Larry was kids, you made plenty trouble for everybody. That… that… what you call him?”

  “Chief Crazy Horse,” I said.

  “Yeah him. Nutty Indian. Always wearing them feathers and you want to be a cop. Nobody wanted to play with you, did they?”

  “I always caught the crooks,” I said. I tapped the side of my head. “You had to be smart, even when you were playing.”

  “Now somebody ain’t playing, Joe. They’re going for real.”

  “Well, I’ll see what I can do. Keep it quiet though.” I pushed some change across to him and we finished our beer and left while Fat Mary was still heaping the plates of the customers that were left.

  Getting into René’s old apartment was no trouble. The padlock the landlord had put on opened with a sharp rap from my gun butt and the door swung open. Marta found the light switch and pulled it after making sure the shades were drawn.

  The police had checked the rooms, found nothing, the landlord had made a partial attempt at cleaning it up, emptying the garbage and piling dishes in the sink, so anything of significance would have been destroyed. Like the other apartments, this was typical of a slum section. It was the front half of a partially renovated brownstone building, the flat containing a living room with a battered TV, a pair of worn mohair chairs and a couple of end tables. The bedroom was furnished with a single bed, chair and table. René’s clothes came from a low cost outlet store, all bore the marks of hard usage except for two pairs of expensive shoes that hadn’t been worn at all. The kitchen was a hodgepodge of rickety pieces, the dishes chipped and cracked, the closet over the refrigerator empty. But there had been plenty of groceries in there. The marks showed in the dust where cans had been stacked and a cash register slip caught in a crack was for forty-two dollars. The landlord wasn’t going to leave all that stuff for the next tenant.

  When Marty came back from looking around I asked, “Find anything?”

  “Possibly. Come back in the living room a minute.” She pointed to the floor and indicated a series of scratches that led from one chair to the other. “We know what we’re looking for… so do those mean anything?”

  I got her point. “Somebody dragged that chair up to the other to make a bed?”

  “That’s right. So René did have somebody here.” She looked at me carefully and sat on the arm of the chair. “You see the same picture, don’t you?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Tell it to me.”

  I nodded and started pacing the room. “Nobody who knew better would trust René. It had to be someone who knew him well enough to be able to handle him. René was a sharpie. So let’s say this guy needs a hideout and is prepared to pay. He approaches René who kicks Noisy Stuccio out and takes this guy in. Now René starts sharpshooting. He’s going to try to take this guy for his bundle and sets something up, only he makes a mistake in underestimating his new boarder. The guy gets wise and kills him.

  “That gets us to Noisy Stuccio. People don’t change and Noisy was a mean little punk who never liked to be second rated. He was always in somebody’s business and he would have wanted to know what was going on and somehow he found out who the boarder was. If this guy knew René, then he certainly would have known Noisy. When René was killed Noisy got the score and made his bid for the loot this guy was packing.”

  Marta said, “And wound up the same way.”

  “This guy is a pure psychopath. He’ll kill at the drop of a hat. He’s an old experienced hand with the crazy intuitive values psychos have and can kill without leaving a trace. That’s the most difficult part,” I said. “There doesn’t even have to be a motive. He doesn’t go into wild flight that attracts attention and anybody in his way is simply disposed of.”

  She frowned and nibbled at a fingernail. “But Hymie Shapiro…”

  I cut her off with, “I’ll have to go back to when we were kids. Hymie and Noisy were a couple of sharpies who stuck together. Hymie used to plan little chintzy jobs and leave them up to Noisy to pull off. Could be that Noisy didn’t want to move in on this by himself because he knew he wasn’t capable of pulling it off alone. He always was a lippy guy with Hymie. Suppose he talked it over with Hymie and they laid it out together. Our guy would have moved out after he killed René, but they found out where he was holed up and Noisy went to see him. So the guy makes a date to pay off and instead lets Noisy have a bullet, but not before Noisy tried to insure himself staying alive by reminding the guy someone else knew the play.”

  “It sounds good, Joe.”

  “What it means is that Noisy didn’t have to tell him who it was that knew. Our guy automatically understood, popped Noisy, then went looking for Hymie and found him.”

  “And that brings us up to Doug Kitchen,” Marta said.

  “Paula Lees saw that action. Doug saw the guy and recognized him. That’s what got him killed. He started across the street to say hello, then saw what was going to happen and started to run. He was the only one shot in the back.”

  “Gus Wilder?”

  “They all knew him. Hell, everybody around here knows everybody else, especially when they’re hardcases.”

  I stopped pacing then and stared at the dark green surface of the dirty window shade. Marta asked, “What are you thinking of, Joe?”

  “There’s a hook in this someplace. I have the feeling that somebody I’ve talked to has fed it to me already and I can’t remember what it is.”

  “It’ll come.”

  “But I want it now.”

  “Relax,” she said softly.

  I turned around and grinned at her. “Sure, little Giggie. Come on and let’s try it from another angle.”

  When we reached the street there was a slight jolt in the air, concussion from thunder far off, and the sky over Jersey turned a momentary pink. It was cooler now, the smell of rain coming in with the west breeze.

  We turned south, reached the corner and saw Hal McNeil, the beat cop, just closing the door of the call box. He touched his cap in a salute and said, “Evening, Lieutenant. I was just going to look you up.”

  “What’s doing?”

  “Sergeant Brissom wants you to call him back.”

  “Thanks, Hal. You got anything on Loefert and his buddies?”

  The cop nodded. “They’re doing a lot of poking around. The way it looks, they’ve sectioned the neighborhood off and are scouting the areas. The only one I could reach said they were looking for a strange face. A lot of drifters come through, but they weren’t interested. It’s somebody that would be known but hasn’t been seen for a while.”

  “No names?”

  “You know these people, sir. They aren’t going to stick their necks out. Too many killings have scared them silly.”

  I left him talking to Marta and opened the call box and got the duty officer to put me through to Mack Brissom. “Scanlon, Mack. What’s the pitch?”

  “Hi, Joe. We have an opening on the action down there. Now get this bit… one of the Chicago hoods was picked up on an old murder second charge and the D.A. got some talk out of him because the guy hoped to drop the charge down to manslaughter.”

  “What’s it about?” I asked him.

  “The wheels inside the mob gave the go ahead signal to a group to set up one hell of a big heist and was going to take care of the cover and protection for a fifty percent bite if it came off. Well, it came off, all right, only the one guy who was holding the loot had it hijacked out of
his hands by an outsider and broke up the whole deal.”

  “Which heist, Mack?”

  “Could be the Montreal job. How this outsider got into it is anybody’s guess. He could have known one of the boys, had a few drinks with him and the story came out. They’ll talk to their own kind sometimes. This time, knowing they had the mob’s protection, they’d figure nobody would have the guts to try to move in.”

  “What’s the connection?”

  “This guy who pulled the hijack was waiting when the driver holding the loot came out of his motel, stuck a gun in his ribs, made him drive to a spot where he had a car parked, belted him cold, took the money and ducked out”

  “Recognized?”

  “No, he was masked, but when he pulled the gun out a five-dollar bill and a piece of paper came out of his pocket with it. There was a phone number on the paper listed to a candy store run by Sigmund Jones in your neighborhood.”

  “I know the one. René Mills kept a pair of whores upstairs over it.”

  “Making sense?” Mack asked me.

  “It’s there, all right. Does Gus Wilder tie into it at all?”

  “When you check the dates it does. Wilder jumped his bond two weeks before the Montreal robbery. He might have known what was cooking inside the mob and was on the spot when it happened to pick up some hideout money. Wilder was damn hot. He knew the mob wasn’t going to let him stay alive if there was any indication that he’d talk about their activities. At the same time he didn’t want to take a big fall. If he didn’t talk, the upstate department was going after him on other charges, so the only choice he had was to jump bail.”

  “So the mob detailed their boys to look him up,” I stated.

  “That’s the picture we’re getting here. All he got is his brother to turn to.”

  I said, “He called Henry asking for five hundred bucks.”

  “Could be reasonable, Joe. He wouldn’t want to throw hot money around just yet. That, or he asked for the money before the hijack. Check out the dates on your end, will you?”

  “Tonight I’ll call you back after I see Henry Wilder.”

  “Right. See you later.”

  I hung up, closed the call box and went back to McNeil and Marta. The wind had come up a little stronger and I felt the touch of a raindrop against my face. McNeil said, “Anything I can do, sir?”

  “Just keep your eyes open. I got that funny feeling that something’s going to break.”

  “Sure will.” He started to walk away, stopped and turned back. “Incidentally, Benny Loefert and Will Fater had a long talk with Al Reese tonight”

  “Where?”

  “In the back room at Bunny’s place.”

  “Who passed on the word?”

  “A little guy named Harry Wope.”

  “I know him.”

  “He thought you might like to know.”

  “Tell him thanks.”

  McNeil saluted again and went back to his beat.

  Henry Wilder didn’t appreciate the interruption. Since I saw him last he seemed to have curled up inside himself and reluctance was in every word he spoke. Gus hadn’t contacted him again and as far as he was concerned he hoped he never heard from him. When I got around to asking when he had the last call he thought about it a minute, then placed the day. I ran it through my mind and let it fit the pattern. Gus’ call had come after he jumped his bond and before the Montreal job, so Mack Brissom could have hit it right. Gus had no place to go and headed back to the only place he knew where he thought he’d have a reasonable place of security, buried in the anonymity of a decrepit section of the city.

  So what happened? I thought. If Gus had lived here he’d know his way around and the people who lived here. It was doubtful that he’d trust anybody, even his stepbrother, so before he moved in on him he’d hole up somewhere else long enough to feel Henry out. Trouble was then, René Mills saw him and knew about him skipping his bond and made a deal with him. If Gus was packing the Montreal money, René would have wanted it for himself and set up the scene to grab it. He would have had Gus move in with him where he could be on top of everything and his greed bought his own death.

  It fitted, all right, even to Doug Kitchen. Doug was a gregarious kind of guy who knew everybody and was always there with a ready hello and handshake. Gus was gone from the neighborhood long enough to warrant a greeting upon his return, and Doug died because he recognized him. From little acorns do big oaks grow. A corny cliché, but true.

  We told Henry Wilder good night and went downstairs to the street again. The sidewalks were just starting to take on a sheen from the light rain that had started to fall. While we walked I gave it to Marta in detail and let her process it mentally the way I did and her conclusion agreed with mine.

  “I think you have it, Joe.”

  I shook my head and turned my collar up against the wind. “I don’t know,” I said. “Something’s loose in the picture. I want everything to fit tight”

  “Does it always?”

  I grinned and looked at her. “Most of the time.”

  We got to Papa Jones’ candy store as he was closing. Most of the lights were out and he was stuffing his daily receipts into his pocket when we walked in. He gave Marta a smile, but when he saw me his face went suddenly tight and his shoulders jumped under his too-loose suitcoat. He was remembering me from a long time ago and the time when he broke my nose with the awning rod and I promised to come back and tear him up but never got farther than breaking his front window with a rock.

  “Ease off, Papa.” I said. “The past is past. It’s different now.” To prove it I let him see my badge in the wallet and his face went sideways in a curious change of expression. He finally swallowed hard and croaked, “Joe?”

  “Nobody else.”

  “A… cop?”

  “Haven’t you heard? I’ve been around a few days.”

  “I… been out,” he said. “Ronnie’s been taking care… of things.”

  Marta turned around and explained, “Ronnie’s his nephew.”

  Papa Jones glanced at both of us nervously, his fingers fumbling with the buttons of his coat. Cops always make them nervous. “So… what do you want with me? I’m closing up.”

  “Remember Gus Wilder, Papa?”

  His false teeth clicked and he nodded. “Sure, I remember him.”

  “See him lately?”

  “He left here a long time ago. He…”

  “I didn’t ask that”

  Papa Jones took on new confidence then. “I ain’t seen him since.”

  “Know him pretty well, Papa?”

  He tried to get my angle, but couldn’t figure it and said, “So enough. He used the phone here all the time. Bought cigarettes and things like that.”

  “Phone number been changed lately?”

  He scowled and shook his head. “Same since you kids used it. The phone got changed, but not the number, why?”

  “No reason.”

  “So what’s the phone? Everybody uses it. That René Mills, Stuccio… hell, the whole neighborhood uses it. Who got their own phones around here?” he demanded defensively.

  “Sure, Papa. Well look, if you see this Wilder, you call us, hear?”

  “Yeah,” he said, but didn’t mean it. “Why don’t you ask his brother where he is?”

  “That’ll be taken care of. Just do like I said or I’ll keep that old promise. You remember it?”

  He did, all right. “Damn bunch of bums, you kids were,” he muttered. Then his face got a little pale and he watched me closely.

  I grinned and took Marta’s hand. “Come on, kid.”

  Papa Jones slammed and locked the door the minute we were out and yanked the shade down fast. Marta said, “You make quite an impression.”

  “I always did with him.”

  “What did you make out of it, Joe?”

  “It’s tightening up. Like he said, everybody uses the phone. Gus Wilder could have done just that and been spotted by René. He
would have waited until Gus came out so Papa Jones wouldn’t see them together and tapped him then. It even explains why Gus had the phone number in his pocket… a secondary number he knew in the neighborhood if he wanted to make a contact in case his brother’s phone was tapped.”

  The sky rumbled again and the lightning flashes moved closer. The main force of the rain was starting to sweep in on the city, driving the inhabitants indoors to their sanctuaries. We hugged the sides of the buildings to get out of the bite of the storm, heading across to Bunny’s place. The street was empty, traffic light, just an occasional cab going by, a couple of trucks, a few private cars looking for a way out of the place.

  I heard the curious slap of lead against the bricks before I realized what it was. The sound behind it was muffled in the wind, but it could have come from only one direction. I grabbed Marta’s arm, yanked her into a run and dashed across the street and just as we reached the middle I felt her spin a little bit and let out a yell and knew she was hit. I cursed softly, got to the sidewalk and flattened up against the building there with my gun out and ready.

  “Joe…”

  “Where’d it get you?”

  She reached up and touched the top of her shoulder. The cloth was torn and a faint tinge of red darkened the edges of it. “It… isn’t much.”

  “Stay down out of sight. He’s in one of these buildings. I’m going in and if I flush him out, hold a gun on him. Think you can make it?”

  “Don’t worry.” She grabbed my hand. “Should you… go in alone?”

  “There isn’t time to raise anybody else. I know these damn buildings and every way in and out of them. You do what I told you to.”

  Before she could answer me I ran up into the brownstone beside me, taking the steps in two leaps, shoved the door open and went up the stairs. There wasn’t an empty apartment on the block and nobody was letting a killer use his place for a firing range. Those shots came from a rooftop and somewhere the guy behind the gun was looking for an escape hatch.

  I made the roof at the top of the four stories and came out into the rain from a rusted metal fire door built into the kiosk, the squeak of the hinges like a shrill scream in the darkness. I hit the pebbled surface of the roof and rolled behind the protection of a weather-eroded brick chimney, my eyes probing the black for any movement, any outline of a person.