Fletch Won (29 page)

“Alston, okay, stop. Who the hell owns Paraska Steamship, or whatever it is?”

“Four women.” Alston then began to repeat, recite a mishmash of names.

Fletch stopped at an orange traffic light. The car behind him honked. “Say what? Say again?” A police car drew alongside Fletch. The cop studied Fletch’s features carefully.

Alston repeated the names.

“’Bye, Alston!” He dropped the phone in his lap.

Fletch stomped on the accelerator.

He went through the red light, made a U-turn in the middle of the intersection, and went through the red light again.

The police car pursuing him did the same thing.

“Lieutenant Francisco Gomez, please. Emergency!”

It certainly was an emergency. There were now two police cars pursuing him through city streets. His trying to outdrive them while talking on the car telephone clearly was a traffic hazard.

“Who’s calling?”

Fletch hesitated not at all: “Biff Wilson.”

He put on his left directional signal and turned right from the left lane. Not a good enough trick to throw off his pursuers, but it did cause noisy confusion at that intersection.

“Yeah?” Gomez sounded as if he were in the middle of a conversation instead of beginning one.

“Gomez, Biff Wilson’s in trouble.”

“Who is this?”

“Fletcher, a.k.a. Alexander Liddicoat. Remember us?”

“Shit! Where are you?”

“Hell, don’t you know?” Fletch spun his wheel mid-block and scurried down an alley. “I thought the police were the eyes and the ears of the city.”

“What are you talking about? What’s all that noise I hear? Sireens? Screeching tires?”

“Yeah, thanks for the police escort. I am in a hurry. Have you got the forensics report on that gun yet?”

“What gun?”

“The gun I gave you. The gun I told you about.”

“Who cares about that? Kid tryin’ to make a name for himself…”

“You haven’t even looked into it?”

“You’re as bad as Charles, what’s his name, Childers, Stuart Childers. Want to play cops and robbers. You want to be the cop, he wants to be the robber.”

“The ballistics report ought to be ready by now, too.” Fletch had a moment of comparative peace as he went wrong-way up a one-way street.

“I’ve got a warrant out for you, Fletcher. Possession of a seller’s quantity of angel dust. I’ve got the evidence right here on my desk.”

“I look forward to seeing it.” Three police cars spotted Fletch at the corner. They accelerated after him. “Aren’t you hearing me, Gomez? Your pal Biff is in trouble.”

“Yeah?”

“At the newspaper. He’s in Frank Jaffe’s office. On the carpet, you might say. In danger of losing his job.”

“No way.”

“You know it’s possible.”

Gomez said nothing.

Fletch turned on his lights and pulled into the middle of a funeral cortege. Demonstrating little respect, the three police cars screamed by the cortege.

“He needs your help,” Fletch said. “He needs the ballistics and forensics reports on that gun. Immediately.”

“Yeah?”

“Would I lie to you?”

“What is this?”

Fletch turned off his lights and ducked down a side street. “As soon as you’ve got the reports, call the
News-Tribune
. Ask for Frank Jaffe’s office. Biff’s in Frank’s office.”

Two blocks up from the next corner, a police car hesitated in the middle of the intersection. As soon as the police saw Fletch’s car, they turned and came after him, lights flashing, sirens screaming.

“Gomez, you want to see Biff out on his rear?”

The line went dead.

Fletch dropped the phone in his lap again. He could see the roof of the
News-Tribune
building. The three police cars were back in V formation pursuing him.

There were only two more corners to skitter around….

“Hey! You can’t leave your car there!”

The guard in the lobby of the
News-Tribune
was known to get red-faced easily. Fletch had left his car half on the sidewalk at the front door of the
News-Tribune
.

Fletch was on the rising escalator to the city room.

“What?” he asked.

At the bottom of the escalator, the guard looked toward the front door. “What are all those sireens?”

“I can’t hear you,” Fletch said. “Too many sireens.”

He passed Morton Rickmers, the book editor, in the city room.

“Did you see Tom Farliegh?” Morton asked. “Is he worth an interview?”

“Naw,” Fletch answered. “He’s a little, blued-haired old lady in green tennis shoes.”

Morton wrinkled his eyebrows. “Okay.”

Through the glass door of Frank’s office, Fletch saw Frank, behind the desk, and Biff Wilson, in a side chair. The color of their faces was compatible with the color of the face of the guard downstairs, now doubtlessly talking to six policemen.

Frank’s secretary said, “You’re late.”

“It’s all relative.” He breezed by her.

Fletch closed Frank’s office door behind him. “Good afternoon, Frank. Good of you to ask me to stop by.” Frank’s watery eyes took in Fletch’s T-shirt, jeans, and holey sneakers. “Good afternoon, Biff.” Biff’s jaw tightened. He looked away. His right ear was swollen and red. Fletch commiserated. “That looks like a real ouch.” Biff’s face was splotched with little cuts from having glass thrown in it. “Lucky for you none of the glass from that beer bottle got in your eyes.” Biff looked at Fletch wondrously. Fletch said to Frank, “That’s nothing. You should see the
News-Tribune
car Biff drives. Big dents. Rear window smashed. Doubt you’ll be able to get much for it on the used-car market.”

“How the hell do you know about it?” Biff demanded.

“I’m a reporter.” Fletch sat in a chair. “Well, Frank. I’m glad to report that Mrs. Donald Habeck does not slip vodka into her tea. In fact, the poor thing doesn’t get to have any tea at all. I’ve learned my lesson in humility. Never go out on a story with preconceptions. Right, Biff?”

Frank said to him, “I’m surprised you showed up.”

“Frank,” Fletch said. “In a moment your phone is going to ring. It will be police lieutenant Francisco Gomez calling Biff. He knows Biff is in your office. I would like you to take the message for Biff, please.”

“Jeez!” In his chair, Biff threw one leg over the knee of his other leg. “Now the wise ass is telling you what to do!”

Through the windows of Frank’s office, Fletch saw six uniformed policemen milling around the city room.

“What’s going on between you two guys?” Although high in color, Frank was trying to sound reasonable. “Fletch, Biff tells me you’re screwing up in ways even I can’t believe. Everywhere he goes on this Habeck story, you’ve already been there, screwing up, swimming bare-assed in the Habecks’ pool, so upsetting Habeck’s son, a monk, he refuses to see Biff, angering another suspect so much that when Biff shows up this thug throws a beer bottle in his face. Twice.” Fletch was grinning. “It isn’t funny. You know you weren’t assigned to the Habeck story. Ann McGarrahan and I made that perfectly clear to you. There are easier ways to get fired.”

“No rookie should ever come anywhere near me,” Biff said. “Especially no wise-guy punk screw-up.”

Frank smiled to himself. “I thought you’d burn off your excess energy over the whorehouse story. Instead, last night I think I heard you say you can’t do that story.”

“I can do it.”

“You said you needed more time on it. Maybe if you spent your time on the story assigned to you instead of bird-dogging Biff…”

Through the window, Fletch saw Morton Rickmers talking to one of the policemen. Morton pointed toward Frank’s office.

“Screw it.” Biff made a move to get up. “This is a waste of time. Just can the son of a bitch and let me go back to work.”

“Do you like bullies, Frank?” Fletch asked. “I don’t like bullies.”

Frank forced a laugh. “Biff’s been with the
News-Tribune
all his adult life. You’ve been with us what? Three months? He’s the best crime reporter around. He’s got a right to do his work without being bird-dogged by a screw-up kid.”

“He’s a bully,” Fletch said. “I don’t like bullies.”

“You went after Biff because he’s a bully?” Frank asked. “Like hell. You went after Biff because you thought you could beat him at his own story. Little you know.”

“I have beaten him.”

“Sure,” said Biff. “You’re ready to wrap up the story of the Habeck murder? Like hell!”

“Right,” said Fletch. “I am.”

Frank was watching Fletch closely. “I told you two days ago, Fletch, Monday, that we’ve had about enough of your crap around here. I thought if I gave you a real assignment, the Ben Franklyn whorehouse story—”

“I’ve got that about wrapped up, too.” Fletch looked at the silent phone on Frank’s desk.

“Sure,” Biff said. “Tell us who killed Donald Habeck, wise ass. We can hardly wait to hear it from your lips. A member of the family, I bet. Crazy Louise? No-brain Jasmine? Daughter Nancy left her five kids in wet diapers and ran out and shot her pa? How about her husband, the two-bit poet? Or better yet, the monk, Robert? Tell us the monk murdered his old man. That will sell newspapers.”

The telephone on Frank’s desk wasn’t ringing. At that moment, Fletch would have appreciated some factual evidence. He took a deep breath. “Stuart Childers murdered Donald Habeck.”

Biff laughed. “Jeez! I’ll bet you know that ’cause he confessed to you!”

“Yeah,” Fletch said. “He did.” Biff laughed louder. “Gotta listen,” Fletch said. “Sometimes liars tell the truth.”

Frank looked through his office windows at the city room. “What are those cops doing out there?”

Six of them stood around Frank’s secretary.

“A criminal is a victim of his own crime,” Fletch said to Biff, “as you’ll come to understand, I think.”

The phone rang. Outside, the secretary was too busy with the police to answer it.

Frank picked up the phone in annoyance. “Hello!… Who is this?…”He glanced at Biff. “Lieutenant Gomez… Yeah, Biff is here…. No.” Then Frank glanced at Fletch. “You tell me the message, Lieutenant…. The gun? Okay… Twenty-two-caliber pistol. Registered to Stuart Childers…” Biff looked up. “Stuart Childers’s fingerprints…” Frank glared at Biff. “… Ballistics … It is the gun used to murder Donald Habeck…. Right. I’ll tell him….” Slowly, Frank hung up.

Frank sat back in his chair, hands folded in his lap. He looked from Biff to Fletch and back to Biff.

Biff sat erect, looking as alert as a rabbit.

Outside the office, the hubbub made by the six policemen was rising noticeably. Clearly, two were arguing with each other. Each was pointing through the window at Fletch.

The secretary, too, had raised her voice.

Irritated, Frank asked, “What’s going on out there?”

“Okay.” Biff straightened the crease in one trouser leg. “Gomez has been working closely with me on the Habeck murder.” He cleared his throat. “That call was for me.

“You didn’t even know he was calling,” Frank said.

Outside, Hamm Starbuck had arrived. He stood between the police and the door to Frank’s office.

Fletch leaned forward in his chair. “Now, Frank, about the Ben Franklyn story…”

“Fuck off!” Biff shouted.

Frank raised his eyebrows. He said to Fletch, “Tell me.”

“The Ben Franklyn Friend Service is owned by Wood Nymph, Incorporated,” Fletch said. “Which is owned by two companies, Cungwell Screw and Lingman Toys.”

Frank, looking from Biff to the ruckus outside his office door to Fletch, nevertheless appeared to be listening. “Cungwell Screw and Lingman Toys are entirely owned by Paraska Steamship Company, which is owned entirely by four women, Yvonne Heller, Anita Gomez, Marietta Ramsin, and Aurora Wilson.”

The blood splotches disappeared against the color of Biff’s face.

Outside now, even Hamm Starbuck was shouting.

Frank looked at his telephone. He said, “Anita Gomez.” Then he looked at Biff. “Aurora Wilson.” Frank moved his chair closer to the desk. “Gomez and Wilson. I guess you two did work closely together.” He reached for his phone. “And that’s how the pictures of those whores got on my sports pages Monday morning.”