Miss Callaghan Comes To Grief (6 page)

June 6th, 12.30 a.m.

GRANTHAM SAT behind his neat desk, writing. A cigarette burnt lazily in an ash−tray at his elbow, and the room was silent but for the faint scratch of his pen.

He heard his door open, and he glanced up irritably. Raven stood looking at him. Behind Raven, Grantham could see Lu Eller, white−faced and uncertain.

Grantham laid down his pen very slowly. The colour went out of his face and a muscle in his jaw began to jump.

Raven said, “Tell this monkey to go away.”

Grantham knew that Mendetta was dead. Raven would never have come if Mendetta wasn't dead. He told Eller with his eyes to go away. He didn't trust his voice.

Lu Eller lifted his shoulders. He seemed relieved that Grantham didn't want him. Raven came in and shut the door. He put a slip of paper on Grantham's desk silently.

Without touching it, Grantham read it. It was in Mendetta's handwriting.

“Is he dead?” Grantham said. His voice was very low.

Raven sat down and looked round the office. “He had a little accident,” he said. “Things'll be very different now.”

“What are you going to do?” Grantham studied the shabby figure sitting before him.

Raven settled back in his chair. “Plenty,” he said. “This town was too small for Mendetta and me. One of us had to go. Now I'm takin' it over.”

Grantham licked his dry lips. “Mendetta had plenty of protection,” he said. “You won't get far without that.”

Raven inclined his head. “I've thought of that,” he said softly. “That's where you come in. You're going to be my front, Grantham. I've got it all worked out. I'll tell you what to do an' you'll do it. You've done the same thing for Mendetta, so you can do it for me. The difference is that I'm goin' to make more money than Mendetta ever did, an' you're goin' to do a lot more work.”

Grantham didn't say anything.

“Don't think you can get out of it. I haven't the time to play around with guys. If you don't like it you'll run into an accident too. Get it?”

“I'll do it,” Grantham said quickly. “I've been waiting for you to take over. I knew Mendetta wouldn't last.”

Raven inclined his head. “Yeah? You're a smart boy. Okay, tomorrow you an' me'll have a little talk. I want all the dope. I want the names of all the girls who worked for Mendetta. Listen, that guy didn't know how to organize vice. Well, I do. Ever been to Reno, Grantham? No? Well, I have. They make a lot of dough in that town. They understand vice. Well, I've got some ideas. We'll get together.” He stood up. “Just so that you don't feel worried about all this, there's a ten per cent cut coming to you on everything if you play ball. If you don't, you'll get a bullet. Think about it.”

He wandered to the door.

“I'll be down tomorrow at ten. Get all the stuff together,” and he went out, shutting the door softly.

Grantham sat back, feeling slightly sick. So it had happened. Where was Jean? He picked up the phone and hastily dialled Mendetta's number. The operator told him after a short delay that no one was answering. He hung up.

Lu Eller came in. Ever since Mendetta could afford gunmen, Eller had been looking after them. He was a tall, powerfully built man, with a heavy jaw and ingrowing eyebrows.

“What's he want?” he said, standing just inside the doorway.

Grantham lit another cigarette. “That's your new boss,” he said bitterly. “Mendetta's met with an accident.”

Lu raised his eyebrows. “That's too bad. You standin' for Raven?”

Grantham put his elbows on the table. “Let's face it, Lu,” he said. “Since Raven moved in, what's happened? Mendetta lost his grip. We know that. They both came from Chi. Mendetta used to carry a gun for Diamond. He thought he was too big for that, so he moved over here. Well, he got on. What Raven did in Chi.

I don't know, but when he came here he certainly scared Mendetta. He offered to come in as a partner, but Mendetta turned him down. You've seen him, haven't you? Looks like he's down to rock bottom, till you look at his face. That guy's going to be big, and Mendetta knew it. When he turned Raven down he signed his death warrant. Raven promised him he'd fix him, and he has. I think Raven can make me more money than any guy in this town. I ain't interested in anything else but making a lot of dough. Raven's good enough for me.”

Lu looked at him admiringly. “That's the swellest bit of lyin' I've ever heard. It nearly convinces me, but not quite. Shall I tell you why you're saying welcome to Raven? Because you're yellow. Because Raven's a killer, and you know it. Because Raven's got a little mob that is as tough as hell and could smash us up in half an hour. Yeah, that's why.”

Grantham got to his feet. “What about you?” he said. “You goin' to tell Raven where he gets off?”

Lu shook his head. “Sure I'm not,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “What's good enough for you suits me.

I'm yellow too.”

“Instead of yapping like this, suppose you go over to Mendetta's apartment and find out what's happened.

I'm worried about Jean.”

Lu shook his head. “Be your age. Suppose the cops walk in when I'm there? Where should I be? You'll have to wait. The papers'll have it fast enough.”

Grantham said uneasily, “Do you think he's killed her too?”

“Why should you worry? She ain't anybody. If you want to know so badly, go an' see for yourself.”

Grantham paced up and down the room. “We've got to find out, Lu. This is serious. Suppose Jean talked?”

“She won't talk.”

“She might about Raven. If Raven gets pinched, where should we be?”

Lu considered this. “Maybe you're right. Say, isn't O'Hara on that beat?”

“I don't know. Is he?”

Lu turned to the door. “I'll go down there and see. If he is I'll tip him to go up and investigate. What the hell are we payin' that guy two hundred bucks a month for if he can't do a little thing like that?”

Grantham looked relieved. “That's an idea. Get after him right away.” Lu left the room at a run.

June 6th, 1.10 a.m.

SADIE HAD just fallen into a light doze when a sound outside her apartment made her sit up, wide awake again.

She listened, her heart beating wildly, the memory of Raven horribly clear−cut in her mind. She wondered if he had returned. For several minutes she lay listening, then, cautiously, she pulled back the bed−clothes and reached for her wrap.

Silently she went to the front door and looked once through the letter−box. The burly figure of a police officer relieved her of all her fears. He was just going into Mendetta's apartment. She opened the door and stood waiting.

The police officer came out of the apartment in a few minutes. His start of surprise when he saw Sadie puzzled her.

“Isis anythin' wrong in there?” she asked.

He looked at her suspiciously. “Who are you?” he snapped.

“I'm Mrs. Perminger. I thought I heard someone cry out a little while back and I thought I heard someone fall.” Sadie looked at him with big eyes.

O'Hara could have killed her. He'd gone up on Lu's instructions just to look around. He had no intention of reporting Mendetta's death. He had no reasonable excuse for being up there, and now this dame must come and put her oar in.

He said, “I'll come in your place for a moment, Miss. Don't want to be seen in the passage; might scare the folks.”

Sadie coloured. “I don't think you'd better come in. I'mI'm all alone.”

O'Hara nodded. “That's all right,” he said; “if you'll just let me stand in the hall.” He was most anxious that nobody else should see him.

Reluctantly Sadie stepped back and let him in.

“Now then, Miss,” he said, taking out his note−book. “You say you heard someone cry out?”

Sadie nodded. There was something about this cop that she didn't like. She wished he'd go away.

“What time was that?”

“It was just after twelve.”

“Did you see anythin'?” O'Hara looked at her closely.

Sadie hesitated, then she said, “Yes, there was a man who came out of the apartment. He had some papers and a gun in his hand.”

O'Hara felt the sweat break out under his arms. “Yeah?” he said. “You're sure of that?”

“Of course I'm sure.”

“Would you know him again?”

“I'd know him anywhere,” Sadie said firmly. “He was middle height, dark, dressed in a shabby black suit.

His face was very thin, with thin lips and horrible cold eyes. I don't think I'll ever forget him.”

O'Hara hadn't much time. He knew that Lu must hear about this. Grantham hadn't picked him for nothing.

He had his head screwed on all right.

“Well, lady,” he said, “there's been a little accident over there. I guess we'll be looking for that guy. Now will you get dressed? I'd like to take you down to the station house.”

“What, now?” Sadie's eyes opened.

O'Hara nodded. “Sure,” he said. “We'll get you to look through some of the photos we got down there. You might spot the guy right away.”

Sadie wished Benny was there. She felt suddenly extremely helpless and alone. She didn't want to go, but she supposed she had to. “Will you wait here? I'll go and dress.”

O'Hara touched his cap. “I'll meet you downstairs, lady,” he said. “I don't want you bothered with newshawks. If they saw me leave with you we'd never shake them.”

He went away, walking very rapidly.

Sadie dressed. She felt vaguely uneasy and wished now that she hadn't told O'Hara anything. Well, they couldn't do anything to her at the station house. She'd just tell them the truth and then they'd let her go. As she was about to leave the apartment she suddenly thought of something. She ran back to the sitting−room and scribbled a note to Benny. She put it on his pillow, hoping that if he came in he'd find it at once. Then she picked up her bag and went down to the hall.

In the meantime O'Hara met Lu, who was waiting in the street. “Listen, boss,” the cop said quickly, “we're in a jam. Both Mendetta and the jane are dead, but there's a little dame up there who saw Raven leave. She can identify him. I thought you wouldn't like that. She's on her way down now. I told her I was taking her to the station.”

Lu cursed under his breath. He stood thinking for a moment, then nodded. “Listen, tell her I'm a cop when she comes down. I'll take her to Grantham's apartment and he must decide what to do with her. When I've got her out of the way, continue your beat. You don't know anythin' about the killing, get it? The longer it remains under cover the better. It'll give Raven a chance to get set.”

O'Hara nodded. “This'll cost me my job if it comes out,” he said with a sly look.

“Don't worry your head about that,” Lu said impatiently. “We'll look after you. I'll see you get somethin'

extra for this.”

“See that it's worth havin',” O'Hara said, and went back into the hall.

Sadie came down as he entered. He touched his cap respectfully. “An officer of the Homicide Squad is outside with a car, lady,” he said. “You go with him. I gotta do some phoning.”

He led her out to Lu, who was standing by his car. Lu raised his hat.

“This is Mrs. Perminger,” O'Hara said with a broad grin. “She's the little lady who saw the guy I told you about.”

Lu opened the car door. “I'm sorry to get you up at such an hour, Mrs. Perminger,” he said, “but you're goin' to be a big help to us.”

Sadie thought he wasn't at all her idea of a plain−clothes cop, but she got in the car, because she was scared that they'd think she had something to hide. Lu got in beside her.

O'Hara stood watching the car drive away. He spat into the street. “I wonder what they'll do with her?” he thought. “Nice little dame,” and he turned and resumed his patrol with measured steps.

June 6th, 2.30 a.m.

CARRIE O'SHEA ran the only high−class brothel in East St. Louis. There were plenty of other such joints in the town, but none of them came anywhere near Carrie's for class.

For one thing, it stood opposite the District Attorney's office. That alone gave it class. Then Carrie, who ran the house, saw to it that she got a fresh batch of girls each month. That wanted some doing, but Carrie knew variety is the spice of life and her clients never knew from one visit to the next who they were going to find there.

She organized the change by shuffling the girls round from the various other houses, ruthlessly selecting only the young fresh ones and refusing anything that the bookers thought they could hoist on to her.

It was only when Mendetta began his Slaving racket that Carrie really ceased to worry. Now, through a careful system, she was getting new girls pretty steadily. Of course, a lot of them made trouble, but that didn't worry Carrie a great deal. She knew how to handle girls who refused to fall in line.

The system worked this way. Trained thugs carefully combed the town for suitable girls. The qualifications that they considered suitable chiefly consisted of having no relations, being down on their luck, or to have committed some petty crime that the bookers could use as a form of blackmail.

There wasn't a great deal of material to fit these qualifications, and after a while the supply dried up. The bookers got a little more daring. They'd go after girls who wanted jobs as models. They persuaded them to pose in the nude, take photos secretly, and then threaten to show the photos, which had mysteriously become exceedingly obscene by clever faking, to narrow−minded parents. This succeeded for a time.

Although Carrie had ceased to worry about the supply of girls, the bookers were continually having headaches. They got well paid for new material, but they were constantly having to think up new ideas to ensnare unsuspecting girls into the racket.

Finally they got so bold that they'd kidnap girls and hand them over to Carrie to break in. This meant a lot more work for Carrie to do, but she realized their difficulties and she entered into her new task with philosophical fortitude.

Some of the girls were so popular that she kept them in the house as permanent workers. They had been well broken in, they got good money, and they showed no inclination to leave. Such were Andree, Lulu, Julie and Fan.

They were sitting in the big reception−room waiting patiently for Carrie to tell them to go to bed. The last client had gone over half an hour ago. Carrie made a habit of having a word with her girls before turning in for the night: to hear any complaints and to hand out punishment to any of them who hadn't given satisfaction.

The girls were all dressed in flimsy knickers, black silk stockings and high−heel shoes, with big showy garters to keep their stockings in place. They had all thrown wraps round their bare shoulders as soon as the front door closed behind the last client.

Carrie thought it was all very well to sit around half naked when the guys were in the house, but when they had gone she liked to see her girls look decent.

Lulu reached for a cigarette, yawning. “Gee!” she said. “Am I tired? I've gotta get my hair fixed tomorrow morning and I don't know how I'll make it.”

Fan, a red−headed girl with a superb figure, but a hard, almost brutish face, gave a short metallic laugh.

“You don't want to bother about that,” she said. “Get a guy to fix it for you. Do it on the exchange system.”

Lulu frowned at her. “You've got a dirty mind,” she said. “If I had a mind like yours I know what I'd do with it.”

Julie, a little silver blonde, broke in: “Save it, you two. Let's have a little peace once in a while.”

Lulu shrugged. “I'm not startin' anythin',” she said. “I'm just tellin' her she's got a dirty mindso she has.”

Julie went on, “I had the nicest and queerest guy tonight. Gee! The dough he had! When he got upstairs he was terribly shy”

Fan groaned, “We'll now listen to a leaf out of Julie's life story.”

Lulu said, “Go on, Ju, don't mind about her. Maybe she's got the crabs.”

Julie pouted. “Well, I guess I won't tell you if you don't want to hear,” she said. “Only he was such a nice guy−”

Fan sneered. “I know those nice guys,” she said. “I've had one or two. What did he tell you? The one about his wife being an invalid?”

“Can't you leave her alone?” Lulu demanded fiercely. “What's the matter with you tonight?”

Andree, a tall brunette with long tapering limbs, gave a little giggle. “My Gawd! I saw that guy Julie's talkin' about. He looked as if his Ma was waitin' outside for him.”

Julie nodded. “That's the one. He gave me ten bucks as soon as he got in the room”she put her hand over her mouth and spluttered with laughter“in an envelope. Can you tie that? He was so genteel he gave it to me in an envelope.”

Even Fan smiled.

“Well, go on,” Lulu said. “What was he like?”

Julie shook her head. “He didn't do anythin'. When I started to undress he nearly had a fit. What he thought he'd come up there for I can't guess. He said, all embarrassed, that he just wanted to talk to me. And would I put on a wrap as he thought it was tough for a girl like me to sit around as I was. Believe me, you could have knocked me over with a mangle.”

“Yeah?” Fan said bitterly. “I guess I'd sooner sleep with a guy than listen to him talk. A guy who likes talkin' about it can go on for ever.”

“Oh, he talked about all kinds of things. He was ever so interestin',” Julie said stoutly. “I liked the guy. He didn't once ask me why I lived here, or if I liked it, or any of the other crap guys always ask.”

Fan got bored. “Gee! I thought you were goin' to tell us somethin' worth listenin' to,” she said.

“Didn't I tell you she'd got a dirty mind?” Lulu chimed in triumphantly.

Just then the door opened and Carrie came in. Carrie was a tall, thin, muscular mulatto. Her face was cut in hard, etched lines. Glittering black eyes, like glass beads, gave her a look of cold, calculated suspicion and cruelty. Her broad flat nose disfigured what would have been an otherwise strikingly handsome face.

“Time you girls were in bed,” she said sharply. “Break it up. Go on, get off to bed.”

Obediently, all of them except Fan got up and murmured respectful good nights and went out of the door.

Fan continued to sprawl in the chair.

Carrie eyed her with reluctant admiration. She had never been able to tame Fan entirely. She was wise enough to realize that Fan with a broken spirit would be a poor proposition, and she took more from her than any of the other girls put together.

She knew that Fan liked the racket. She knew also that Fan would never have admitted it, but Carrie had long ago come to realize that Fan was physically built for the game.

Carrie said, “You smoke too much. It ain't going to help you when you get older.”

Fan looked at her. “Listen, nigger, I like smokin'. To hell with that stuff about getting old.”

“You'll see. I'm tellin' you when you start slippin' I'll turn you out. Make no mistake, sister, I've got no time for worn−outs.”

Fan got up and gathered her wrap around her. “I'll be gone long before that time,” she said. “One of these days I'm goin' to start out on my own.”

Carrie had heard all this before. She knew Fan was too lazy to hunt up her own clients. “Sure,” she said“one of these days.”

Fan stubbed her cigarette out and then crossed to the big mirror on the wall. She stood looking at herself carefully.

Carrie grinned. She knew that Fan was secretly worried about getting old and useless. She didn't want her to be discouraged. “You're all right,” she said; “one of my best girls.”

Fan looked at her and sneered. “You bet, nigger,” she said; “you an' I ain't the only two who know it.”

She went out of the room, leaving the door wide open.

Carrie went into the little office that led from the reception−room and sat down behind a small desk. With a neat hand she entered some figures in a ledger, and then locked the ledger in a wall safe. She was quite contented the way the business was paying. Tonight had been a good one.

She looked disapprovingly at the clock on the wall. Time was always her enemy. She was a tireless worker and begrudged herself the hours wasted in sleep. But she looked after herself very carefully. She wasn't taking any chances of falling ill. Mendetta was the kind of guy who liked you a lot when you were bringing in the dough, but cast you off once you lost ground. She always gave herself six hours' sleep.

As she was getting up from behind the desk the telephone rang shrilly. She picked up the receiver. “Who is it?”

Grantham's voice floated over the line. “Carrie? Listen, I've got a girl I want you to look after.”

Carrie's mouth twisted. “That's fine,” she said. “Must you ring up at an hour like this to tell me a little thing like findin' me a girl? I've got plenty.”

“Lu's bringing her round right away,” Grantham went on. “This is important. She's not to talk to anyone.

Do you understand? Hell's been poppin' tonight and she knows all about it.”

“What's happened?”

“Tootsie's been bumped. Raven's taken over. And this dame knows a hell of a lot more than she should do.”

“Mendetta's dead?” Carrie repeated.

“Yeah. About a couple of hours ago. They haven't found his body yet. You're not to know anythin' about it.

The news mightn't break for a couple of days.”

“What's this about Raven?”

“He's moved in. You've got a new boss now, Carrie.”

Carrie's fist tightened on the phone. “Why the hell did you let him move in? I tell you, Grantham, that guy's goin' to cause a lot of trouble.”

“Never mind about him. You look after the girl.”

Grantham hung up before she could reply.

Carrie put the phone down slowly. She stood looking at the opposite wall with blank eyes. So Raven had got there at last. She had watched him closely ever since Mendetta had turned him down. She knew that Raven would be a very different boss from Mendetta. Maybe he wouldn't be so mean, but he was going to be a lot more ruthless. Carrie suddenly found herself anxious for her girls. She didn't mind how she treated them herself, but it made her feel dismayed to think that Raven was going to control them all in the future.

She went back into the reception−room and sat down to wait for Lu.