The Mike Hammer Collection (44 page)

Pat jumped to his feet, a light blazing in his eyes. “Son of a bitch, if it is we can rip him apart! We can split this racket right down the middle!”

His language was getting contaminated from hanging around private detectives. “Only temporarily,” I reminded him.

“It's better than not at all. It'll pay for people getting killed. Where did you get it, Mike?”

“Your boy Candid has himself a party den in the Village. While you were popping the questions he sent his lads up to get that book, taking no chances. I surprised them at it. The damn thing was worth their trying to knock me off. I just missed having my head handed to me.”

“You can identify them, then?”

“Nope. I didn't see their faces. But one will have a cut on his hand and a beauty across his forehead. The other guy is his pal. Ask around the club. I think they were Murray's personal bodyguards. We put the squeeze play on so fast Murray didn't have time to pull that book himself. He probably figured nobody would question Ann's death except for routine questioning at his joint.”

“You might be right. I'll get this thing photostated and hand it around to the experts. I'll let you know what comes of it.”

“Good.”

“Where will I get in touch with you?”

“You won't. I'll get in touch with you.”

“I don't get it, Mike. Won't you be ... ?”

He stopped when he saw the expression on my face. “I'm supposed to be dead.”

“Good Lord!”

“There were three guys at Murray's place. One wasn't in on it. All he wanted was the redhead's ring. He gave it to me square in the chest. So he's gonna drop his load when he sees me again.”

Pat caught the implications at once. “He tailed you. The same guy killed the blonde, tailed you home, searched your place and stayed right behind you until he had a clear shot at you.”

“Uh-huh. In a dark hallway.”

“And he just wanted the ring?”

“That's right. I had that book on me and he never looked for it.”

“That makes two parties. Both after you for a different reason.”

“Could be the same reason, but they don't know it.”

A grin spread over his face. “They'll be waiting for your body to show. They'll have their ears to the ground and their eyes open. They'll want to know what happened to your body.”

I nodded. “Let 'em wonder,” I said slowly. “They'll think the cops are keeping it quiet purposely. They'll think you have more than you're giving out. Let's see what happens, Pat.”

“Ummm.” That was all he said. He went to the door, looking satisfied, his mind pounding out the angles. He turned around once, grinned, waved good-bye and was gone.

Lola picked up the empty bottle and looked at me sideways. “If you're really dead it's going to be a wonderful wake.”

I faked a kick at her and she ducked out for a refill. When she came back she was serious and I knew it. Her eyes questioned me before she asked, “Could you tell me ... about your place being searched, I mean? If I have to worry about you I want to know what I'm worrying about.”

I told her then, skipping some details, just a general outline of what had occurred. She let me bring it up to date, absorbing every word, trying to follow with her mind. When I was through I let her mull it over.

Finally she said, “The baby clothes, Mike ... it fits.”

“How?”

“Nancy had stretch marks on her abdomen. Purplish streaks that come with pregnancy. I never questioned her about it.”

“We discovered that. It was a stillbirth.”

“The father ... ?”

“No trace.”

She was thinking of something else and chewed on her fingernail. “Those pictures that were stolen....”

“Only snapshots of her when she was younger.”

“That isn't it.”

“What then?”

“This person who was so careless ... you said he just took the ring ... didn't look for the book you had....”

“He didn't know I had it.”

“No, I don't mean that. Maybe he just took the pictures. He didn't look at them, he just took them. He would have taken any pictures.”

I was beginning to get the point, but I wanted to make sure. “What are you getting at, Lola?”

“Nancy had a camera, I told you that. Maybe it was pictures she took that were wanted. Maybe the others were taken by mistake.”

It made sense. I gave her neck a little squeeze and grinned through my teeth. “Now you're the smart one,” I told her. “You said Nancy wouldn't go in for blackmail.”

“I said I
thought
she wouldn't. I still don't think she would, but who can tell?”

“You know, we're throwing this right in Feeney Last's lap. If he's the bastard behind this he's going to get it right!”

Lola laid her hand over mine, reaching for my fingers. “Mike ... don't get excited too fast. You have to think about it first. If he's not the type....”

“Hell, he's the type, all right. Could be that I didn't give him credit for being that smart. You can't tell what goes on behind their heads, Lola. Their faces might be blank as an empty coconut, but up here there's a lot of brain power. Damn! Just follow Feeney with me ... he approached Red in the hash house ... he had her scared and a lot of other people scared. He was tough and dirty and decent people are usually scared of that kind. He could carry a gun to push a scare through, even if that wasn't the purpose of the gun. What a nice setup he had!

“So Nancy had his blackmail stuff ... he said it was pictures of somebody in a hotel room with a babe. Who was the somebody and who was the babe? Maybe it was Nancy herself. If she had a good camera she could take shots automatically with a time arrangement on the camera. Maybe Feeney knew she had it and wanted it ... maybe it was the other way around and he had it and she got it. Hell, maybe they were in it together.

“One thing we know, Feeney searched her room. He's a snotty little bastard who'd take a chance on anything. There's only one trouble. Feeney has an alibi. He was with Berin-Grotin when Nancy was killed, and unless he was able to sneak off without the old boy knowing it he had to have somebody else do the job.”

She reviewed it with an expression that reminded me of Pat, making me eat my own words. “But you said Mr. Berin was positive in his statement ... and the police were just as positive that the boy ran down Nancy accidentally. How can you get around that?”

My chest started hurting again and I slumped back. “Ah, I don't know. Nothing makes sense. If Nancy was an accident, who took her ring off and why ... and why the trouble to get it back? The ring's the thing. If I could find what it meant I'd have it.”

I pulled out the cigarettes, stuck two in my mouth and lit them. Lola took hers from between my lips and dragged on it deeply. When I closed my eyes she said, “That's not the point I'm trying to make, Mike. Nancy had pictures of some sort that were important. Her place was searched for them ... must have been because then they already had the ring. You say they didn't find them. Then they searched your place and took pictures that apparently had no meaning. All right, suppose they didn't have any meaning ... where are the ones that have?”

Good Lord, how could I be so incredibly stupid! I took the cigarette and squashed it out in my hand and never felt it burn me. The pictures, the pictures. Nancy must have used herself to work up the prettiest blackmail scheme that ever was. She had pictures of everything and everybody and was getting ready to use them when Feeney Last in his visits to her room saw the damn things and wanted them himself.

Of course, how could it be any other way? A cheap gunman with big ideas who saw a way to cash in. But before he could do the job himself Nancy stepped out in front of a car and got herself killed. Maybe Feeney even had a guy tailing her to keep track of things, a guy who knew enough to take the ring off and stall identification. And why? Because when she was identified somebody else might get to the stuff first. The ring was an accident.

And Nancy was just a blackmailer at heart.

Nuts, I still didn't care what she was. For a little while she was my friend. Maybe Feeney didn't kill her, but he had it in mind, which was the same thing to me and he was going to pay for it. I had liked the blonde, too.

I blew a ring at the ceiling and Lola stuck her finger through it. She was waiting again, giving me time to think. Aloud, I said, “The camera, Lola, where could it be?”

She answered me with a question. “Didn't Nancy imply to you that she was up against it for some reason?”

The redhead had, at that. “Uh-huh. Business was bad, she said. Feeney might have conceivably been driving her customers away purposely. He tried it with me that first night. She needed dough. She hocked the camera.”

Each thought brought a newer one. The puzzle that had been scattered all over the place was being drawn in on the table by an invisible vacuum cleaner. Ghostly fingers were picking up the pieces and putting them in place, hesitating now and then to let me make a move. It was a game. First he'd put in one, then I'd put in one. Then he let me put in two, three, urging me to finish the puzzle myself. But some of the pieces would fit in two places, and you'd have to hold them out until you were sure.

The old biddy at Nancy's rooming house said she showed up with a couple of bucks and nothing else. She was broke. Where did she come from? Was she trying to get away from Feeney Last ... only to have him catch up with her anyway? Like Cobbie Bennett said, the grapevine had a loud voice. It could certainly keep track of a redheaded prostitute. So she moved around trying to get away from him and couldn't. Some place behind her she had left the wealth of pictures he was after and they were still there. Still there waiting to be found and right now somebody was looking for them and taking his time because he thought I was dead. Feeney Last was in for a big surprise.

Lola slipped her arm around me. “Is it finished?”

“Almost.” I relaxed in peaceful anticipation.

“When?”

“Tomorrow. The next day. It'll be soon. Tomorrow we'll pick up the trail. First, I'll have to get a new gun. Pat'll fix me up. Then we'll begin.”

“Who's we?”

“Me and you, sugarpuss. I'm supposed to be dead, remember. A corpse can't go roaming around the streets. Tomorrow you're going to run your poor legs to the bone checking every hock shop in town until we find that camera. There will be an address on the ticket, if it's still around, and that's what we want.”

Lola showed her teeth in a grin and poked her legs out in front of her. Very temptingly she inched her dress up, letting me see the lush fullness of the calves, bringing it higher over her knees until the smooth white flesh showed over her stocking tops.

Her eyebrows were lifted in a tantalizing way and she whispered. “Won't that take a lot of walking?”

It would take a hell of a lot of walking.

I reached over and pulled her dress down, which wasn't like me at all, but it was worth it because she threw her head back and laughed and I kissed her before she could close her mouth and felt her arms tighten around my neck until it hurt again.

I pushed her away roughly, still holding her close and she said, “I love you, Mike, I love you, I love you, I love you.”

I wanted to tell her the same thing, but she knew it was coming and stopped me with her mouth again. She stood up then, holding out her hands so she could pull me to my feet. While I watched she transformed the sofa into a bed and brought out a pillow from her bedroom. I kicked off my shoes and tossed my coat and tie on a chair. “You go to bed,” I said, “we'll hold the wake some other night.”

“Good night, Mike.” She blew me a kiss. I shook my head and she came back for a real one. I lay down on the sheets trying to figure out whether I was a jerk, just plain reformed, too tired or in love.

I guessed it was because I was too tired and I fell asleep grinning.

CHAPTER 11

I
t was the sound of coffee bubbling and the smell of bacon and eggs sizzling in a pan that awakened me. I yawned, stretched and came alive as Lola walked in. She was just as lovely in the morning as she had been last night. She crooked her finger at me. “Breakfast is served, my lord.”

As soon as she went back to the kitchen I climbed into my clothes and followed her. Over the table she told me that she had already called and told her boss that she was sick and was ordered to take the day off. Several, if she needed them.

“You're in solid, I guess.”

She wrinkled her nose at me. “They're just being nice to a good worker. They like my modeling technique.”

When we finished she went into the bedroom and changed into a suit, tucking her hair up under her hat. She deliberately left off most of the make-up, but it didn't spoil her looks any. “I'm trying to look like I can only afford to do my shopping in hock shops,” she explained.

“They'll never believe it, honey.”

“Stop being nice to me.” She paused in front of the mirror and surveyed the effect, making last minute adjustments here and there. “Now, what do I do and say, Mike?”

I leaned back in the chair, hooking my feet over the rungs. “Take the phone book ... the classified section. Make a list of all the joints and start walking. You know the camera ... it may be in the window, it may be inside. Tell the guy what you want and look them over. If you see it, buy it. Remember, what you want is the address on the ticket. You can make up your own story as you go along ... just make it good and don't appear overanxious.”