by Jerry eBooks
I got out of the place just in time to keep from being sick.
Miss Bryce said: “If he wasn’t there that means there’s still a chance, doesn’t it, Mr Shannon?”
“I’m afraid it’s slight,” I told her. “What about that ad?”
“I got a friend of mine who knows a columnist down there to ask about it. It was a girl named Mary Ames who put it in. Does that help you any?”
“Quite a bit!” Then I told her that I’d keep in touch with her.
I hung up the phone, feeling even sicker than I had at the morgue. I remembered what the girl had said when I’d mentioned the twenty dollars I was going to give her for the information. She’d said she wasn’t telling me anything because of the twenty, and I’d asked her why she was talking then. She’d said I wouldn’t understand—and I hadn’t then.
Finding about the ad gave me the answer. The kid had been sticking around and she’d seen he was going to get into trouble. She had tried to get him out of there without telling him anything that would hurt the place too much.
I didn’t understand this last—but I had a notion I would in a very short time. In fact, just after Darnell’s closed after that night’s business.
That’s when I planned on crashing the place.
We went in at half-past four. Just Whitey and I. We waited until the band boys had packed up and left and until most of the stragglers were gone. But we didn’t wait long enough for any of the help to leave. I mean kitchen help and waiters and bar men. I didn’t know who was wrong and who was right in the place. And I didn’t want any of the wrong ones to get away.
The doors were locked, of course, so we went in through a window we opened on the dressing-room side of the place. I went in first. Then Whitey passed me the gun I’d made for him during the afternoon and followed it.
It was a good gun, but not handy for housebreaking. I’d gone into a second-hand shop and picked up one of the best guns the Winchester people ever made—an 1897 model twelve-gauge shotgun. That’s the one with the hammer.
The new hammerless pumps are quieter and maybe they work a little smoother. But those old hammer guns never hung up and there was never a question about ’em being ready for action. All you have to do is pull the hammer back and pull the trigger.
I’d taken a hacksaw and cut the barrel off just in front of the pump grip. There were five shells in the barrel and another in the chamber, and all loaded with number one buck shot. That’s the size that loads sixteen in a shell, and for close-range work that’s just dandy. They’re big enough to blow a man to hell and back, and there’s enough of them to spread out and take in a lot of territory.
It was the logical weapon for Whitey, because he didn’t know any more about a pistol than a cat knows about heaven. And he’d shot a rifle and shotgun a few times.
And he was out for blood. It wasn’t that he’d been roughed up in my room at the time I killed Maury Cullen—because that didn’t bother him. That was just a piece of hard luck to him. When I’d been knocked out and my gun taken from me no doubt the barman had rolled me and found my address and had remembered it.
Whitey had just happened to be calling when they came after me. It wasn’t that. It was the girl being killed that was getting him crazy. And he was getting crazy, no mistake. He was a little punchy anyway, from a few too many fights, and when he got excited it hit him.
I whispered: “Now remember! I make the play, if there’s one made. Wait for me and back me up. Don’t start it.”
He mumbled: “The dirty skunks!”
I went out to the front and peeked through the curtain shutting off the hall from the main room. There were still a few people finishing up their last drinks. But the lights had been cut and the bar was closed, and only one waiter was in evidence.
Quite a lot of noise came from the kitchen, and I figured they’d be following the usual roadhouse custom of eating after the guests had left. So I went back to where I’d left Whitey and his shotgun.
“We’re getting a break!” I said. “I think they’ll all be together in the kitchen. Let’s find the door.”
Somebody found it for us. We were going down the hall toward the back of the place when a door opened just ahead of us and somebody stepped out. I could hear dishes rattle and heard somebody laugh. The man who’d opened the door turned away from us without seeing us, letting the door slam shut behind him.
He didn’t get far. I didn’t know who he was or whether he was right or wrong, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I caught him just as he started to open another door. When he turned his head to see who was running up to him I slammed him across the jaw with the side of my gun. It’s no trick—you just palm it and swing.
Down he went and I took a look in the room. It was empty and I went back to Whitey, who was just outside the kitchen door. Whitey was breathing through his nose, like he used to do in the ring.
I said: “Let’s go!” and opened the door into the kitchen.
And I was in, with Whitey and the shotgun right on my heels, before anybody even looked around.
It wasn’t the way I’d have put ’em if I’d had the placing. There were two guys in white aprons over in front of a big range. One man in a waiter’s uniform was just in back of them. The barman who’d first slugged me was sitting at a kitchen table, alongside the one the dead girl had pointed out as being the boss.
Another waiter was leaning across the table and telling them something they were laughing over. One other waiter was right in back of them, and two men were sitting at the same table with their backs to us.
They didn’t stay that way. The waiter saw by the look on the tough barman’s face that something was behind him, and he swung. So did the two men by him.
The odds were all wrong and I was glad the shotgun idea had occurred to me. Nine of them and two of us—but the shotgun evened it a bit.
I said: “Everybody over against the wall. Jump!”
I moved the muzzle of my gun a little, and Whitey croaked: “Move!”
The two cooks and two of the waiters started to move. But they never had time to get to the wall. All hell broke loose—like I was hoping it would. The big barman stood up and brought a gun up from where he’d pulled it under the protection of the table. I shot him as near centre as I could. When he didn’t fall I did it again.
He tottered and looked at his boss, just in time to see the front of the man’s face go out the back of his neck. I swear it looked like that. Whitey’s shotgun just blew his face off at that distance. One of the men who’d been sitting with their backs to us fell off his chair. He started to crawl under the table, but the other one stood up, dragging at a gun he must have been carrying in a hip pocket holster.
I took time and did it right. I lined the sights of my gun on the pit of his stomach and let go. Then he doubled up and fell straight toward me. He landed on his face, without even putting his hands out to break his fall.
Whitey’s shotgun blasted out again. The waiter on our side of the table went back through the air at least three feet. It was as if there’d been a rope around his middle and somebody had yanked. Then the man who’d ducked under the table shot. I sat down on the floor without knowing how I got there. Whitey shot twice. There was a lot of thumping noise coming from under the table and no more shooting.
The two cooks and the waiters who were left were against the wall, but only two of them were standing with their hands up. The other two were sitting on the floor holding their hands on their legs and howling blue murder.
Whitey said: “You hurt bad, Joe?”
The slug I’d taken had gone through the fleshy part of my leg. I didn’t think it had touched the bone because I could move my foot and not hear anything grate.
I said: “I don’t think so. Tell those guys over against the wall to come over to me one at a time. I’ll shake ’em down and you watch it.”
Whitey said: “To hell with it. They’re in this, too. They get the same.”
I d
on’t know yet whether he was bluffing or meant it, or was just a little crazy with excitement and didn’t realize what he was doing. Anyway, he raised the shotgun and the men by the wall screamed at him not to do it. I shouted the same thing.
“Go out in front and collect everybody,” I said. “Bring ’em in, customers and all. They see that shotgun and they’ll mind you.”
Whitey went out of the service door. He came back in a moment with a puzzled look and a bottle of whisky.
“There’s nobody there and the front door’s wide open,” he said. “I thought you could use a drink.”
I had the bottle up to my mouth when the big barman—the one I’d first shot—started to move. He’d fallen ahead, so that his head and upper body were across the table. Now he raised his head and looked at me, saying: “I knew I should have taken you and that girl out of the way that first time you came in. My name’s Ames—I was married to Mary.”
Then he put his head down again, but it didn’t stay there. He slipped down on the floor, moving gradually at first, then hitting the floor with a bang.
Whitey said to the four men by the wall: “Well, you guys going to talk, or do I turn loose on you?”
They talked with that, and I didn’t blame them. A dumb man would have found speech if he’d looked at Whitey and that shotgun, because Whitey certainly looked as though he wanted to use it.
I heard all about it in the hospital. It was a good hospital, too, and I had a private room. With the Bryce girl’s father footing the bills.
Whitey said: “Yeah, the state cops found Harper’s body back in the woods. One of them damn waiters showed ’em where to look. The kid got looping drunk and kept wandering around the place. Finally he walked into Maury Cullen and his two pals who were hiding out.
“The barman and Maury and his pals grabbed the kid, but they didn’t knock him off right then. They held him down in the hideout room, in the basement of the joint. That’s what the spot was doing as a side-line—hiding out guys who were plenty hot and willing to pay for a place to stay.”
“That’s what the cops said.”
Whitey went on: “Well, the gal didn’t want to turn in her husband, even if she wasn’t living with him. She gets the idea that if somebody come looking for Harper they’d get scared and turn him loose. They didn’t—they knocked him on the head and buried him instead. He’d been nice to the girl—he’d even given her his frat pin after his girlfriend had given it back to him. That killing got the girl. She wanted to squawk, but she was scared of her husband.”
“She was going to talk to me,” I said.
“But she wasn’t going to let her husband know about it,” Whitey explained. “He caught her and they knocked her off. Anyway, the whole gang were in the hideout racket and they’re all going up. You know, Joe, I should have told you about Maury, but I didn’t have the guts. I knew the guy the minute I saw him in the can.
“He was a bad one years ago. He’d come to me when I was fighting and wanted me to throw a fight. That’s why I didn’t want to tell you, see? I figured you’d think maybe I was crooked or something. Say! You going to get in trouble with the cops over this?”
“Hell, no!” I told him. “Bryce got everything cleared. The cops act like I’ve got a medal coming. They figured it cleared out a bad bunch they didn’t know about. And then, Bryce pulls a lot of weight. It’s all okay.”
“Swell, Joe,” Whitey said, beaming at me.
“Tell me something,” I said.
“Sure, Joe.”
“Did you throw that fight that Maury Cullen wanted you to throw?”
Whitey stared at me and said: “Why—hell, yes! D’ya think I’m nuts?”
THE SILENT WITNESS
H. Frederic Young
Young Brenda chauffered her father and a kill-crazy gunman to the brink of a gruesome grave.
AS SHE stepped along the dark foyer, Brenda simply could not resist the dual voices behind her father’s bedroom door, so she paused and frowned. Then, her hand moving hesitantly, grasped the knob and gently turned it, pushing the door slowly inward.
She took one step across the threshold. She stopped and felt tight inside. A man, waving a black automatic at her father, turned and scowled at her. He wore a black overcoat and a black, rakish hat which he had not bothered to remove. He made a curt motion with his head while the gun flicked her way.
“Step inside, Babe.”
She did not move. “If it’s money you want,” she said unsteadily, “I’ll open the safe. Father’s stubborn and probably wouldn’t.”
He dug in his coat pocket and brought out a pack of cigarettes, working one free and grasping it with his thin lips. Then he grinned and a beam of morning sunlight easing around the curtain flashed on his white teeth. “It ain’t money, Babe,” he said, patting his coat pocket with his free hand. “I’ve got that already.”
She watched him crease a match with his thumbnail and light the cigarette. She looked at the automatic and the man’s eyes, both merciless.
“Then what do you want?” she asked, but the expression on her father’s face almost told her.
“Your father just decided to go for a nice long ride this morning.” The man gave a short chuckle. “I didn’t figure you would be up this early. But since you are you’ll have to go along.”
She turned to her father. He glanced up helplessly. Brenda paled; her fingernails dug into her purse. “You mean—”
“Take it easy, honey,” her father said. “I sentenced this gunman to life in prison, ten years ago. He got a parole and he’s back for revenge. He can’t get away with it.”
“Step on it!” snapped the gunman. “You’re wasting my time. I got places to go.” He flicked ashes on the floor and added: “Anybody but a yokel could get by with this job.”
The girl chewed thoughtfully on her lip. “Are we going in your car?” she questioned the man.
He looked at her, and she could feel the insolence of his eyes. “Why, Babe, when you plan a thing ten years you ain’t liable to make a phony move like that. In the first place I ain’t gotta car. Now listen close, Babe, because I ain’t got time to be repeating myself. We all three walk out the front door, just like me and your father was taking you to work. Do you usually drive down yourself?”
She hadn’t moved, kept leaning against the door jamb. “I used to,” she admitted, with a sidelong glance at her father. “But since I lost—”
“Never mind the explanations!” the man snapped. “I just wanted to know if you could drive a car.” The girl’s father parted his lips to speak, but the gunman waved him to silence by the quiet menace of the automatic. “Don’t waste my time arguing. Get your coat on, judge . . . When we get in the car you take the wheel, Babe. That’ll look natural. Your father will sit in front with you, and I’ll sit in the back seat. Don’t forget I gotta gun. One squawk or phony move if we pass a copper, and I can silence you plenty.”
“I’m ready,” said the girl’s father.
Outside, in the crisp morning, they stepped quickly to the garage. Brenda slipped inside the big sedan and moved under the wheel. Her father handed her the key, and soon the motor was humming.
The gunman sat in the back seat with the automatic on his lap. “Get moving!” he ordered. “What’s the delay? And one more thing—don’t break no traffic rules.”
Dropping the car into reverse, Brenda eased out of the garage and then began spinning the wheel.
“The other way,” the man said.
SHE reversed the wheel and the car moved forward, sputtering and jerking a little.
“Damn it! Choke it a little,” snapped the man from the back seat. “I’m not a yokel. Don’t try to pull a motor stall on me.”
“Which way?” asked Brenda icily. “Turn right at the next corner, then north on the Valley Boulevard. Nice place, about twenty miles out. Just one motor cop on that stretch this time of morning.”
They drove along in silence a few miles. Brenda began to realize h
ow thoroughly the gunman had worked out his little plan. Just one motor cop along this stretch, she knew. And, Judge Balcomb’s daughter or not, she’d learned that Drescoll, the morning cop on this run, would stand no infraction of traffic rules.
Three times in the past year Drescoll had flagged her down and issued her a ticket for speeding. She remembered his reproachful words the last time. “That’ll be the end of my trouble with you for a spell. Miss Balcomb.”
They were humming along a level stretch when the gunman, jabbing something cold into the nape of her neck, suddenly warned her to travel slower.
“We’re nearing the copper’s hangout,” he said.
The girl’s father sat in stony silence. Finally the gunman growled a curse.
“Here he comes.”
“Yes, it’s him.” Brenda went tight inside.
The man leaned back in the seat. His eyes were on the motorcycle, too. “I’m aiming at the back of your head,” he told the girl. “Just look plenty natural, is all. I can see your face in the rear vision mirror, so don’t try any monkey-shine faces at the copper.”
“No, I won’t—”
She sat perfectly at ease and looked straight ahead as the drone of the white motorcycle came even with the car, then passed.
The man in the back seat chuckled softly, then shot a quick glance through the back window—and sent a curse through his clamped teeth.
“That damn copper!” he exclaimed. “He’s turning around.”
BRENDA was ostensibly fighting down a smile, and in the rear vision mirror she saw the gunman’s mouth twitching while his eyes nervously darted from side to side. Then the faint wail of a siren came knifing into the car.
“Hit the gas!” screamed the gunman. Brenda stomped her right foot down and the big sedan leaped out. Her lips were tight and she barely breathed. The chase went through low hills and swept around wide curves. Brenda watched the speedometer waver past ninety. The siren spilled its eerie wail through the interminable thickets, growing steadily louder. From the corner of her eyes the girl could see the front wheel of the motorcycle. The gunman lowered a window and fired. The siren chopped off.