by Jerry eBooks
Dink took a seat not far from the cashier and he could also watch the duo at the far table. He was thankful that his trailing had led him to a place where he could at least keep hunger from killing him. He gratefully cut into his steak.
He didn’t have time to finish his coffee, Crandall passed something to Ordren and both men arose. Dink hastily picked up a menu and buried his face in it. The men paid their checks and left. Dink scrambled from the table.
Outside, he caught a glimpse of the men, walking along and talking earnestly. Dink followed them right back to the parking garage. He crossed the street to the plain black prowl car and waited. The hunch was growing in him that the end of the trail was not far off. He wondered what the final answer would be.
CHAPTER VI
IN A FEW minutes the roadster rolled out into the street, Ordren seated beside Crandall at the wheel. The novelist turned west. Dink started his own car and a sudden fear clutched at him. The airport was to the west and he remembered that Crandall owned a plane.
Crandall drove at a fast clip, yet, well within the traffic rules. Dink had to drop back several times when he was pocketed or a traffic light went against him, However, Crandall stuck to Washington street and Dink was able to keep him in sight, By now night had fallen and Dink felt better. There was less chance of Crandall discovering he was tailed.
Dink lit a cigar and comfortably started chewing on It, his green eyes steady on the two men in the roadster ahead. The city began to thin and shortly they came to the limits. Dink had to drop back though traffic was fairly heavy on the National Highway. At High School Road, Crandall turned south and Dink’s heart dropped. They were going to the airport.
He wondered if he would have to tip his hand and have Ordren arrested on a theft charge. The theft must be cleared but Dink felt the solution of Werner’s death to be the most important. He cursed silently at the run of luck he had encountered in this case.
He braked suddenly, for Crandall swung the roadster off the state road onto a gravel lane that led westward. Dink pulled his car to the shoulder, puzzled. Where was Crandall going? That lane had a dead end not more than, half a mile ahead, no outlet. Dink switched off the motor and lights. He climbed from the car and loosened the automatic he wore in a shoulder holster, He slipped an extra pair of handcuffs in his pocket. It was pitch dark and the lane was but a white blur that was quickly swallowed by the trees. Dink shifted his cigar to the other side of his mouth and started walking.
He went cautiously, his big ears strained to catch any sound. There was nothing alarming, Dink kept away from the lane, trying hard to be soundless. He stumbled once in a ditch and his leg plunged into tepid water. He cursed silently and went on.
A few yards further he stopped, frozen. He had heard the single blast of a shot. His thick lips set grimly around the shredded cigar and the automatic flowed into his hand. He started running.
He heard a motor start a short way ahead. Lights flashed on and swept in a half circle as someone turned the car around. He plunged into a small glade just as the roadster jerked forward.
Dink yelled, “Halt!”
The roar of the motor was deafening and the metal monster thundered down upon him. Dink blasted a shot to the windshield, then jumped for the side of the road. The car missed him by scant inches.
He twisted around and sent three fast shots after the roadster. A tire blew like blasting powder and the car jumped crazily from the road. It hurdled the shallow ditch and jarred to a halt against a tree.
Dink started forward, his face grim. There was a roar and a red tongue that licked toward him from the car. Dink heard the bullet sing close and he dropped flat, rolling to the protection of some bushes. Another bullet whined over his bead but he made the bushes.
He discovered that he had lost his cigar and it made him. angry. He swore fervently and peered toward the car. There was no sound and Dink wondered if the sharpshooter had scurried away. The man cut loose again, his lead searching the frail concealment of the bushes. Dink dropped flat and burrowed his nose in the ground.
The firing stopped and Dink was instantly on his feet. A man had jumped from the car and was zigzagging down the road. His running figure swiftly dimmed. Dink took careful aim and fired. At first, he thought he had missed. Then the man stumbled, caught himself and stumbled again. He took another step or two forward and fell flat.
Dink advanced cautiously toward the sprawled figure. The safety was off the automatic and he was taking no chances. He came closer. The man lay face downward. Dink rolled him over. Stanley Crandall’s pale face showed white in the night. Dink struck a match.
THERE was a long wound along JIL the man’s skull where Dink’s lucky shot had knocked him out. Other than that, he was not hurt. Dink snapped handcuffs on the limp wrists and another pair on the ankles. He straightened and turned back the way he had come.
Dink came to the end of the road, a blank wall of saplings and bushes. He peered into the darkness but could see nothing. He finally held matches low to the ground until he found the tire marks showing where the car had been halted and then turned around.
He worked in a circle from there and finally came upon a broken swath leading into the bushes. He trailed in. A few yards beyond the road, he stumbled over a body on the ground. He quickly recovered, stooped and lit a match.
Porter Stanfield, alias Ordren, was very dead, a bullet in his heart. Dink stared into the white face for awhile then snuffed out the light. He worked his way out of the bushes and back down the road.
Stanley Crandall had recovered consciousness. He was sitting up, staring at the manacles. Dink approached slowly and the novelist’s arrogant face jerked up to him.
Dink sighed and he suddenly felt very tired. “You do a messy job of murder,” he said. “I found your handiwork back in the bushes.” Crandall was silent a moment. Then he spoke, his voice disdainful. “He had it coming. He was a common blackmailer.”
Dink nodded. “I figured that angle. Crandall, you did a much neater job on Werner. Of course, I think you’re a heel to have tried to turn suspicion on Mary Taggart.”
Crandall shouted back. “Why shouldn’t I? She was turning me down for him!” He broke off sharply and there was only the night noises for awhile. Then his voice came quietly. “How did you know?” Dink shrugged. “Oh, I figured it out from what was left laying around. I see the case this way. You told the truth about Werner calling to sell you stock. His real name was Fenton and that was his racket. I also knew that he played the ladies pretty heavy and it was obvious your secretary fell hard for him.
“You were also truthful in reporting the theft of the securities from your safe. Werner was an opportunist of the first water and an open door like that was too much to resist. But after that, Crandall, you tried fiction. You’d write lousy detective novels, judging from the way you tried to set this stage.”
“I’ll be the judge of my own writing,” Crandall snapped.
Dink sighed. “Not much longer, I’m afraid. But here’s what happened. Mary went to Werner, shocked at his theft. You also went to see him to recover the securities and to raise hell about Mary. You had to wait until she was gone and Porter Stanfield got a good eyeful of you hanging around. Enough to make him suspicious, in any case.
“Mary left and you went into Werner. Things got pretty hot and you slugged him. Maybe you hit him too hard, maybe his head cracked against some object. Anyway, you found you had killed him. You were jealous as hell of Mary Taggart and you wanted to get even. So you wrote the note in the typewriter, you set the whole stage, even to gun Werner had just taken from Mary when she was hysterical.
“It worked nicely, you figured. The stage set, you pitched Werner out the window and very calmly left the apartment. Two strikes were against you from the beginning. First, Stanfield probably saw you leave the apartment, but in any case, he knew you had been hanging around after the girl left.
“The second strike was Werner’s way with the women. Mary wasn�
�t the only one, and he had made a definite date with a girl for the night of his death. I never heard of a guy like that bumping himself off. It made your note look silly, and when the note was false, the rest of your setup was haywire.
“I suppose Stanfield told you what he knew and that he could easily have suspicion swung right around and you’d be in trouble. Probably, he pretended to be satisfied with the stolen securities at first. That’s why you changed your mind.”
Crandall growled. “Stanfield was too damned greedy.”
Dink nodded. “All blackmailers are. He called you last night, figuring he could pull out of town safely enough now. But he wanted some more dough and you realized that you were in for a bleeding as long as you lived or your money held out. You figured you could never be sure Stanfield would be silent even if he was paid. So you pulled a second murder.”
Crandall was silent. His voice came in a surly whisper. “I don’t have to confess to anything, you know.”
DINK sighed again. “That’s right. But I can prove Stanfield’s murder and you’re burnt just as bad for one as for two. So you might as well come clean.”
Crandall stirred uneasily. “I’ll think it over. How about getting out of here?”
Dink pitched a key at his feet and he pulled the automatic from the holster, covering Crandall. “Take ’em off your ankles. Think it over in your cell. I’ll book you on tonight’s killing and that’s all I’ll try to prove. But you’ll get the chair, Crandall, Why not give Mary Taggart a clean slate?”
Crandall came to his feet. He smiled at Dink. “She is a nice kid, isn’t she?”
Dink growled, “The best. If I wasn’t so damned old and so damned ugly—” He broke off.
Crandall chuckled as he turned to walk toward the police car. “You’ve got something there, Lieutenant. It’s a good idea for a love story. Well, let’s get going. I’ll make a full statement in the morning.”
They walked down the road toward the car, Crandall slightly ahead. Dink cursed silently and wished he had a cigar to chew. Except for that, everything was fine.
THE END
LITTLE PIECES
C.S. Montany
Don Wheeler, Pyrotechnics Expert, is in on Plenty of Fireworks—and Learns That Revenge is a Two-Edged Sword
I USED to think I, Don Wheeler, was a pretty smart guy. That was when I was keeping company with Marge Kelsey, before I met “Frenchy” Bergdorf and his crowd. Three years ago next September. There were a lot of things I didn’t figure—for instance, that the dame, Paula Drew, would spill to the cops and that they could tie me into it like they did.
I guess I’m lucky at that. If I hadn’t listened to my lawyer, and pleaded the way he said, I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be anywhere!
I liked Bridgetown. It was the right size city. Not too big, but big enough. A lot of factories, mills and warehouses. I understand it’s important now, turning out planes and guns to lick the Axis. But when I was there it was a peaceful burg. That is, until Frenchy Bergdorf and his friends moved in.
I was working for the Star Pyrotechnics Company. It was a steady job. Some people think you only use fireworks on the Fourth of July, but that’s a mistake. The company sold them all the year round.
For instance, we’d always get a big order from the Mardi Gras crowd in New Orleans, around February. Florida always kicked through with big orders. You’d be surprised at all the holidays, the religious festivals and county fairs in the country. South America, too, kept us busy.
I worked in the powder room. I got more dough than the other guys—the boys on the machines who made the casings, tubes, fuses and so forth. Maybe you’d call my job dangerous. I guess it was. I know the insurance company wouldn’t give me a policy.
Nearly every night that summer I used to take Marge over to Lake Waseka. There were boats and canoes for rent. It was nice drifting around in the dark. Some guys brought mandolins. There was a little island halfway up the lake. We used to paddle up there sometimes and watch the stars shine on the water.
I was crazy about Marge. She was eighteen, swell looking. A real blonde, too. Not one of these black-at-the-part babes. She had the best figure in Bridgetown. All curves, soft and cuddly. And speaking of curves, Marge knew all the angles, believe me!
AROUND the end of July, I met Frenchy Bergdorf for the first time. He, Clint Oster and some other lugs were at the boathouse one night when Marge and I came down from the island. Her yellow hair was a little mussed up and I had lipstick on my cheek. Before we went in to get a Coke Marge dipped her handkerchief in the lake and cleaned my pan.
“You look terrible, Don,” she whispered. “Like you’d been peppered with buckshot.”
She was close to me. I tried to reach out and grab her, but she laughed and pushed me away.
I knew Clint Oster fairly well. He never had a steady job, but he always seemed to have plenty of cash. He was tall, with a bad complexion and a couple of front teeth that needed fixing. He got up from the table where he was sitting with the others and spoke to us.
“Hello, Don. Howdy, Marge. Come on over and sit in. I want you to meet my friends. This is Frenchy Bergdorf and Eddie Milton. They’ll be in town for awhile now.”
I didn’t pay much attention to Milton. He was just a sappy looking bird in a striped suit. The mustache he was wearing didn’t add much to his appearance. Bergdorf was different.
Frenchy was big, big all over. He had jet-black hair, and sharp eyes that looked at and through you. His skin was dark like he was always sunburned. That made his teeth seem even whiter than they were. A neat dresser, too. His linen suit looked expensive. It didn’t have a spot on it.
I shook hands with him and we sat down. Frenchy shoved a lot of nickels in the juke box. We gagged and kidded around. Frenchy asked Marge to dance with him, but she shook her head. She said she was tired, that she’d have to be getting on home.
Frenchy kept looking at her. I didn’t object. In fact, it made me feel kind of proud. Marge was my girl. To have people admire her made me feel I was lucky, that I knew how to pick ’em.
“Glad to have met you,” Frenchy said to Marge and me when we stood up to go. “Be seeing you around.”
“What’s his grind?” Marge asked, when I started my ‘35 flivver and we headed for home.
“Search me. What is he, a Greek or a Spick?”
“If they call him Frenchy,” Marge said, “I guess he’s that. Did you notice what nice teeth he has?”
I ran into Bergdorf a couple of nights later. Marge had to stay home and mind her kid sisters while her old man and lady went to the movies. I dropped in at the Omega Bowling Alley to pick up a game. Frenchy, Eddie Milton and Clint were there.
Between strings, I asked Clint what Frenchy did for a living.
“Haven’t you heard?” Oster looked at me as if I was dumb. “He’s the head guy of the Associated Florist Society.”
“What does that mean?”
Clint laughed. “Try and open a flower shop or greenhouse or run that kind of a business without signing with Frenchy’s society and see what happens.”
Still, I didn’t understand exactly what Bergdorf’s racket was.
HE TOOK a liking to me. It was mutual, because I liked Frenchy. I liked the way he dressed, the way he talked, the way he acted. He’d been around. He had a big city polish. He never got excited, always kept his voice quiet. But when he got sore about anything, and turned on the pressure, it showed in his eyes and the way a muscle twitched in his cheek.
From what he dropped, Frenchy was quite a ladies’ man. But particular. He didn’t run after dames just because they were dames. If they didn’t have class and looks, he never gave ’em a second glance.
After all, why should he? He had money. He didn’t have to bother with the riff-raff and the janes that only liked a guy for what they could get out of him.
He opened an office in the Manning Building on the corner of Second Street and Congress Boulevard. It was furnished in red l
eather and mahogany. He had a girl working for him by the name of Paula Drew. Miss Drew had been with Frenchy in Chicago. He told me she knew the business backwards, that he paid her sixty bucks a week.
Paula Drew was a nice, clean-looking girl. Not as attractive as my Marge, but different. She was older, more sophisticated. Any time I dropped in at Frenchy’s office, she was always busy on the books.
When Miss Drew worked on them she wore horn-rimmed spectacles. They made her look like a school teacher. She boarded with the Klausmeyers on Valentine Lane. Sometimes in the evening, when I was coming back from the fireworks’ factory, I’d meet her crossing Second Street. She’d always give me a funny little smile and a nod.
It was in August that I began to have trouble with Marge.
One night she stood me up. We had a date to go to the lake. When I stopped by to get her it was her mother who came to the door.
“Don, Marge went to see her cousin Ella,” Mrs. Kelsey told me. “She said to tell you she’s sorry. She’ll call you up tomorrow.”
Marge called all right, and I saw her that Thursday. But Saturday night it happened again. This time she rang me at the plant. Jackson, the foreman on the second floor, told me I was wanted on the phone.
“And don’t make this a habit, Wheeler,” he said. “You know what the rules are about personal calls during business hours.”
Marge, on the wire, said: “Don, I’m terribly sorry. I’ll have to break tonight’s date. Don’t be sore, Don. Ella’s been sick and there’s no one else but me to take care of her.”
“Why don’t she get a trained nurse?”
“Please don’t be angry, Don. You can’t help sickness. I’ll see you Monday, positively. Come over at eight—earlier. And Don—haven’t you anything nice to say? Tell me something sweet.”
I stood there for a minute, the receiver like a piece of ice in my hand. Then I blurted out: “Okay, babe. You know it. I’m nuts about you. All day I’ve been thinking about you—the island, the stars—”