N THE D. A.’s office some time later, Willie Klump sat near Satchelfoot Kelly listening to Mrs. Ginzer tell a story he
almost doubted himself.
“Yeah,” the widow said. “Virgo wasn’t in that hotel fire. That’s his corpse in the morgue. Harry the Ox arranged for it to be there. It was like this. Virgo called me from Trenton on the morning after the fire where he went to look over a hijacking proposition. The day before he got his pockets picked and the crook must have gone to that town upstate and registered at the hotel. He says for me to be sure to identify him as my husband, as then we
could collect double indemnity on a twenty-five-grand insurance policy which would be fifty grand.”
“Oh, brother,” Satchelfoot Kelly squeezed out.
“Virgo said for me to give him time to change his looks and that he’d stay away under another name until we got the sugar. But the dope sneaked into the apartment one night an hour after Harry the Ox knocked on my door,” Mrs. Ginzer forced out. “Me and Harry found out we was still that way about each other and I told him about Virgo and what had happened, and then we cooked up we would take the fifty- grand insurance for ourselves, and run away to Rio or some place far away— where we couldn’t be nabbed.
The D.A. said, “Only you could have uncorked a rhubarb like this, Willie. If anyone else had, I wouldn’t believe it. Go on, Mrs. Ginzer. So you had to make sure your husband was really defunct, that right?”
“Harry the Ox did,” the widow said, letting the floodgates down. “I weakened at the last minute, but he did the job while I wasn’t looking and later on we got Virgo out the back way and into a car. We dumped him and came back to stick around until—”
“So he took the name of Louie Kropper when he saw he was burned in a fire,” Willie said. “I wouldn’t of got into this if
Mrs. Kropper hadn’t hired me to find Louie. And if Nolly Okum out at Jamaica hadn’t told me about the stitches in Virgo’s noggin—”
“Well, Klump,” the D.A. said after the doll was led away, “the F.B.I. should reward you for this. Somebody look out for Kelly quick. I think he’s got a fit or something.”
“This time I don’t blame nobody for throwin’ one,” Willie said. “I hope they’ll build a special Alcatraz for Harry the Ox else I’ll never rest comfortable in my bed from now on.”
“Don’t worry, Willie,” the D.A. said. “Harry the Ox will sit in a gas chamber.”
Gertie Mudgett called Willie up the next morning. “What makes you think I would stay mad with you, sugar?” she cooed. “That was a laugh on me what you and Kelly did at that rest’rant. Ha ha! That was a swell picture of you in the tabloid, honey lamb.” Butter could’ve melted in her mouth.
“So six other babes told me that called up,” Willie needled. “I got to sign off as more reporters are here to see me.”
“I thought maybe we could see a movie tonight, darling,” Gertie persisted. “Borgart is in that picture playin’ at Louie’s Lexington called ‘The Corpse Sends Flowers.’”
“Oh, they are silly,” Willie said. “They are always so farfetched.”
PHOTO FINISH FOR A DAME
Late one afternoon when William Klump was considering closing the office of the Hawkeye Detective Agency, Inc., not only for the day but for keeps, a female of quite some magnitude opened his door and walked in. The droopy feather on her hat nearly brushed the ceiling, and the blue suit she wore, Willie was very positive, had enough material in it to clothe all the jack-tars on a flat-top. He judged the caller to be on the risky side of sixty but would not have cared to go even two rounds with the old babe in Stillman’s gym.
The visitor surveyed Willie’s modest office briefly, then after being sure he was W. J. Klump, turned ponderously and called out, “Come on in here, Bartholomew.” Entered forthwith a character of bantamweight proportions wearing a little soft hat he seemed to be balancing atop his little egg-shaped noggin. He had eyes like a penitent bunny rabbit, slightly-bucked teeth, and a twitchy little nose.
“I am Mrs. Herford Fusty,” the large female said. “This is my son, Bartholomew, but all aitch only knows why he lives without no backbone, an’ how he lived with that wife of his so long without knowin’ she was a two-timin’ jazzbelle who can’t never pass even a peanut stand if it whistles.”
“Now, Ma,” Bartholomew protested. “Don’t you go talkin’ about Electra like that as—”
“Shut up!”
“Yes, Ma.”
“Mr. Klump,” Mrs. Herford Fusty said, her lower jaw thrust out like an irked umpire’s, “I want you should follow Bartholomew’s wife, especially on Friday nights. Not more’n a few days ago when me an’ the girls of the Greenpernt Women’s Political Club had our annual lunch at the Hotel Picadillo I saw that blonde traipsin’ out of the cocktail lounge with a character looked like Toots Sher. So I ast Bartholomew where would she git fur coats an’ toopaz earrings on what he makes as a mortician’s helper. She never got that wine-colored dress she was wearin’ out of no casket linin’ material.”
“She goes around a lot t’ quiz programs on the radio,” Bartholomew sniffed. “Only couple of weeks ago, Klump, she come home with a deep freeze unit, a new Jap beetle trap, an’ three cases of canned pineapple. Maybe she swaps—”
“A likely story!” Mrs. Fusty says down her nose. “I won’t have no blonde takin’ my only son for a sucker, Klump! I want evidence against that babe that’ll stick, see. So’s Bartholomew won’t even have t’ pay alimony. What you charge?”
ILLIE struggled to assume an air of indifference and importance. He
riffled papers on his desk, quickly pushed aside an arty magazine and said, “This matter is kind of persons sans gratis an’ has some semblance of status crow. My fee on such jobs is fifty down an’—”
“That is okay, Klump,” Mrs. Fusty said, and opened a handbag big enough to accommodate three days rations for an
elephant. Bartholomew demurred, however. “Now, ma, it ain’t me doin’ this. I still says—”
“Sha-a-addup!” Mrs. Fusty yelped. “If you are willin’ t’ be made a patsy of, I ain’t, sonny boy. Now tell Mr. Klump where you live whicht is in a basement apartment on East Eighty-sevent’ Street.”
“I’ll just jot that down, Mrs. Fusty,” Willie said after gleefully pocketing the advance. “I’ll get everythin’ you want on that tomat—er—dame. I’ll have two ops besides myself workin’ all hours.”
“Come on, Bartholomew,” Ma Fusty snapped. “An’ if you dast interfere on this I will commit what crime it is for a mother who strangles her only son wit’ her bare hands.”
Willie sighed when the door closed behind the pair. Having seen Bartholomew he felt very important in comparison. “I should hire him t’ sit around,” Willie told himself. “In no time I would have a superior complex. I—”
The phone rang in such a fashion as to convince Willie that Gertie Mudgett was waiting on the other end of the hookup. “Hello, Gert,” he said.
“Look, Willie Klump. About that twenty bucks you won on the Take It or Leave It Alone pogrom,” Gertie Mudgett snapped. “My girl frien’ says they don’t payoff less’n fifty for a correck answer. If you’re holdin’ out on me, you—!”
“If you was listenin’ to the program,” Willie sniffed, “you would of knowed I only got the constellation prize. I answered it so wrong they thought it was funny an’ give me twenty bucks anyway. You can call station WHAM an’ prove it!”
“You think I won’t, Willie Klump? G’by!”
Yes, Willie had been telling the truth. The quiz master had asked Mr. Klump what a chamois was and Willie right away had said it was an old fashioned shirt worn
by dames around the time Dewey said he’d take Manila. Somethink like a camisole. The studio audience had thrown fits and so Willie had been handed twenty leafs of lettuce.
Now at seven P.M. t
he next evening, William Klump stood in a doorway across the street from a brownstone on East Eighty-seventh and waited until a doll issued from a certain basement apartment. Even at that distance Willie could see that the dish was easy on the lamps and he judged she was at least a foot taller than Bartholomew. Willie dogged the blonde’s steps to a subway kiosk and was about to descend the stairs himself when something told him to look around quick. He did. Right behind him was Gertrude Mudgett and she yelled, “Go ahead, wolf man! Chase the pretty blonde. Don’t let me stop you!”
“Now look, Gert—!”
“So you was workin’ on a case t’night, was you?” Gertie said and advanced upon Willie. “Well, I says I will tail that lemonhead an’ see what a sucker I been. Of courst I ain’t got a short leopard’s coat on an’ can’t wear Lily Dashay hats so I ain’t good enough for the likes of a bum like you.” She hit Willie a beaut with her plastic reticule before he could try and explain.
“It is a client I am doin’ it for, for heaven’s sake!” Willie gulped. “What you doin’ with a bowlin’ ball in that pocketbook? That blonde was to take me to a guy a character’s mother thinks is two- timin’ her boy. Now I’ve gone an’ lost her. An’ Mrs. Fusty paid me fifty b—Oh, my big mouth!”
“Fifty?” Gertie gasped. “That would be just the detainin’ fee, wouldn’t it, Willie? We could go somewheres t’night now—”
“Well, there is one joint maybe I will pick the babe up,” Willie sighed. “The Picadillo. Lightnin’ maybe does strike twicet durin’ the same thunderstorm.”
UST an hour later, Willie, sitting close to Gertrude Mudgett in a corner of the Picadillo cocktail lounge, suddenly got a gander at Electra Fusty who was at a table with a stylish male stout wrapped up in a plaid double-breasted. The doll did not seem too animated, and her escort, Willie thought, looked as if he had just received the news that his X-ray plates showed positively he had advanced leprosy. “There she is,” Willie whispered. “The one with
the spotted veil.”
“Forty if she’s a day,” Gertie sniffed. “The boy frien’ is sumpin’ though. I like’ guys use cigar or cigarette holders, an’ I bet you he has switched t’ Calvert’s. H-m-m, I wisht he’d make a pass at me.”
“You forget you are with somebody?” Willie said indignantly.
“Let me, will you?” Gertie snapped. “I’ll have another highball. From here, Willie, looks like the fire was goin’ out, as if he is enjoyin’ himself with her.”
“Everybody in love likes t’ fight,” Willie said. “It don’t prove nothin’. Well, I got the proof she is unfaithful to Bartholomew.” He called a little wren in a short skirt over and slipped her five dollars. He pointed out the couple and said to take the picture and to see he got a print. He flashed a badge.
“F. B. I?” the comely chick gasped. “Honest?”
“Yeah,” Willie sniffed. “Fusty Bustup Insurance, ha! Look, leave us not attract attention.”
The cute trick went over to the table and then there was a bright flash. Then the character in the plaid coat jumped up and chased the frightened little doll all over the place with bouncers breathing on his neck. He finally got hold of the camera and threw it toward the bar where it crocked a character who had just downed one neat.
“Yow!” the customer said. “Put more of the same in the nex’ one, Charlie, m’boy!”
A bouncer made a pass at the recalcitrant and missed. The stylish stout whanged the bouncer right on the button and then went through some swinging doors into the kitchen. Willie Klump saw the blonde jump into a cab outside and then he grabbed Gertie by the arm. “Le’s git out an’ fast as the doll will say I am an F.B.I. an’ you can git twenty years for—”
They managed to slip out of the Picadillo before order was restored and ran all the way to Ninth Avenue and hid in a quick and dirty until they were sure the hounds were back in their kennels. “I got a secret ambition, Willie,” Gertie Mudgett groaned. “That is that some day I will go in some place an’ be there at the finish. I lost a shoe somewheres, Willie. You got to put me in a cab.”
“Well, it would of been quite a coop for me if it’d worked, Gert,” Willie sniffed. “I wonder did that wolf git away without cops gettin’ his name?”
“Wa’n’t he the han’somes’ thing, Willie? What has that blonde got I haven’t, huh?”
“A husband named Bartholomew an’ you should be glad you didn’t,” Willie retorted. “When you see him, if ever, you will start callin’ me dream boat. Leave us git a cab.”
Willie called the Fusty apartment a few minutes later. “If a woman answers I’ll hang up,” he snickered. But Bartholomew’s nasal twang beat against Willie’s ears. Willie queried, “This is Klump, so keep your voice down. Your wife home yet?”
“She is,” the little character replied, irked.
“Your ma is right,” Willie reported. “She was with a guy.”
“I wish you would not bother me, Mr. Scrump,” Bartholomew said testily. “You make your reports to who hired you, not
me. G’by.”
“I do not understand his attitude,” Willie sniffed.
HE first thing the power behind the
Hawkeye Detective Agency did the next morning was to relate preliminary progress to Mrs. Fusty. Bartholomew’s ma was quite pleased. “Keep it up, Klump, until you got that fluff dead t’ rights. You git a hun’red more when you wind things up.”
Willie was very sure that the blonde would stick close to the home fires for the next day or two, and he closed shop early and went over to Brooklyn to see the Bums play the Cards. He read a tabloid on the way and a gin mill journalist had a stick or two in his stint anent the rhubarb at the Picadillo. He gushed:
Firing broke out along the fleshpot front last nite in the Pomegranate Room at the Picadillo. Seems a large character wearing a blonde on his sleeve (Whose it is hard t’ tell) ran amok when a cute camera Queenie snapped his pan without first asking him to take a gander at the little birdie. The caustic customer caught the chick before she reached cover, copped the Bistro Brownie and bounced it off an innocent imbibing bystander’s noggin, slugged one of the Picadillo’s sentries and then lammed out of the joint via the commissary. The management is holding a feminine clodhopper size six and a half B, and hopes the Cinderella will claim same and also bring along her prince who ran out on a check.
“I wisht I could write like that,” Willie said ruefully. “Cinderella, huh? That pum’kin I sent Gert home in set me back a dollar an’ thirty cents is all I know.”
Quite somewhat more than twenty-four hours later, Willie was in his rooming house listening to a program called “Murder Takes the Air” when he got the buzz from his landlady. He jumped out of his chair and went downstairs to answer the phone. It was Aloysius “Satchelfoot” Kelly of the homicide squad and the flatfoot’s
voice was enough to nauseate Willie
Klump.
“Awright, so it is you, saucerhead,” Willie sniffed. “Why brag about it?”
“Look, vacuum puss,” Kelly countered. “You happen t’ know a doll named Electra Fusty?”
“Never heard of the tomat—what was that name ag’in? Satchelfoot, you leave my client be, you hear?”
“The dame has been bumped off, Willie. Rubbed out!” Kelly yelped, and Willie’s knees became two strings of damp spaghetti. “She has been murdered, and a little character here says you been shadowin’ her. You are mixed up in this, Willie, so you come up here right away— and have an alibi.”
Willie Klump left the receiver dangling and ran upstairs to put on his coat and shoes. He had the kicks on the wrong feet when he galloped out of the rooming house.
It was quite a scene in the basement apartment of the Fusty’s. The blonde, reclining on the rug, no longer looked fickle to Willie. Bartholomew Fusty, the widower, was bent forward in a big chair and holding his noggin with both ha
nds. The corpse appraiser was closing up his black bag, and Satchelfoot Kelly was probing into the contents of one that only a dame would carry. “You would think babes would hire a detective to find things in these knapsacks, huh? They—so you finally got here, Willie!”
“Maybe you was expectin’ the assassin come back to git his knife?” the private detective said impolitely.
“She was shot,” Satchelfoot snapped. “I got a good idea you could say why so leave us have it all, Willie!”
“Oh, this is awful,” Bartholomew wailed. “My poor li’l wife. My darlin’ Electra! What fiend would do this thing, huh?”
“Was shot about nine-thirty P. M.,” the M.D. said. “I’d guess it was by a thirty- eight caliber Betsy. Far as I’m concerned you can move the remains.”
“Willie, sit over there by the winder where I can watch you,” Satchelfoot ground out, and dumped the contents of the late Mrs. B. Fusty’s handbag onto the table. “Everythin’ here but a flyin’ saucer,” he griped. “Willie, what was you chasin’ after this blonde for? Don’t you try to hold nothin’ back neither!”
“I was hired by Bartholomew’s ma,” Willie said. “She had a hunch the doll was two-timin’ her boy. Ain’t that so, Mr. F.?”
The widower nodded. “But it wa’n’t so. Don’t nobody cast no dispersions on my poor darlin’!”
“Then maybe it was Santa Claus cheerin’ her up last night at the Picadillo, hah?” Willie countered. “Her escort nearly wrecked that joint when—”
“There is lots of other blondes,” the bereft character argued staunchly. “Some look alike.”
“Awright, shut up, Willie! Now, Mr. Fusty,” Satchelfoot said. “Leave us go back to where this poor man’s gumshoe come in. You worked late prettyin’ up a no more hope chest an’ it was quarter of ten when you found the corpse.”
The Willie Klump Page 17