The Willie Klump

by Joe Archibald

  Arnie Fago seems quite nonplussed and he swings his noggin around to gape at Cassandra. It gives me time to get to my feet and it swiftly occurs to me that Arnie has no idea at all as to why Cornelius Meany was erased.

  “Don’t just stand there, Arnie!” the babe howls, and thrusts a hand into her beaded bag. I know she is not after a lipstick. “Anybody has a right to kill a burglar!”

  “Ah—er—sugar,” Arnie gulps, “why should a detective— Hinkey, you talk fast or I’ll—”

  Bang!

  The bullet from the blonde’s Betsy clips a lock of Arnie’s hair just above his right ear. It continues and goes through the crown of my new hat just before I put my noggin down and go into a clinch with Arnie.

  “You big sucker!” I howl. “This pigeon knocked off Cornelius Meany!”

  “What?” Arnie howls as I shove him toward the blonde. “Sugar, don’t shoot. You’ll git me!”

  “Ha! You catch on easy, Buster!” Cassandra yelps. “I’m taking care of you both so’s you won’t ever talk. Give Meany my best when you see him!”

  Just before I give Arnie a terrific shove, I see the little emeralds on the brooch on the babe’s dress glitter. Her eyes look harder than the gold snake’s. A Betsy booms once more and Arnie squeals with pain just as he knocks Cassandra off her feet.

  “She got me, Hinkey!” Arnie wails.

  I hurdle Arnie’s bulk and cover the blonde like a collapsing pup tent. I bang her noggin against the floor once, relieve her of her artillery, and get to my feet. My legs are quite as solid under me as cooked strips of spaghetti.

  “What is this, Hinkey?” Arnie chokes out as he gets to all fours.

  “You was only playin’ around with a dame worst than the Borgias,” I sniff. “You hurt bad, Arnie?”

  “It just nicked me, Hinkey,” the big citizen says. “Did you say she rubbed out Meany?”

  “Yeah. Leave us look for a rifle of the kind they use in shootin’ galleries,” I says.

  Arnie’s eyes bug out as he gets to his big feet. “Why, Hinkey, she has got one. We went to a joint on 125th Street a couple weeks ago an’ she won six dolls an’ two lamps. An’ the boss of the dump give her a gun for a souvenir an’ said she made Annie Oakley look like a bum. But what’s that got to do with it?”

  “She’ll tell us,” I says. “After Meany cleaned you guys in that crap game, he stopped by to give the babe a laugh. He most likely flashed the roll and twitted her about givin’ such a smart dice thrower the gate. She tried to win him over with a mink coat in mind. But Meany laughed at her again an’ took off. Then— Look, she’s comin’ to, Arnie. The rest can wait.”

  Cassandra is mumbling something about not seeing the truck and that the traffic light was with her anyway. But in no time her lamps lose their glaze and suddenly everything comes back to her. “Watch her, Arnie,” I says. “I will finish casin’ the closet to get exhibit A.”

  “You snake-eyed demon!” Arnie says to the babe. “You knocked off Meany.”

  “Prove it,” the blonde says.

  * * * *

  I find the rifle wrapped up in a slip inside the blonde’s laundry bag and I come out admiring it. Cassandra turns as pale as the first run of maple sap.

  “After Meany left,” I says, “you grabbed for this rifle and you stood over by that window and waited until he passed those steps next door. You got a bead on him and let go. Bein’ a female Nimrod, you couldn’t miss at that distance.”

  “Let’s talk this over, Hinkey,” the blonde gulps. “I’ll give you three grand. I—”

  “You cold-blooded bobcat!” Arnie snaps.

  “One thing you didn’t figure on, baby,” I go on, “was that Meany did not die at once. Before he gasped his last, he took out his dice and placed them close beside him. A pair of one-spots, sister. Snake eyes! He made his point for the cops, hoping they would not all be dumb like Hambone Noonan. He saw you wearin’ that brooch too—with snake eyes. That pointed to you. You don’t beat a swell crap shooter like the late Cornelius Meany.”

  “Well, what do you know?” Arnie Fago gasps.

  The doll looks quite as healthy at the moment as three cents’ worth of dogmeat.

  “I began to think, Arnie,” I says, “when I saw that brooch she is wearin’ for the first time. Snake eyes, get it?”

  “Yeah,” the big character says, and wipes dew off his brow. “Smart, Hinkey! An’ Meany wasn’t so dumb, neither, was he?”

  “I’ll make it five grand, Hinkey,” the babe says.

  “I am a little hard of hearin’ tonight,” I says, and feel sorry for Noonan.

  “Hinkey,” Arnie says as I walk to the phone to call a blitz wagon, “they got Isky with the bankroll. How can this babe have it, too? Isky couldn’t give no alibi. We heard it on the radio while we was headed downtown before she remembered she’d forgot somethin’ here.”

  “I have no answer for that one,” I says. “Maybe we can make Isky talk if we get him loaded.”

  We take Cassandra De Video to the D.A. The prosecutor is not feeling in the pink as he has contracted a summer cold. Hambone Noonan comes in and he looks as if he had been dragged through a length of two-inch pipe.

  “Chief, lemme use the hose on that lug,” Noonan begs. “Or we can twist his arm until—Alvin, what are you doing here with Arnie?”

  “This is the babe that knocked off our old sidekick Meany,” I says. “Just sit quiet and let the stenog take her story down.”

  The blonde sings. What else could she do? We have the weapon that laid Meany away for keeps. The shooting gallery proprietor would testify that it was the artillery he had given Cassandra. We told the babe we had the bullet that erased Meany, although that was not true.

  “Sure, it was the way Hinkey said it was,” the blonde finally confesses. “I shot him from the corner window around two o’clock in the morning. Afterwards, I sneaked out and frisked him of the money he’d won in the dice game. Who’d ever think a lemonhead like Hinkey would catch wise like he did?”

  “Crime don’t pay,” I says. “And flattery won’t give you no lenience, sister.”

  “Then where the devil did Isky Pinza get that hunk of lettuce we found stashed in his room?” Noonan howls. “This don’t make no more senst than I do. What am I sayin’?”

  * * * *

  It is quite late that night when me and Hambone, Arnie Fago, and Isky Pinza enter a tavern not far from the hoosegow. Isky is quite elated over beating the sizzle sofa and is in the mood to celebrate the event.

  “They’re on me,” Arnie Fago says.

  Half an hour later Isky’s tongue is as loose as a burlesque comedian’s pants.

  “Awright, Isky,” I coax, “where did you get the clams? Meany cleaned you out same as the others, didn’t he?”

  Isky takes another snifter and ogles me warily. “Look, palsh,” he says, sweeping us with his foggy eyes, “you shwear t’ keep it mum, crosh your heartsh?”

  “Sure,” Arnie says, “we are among friends, Isky. Have another belt.”

  “Yeah,” Isky says. “Thanksh. Well, I sat down in that crap game with almosh two grand an’ it wash dough I owed a bookie. An’ that bimbo had give me twenty-four hoursh t’ pay up or git measured for a concrete shports coat. So Meany cleans me an’ I shmell lilies, so what could I do? I ask you, palsh, what— hic—could I?”

  “What did you, Isky?” I ask, all agog. Isky grins. “Hah, you remember another crap game on that night, Arnie, ol’ pal? At Nick Mazuza’s? Wash invited myshelf but went to yoursh instead, Arnie. Well, when I left I saysh to myshelf I bet that game at Nick’s ain’t over yet. So I went over to Nicksh an’ stuck the game up. Had a hansh’kiff over my kisher. Nobody reckernized me. . . . Say, how doesh a guy get a drink aroun’ here, Arnie?”

  “See, Hambone?” I says. “If Isky had told where he was he would have be
en knocked off by Nick’s gorillas.”

  “A vicious shircle, ain’t it, palsh?” Isky says.

  “I’ll see that Isky gets home okay, boys,” Arnie Fago says. “It’s been fun.”

  Hambone catches on, too. “Alvin,” he says. “We are cops and cannot stand for this extortion even if Isky is a—”

  “I’m a friend of Nick’s,” Arnie interrupts.

  “Yeah,” Isky agrees. “I’ll shplit two ways, Arnie, ol’ pal.”

  “This is where we go out, Hambone,” I says. I do not like the look in Arnie’s glimmers. They are green and hard. Yeah, snake eyes! “We bid you good evening, Arnie.”

  “Smart cookie, Hinkey,” Arnie compliments.

  Me and Noonan go out. Even cops have to look the other way at times. It is quite healthy any way you look at it.

  CHEESECAKE AND WILLIE

  WILLIAM J. KLUMP walked into his office late one afternoon burning slower than a city dump

  and swearing that one fine day he would murder one flatfoot by the name of Aloysius “Satchelfoot” Kelly. Willie had been all the way up to the Bronx as the result of a telephone call that had informed him that a body was reposing in an empty lot near Gunhill Road. He had found the remains of an ancient Model T jalopy with a sign hanging on same which said: For Sale. See William J. Klump, Hawkeye Detective Agency.

  “A comic,” Willie sniffed. “Like Dracula,” and opened the tabloid he had purchased on the trip back. A box on the front page warned citizens that this was April First and not to pick up stray pokes or accept any kind of a cigar.

  “Now they tell me,” Willie sighed.

  The phone rang and he snatched it up. “This is Station WHOZ calling. Are you William J. Klump?”

  “Yeah.” Willie set his jaws and waited. “Well, you lucky man, you! If you can

  answer this question, Mr. Klump, you will get five hundred dollars cash! Are you ready?”

  “You ain’t kiddin’,” Willie snapped. “Who lost at the battle of Waterloo?” “Maxie Rosenbloom!” Willie yelped.

  “Ha ha!” He hung up and hoped they liked those for apples. “You’d think I was born yesterday an’ would bite twice at the same hook. If I’d said it was Napoleon they would have ast me to wait as Josephine wisht to talk with me. How dumb do they think anybody can git?”

  Just one hour later the phone in the Hawkeye Detective Agency clamored for Willie’s attention again. At first he decided to ignore it and then it occurred to him that it might be Gertrude Mudgett and nobody could fool with that babe even on the first of April. He answered it.

  “Hawkeye Detective Agency?” an excited voice inquired. “Look, I haven’t time to talk. I need protection! This is Barnaby Bowers, Lovering Arms Apartment on East Thirty-Sixth. I think they’re outside—my life’s in great danger, Klump! She an’—”

  “Drop dead!” Willie yelled and banged the phone back on its cradle. “Now I’m goin’ home an’ sleep until April Secunt. Of all the silly—!”

  Willie went home and stayed there until ten ayem, the next morning. When he walked into the Hawkeye Detective Agency the phone was ringing once more. This time it was Gertie Mudgett:

  “Oh, Willie, wait until you hear!” she said. ‘‘Then you’ll know why I can’t keep no date with you t’night. You know my girl frien’, Tilly Hoffenspiel? She won five hun’red dollars on a radio pogrom by jest answerin’ who lost at Waterloo yesterday. So us gir1s are goin’ t’ help her celebrate. Ain’t that wonderful, Willie, say

  somethin’?”

  HE HEAD of the Hawkeye Detective

  Agency became articulate on the third try. “Arsenic,” he gulped. “Do you need an inscription to git it, Gert?”

  “Look, lemonhead I just said Tilly H—” “Shah·h-hdup!” Willie said, and severed connections, and felt like doing the same to his jugular vein. He stared woefully at the open window which was very inviting and wondered if worse could have happened to him if he’d been born a cocker spaniel. “Five hun’red clams,” Willie sighed. “For that much I would commit mur-oh-h-h-h-

  h!”

  William Klump’s jaw dropped and the worry brine oozed out of his brow. He thought of the frantic appeal for help he had callously ignored and wondered if it had been the McCoy. “I’ll jus’ forget about it,” he said. “I got to git holt of myself an’—”

  The phone rang. Willie answered it and Satchelfoot Kelly’s voice scraped along his nerves. “Look, Willie,” it said, “You get over here to Lovering Arms on East Thirty- Sixth right away. We are in the penthouse with a corpse an’ you have got to tell us why we found your name an’ address on a card it had in its pocket! Hurry up, knucklehead!”

  Willie went quite limp and the phone he held became as heavy as a keg of nails. Yeah, why did that citizen call you and not the cops, Willie? He got his hat, put it on backwards, and hurried out of the Hawkeye.

  Twenty minutes later William Klump stepped out of an elevator right into the sunken living room of a very swank penthouse where Satchelfoot Kelly and four cops were in a huddle near a defunct character wrapped up in a silk dressing gown.

  “Okay, Klump!” Kelly said sternly. “What you know about this rub-out?”

  “I know he could have been alive right

  now but for you, Kelly!” Willie yelped. “He called me on the phone yesterday just after Napoleon—I mean after you pulled that April Fool gag on me, so I figured it was you ag’in an’ I hung up on him.”

  “A likely story,” Satchelfoot sniffed. “How would you like t’ git a nice goin’ over with a rubber hose downtown, huh? A guy like Barnaby Bowers gits his life threatened an’ he calls a shnook like you, Willie?”

  “Yeah,” Willie said. “It is silly, ain’t it? I wisht I knew why myself. Who is Barnaby Bowers?”

  “Oh, brother,” Kelly groaned. “Didn’t you ever hear of Bowers’ models?”

  “Airplanes or ships?” Willie asked. “Dames, stupid!” Kelly yelled. “He had

  a big agency where he photographed the cuties for ads an’ such an’ hired them’ out t’ wear minks an’ lingery an’ stuff.”

  “May I ask how long he has been dead?” Willie said. “In a way he is my client, you know.”

  “Sincet last night around eleven accordin’ to the medico,” Satchelfoot said. “Somebody shot him with a thirty-two caliber Roscoe. We been investigatin’ an’ the murderer come over from the other roof as—”

  “There was more than one,” Willie cut in.

  Kelly took off his hat and banged it down on a table. “So you do know all about this rub-out, hah? Awright, come on an’—”

  “When Bowers called me,” Willie said, “he said they was after him. She an’ somebody elst.”

  “I told you I bet one of them beautiful dolls did it,” a cop said to Satchelfoot. “In that den over there the walls is covered with cheesecake. Wo-wo-o-o!”

  “They I must see,” Willie said, and crossed the room, his feet sinking deep into the oriental. In the late Barnaby Bowers’ snuggery he felt his ears blush, and he wondered why the victim had bothered to

  install a radiator in the room. Never had Willie seen such a broad-minded display of feminine pulchritude. The autograph of each cutie, he noticed, had been scribbled on the works of art.

  “Come out of there, Willie,” Satchelfoot said. “You ain’t an adult above the ears.”

  Willie came out into the living room just as a cop came up from behind a long divan holding a flimsy hanky between thumb and forefinger. “Look, Kelly! I thought I smelt perfume somewheres an’ look what I got! A dame’s nose doily.”

  “Gimmie it,” Satchelfoot yelped. “Any initials on it?”

  “Yeah, J. D.,” the cop said.

  “Now we’re gittin’ somewheres,” Kelly yelped elatedly. “Most likely a babe was gittin’ a spare tire around the middle an’ had bags under her
eyes an’ Bowers fired her. Well, don’t jus’ stand there. Le’s find out where his list of babes is kept.”

  “They wrote their names on their pitchers,” Willie said, “Didn’t you notice in there?”

  ATCHELFOOT snarled at Willie and hurried into the picture gallery, the cops behind him. Finally he said, “That’s the babe!” and pointed. “The one with the long

  black hair an’ French bathin’ suit.”

  “Why she really has one on,” Willie said. “I could of sworn—”

  “Shuddup!” Kelly said. “Her name is Jellica Devine. She better have an alibi but good as it looks like we’ve got plenty on her, boys!”

  “She needs it,” Willie sniffed.

  After the remains of the cutie maestro had been removed, Satchelfoot Kelly combed the contents of the late Barnaby Bowers’ Louis the Sixteenth desk and found a very ornate address book containing the names of at least a hundred delectable dolls.

  Jellica Devine, the book revealed, shacked up on West Ninth Street and so

  Satchelfoot Kelly did not spare the horses. “We’re on our way,” he said. “You, too, Willie. You ain’t in the clear yet.”

  Jellica Devine came out of the little apartment house on West Ninth just as Satchelfoot got out of the blitz wagon. “We are from headquarters,” Kelly said, and flashed his badge. “We have some questions to ast you, sister.”

  Willie thought the doll looked scared for a second. Then she became indignant and said she had an important appointment with Mr. Bowers. “I am a model, you know,” she said.

  “If you want to meet Barnaby Bowers,” Satchelfoot sniffed. “You’ll have t’ turn on the gas, babe. He was murdered last night whicht is what we want to see you about. Leave us go inside, huh?”

  “Mr. Bowers? Murdered?”

  “Yeah,” Kelly grinned coldly. “Surprised? Don’t kid us.”

  The cops followed Jellica Devine into a cozy little two-room apartment and Satchelfoot snapped: “Okay, why did you rub him out?”

  “I didn’t!”