Hell's Siphon

by George Harmon Coxe

  “Sure.” She started for the doorway to an inner hall, but Leo said: “Wait a minute.”

  She stopped. Leo grunted, nodded at his companion. “I'll watch the dick, Hymie. Go with her.”

  “I'll go alone,” the girl snapped. “You'll go with Hymie,” Leo said, grinning derisively. “And if there's any windows you can get out of in that room of yours, he's gonna stay with you. You can dress in your closet if you're so modest.”

  The girl's eyes filled with scorn and loathing, and Nason saw this and felt a certain grudging respect for her.

  Leo said: “We should let you give us the slip, huh?” He chuckled. “Get started. We ain't got forever you know.”

  Hymie grinned and shuffled off down the hall after the girl.

  CHAPTER IV. THE HOSPITAL CLUE

  RITA JORDAN was dressed in a tight-fitting blue dress when she came back into the living room with Hymie five minutes later.

  Leo nodded in approval. “Now watch 'em both, Hymie. I think I'd better make a call.”

  He picked up the telephone receiver, dialed a number. A moment later he said: “Hello—Leo. Yeah. Yeah, we got her. But get this: that dick and the photographer were here ahead of us. They were putting the bee on her when we got here. I don't know. No. But she screamed about something just as we came in.”

  Leo fell silent for a few seconds, nodding his head slightly as he listened. “Okay,” he said finally. “Sure. How much time do you want? Fifteen minutes. Okay.” He hung up.

  There was a peculiar smile on his lips now; a peculiar, pitiless look in his little eyes as. he faced Nason, and the detective sensed the answer.

  Fifteen minutes. For somebody to fix plans—or frame an alibi probably. He knew too much now. And the hoods could not take chances on how much Rita Jordan had talked. And that went for Walcott, too. The thought sent a quick chill through his veins. He glanced down at the youth. Blood stained the brown hair. He had not moved an inch since he fell. Nason looked up again, and smiled.

  “Whose move is it?”

  “Not yours, copper.” Leo's merciless expression was unchanged. He turned to Hymie. “Take her along. I gotta wait about fifteen minutes.”

  Rita Jordan gave Nason a frightened, half- appealing look as she went through the door with Hymie's hairy hand on her arm. The door closed and Nason looked back at Leo.

  “It's pretty tough,” he said slowly, “knocking off a cop and a reporter.”

  “So they tell me,” said Leo insolently. “But they don't put any more volts in the chair for that than for anything else. I shoulda let you have it there in the hospital.”

  Nason sat erect in the straight-backed chair for several minutes before he spoke. He knew that in some way Donigan had been framed. Just why, he did not know, and this bothered him. His bitterness was like a cancerous growth in his brain.

  A half-hour before he had set out from headquarters with his only hope of solution the finding of the two gunmen. And he had found them; or they had found him. And now he was worse off than before.

  It was not him alone now. Walcott would have to pay the penalty along with him. And then Rita Jordan. Nason felt that the girl, too, was marked for death.

  He cocked one eyebrow at Leo, who stood over by the windows, watching the street below with occasional quick side glances. “So you framed Donigan, hunh?”

  Leo grinned and remained silent. Nason shrugged and hooked his thumbs in his vest pockets. “What I can't figure is how you knew Steig was still alive.” He was shooting in the dark now, but he tried to make his voice idly curious.

  “You must've hung around that alley and followed the ambulance to the hospital; or maybe called up—”

  Nason stiffened there on the chair as his mind trapped the idea. That question that had lain dormant for so long at the back of his head. He did not have the answer yet. But he felt sure he knew what it would be. And if he was right—

  “Sure,” said Leo, “what about it?” Nason stood up and stretched nonchalantly. The thoughts which had vortexed in his brain for so long began to fall into an orderly sequence. Much of his idea was still hunch, still a matter of conjecture. Only—unless he had a chance to follow through, Donigan would be branded a crook forever.

  LEO glanced at his strap watch uneasily, shifted his automatic slightly. Nason took a step forward, towards the center of the room and put his fists on his hips.

  Leo's brows lifted. “You wouldn't want to start something, would you?”

  “Me?” Nason jabbed a thumb at his chest and looked surprised. “Don't be foolish.”

  “Then go back and sit down.” Nason grinned with that tight, weird smile at his lips and remained motionless. Leo's pimply face flushed and he moved forward with a threatening set to his shoulders. He started to step over Walcott's body, seemed to think better of it. He detoured and walked around in front of the photographer.

  Then it happened. Leo had nearly passed out of Walcott's reach when that hand shot up. It was the first movement Walcott had made since he fell, and he was lying on his face, his eyes apparently closed, so that the element of surprise was all in his favor. He could not hold Leo, but this hand caught one ankle long enough to trip him off balance.

  Leo cursed shrilly and went to one knee. Before he could swing the automatic around, Nason hit him; hit him with a lunging dive that brought his shoulder into the gunman's neck.

  They went down together, arms and legs thrashing. The automatic flew from Leo's grasp, smacked against the wall and bounced back towards him. Nason, rolling clear, concentrated on that gun. His forward momentum, as he bowled Leo over, carried him on a few feet, and he snatched up the automatic as he twisted to his knees.

  Walcott was struggling to his feet. Leo, swinging a wild right as Nason turned to face him, made one more last, desperate lunge. Then the detective whipped the gun down on the unprotected head.

  Leo, on one knee, started to sag and his breath whistled through his teeth. Nason cocked his arms once more. The gun came down in a short, vicious arc. There was a quick, crunching sound. Leo went over on his back, his arm outflung. One leg drew up, straightened. The other twitched once. He did not move again. He did not look as if he would ever move.

  Nason watched the gunman for a moment, then turned to Walcott. The photographer had a handkerchief in his hand now, was dabbing at the bloody spot on his head. He said: “You hit that guy like you was mad,” thickly.

  Nason grunted. “Nice work. How long you been around?”

  “When Hymie took the girl out, I guess. I didn't figure we had much chance against that gun unless—”

  “You newspaper guys,” Nason said grimly, “don't do so bad.”

  He slipped the automatic in his coat pocket, crossed quickly to the telephone, snapped up the receiver and dialed the operator.

  “City Hospital. Sure. I know they got a number. Get it. Police business.”

  After a moment he got his number. Then it took him some minutes before he could reach the party he wanted. When he did, he spoke crisply, a bit profanely for a few seconds, hung up.

  He picked up his hat and started for the door, and Walcott said: “What're you gonna do with this guy?”

  “Leave him,” lipped Nason. “He won't be goin' places alone. We'll send for him.”

  THE taxi driver was asleep when they got downstairs. He started to protest Nason's rude method of wakening him, but something in the detective's manner stopped him.

  Nason gave an address off Commonwealth Avenue and as soon as the cab started, Walcott said:

  “What's out there?” His voice got eager,

  excited. “I can tell you've got something by the look on your pan. Is that where Hymie and the girl went?” Then, without waiting for an answer: “How do you know?”

  “I don't”

  “You're a hell of a dick.”

  “You heard me call the hospital.”

  “What about it?”

  “How did those two torpedoes know where Steig was?”


  “They coulda followed the ambulance. I heard you say that yourself, when I was playin' 'possum.”

  “Yeah. And boy was I dumb to think that.” Nason's voice got sarcastic, mocking. “They could've followed the ambulance. Then they could've gone to the Greek's, decided to go back and rub him out, got the idea of getting your camera to front for 'em.”

  “Sure,” grunted Walcott. “Why not?”

  “Then how did they know which room to go to? How'd they know just what room Steig had?”

  “Hell, they could've asked.”

  “Yeh,” rapped Nason. “They could've asked. Only they didn't!“

  “They didn't?” echoed Walcott hollowly. “Then—”

  “I got the reception room girl on the telephone. She remembers those guys coming in. But they breezed right past her. She's sure of it.”

  “Hell!” wheezed Walcott, jerking erect on the seat. “Then somebody tipped 'em off.”

  “Sure.” Nason cursed softly. “Carrigan, Alpert, Fitzpatrick and me in the room with Steig.”

  “It coulda been somebody in the hospital.”

  “It could, but it wasn't. I had the girl check with the operator. Nobody called in about Steig until after the shooting.”

  “Alpert!” Walcott said hoarsely. Nason said: “He must've called those two hoods at the Greek's just after he left the hospital. You happened to be there when the call came. And somebody—Leo, probably—flashed the idea of using your camera and card.”

  The taxi slowed down and Nason rapped on the glass partition and said: “Pull on up to the corner.”

  THE two men walked back to the marquee of a modern brick apartment house in the middle of the block. There was no name on the wide, chromium-trimmed doors, but in the rubber mat which crossed the sidewalk were white letters which spelled: The Ellington.

  At that hour there was no doorman, and Nason crossed the spacious entryway to the sunken lobby. A sleepy-eyed clerk blinked at them from his desk on the left wall, but Nason paid him no attention, continuing on to the elevators with Walcott, still lugging his camera and plate case, at his heels.

  The elevator boy furnished the information that Alpert had apartment 4-F, and they went up. It was the last apartment on the left side of a thickly- carpeted hall, and as Nason stopped in front of the pastel-gray door, he sobered slightly as he analyzed his hunch.

  In his own mind he was certain that Alpert had been connected with Steig's death. But even so, there was no proof; and the only chance was to bluff his way through—or find Alpert and Hymie and Rita Jordan. He turned to Walcott, spoke in quick, low tones.

  “If Alpert is here alone, it may be a bust. I may have to get rough, and it'll be a mess if I don't produce.”

  “Yeah,” whispered Walcott. “But suppose Hymie is in there?”

  “That'll be swell.”

  “But the heat might go on. You oughta have some help. Why don't you call headquarters and—”

  “And get 'em down here on a false alarm?” grunted Nason. “I'm in bad enough as it is.”

  He hesitated, glanced up and down the hall. There was a window at the rear end, and he stepped to it, opened it and looked out. Faintly outlined against the rear of the building was a network of fire escape, a branch of which apparently scaled the side of Alpert's living room—some room, at least, where the light was on.

  He made his plan then, because he knew the truth of what Walcott had said. He might need help. He pulled the youth close.

  “I'll give you a couple of minutes to get down in the alley here. Watch this window. If I move the shade, beat it for a telephone and get Fitz down here—I'll need him. If you don't see anything you'll know I've drawn a blank.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then”—a wry grin twisted Nason's somber face—“we'll leave town together.”

  He gave Walcott a push, watched him until the elevator door closed behind his back. He waited a full two minutes longer; then he pressed the mother-of-pearl button at the side of the door, and slid his right hand into his pocket, fitted it around the cool metal of Leo's automatic.

  A moment later he heard the soft tread of footsteps, realized that if Alpert asked who he was, and he gave his name, it might ruin his scheme. A sudden burst of inspiration gave him the name of Alpert's lawyer.

  A voice said: “Who is it?” Nason spoke quickly, from way down in his throat. “Sol Hirschbaum.”

  The knob turned and Nason waited until the door started to open. He moved with it, slapping his shoulder against the panel. The door gave a foot or so, caught against some object; Nason's weight crashed into this object, knocked it aside as he barged forward.

  Alpert was slammed against the wall of a tiny entryway. Beyond him, at the far side of an expensively-furnished and softly lighted living room, sat Rita Jordan. The bull-necked Hymie had spun towards the door, was clawing at his shoulder- holster.

  Nason said: “Take it out, Hymie, and see what it gets you.”

  Hymie hesitated with his hand at his lapel, met Nason's hostile gaze for an instant, dropped the hand. Nason poked the white-faced and astounded Alpert with his gun, said: “Get in there,” as he closed and locked the door.

  Alpert backed into the living room, his hands half-raised, although nothing had been said about them. A frightened expression twisted his fatty face now, and his thick-lipped mouth hung open. He kept backing until he felt the divan against the calves of his legs; then he dropped down on it beside Rita Jordan.

  Nason gave the girl a quick, searching glance. She sat stiffly erect on the edge of the divan, her hands tightly twisted together in her lap. Her eyes were wide and round, and there was fear in their depths.

  Nason moved slowly across the room to the windows. He saw that the first one, by the fire escape, was open, that a faint draft was sucking the drawn shade outward. Reaching down, he raised the shade halfway, glanced out; then he turned to face Hymie, and Moe Alpert.

  CHAPTER V. DRINK TO THE DEVIL

  HYMIE continued to stand in the middle of the room, his thick homely face sullen and malignant, until Nason said: “Just stand right there,” and went around behind him and took his gun. Slipping it into a pocket of his coat, he moved away, added, “Now sit down with your pal—so I can watch the both of you.”

  For a few seconds, while Nason studied Alpert and Hymie, he considered the time element. It would take Walcott two or three minutes to find a telephone at this hour; it would take another eight or ten minutes before Fitzpatrick could get here. Say twelve minutes altogether. He decided to use the time to try and plug the gaps in his half- completed theory of what had happened.

  “You've been pretty lucky tonight,” he said finally, looking at Rita Jordan.

  “I know it.” The girl's voice was jerky, uncertain. “I—I think they were going to kill me.”

  “So,” went on Nason, “if I were you, I'd come clean. I want to know where you fit. You and Steig—”

  “We were going to be married,” the girl said, her voice flat and hopeless. “Only I wasn't satisfied. I knew he worked for Alpert, but he always had a lot of money—and he would not tell me where he got it. I was afraid that after we were married, maybe something would happen. I didn't know what—only I was afraid.”

  The girl hesitated a moment, continued in the same low tone.

  “But he promised me we could go away. To Philadelphia—I've got a brother there. Sam said he'd tell Alpert he was going to leave next week and—”

  “Oh—” Nason's voice held a thin, metallic ring, and a mirthless smile tugged at his lips. “Maybe I get it now.” He looked at Alpert. “I guess you are the reason those other three jewel breaks were so neat.

  “You could be your own fence, huh? And Steig was in on it with you—your guard. But you were afraid to let him go. So you figured a way to rub him out. You told him you were going to rob your own store to make it look like you were just another victim. But your real reason was to put him out of the way.”

  “
You're nuts.” Alpert licked his lips. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

  “You know, all right,” Nason said ominously. “And I know you put the finger on Steig in the hospital.” He went on to explain how he had checked up with the clerk at the hospital. “And if these two hoods had asked what room Steig had, you'd been clean on this. But when you called 'em at the Greek's, you gave 'em the room number.”

  NASON moved slowly forward, his dark eyes hard and glaring. “One of your punks planted those stones on Donigan.”

  “No,” wheezed Alpert. “You got me wrong.” His eyes were shifty now, his forehead moist with sweat. “Why should anybody do that?”

  “I can guess that part, too—now,” Nason answered. “You imported Hymie and Leo—you don't need to worry about him anymore—and you told Steig they'd do the job and leave him tied in a chair. Maybe slug him a bit to make it look better. Only you knew they were going to rub Steig out when they finished.

  “Donigan surprised the break. The trouble was”—Nason's voice thinned out—“he thought Steig would be on his side. He turned his back and Steig, the rat, shot him. It was either that or go to jail when your punks talked. And Steig didn't know then that he was on the spot.

  “Then,” Nason's lips pulled back, “I've got an idea somebody called you and told you what had happened. It would look funny, a cop who was on to that kind of a job being shot in the back. The first thing we'd think of was that somebody he'd trusted shot him—which had to be Steig.

  “So you planted the stones and put Donigan's gun back in his holster to make it look as if Donigan was the crook and Steig was honest— when we found him dead; to make us think just what Fitzpatrick did think. So that—”

  A sudden gasp from Rita Jordan that was like a half-stifled scream, tensed Nason's muscles. Then a rough voice said:

  “All right. Drop it!” For a fraction of a second Nason hesitated. The voice came from behind—there was a doorway here, he remembered, which led to the apartment's other rooms. He glanced over his shoulder. The man in the doorway who held the heavy automatic was thin, swart, black-eyed. A stranger. He was smiling now and perfect white teeth flashed in the overhead light.