Maynard paled. “You think some of Russcorp’s men—” he choked on the word “—murdered Bob?”
“I’m smart enough not to think anything at all along that line. Forget about it. Leave it alone.”
“But—they might—I might be next!”
“Yes,” Ray agreed stonily, “you might.” Maynard dropped the pencil.
“Oh, God.”
“Now, take it easy,” Ray soothed. “Trust me to handle things. If you sit tight and do as you’re told, you’ll be all right.”
Maynard did not answer. Ray ordered, “Write the list.”
He re-lit his cigar, moved a page he had not read, noted that Maynard had filled half the page with uneven lines of writing. Yes, Louis Russ, or Abbott or Botsch, could have learned of Whitehall’s connection with Maynard, found out that it was more than a mere business relationship, perhaps even discovered that it was Whitehall who was the more dangerous of the two.
He glanced around the office. Was this place wired? Hardly, who would have planted bugs so quickly, and why? Had Fancy talked? Impossible. Had he himself said too much to the Russcorp crew? He went over the conversations in his mind. No, he had been careful, wanting to use Whitehall in his own plans.
He stood up, took his hat, and said to Maynard: “Give that stuff to my secretary when you get it finished. Instead of coming down here in the morning, start looking around uptown for a nice suite of offices for us. Something with a good address and a good front. Try and get three or four private offices and a big space for a bull pen or offices for the writers and artists and the girls.”
Maynard brightened. “We’re moving to better quarters?”
“If you can find ‘em. Think you can do?”
“Oh, yes,” Maynard was almost enthusiastic. “I have a few friends.”
“O.K. And when you make the arrangements—don’t mention me. Pick ‘em out, I’ll take a look at ‘em, and if they’re O.K. you can handle the lease.”
As he went out Ray told Silvia: “Type up what Maynard gives you. I’ll be back in less than two hours.”
He went down in the rickety elevator and stood for a moment in the entrance of the shabby building. He took a deep breath of the mild, spring air. He wouldn’t be using this skid-row address much longer. He was picking up speed!
The old caution made him look around carefully. He sauntered north, pausing now and then to look in store windows and unobtrusively study his back trail. He spotted the tail in the fourth block—a little guy with a brown coat too long for him. He walked swiftly after that, and went into Wilner’s Bar.
The same bartender was pouring them out. When Ray ordered bourbon and ginger, the bland-faced man looked at him sharply. “All right, all right,” Ray chuckled. “I know they were here. Two of ‘em, eh?”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“Ask you about me and how long I was here?”
“Yeah.” He rang up sixty cents and gave Ray the change. Ray pushed it back across the bar.
“Bad trouble?”
“None at all. What’d you tell ‘em?”
“The truth, of course. We got a license to keep.”
“Good enough. That’s exactly what I wanted you to do.”
The bartender seemed relieved. He waited on a beer drinker and came back. “They asked about a girl. I didn’t remember.”
Ray looked at him sharply. “Agnes? Hell, she’s a regular. You know her.”
“If you say so. It’s against the law for the girls to work the bars.” He shrugged. “Just thought I’d tell you.” He walked away, and although Ray tried to catch his eye, he found a great deal to keep firm busy. So busy that he poured Ray’s next drink as if the place were on fire and he had to get out, rang up the sale, and walked away.
What would they find? Nothing to directly charge him with—his law-breaking had been minor, the one or two rough deals well-covered and any leads eroded by the march of time. But enough! Enough, that if Russcorp were advised, or even if a weakling like Maynard obtained the knowledge, he would be finished. The Plan, for prosperity and security in the big time, would be smashed. He’d be just Ray Heine—a pretty good copywriter who was too erratic and prone to disappear for unknown reasons. A talented lad without the patience or false humility that was necessary to reach the real big time, the twenty-thousand a year spots where a little ability was held up by the pyramid of bluff and politics and the fact that the others had no ability at all.
He drained his glass, stood up and waved a dollar-bill at the bartender. The man’s eye caught it, and he came to it, reluctantly but unable to reject the unspoken offer, Ray gave him the bill. “I know you don’t know her, but if you should see a girl named Agnes, tell her I’d like to keep my date with her. Right here at seven.”
“O.K.” The answer was not encouraging.
“Yeah. And when I see her, there’ll be a five for you.”
“O.K.” There was more interest in this one.
Ray went out and walked slowly north. In the next block he saw his shadow, the man in the long coat. Ray turned east, selecting the cross street with care, searching for the kind of building he wanted. He found it several blocks farther along, a residential street of old, decadent buildings, with an abandoned, four-story apartment house in the middle of the block. The afternoon traffic was light.
He stood there, waiting, and watched his shadow come along the street, walking with his head down, apparently just another little, rather shabby, citizen out for a stroll. The man did not look up, although he must have seen Ray stop and wait for him. If the trailer stopped abruptly, it would arouse suspicion, so now he would casually walk past Ray and take up his position out of sight on a far corner.
But Ray had other plans. When the small man passed him, Ray leaped across the five feet of sidewalk, grabbed him in powerful hands, and dragged him through the door in the wooden stockade. “Hey!” The man squealed, and Ray slapped him across the mouth and he was still.
Ray locked the man’s arms behind him with a wrist hold, forcing one arm up into the small of the man’s back, and marched him down the grimy, littered stone stairs to the open space before the basement entrance. The door had closed behind them, but plenty of light came over the top of the plank barrier where it failed to meet the stonework.
“Hey!” The man found his voice again. “What’s the idea?”
“Shut up and you won’t get hurt,” Ray growled. “You’d better have some dough on you.”
He held the man by the one arm while he frisked him, found no weapon, and then pulled a wallet from inside his suit coat. He turned him around and slammed him ungently down on the stairs. “Sit there, punk.”
Ray pretended to check the wallet for money. He pulled a ten and six ones from the bill compartment, regarded them distastefully, then looked at the cards and license in the other sections as if he were searching for more loot.
One of the cards told him what he wanted to know. It read Samuel N. Foxe, Hemisphere Detective Agency.
He glanced at Foxe. The man had an uninteresting, vague face, which blended with the long, seedy-looking coat and nondescript brown hat to make him appear as innocuous as one of the fleeting gray figures in a crowd in a television newsreel. A good man for a shadow. He sat there calmly, looking somewhere between Ray’s knees and ankles. Ray tossed the wallet and bills into his lap and said: “We can cut the act. Put your dough back. You’ve been figuring that if I’m crazy enough to mug you it’s O.K., because you know who I am.”
“Huh? How would I know?” His voice was as colorless as the rest of him.
“You’ve been following me.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
“Come on, Sammy, come on. Who’s the client?”
Foxe placed the bills back in their compartment, saw that his cards had been pulled out, and looked up. “O.K., so you know me. I don’t talk about nothing. So long.”
He started to get up. Ray reached out one long arm, placed it against his forehe
ad, and pushed. Foxe landed back on the stairs with a teeth-loosening jar.
“I’ll tell you when to get up, Sam. I want to know who hired you.”
“I dunno.”
“You’re a liar.”
“My boss at the agency just told me to trail you. Ask him.”
“You’re a liar. I’ll bet there aren’t more than two of you in the agency. You probably got the call yourself.”
“No. George Drake did.”
“George will be sore because I spotted you.”
“I guess so.”
Ray lit a cigarette without offering one to his unwilling guest. This could be a stand-off. But he couldn’t afford not to know who was checking up on him. Dammit! This little guy was lying. The ten-dollar-a-day keyhole peeper!
He felt his breath shorten as his temper rose. He leaned forward and slammed his hand against Foxe’s head, a ringing blow that tipped the man over like one of the dumpy, little toys that tip over and bounce up. But Sammy didn’t bounce. Ray dragged him up and rammed him back into a sitting position on the stairs.
“Cut it out!” Foxe almost screamed, his face suddenly white. “You crazy?”
Ray hit him again, on the other side of his head, but not quite so hard, and dragged him upright again. “If you speak too loud again,” Ray said, his voice soft, but the words carved out with a cold knife, “I’ll knock you out and work you over. You got a family?”
“Yeah, yeah. A wife and two kids.”
“Gee, that’s too bad. I hate to send a family man to the hospital.”
“You wouldn’t do that . . .”
“Who hired you?”
“I—I don’t know.”
Ray controlled himself with an effort. He would have his way, or smash something. Smash Foxe. It would be only his word against Ray’s denial, if he pressed charges. Damn the little rat! “Listen to me, Foxe, because it will be the last listening you do for a long time, if you don’t give the right answer.”
The flaccid face had expression, now—fear. Foxe stared at his captor with terrified eyes.
Ray balanced on his heels, flexed his powerful hands in front of Foxe as he talked. “You go in and tell the agency I braced you, and you look like a dope. Maybe you’re out of work for a few days. Now you do the smart thing—tell me who the client is, and I give you fifty bucks. You can keep on tailing me, for all I care. I won’t bother you.”
He bent down, held his clenched fists in front of Foxe’s nose. “You don’t talk—and I knock your teeth out, bust some ribs, maybe your head, kick you in the guts, maybe break a gut, smash a kidney, right now!”
Foxe shrank back into the litter and dirt. He was not a coward, he’d worked on some tough cases, hadn’t he? But this guy! This madman! “Sullivan,” he gasped.
Ray stood erect. “Sure,” he murmured, “Sullivan from Russcorp. Anyone else with him?”
“Not that I know. He came in and I had to see him to get your description.”
“What did he ask for?”
“Just a tail. Find out about you. We wired Chicago.”
Ray nodded. Chicago shouldn’t give them much unless they spent money and time for a real check-up, and they wouldn’t bother on a case like this. They’d get the picture he had left for them, feed it to Sullivan, and that would be that. He pulled five tens out of his wallet. No one would ever be able to say that Ray Hitchcock was a welcher. He felt expansive, almost kindly toward Foxe, now that he had had his own way.
“Here—buy a present for the wife and kids.”
Foxe swayed upright, took the money. “Thanks,” he said in tones that still shook slightly. “What the hell—they don’t pay me enough to get pushed around.”
“That’s the stuff. You’ve got nothing to worry about. In fact, your tailing job will be easy, because you don’t have to dodge me.”
Foxe looked almost happy. He was quickly rationalizing his position. “Yeah, it’s almost a break for me.”
“And look—if you happen to find out anything on the agency end, there’s more dough for you where that came from. Play it smart, like the big-timers, and collect both ways.”
Foxe fumbled with a cigarette. Ray held his lighter for him, said, “I’m going back to my office. Wait a few moments down here, in case anybody is watching. We don’t want to be seen together.”
He went up the stairs and through the barricade to the sidewalk. The street was still virtually deserted. He walked down the avenue and boarded a bus. Sullivan, eh? That boy didn’t have a very promising career.
Chapter 9
It was after four when Ray entered his office. Silvia looked up from her typewriter and said: “A Mister Charles Olson called. He’s at the Russcorp number. He said it’s important.”
Ray grinned smugly. “I’ll bet it is. Try and get him, honey.”
He lounged against her desk as she dialed the number. Just being near her excited him mildly. I’m getting old, he thought, I’m thirsty for the young ones. So round, so firm, so fully stacked. He touched her hand as she held up the telephone, a contact that brought their eyes together. So she was attracted, too! It might be fun—perhaps worth it—keep it quiet—play it cagey—train her his way—
“Hello. Hello, Mister Hitchcock?” The voice of Maynard’s assistant was jarring his ear.
“Hello,” Ray answered. “This is Hitchcock. Let’s see, you’re Charles Olson, aren’t you? I met you when I called on Maynard.”
“Yes, that’s right.” The voice was worried, with a bit of anxious speed. “There’s a lot of things to do here, and Mister Maynard just took his things and dashed out and then when I asked Mister Russ about some problems he said that maybe you would know what to do. Are you taking Mister Maynard’s place?”
“In a way,” Ray told him smoothly. “I’ll be in in the morning to have a talk with you. Well get everything under control then.”
“There are some men here from the agency. Mister Whitehall is dead, and they want to talk about national advertising.”
“Where are they now?”
“Out in the reception room.”
“Tell them to come back at ten in the morning.”
“Yes, Mister Hitchcock.”
Ray said good-by and handed Silvia the telephone. Oh, the inside track! The wonderful, high speed, inside track to the gold mine! He felt great. “We’ll have telephones for everybody soon, honey,” he told her. “Fancy ones, if you like, any color you want.”
She smiled, the dark eyes gleaming. “Things are working out well?”
“Splendidly. Don’t forget about tomorrow night.”
“I told my mother. What time?”
She broke off the question and he guessed the rest. “What time will we get home? Don’t be afraid to ask. Families have a right to know. Tell them we’re going up to Westchester. A very formal and dignified affair. You should be home by one, and I’ll see you right to your door.”
“Thank you. I can hardly wait.”
“We’ll have fun.”
He went into his office, called Fancy, and went over the Happy Day program. A touch or two, and it would do.
The office, hemmed in by the walls of adjacent buildings, was almost dark before five. As Silvia turned on the desk lights—they had to keep the overhead globe on all the time—Ray said: “C’mon, Fancy. Let’s get out of here and have a drink. I need it.”
“Me too,” Fancy seconded. “We’ve earned one.”
They said good night to Silvia and went down into the canyon of the street. Ray walked north until he reached Wilner’s Bar, and Fancy had to follow, although once or twice he ventured, “There’s a snappy looking place.”
Agnes had not been in, or so the bartender asserted. Ray bought five drinks for Fancy and himself, and they took a taxi to the hotel.
“Going to have dinner?” Fancy asked as they washed.
Ray unwrapped a clean shirt. “Nope. Got a date. Sort of business half-and-half. One of the girls from Russcorp.”
“Ge
tting a wire to the inside, eh?’
“Yeah. We’ll want to know what goes on.”
Ray told Fancy to enjoy himself, but get to bed early, went down and walked toward the subway. It was a warm, almost unseasonal night. He was glad. His topcoat was shabby, and he was not wearing it. He wouldn’t have to worry about his wardrobe much longer. On his way! He was on his way! Big time, I’m coming!
He should feel fine, but the five drinks were wearing off. He had two bourbons at the corner bar before going down into the noisy tunnel of the subway.
Charlotte Sanderson lived in a modern apartment building far enough from the rivers and parks and good addresses to keep the rental down. As he left the self-service elevator and walked down the tastefully decorated corridor, he thought that she must strain to pay for it. What the hell, it was her front, a pitch to make the right contact or interest the right man. He found 6-D and pressed the button, heard a mosquito-like buzz beyond the panels of the door. The brass-bordered peep-hole opened. He saw one eye, deep violet in the soft light, and then the door opened and she said, “Hello, Ray.”
He entered the foyer, looked her over. “Hi, Charlotte. You look like a butterscotch sundae. All ready to eat.”
“Thank you. That’s very nice. I suppose advertising men all talk that way.”
“You know they don’t. You’ve met plenty of ‘em.”
She was wearing an amber dinner gown that complemented the polished sheen of her hair, golden slippers, and Dutch Boy blue earrings and a sort of chatelaine in which the blue stones flashed when she moved.
She had taken his hat, and he stepped down the three stairs beyond the foyer that led to a sunken living room. A contemporary suite of some dark wood was accented by a large, glass and wrought-iron coffee table, with plenty of room remaining to avoid an air of stuffiness. The few water-colors on the walls were good.
The Heel Page 10