“What’s the trouble?” Terrell asked, laying his big hands on the mass of papers on his desk.
“I have just come from the airport. I was seeing my grandson off. I wanted to telephone my daughter to tell her Jerry . . . that’s my grandson . . . had got off all right.” Mrs. Dobey paused. “I don’t want you to imagine I’m talking for the sake of talking, but I know when one talks to police officers one has to give facts . . . that’s right, isn’t it?”
“That’s right,” Terrell said. His virtue was patience and this was one of the reasons why he was a good Chief of Police. “My daughter has a job in an office. My sister who lives in Miami is taking care of Jerry . . . but, that won’t interest you. I agreed to see Jerry off because my daughter was tied up with this office . . . that’s what grandmas are for, aren’t they?”
Terrell sucked at his pipe and nodded.
“I guess that’s right, Mrs. Dobey.”
“My daughter takes it for granted, but young people do take things for granted. I don’t mind. Don’t think I’m complaining.” Terrell tapped ashes out of his pipe.
“You telephoned your daughter?” he said as he began to refill his pipe.
“Yes. I went into one of the booths at the airport. I happened to drop my purse.” She looked at Terrell, her alert eyes quizzing. “Call it old age if you like, but it could have happened to anyone.”
“Yes, I guess so,” Terrell said. “I’m always dropping things myself.”
Mrs. Dobey looked at him suspiciously.
“You don’t have to say that to be polite.”
“You dropped your purse?”
She smiled; it was a nice understanding smile.
“The trouble with me, Chief, is I talk too much. Excuse me.” She settled herself more comfortably in her chair, then went on. “When I bent to pick up my purse I saw this envelope under the coin box . . . stuck there with tape.” She opened her large, shabby handbag and took out an envelope.
“Now that, I thought, is a very funny place for an envelope to be.” She looked directly at Terrell. “I’ve probably done wrong, but I opened it. But if I hadn’t opened it, how would I know what was inside? Perhaps I should have gone to the first police officer I saw and given it to him without opening it. Should I have done that?”
“What’s inside the envelope?” Terrell asked, avoiding the question.
“A lot of money . . . a lot of money.” She regarded him. “As soon as I looked inside and saw all this money I knew I shouldn’t have opened it. I knew I had to come to you and not give it to any police officer. So much money offers a temptation and police officers aren’t millionaires.”
Terrell cleared his throat.
“May I have the envelope, Mrs. Dobey? I’ll give you a receipt for it.”
“I don’t want a receipt,” she said, handing over the envelope. “I just want to get home so I can get Mr. Dobey his dinner.”
SEVEN
Poke Toholo dropped the half-eaten orange on the floor and kicked it under the bed. He wiped his fingers on his hipsters, then held out his hand.
“How much did you get?” he asked.
Chuck came into the room as if he knew the floor was full of dry rot and would cave in under his weight.
His mind was paralysed at the sight of the Indian sitting on the bed. Ten seconds ago, he was imagining himself in the car with Meg at his side, with two thousand dollars in his pocket. This sudden spin of the coin sealed his reflexes as if the nerve cells in his brain had been cut.
“How much did you get?” Poke repeated.
Chuck pulled himself together and part of his brain began to function.
Did this crazy Indian suspect anything? he asked himself.
He looked at Poke, seeing the expressionless brown face and the glittering black eyes, but there was nothing to tell him that Poke suspected he had been about to be betrayed.
“One of them didn’t pay up,” Chuck said huskily.
He became aware that Meg was behind him so he moved further into the room so she could come in.
She went over to the window, not looking at Poke and sat down on the only upright chair, lifting her hair off her shoulders and letting it drop back in an indifferent movement that made Chuck want to hit her. She leaned forward, her elbows resting on the window ledge and stared down at the busy quay.
“Do you expect me to believe that?” Poke asked, staring at Chuck.
Chuck moistened his lips with his tongue.
“Ask her . . . she collected the envelopes.”
“I’m asking you,” Poke said.
Slowly and reluctantly Chuck took the four envelopes from inside his shirt.
They were damp with his sweat and he tossed them on the bed.
“One of them didn’t pay up . . . the one at the airport: I sent her back. She checked every booth.”
“The airport!” Poke’s face relaxed. “Hansen . . . yes . . . I go along with that. Hansen wouldn’t pay, but he will.”
Chuck didn’t know what he was talking about. He leaned against the wall, trying to make himself relax. He watched Poke open the envelopes and count the money. Poke flicked six one hundred dollar bills in Chuck’s direction.
“Five more tomorrow,” Poke said. He produced a slip of paper which he dropped on the bed. “Like milking a cow, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Chuck watched the Indian put the rest of the money in his pocket.
“That’s it . . . yeah.”
Poke got to his feet and moved past Chuck to the door.
“They may not all pay, but most of them will.” His black eyes stared fixedly at Chuck. “They’re scared. When people get scared they do what they’re told,” and he was gone.
There was a long pause, then Meg said without looking around, “Do you want me to pack?”
“Didn’t you hear what he said, you dumb bitch?” Chuck snarled. “We do it again tomorrow.”
“Do we?”
There was a note in her voice that made him look sharply at her. She still continued to look out of the window. Her hair hid her face, hut the note in her voice made him uneasy. He suddenly realised he would never have the nerve to go to those booths and pick up the money. He could never bring himself to do it. It was a goddamn trap. The thought of the cops descending on him as he took the envelope from its hiding place made him sweat.
He picked up the piece of paper Poke had left and read what was written there:
Airport Booth B.
Greyhound Bus. Booth 4.
Railroad station. Booth 1.
Excelsior Booth 2.
Adlon Booth 6.
Okay, he thought, suppose only three of them jelled: fifteen hundred dollars plus the six hundred Poke had given him! But this time he wouldn’t return to this dump. As soon as they picked up the last envelope they would go. He had been crazy to have come back this time to pick up their things.
“Listen,” he said, “tomorrow, we get the money and we go. This time we don’t come back. That’s where I went wrong. Tomorrow, as soon as we’ve got the money, we drive off. He won’t know about it until we’re miles away.”
She turned and looked at him.
“You aren’t much, are you, Chuck?” she said quietly. “I thought you were somebody. I guess I’m stupid. I’ve got nothing now. I’ve got less than nothing.”
“You’re going to share two thousand dollars with me, you dope! Is that less than nothing?” Chuck demanded angrily. “Tomorrow, we’ll be in the clear. You’re going to do it, aren’t you?”
She turned and looked out of the window. The sponge boats were coming in. Three men were struggling with a hundred pound turtle. The Indians were waving oranges and yelling at indifferent buyers.
Chuck got to his feet and went over to her. He pulled her away from the window. His hot, sweaty hands gripped her arms and he shook her.
“You’re going to do it, aren’t you?” he demanded.
“I’ll do it,” she said and the lost look in her eves made Chuck release her.<
br />
“Why should I care, you gold plated meal ticket?”
While she was speaking, Poke had come to rest before the desk of the fat, smiling Indian who owned the rooming house.
This Indian’s name was Ocida. His fat, simple face hid a criminal mind. The rooming house was a cover for his many activities. He was a man of considerable substance. He had a Swiss bank account. He was the head of a L.S.D. smuggling ring. He controlled twenty-six Indian prostitutes who paid him a quarter of their earnings. He had a 2% cut on all the fruit sold in the markets because he had made a deal with a Mafia Union man. He had a 1% cut on the turtle soup industry because a number of Indians worked in the turtle factories and he controlled most of the Indian labour. He had a 3% cut on all parking fees on the quay because, until he got his cut, cars got pushed into the harbour.
Ocida was the hidden man behind most of the rackets on the quay and he was smart enough to keep hidden.
He was happy to sit behind the desk in this shabby rooming house, smiling, picking his teeth and making sums in his head. People worked for him. Money flowed in. Why should he worry? Money moved from Paradise City to Berne, Switzerland. Money to him was like a Picasso painting to an art lover. You had it, you kept it, you admired it and you were happy.
Ocida liked Poke Toholo. He knew he was dangerous, but if you were going to make a living out of this stupid, sloppy world, you had to be dangerous.
He knew Poke was the Executioner as he knew everything criminal in the City. He considered this idea to get even with the rich whites was inventive.
He admired any form of invention. He knew too that Poke was a little sick in the head. Well, lots of people did important things who were sick in the head. Any man, sick or not, who could dream up an idea to scare the rich whites and make money out of it, had Ocida’s approval.
So when Poke came to rest before Ocida’s desk, Ocida turned on his widest smile.
“I want a gun,” Poke said softly.
Ocida leaned forward and selected a quill toothpick from a box on the far side of his desk. He inserted the quill between two of his gold capped molars while he regarded Poke.
“What kind of gun?” he asked.
“A good one . . . .38, automatic and accurate,” Poke told him. Ocida removed the quill, wiped what was on it on his shirtsleeve, then put the quill hack in the box.
“Guns cost money, Poke. Have you money?”
“I’ll pay a hundred dollars.”
Ocida admired men who didn’t fear him. Poke was one of the very few.
“Wait.”
He left his desk and heaved his bulk into the back room. Some ten minutes later, he returned with a parcel done up in brown paper and tied with string. He put the parcel on his desk. As Poke felt in his hip pocket, Ocida shook his head.
“It cost me nothing . . . so why should it cost you anything?”
Poke put a one hundred dollar bill on the desk and picked up the parcel.
“I pay for what I want,” he said curtly and walked out into the hot sunshine.
Ocida lost his habitual smile. He stared at the bill, then put it in his shirt pocket.
He believed no one should ever part with money unless he had to. This was his philosophy of life.
He rubbed the side of his fat jaw.
Maybe this boy was sicker than he had thought.
***
As Beigler handed back the extortion note to Terrell, he said, “Well, now we know the motive.”
“It had to be more than an old woman calling him a nigger,” Terrell said.
“How many other members of the Fifty Club have had the same demand? You follow my thinking? These people at the club, scared sick by what has already happened, could be getting demands for money and to save their skins, could be paying up and not reporting to us.”
Beigler lit another cigarette.
“I can’t say I blame them, Chief. It’s a smart ploy if that’s his racket. Three of them have been knocked off to soften the others up and we haven’t done much to give the rest of the old dears much confidence, have we?”
Terrell nodded.
“I’ll see Hansen. We’ll have to give him protection and I mean protection. He paid up, but Poke hasn’t had the money and he might think Hansen didn’t pay and he could hit back. Get a couple of good men guarding the front and back of the club. Every Indian going in and out is to be checked.”
Beigler went off to the Detectives’ room while Terrell went down the back stairs to the police yard where his car was parked.
The Detectives’ room was deserted when Beigler walked in. Every available man was out trying to find a couple who called themselves Mr. and Mrs. Jack Allen. Realising the urgency to get Hansen guarded, Beigler reluctantly called Captain Hemmings of the Miami police force to ask for additional help.
“You’ve already got fifteen of my men,” Hemmings pointed out. “Do you imagine we haven’t any crime in our own City?”
“If I could borrow two more men, sir,” Beigler said, “I’d be obliged. I’ll send them back the moment I have two of my own boys available.”
“You know something, Joe? If I was handling this thing of yours, I’d have this Redskin in the tank by now. Frank’s handling it all wrong, but it’s his territory so who am I to talk?”
Beigler controlled his temper with an effort.
“Captain Terrell knows what he is doing, sir.”
The strangled note in Beigler’s voice reminded Hemmings that he was criticising Beigler’s boss.
“Sure,” he said hastily. “Well, okay. I’ll get a couple of men over to you. Maybe if we ever have a crime wave here, you’ll help us, huh?” He gave a short barking laugh. “If we ever need help which we won’t.”
“I hope not, sir.” Beigler would have liked to have been able to slide along the telephone line, kick Hemmings’ fat rear and slide back to safety to his desk, but miracles don’t happen that way.
“Your man will be covered in an hour,” Hemmings promised.
But this coverage came too late. While Terrell was snarled up in the heavy traffic and while Hemmings was detailing two detectives to get over to Paradise City, Poke Toholo struck.
Killing Elliot Hansen didn’t present any difficulties. There were risks, of course, but Poke was ready to accept risks.
The time was 14.30: the time when the Club lunch was over; when the Indian staff were in the vast kitchen in the basement having their own lunch; when two-thirds of the members of the Club had gone back to their offices and the other third were snoozing in the lounge. All this Poke knew.
He also knew at this time Elliot Hansen retired to his office and stretched himself out in a couch for a forty minute nap. Because Hansen had sensitive nerves, at his own expense, he had had this office sound proofed. This Poke also knew.
He arrived at the staff entrance of the Club about the same time two bored detectives were heading for Paradise City and at the same time as Captain Terrell pulled up before a red traffic light, some half a mile from the Club.
Poke moved silently along the dim corridor, listening to the noise the staff made as they ate and talked in the kitchen. He took from a rack one of the many white coats hanging there and put it on. It was a little too big for him, but this didn’t matter. He walked past the open kitchen door and no one noticed him. He moved into the deserted dining room, then into the corridor and along to the bar. He slowed his step as he reached the entrance to the bar. He saw his father washing used glasses with that patience and servility that always angered Poke. He paused just out of sight to take a long look at the old man and he felt the urge to go into the big room and take his father in his arms. He knew he couldn’t afford such a luxury and he moved on.
Two club members: sleek, well fed men with cigars between their fingers went by him. They didn’t see him. Who saw a monkey in a white coat? He was as anonymous as a fly on the wall.
He reached Hansen’s office. He didn’t even look around to see if anyone was watching. He
turned the handle gently and moved into the room. The door closed with a soft sigh as the air was expelled by the sound proofing around the door.
Elliot Hansen was sitting at his desk. Usually at this time, he would be asleep, but now he was too frightened to sleep. The world he had built up was crumbling and soon, he felt, it would crash down on him.
He looked up and saw an Indian in a white jacket and he waved impatiently.
“I didn’t ring for you! Go away! What do you mean coming in . . .” Then he recognised Poke and with a shuddering gasp, he shrank back in his chair.
Poke lifted the gun. There was a little smile on his brown face as he squeezed the trigger.
The first bullet made a blossom of blood on Hansen’s white jacket at his right shoulder that told Poke the gun threw to the right. The second bullet hit Hansen in the mouth, smashing his beautiful white dentures. The third bullet scattered his brains on his blotter.
That was the way Captain Terrell found him when he arrived ten minutes later.
***
Sergeant Beigler had sweat beads on his face and a stormy look in his eyes when he came into Terrell’s office. Terrell had handed him the thankless task of handling the press, instructing him to give out no information. The reaction of the press to this was almost too much for Beigler’s blood pressure.
“Do you know what those sonsofbitches are calling us?” he said, clenching and unclenching his big fists. “The Keystone cops! They said . . .”
“All right, Joe, never mind about them.” Terrell had just had a session on the telephone with Mayor Hedley who was almost hysterical. When Terrell was sure he was playing his cards right no amount of hysteria nor shouting could ruffle him. “Sit down . . . have some coffee.”
Beigler sat down and poured coffee that had just arrived into a paper cup.
“We’re in for a hell of a press tomorrow, Chief,” he said, trying to calm down. “And tonight on TV news . . . that’ll be something!”
“You told them we had no leads?”
Beigler winced at the memory.
“I told them.”
Terrell began to fill his pipe.
1971 - Want to Stay Alive Page 14