Dick Tracy

by Max Allan Collins

  She shook her head.

  “It’s probably better for him,” Tracy said not too convincingly. He ate the chili; he was hungry, wolfing it down—it was the first time he’d eaten since breakfast.

  “Probably,” Tess allowed. She didn’t sound very convinced, either.

  Mike was pouring Tracy some coffee. Tracy swallowed a spoonful of chili and asked, “What’s the ratio of beans and meat to melted rubber in this concoction, Mike?”

  “Trade secret,” Mike said good-naturedly, and moved away.

  “You may be right,” Tess said.

  “What?” Tracy asked.

  “About the child. We can’t keep passing him around between us like a puppy. Spends half his time at the greenhouse with me, the rest at police headquarters with you . . .”

  He nodded, embarrassed. “I’ve stuck you with him a lot, the last two days . . .”

  “I don’t consider myself stuck with him.”

  “I know, I know. But I haven’t been able to do my share. The case is really heating up. We’ve been knocking off mob operations left and right . . . we’ve intercepted half a dozen of Big Boy’s payoffs. One more major sting and we can cripple his cash flow.”

  She smiled faintly. “You’ve really got him on the run, don’t you? That’s good. I’m very proud of you, Dick.”

  He looked at her shyly. “You know, I might be able to spend time with you two this evening. Since it looks like the orphanage is in the cards for the little guy tomorrow.”

  “Dick, we have to talk.”

  “Well, sure.” He put the spoon down; he touched her hand. “What is it, dear?”

  She seemed to be having difficulty finding the words; then she was about to begin when his two-way spoke up.

  “Tracy!” Bug Bailey’s voice said. “Come in, Tracy . . .”

  She sighed; not angry, just frustrated, and a little sad.

  “Honey,” he said, patting her hand, ignoring the two-way, “don’t worry about it. I’m sure Sam or Pat will intercept that call. I’m off-duty.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He made a sweeping gesture of finality with one hand. “Positive. Now, what is it?”

  “Dick . . . I can’t stay at your place any longer.”

  “Well, I can understand that. For appearance’ sake . . .”

  “No. It’s not that.” She sighed again; averted his gaze. “My apartment isn’t really habitable right now, so I’m . . . leaving.”

  “Leaving?”

  “Going to my mother’s, in Homewood.”

  After the murder of her husband, Mrs. Trueheart had sold the delicatessen and moved from the city to a bungalow in one of the outlying suburbs.

  “Well, Tess, that’s an awful long commute into the city to get to your job.”

  “I know. But it’ll only be temporary.”

  “Good. Until you can find a new apartment.”

  “No. I mean, until I find a new job, closer to Mama’s.”

  “Tess. I don’t understand . . .”

  Her eyes were tragic. “Dick, I used to dream that someday maybe things would settle down. That you’d be able to take the time to really live a normal life. Now . . . now I know that’s never going to happen.”

  “Tess . . .”

  “I wouldn’t want you to give up what you love doing. I’d never ask that.”

  The wrist radio interrupted again, in its obnoxious, staticky way: “Come in, Tracy . . . come in!”

  Bug’s voice.

  “Sam’ll cover it,” Tracy said.

  “No. It’s all right. I understand.”

  “Tracy,” Bug’s voice said, “please come in . . .”

  “I’ll just tell him to call Sam,” Tracy said, and raised his wrist near his face, as if lifting a great weight. “What is it, Bug?”

  “Tracy,” Bug’s voice said, “you better get down to the Southside Warehouse right away—sounds like a big payoff is comin’ down.”

  “Bug,” Tracy began, “check in with Pat or Sam. I’m indisposed.”

  “No,” Tess said quietly, touching his arm. “It’s all right. Go.”

  “You’re sure?” he asked her.

  She nodded.

  “I’m on my way, Bug,” Tracy said. He took Tess’s hand and squeezed it. “I’ll be back. We’ll talk this out.”

  “Go,” she said, and her smile was faint, but supportive.

  The industrial area near the river was blacker than the inside of a fist. Tracy parked and walked to the massive redbrick warehouse, thinking he’d probably go in that same window in the alleyway, where he’d found Patton unconscious a few nights ago.

  But when he tried a door on the Front Street side, and it quietly opened, he slipped on in—why stand on ceremony? As long as he had his gun in hand, that is.

  Stacked crates loomed, throwing inky shadows; the stockpiled boxes along the periphery provided good cover, and he ducked behind them, moving down an aisle, edging quietly along, listening for voices, for any sound.

  He didn’t hear voices, but he did hear a mechanical rumbling; and the guttural purr of an engine.

  Moving cautiously, he headed toward the source of the sound, and then, between stacked boxes, he got a view of something.

  He saw Bug Bailey.

  Bailey was visible only from the chest up; he was gagged, a bright red handkerchief like a gash across his lower face, his eyes buggy and filled with no hope.

  Though he could see no ropes, Tracy knew the little man was bound.

  Bug Bailey was standing in an iron-chain-draped crate, the upper portion of which was open, and above him was the spout of a cement mixer.

  Tracy drew a sudden breath, afraid for his friend.

  At the same time, the detective saw Bailey’s captors, standing on the platform just to the left of the churning truck: two men in dark fedoras and topcoats—the wrinkled human nightmare that was Pruneface, backed up by his chief enforcer, the skeletal-faced Influence, whose hauntingly hideous gaze bespoke his days as a carnival hypnotist.

  Both of them had tommy guns.

  Influence’s staring eyes caught Tracy, and Tracy ducked out of sight, as Influence signaled his withered boss that they had company.

  “Come save your little friend, Tracy!” Pruneface called out tauntingly. “Be a hero! That’s what you’re so good at, isn’t it?”

  And Pruneface nodded to Influence, who reached up and threw a lever on the truck. Its huge mixer tumbled and churned and began to cascade wet cement down upon Bug Bailey, covering his head like thick gray molasses, splattering his yellow-and-black coat with the same blobby gray.

  Ye gods, Tracy thought, he’s going to drown in that stuff!

  The detective had changed positions and was fashioning an impromptu scarecrow, hanging his yellow topcoat on a mop and using a bucket for a head, on which he snugged his fedora. He propped the Tracy-like figure between two crates not far from where Influence had spotted him.

  Hunkered down, he quickly, carefully moved along an aisle between walls of stacked crates, leaving the scarecrow behind, circling around to get at Bailey from the other side.

  While he was doing this, Pruneface and Influence were stalking him—or so they thought. They moved slowly down an aisle of boxes, where the yellow of Tracy’s coat and fedora attracted the attention of their combined tommy guns.

  Tracy smiled tightly at the sound of machine-gun fire elsewhere in the warehouse, as the bullets chewed up the wood of the crates, and killed a topcoat, hat, bucket, and mop. With that cacophony as a backdrop, Tracy was getting bathed in cement while he worked at untying the Bug.

  But it wasn’t easy. The bonds were tight, the cement was sloppy and flooding down on them both, and the groggy little man was wedged down inside that upended crate.

  “I hate heroes,” somebody said.

  Tracy, his face, his hair, his black suit, splotchy with wet cement, glanced back to see Pruneface, his shriveled face cracked apart in a smile. The ancient gangster was pointing a
.45 automatic right at him. Influence, his tommy gun empty, smoke curling out its barrel, stood watching with glazed, contented eyes.

  “Somebody should have done this years ago,” Pruneface said, and a shot echoed through the warehouse, but it wasn’t his.

  Nor was it Tracy’s.

  A figure in a black topcoat with a black slouch hat had emerged, just barely, from a gap between stacked crates, a smoking .38 in his black-gloved hand.

  A man with no face.

  “Ye gods,” Tracy said softly.

  Influence, armed only with an empty tommy gun, scrambled for the Front Street door, and Tracy watched as the faceless figure seemed to consider putting a hole in the fleeing man’s back. But it didn’t happen. The door opened and closed, and Influence was gone.

  Tracy looked back at his savior, but the man with no face had receded into the darkness.

  Tracy didn’t pursue the faceless man; he couldn’t—he had to proceed with rescuing his little friend, who thank God was alive. He wrestled Bailey out of the crate, and the gray men looked like statues come to life, doing a bizarre dance in the dimly lit warehouse, their only audience a wrinkled gangster who lay on the floor, his staring eyes as blank as the face of the man who had killed him.

  Big Boy sat at the conference-room table with a full-course meal laid out in front of him, a feast fit for a king—only the king was fit to be tied. Utensils clutched in his fists like weapons, a lobster bib tucked in his collar as if he were a tot, Big Boy was fuming, his eyes flashing dangerously as he spoke to Flattop.

  “The Blank bailed Tracy out?” Big Boy asked incredulously.

  “So Influence says.” Flattop shrugged. He laughed shortly. “Old skeleton-face has scurried into his rat hole, shakin’ like a little girl.”

  Breathless was buffing her nails by the fire. Her black gown glittered in the glow.

  “What the hell’s goin’ on?” Big Boy said, eyes flickering with confusion. “Is he working for Tracy, this no-face bum?”

  “Who says he’s working for Tracy?” Flattop said.

  “What sort of man has no face?” Breathless asked.

  “Keep out of this,” Big Boy snapped. “If I want your opinion, I’ll slap it out of you.”

  Her smile was wicked as she studied her red nails. “That Dick Tracy really gets under your skin, doesn’t he?”

  Big Boy grabbed a glass of wine and, half standing, flung it wildly at the mirror over the fireplace; the wineglass and the mirror shattered into shards and rained near Breathless, who backed away, shaken. Red wine dripped like blood down the broken remains of the mirror.

  “Get out!” the gangster ordered her. “Go find your pansy piano player and rehearse or something! What do I pay you for?”

  “That’s an embarrassing question,” Breathless said coldly, and, her blue eyes mingling fear and rancor, she moved to the door, exiting as fluidly as the wine Big Boy had spilled.

  “All right, all right,” Big Boy told Flattop and Itchy. Numbers Norton stood on the sidelines, as well. “That’s enough of this garbage. I want ’em dead, both of ’em! I want the Blank blanked, and I want Tracy deader than this here steak!” He stuck his fork in his rare steak and it quivered there.

  Itchy and Norton exchanged nervous glances; Flattop remained impervious.

  “What’s the deal anyway?” Big Boy ranted. “Did you bums forget how to kill people? Don’t you have any pride in your work anymore? Have you no sense of duty? I want Dick Tracy dead! Dead, dead, dead!”

  “It was Pruneface and Influence that screwed up, boss,” Flattop said, gesturing casually, trying to get Big Boy to be reasonable. “You want us to do the job, we’ll do it.”

  “But you wanted it to look like an accident, boss,” Itchy said, in a pleadingly nasal tone, gesturing with his palms up.

  “That’s right, boss,” Norton said. “We got to be careful. We’re running a business here. Killing cops brings down the heat. Look at how worked up they got over that harness bull getting it at the warehouse!”

  “Yeah,” Big Boy said, calming himself, his seething turning into scheming. “Yeah. You’re right. When you’re right, you’re right, and you’re right. Listen . . . Flattop. Tell that funny-boy piano player I want to talk to him . . .”

  By the time Tracy got back to the diner, Tess was gone.

  He’d stopped by headquarters to shower away the cement and generally clean up, as well as grab his spare topcoat and hat (placing another bullet-riddled fedora on the shelf for Pat’s wall-display collection). But he’d done all that as quickly as humanly possible and he was sure Tess would understand.

  Chief Brandon sat at the counter with the Kid. They were polishing off pieces of pie.

  “Where’s Tess?” Tracy asked.

  “She’s gone to stay with her mother,” Brandon said, surprised that Tracy would ask. “She called and asked me to stop by and mind the boy, here, till you got back.”

  “She’s gone?” Tracy said, sitting on stool, stunned.

  “Sorry, Tracy,” Brandon said. His rugged face had gone soft with sympathy. “She said you knew . . .”

  “Yeah. Well, uh, thanks, Chief. Thanks for pinch-hitting for me.”

  Brandon’s face tightened; his eyes were hard and strictly business now. “What’s this about some mystery man shooting Pruneface and saving your tail?”

  Tracy clued him in. The Chief reacted with the same skeptical surprise as had Catchem and Patton when Tracy had filled them in at the scene. In the darkness on the dock, with a foghorn making its ghostly wail from somewhere out where the river met the lake, the tale of the faceless man saving him had seemed less than credible to Tracy himself. But both his assistants had bought his story.

  “If you say there was a man with no face,” Patton had said, “I’ll bet the mortgage there was. But who is he workin’ for?”

  And now the Chief was asking the same thing.

  Tracy told Brandon what he’d told Pat at the scene: “I don’t know. But somehow I don’t think he’s working for me.”

  The Chief raised his eyebrows, then hauled himself off the stool; he smiled and patted the Kid on the back. “You take care of this big lug, son.”

  “Will do, sir,” the boy said. He was still eating his pie, though with, less enthusiasm, now. He was studying Tracy’s face.

  The Chief walked out into the night.

  “You look sad, Mr. Tracy,” the boy said.

  “It’s that kind of night, junior,” he said. “Are you done with that pie?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Come on. Let’s walk.”

  He’d left his car at headquarters, which was only half a dozen blocks away. It was midevening. It had rained, a brief but world-shaking thunderstorm; in the aftermath, the streets were shiny and slick under an ink-black sky. The city was a mass of rectangles with occasional dots of light; geometric, unreal, as cold as a blueprint, and every bit as inviting. The sidewalks were largely empty, but for the occasional street person stumbling in the dampness, searching for the recession of a doorway to duck into, or a soup kitchen open for business.

  “You can make her like you again,” the Kid said with a touching urgency in his voice, so close to the man that their clothing brushed as they walked. “Just tell her that dame didn’t mean nothin’ to you.”

  “Thanks, kid,” Tracy said gently. “That’s good advice.”

  “I’ll talk to her for ya. I’ll tell her it wasn’t your fault that babe plastered her lips on ya.”

  Tracy had to laugh a little. “With you as my defense counsel,” he said, “I just may get the chair.”

  The Kid frowned, but then he laughed. “Yeah, I guess that did sound kinda bad. I mean, the babe kissed you, you don’t kiss her—right?”

  “Right. How did you know?”

  “Tracy, you got nerve when it comes to crooks. But with dames, you’re putty in their hands.”

  “Thanks a bunch. But you’re right. She kissed me.”

  “Yeah, but you aid
ed and abetted.” He patted Tracy’s arm. “Don’t let it get ya down. Miss Tess is nuts about ya. You can get back on her good side. I got faith in ya.”

  Tracy smiled at the Kid; he felt a warmth for this little roughneck that went beyond simple compassion. He slipped his arm around the boy. “You come up to the office with me. We need to talk about this orphanage business.”

  “I know.” The boy shook his head, glumly. “It’s a lousy world, ain’t it?”

  “Sometimes.”

  Tracy could understand why Tess would be hurt, would be angry; he was angry with himself. How could he let Breathless vamp him like that? She’d played him like a two-cent kazoo. At the same time, the memory of kissing her remained something he could not throw off; the sensation of it lingered, like a dream you couldn’t shake upon awakening. The heat of her, the coolness, her body so soft, so firm; was that it? Was that the fascination? The contradictory nature of the woman? The sweetness and the wickedness?

  With Breathless on his mind, but Tess in his heart, Tracy neared the front steps of the police station, with the well-dressed ragamuffin at his side. Puddles on the sidewalk reflected light from the nearby street lamp; but even with that, the world was dark.

  “Look,” the boy said, “Miss Tess is still comin’ into town to work at the greenhouse, right? So stop by and see her in a day or so, and con her into coming to see me at that orphanage, why don’t you?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Sure! She’ll go along for my sake—then you can take me for a picnic or something, and I’ll pretend to fall asleep . . . and, you know—you let nature take ’er course.”

  Tracy laughed. He took off the boy’s red cap and ruffled his wild mop of reddish hair. “Junior, you’re a pal.”

  They were going up the steps when Sergeant Crane came out.

  “Tracy!” the uniformed man said. He worked the receiving desk, and his shift had just ended. “A message just came in for you . . . some woman wants to meet you somewhere.”

  Tracy glanced at the boy, who grinned and said, “Miss Tess!”

  “No,” the sergeant said. “I think it’s a Miss Mahoney.”

  Tracy swallowed. He turned to the boy. “I’ll take you upstairs.”