A Horse’s Head

by Ed McBain

  “I trusted you, and you didn’t come back.”

  “I promised to come back with the money, but there was no money.”

  “So Merilee has told me,” Kruger said, still not taking the binoculars from his eyes. “What do you make of it?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Mullaney said. “I have the jacket here with me, if you’d like to look it over. You can take my word, however, that …”

  “I will never take your word again,” Kruger said. “You may not realize it, sir, but you hurt me deeply last night. Give me the jacket.”

  He put down the binoculars and took the shopping bag from Mullaney, who watched as Kruger carefully examined the jacket, turning it over in his hands, feeling inside the lining, searching the pockets, examining the buttons, and then finally crumpling it into a ball again and thrusting it back into the Judy Bond shopping bag.

  “Worthless,” he said, which ascertained what Mullaney had suspected all along: Kruger, no more than any of his fellows, knew why the jacket was important. Only K knew. K was the key.

  “If you’d tell me what this is all about,” Mullaney said, “I might be able to help.”

  “This is all about half a million dollars.”

  “In American money or Italian money?”

  “In American money,” Kruger said.

  “Was it supposed to be in that coffin?”

  “Yes.”

  “How’d you know that?”

  “Why should I tell you anything when you’ve already broken trust with me?” Kruger said, offended, and put the binoculars back to his eyes.

  “Because I may be able to help.”

  “How? You’re a loser. Merilee told me you’re a loser.”

  “When did she tell you that?” Mullaney said, turning swiftly to look at Merilee, who had not said a word to Kruger since they’d joined him, and who was sitting now with her legs crossed, her hands delicately clasped in her lap, her eyes on the horses in the paddock.

  “Last night after your abortive love-making attempt,” Kruger said, and Mullaney felt foolish.

  “Well …” he said.

  “Well, that also was not very nice,” Kruger said, “making a pass at another fellow’s girl.”

  “Well, I’m sorry,” Mullaney said.

  “Well, you should be.”

  “Well, I am,” Mullaney said, thinking he was sorry about a great many things, but not necessarily about having made a pass at Merilee. Actually, he thought, if you really want to know, Mr. Kruger, it was a hell of a lot more than a pass, nor was it only an attempt at love-making, it was real and genuine, bona-fide and true love-making, me inside her, abortive or otherwise, though I don’t imagine Merilee told you that. If she had told you that, you wouldn’t have generously and kindly given her three hundred dollars to squander on the nags, which largesse she promptly turned over to the loser she supposedly claimed was me; she couldn’t have thought I was very much of a loser if she was willing to trust me with three hundred dollars, what do you think about that, Mr. Kruger? She must have thought I was pretty hot Stuff, don’t you think, Mr. Kruger, no matter what she said to you or even to me, a pretty interesting and exciting fellow, if she was willing to give me three hundred dollars, which doesn’t grow on trees where I come from. Think about that for a little while, Mr. Kruger, while you peer through your binoculars and examine the horses, what the hell do you know about horses, or women, or me, for that matter, a loser indeed!

  But he could not justify her betrayal.

  She had promised not to tell, she had promised to say only that he had escaped, and yet she had told all, or almost all, told enough to make him appear a fool. You shouldn’t do that after making love, he thought, because making love is total exposure, and it only works if you can trust the other person enough to make a complete fool of yourself. Show and Tell is for kindergarten, he thought, not for lovers.

  He suddenly wondered whether Irene (who had undoubtedly known other men since the divorce) had ever told any of them, for example, that he sometimes made muscles in front of the mirror, or that, for example, he had once said “Yum-yum” while going down on her, or that, for further example, he had once lain full-length and naked on the bed, with a derby hat covering his erection, which he had revealed to her suddenly as she entered the room with a “Good morning, madam, may I show you something in a hat?”—wondered, in short, if she had ever told anyone else in the world that he, Andrew Mullaney, was sometimes a fool, sometimes most certainly a horse’s ass.

  The thought bothered him.

  To take his mind off Merilee’s betrayal, off Irene’s betrayal by extension, he turned back to the matter of the money again; there was always money to occupy a man’s thoughts, there was always money to take a man’s mind off the nagging knowledge that he was sometimes, perhaps often, a fool. “How did you learn about the money?” he asked Kruger.

  Kruger lowered his binoculars, turned in his seat, and looked Mullaney directly in the eye. He was silent for a long time. Then, at last, he said, “I’m going to level with you, sir.”

  “Please do,” Mullaney said.

  “Someone in K’s organization was in my employ.”

  “Who?”

  “Gouda.”

  “Gouda,” Mullaney repeated, thinking Where there’s cheese, there is also sometimes a rat.

  “Yes,” Kruger said. “Unfortunately, he was killed in a terrible highway accident, as you may know …”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “Yes, I thought you knew. In any event, he had outlived his usefulness.”

  “Was he the one who told you the money would be in the coffin?”

  “He did more than that.”

  “What did he do?”

  “He was responsible for putting those paper scraps in the lining of the jacket.”

  “Gouda?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought maybe McReady.”

  “No. It was Gouda.”

  “I see. In place of the money.”

  “Yes.”

  “What happened to the money?”

  “He delivered it to us.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “He delivered it to us.”

  “The five hundred thousand dollars?”

  “Well, give or take.”

  “He delivered it to you?”

  “Yes. I told you he was in my employ.”

  “He gave you the money, and substituted paper scraps for it, is that what you’re saying?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “Then you already have the money.”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No.”

  “Who does have it?”

  “K, I would imagine.”

  “But if it was delivered to you …”

  “It was delivered to me, yes. But apparently someone knew Gouda was working for me, someone knew Gouda would make the substitution, and someone very carefully worked out a triple cross.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “The money Gouda delivered was counterfeit.”

  “This is very confusing,” Mullaney said.

  “Yes,” Kruger agreed.

  “You mean they knew he was going to steal the money, so they …”

  “Steal is a harsh word,” Kruger said.

  “They knew he was going to arrange a transfer,” Mullaney said, “so they substituted counterfeit bills for the real bills, which counterfeit bills Gouda subsequently sto … transferred to you, leaving paper scraps in their place?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t get it,” Mullaney said. “Why go to all the bother of shipping the coffin to Rome if they knew there were only paper scraps in the jacket?”

  “I don’t know,” Kruger said thoughtfully. “But that’s why we hijacked the coffin. When we discovered we’d been tricked, we assumed the real money was still hidden in the coffin someplace. As you know, it wasn’t.”

  “Nor in the jacket,
either,” Mullaney said.

  “Well,” Kruger said reflectively, “it wasn’t exactly a total loss. In my line of work, even counterfeit money is worth something.” He paused. “Would you have any idea, sir, where the real money is?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  “No, I have no idea.”

  “Mmmm.”

  “There’s something else that’s bothering me, though,” Mullaney said.

  “Yes?”

  “Where’d all that money come from?”

  Kruger was silent for quite a few minutes. Then he put the binoculars back to his eyes.

  “Mr. Kruger,” Mullaney said, “where’d all that money …”

  “I think our business is concluded,” Kruger said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I think you will have to leave the track now in the company of Henry and George.”

  “What?” Mullaney said.

  “Yes,” Kruger said.

  “But you said you trusted me!”

  “No, I said I was going to level with you.”

  “That’s the same thing!”

  “Not quite,” Kruger said. “Several men were killed in that highway accident yesterday, as I’m sure you know.”

  “Yes, but what’s that got to …”

  “Three men, to be exact. The police know only that a red pickup truck entered the Van Wyck Expressway, cut off the hearse, and shot three men to death. The fourth man unfortunately escaped through the bushes and brambles lining the parkway.”

  “That would be K,” Mullaney said.

  “Yes, that would be K. So you see, we do not wish the police to learn anything more about the accident than they already know.”

  “I see.”

  “We do not wish them to know, for example, that I or any of my fellows had anything to do with it.”

  “I see,” Mullaney said again.

  Kruger put down the glasses, turned to Mullaney, and smiled. Mullaney knew he was about to make a joke.

  “Loose lips sink ships,” Kruger said.

  “I think I get your meaning,” Mullaney said.

  “I hope so.”

  “But you have nothing to worry about. I’m in trouble with the police myself, you see.”

  “Oh, are you really?” Kruger said drily, and put the glasses to his eyes again.

  “Yes. So I would hardly go to them with information, you see, being in trouble with them myself, you see.”

  “I see,” Kruger said.

  “Yes.”

  “Yes, but in any event I think you will have to leave us now.”

  “You don’t understand,” Mullaney said.

  “I think I understand,” Kruger said.

  “I’m telling you the truth,” Mullaney said. “I really am in trouble with the police.”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I was arrested for burglary, in fact!”

  “Take him away,” Kruger said.

  “The hors-es are on the track!” the announcer said.

  “Do you see anything you like?” Kruger asked Merilee, lowering the binoculars.

  “Mr. Kruger, look …” Mullaney said.

  “Up!” George said behind him.

  “I thought the seven-horse,” Merilee said.

  “Mr. Kruger, I assure you …”

  “Let’s go,” Henry said, and prodded him with something that felt very much like a gun in a jacket pocket. Mullaney picked up his shopping bag.

  “The terrible thing though,” Merilee said, “is that I lost all my money on the last race.”

  “Do you really like the seven-horse?”

  “Oh yes indeed, I think he’s a cunning horse.”

  “Mr. Kruger, I wish …”

  “Get him out of here!” Kruger said sharply, and Henry poked him again.

  “All right, don’t get tough,” Mullaney said.

  “Move!” Henry said.

  “All right, all right,” Mullaney said. Clutching the shopping bag to his chest, he began moving sideways put of the aisle, then stopped and turned to Kruger, who had the binoculars to his eyes again. “You haven’t heard the last of me, Mr. Kruger,” he said.

  “I think I have,” Kruger answered. “Which horse did you say?”

  “The seven-horse,” Merilee answered.

  “Looks like a good horse,” Kruger said.

  “Looks like a dog to me,” Mullaney said petulantly.

  “No one asked you.”

  “And as for you …” Mullaney said, turning to Merilee.

  “Yes?” she answered, looking up at him.

  “I am not a loser.”

  “If you lose, honey,” she said, “why then you’re a loser, yes indeed.”

  “Move!” Henry said again.

  Mullaney moved out of the aisle without looking back at either Merilee or Kruger, feeling the hard snout of Henry’s gun against his back, and thinking how remarkable it was that you could always tell a gun by its feel, even when it was in somebody’s pocket. He could not for a minute believe they were really going to kill him, and yet they all seemed so terribly serious about this, especially Henry and George, who solemnly led him to the escalator and then down to the exit and across the wide concrete path leading to the elevated train station.

  “Shouldn’t we take the car?” Henry asked.

  “Kruger will want it,” George said.

  But that was all either of them said, leading him silently up the steps to the change booth, and buying three tokens (very nice of them), and passing him through the turnstile, and then taking him out onto the platform where they silently and ominously waited for the train going back to Manhattan.

  “Where are you taking me?” Mullaney asked.

  “Someplace nice,” Henry said.

  “Very nice,” George said.

  “You’ll remember it always,” Henry said.

  “You’ll take the memory to your grave,” George said, which Mullaney did not think was funny.

  When the train pulled in, they waited silently for the doors to open, and then got into the nearest car and silently took seats, Mullaney in the middle, George and Henry on either side of him. The shopping bag with the damn inscrutable jacket rested on the floor of the car, between Mullaney’s feet.

  “How should we do it?” Henry asked.

  “I don’t know,” George said. “What do you think?”

  “The river?”

  “Always the river,” George said disdainfully.

  Mullaney, sitting between them, realized they were talking about him, which he considered impolite.

  “You got any better ideas?”

  “We could throw him on the tracks.”

  “Where?”

  “In the subway. When we get back to the city. It’ll look like an accident. What do you think?”

  Henry thought it over for a moment. “No,” he said, “I don’t like it.”

  “Well, what do you feel like doing?” George said.

  “I don’t know,” Henry said, “what do you feel like doing?”

  “I saw a movie once where they were getting this guy with a laser beam,” George said.

  “Yeah, but we don’t have a laser beam.”

  “I know. I was just saying.”

  “We could throw him off the Empire State Building,” Henry suggested. “They’ll think he jumped.”

  “I never been up the Empire State Building,” George said.

  “Me either.”

  “I hate to go someplace I ain’t never been,” George said.

  “Me too.”

  “So what do you want to do?”

  “I don’t know. What do you want to do?”

  “We could just plug him,” George said.

  “Yeah, I guess,” Henry said.

  “That’s such a drag though.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know. What do you think?”

  “I read a book once, th
ey had it fixed so it looked like the guy took an overdose of heroin.”

  “Yeah, but then we got to look up Garafolo, and maybe he won’t even be holding, and then we get all kinds of heat from the narcotics dicks, it ain’t worth it.”

  “Yeah.”

  They had passed perhaps three station stops by now, and were pulling into another one—Grant Avenue, Mullaney noticed. He thought he had better get the hell out of here quick because whereas it had not occurred to either Henry or George as yet, a very neat way of dispatching him would be merely to stomp him to death right here on the train. The way things were these days in New York, no one would pay the slightest bit of attention. He wondered when they would hit upon this best of all possible solutions, and saw the train doors opening, and calculated how long it would take him to reach those doors, and realized they could shoot him in the back before he’d run more than two feet from where they were sitting. The doors closed again, the train was once again in motion.

  They changed trains at Euclid Avenue. There were a lot of people in the new car, reading their newspapers, or holding hands, or studying the carcard advertising, or idly gazing through the windows as the train clattered from station to station, making its way toward Manhattan. Mullaney wondered what would happen if he stood up and announced that the two men with him were at this very moment discussing ways and means of killing him, and guessed that everyone in the car would simply applaud and wait for him to pass the hat. He glanced across the aisle to the other side of the car, where a fat dark-haired woman sat with her button-nosed little daughter, and then looked beyond them through the open windows, watching the apartment buildings as they blurred past, wondering what part of Brooklyn they were traveling through. He suddenly realized he would be leaving the train by the doors on his right, in the center of the car, and he decided he ought to know how long it took for those doors to open and then close again. So he began counting as soon as the train stopped at the next station, one, two, thr … the doors opened, four, five, six, seven, they were still open, people were moving out onto the platform, others were coming in, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, the doors closed, the train was in motion again. Well, that was a very pleasant exercise, Mullaney thought, but I don’t know what good it will do me when the time comes to make my break.

  “What we could do,” George said, “is throw him in that big garbage-burning thing they got on the East River Drive.”

  “I can’t stand the smell of garbage,” Henry said.