Wally asked, “Going to have plenty of time? Or would you rather dictate it to a fast rewrite man?”
“I can do it.”
“Okay. Send it to me as it comes out of the mill, a page at a time. I’ll have a boy waiting at your desk. Slug it MIMI.”
Sweeney slugged it MIMI and kept typing. A minute later a copy boy was breathing down his neck, but Sweeney was used to that and it didn’t bother him. He sent the last page in ten minutes before the first edition deadline.
After that he lighted a cigarette and pretended to be busy so Crawley wouldn’t think of anything else for him to do right away, until deadline was past and he figured Wally would be free again, and then he wandered into Wally’s office again.
“How’s Mimi?” he asked.
“A broken woman. Look in my wastebasket if you don’t believe me.”
“I’d rather not,” Sweeney said.
A boy came in with papers fresh off the press and put three of them on Wally’s desk. Sweeney picked one up and glanced at the page one layout. There was Mimi, all right, slightly larger than actual size. She had the banner head, two columns of story, four columns of picture. And Wally had by-lined the story for him.
Sweeney said, “Nice layout,” and Wally grunted, reading.
Sweeney said, “Nice story, too. Thanks for telling me so.” Wally grunted again.
Sweeney said, “How about the rest of the day off?” This time Wally didn’t grunt; he put down the paper and got ready to explode. “Are you crazy? You’ve been off two weeks, come back to work for two hours and–”
“Relax, Wally. Don’t break a blood vessel. Where do you think that story came from? Out of the air? I’ve been working twenty hours a day on it, more or less, for three days. On my own time. I came in with that story ready to write up. And brought Mimi with me for company. And why? Because I worked till four o’clock this morning and got two hours sleep, that’s why. Dragged myself out of bed half-awake to come in and write the biggest story of the year for you and then you–”
“Shut up. All right, get the hell out of here. Of all the Goddam goldbricks–”
“Thank you. Seriously, Wally, I am going home. I’ll be in my room to rest, but I won’t get undressed – and if anything breaks on this story call me quick. I’ll be on it just as fast as I would if I were waiting around here. Okay?”
“Okay, Sweeney. If anything breaks, you’re on it. And listen, Sweeney – win, lose or draw, it’s a swell story.”
“Thanks,” Sweeney said. “And thanks to hell and back for carrying me while I was – gone.”
“This makes up for it. You know, Sweeney, there are damn few real reporters left. And you’re–”
“Hold it,” said Sweeney. “Pretty soon we’ll be crying into our beer, and we haven’t got any beer to cry into. I’m going to beat it.”
He beat it.
He took one of Wally’s papers with him so he wouldn’t have to hunt one up elsewhere or wait for one on the street, and went home. He took a cab, partly because he still had more money than he knew what to do with, and partly because – temporarily – he really did feel tired as hell.
It was partly the letdown, but mostly the fact that, for a while now, there was nothing intelligent to do but to wait.
Either the story of Mimi would lead to a big break in the story of the Ripper or it wouldn’t. If it did, it would probably happen this afternoon or this evening. Or possibly tonight.
If it didn’t – well, then it didn’t. He’d be back at work at nine o’clock tomorrow morning and he didn’t think, now, that Wally would keep him off the Ripper case. He’d just have to forget Mimi and try to dig up another angle, somewhere. Probably by going over again, and more thoroughly, a lot of the ground he had already covered.
At home, he made himself comfortable and read the story through, leisurely and carefully. Wally had added to it, splicing in some recapitulation on the stories of the other three women who had been attacked (for the Mimi story had concerned directly only Lola Brent, who had sold Mimi to the Ripper), but he had changed hardly a word of what Sweeney had written.
This time he even read the continuation on an inside page; then he folded the paper together and put it with the others that covered the various Ripper murders.
He sat down and tried to relax, but couldn’t. He went over to the phonograph – it seemed naked now without the naked statuette atop it – and played the Brahms Fourth. That helped a little, although he couldn’t really concentrate on it.
By two o’clock he was hungry, but he didn’t want to risk missing a phone call so he went downstairs to Mrs. Randall’s rooms and got her to fry some bacon for a sandwich.
By that time he’d decided he didn’t give a damn if the phone rang or not. Then it rang, and he almost choked swallowing the big bite of sandwich he’d just taken and almost fell getting up the stairs to answer the phone in the second floor hallway. The call was for another roomer, who wasn’t in.
He went back downstairs and finished the sandwich.
He went back upstairs to his room, put the records of a De Falla album on the phonograph and, while they played, tried to reread the short stories in a Damon Runyan collection. He didn’t do too well with either the reading or the listening.
The phone rang. He got there in nothing flat, slamming the door of his own room to shut off part of the sound of the phonograph – which was about one second quicker than stopping to shut off the phonograph itself would have been.
It was Wally. He said, “Okay, Sweeney. Get over to State Street. You know the address.”
“‘What’s up?”
“They got the Ripper. Now listen, we got a headline and a bulletin going in the Final – it’s going to press now – and we’re not holding it for details. We got the main facts, and the full story will have to go in tomorrow. It’s an even break; we’ll beat the morning papers on the bulletin and the main facts, but they’ll beat us on getting a detailed story.
“So there’s no rush. Get over there and get the full dope, but you can write it up when you get in tomorrow.”
“Wally, what happened? Did he make another try at Yolanda Lang? Is she all right?”
“I guess so. Yeah, he made another try and this time the dog got him, like it almost did last time except that last time he slammed the door on the dog–”
“I know what happened last time. What happened this time?”
“I told you, dammit. They got him. He’s still alive but probably won’t be long. Took him to a hospital, but don’t waste time; they won’t let you talk to him. He went out a window. At the dame’s place, I mean. Good work, Sweeney; that Mimi story of yours broke it. He not only had the statuette, but had it with him.”
“Who? I mean, have they got his name?”
“Name? Sure, we got his name. It’s Greene, James J. Greene. Captain Bline says he’s suspected him all along. Now quit pumping me; get over there and get the story.” The receiver banged in Sweeney’s ear, but he stared into the black mouthpiece of the wall phone for seconds before he put his own receiver back on the hook.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It wasn’t quite believable somehow. He’d thought it all along, and yet the reality was hard to swallow. For one thing, one simple thing, he couldn’t think of Doc Greene as being dead.
But Horlick – who was already there when Sweeney got there – was saying that he was.
“Yeah,” he said. “Bline got a call from the hospital; he sent two of the boys with Greene to try to get a detailed confession and get it signed, but I guess they didn’t make it, and that he couldn’t have signed it anyway what with both arms broken, among other things. And he wasn’t very coherent, what I heard of him. I got here before they took him away.”
“How come so quick, Wayne?”
“Bull luck. I was already on my way here. For part of the follow-up tomorrow on that Mimi story you broke today, Wally sent me to interview Yolanda Lang, to ask her if she’d ever seen such a st
atuette. And if not, and it probably would have been not, I was to get a story anyway by asking her what her reaction was to a picture of it – whether it looked like she felt when the Ripper was coming at her in the hallway. That kind of crap. And I got here about the time the police ambulance did.”
“And Yolanda isn’t up there?”
“Nope, she ran out with the dog, just after it happened. Shock again, or fright. She’s probably having the meamies somewhere but she’ll show up. I’m going in with what I got; you go on upstairs and see if you can get more if you want to. Bline’s up there.”
He went his way, south on State Street, and Sweeney pushed his way through the knot of people who were standing around the doorway of the apartment building on State just south of Chicago Avenue, the same doorway through which Sweeney had stared only a few nights ago and had seen a woman and a dog. This time the crowd was bigger, although there was nothing to be seen through the glass. Sweeney pushed through to a policeman guarding the door. His press card got him inside and he ran up the stairs to the third floor.
Yolanda Lang’s apartment was the rear north one of four on the third floor. There wasn’t any need checking the number on the door because the door was open and the place was full of cops. At least it looked full of cops; when Sweeney got in, he saw there were only two besides Bline.
Bline came over to him. “Sweeney, if I wasn’t so happy, I’d break your neck. How long did you have that Goddam statuette?”
“Don’t remember exactly, Cap.”
“That’s what I mean. But – well, we got the Ripper, and without another ripping, although that must’ve been a pretty close thing. And I’ll settle for that. I’m even ready to buy you a drink. Guess I’m through here; I’ll leave one of the boys to wait for the Lang dame to be sure she’s all right when she comes back.”
“Is there any doubt that she isn’t?”
“Physically, sure. He didn’t touch her with the knife at all this time; the pooch got in ahead. But she’s probably in a mental tizzy, worse than last time. Hell, not that I blame her.”
“Did Devil kill Greene?”
“Well, he chewed him up a bit but didn’t kill him; Doc must’ve managed to keep an arm over his throat. But he went out that window and that killed him all right. Must’ve backed up against it and a lunge of the dog knocked him out backwards.”
Bline had gestured to a wide-open window and Sweeney went over to it and looked out. Two stories below was a small cement courtyard. It was pretty well littered with junk people had thrown out of windows.
Sweeney asked, “Where’s the statuette?”
“Down there in the courtyard, most of it. We found enough pieces of it to identify it. Doc must still have had hold of it when he went out the window. Probably trying to club off the dog with it. The knife was there, too; he must’ve had the statuette in one hand and the knife in the other – it’s a wonder the dog managed not to get hurt. But I guess Doc had to keep one arm to cover his throat and wasn’t fast enough with the other. A dog like that is hell on wheels in a fight.” Sweeney looked down into the courtyard and shivered a little.
He said, “I’ll take that drink, Cap. And I’ll buy back. Let’s get out of here.”
They went to the corner of State and Chicago, the tavern from which the phone call had been made the night of the first attack on Yolanda. Bline bought.
Sweeney said, “I know everything except what happened. Can you put it in order for me?”
“The whole thing? Or just this afternoon?”
“Just this afternoon.”
Bline said, “Yolanda was alone in her apartment – as of a few minutes after three o’clock. We know that because I had a guy stationed to watch the place, from across the hall. We’d sublet the flat across from hers for that purpose, and there was a man stationed there at all times, except of course when she was working at the club. He had a peephole rigged so he could watch the door to her place.
“He saw Doc Greene come up with a shoebox under his arm and knock on her door, see? Well, that was all right; Doc had called there before and I’d said it was okay to let him in. If it had been a stranger, Garry – that’s the guy who was on duty – would have had his door open and a gun ready.”
Sweeney asked, “Did Doc call on business? I mean, when he’d been there before?”
Bline shrugged. “Don’t know and didn’t care. We’re not the vice squad; we were just hunting the Ripper. And I’d thought, from Greene’s alibis, that he was in the clear. Well, I was wrong. Did you really suspect him, Sweeney, or did you keep needling him just because you didn’t like him?”
“I don’t really know, Cap. But what happened?”
“Well, Yolanda answered the door and let him in. He was in there about five minutes when things started to happen. Garry heard Yolanda scream and the dog growl and Greene yell, almost all at once, and he yanked his own door open and started across the hallway. He yanked at Yolanda’s door, but it was locked – a snap lock – and he was just about to put a bullet through the lock when the door opened.
“He says Yolanda had opened it and she pushed past him into the hallway, her face as white as a sheet and looking like something pretty horrible had happened. But there wasn’t any blood on her; she wasn’t hurt. Garry tried to grab her with his free hand – he had his gun in the other – but the dog jumped at him and he had to let go to cover his throat. The dog took a piece out of his sleeve but didn’t happen to get hold of his arm.
“By that time Yolanda was past him and starting down the stairs and the dog wheeled and followed her. So he didn’t have to shoot the dog. And as long as Yolanda seemed all right, he ran into Yolanda’s apartment to see what went on there. There didn’t seem to be anyone in there and he wondered what happened to Greene; then he heard a groan from the courtyard and looked out the open window – it’s a pretty big one, the kind that swings out instead of raising – and there was Doc Greene lying in the courtyard.
“So he phones for me and the ambulance and we get here. Greene was still alive, but dying and not very coherent. He could just say a few words, but they were enough.”
Sweeney asked, “What do you figure sent Greene around there?”
“How do you figure how a homicidal maniac reasons, Sweeney? How the hell do I know? But I think it was your story about that statuette that set him off. He had it, and maybe Yolanda knew that he had it and the jig would be up as soon as she happened to see your front page. Why he took it along in a shoebox when he went to kill her, I don’t know.
“But he had it out of the box, in one hand, and the knife in the other hand – when the dog saved her by getting him. Chewed him up pretty bad; maybe he even jumped out of the window to get away from the dog, but I think it’s more likely he got backed up against it and went out accidentally when the dog jumped for him again.”
“What do you figure happened to Yolanda?”
“Shock again, of course. She’s probably wandering around in a daze, but she’s well protected. She’ll snap out of it by herself, probably, and come back. If not, she can’t be hard to find – a dame like that with a dog like that. Well, I got to get in and report. So long, Sweeney.” Bline left and Sweeney ordered another drink. And another and then one more. It was getting dark when he left the tavern and went back to Yolanda’s flat. There was still a policeman at the door. Sweeney asked him if Yolanda had come back, and she hadn’t.
He strolled over to Clark Street, stopped in at Ireland’s and ordered a lobster. While it was cooking he went to the phone booth and called Ray Land, the private detective he’d hired in New York.
He said, “This is Sweeney, Ray. You can call it off.”
“That’s what I figured, Sweeney. Heard on the radio while I was eating dinner that your Chicago Ripper was caught and his name was familiar. So I figured you wouldn’t want me to keep on. Well, I put in a day on it, so you got fifty bucks coming back. I’ll send you a check.”
“Get anywhere on it?”
“Hadn’t yet. It was tough going, what with it being two weeks ago. Best bet I had was a maid who managed to remember that one morning his bed hadn’t been slept in, but she couldn’t remember which morning it was. I was going to see her again after she’d had time to think it over. Shall I send you that check care of the Blade?”
“Sure. And thanks, Ray.”
He called Captain Bline at headquarters and asked, “Any reports on Yolanda yet?”
“Yeah, Sweeney. A funny one.” Bline’s voice sounded puzzled. “She turned up at El Madhouse some time ago. Just half an hour after Greene had tried to attack her. She got some money from Nick and left again. And no report on her since.”
“The hell,” said Sweeney. “How did she act?”
“A little funny, Nick said, but not too bad. He said she was pale and a little jittery, but he didn’t think anything of it; he hadn’t heard about what happened to Doc yet, and she didn’t say anything about it. Just wanted some money – gave him a song-and-dance about being able to buy something she wanted for a hell of a bargain if she did it right away for cash. Nick said he figured somebody had offered her a stolen mink coat or something for a few hundred bucks and she wanted it but was a little afraid of the deal and that was why she was nervous.”
“How much did he give her?”
“A week’s salary. She had it coming as of tomorrow night anyway so he figured he might as well give it to her a day sooner.”
“That’s funny.”
“Yeah, but I think I can figure it. I’d guess it that she just wanted to hide out for a day or two. It was shock, but temporary, that sent her chasing out of the building after Greene tried to attack her a second time; but she must’ve got over the worst of it quick if she could talk normally to Nick within a half hour. Only I’d guess she just didn’t feel up to facing us and all the reporters and everything. But she’ll show up in a few days when she gets her balance back. She won’t miss cashing in on her contract and all the publicity and everything.”
The Screaming Mimi Page 21