“That’s enough, Gottlieb! Now that we’ve introduced ourselves, would you do us the courtesy of telling us who you are?” Braun’s frown went all the way to the bone.
These guys were krauts of some sort, that much was clear, and Gottlieb mentioned a meeting. I rolled the dice, wagering my life on a hunch. “My name’s Weber, Eva Weber. From New York.”
Gottlieb’s brow worked. “Weber?”
“Yeah, Weber. Heloise Kendall is a pal of mine from way back, and I’m in town for her wedding. Guess I won’t need to buy her a gift now.” I grinned as I mashed my cigarette out on the tabletop and lit another one. “Seems the wedding is off, though a funeral is on, I suppose.”
Braun rubbed the stubble on his lantern jaw. “Why are you wearing a man’s suit?”
“Same reason you are.”
He didn’t have an answer for that and shot a glance at Gottlieb. “What do you think?”
“Hmmm. Tell me, Fräulein Weber, vhat is your father’s name? I haff been to New York, and I know several Webers there.”
Damn the man, he wasn’t as dim as Braun. It took a moment to recall the name from the pamphlet. “Rolf. His name is Rolf Weber.”
A smile oozed across Gottlieb’s face. “Rolf Weber! Indeed, I know a Rolf Weber, but by reputation only! Ve haff friends in common, I believe.”
The emphasis he put on ‘friends’ confirmed my suspicion. “Yeah, daddy has all kinds of friends in both New York and Cincinnati.”
“Gottlieb?” Braun hadn’t kept up at all. “You know this crazy broad?”
“Herr Braun! Her father is Bundesführer of the New York chapter of the Bund!”
“No kiddin’?” Braun looked me up and down. “Why didn’t you say so?” He visibly relaxed.
“Why didn’t you?” I took a drag on my cigarette. “So, where is Heloise? I need to break it to her that her fiancé got himself a severe case of lead poisoning.”
Gottlieb spread his hands. “Ve don’t know, Fräulein Weber. Ve vere supposed to pick Herr Shultz up in the car for tonight’s Bund meeting. Ve found him as you did, dead. Ve vere vaiting for Fräulein Kendall, vhen ve found you.”
“How long has Shultz been dead? He’s all stiff.”
“Ja. Rigor mortis. Dead men take a few hours to get stiff. Three, maybe four hours.”
Braun handed my pistol to me. “He telephoned me this afternoon, to arrange a ride.”
“When was that?”
“Around two. We found him at seven-thirty, and he was stiff then.” Braun looked distinctly uncomfortable discussing the corpse.
I nodded slowly. “So, somebody waltzed in here and plugged him between three and four-thirty in the afternoon? In the daytime, under the shining sun?”
Gottlieb nodded. “Ja, a brave man.”
“Or a brave woman.”
“Huh?” Braun frowned again.
“It could have been a woman, Braun. Heloise is missing, after all.” I tugged at my lip. “Did you kill your fiancé, Heloise? If so, why?”
“You think that broad shot Shultz?” Braun shook his head. “I tell ya, dames used to make sense. Not anymore.” He laughed.
I showed him my best scowl. “It’d make sense if Shultz beat her, wouldn’t it? How well did you know him?”
“Not well at all. He never said much at the meetings.”
“But you knew him well enough to give him a ride?”
Braun shrugged. “We want the boys to come to the meetings, sometimes we give them rides. It’s no big deal. I didn’t drill him, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
I took a long, slow drag on my smoke. “Well, somebody wanted him dead. If it wasn’t you gents, who else would shoot him?”
“Besides the dame?”
I gusted smoke at Braun. “Yeah. Besides the dame.”
“Got me, sister. I don’t even care. Chump got himself shot, no big loss. I ain’t gonna cry for him.”
Gottlieb chuckled, eliciting a scowl from Braun. “Herr Braun has a morbid fear of corpses.”
“Shut your damned mouth, Gottlieb, before I turn you into one. I ain’t afraid of nothing!”
“He vouldn’t even enter the room vith Herr Shultz’s body.”
Braun punched Gottlieb’s bicep. “I said for you to shut up!”
Gottlieb shut up, but his smirk stuck around for a while.
I shook my head. “I need to find Heloise. You boys know where she might be?”
Braun waved away the question. “How would we know that? She was Shultz’s old lady, not mine, not Gottlieb’s. Who the hell knows where a woman goes? She’s probably out getting her hair done or something stupid like that.” He laughed, a huge fan of his own humor.
Gottlieb cleared his throat. “I am sorry, fräulein, but ve vere not acquainted vith Shultz’s fiancée.” He shot an annoyed glance at Braun. “Perhaps she returned to her family home?”
“Could be. Her family’s from Columbus. I’ll give her old mother a ring.” I crumpled my smoke on the table. “So, what are you gonna do with the body?”
“Nothing. It’s not our problem.” Braun licked his lips nervously.
“You’re just gonna leave him rot right there on the floor?” I raised my eyebrows.
“It is the best thing to do, Fräulein Weber.” Gottlieb crammed his hands in his pockets and stared at the floor.
“Okay. Whatever you say.” I stood and glanced at my wristwatch. “Well, boys. This has been great fun, but I have to go. I’ve got things to do. Will one of you call me a cab?”
Gottlieb demurred. “Nein, nein, nein! We shall drive you vhere you vant to go!”
I yawned as I waved that away. “That works too. You can drop me off at the train station.”
Braun frowned. “Train station? Are you leavin’ town?”
“Not necessarily, but I have business at the train station.”
“What kind of business?”
I stood up and gestured vaguely at Braun. “My own business.”
“Of course, of course! Come Fräulein Weber, ve vill drive you to the station!” Gottleib gestured to the front door. His obsequious grin made me a little queasy.
“Right. Come on then.” I strode out the front door with both krauts hard on my heels. Gottlieb opened the car door and I sat in the back seat. Both men sat in front of me, and I had my pistol. I could have popped them both before Braun choked the engine to life. I found out in that moment that I wasn’t a cold-blooded killer. News to me, disappointing news even. Instead of killing them, I sat in a swirling cloud of blue smoke, blasting gusts of tobacco at the back of their heads instead of lead.
I watched the darkened houses slide by the car as we drove toward Queensgate. I had to smile. A half-hour ago these men had me at gunpoint, now they were chauffeuring me around town. I chose Union Terminal because I could lose myself in the crowd and I’d be able to get a cab no matter how late I got there. “Drop me off in front.”
Braun slowed the car and I got out. Gottlieb rolled his window down. “Fräulein Weber, I hope that you vill haff good things to tell your father about your trip to Cincinnati.”
“Good things to say about you? That’s what you mean isn’t it, Gottlieb? I might forget to mention that you goons had me at gunpoint.” His face fell. “It was just a misunderstanding after all. Right?” I didn’t wait for an answer but spun around and stalked into the station. I watched them pull away before I felt safe enough to breathe. I bought a cup of coffee and toppled, boneless, into the nearest chair.
I sipped my coffee and tried to sort out just what the hell was going on. Who were the Friends of Teutonia? What did ‘Bund’ mean? Who murdered Joe Shultz? Most importantly, where was Heloise Kendall? I had all kinds of questions, but precious few answers.
I pulled out the marker and read it again. Another question: What was the Bremen Street Club? Bremen Street. I’d never heard of it. The newsstand sold maps of the town for a nickel. I bought one and spread it out on a bench. I looked it all over and found a fat l
oad of zilch. No Bremen Street in Cincinnati. I cursed in an unladylike way.
Map tucked under my arm, I went outside and hailed a cab and we set off toward my place. As we careened through the darkened streets, I leaned forward to speak to the cabbie.
“Hey Jack, I got a question for you. Where the heck is Bremen Street?”
“Bremen Street?” He sounded confused, not a hopeful sign. “Bremen Street?”
“Yeah, Bremen Street. Ever heard of it?”
“No, can’t say that I have. Is it across the river in Newport?”
I hadn’t considered that. “I was told it was in Cincinnati.”
He shook his head. “You were told wrong. I’ve been drivin’ here for twelve years and I ain’t never heard of Bremen Street. Sorry.”
I sighed. “That’s all right. I’ll check the address, maybe I got it wrong.” I tipped him a buck and he drove away happy. I climbed the steps and stopped outside my room. I could hear Norman’s breath buzz sawing from his room. At least one of us had had a good night. I unlocked my door and stepped inside my own room. I leaned against the cool, stout wood of the door, happy as a pig with a new mud puddle that I’d made it back to this room without having been blown apart by a .45 shot to the ribs.
I hung my suit in the closet and pulled out the bottle of Old Granddad that I kept tucked away for emergencies. I poured out a double and tossed it back, and immediately followed it with another. The hooch lit a fire in my guts; it always did, but I felt better for it. Burning guts meant I was alive, and I still wanted to be alive. I slid under the covers and tried to stop shaking. I clutched my pistol to my chest, and it still took an eternity to fall asleep.
Chapter Five
I dreamed about Mary. She and I walked along the river, chewing the fat and laughing like loons. She carried a picnic basket in one hand and lit my cigarette with the other.
“Isn’t it a lovely day?” She smiled her smile, so painfully alive.
I looked at the sky, crowded with roiling clouds, and at the madly rushing water of the river, as it splashed out of its banks and over our feet. “It’s a day, anyway.”
Mary laughed her laugh, sweet as honeyed sugar. “You’re always so negative!”
Thunder pounded rhythmically above us, and we both looked up. When I looked at Mary again, she had her face turned away from me. “Mary?” Suddenly I felt worried about her, manically worried about her, but I couldn’t remember why. “Mary? Are you all right?”
She turned to face me, and what I saw made me stagger back. Mary’s eyes stared, glazed and unblinking, the cold, sightless eyes of a dead woman. Blood trickled down her chin and onto her gore-spattered blouse. Her stiff fingers clutched at me. “Kissy ...” Her voice scraped like rusty steel and the thunder pounded away at my eardrums. “Kissy. Find him, Kissy. Kill him ...”
Mary faded away, but the thunder rumbled on. “Kissy! Kissy Lisbon, Ah know yore in dere, so you just better open this here door raht now!” Unmistakably, Mama Jose.
I sat up in bed, holding my head until the world decided to stop skittering around the room. “All right, Mama! Stop using the door for a punching bag; I’m awake!”
The thunder, mercifully, stopped, but the powerful instrument of her voice boomed on. “Open up, Kissy! We needs to talk about de rent, girl. I done let y’all slide as long as Ah ken, but Ah got to eat too, girl!”
I shrugged my way into a shirt, buttoned one button and opened the door. Mama Jose sweated in the hallway, wringing her ham-hock hands. “Lord Almighty, Kissy! Put some clothes on, girl!”
I winced as her voice tried to chisel my head in two. “Mama Jose, I had a rough night. Can this wait a while?”
Mama Jose put her hands on her voluminous hips. “Kissy child, I done tole you, I let you go as long as Ah ken ...”
I held up my hand and stopped her. “All right, all right, Mama. You win. How much do we owe you?”
She wrung her hands as she thought. “Bes’ I figure it, you and him,” she jerked a thumb at Norman’s door, “each owe thirty dollars. I can settle for fifteen each, but I need somethun’ today. I’m sorry girl, I really am, but I got to eat too.” She really didn’t look very sorry, and I’d bet a buck she hadn’t missed many meals in her life. Probably had more than a few extra.
“Fine, Mama, fine. I got the money.”
“All of it?”
“Yeah, all of it.” I went to the closet and rummaged in my jacket pocket. I peeled a fifty-dollar bill off the roll I’d found in Shultz’s pocket, added a ten and handed it to Mama. Her eyes bugged when she saw it.
“Girl, where you find a fifty? I ain’t seen one o’ them in a dog’s age!” She squinted at the bill and rubbed it between her fingers.
“I have a job, Mama. I got paid last night.”
“What kind of job? Yore awful hung-over to have worked much last night. You ain’t turning tricks, are ya? I ain’t having none of that in my buildin’, Kissy!”
I closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead. “No, Mama, nothing like that. A woman paid me to find her daughter, that’s all.”
Mama eyed me for a minute, frowning. “If I fahnd out yore a-lyin’ to me, yore out. Both of ya.” She tucked the money away in her pocket and chugged down the hall like an angry locomotive with a full head of steam.
“Thanks for having so much faith in me, Mama.” She didn’t even slow down.
I gathered up some clothes and staggered down the hall for a long, hot shower. My headache had receded into the innermost cavern of my brainpan by the time I made it to Lou’s and slid into the booth across from Norman.
“Morning, Kissy.” His runny eggs, gasping for air in a puddle of ketchup, made my stomach churn. “You look like you’re ready for a coffin. Are you sick?”
I ordered a coffee and lit a cigarette. “No. I’m not sick, but you’re closer to the truth than you might think, about the coffin.”
He stopped chewing and his brow beetled. “Huh?”
“I got a question for you, Norman.” I leaned closer to him; we weren’t the only people in Lou’s. “What does ‘Bund’ mean? It’s a German word, right?”
“My German is really, really rusty ...”
“Just tell me what it means, Norman.” I huffed out a cloud of smoke in his face.
“I think it means ‘alliance.’ Where did that question come from?”
“Ever hear of the ‘Friends of Teutonia’?”
His fork stopped halfway to his mouth and slowly sank back to his plate. He quickly glanced around the room, and then at me. “No. Why would I?” He shoveled eggs and toast into his maw, but kept his eyes busily watching me with those little glances that I knew so well.
“You’re lying.” I sat back and took a long drag on my cigarette before tossing it into his breakfast. “I hate when you do that. You’re too stupid to do it right.” I gave him a long disapproving stare and watched his jaw work while his brain tried to catch up.
“Kissy, I ...”
I held up my hand. “No. Stop.” I gnawed my way through a mouthful of Lou’s coffee. “I can see you’re not ready to tell the truth yet, so don’t say anything. I’ll wait.” I did wait. It took Norman almost five minutes to think his way through to the truth.
His voice suddenly crackled with enthusiasm, uncharacteristically upbeat, and a little too loud. “It’s such a nice day, Kissy, maybe we should go for a walk?” He waved Lou up for the bill. He grinned as he slid it toward me to pay. I stacked three quarters on the table, and we stepped outside. The sun shone brightly, but the spring wind still carried a chill.
“Ready to talk, Norman?”
He glanced up and down the street before nodding. “What’s this all about, Kissy? Why are you asking about the Bund?”
“The Bund? Is there only one?”
“Only one that matters, The German-American Bund, or in German, Amerikadeutscher Bund.”
I felt for my cigarettes, but the pack was empty. “What is it?”
His voice dropped to
a low whisper. “A group for American Nazis.”
“That’s what I was afraid of.”
“Kissy, why are you asking me these things? How do you know about the Bund?”
“I found Shultz last night. He’s dead, shot in the head. Back too. Someone didn’t like him and I’m guessing it was the Bund.” I briefly filled Norman in on my trip to Mount Washington. “So, Shultz is dead, and Heloise Kendall has vanished down a rabbit hole.”
Norman’s hands rasped as he rubbed them together. “So, I guess it’s all over, right, Kissy? If Shultz is dead, the Kendall girl will just go home, so we’re all done being detectives.”
“I don’t think so, not yet. Tell me what you know about the Friends of Teutonia.”
Norman took a deep breath before he began. “They were a group of German immigrants, here in Cincinnati who supported Hitler. Around the time of the ’36 Olympics, the Friends were merged into the larger Bund. That was before the whole thing fell apart when the war started. The Feds broke up the group and arrested most of the leaders. Including my uncle.”
My eyebrows raised. “Your uncle was a Nazi?”
Norman shushed me and spun himself in a circle looking for eavesdroppers, Feds or, maybe, Nazis. “Not so loud, Kissy! Yes, he was, a kraut from head to toe. He tried to talk my old man into joining, but Papa wouldn’t have any of it. Like me, Papa is one-hundred-percent American.” He stood a little taller and puffed out his chest.
“What did they do?”
“The Bund? They held parades, great big parades with hundreds of guys dressed like Nazi stormtroopers. They gave speeches and generally tried to make people believe Hitler and his thugs weren’t so bad. They tried to keep America out of the war. Didn’t work very well, did it?” He smiled a little.
“So, the Feds broke up the Bund?”
“Yeah.”
“But they didn’t arrest every member?”
“I suppose not. They might not have known everyone who was in it.”
I tugged my lip as we walked. “If you were a dedicated Nazi, and the Feds missed you during their roundup of Bund members, what would you do? Would you stop supporting Hitler? Or would you just take what was left of your group underground?”
Big Shots and Bullet Holes Page 4