Big Shots and Bullet Holes

by B David Spicer

  “Nothing doing, Greene. You’re under arrest for murder, conspiracy and treason.”

  He took a step toward Paolo. “You wog bastard! We’re at war! You have no idea what’s going on here. Far from arresting me, I’m arresting you, both of you, for interfering in an Army Intelligence operation. Now put that gun down.”

  I cocked the hammer back on my gat. “If he doesn’t arrest you, I’m gonna put a hole in your stomach and watch you bleed out, nice and slow, but if the bleeding starts to slow up too much, I’ll just drill you again. That ought to keep us occupied for a while, don’t you think?”

  “You’re a nasty bit of work. What’d I do to you?”

  “You shot my friend in the guts.”

  “You mean the genius at the Aristocrat? He must run, what? One-ten when he’s packing an anvil?” He laughed. “You should have left that one in the cradle, dollface. He’s not grown up enough to play in the big leagues.”

  “So why did you shoot him?” Paolo took a step and stood shoulder-to-shoulder to me.

  Greene shrugged. “Who cares? I can shoot anyone who gets in my way. Even wog detectives and nutty dames.” He poked a new cigar between his teeth and rummaged through his pockets for a match. “But I tell you what, Belvedere, I’m gonna let you take me in, just to teach you a lesson in how the world really works. With one phone call, I’ll have your badge and you’ll find yourself in a very unpleasant prison cell at Ft. Leavenworth, but you’ll have learned a valuable lesson. Hell, they might even let you out in time for the ’72 World Series.” He lit his smoke and tossed away the match. “How does that sound?” He crammed his hands in his coat pockets and smiled broadly.

  “How about I just put you down like a rabid dog, Greene?” I watched his smile fade and felt my own light up. “How does that sound?”

  He tore his hands out of his pockets and held up a hand grenade. He’d pulled the pin, but the lever was still in place. If all the Saturday matinee war movies had it right, it wouldn’t detonate unless he let go of the lever.

  “Now, drop ‘em. Both of you!”

  Paolo started to place his cannon on the ground.

  “No, Paolo. Stand up.”

  “That’s a grenade, Kissy.”

  “I don’t care. He’s not getting away.”

  Greene laughed. “Your name is Kissy? Oh my God! Could either of you be more pathetic? Drop the heat, sister. I’m tired of playing with you two crumbs.”

  “No.” I kept the gun’s sights in his face.

  “I’ll drop it, don’t test me.”

  “You won’t. You value your own hide too much to drop it.” Then he did something I honestly hadn’t expected: he dropped the grenade. He spun around and darted across the room and out the door. I squeezed off a couple of rounds, but by then Paolo had his arm across my chest, shoving me out the door we’d come through. I missed Greene both times and I hit the floor hard. Paolo scrambled to haul me behind the cinder block barricade the wall provided.

  The blast shattered the glass in every window in the room, it rained down on us from above. My ears rang with the echo of the blast and the world wobbled when I tried to sit up. Paolo sprawled across me, an unmoving lump that I struggled to move. I managed to roll him onto his back. His face bled from half a dozen little cuts. I patted his cheek.

  “Paolo?” He didn’t open his eyes, so I belted him across the chops. “Paolo!”

  His eyes snapped open, but they wouldn’t focus on anything, so I grabbed his face and gave it a shake. “Paolo, wake up.” His eyes fluttered for a moment, then closed. I held his face between my hands. “Come on, Paolo.” Before I knew what I was doing, I pressed my lips against his, a kiss I’d denied myself for five years, a forbidden kiss from a lifetime ago, a kiss so familiar that I suddenly felt like I’d come home.

  I pulled my lips away from his and saw him staring up at me. “Hello to you, too.”

  “Are you awake now?”

  “I sure hope so, but I’ve had this dream so many times that I’m not sure.”

  “Good. Get up, Greene’s getting away.” I stood and helped him to his feet. “I didn’t think he’d drop the grenade.”

  He rubbed his temples with his fingertips. “I noticed. Let’s not underestimate him again. Okay, Kissy? I don’t think my skull can take the pounding.”

  I picked up his .45 and handed it to him. “Come on!” We raced through the ruined office and out the far door into the second hangar. No sign of Greene. We paused long enough to peek around the corner of the hangar. His Packard had disappeared, but the body of Corporal Wills floated in a pink puddle of bloody water. The good Colonel had taken the time to find my car and shoot out both front tires.

  “Turnabout is fair play, right Kissy?” Paolo grinned.

  “Now what do we do?”

  “You have a spare tire, right?”

  “Yeah, that still leaves us one tire short. Can’t cops count?”

  “Open the trunk, Kissy.”

  “Greene’s getting away!”

  “No, he’s already gone, which is where we need to be before he comes back with a whole platoon of sharpshooters. Now, open the trunk.” I did, and Paolo changed the tire. We briefly considered calling a tow truck, but we decided that we didn’t need a record of our being there, so we ended up calling his old friend Stephen Mason, who brought us a tire.

  Mason lingered just this side of seventy, his snowy hair being the only indicator of his age. Otherwise, he could have passed for a man of fifty. “No, Belvedere, I don’t want to know what’s going on. I’m helping a friend, and that’s that. I haven’t seen any perforated corpses because I can’t get involved in murders and such nonsense. I’m retired.”

  Paolo finished tightening the lug nuts on the tire Mason had brought and spat out a harsh laugh. “Yeah, and you’re losing your mind from boredom.”

  “Not at all. I collect stamps, you see.”

  Paolo slammed the trunk closed. “Fascinating.”

  “I’ll keep my ears open though. Give me a call tomorrow, and I’ll let you know what I’ve heard, assuming I hear anything.”

  Paolo shook his hand. “Thanks, old man.”

  “Watch your back, young pup.” I gave him a hug which made him grin like a lecher. “Keep an eye on him, Cassy.”

  “It’s Kissy now.” I jerked my head toward Paolo. “He’s a passel of trouble, isn’t he?”

  “Always has been.” He climbed into his truck, waving as he drove away.

  Paolo offered me an ample dose of his frown. “I’m the passel of trouble?”

  “Yeah.” I lit my smoke and started the car. “Get in, copper.”

  He did. “We need to hole up somewhere for a while.”

  “Let’s go back to the Aristocrat. We still have a suite there. The hounds’ll be poking their noses into every fleabag motel in the city, but they aren’t bright enough to look in the high-class joints.”

  “Fine.” He rubbed his forehead. “I feel like my head’s been split open with a chisel.”

  The rain slackened to a drizzle as I drove. I expected to pass a pack of howling black-and-whites, but I didn’t see any at all. Paolo rested his head against the passenger window, his eyes closed, and I couldn’t tell if he’d fallen asleep or not. I pulled into a spot on the street and turned off the engine. He didn’t move, so I leaned in for a closer look. His breath came and went with clockwork regularity, so I at least knew he hadn’t gone to the great police precinct in the sky.

  I whispered his name. “Paolo?” He didn’t seem to hear me, so I pressed my hand against his face. I moved my fingers through his curly blond locks, which had mostly dried. The glacier that had crusted over my broken heart, shifted, just a little. I’d seen him asleep before, run my fingers through his hair before, but I’d never felt the yawning expanse of regret that clutched at my soul before. He moved his head and I yanked my hand away from him.

  “Hey, sleeping beauty. We’re here.”

  He opened his eyes and squinted a
t me. “Already?”

  “Yeah. Let’s go, already. I want to get out of these wet clothes.”

  We crossed the lobby, but nobody saw or cared. The old man with the crooked back took us up the elevator. Paolo leaned against the corner of the elevator. He held his head in his hand. The old man gave him a curious look but didn’t say anything.

  “Too much gin with dinner.” I stared the old coot down until he shrugged and resumed his vacant stare. He rattled open the gate and I helped Paolo stagger down the hall. “Damn, this headache just keeps getting worse.”

  I unlocked the door to our room and helped him inside. “Get in the shower and warm up. You’ll feel better.”

  He grunted and headed for the bathroom. I peeled off my soggy clothes and hung them up, hoping they’d have the decency to dry themselves by morning. I wrapped myself in a fluffy white robe and sat on the sofa, burning my way through a pack of Camels.

  Paolo came in wearing a robe of his own. I smiled up at him. “Feel better?”

  “Yeah.” He sat at the desk and pulled the telephone closer to him. “I’m gonna call the precinct.”

  “Why?”

  “To see how much the bounty for our heads is worth.”

  I mashed out my smoke. “Have fun. I’m taking a shower.” Once under the showerhead, I scrubbed the stink of the fire and the grit of the hangar floor off my skin. The scalding water burned away the last twenty-four hours and the room had filled up with steam before I felt anything close to my normal, upbeat, cheerful, self. I brushed my hair and, for a change, left it down. I put my robe back on and went looking for Paolo.

  He sat on the sofa with a tall glass of bourbon in his hand. He handed it to me. “Well, I called them.”

  “How bad is it?” I took a swallow of the whisky and handed the glass back to him.

  “Brightman’s issued warrants for our arrest. He’s strong-armed both the city police and the sheriff’s department to bring us in at any cost.” He poured the rest of the bourbon into his guts. “Dead or alive.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The sky rained itself out, but the stubborn clouds lingered over the city, choking out the sunlight and stifling the breeze. The air felt muggy, the heat and humidity conspiring to create the unique misery that is Ohio weather. I flung myself on the sofa and had just started tiptoeing around a nap when a knock at the door roused me.

  I picked up my .22 and stepped toward the door. “Who is it?”

  “Laundry.”

  I dropped the gun into my trousers pocket and opened the door. I’d almost forgotten that I sent two of my suits and one of Paolo’s out to be cleaned and pressed. I tipped the girl a quarter and carried the clothes into the bedroom to hang them up. On impulse I went through every pocket, desperately hoping to find a cigarette. No dice.

  I sat down at the desk and stared at the last two cigarettes in my possession. I needed a smoke in a bad way, but until Paolo came back with more provisions, these two had to last. “Willpower, Kissy, willpower.”

  I waited almost another minute before giving up.

  I poked one of the snipes between my teeth and lit it with a match. The tobacco flowed into my lungs and for a few seconds, I had only good things to say about the world. I sat back and relished it while I could.

  I heard a key in the lock followed by the door opening and Paolo cursing. He had a carton of cigarettes, two bottles of hooch, and a paper bag of sandwiches from the deli precariously balanced in his arms. He unceremoniously dumped everything on one of the high-backed chairs opposite the sofa. “Have I ever told you how much I hate shopping for other people?”

  “Yeah, you griped about it for an hour before I threw your carcass out the door.”

  “I did not.” He flopped himself into an armchair and I could tell by the look on his face he had bad news. “It’s pretty bad out there. They’ve got black-and-whites patrolling all over, and they’ve at least doubled the number of cops on foot. Brightman’s throwing everything he can at us.” He pulled a newspaper out of his jacket pocket and tossed it to me. “Read the front page.”

  I opened it up and read the headline out loud. “Spies in the Queen City!” I shot him a glance. “I didn’t know you were a spy.”

  “Keep reading.”

  “The Cincinnati Police, working in conjunction with the Hamilton County Sheriff's Department and the FBI, are looking for a pair of mad-dog killers who have rampaged their way through the city, leaving a string of dead bodies behind them. Sheriff Fred Sperber told the Post that the FBI has requested the help of both his department and the Cincinnati Police to locate and arrest Detective Paolo Belvedere, a detective in the Police Department and an unknown female accomplice who may go by the name Missy ...” I rolled my eyes. “Missy? When have I ever gone by Missy?” I skimmed through the rest of the article. “So, they’re blaming us for their messes? Martingdale, Wexler, Gottlieb, Braun, Affen, and even Corporal Wills.”

  “Looks that way.” He slumped further in his chair, gnawing on a ham sandwich. “I had to avoid a beat cop I know. His name’s Boyd, a good egg, but he’d have tried to arrest me. At least they’re not gonna find you, Missy.”

  I tugged at my lip. “Tanner knew my name, so did Brightman. Why would it be wrong in the paper?”

  “Probably just some half-deaf reporter misunderstanding Sperber. Kissy isn’t such a common name when you think about it.”

  I lit another smoke. “Well, they got our descriptions mostly right. Are you really six foot one?”

  “Six foot two.” He rubbed his temples with his fingertips.

  “Head still hurt?”

  “Like I got smacked with a king-sized sledgehammer.”

  “Go take a nap. I have to make some telephone calls.”

  He squinted at me. “What kind of phone calls?”

  “The kind where I ask for a number and talk to someone on the other end.”

  He waved that away and stood up. “We’ll need to find a good lawyer. You might as well start looking for one this morning.”

  “You can give up if you want to, but I’m not. Greene hasn’t won yet.”

  “Kissy, we have literally every cop, deputy and Fed in the city looking for us. Not to mention the United States Army. Brightman’s probably already asked the governor to call up the National Guard to help look for us.”

  I shrugged. “None of that compares to what we have.”

  “Oh yeah, what do we have?” His puzzlement creased his forehead.

  “Guile.”

  “Oh good! We have guile! I’d forgotten about guile! Long live guile!” He padded into the bedroom and closed the door.

  The first call I made was to the front desk to ask if they could spare a bellboy to run some errands for me, which they could. I told them I’d call for him when I’d finished making the arrangements. Then I telephoned Woolworth and described to the manager what I wanted. I added that I’d send someone to pick the items up, so have them ready. I called for the bellboy and gave him a $20 bill and a quarter for the bus. I told him he could keep the change, which I figured to be near $6.00, if he didn’t tell anybody. He whistled as he left the suite.

  I considered my next move carefully. Greene presented a difficult problem because of his position as an Army Intelligence officer, but more directly because of his influence over Avery Brightman. Brightman was the big shot in the local Bureau office, and he issued the warrants for our arrest, but he also carried Greene’s water. Brightman, from what I knew about him, sounded like a spineless bucket of goo, which made him the weak link.

  I looked for the Bureau’s telephone number in the local directory, but it wasn’t there. I dialed the operator.

  “Operator, number please.”

  “I need to speak to the FBI.”

  Silence for a year or two. “I’m sorry, I need a number.”

  I sprinkled some backwoods into my talk. “Look here, just between you and me, because I think I can trust ya, I need to speak to them Feds because I think
I know where them spies from the paper are a-hidin’.”

  “Ma’am, I can connect you to the sheriff’s department or the city police.”

  “Naw, I’m not a-wastin’ mah time with the likes of them. Them’s the ones that locked up my Jim last year for jaywalkin’, course he was a little lit up from a bad jug o’ shine ...”

  “Ma’am, I really think you should talk to the police …”

  “I know you knows the number, jus’ poke that pigsticker in the hole and let me talk to ‘em. I won’t talk to anybody else, you unnerstand?”

  I heard her sigh. “One moment, I’ll connect you to their switchboard, but I can’t guarantee they’ll talk to you.”

  “Thank ya.” I head a couple of clicks, then the bell.

  “FBI, Cincinnati Office, how may I direct your call?”

  “Agent Tanner, please.” More clicks, then another tolling bell.

  “Tanner.”

  “Hiya, Tanner. Still watching my flop-house?”

  His voice dropped to a whisper. “Kissy, where are you?”

  “I’m safe. You don’t believe all this hogwash, do you?”

  “No, of course not, but Kissy, Brightman is determined to bring you in, dead or alive, which really means dead.”

  “So I’ve been told. Was that Brightman’s idea, or Greene’s?”

  “He doesn’t live up to his name, but he’s not a traitor either. At least I don’t think he is.”

  “I think he’s in it with Greene.”

  Tanner paused a long time. “Why do you say that?”

  “He was with Greene at that little airfield north of town last night. I heard him tell Greene that he’d take care of Corporal Wills’ body. Said he’d send some ace named Pressman to make Wills’ body go away.”

  Another pause. “That doesn’t mean what you think.”

  “Do you have a guy named Pressman who does that sort of thing?”

  “Agent Pressman is a crime scene investigator. He looks for evidence at the scene of murders and the like. Brightman just meant that he’d have Pressman and his team process Wills’ body.”