Brute In Brass

by Harry Whittington

  “Why would I shield him? I never even liked him. There was just one thing about that boy. He paid his bills. He paid his rent the minute I knocked on his door.” She got her back against the door and wriggled against it. “Other than that, he was a fink. I didn’t like him. I don’t know what it was, but I didn’t like him.”

  “All right, then, tell me where he is, I can make it hot for him.”

  “I don’t want you to make it hot for him. He was a fink. I didn’t like him. But I don’t like cops either. I like cops just a little less than I like finks.” She laughed again, parchment crinkling.

  “Didn’t he tell you where to send his mail?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where’s that?”

  She laughed at me and scratched some more. “To the place he worked. The Crystal Room. See, cop? Ain’t I helpful?”

  If she’d have laughed like that in Salem two hundred years ago, they’d have burned her at the stake.

  I walked past the apartment house on Brevard where Ruby Venuto had lived and been killed. The Crystal Bar was in a white building on the corner, single-storied, with a glass-brick front and large neons glowing even in the daytime.

  The inside was smartly done in red leather and chrome. It was cozily dim, even in the day. At the rear on a dais was the piano where Ruby used to sit in low-cut gowns and croon to the customers.

  I sat at the bar and ordered a straight rye. The bartender wore a smart white shirt with a neat Eversharp pencil in the pocket. His black tie was straight. He didn’t bother to smile. There was a couple in a rear booth, otherwise we had the place to ourselves.

  “I’m looking for Tino Gonsmart.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know him.”

  “He’s a bartender here.”

  “He gave you a bum lead, mister. Not here. I been here ten months. He doesn’t work here.”

  “He said he worked here nights.”

  “No. Charley works here nights. Charley Dunsinger. On Saturdays a fellow from the post office comes in and helps. Part time. Can’t think of the kid’s name. But it ain’t Gonsmart. That I know.”

  “Is the owner here?”

  “Yeah. He’s back there. Office right through there where it says Rest Rooms.” »

  I finished off the drink and went back there. The owner said to come in. He was a beer-bellied German with a thick accent and a loathing for any suggestion of trouble.

  “Lieutenant, that boy is not with me. He has not been with me for almost a year now. That’s right. Almost a year. He was a good bartender. He got the money out of a fifth of whisky. You know that’s important. A bartender that can do that, he can make the difference between a profit and a loss.”

  “All right. So Gonsmart left here. Where did he go?”

  The fat man spread his hands. “I don’t know. He didn’t say.”

  “What about his mail?”

  “So far as I know, Lieutenant, that boy didn’t get any mail. He was here, he was a good bartender. Then he was gone. It’s like that.”

  Chapter Nine

  I sat in the Crystal Room Bar and had three stiff drinks. I thought about Tino Gonsmart. In thirteen years as a cop, I’ve learned one thing. Don’t ask yourself where the wild geese go. If a thing has one angle, it has two. I didn’t spend any time on the blank wall that stared back at me when I looked for Tino Gonsmart.

  I walked out of the Crystal Room and went back along Brevard Road to the apartment house where Ruby Venuto had died.

  I thought about Ruby. I brought to mind all I had heard about her and known about her. It was considerable. She’d been way up the ladder and was on her way down, fast, with the way greased by booze, when somebody snuffed out her life up on the seventh floor of this modern-looking apartment building.

  That was what interested me, this apartment house was at least as nice as the place where I rented for Hilma Kenyon. Where did Ruby get that kind of money? She didn’t make it singing in spots like the Crystal Room. Joints like that paid off in drinks. And I knew Ruby had been on the skids. She’d done things that women do when they’re frightened and insecure. She’d gotten in trouble with my bureau.

  I rang for the manager. He came out of his apartment, a tall man with graying hair parted in the middle.

  “I’m trying to get some information on Ruby Venuto,” I said.

  He looked pained. “I thought that was over,” he said.

  “Well, that’s the way it goes. Can you give me the address of her family?”

  “Would you mind saying why you’re interested?”

  “No. I don’t mind.” I showed him my badge. “Some additional information has turned up on the case. I’m working on it.”

  “I don’t want any more notoriety,” he said. “I’ve had enough. I’ve had just enough.”

  “All right. Why don’t you give me the information you have? Maybe you won’t hear any more about it.”

  “The reporters. The curious. It was like a nightmare, Lieutenant. I don’t want ever to go through a thing like that again.”

  “Do you have her parents’ address?”

  “I believe it’s on the card she filed with us when she moved in. It’ll take me a few minutes.”

  “I’ll wait...”

  The place where Ruby started was lower than she had skidded when she died. It wasn’t anything like Tower Street, but it was a long taxi ride from Brevard Road.

  The apartment house was old. There were a doctor and a dentist on the ground floor. I went up the stairs and knocked on the second-floor door.

  A man answered. He was hitching his trousers up over his bay window. His undershirt was smeared and he looked groggy with sleep.

  “Venutos,” I said. “Do they live here?”

  “Not any more, Bud. Used to. Years ago. We been here a couple of years. Moved here when they left.”

  “Did you know them very well?”

  “Yeah.” He yawned, his mouth stretching wide. “I knew the family.”

  “Did you know Ruby?”

  “Not very well. She was wild. Did some kind of strip tease, I heard; worked with a monkey that had learned to unzip everything. Sang some. She wasn’t much any way you looked at her.”

  His wife came to the door behind him. She was about five feet tall and round. She put her hand on his shoulder.

  “Whatsa matter, Ralph?”

  “This man’s asking about the Venutos. You know where they moved?”

  “Nah.” She shook her head. “When that no-good Ruby got killed, they moved out of town. Old Lady said all she wanted was to get away. She wanted to forget.”

  “Did you know Ruby Venuto?”

  “Say, fellow, smile when you ask me a question like that. I’m a respectable woman. I didn’t know Ruby, but I wouldn’t admit it if I did.”

  “Do you know anyone in this neighborhood who might remember her?”

  “Nah.” The fat woman shook her head. “You’re going to have trouble. Nobody around here even wants to remember that one.”

  “She must have had a friend.”

  “I don’t know who it would be. Oh, yeah. I do remember. A girl she used to bum around with. And I mean bum. They used to stand on street corners peddling it when they weren’t any more than thirteen. The Gonzales girl. You remember her, Ralph? She was a good friend of the Venuto tramp.”

  “Yeah. That’s right.”

  “Was that Lois Gonzales?” I said.

  The woman nodded. “Yeah. Do you know her?”

  I grinned at her. “Sure, I know Lois Gonzales,” I said. “I’ve known her for years.”

  The woman sniffed. “If that’s the truth, then you ain’t much, mister.”

  Chapter Ten

  I parked the Olds and walked along Halsey Street. I passed Meistre’s Bar, listening to the blare of the juke. A woman’s shrill laughter leaped out at me. I moved past the double doors without looking in. It was just after dark and things were livening up down here.

  It’s been a
long time, I thought. I shivered. Not long enough. I came out of this place clawing and grasping and fighting, and knowing what I wanted. I suddenly was filled with it, all the memories rushing through me.

  A woman stepped from a darkened doorway, started along the walk toward me.

  She was young, about eighteen. She wore a cotton sweater stretched taut across her breasts. Her corduroy skirt was too tight, too. When she was ten feet in front, she stepped directly into my path and moved out of it again.

  “Sorry,” she said. Something was wrong with her voice. She was either drunk or on marijuana.

  “It’s all right.” She’d hesitated. I kept walking. I heard movement behind me. I paused, looking over my shoulder.

  A thin little man stepped from a doorway beyond Meistre’s Bar. He ran up to the girl, grabbed her arm. She tried to shake free.

  “What I done now?” she whined.

  “Damn little fool. That was a cop. Vice cop. Ain’t you got good sense? Shape up. You want to end up in the reformatory before you make me a stinkin’ dime?”

  He drove his knotted fist straight and hard into her face. She staggered. She would have fallen but the pimp caught her.

  She stood perfectly still. Tears rolled down her face. She didn’t make a sound.

  Hell, I knew. I came from here. I was back in my old neighborhood now.

  After a moment she sniffled, shook her head, lifted it higher, started along the dark walk again. The pimp melted into the darkness.

  I shoved my hands into my coat pockets, strode away. The cops paid me to pick people like this up, but I was paid better to turn my back.

  God, I thought, no wonder I hate to come back down here. No wonder it scares me.

  I turned the corner at Twenty-second Street, walking rapidly. This was a wide brick thoroughfare of run-down shops and crawling tenements.

  I shivered. Even if I’d never escaped this, I was out of it physically. Two-hundred-dollar suits. An apartment that was furnished as slickly as the town’s best interior decorator could make it. I hurried, trying to walk away from my memories. My head throbbed. I was a kid again, frightened, running along this street in the night. I glanced over my shoulder, surprised to see there wasn’t anyone behind me.

  I looked up. There was the number I was looking for. A small light gleamed in the foyer. I pushed the front door open and climbed the stairs.

  I knew the Gonzales number. I didn’t have to search for it on the foyer mail boxes. I had sent Lois Gonzales back here. I’d told her to stay.

  On the fifth floor I went along the narrow corridor. I heard someone snoring through the thin walls. A man grunted in his sleep. A small dog yipped. Over a doorbell, Gonzales was printed in crude square letters.

  I jammed my thumb against the doorbell, listening to it ring through the apartment. It was a crowded apartment— the parents, five kids, and Lois.

  The bell rang a long time. A kid bawled. Somebody swore. I heard the slap of bare feet on the floor. A light was snapped on, the door was unlocked and opened cautiously.

  I looked at the woman. Josie Gonzales stood, black hair braided down the side of her round head, the ends of it against the faded gray woolen gown. The gown hung on her five-by-five frame like a tent.

  “Hello, Josie. Is Lois here?”

  She made the sign of the cross. Her eyes were stricken. “She is here.”

  Joseph Gonzales padded to the door behind her. One of the children stared from the bedroom doorway.

  “What you want here?” he said.

  I stepped into the room. The air was heavy with stale garlic. Josie stepped back. She held the door open.

  “Close the door,” I said. She nodded and closed it. “I want to see Lois.”

  “Is not here,” Joseph said.

  “Your wife said she was.”

  Josie cried out. “I mean she is not here. She lives here. Yes. Like parole orders. Yes. Is here? No.”

  “But you expect her back? Tonight?”

  “Oh, yes. Yes.”

  “You won’t mind if I wait then?”

  Josie peered helplessly at Joseph. I looked at him, too. “How’s the shoe repair business, Joe?”

  “Business good. Is late. You want to see Lois. You come back tomorrow.”

  “Yes.” Josie’s voice was wheedling. “Lois may be late. She’s—gone dancing. You know—a young girl—”

  “Lois is twenty-seven,” I said. “And on parole. I’ll wait.”

  “Maybe she’ll be awful late.”

  My voice snapped. “Or maybe she won’t be back at all?”

  Josie retreated, pressed against the wall. “Yes. She’ll be back.”

  “Does she live here, Josie?”

  I didn’t wait for them. I walked into the bedroom. Children were in all the beds.

  “Where does Lois sleep?” I said.

  Josie looked sick. She tried to smile. She pointed toward a cot against the wall. “When she comes in—we move the baby to the bed.”

  “There are already three kids in that bed.”

  “They don’t mind. Children, they like to sleep together.”

  “Stop lying to me, Josie. I had to beat Lois once to make her stop lying to me.”

  “Don’t you touch her,” Joseph whispered. His voice quavered. “You touch her, I kill you.”

  “Shut up, Joe,” I said. “If you were any kind of man, you could have handled Lois when she was a kid. She wouldn’t be on parole. She could live where she wants to.”

  Joe held his hand against his mouth. “Lois is a good girl.”

  “Only she doesn’t live here.”

  “Sure she does, sure.” Josie was trembling.

  “Show me her clothes.”

  She nodded, pulled back a creton drape. Four or five dresses hung there. They belonged to Lois, all right. Only she never wore clothes like that.

  “She hasn’t worn those things in years. Where is she, Josie?”

  “She lives in the Warwick Arms Apartments, Mr. Ballard. Under name of—Sophie Lentz.” She caught my arm. “You won’t hurt her, Mr. Ballard. Remember, Mike, when you were a small boy. I was nice to you then, Mike. Can’t you let my girl alone?”

  “I tried to do her a favor, Josie. I tried to be tough with her. You never had. Joe never had. I thought she’d have sense enough to stay here.”

  Sophie Lentz. Lois didn’t dare list her real name in the foyer of the Warwick Arms. She was flying high again.

  She opened her door the first time I rang the bell.

  “Get out,” she said.

  “So you were expecting me?”

  “Ma called. She said you were sniffing around. Now get out of here or show me your warrant.”

  “That’s how little girls get hurt, baby. Talking to me like that.” I looked at the swank apartment she lived in. She was working some new gimmick. She was a bad chick; the only time she was on the level was when she was staring at a ceiling.

  “I know all about how little girls get hurt—by you. I know how bad. Now get out of here.”

  She moved to slam the door. I lifted my shoe. The door struck my leather sole, rebounded. She stepped back out of the way.

  She stood perfectly still in the center of the smartly furnished room. She was like a coiled snake. Her eyes smoldered and her mouth stretched taut. She looked ready to strike.

  The only thing lacking was the hiss of rattle. There was no sound, she seemed not even to breathe.

  I’d seen plenty little hell cats like her. My squad collected them. The grabby little tart that took what she wanted from the start, taking money and running from impoverished family, taking up with the first guy that came along. Grabbing on for the fast, hot ride, money thrills and trouble. They always got in trouble, and then I met them. Whisky, dope, slavery. Whatever there was to do, they did it, as long as there were thrills in it, and money.

  They never stopped to figure what it cost them. They came out looking like hell, burned out, fagged, beaten, or they were found flo
ating face-down in the Charles River. The odds were stacked against them the way they loaded a clip-joint wheel.

  That was what was different about Lois Gonzales. She’d gone through every hell in the books, scratched and clawed her way through, but when you looked at her, there was not a sign of that hell.

  She wasn’t much taller than her mother, and she had Josie’s ripe olive eyes and her complexion was from south of the Border. She wore her hair thick down to her shoulders. It was gold poured hot to frame her classic Greek profile and glistening mouth. Her breasts strained against the fabric of her negligee.

  I closed the door. “I came on a friendly call, Lois.”

  “Go call on a friend, cop.”

  She wasn’t forgetting the day I’d found her answering calls at the Essex. This was a Luxtro enterprise, but I’d taken her out anyhow. I slapped her around, sent her home, warned her to stay there. She was on parole for pushing dope, another Luxtro business, and she should have had sense enough to behave.

  But there was the same hatred in her eyes I’d seen that day I told her to go home to Josie and stay.

  “I want to talk to you about Ruby Venuto.”

  “Who the hell you think you are, breaking in here like this?”

  “What about Ruby? I hear you were buddies.”

  “Following me. Hounding me. Scaring my folks and the kids. Cop.” She spat that word.

  “What about Ruby, Lois?”

  I stepped toward her. She didn’t retreat, the look of hatred deepened.

  “What about Ruby, Lois?”

  Her mouth twisted with hundred-proof hatred. “She’s dead, cop. Haven’t you heard?”

  “She’s dead. But you’re not.”

  “You’d have killed me. I was too tough for you.”

  “Lois, you’re in trouble this time. Parole violation. I can’t send you home with a paddling. I’m going to throw you back in the pen.”

  “That sounds like you.” But her face was white.

  “I’ll make a deal with you.”

  “No thanks. I’m scared in my guts of any deal Mike Ballard would make with you. Besides, cop, I never came here because I was a fool. You better just be smart, and let me alone.”

  I caught her arm. She writhed free and stood away from me. “Luxtro?” I said.