Brute In Brass

by Harry Whittington

  I stared at the doctor, frowning. Our gazes met over that headline. He’d seen it, read it, knew all about me.

  “Why?” I said.

  “I heard the later news, Mike. I’ve heard about Luxtro and his two hoods.” He shrugged. “I can’t give you a medal, Ballard. But I do say God bless you, and I’ve done what I can for you.”

  Chapter Twenty-three

  The doctor let me out of his car half a block from Peggy’s apartment. I went through the alley, feeling the morning sun hot against me.

  I went up the steps, feeling the needling of pain piercing through me. I knocked on the door. I only tapped it once. She threw it open, grabbed my hands and pulled me inside.

  She put her arms around me, pressing herself close, crooning. She kept whispering my name over and over. It was good. Maybe it’s what happened to the first cave man when he killed a bear and came home to his cave, and his woman was waiting for him, and she caught him in her arms and she crooned his name. It was a lovely sound.

  “You haven’t been out of my thoughts,” she whispered, “not for a minute since—in your apartment.”

  I looked down at her, feeling the resilient pressures of her body against my body, aching with wanting her, aching with remembering the way she’d been.

  But that brought me back to the reason I was here. I stepped away from her. I leaned against the wall, and smiled at her. Her face was worried, and her gaze darted over me to be sure I was here, and whole.

  I fumbled in my pocket, found Tino’s confession.

  I shook it out, handed it to her.

  She took it, without moving her gaze from my face.

  “Read it,” I said. It was wonderful to be loved like that, maybe made it all worth it.

  She nodded, and read the confession. Her lips trembled, her eyes filled with tears, and you could see a whole year of agony cloud up from her.

  “It’s true,” she whispered. “He is innocent. He is innocent!”

  It wasn’t good any more. Nothing was good.

  “You can get him out of there,” I said. “You take that letter of Tino Gonsmart’s to the district attorney. He has writing of Tino’s. He’ll know the signature is genuine—hell, that’s Tino’s blood on it. All the D.A. wants is the truth. The truth is there. Earl will be out of the pen as soon as the D.A. can arrange it.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  I looked at her, looked at the apartment where she had lived with Earl Walker all those five years before he ever took one wrong step with a dame named Ruby Venuto.

  This was her life and her home, and soon Earl would be back in it with her. Earl had been through hell enough.

  I turned, started for the door.

  “Mike.”

  “Yes?”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know. I’m in trouble. Up to here. Unlawful flight. Murder. Bribery. Graft. Lying. Attempted adultery.” I laughed. “Attempted— Well, kid, you can tell Earl you saved it for him.”

  Her voice was low. “Why would I tell him that? Do you want me to tell him the truth? That I begged you—that I would have given you anything in the world, but you wouldn’t take me? Is that what you want me to tell him?”

  I sighed. “It wouldn’t have been perfect, Peggy. I wanted you too long, too terribly. I couldn’t settle for less.”

  Her breath caught. “Don’t you think I knew that? Do you think I’d have let you go if I hadn’t known that? I’d have killed you before I’d have let you go that night—the way I felt—except that I knew, too, that it would be better..” She caught my arm. “There’s nothing between us now, Mike.”

  “There’s Earl Walker.” I jerked my head toward the confession in her hand.

  “There’s nobody.”

  “Look, honey, it happens all the time. A dame gets in trouble, like you did. She falls for the guy who can get her out of it. But when the trouble’s gone, so is the way she felt.”

  She laughed through her tears.

  “All right.” My voice was sharp. “Maybe that’s not it. But you were a long time without a man. I came along, and I looked good. But Earl Walker is coming back now. You don’t need me.”

  “I told you.” Her voice was low. “We—Earl and I—we never had what I want with you, what I know you and I will have. How could I miss something that I’ve never had?”

  “All right. It’s too bad. We missed the boat.”

  “Maybe you have,” she said, “but I haven’t.”

  “You go to the D.A.,” I said. “You get Earl Walker freed. You’ll be busy. You’ll forget all about me.”

  I turned again, started for the door.

  “Mike.” The chill in her voice stopped me. I turned, looked over my shoulder. The confession from Tino Gonsmart lay on the floor, a scrap of paper.

  “I won’t go, Mike. I want Earl free, but only because he is innocent. Not because I love him. If I ever did love him, I don’t any more.”

  “You’re just hurt. You’ll get over it.”

  “I’m not hurt. I got over that a long time ago. Just as I got over loving Earl a long time ago. Living with Earl—that was all right when I was only half awake, half alive. I couldn’t stand it now, Mike.”

  “You’ve got to stand it.”

  “I won’t go back to him.”

  “I can’t make you go back to him.”

  “I won’t even go to the D.A., Mike. I won’t even take that confession to the D.A. If I can’t have you, I won’t do anything, Mike. I’ve thought it over—I haven’t thought about anything else. We’ll get Earl free, but only if we can be together.”

  “Baby, that was fine. That was what I wanted to hear. But not now. It’s too late now. I’ve killed at least two men, Peggy; maybe three, if Orzatti dies. I don’t know. I hit him hard enough to kill him.”

  “Hoodlums.” She made something vile of that vile word.

  “Yeah. Sure. But Luxtro was a church member, a club member, a civic leader, bought in with all the right people. It’s murder.”

  “You told me the D.A. wanted the truth about Earl. You think he wouldn’t work just as hard with the truth about you?”

  “He might. But I have a bad record, baby. When the D.A. started getting the truth about me, nothing would save me. They got me, kid. All they got to do is find me. They’re out looking for me now.”

  “We’ll get away. You can stay here. I’ll take this confession to the D.A.”

  “And when he asks you where you got it?”

  “I’ll tell him I got it from you, just before you got a plane for Cuba.”

  “They’ll believe that, too. But just to be sure, they’ll have a man follow you home.”

  “All right. We’ll mail the confession. Special delivery. Registered. They don’t need me with it. Earl will be all right. You and I will get away.”

  “Baby, I got only one chance in a hundred of getting away. I don’t even know where I’d go. I won’t drag you along.”

  “You won’t drag me. I’m going. I won’t stay here, going insane worrying about you. I’m going to be there with you.”

  There was that shaft of iron, the set of her jaw, the brown of her eyes... and the smell of her hair. I walked slowly back into the room.

  I picked up the confession, toppled into an easy chair. She came over to me.

  “Go somewhere,” I said. “Baby, this will take some figuring.”

  She sank to the floor at my feet, wrapped her arms around my legs, laid her head in my lap.

  I put my hands in her hair, knowing if I was going to get any thinking done, it would have to be done in a hurry.

  I moved my hands in her hair, feeling the trembling of her body against my legs.

  “I got to take it slow,” I said. “The doc shot me with something to kill the pain. It’ll probably stop my thinking, too. Maybe I’ll foul this up. But this is how it’s got to be, the only way I can see it, Peggy.”

  “Tell me, love.” She moved her mouth against my leg. I fe
lt her breath, hot and deep.

  I took a deep breath. “You got to go to the D.A., Peggy. That’s the only way. Tell him you saw me, act honest about it. When he asks you to help him find me, promise you will. Maybe—there’s just one chance that if you keep him thinking first about getting Earl out of the death house, and second, that there’s nothing you wouldn’t do to help him, he might not have you followed—yet.”

  “I can do it,” Peggy said, and the iron showed in her voice.

  “Sure you can,” I said. “You can do anything you want to do. Sooner or later, he’ll have you followed. But right at first, if you can sell him and get away not followed—that’s all the time we need.”

  I put my head back against the chair, tired. I was so tired that I suddenly didn’t even know how I could go on talking. There was so much we had to do, we had to run so fast and so far, we had to move and keep moving—and God only knew how tired I was.

  I must have closed my eyes, trying to shut out the picture of the way it had to be.

  “Mike? You all right, Mike?”

  “Yes. When you leave the D.A., I want you to take this card of mine and the power of attorney I’ll give you. You go to the safety deposit vaults. The key I give you, and their key, will open a deposit box. You’ll have to get all the money you’ll find in there. Put it in a purse; carry a large one.”

  “Mike. You’re kidding.”

  “No. I’ve a couple of checking accounts but the police commissioner will have ordered them impounded along with my car. You’ve got to get that money this morning. I can’t get any checks cashed, and we’ve got to have all the money in that deposit box.”

  “All right, Mike.”

  I gave her the card, my deposit key, wrote out a power of attorney if they questioned her. I didn’t think they would. The commissioner would be satisfied with impounding my checking accounts. Nobody knew about the deposit box yet, just as they didn’t know about the accounts I’d opened in out-of-state banks, an idea I got from Hitler, Peron and other boys who stashed it away with the idea of running to it some day.

  “When you leave the bank, have a cab driver take you to the most reliable used-car dealer he knows. If you put the right tone in your voice, he’ll choose you the best one. When you get there, look over the year-old models of used cars, no older than that, and nothing with more than six thousand miles. And don’t get a loud one, get a dark blue, or black, something easy to forget.”

  She pressed closer. “And when I do all that, Mike, will you take me with you?”

  “I’ll take you with me,” I said. “That’s why I’m doing it. I’m so tired I wouldn’t do it, even for myself. I’ll wait. You come back, pick me up and we’ll take off.”

  Her breath sounded fast in her throat, her heart pounded against my leg. She pushed herself up on her knees, pulled in close against me.

  Her voice was breathless. “You do mean it, don’t you, Mike? You’ll take me with you. You’ll keep me. You’ll let me love you.”

  “You’re all I want, Peggy. Somehow we’ll get away.”

  She nodded. “I’ll go, Mike. Soon. But love me first. Now. Quickly. You’ve got to, Mike. I can’t stand it any more. I can’t wait any longer.”

  “We won’t get away—”

  “Please, Mike.” She pressed harder. “Don’t put me off any more.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Let’s go to bed. You think I don’t want to? You think I’m fighting it? Lets go.”

  “What’s the matter, Mike?”

  “What do you think the cops will be doing? How long do you think it will take to trace me here? If we don’t get started, we’ll never go.” I shrugged and looked down at her. “It’s up to you.”

  She pressed close a moment, pressing her parted mouth against mine. I could taste the warmth of her mouth, the salt of her tears, and just the promise of what it was going to be...

  “I’m sorry, Mike. I’ll go. I’ll hurry. You know I’ll hurry because you’ll be here. You will wait for me, won’t you, Mike?”

  I stared into her eyes. “Didn’t you think I would?”

  She tried to smile. “I thought you might—if I could get you to love me.”

  I held her close. “You never had any faith. But I did. All the things you wanted and didn’t believe I’d do, I will do. I’ll be here.”

  She kissed me, holding her hands against my face. She smiled. “You think I didn’t believe in you. Oh, Mike, what a fool you’ve been.”

  She got up then, moving swiftly, making herself presentable, stuffing Tino’s confession in her handbag. Then she was gone.

  I waited.

  Not all the thoughts I had were pleasant. I stayed in that chair with my head back. The fever raged in me, and the fear.

  I thought about Earl Walker. I thought about the way it was going to be for him. While he was in the death house some guy got to his wife. He’d have his freedom, but what was it going to be worth? Sure he’d betrayed Peggy, and lied to her, and hurt her. But he was a sick man—not sick the way a man with pneumonia is, Mr. Ballard—mentally ill. He needed a lot more than freedom; he needed his faith restored. It was going to take all that to make him well. What a surprise he had waiting for him.

  I shook him from my mind. I couldn’t think about Earl Walker. I’d done all I could for him. He was going to walk out of that death house a free man. They didn’t do that every day in the week. I didn’t tell him to get snarled up with Ruby Venuto. I never even told him to send Peggy to see me...

  I thought about Alex Luxtro. I thought about the editorials that would be in the newspapers. The death of a civic leader. Commissioner Mitchell might even be a pallbearer. In my mind I could see Mitchell in a dark suit and that white hair, looking sad because Luxtro was dead. One thing about Luxtro, he’d worked for one thing: security and respectability. When I thought about his payoffs, I knew that part of his riches was in his personal satisfaction when he sat playing bridge in his club, or met with the vestry men of his church. I could see him killing Ruby. It was a personal thing, and had to be handled quietly. It was the sort of thing he could do well. He needed a patsy, and one of Ruby’s own followers would fit. Tino was a man he could trust—and another man went on the payoff list. And now Luxtro had joined Tino. Maybe they could talk it over in hell.

  I thought about Peggy. In my mind I saw her walking along the street, going into the D.A.’s office, getting frightened, being questioned too much and too long. I saw the D.A. picking up the telephone, I saw the sirens, cars racing into the alley down there, the men coming up the steps slowly, with guns drawn. “A vicious killer,” Commissioner Mitchell would say. “My orders are to shoot him if he resists arrest.”

  For a long time I lay and sweated, barely breathing. I heard heavy treads on the steps outside. I wanted to go to the window and check, but I couldn’t get up; I was too tired. I couldn’t make myself care enough to walk that far.

  I heard the garbage cans rattle, and the steps went away, plodding down the stairs. The janitor was taking the garbage cans to the alley.

  I closed my eyes again. I’d given Peggy too many things to do; too much depended on her. The D.A. knew I’d been working with her. Why would he let her out of that office without sending somebody up here to check?

  Sure, he’d send somebody to check.

  I fumbled Luxtro’s gun from my pocket, laid it on my lap, covered it with my hand.

  I waited. Let them come to check. I wouldn’t get up to greet them, but Luxtro’s gun would.

  The door opened and Peggy stood there.

  “Mike.”

  I leaned forward in the chair. The gun spilled from my lap, between my legs, the fever fled from my head and it was suddenly clear. It was all right. Peggy was back and the fever was gone.

  “Peggy.”

  “It’s all right, darling.” She did not come near me. She stood there inside the door. Something had happened to her, and I started, trying to see inside her to know what it was.

  “P
eggy.”

  “I saw the D.A. He told me that Earl would be free. That I had done a wonderful thing standing by him all this time, that Earl would need me more than ever, and that I must be strong, and he knew I would be strong.”

  “All right,” I said.

  “He didn’t ask about you. He wanted to know if I’d gotten this from you. I said yes. He said did you send it to me? I just nodded. It was what he wanted to believe, Mike. I let him believe it.”

  “Yes.” I said. I didn’t care any more. I was remembering what she’d said about when Earl came home. Sure, that was the way it had to be. She was his, wasn’t she? Did it matter what I’d done for her? Did it matter what he’d done to her?

  “They didn’t even question me at the bank. I showed them the card, and the key. They opened the box for me. They went away.” She took one more step into the room. “Mike. I never saw so much money. Where did you get it?”

  My voice was cold. “Hell, baby, if you’re bad enough long enough, you can stack it up. That’s what I did. Kids in school bought dope, and I didn’t stop it. They ran gambling joints and I didn’t even question it. I got a lot of money. Pimps trained whores right on Halsey Street. I banked some more money.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Mike. That’s the way it has always been. People are going to gamble, they’re going to do the things they want, it doesn’t make any difference about the laws.”

  “Sure.”

  “Don’t talk like that. If it hadn’t been you, it would have been some other cop.”

  “Sure. That’s what I told myself at the time.”

  “What’s the matter, Mike? You stare at me. Don’t you want me? I thought you couldn’t wait for me to get back. The car is down there, Mike. We can go. Any time you want to. There’s nothing I want to take.”

  I stood up.

  “You want to go?”

  “That’s all I want.”

  “No. There was something in your face. When you came in that door. What is it, Peggy?”

  “Nothing. It’s nothing. Let’s go.”

  I started across to her. She came into my arms. “It’s all right, Mike. If we just run now. We’ll be all right.”