Mink Is for a Minx

by editor Leo Margulies

  “So dumb they got to use a stoolie as stupid as you,” Maxie said. “Okay, now you get a message to Walter. You tell him Little Maxie wants to see him about a big job, a driving job, got that? You tell him it’s me and a big job. And, Eddie, if anyone except Walter knows I’m in town I’ll be back for you.”

  “Sure, Maxie,” the fat stoolie said.

  “Okay. You get Walter here, and you get him to call me and ask for Alice, just Alice. That’s all.”

  Little Maxie gave Eddie a Chelsea number, and turned on his heel and walked out. He did not have to worry about Eddie yet. Later, when Eddie thought he was safe, but not yet.

  Maxie walked across the city to the Sixth Avenue bar that had the number, the Chelsea number, he’d given Eddie. He waited back in a dark doorway across the street until he was sure Eddie had called no one else. Then he crossed the street and went into the bar.

  There were two men in the bar, and the bartender. Maxie covered his face as he passed the two men. He ordered a beer. A clock above the bar read ten o’clock. The little killer figured he had maybe ten hours left. He began to smile to himself. He was going to make it. With a break. He was on his third beer when he noticed that there was only one man sitting at the bar now.

  Little Maxie jumped up and headed for the door. The telephone rang. Maxie hesitated, he did not know how long the man at the bar had been gone. It was a chance he would have to take. If he missed Walter this time it would take hours to make another contact, and Maxie did not have many hours. He went for the telephone.

  A deep voice said, “Alice?”

  “Okay, Midge, meet me in the alley behind the Belden Hotel in a half an hour. Come alone, I’ll be watching.”

  The voice seemed to hesitate. Then the voice said, “Is this Maxie Lima? The hired gun?”

  “Yeh, Midge, so be quick. It’s a big job.”

  Little Maxie hung up and ran for the door. He was a half a block away when he looked back and saw the car drive up to the tavern. Two men got out and went into the saloon. In the distance Maxie heard sirens coming closer. The man from the bar had called everyone. Little Maxie walked faster and smiled in the night. His luck was holding.

  He waited in the dark of the alley for Walter Midge. From where he stood he could see the mouth of the alley lighted by a street lamp. There was a blank wall behind him. The doors into the alley were all unlocked; Maxie had checked that. He had his escape route, and no one could sneak up on him. He lighted a cigarette as he waited, sure he had checked everything as usual.

  The big man appeared at the mouth of the alley. Midge was almost a giant, and as broad as a wrestler. Little Maxie watched Midge walk down the alley. The big man seemed to move slowly as if afraid of something, hesitant. Little Maxie stepped out and shined a quick light on the big man.

  “That’s far enough, Walter.”

  Midge stopped. The big man’s eyes blinked in the light There was a thick cigar clamped in Midge’s mouth. The big man’s suit was good and pressed. His shoes were shined. Midge looked prosperous enough. Maxie shut off the light.

  “You said you got a job,” the big man said in the dark.

  Maxie stepped close to the big man. “A driving job, Midge. A bank, you drive the get-away car. You can handle that kind of job, right?”

  The big man seemed to hesitate again. Then his voice from the dark said, “Maybe I can, maybe I can’t.”

  The tone of the voice had changed, become, suddenly, arrogant. Midge’s voice was arrogant and wary, the voice of a man who is not sure how much he should admit, but who didn’t care if someone guessed what he had done. Midge was saying, “Maybe I can, maybe I can’t.”

  “I know all about it, Walter,” Maxie said.

  “All about what, Lima,” the hard voice said.

  Maxie laughed. “Don’t try to con me, Midge. The robbery, I know all about it. What was your cut, ten percent? That’d be one hundred grand more-or-less, right? You ain’t been spending that much, you been taking it real easy. I figure you got most of it left.”

  The big man’s voice was harder, cagy. “You got big ears, maybe you know too much.”

  Little Maxie said, “Don’t try it, Midge! I got a gun in my hand, and a knife in my pocket. You know who I am. I could kill you ways you never heard of, and no one the wiser.”

  “What do you want from me?” Walter Midge said.

  Little Maxie smiled to himself. “Let’s say you got seventy-five grand left, I’ll take about twenty thousand bucks of that. I’m being good to you, that’s less than half.”

  “Why should I pay you?”

  “Because I know about the robbery. I figure it’s worth ten thousand dollars I don’t tell the cops; they’d listen to Maxie Lima, believe me. You fooled them once, only this time they’d have the tip from me, and this time they’d keep you inside until you rotted.”

  Maxie went on: “The other ten grand is for not telling the Syndicate boys. You don’t pay, I tell the cops and the Syndicate boys. If the cops don’t lock you up and throw away the key, someone in the Syndicate is gonna get the idea of helping you spend that dough, right?”

  There was a long silence this time. Little Maxie took a tight grip on his .38 and waited. At last the voice of Walter Midge said, “You’ll tell them? The cops and the Syndicate?”

  “I will,” Maxie said. “And don’t think about knocking me off. In the first place you couldn’t do it, in the second place that’s a murder rap and twenty grand ain’t worth a murder rap to a guy like you.”

  The silence was longer this time. The little killer went over the whole thing in his mind. The kind of man who drove a get-away car for ten percent of a big robbery was not the type who would kill anyone if he could help it. Maxie knew all about killers, and robbery drivers were never killers if they could help it.

  Little Maxie was sure of that. It wouldn’t do the big man any good to turn him in to the police. And the big man was too dumb to know that Little Maxie wasn’t about to talk to the Syndicate. If Midge knew that, the big man would have walked out already.

  The big man’s voice said, “You’ll tell the Syndicate?”

  “You heard me,” Maxie said. “Here’s what you do. Bring the money to the Valencia Hotel, you know where it is. Ask for Mr. Brown’s room. Then you go straight up and wait at the room door, got it?”

  The big man did not answer. Little Maxie was sure Midge was shaking his head up and down in the dark, but the big man did not speak, and then Maxie saw a shadow at the mouth of the alley. Maxie hissed, “Run!”

  A voice called, “Halt! Police!”

  Maxie was down and crawling away before the first shot was fired. The little killer never did see what happened to Walter Midge. Maxie knew the voice—Lieutenant Jacoby.

  Maxie swore under his breath. The only way Jacoby could have known was from Eddie the Wasp. Eddie must have heard him on the telephone to Walter. He decided he would take care of Eddie after Walter paid the money.

  There was movement at the mouth of the alley. Little Maxie fired four quick shots and made a dash for the nearest door. He went through the door in a sprawling dive, landed, rolled, and came up running. One last shot missed him by a hair as he went down a laundry chute in the hotel head first. He came out in the cellar and was out the front way and running away in the dark before the police reached the cellar.

  From the shadows Little Maxie watched Midge cross the street and go into the entrance of the Valencia Hotel. The big man was carrying a brown-paper wrapped package. The little killer waited in the shadows. Light was just beginning to break in the sky to the east.

  Dawn soon, and Maxie had already checked on the nine o’clock flight nonstop to Brazil. They had a seat. Now he waited across the street to see if Walter Midge had decided to try to be smart.

  Fifteen minutes passed, but no one else went into the hotel, no one drove up and parked on the block.

  Midge was playing it straight. Maxie knew Walter himself was no danger, but it paid to be sure,
and Maxie checked his .38 before he put it in his pocket with his hand on it and ready. Then he walked across the street and into the hotel. He had played it all as smart as it could be played; now his luck just had to hold another three hours.

  In the hotel he walked up the stairs. Walter Midge was waiting in front of the door of the room he had taken in the name of Brown. Maxie walked up to the big man and pulled out his .38. “Hold still!”

  He carefully searched the big man. Midge was not carrying a weapon. Maxie had been sure, but it paid to figure on everything. Maxie said, “Okay, come on.”

  “Where?” Walter Midge said.

  “Just come on,” Maxie said. He led the big man down the stairs to the next floor. He took a key from his pocket and opened the door of an empty room.

  Maxie grinned. “In case you told anyone. I got the key and checked the room being empty while the clerk was off buying me some whisky, for a small tip, of course.”

  The big man walked into the room and Little Maxie locked the door behind them. Maxie still held his .38, just in case, but he was not worried about the big man. And he had decided not to kill Midge later. Sudden killings were dangerous, too much could go wrong. A shot in the hotel was too risky—too many people. With a man as big as Midge a knife was chancy.

  The main thing was that Little Maxie did not want a killing to start the police checking the airports. Eddie the Wasp would have told them Maxie was looking for Walter Midge by now.

  “Okay, Midge,” he said, “hand it over and I’ll blow.”

  The big man handed Maxie the package. Maxie laid his .38 on the bureau and tore open the package. And Maxie stared down at the neatly stacked and wrapped piles of cut newspaper. Not all newspaper. On each stack there was a single ten dollar bill. Little Maxie screamed at Walter Midge:

  “Newspaper?! Why you stupid—”

  The big man moved with amazing speed. Midge was half way to Maxie before the little man knew what was happening. The big man shouted, “You ain’t gonna tell! You ain’t—”

  Little Maxie grabbed for his .38. His mind was racing. The shots would bring the cops if the big man’s shouts didn’t. It was crazy, stupid!

  The big man came closer. Maxie fired before his gun was steady. The big man grunted. But Midge did not stop coming. Little Maxie panicked. It was all wrong! It was stupid! Maxie ducked and ran. It made no sense, and the little killer reached for the door in panic.

  The big man’s hands closed on his throat. The .38 fell to the floor. Little Maxie tried to breathe, but the fingers crushed his throat. Maxie heard shouts and running feet in the hall. He tried to scream, but his throat was twisted and nothing came out.

  Blood rushed up behind Maxie’s eyes and his mind screamed over and over—it don’t figure, it’s stupid, it don’t figure, it don’t…

  And Little Maxie Lima died trying to think of what had gone wrong.

  Detective Lieutenant Fred Jacoby looked down at Walter Midge. The big man was breathing hard with the bullet in his chest. Jacoby said to the Sergeant, “So Maxie put his gun down and when Midge rushed him he couldn’t get it up fast enough. It looks like he panicked. He couldn’t figure what went wrong.”

  “Midge was lucky,” Sergeant Allers said. “He gonna make it?”

  “Maybe,” Jacoby said. “I don’t figure he cares.”

  The coroner, who was working over the injured Walter Midge, looked up at Jacoby. “He’s got a chance.”

  “That newspaper trick was smart, but risky,” the Sergeant said. “Me, I’d of given Maxie the money.”

  “What money?” Jacoby said. “Walter never went near a big robbery in his life. You’re as bad as Maxie. The newspaper wasn’t a smart trick; Walter really thought it was twenty thousand dollars. That’s why the tens on every stack. You heard him tell us what happened? He still thinks he was in on the robbery, drove the car, and brought the money to Maxie. It’s a delusion, he wants to believe it. The only thing he doesn’t know is why he killed Maxie. If he had really been in on the robbery, he would have paid Maxie, not killed him.”

  The coroner stood up. He looked down at Walter Midge. “He had to kill Maxie or face up to his delusion. If he let Maxie tell anyone about the robbery, the part of his brain with the delusion would have to admit it was only a delusion. So his subconscious killed Maxie to protect its delusion, so it could go on believing what it wanted. I’ll bet Maxie still can’t figure it out wherever he is.”

  Jacoby said, “Maxie should have asked me. We checked Walter two months ago. We’d heard the same rumors. It turned out he inherited some money—he’d rolled some drunks when it was real safe. The big criminal, just a delusion. Poor Little Maxie.”

  “You mean he killed Maxie because he didn’t do the robbery?” the Sergeant said. “It’s crazy.”

  “A crazy delusion,” Jacoby said. “He had to protect his delusion. He still doesn’t know why he killed Maxie. He knew Maxie had nothing to tell but his mind couldn’t admit that.”

  The coroner put on his hat and coat as the stretcher arrived from the ambulance. As they went out behind the stretcher with big Walter Midge on it, the coroner said, “If he lives, it’s Bellevue. He can still think he’s a big man there.”

  “You know,” Jacoby said, “he did the job on Maxie for the Syndicate. Maybe they will even pay him.”

  On the stretcher Walter Midge struggled to raise his head. The big man gasped out, “Yeh, I done the job, copper. I got Little Maxie Lima, I’m a big man, copper.”

  “How’d you do it, Walter,” Jacoby said, “with his own thirty-eight I’ll bet.”

  Walter Midge lay back on the stretcher. Then the big man smiled like a child. “Yeh, that’s right, I done it with his own gun.” The big man smiled like a happy child, and then, suddenly, the big man scowled and his eyes narrowed as he stared up at nothing. “Maybe I did it, maybe I didn’t, copper. You get me my lawyer. Yeh, that’s it, my lawyer. I ain’t talking.”

  Lieutenant Jacoby closed the ambulance door behind Walter Midge and watched the ambulance drive away in the cold morning. A jet flew over the city high up. On its way to Brazil maybe, Jacoby thought to himself. Poor Little Maxie.

  DEATH, MY LOVE

  by John Douglas

  KILLING MARION WAS GOING to be, in a way, the best part of it, John S. Johns thought as he pointed the pistol at his secretary and mistress. The icing on the cake, the final touch that would bring him safe, alone, and rich to the life he wanted.

  “John! Don’t point that at me, please,” Marion said.

  “I’m sorry, Marion,” John S. Johns said. “I really am.”

  In a way he was sorry. She had a fine body, she knew what to do with it, and he supposed she did love him in her smothering, clinging way. But he was going to be free of his wife, his stupid children, his job, and of Marion and her tedious love. That was the way he had planned it from the start. A clean sweep, the past dead with no loose ends, no excess baggage.

  One man could hope to vanish, but a man and a woman had to leave a trail. And he would have to watch her every minute. John S. Johns was not going to risk the universal mistake of taking a woman who could turn against him any minute, who had a hold on him the rest of his life. A new life, that was what it was all for. A new life with a half a million dollars in his pocket.

  Marion’s blue eyes were wide with a mixture of fear and disbelief. “Please, John, don’t play games with me—not now.”

  John S. Johns sighed. “It’s not a game, I’m afraid, Marion. I’m tired of you. I’m sorry but it’s that simple. You’re just too dull, my dear. I could just leave you, but you know too much about my plans.”

  Now there was only terror in the blue eyes. “I helped you! Without me you couldn’t have done any of it! John, please, please!”

  “No, I couldn’t,” he said. “You did help me, and I’m truly grateful. Look at it this way, Marion. You’re proving your love, you’re going to die for me.” And John S. Johns smiled at his secretary and mistress as he
squeezed the trigger.

  The sound of the aircraft’s engines covered the shots. He had counted on that. In the dark night no one had even noticed Marion and himself standing in the shadows near the edge of the field.

  John S. Johns made sure she was dead, then he picked up the two suitcases and ran toward the waiting aircraft. One more step and it was finished. It was a drastic solution. But, then, he had counted on her unquestioning help, her complete trust to the end, and her own folly had betrayed her.

  Johns was a student of human nature, and it was his discernment in that respect which had made his whole plan possible. She had been too devoted, too trusting, and had provided an irresistible temptation that a man like himself could hardly be blamed for succumbing to.

  Johns had begun to work out his plan three months ago. After twenty-two years in the office of Jamesville’s leading bank, he had worked up to be first vice-president in the main office at the munificent salary of $15,227.70 a year. The odd seventy cents was a courtesy of IBM, the exact percentage of his worth having been calculated by machine.

  Everything in the bank was done by machine, for old man Moss, the president, trusted no human being. So John S. Johns received his salary (less than $1000 for each endless year he had worked in the same bank), lived moderately well, owned his own home, belonged to the second-best Country Club, sent his three children through college, and was bored beyond belief.

  That was where Marion Astor came in, and, three months ago, the plan.

  Marion had been his mistress for five years. At first she had made life very much more interesting for him. And then it changed, and he found that what he had was not a daring and illegal mistress, but only another wife. Marion became a second wife as domestic and boring as his real wife, Maude. Younger, blonder, stupider, but just another Maude after all.

  Marion was as faithful as any wife, as unimaginative, as little a challenge. Marion liked to stay home and cook him dinners. She hated going out, and she understood him. An illegal wife, no more, and Johns did not want to be understood. He did not want a cozy second home. He wanted to be dazzled, challenged, and tempted.