Too Many Crooks

by Richard S. Prather

  "Out the window," I said. I pointed to the wall. "Not much chance anybody's there. Move!"

  She whirled and unlocked the frosted-glass window and slid it up. There wasn't any screen, and she shoved the package through, then stuck her head and shoulders out. I stood by the door. I knew that if the boys who'd come in were after me, they'd seen us come inside here. And they'd be after Betty, too, now.

  "Help me," Betty said.

  I glanced at her, and she was really a most engaging sight. She was half out the window, trying to get her knee on the frame, and she did not look at all subdued and proper at the moment. This, however, was no time to be eyeballing Betty's anatomy. I stepped to her side, reached for her foot with my left hand, gun in my right hand pointed at the door. The door burst open.

  The guy had a gun in his hand and he had a face like a horse. I'd met him with Norris, but I'd never said hello to him. And I was never going to get the chance, either, because almost simultaneously with my first glimpse of him, he flipped his gun toward me and I was pulling the trigger of my Colt. He was so close that I could hear the ugly smack of .38 slugs as they slammed into his flesh, even though the sound of shots was almost deafening here in the small room. He slumped against the doorframe with two bullets in his body and one hole in his forehead.

  I saw a blur of movement behind him as somebody leaped sideways out of the doorway and a woman in the restaurant screamed shrilly. A man shouted. Betty was still struggling through the window, but her struggles soon ended because I spun around, planted both hands and the .38 against her fanny, and shoved hard. She yelped and then she was no longer in the window. I literally dived out after her, using my left hand to help me through, and landed sprawling on hard-packed dirt. Betty was already getting to her feet.

  I said, "Run."

  I was coming after her, but not right now. Lilith—or Dorothy Craig—wouldn't have known Betty was with me, and she'd thus have expected to get me outside, and killed, with no trouble. So there probably were only the two men, one of whom was still alive to chase us. Well, I wanted to be damned sure he didn't catch us.

  I stood by the window. This had all taken so little time that I saw the last movement of Horseface as he hit the floor. And then the other man came through the door. It was Zimmerman.

  Zimmerman, the guy Baron apparently called for when there was somebody to be killed—somebody like Emmett Dane, or like me. It made me feel good, in a way, to see that handsome face, because I'd been afraid I wouldn't ever see him again, and it also made me feel good to see that he had a gun in his hand. It made what I was going to do that much easier.

  As Zimmerman jumped into the room and started to turn toward me, I stuck my right fist through the window, the .38 cocked and aimed. He saw the revolver in my fist, and then his eyes rose to my face as he brought up his gun. And that was the last thing he saw in his life.

  I turned around and ran, my ears still ringing from the blast of my .38.

  The window opened into an alley and I ran down it to the street. Betty was standing there and I grabbed her hand and pulled her across the street. We ran together down the alley for another block. There we turned left and walked a few feet to a parked car.

  "Just a minute," I said. When I turned the door handle the door swung open and I scooted under the wheel. "Get in," I said, and she slid in beside me.

  "What are you going to do?"

  "Steal a car, if I'm lucky." I was fumbling under the dash. I found the ignition wires, ripped them loose, and spliced them. In a few more seconds, I started the motor and drove a mile or so, then parked across the street from a dumpy rundown motel. In front of it was a flickering neon sign, about on its last flicker: plaza motel—vacancy.

  Sirens wailed in the distance as I got out cigarettes, gave one to Betty, and lit hers and mine. "Honey, we're in trouble. I'll spell it out later, but the idea is that the blonde Dorothy Craig set me up for a kill. I know too much. So do you now. Anyway, she saw you with me, and she knows by this time what just happened to her playmates. So, to put it simply, you're not long for this world."

  I wondered for a moment how they'd worked it, what had made them think they could get away with passing off Dorothy Craig as Lilith Manning. After I'd thought about it for a minute, the mechanics were ridiculously simple. Only two factors were necessary: that Emmett Dane had never met Lilith Manning—and he'd told me he had met her for the first time only a few days before I'd arrived here in Seacliff—and that Lilith Manning be out of town. Probably, I thought, she was in Europe or Hawaii, or maybe back east. At least far enough away so she'd never get wind of what was going on.

  And the con had obviously been, at first, designed only to fool Dane. When Baron introduced Dorothy as Lilith, Dane would have had no reason to suspect Baron of lying—no more reason than I'd had. When I showed up, the con became a bit more complicated, but all would still have been well if Baron or the cops or Norris and his hoods had convinced me I should leave town. They'd tried hard enough, and now I knew why.

  I thought of other things: that we had never gone inside Lilith Manning's home. On each of the three occasions when I'd been there, we'd stayed outside; the first two times at the pool and the last time on the porch. And now I knew that all along I'd been thinking the cops had slipped up when they tried to knock me off right in front of Lilith Manning. They hadn't been worried about a witness; the witness was in the murder mess just as deeply as they were. The only thing I could say for Dorothy Craig was that just before the kill attempt she had, at least, tried to get me to "run away" with her, the thought of murder right in front of her eyes momentarily revolting her, perhaps. But it had been only a momentary weakness, because my sweet, passionate Dorothy must have known, even while her lips were hot on mine, that her cop friends were on their way to kill me. It was easy to understand now why she'd refused to take off in the Cad with me. I understood something about Blake's death, too. There wasn't even one witness to that on my side now.

  When Thurmond called Baron from jail, Baron must have thought pretty fast. He would want me killed, naturally—especially since I'd recognized Zimmerman at Dane's the night before—and he must have figured it would be far less money to have me murdered at the deserted Manning estate than in or near the police station. He must also have been sure in his own mind that I'd go out to see "Lilith" if he told me she was dying to see me. He would have phoned Dorothy before he even started for the jail and told her to get out to the house fast to greet me, hold me there any way she could. Then, when I drove off, all Baron had to do was go back inside the station and tell his crooked cops I was on my way to the Manning home. It must have looked perfect.

  Betty was saying, "I'm so confused I don't know what I'm doing. Why did you say that was Lilith?"

  "I thought it was. I'd never seen the real Lilith, or Dorothy Craig, either. Baron introduced Dorothy to me as Lilith. When I got out of the hospital Wednesday night, I went first to see Baron. He knew I was going from his office to see Lilith, so he made sure she was there. As a matter of fact, I remember he picked up the phone and called her, and then kept me in his office for five minutes or so. I took it for granted he was calling the Manning place, but he must have called Dorothy at her home here in town. Funny, if I'd ever gone out to the Manning home without giving Baron a chance to announce me, nobody would have been there. Looking back on it, I can see—"

  I stopped, my mind shocked. The muscles in my stomach tightened spasmodically and I could feel sickness rising in my throat. That night at the pool, Dorothy must have reached the Manning estate shortly before me, stripped off her clothes—I'd found them all on the canopied swing—and then slipped into the water to wait for me. And while she had tried to make love to me, keep my mind filled with thoughts of her and not of anything else, Baron must have been sending out the word to murder Dane. His plans were getting shaky then; I was out of the hospital ahead of schedule and he knew I didn't intend to leave town. I'd told him as much. My staying too long with Doro
thy had given him time to have Dane killed. If I had left even five minutes sooner, I might have stopped the killers; Dane might still be alive.

  A deep, hot anger was growing in me, even drowning the sickness I felt. I had been angry for a long time, but my emotion had been almost without focus, really. Now finally I had a man to focus my anger on. The right man—Clyde Baron. I was sure that was the way it had to be. Baron had been the guy calling the plays, setting up the beatings and corruption and murder. I went back over my thoughts, over what I'd told Betty just now, and at every point, the man responsible for the ugly things that had happened was Baron.

  I forced my mind away from the past, from the things I couldn't change, and made myself think about here and now, about what I still could do.

  I said to Betty, "Have you got any idea how serious this is? Not just for me, but for you now?"

  "I think so."

  "You'd better know so. You'll have to have nine kinds of luck just to get out of town alive."

  "I'm not getting out of town."

  "Look, don't give me any arguments like you did last night."

  "I'm not going to talk about it. I've made up my mind."

  This Betty, I was thinking, had less sense and more guts than I did. But I said, "We'll talk about it later. Right now we've got to get off the street. There'll still be roadblocks around town. There's one road I came in on, but this explosion tonight has made headquarters by now. They'll figure out how I got in, probably. Maybe you could get out alone, but you certainly couldn't with me along."

  "I'm not—"

  "Listen to me! By now the chief or Carver will have sent the word out to grab you too. And if you still don't know how serious this mess is, I killed two men back there at Lanny's."

  She swallowed. "Are you sure they're—"

  "Yes, I'm sure." I looked over at the motel. It was the kind of setup you see a lot of along the coast, a series of small, run-down cabins. I said, "Hop out and go across the street. Get a cabin. If you see anybody you recognize, or who might know you—anybody—turn around and come back. If not, get it in the name of Mary Owens. For you and your brother. No, the clerk might have a nasty mind. Make it you and your husband."

  Betty had been looking at me intently, strangely, her lips parted. Now she ran her tongue over her lower lip, swallowed again, and said softly, "All right, Shell."

  "Incidentally, I'm not going to stay there all night." I tried on a grin. It didn't fit. "But we've got some talking to do. More about Dane's will, for one thing. If you get the cabin, go right in. I'll join you later."

  "Can't you go in with me?"

  "I don't want you seen with me around here. And I've got to ditch this car. If it's found here, after it was stolen a block from Lanny's, we'll have cops in our ears within an hour."

  I pulled out my gun and broke it open. Only two cartridges in it. In my coat pocket I found one more. I inserted it in the place of an empty case, then put the gun back in its holster. Three slugs were about one hundred less than I'd have liked, but three would have to do. I didn't expect to be rummaging in the trunk of my Cad for a spell.

  Betty was still looking at me. "Well, go on," I said.

  "Do you have to talk so rough? To me?"

  "I'm sorry, honey. I'm all up in the air. I remembered a lot of things that have happened."

  "I understand." She was quiet for a moment, then smiled softly. "I suppose you call everybody honey, don't you?"

  I grinned. "Not men."

  "I like it. Keep calling me . . ." The words trailed off, but she kept looking at me with that odd, tense expression on her face. "Shell," she said finally, "please be careful, please come back. I—" and all of a sudden her arms were around me and her lips found mine, and they were soft, trembling. Her arms pulled convulsively at my neck. She kissed me almost savagely, and then pulled her face from mine, looking straight into my eyes, her mouth partly open and her breathing irregular.

  Then she was gone. She opened the car door and slammed it behind her as she ran across the street. I watched her as she walked to one of the cabins. She went inside, coming out in a few minutes with a heavy-set woman. They walked down the row of cabins to the fourth one on my right. Betty went inside and the heavy-set woman waddled back to the office. I started the car and drove down the street.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I knocked. Inside the cabin Betty said softly, "Yes?"

  "It's me, Shell."

  I heard her unlock the door, then it opened and I slipped through. I'd brought the package with me from the car and I dropped it on the floor as I locked the door again. Betty looked at me uncertainly, and I tried to play it light.

  "Mrs. Mary Owens? Allow me to introduce myself. I'm your husband."

  She smiled a little, those soft, warm lips curving and the full lower lip protruding slightly. She said, "I've been wondering where you went that day in forty-one. You'll have to go. I've remarried several times."

  "Polygamist. I was winning the war. And I demand my rights." I frowned at her. "Tell you what, wife. I want my veteran's benefits."

  She shook her head. "How can you talk like this when . . . everything's happening?"

  "You were doing OK yourself. Can't be serious all the time, honey. We'd crack up. But I guess you're right. Well, sit down."

  She sat on the edge of the bed and I pulled a chair over near her, straddled it, and leaned on the back. "Give a listen," I said. For the next few minutes I filled her in on what she didn't already know, including the parts I'd figured out. Finally, I said, "The main thing behind the whole mess is nothing more than money. But a lot of it, millions of dollars. That and the power that would go with it. The way it looks, the original idea was probably Baron's. Get all the beachfront property here, plus any other land they could, then have it rezoned. With the power and influence Baron already has, plus that of his chums, I imagine there'd be no hitch in the rezoning angle. And now there's this Manning Foundation gimmick you mentioned. Could be this is even bigger than I thought it was."

  As I talked, Betty had gradually relaxed, until now she was lying back on the bed with two pillows under her head, and she looked very nearly as good as when she'd been climbing out the window. I sighed and said, "As of now there are legal grounds for transferring title to Seacliff's public beach over to the foundation. Right?"

  "That's right. And whoever controls the foundation—there are seven directors—would control the property."

  "Undoubtedly Baron's well aware of that. He's one of the foundation directors. Dane was one of them, too. There's an empty space now, and what do you bet one of Baron's chums fills it?" I stopped a moment, then said, "Anything else you can add about Emmett's will? Where it is, or who's got it? Did you see it?"

  "No, but Ferries Gordon has it in his office, I think. There's one thing. Dorothy Craig was in Gordon's office when I went up, and I talked to them both there. They wouldn't say much, except what I've already told you. But I think they might have been discussing Emmett's will. Anyway, Gordon gathered up some papers and put them into his safe when I came in. He acted secretive."

  "Could be. What kind of safe?"

  She said, "Just one of those big green safes in the corner of the room. Why?"

  "Where's his office?"

  "Braeden Building. Room Four-twenty. It's on Sycamore, just a block from Main. What do you want to know all this for?"

  "I may go up there. All the beachfront property went to Craig?"

  She nodded and I said, "We know the will must be a fake. That means, too, that Dane's lawyer is part of— of the opposition. Dane wouldn't sell to Seaco, was going to fight them—even brought me in to help—so the solution was to kill him and inherit his property." I thought a moment, then went on, talking to Betty but also getting it clearer in my own mind. "At first I thought the Seacliff Development Company was trying to grab all the land, and putting pressure on the three big landholders: Dane, Baron, and Lilith Manning. But from the beginning it must have been Baron in ba
ck of it all, with his big chunk of property, his Baronial Estates, already in the pot. His next and biggest single grab was set up with the con and kill of Dane and the fake will, and for that he used Dorothy. That leaves only the real Lilith Manning, who, not liking Seacliff anyway, would probably sell to Baron. By that time, if all should go well, Baron could afford to pay even a stiff price for her holdings because he and his associates would own damn near everything else by then. If they could somehow get control of even part of the foundation property, they'd almost literally own the whole damned city." I turned to Betty. "What did this Craig dish have to say when you interviewed her?"

  "She wasn't too happy about talking to me, but she did say she and Dane had been seeing a lot of each other. He was in love with her; they were going to be married." I opened my mouth, but Betty held up a hand. "That's what she said."

  "Uh-huh. I suppose if they can fake a will, they can also fake a marriage license or whatever they'd need."

  Betty said, "I can tell you some more about Dorothy Craig, Shell. There wasn't time till now. I know a little about her, because not long after she arrived in Seacliff, a few years back, there was some scandal about her. There was supposed to be more than friendship between her and Josephson."

  I interrupted her. "The same—"

  "The same. Publisher of the Star. He's married and has, believe it or not, seven kids, none over fourteen years old. The story went that Josephson and Dorothy were seeing each other, meeting in secret. Of course, nothing came of it—no real open scandal, I mean. After that, Dorothy was seen with a number of fairly well known local men." She paused. "The most interesting point is that the last man she's supposed to have become friendly with is Clyde Baron."

  "Indeed. Interesting. Perfect, too. Pretty obvious what might have happened. Dorothy Craig, an incandescent tomato more than a little chummy with publisher Josephson, might have enough on the guy to make him jump through the hoop when she says jump. And we know she's just as interested as Baron in seeing that none of the truth about their racket hits the papers. That might explain why Josephson's so concerned, and kills all your stories. Funny, Dane didn't know her, especially if, as you say, everybody knew about it. When was the Josephson affair?"