Killer's Wedge

by McBain, Ed

  "Oh, all right," she said. She shifted the38 to her left hand. The muzzle of the gun was an inch from the bag. With her right hand, she took the cigarette Byrnes offered.

  Standing at her right, he figured he would extend the match with his left hand, let it fall into her lap, and then clip her with a roundhouse right when she pulled back in fright. Oddly, his heart was pounding furiously.

  Suppose the gun went off when she pulled back?

  He reached into his pocket for the matches. His hand was trembling. The cigarette dangled from Virginia's lips. Her left hand, holding the gun against the purse, was steady.

  Byrnes struck the match.

  And the telephone rang.

  CHAPTER 5

  Virginia whipped the cigarette from her mouth and dropped it into the ash tray on her desk.

  She switched the gun back to her right hand and then whirled on Bert Kung who was moving to answer the telephone.

  "Hold it, sonny!" she snapped.

  "What line is that?"

  "Extension 31," Kung~answered.

  "Get away from this desk, Lieutenant," Virginia said. She gestured at him with the gun, and Byrnes backed away. Then, with her free hand, she pulled the telephone to her, studied its face for a moment, and then pushed a button in its base.

  "All right, answer it," she said, and she lifted her receiver the moment Kung did.

  "Eighty-seventh Squad, Detective King."

  He was very conscious of Virginia Dodge sitting at the next desk, the extension phone to her ear, the snout of the .38 pointed at the center of the big black purse.

  "Detective Kung? This is Marcie Snyder."

  "Who?"

  "Marcie." The voice paused.

  "Snyder."

  Intimately, it whispered.

  "Marcie Snyder.

  Don't you remember me, Detective Kung?"

  "Oh, yes. How are you, Miss Snyder?"

  "I'm just fine, thanks. And how's the big blond cop?"

  "I'm ... uh ... fine. Thanks."

  He looked across at Virginia Dodge. Her lips were pressed into a bloodless smile.

  She seemed sexless, genderless, sitting opposite him with the lethal38 pointed at the black hulk of the bag. And, in contrast to the thin shadow of death she presented, Marcie Snyder began to ooze life in bucketfuls. Marcie Snyder began to gyrate with her voice, undulate with her whispers so that Kung could visualize the nig reoneaci lying Oil a ~itai~ in a gossamer negligee, cuddling up to the ivory telephone in her hand.

  "It's nice talking to you again," she said.

  "You were in such a hurry last time you were here."

  "I had a date ~xith my fiancee," Kung said flatly.

  "Yes. I know. You told me. Repeatedly." She paused. Her voice dropped slightly.

  "You seemed nervous. What were you nervous about.

  Detective Kung?"

  "Get rid of her," Virginia Dodge whispered.

  "What?" Marcie said.

  "I didn't say anything," Kung answered.

  "I was sure I heard ..

  "No, I didn't say anything. I'm rather busy, Miss Snyder. How can I help you'?"

  Marcie Snyder laughed the dirtiest laugh Bert Kung had ever heard in his life. For a moment, he felt as if he were sixteen years old and entering a whorehouse on La Via de Putas. He almost blushed.

  "Come on," he said harshly.

  "What is it?"

  "Nothing. We've recovered the jewels."

  "Oh, yeah? How?"

  "It turns out they weren't burglarized at all. My sister took them with her when she went to Las Vegas."

  "Are you withdrawing the complaint then, Miss Snyder?"

  "Why, yes. If there was no burglary, what have I got to complain about?"

  "Nothing. I'm glad you located the jewels. If you'll drop us a letter to that effect, stating that your sister-" "Why don't you come by and pick it up, Detective Kung?"

  "I'd do that, Miss Snyder," Kung said, "but there's an awful lot of crime going on in this city, and I'm just about damn near indispensable.

  Thanks for calling. We'll be waiting for your letter."

  He hung up abruptly, and then turned away from the phone.

  "You're a regular lover boy, aren't you?"

  Virginia Dodge said, putting her receiver down.

  "Yeah, sure. A regular lover boy," Kung answered.

  He was, to be honest, embarrassed by the fact that Virginia had listened to Marcie Snyder's come-hither conversation. Bert Kung was twenty-five years old and not exactly adept at the sort of fencing Marcie Snyder did. He was a tall blond man with broad shoulders and a narrow waist, his face bearing the clean stamp of milk and strawberries. He was, in a sense, handsome-but his good looks were overshadowed by the innocence with which he carried them. Kung was engaged to a girl named Claire Townsend, whom he'd been dating steadily for the past year. He really wasn't interested in Marcie Snyder or her sister, or the countless Marcie Snyders & Sisters to be found everywhere in the city. And so it annoyed him that Virginia Dodge might have thought he'd promoted this particular phone call. He didn't want her to think that.

  He knew it was odd that he should care what a bitch like Virginia Dodge was thinking, but somehow it became a matter of pride to him that she should not think he was diddling around when he was supposed to be investigating a burglary.

  He walked over to the desk where she sat.

  The black purse made him nervous.

  Suppose someone fell against it? Jesus, you had to be absolutely nuts to go around carrying a bottle of nitroglycerin.

  "About that girl," he said.

  "Yes?"

  "Don't get the wrong idea."

  "Why, what idea would that be?"

  Virginia Dodge said.

  "Well, I mean... I was investigating a burglary, that's all."

  "Why, what else would you be investigating, honey lamb?" Virginia asked.

  "Nothing. Oh, forget it. I don't know why I'm bothering explaining it to you anyway."

  "What's the matter with me?" Virginia said.

  "Well, I wouldn't say you were exactly a stable person, would you? No offense meant, Mrs. Dodge, but the run of-the-mill citizen doesn't run around waving a gun and a bottle of soup."

  "Don't they?" Virginia was smiling now, enjoying herself immensely.

  "Well, it's a slightly crazy stunt. I mean, even you have to admit that. I can see the gun, okay. You want to kill Steve, that's your business. Listen, am I going to fight City Hall? But the nitro's a little dramatic, don't you think? How'd you manage to get it over here without blowing up half the city?"

  "I managed," Virginia said.

  "I walked gently. I didn't sway my hips."

  "Yeah, well, that's a good way to walk, I guess. Especially when you've got a high explosive in your bag, huh?" King smiled disarmingly. The clock on the wall read 5:33. It was beginning to get dark outside.

  Dusk spread across the sky, washing a deeper blue behind the color-riot trees in the park. You could hear the kids shouting for a last innings of stickball before real darkness descended. You could hear mothers shouting from windows. You could hear men greeting each other as they entered bars for their before-dinner beers.

  You could hear all the sounds of life outside the grilled windows and you could hear, too-a sound as real as any of the others-the silence inside the squad room

  "I like this time of day," King said.

  "Do you?"

  "Yes. Always did. Even when I was a kid. Something nice about it. Quiet." He paused.

  "Are you really going to shoot Steve?"

  "Yes," Virginia said.

  "I wouldn't," Kung said.

  "Why not?"

  "Well .

  "Is it all right to turn on some lights in here, Virginia?" Byrnes asked.

  "Yes. Go ahead."

  "Cotton, snap on the overheads. And can my men get back to work?"

  "What kind of work?" Virginia asked.

  "Answering complaints, typing up
reports, making calls to ..

  "Nobody makes any calls. And nobody picks up a phone unless I'm on the extension."

  "All right. Can they type? Or will that disturb you?"

  "They can type. At separate desks."

  "All right, men," Byrnes said, "then let's do it. And listen to everything she tells you, and let's not have any heroics. I'm playing ball with you, Virginia, because I'm hoping you'll see reason before it's too late."

  "Don't hold your breath," Virginia said.

  "He's right, you know," Kung said softly, boyishly.

  "Is he?"

  "Sure. You're not doing yourself any good, Mrs. Dodge.

  "No?"

  "No. Your husband's dead. You're not going to help him by killing a lot of innocent people. And yourself, too, if that soup should go off."

  "I loved my husband," Virginia said tightly.

  "Sure. I mean, Jesus, I should hope so.

  But what's the good of this? I mean, what are you accomplishing?"

  "I'll be getting the man who killed him."

  "Steve? Come on, Mrs. Dodge. You know he didn't kill your husband."

  "I kiow nothing of the sort!"

  "Okay, let's say he did kill him. I know that's not true, and you know it too-but we'll say it if it makes you happy, okay? So what do you accomplish by revenge?"

  Kung shrugged boyishly.

  "Nothing. Jill tell you something, Mrs. Dodge."

  "Yes?"

  "I've got a girlfriend. Her name is Claire.

  She's a dream. I'm gonna marry her soon.

  She's full of life, do you know? But she wasn't always that way. When I met her, she was dead. I mean dead, really dead. Do you know why?"

  "Why?" Virginia asked.

  "Why?"

  "I'll tell you," Kung said boyishly.

  "She'd been in love with a fellow who got killed in Korea. And when he died, she let herself die, too. She went into this big shell, and she just wouldn't come out. A young girl! Hell, you can't be much older than she is. And in this shell." He shook his head.

  "She was wrong, Mrs. Dodge. She was so wrong. You see, she just didn't realize the guy was dead. She didn't realize the minute that bullet hit him, he wasn't the guy she loved any more, he was just another corpse. Dead! Finished! Out of it! She was carrying on an affair with a pile of fleshy rubble covered with maggots."

  KIng paused and rubbed a hand over his chin.

  "If you don't mind my saying so, you're doing the same thing."

  "I'm not," Virginia said.

  "Sure. Sure, you are. You're coming in here, and you're bringing the stink of death with you.

  Why, you know, you even look like Death, you know that? A pretty woman like you, and you've got death in your eyes and hanging around your lips. You're being stupid. Mrs. Dodge. Really. If you were smart, you'd put up that gun and..

  "I don't want to hear any more," Virginia snapped.

  "You think Frank would want you to do this?

  Get in all this trouble over him?"

  "Yes! Frank wanted Carella dead. He said so.

  He hated Carella!"

  "And you? Do you hate Carella, too? Do you even know him?"

  "I don't care about him. I loved my husband.

  That's enough for me."

  "But your husband was breaking the law when he got arrested. He shot a man! Now you couldn't expect Steve to give him a medal, could you? Now come on, Mrs. Dodge, be sensible."

  "I loved my husband," Virginia said flatly, "Mrs. Dodge, I'll tell you something else.

  You've got to make up your mind. Either you're a woman who really knows what love is all about, or else you're a coldblooded bitch who's ready to blow this dump to hell and gone. You can't play both sides of the fence. Now which one is it?"

  "I'm a woman. I'm here because I'm a woman."

  "Then act like one. Put the gun up, and get the hell out of here before you get more trouble than you've had in all your life."

  "No. No."

  "Come on, Mrs. Dodge... Virginia stiffened in her chair.

  "All right, sonny," she said, "you can knock it off now."

  "Wha ... ?" Kung started.

  "The big blue-eyed baby routine. You can just cut it. It didn't work."

  "I wasn't trying to .

  "Enough," she said, "damnit, that's enough!

  Go find somebody else's fit to suck!"

  "Mrs. Dodge, I .

  "Are you finished?"

  The squad room went silent. The clock on the squad-room wall, white-faced and leering, threw minutes onto the floor where they lay like the ghosts of dead policemen. It was dark outside the grilled windows now. The windows, half-way open to let in the October mildness, also let in the night sounds of early traffic. A typewriter started.

  Kung glanced toward the desk near one of the windows where Meyer had inserted a blue D.D.

  report together with two sheets of carbon and two duplicate report sheets into the machine. The hanging globe of light over Meyer cast a dull sheen onto his bald head as he hunched over the typewriter, pecking at the keys. Cotton Hawes walked to the filing cabinet and pulled open a drawer. The drawer squeaked on its rollers. He opened a folder and began leafing through it.

  Then he went to sit at the desk near the other window. The water cooler suddenly belched into the silence.

  "I'm sorry I bothered you," Kung said to Virginia.

  "I should have known a person can't talk to a corpse."

  There was a sudden commotion in the corridor outside. Virginia tensed where she sat at the desk.

  For an instant, Kung thought her finger would involuntarily tighten around the trigger of the .38.

  "All right, inside, inside," a man's voice said, and Kung recognized it instantly as belonging to Hal Willis. He looked past the desk and into the corridor as Willis and his prisoner came into view.

  The prisoner, to be more accurate, burst into view. Like the aurora borealis. She was a tall Puerto Rican girl with bleached blond hair. She wore a purple topcoat open over a red peasant blouse which swooped low over a threatening display of bosom. Her waist was narrow, the straight black skirt swelling out tightly over sinuously padded hips. She wore high-heeled pumps, red, with black ankle traps. A gold tooth flashed in the corner of an otherwise dazzlingly white set of teeth. And, in contrast to her holiday garb, she wore no makeup on her face, which was a perfect oval set with rich brown eyes and a full mouth and a clean sweeping aristocratic nose. She was one of the prettiest, if flashiest, prisoners ever to be dragged into the squad room

  And dragged she was. Holding one wristlet of a pair of handcuffs in his right hand, Willis pulled the girl to the slatted rail divider while she struggled to retrieve her manacled wrist, cursing in Spanish every inch of the way.

  "Come on, cara mia," Willis said.

  "Come on, tsotzkuIuh. You'd think somebody was trying to hurt you, for Christ's sake. Come on, Liebchen. Right through this gate. Hi, Bert! something, huh? Hello, Pete, you like my prisoner? She just ripped open a guy's throat with a razor

  Willis stopped talking.

  There was a strange silence in the squad room

  He looked first at the lieutenant, and then at KIng, and then his eyes flicked to the two rear desks where Hawes and Meyer were silently working. And then he saw Virginia Dodge and the .38 in her hand pointed into the mouth of the black purse.

  His first instinct was to drop the wristlet he was holding and draw his gun. The instinct was squelched when Virginia said, "Get in here. Don't reach for your gun!"

  Willis and the girl came into the squad room

  "Brutal" the girl screamed.

  "Pendega!

  Hijo de la gran puta!"

  "Oh, shut the hell up," Willis said wearily.

  "Pinga!" she screamed.

  "Dirtee rotten cop bastard!"

  "Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Willis pleaded.

  The girl was possibly three inches taller than Willis, who just cleared the minimum five-f
oot-eight height requirement for all policemen. He was, assuredly, the smallest detective anyone had ever seen, with narrow bones and an alert cocker-spaniel look on his thin face.