She chortled. "Then why not Toddy-Boy? He had you under wraps longer than anybody else. You even slept off that club explosion in the Caddie, from what he told me. He had a dozen chances to lift your precious card."
"He did but he didn't. Crown may be a lot of things but take my word for it. Just look at the guff he takes from you. He can't ever get violent enough to kill anybody. Tell her why, Crown. I'm on your side."
He blinked at me, his blandness deserting him. Memo Morgan frowned at the dark man and then a slow smile of understanding spread across his face too. He wasn't the memory man for nothing.
"Hey, that's right," he rumbled. "He didn't drink in Downey's, he don't smoke and he walks about as slow as anybody I've ever seen. Either a very peaceful abstaining man or a guy with a heart condition."
I remembered the way he had laid back when Joe Violets bounced into Truth Ruth's apartment with the bull whip.
Tod Crown sighed. "Am I that obvious? Yes, you are right. I am not supposed to lift things, climb too many stairs or exert myself. A smile will help me live longer. It won't kill me—my heart—unless I treat it badly."
Augie French snorted impatiently.
"So you're checking everybody off, Noon. What about Morgan here?"
I smiled at that. Morgan's eyes popped and it made his clown face funnier than ever.
"Not a chance, Augie. Memo is also constitutionally unsuited. He's in this game only because Crown looked him up as a possible help in finding Louis. Memo knows everything but he didn't know that. Which reminds me, Memo. Where's the beautous Olan Wing?"
He scowled at me. "Working, Ed. Where else should she be?"
"Where she's probably been since the start of this. On the payroll of The Ice Man here. She's been working on you for him, I think. Unless there's another interested party we don't know about"
"Olan? A fink? Now, look here, Ed—that's hard to take. Even from you. That sweet kid's—" He didn't know what else to say.
I ignored him and looked at The Ice Man.
"How about letting me see your address book, Ice Man?"
"Screw you," he said. But his thin face was changing colour. The blood had left it. Raf Bunker started to shift from toe to toe. Augie French growled. "Give him what he wants. He must have a reason for asking you."
The Ice Man cursed and glared at me.
"All right. I sicked her on to the clown here. Trying to find out a few things about Morgan. She couldn't come up with anything. So we came over to talk to him, making out we didn't know her from Adam. Big deal. So her name's in my address book. Sue me. That Chinese chick's no jerk. She wanted to earn some side money and I'd heard through the grapevine she'd do anything for a buck. She even slept her way into that play she's in."
Memo Morgan balled up his fists and in spite of his native cowardice started to go for The Ice Man. I got between them, holding him by the shoulders.
"Take it easy. Better you know now, right?"
"But, Ed—"
"Sit down. Count to ten and then count all over again. You can live without Miss Wing. It didn't add up and nothing could make it add up. It was like a cracked Chinese gong. You hit it and you get the wrong notes. Richard Watts Jr. told me she was a good actress."
Augie French was losing his calm. "All right. We've been through all this. The boys made a bum play. So they hired some doll to make it easy. So what?"
"So this, Augie. Your brother was killed last night. Morgan's known Olan Wing at least a week. Which means that The Ice Man and Bunker got moving right after Louis disappeared. They wanted that heroin real bad. They got to work really early, didn't they?"
Pock-faced Raf Bunker gulped nervously. Even his dim intellect didn't like the connotation I was handing out.
"Wait a minute," he rasped. "You're making it out like me and Godkin put the skids on La Rosa. Cut it out. Augie, he's nuts. Horse is all we wanted—"
"You bastard," The Ice Man said. "Always making trouble."
Augie French stared at me over the tips of his manicured fingers. His owl eyes were unblinking and cold.
"Are they clean, Noon? Like they say or are you leading up to somebody else?"
I took a beat, knowing that the next few seconds were going to be important. You get a feeling about times like that. Melissa must have sensed it too. She wasn't looking at me anymore. Her eyes were roving around the oaken table, taking the measure of each person in the room, one by one.
I stubbed my Camel out in a glass ashtray near my chair.
"Yes, they're clean. They'd murder their families for ten cents I think but they didn't kill Louis La Rosa. If they had, I think The Ice Man would have left town like he usually does after a 'hit' and Raf Bunker would have gone underground and stayed there. No, this one is out of their league. Because it was too amateurish, too stupid and just plain bad business. It didn't help anybody or anything."
Truth Ruth stirred. Somewhere in that hellish brain of hers, there was a vestige of the intelligence that had been there before headshrinking, needles and the whole dismal plunge into that other world of unreality.
"Joe—" she pronounced the name like it was holy. "Joe Violets? That punk kid? That little jerk with ideas about being my man and top cat? You must be out of your mind, private eye baby. The woods are full of characters like Joe. He was stamped out by IBM. Young Jerks of America. He's an acid-head."
"Violets?" Augie French shifted his weight, his eyes flying to the archway. "You mean that creep you came with? The one in the kitchen with the other two? That skinny teenager? Him? The one who said he was hungry and wanted some food?"
"Yeah!" The voice shouted from the doorway. "Me! Joe Violets! King of the Flower People! Who the hell else do you think she means? You shouldn'ta said that, Ruthie, you hadn't oughta have said that. . . . I'm sorry I had to hear it. . . ."
I was as flabbergasted as everybody else at the sight of Joe Violets framed in the archway of the room. He was as wild as I remembered him. Hollow-eyed, dangling hair and tight jeans and leather windbreaker. But that wasn't all. Cradled in his arms was the grease gun that Tod Crown had flashed on me in the Temple Kreshna-Rukka. On either side of Joe stood the two carbon copy Joes from the battle of the alley. All of them had one terrible thing in common.
Their eyes were not the sort of eyes you expect to see in any young boys' faces. They were fiery, glary and astoundingly wide as though they could see beyond you into the next room.
Acid-heads, was right.
Joe Violets and his two flower friends were having their LSD trip right in front of us.
They were giggling, enjoying themselves. Like three kids sharing a private joke. But they were sharing a private world and it didn't include anybody in Augie French's executive suite.
"Big shot," Joe Violets hooted, swaying on his dead feet, the grease gun wavering his line of fire. "All the hoods in the world and you're stupid! Know how we got this gun in here? In three parts! Bugs carried one part, I had the other and Bitsy carried the last piece. Your goon on the door shoulda looked in our pants. But he treated us like kids. And now you'll pay for it—" He swayed. "You know you all look funny? Like your heads were balloons and that old owl in the picture is getting ready to fly around the room—whheeeeee!"
The boy on his left put his hands to his own head, shaking it.
"Man, everything is gettin' purple. You know that, Joe? You sound like a loudspeaker. Hi-Fi—"
"Man. Mmmmmmm," the third boy shouted. "Come fly with me!"
"Shut up," Joe Violets laughed, aiming the nose of the grease gun at Truth Ruth. "You. Preferring that fat slob to me. Hah. What a laugh. I'm gonna kill you, Ruthie and then I'm going to carry you to the river and float you out to sea. We'll sing for you, too. You hadn't oughta laugh at a cat that loves the ground you walk on . . . oh I hate to see that evening sun go down . . . boom-boom . . . where do you want it, Ruthie? Through the heart or through the navel?"
"Joe," I said softly, hearing some stirring sounds from way out by the doo
r and hoping that Perry the big guard hadn't gone to watch his favourite TV programme. 'Tell us how you killed Louis La Rosa. We'd really like to know."
"How I killed him?" Joe Violets threw back his head. "Man, we butchered him! Didn't we, gang?"
Before they could answer, his eyes widened in fear and he threw up the grease gun. It started to clatter in his hands, shooting orange flame and leaden fury. A hail of withering fire whistled over the oaken table, splattering the wall. A short, stuttering burst of violence and noise. Everybody shrank. One of the women shrilled a cry of fright. It sounded like Ruth.
"Damn bird," Joe Violets muttered, eyes on the wall behind us, over our heads. The gun was limp in his hands. Silent. "Wants to fly right outa the frame. An owl. A red owl. Who-o-o-ooooo!"
He was high as a kite now and twenty times more deadly.
There was no telling which way he would sail.
As he had sailed last night, sky high and murderous, on that five block walk or run or crawl to the butcher shop.
On Mac Dougal Street where he had slaughtered Louis La Rosa.
Chapter Fifteen
COLOUR HIM DEAD
□ There was no keeping Perry away now. The noisy grease gun outburst brought him on the dead run. I don't know what kind of armament he had but he was a sitting duck in a shooting gallery. We heard him thunder down the hall, heard him shout something and then Joe Violets turned the grease gun on him. One short clattering burst. There came a strangled yell of surprise and pain then a loud thump of a body thudding against the parquet flooring. Heels clicked against the woodwork in some kind of dancing tattoo of sound.
Bugs and Bitsy started a clapping medley with their hands. Yelling and laughing like kids at the circus. And Joe Violets smirked back at us. There was a smell of cordite in the room now. Not one of us had moved so much as an inch. What can you do when a kid who hasn't got all his marbles is waving a machine gun like it was something he bought in a toy department?
"Do something, Noon," Truth Ruth wailed. "For the love of Jesus, he's flying high on LSD!"
"Sure he is, Ruth. And you helped put him there. Joe! Listen to me! Tell us how you got Louis?"
He seemed distracted. He had placed a forefinger at the tip of the hot grease gun and pulled it back, chortling. His eyes came back to all of us, ranging around the room from Bunker to The Ice Man to Memo Morgan to Augie French to Tod Crown to Truth Ruth and then Melissa Mercer. And then me.
The red owl was hanging side-saddle on the wall, perforated and shattered like a smashed wedge of Swiss cheese. The owl looked hurt and bleeding.
I wondered what it looked like to Joe Violets.
"Sure . . . " He cackled. "I killed the great Guru . . . he was leery of me . . . wouldn't let me tackle anything important . . . took my Ruthie from me . . . laughed at me . . . then he got chicken and ran away. I found him. Me! Joe Violets. Know where I done found him? Outside that butcher shop . . . scattering the heroin in the gutter . . . watching it flow down into the sewer . . . I shoulda killed him right there . . . but me . . ." He looked around at Bugs and Bitsy. They managed to look proud in spite of their bleary eyes. "We had a better gig. The butcher shop for that big pig. Hung him up like a side of pork. You shoulda seen how his tongue stuck out . . . the wire . . . geez, it was beautiful! Right before our eyes . . . Louis La Rosa . . . the fat slob! No brains, no guts. I'm the man for Ruthie! The man for the Temple! I will be . . ."
Augie French, as wise as he was about hopped-up kids and guns, trembled from his end of the table. His owl's face was nearly as red as the one in the canvas.
"You? You killed my brother? A punk like you?"
"Yeah!" Joe Violets raised the grease gun, grinning like a Death's head above the barrel. "Like I'm gonna kill you. Know something, mister? You look like an owl. A big bloody owl . . . ain't that a scream? Let me hear you go . . . whooo-oooo—!"
One of the boys, the one on his left, tugged at his elbow. "Let me have him, Joe. I ain't shot an owl in all my life—"
"Let go my sleeve, Bugs!"
Bugs whimpered and looked hurt. It was pathetic. A trio of young swaying men, lost on their own Cloud Nine, incapable of one sensible thought or act.
French's hands were out of sight behind the table. Joe Violets was too far gone to notice a fine detail like that. I didn't. Even a power-mad czar like Augie French must have had his secret drawers and compartments on a business table. Just for emergencies like this one. The rest of them, Crown, The Ice Man, Morgan and the girls and Raf Bunker had been unable to take their eyes off Joe Violets. Truth Ruth was trying to shrink into her chair, hoping Joe would forget about her. She almost made it, she was so skinny.
"Sit up, Ruthie!" he yelled. "I'm gonna kiss you with about ten pounds of red hot lead."
"Joey," she whined. "Don't—it could be like it was before—"
"Yeah?" He blinked. "Where are you, baby? You're so thin I can just about see you."
Tod Crown coughed. "Brother Violets, stop this. You're high, man. Way, way up. You're going to hate yourself in the morning."
"Don't talk to me, nigger. I hate your guts. The friendly black man—you poor jerk. After Ruthie, you get yours. I can't stand the sight of you!"
My eyes found Melissa's. She was tense but hanging on to her nerve. She tried to smile. I flung my head back towards Joe Violets. He looked about ready to dance, he was so far gone.
"Joe," I said. "Why did you plant the dynamite at the Grass Gardens?"
The boy called Bugs giggled. "Go ahead. Tell him, Joe. Man, that was cool, huh?"
Bitsy looked aggravated. "Hey! Don't take the credit! I rigged the chandelier. You couldn'ta done it without me, could you?"
Joe Violets shrugged, his eyes starting to lid like they were too heavy for him. "You're gonna get it too, Noon man. The club? I thought Louis was there that night . . . anyway . . . it was great . . . all those lights . . . the kids screaming and jumping . . . I could feel the power. . . ." He must have had one wild night.
Augie French's hand came up from behind the table. It held a long pistol, with a silencer attached. It looked expensive, custom made and high-powered in some way. The look of triumph and outrage on the owl face was as bright as neon. I don't think he had fired a gun in years but beggars can't be choosers.
The only catch was Joe Violets saw the flash of his weapon the same time I did. The kid's face twisted and the grease gun swept up. By that time, the whole room was upside down. Raf Bunker and The Ice Man dived under the conference table. Truth Ruth screamed and covered her face with her hands. Tod Crown dropped his head almost to the table top. In resignation. Memo Morgan, who wanted to live longer, flipped his chair over backwards. It all looked silly. That's the way it is with applecarts. It only takes one sudden move to start the cart down the hill.
And Melissa Mercer threw me a curve.
From across the wide table, she tossed me a nickel-plated .22 automatic. I caught it before the egg on my face ran down all over my tie. Then she ducked, too. Now the show was really on the road.
Augie French's silencer-pistol coughed once and was immediately upstaged by the ear-splitting fusillade clearing the top of the table. French missed. Joe Violets didn't. He didn't let up on the trigger either. He kept blasting away, a kid in a shooting gallery, shouting and screaming and firing all at one time. Bugs and Bitsy must have joined in the mad chorus. I saw their leering, gargoyle grins, their drug-crazed eyes. They were clapping again.
A hail of lead picked up Augie French's broad figure, plastered it against the chair and kept him dancing like a rag doll. The owl face was etched in astonishment and terror. Joe Violets came around the table end, down the line, past Morgan's sprawled figure, the gun still riddling away at French's long-since-dead body. He had never had time to let out even one bleat of sound.
I couldn't wait.
I couldn't talk to Joe Violets, could I?
I aimed the .22, straight out, like you do on a target range and let go. It had to be a good s
hot. A .22 is a flea bite unless it's in the right place. The .22 spit like a sneeze.
The grease gun shut down.
Joe Violets sagged.
He turned to look at me. His wild eyes were rounder and nuttier still. For one mad moment, I thought he was going to say something. Even with a round blue hole in the centre of his left temple. But he didn't.
He swayed a second longer and then dropped down out of sight beyond the lip of the table.
Bugs and Bitsy stopped giggling and looked down at him. They giggled again. "Hey, Joe—" Bugs laughed. "You tired or something—Joe—?" There was no answer from the floor.
The Ice Man and Raf Bunker were on their feet, guns out, and ready to shoot the kids down where they stood. They were seeing red.
"Hold it," I yelled. "There's four witnesses in this room and that would be murder. Save them for the cops." I had the .22 on them but it wouldn't have meant a thing if they had both decided to cut loose on me. Bunker growled and rushed the kids, slamming them into a corner of the room. Where they looked confused, hurt and bewildered. Bitsy's face had contorted into a sobbing mask.
The Ice Man had walked to the head of the table. He looked at what was left of Augie French for a long time. Truth Ruth still had her hands over her eyes. Memo Morgan was muttering to himself. Tod Crown crossed himself. I have never seen a sad Louis Armstrong before but Crown was unhappy now.
Melissa Mercer hugged her own elbows and shivered.
"God damn," The Ice Man said thinly. "All that money, everything going for him. And a punk kid makes Swiss cheese out of him. You never know, do you?"
"No, you don't." I passed a hand over my forehead. It was shaking. Little Joe Violets had put us all through the hoops. In fine style. I tucked the .22 in my side pocket. "Time to call the cops. Don't worry, Ice Man. It's my word and these other folks' testimony that may keep you and Bunker out of jail."
He wasn't worried about that anymore. He was already looking ahead. "Who'll take Augie's place? This'll put a real dent in the organization—"
The Flower-Covered Corpse Page 13