Hot Red Money

by Baynard Kendrick

But they didn’t intend to use those checks—unless—! The Party knew, and Maury knew, how quickly he would be jobless and discredited if photostats of those damning checks ever reached the desk of B. Franklin Jeffers. And the more years that slipped by, the more futile any of Maury’s explanations would become.

  No, they didn’t intend to use those checks except as a very last resort. There was too much value to the Party in maintaining Maury’s status quo. Besides, there were other things the Party knew!

  He and Sorenson had reached Seventh Avenue, walking in silence. They stopped at the corner. Sorenson looked up and down the avenue for a cruising taxi, while Maury, beginning to perspire at every pore, stared morosely at the lights of Nick’s a few blocks uptown.

  He wished he were in there, nursing a drink, listening to jaw, waiting for a sizzling steak, lost among the crowded tables.

  “I suppose you’ve been detailed to give me some sort of a warning,” Maury said, shoving his clammy hands into his trouser pockets. “Did it ever occur to you that I might turn? Do a job of denouncing, myself. Frankly, Erick, you’re not much of a hatchet man.”

  “I’m not acting as any hatchet man. I hear things, that’s all.” The whine was back. Maury knew he had struck him in some tender spot, aroused that ever-present terror that consumed them all.

  “What did you search our apartment for?”

  “Your apartment?”

  “Monday night. You know damn well you did it—tore it to pieces. Took those pictures we made at the beach last month, and our phone index so you could make that long distance call to Anne.”

  “Maury, so help me, I didn’t. You have to believe me.” Sorenson had begun to shiver.

  “Why should I? I know the Party better than you do. All against all! If you lost your job on the paper blame yourself, or Hal Gow, not me. I can really twist things around if I want to. Make charges that you’re guilty of destructive criticism against your superior—searching my place, calling my wife, trying to intimidate me. I’m damn sure going to bring such charges and see you tossed out of the Party on your ear—unless you come clean with me.”

  “My God, Maury, you’ve got me all wrong! I didn’t search your place. I’ve been trying to warn you.”

  “Warn me? Why?”

  “Because Anne is the only one in the world who has ever been decent to me. Don’t you—?”

  “Quit groveling. I want some details. What’s the Party supposed to have on me that can lose me my job? Answer me.”

  “Checks endorsed by you from New Lines magazine.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “I don’t know, Maury. Someone called me on the phone.”

  “And said I was in a hell of a mess—about to be tossed from my job and out of the Party as well?”

  “Yes, believe me.”

  “But they didn’t say why?”

  “No.”

  “And what were you supposed to do—outside of searching my place and frightening Anne?”

  “I’ve sworn I didn’t search your place. I was supposed to do just what I did—pass that information along to you, as I did tonight.”

  “And tell me about New Lines, too?” Maury had the contrite sensation of whipping a puppy, but a vicious mad one, whose hydrophobic bite was concealed by a wagging tail.

  “I wasn’t supposed to tell you about that. It wasn’t mentioned—” A cruising cab came along and Erick signaled it by stepping off the curb and waving his arm.

  “It wasn’t mentioned to you over the telephone?”

  “No.” The cab pulled up. Erick opened the door and had one foot on the running board when Maury seized his arm, digging his fingers into the flabby biceps.

  “Who told you about those New Line checks?”

  “I just heard about it somewhere, Maury. You’ll have a chance to clear things up all around. They’ll contact you.” He tried to pull loose but Maury tightened his powerful grip.

  “Who told you about those checks?”

  “I heard while I was working on the paper.” Sorenson whimpered as Maury dug his fingers deeper.

  “That’s a lie—like everything else you’ve said tonight. If anyone on the paper knew about those checks I wouldn’t be there. I’m going to get to the bottom of this, Erick, and really go to work on you, when I get the lowdown.” Maury let go and gave Erick a push inside the cab.

  “Ask him yourself if you don’t believe me.” Erick sat rubbing his muscle. “He’s still at your place. Ask him yourself—I heard about those checks from Hal Gow.” He slammed the cab door, gave the driver his destination, and the cab moved off.

  Maury walked back to Morton Court, stiff-legged like an old man. If Sorenson had told the truth, the only explanation that fitted was that Hal was a Party member, a front, or a fellow-traveler. Any of the three would complicate matters beyond endurance. Maury hoped to Heaven for his own sake that Erick was lying and that none of his, Maury’s, conjectures about Hal Gow would prove to be true.

  He had to find out fast. The Party had him ripened up properly now, ready for plucking. He’d learn pretty quickly what they wanted him to do.

  Chapter Eleven

  Anne was in bed and asleep when Maury got home. Somehow she had disposed of the crowd and gotten Hal stretched out on the living room divan where he lay breathing stertorously.

  Maury removed Hal’s shoes, spread a blanket over him, and hung up Hal’s coat that had been tossed on a chair.

  He collected glasses, took them into the kitchen, then started emptying ashtrays. That done, he mixed himself a nightcap, which he didn’t need, sat down in his easy chair and stared at the sleeping city editor.

  Maury had been with the Globe-Star nine years longer than Hal, who came to the paper from a Denver newspaper in 1943, starting as a reporter. It was through Maury’s efforts that Hal had been appointed city editor in 1948, when Everett Dupree had been promoted from the city desk to managing editor. Maury had flatly refused the city editor’s job, offered to him for the second time since he’d been with the Globe-Star. He had strongly recommended Hal to Ray Lindeman, the editor, and the Old Man.

  Maury’s refusal of an executive post merely confirmed everyone’s opinion that he was utterly unpredictable, a confirmed and brilliant free-lancer, and wanted no part of an office job that would tie him down.

  Now, if Sorenson’s statements were true, it began to look as though Hal Gow was covering up for Maury.

  Gratefulness?

  Friendship?

  Or was Hal enmeshed with the Communists himself?

  Thinking about it coldly, over a drink before dawn, Maury found he might accept the first two reasons. Hal was grateful for Maury’s push. His friendship for Maury and Anne was strong. But the idea that Hal was involved with the Party just didn’t ring true.

  There was nothing devious about Hal Gow. His honesty was impeccable, his integrity unimpeachable. He was free with praise or criticism, and candid to a point of discomfiting even Ray Lindeman, who, at times, felt certain situations should be handled with gloves on. Hal went at things bare-handed.

  No. Hal Gow just wasn’t the type. He’d fold up under a tenth of the double dealing that had marked the career of Maury Morel. Truth was Hal’s watchword. Not truth watered down with an angle. When Maury had outlined the series about Rest Homes to him a couple of days before it hadn’t taken Hal more than five seconds to say, “Interesting! Go to it, Maury. Write anything you want to about them—so long as you know it’s true.”

  Maury finished his drink and went to bed, to toss restlessly until nearly daybreak. He was up again at ten, had coffee made, and was skimming through the Sunday Times when Hal came to life and sat up with a groan.

  “Thanks for a lovely evening—and for giving me a decent burial.”

  “Anne tucked you in before I got back.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know you’d gone. Where did you go?”

  “Seeing Erick home—as far as Seventh Avenue where he got a taxi. I stood him as long as I
could.”

  “So did I—on the paper.” Hal stood up and stretched. “How’s the bathroom?”

  “All clear. Anne’s still asleep.”

  “I’m going to borrow your shower and electric razor. What’s the time?”

  “Ten thirty.”

  “Good lord! This isn’t Monday, is it? What got you up so early?”

  “Uneasy conscience. Want some coffee now? It’s made.”

  “I’ll wait. I’d appreciate a curry comb for my tongue.”

  “You’ll find a fresh toothbrush in the medicine cabinet. When you travel stay at a Morel Hotel.” Maury went back to his paper.

  By the time Hal was back, looking considerably fresher in spite of slightly puffed and reddened eyes, Maury had decided that the best line of approach was to jump right in.

  They were dawdling over coffee, toast, and marmalade when Maury said, “Sorenson got a bit burned at my rushing him out last night. He said, without mincing many words, that you’d told him while he was on the paper that you’d heard I once took money direct from the C.P.”

  Hal was looking at him intently and for a second Maury wondered exactly how much he knew, not only about the New Lines checks, but about everything.

  “He’s not only a liar, he’s a horse’s ass.” Hal took a bite of toast and washed it down with coffee.

  “Then you didn’t tell him any such thing?”

  “No,” Hal said. “Sorenson told me—about three hundred bucks you got from the editor of New Lines. Articles signed by Robert L. Skeene.”

  “What if that happens to be true, Hal? Just how far out on a limb would that leave me?”

  “Is it true?”

  “Yes. It’s true,” Maury said in a toneless voice.

  Hal finished his coffee and toast before he answered. Then he smiled and lit a cigarette. “I’m glad you’ve been honest with me. I had to take the trouble to check, Maury.”

  “To check with whom?”

  “With the FBI.” Hal was staring at him steadily. “Ray Lindeman and Ev Dupree were both riding me. Should they take this terrible scandal up with Jeffers, or would discovery that his fair-haired boy, Maury, had a poison pen, finish off the Old Man?”

  Maury shook his head. “If the Old Man gets it, I’m finished, Hal, not him—and probably with no severance pay. I thought that went for Lindeman, too. Possibly Ev Dupree—maybe even you.”

  “You’ve been the subject of several quiet three-handed conferences since Sorenson started his sabotage around the office, Maury. You can take that as the greatest understatement of the year. Lindeman started back through the morgue and read proof on every line you’ve written, with and without ‘by-lines’ since 1934. There were several stories that were anti-Communist. But when regarded through the wrong end of a spyglass and thrown back into time, Lindeman found it difficult to sort out the ‘anti’ from the ‘pro.’ Do you want to know what saved your neck?”

  Maury said, “It was a fellow named Hal Gow.”

  “Well, yes and no. There are certain facts about this mess that do not meet the nude, or naked, eye. Do you happen to remember that you were quite instrumental in planting my rear in the City Editor’s chair?”

  “I did nothing but pass it by.”

  “There was also a spot of office campaigning, as I recall, but we’ll skip it. Sorenson was after my hide as well as yours—”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “You hired him, and both of us fired him. That’s why. He dug up that I’d been a Party member for a couple of years, in the thirties. But neglected to mention that I’d checked out, just like a lot of others.

  “So you’d taken dough from the Commies, and then put a comrade, me, into the City Editor’s chair. It took some fast talking, Maury—pointing out what you’d done for the paper, how you’d even showed up New Lines as a Commie organ, how you had been blasted in the Daily Worker, and so had I. Lindeman got in a long-winded report from that gabby organization, the FBI. It informed Lindeman that the FBI didn’t make reports of loyalty of employees to private corporations Period. So in spite of Mr. Sorenson, both of us are still working for the old G-S today.”

  “There’s more to it, than that, Hal.” Maury took the coffee cups into the kitchen, came back and sat in his big chair.

  “What more?”

  “You. You didn’t have to go to bat for me in such a big way.”

  Hal thought for a minute. “There’s some quality about you, Maury, that makes people believe in you. I’ll think you’re on the level whatever you do.”

  “That’s the pitch of every con man.”

  “Then let’s just say I like you.”

  “It’s a mutual admiration society, Hal—” The doorbell rang.

  Chapter Twelve

  Two men were outside. A sharp-faced one, blue eyed, wearing cares that fitted him as well as his tan gabardine suit, and a stouter one, round faced, with deep swimming dark eyes that took in the living room, Hal, and Maury without seeming to move in their sockets.

  “Mr. Morel?” the sharp faced one asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Police officers. I’m Detective Lornegan. This is my partner, Detective Greenbaum.”

  “Come in.” Maury stepped aside and closed the door behind them. “This is Mr. Gow, City Editor of the Globe-Star.”

  Hal gave the pair a friendly but curious glance and said, “Hi! So you’ve finally tracked him down.”

  “Not the man we’re looking for, Mr. Gow. We need some help. That’s why we’re bothering Mr. Morel.”

  “You might as well bother me while you’re sitting down.” Maury gestured toward the divan. “My wife just got home from California yesterday. She’s still asleep. There’s coffee made if you care for some.”

  Lornegan shook his head. Greenbaum smiled and said, “No, thanks.” Both of the officers sat down.

  “Your head any better?” Lornegan asked.

  “I can still feel it, but at least the sticking plaster’s gone. It gets in your hair.”

  Both officers nodded solemnly. “You haven’t been down to identify that corpse as Beshara Shebab, have you, Mr. Morel?”

  “I couldn’t. I never saw the man before I met him in the Beirut Café.”

  “But you could identify him as the man who was with you in the café,” Greenbaum said.

  “I thought he’d already been identified,” Hal put in. “Two waitresses. Fingerprints off a window sash and off his chair. A footprint from the window sill. Seems like a clincher to me, and to Dykes who covers headquarters.”

  “If Mr. Morel doesn’t make an identification it’s going to leave a hole in my D.D.5’s—the follow-up reports—that you can drive a truck through.”

  Detective Greenbaum nodded agreement. “We’re carrying this case, and in spite of the fact that Mr. Morel made a statement to Captain Knox, of Homicide, we’d like to get one, too—also an identification.” His brown eyes blinked solemnly at Maury. “The D.A.’s office will be much better satisfied if we follow out a thorough routine.”

  “Okay, boys,” Maury said quickly. “Let’s keep the D.A. satisfied by all means. Where do you want to begin?”

  Lornegan took out a notebook.

  “While Captain Knox was here last Tuesday, the morning after you were assaulted, you talked to your city editor on the phone. Is that so?”

  “Yes,” Hal Gow said. “Maury talked to me.”

  “Good.” Lornegan shifted his attention to Hal. “On the phone, Mr. Morel mentioned an assignment you had given him. Something about ‘hot red money’—could you give us a few more details on that?”

  “I’ll give you what I can—but finding out the details was the job I assigned to Maury. Briefly, Russia has a tremendous gold reserve—over ten billion dollars—that she’s pumping into this country through Swiss, Lebanese, and South American banks, some in Canada, too.”

  “Can you prove that?” Detective Greenbaum asked.

  “When I started Maury out on this that’s wha
t I hoped to do. This money is carried in numbered accounts, principally in Switzerland and Beirut—”

  “Beirut?” Greenbaum had his notebook out. “That’s in Lebanon?”

  “Yes.”

  “And this fellow who was murdered, Beshara Shebab, was a Lebanese. Isn’t that true?”

  Maury said, “That’s what he told me. I passed it on to Ben Knox. Shebab said his father was the director and principal shareholder of the Banque de Shebab-Syrie—”

  “We have all that, Abe,” Lornegan interrupted. “Hearsay, until we can tie it down. Now, tell me Mr. Morel, did Beshara Shebab slip you any information that might indicate someone was after him?”

  Maury thought it over. “He said he was afraid he’d gotten me into a mess—and himself, too. But he wasn’t putting out too much until I guaranteed him some money. We were coming up to my apartment, here. I thought his fears were a build-up to get more dough.”

  “He was afraid, then?”

  “He went out a window, didn’t he? Refused to walk out with me. I was to meet him in that alley in back of the place in five minutes. When I found him he was dead, as I told Captain Knox, and his pea jacket was gone.”

  “How did you happen to notice that?” Greenbaum asked casually.

  Maury sighed. These precinct detectives knew their business. It wasn’t going to be easy to hold back anything. “He was carrying the jacket over his arm when he left me—didn’t have it on. He claimed to have proof of what he wanted to sell me sewed into the lining.”

  “Then he told you what he wanted to sell you,” Lornegan said.

  “Only generally,” Maury admitted. “He said he knew the name of the man who controlled millions in numbered accounts in his father’s bank, and others. He said that man was in the United States, and that he knew how the man got in, the name he was using, and what the man was doing with the money.”

  “Now, let’s see.” Lornegan turned back a page in his notebook. “You found this man, who was with you at the table, stabbed to death about six feet off of Charlton Street, up this alley. You struck a light, saw the knife in his back, then looked around and saw that his jacket was gone. Then someone hit you and knocked you cold. Is that correct, Mr. Morel?”