“So you picked him up.”
“Well,” she said, “let’s say I let him pick me up.”
“Yeah?”
“We had a few drinks. He wasn’t feeling so good. His self-confidence was about gone. Worried and suffering because he felt he’d made a mess of things. Now Giles could have taken Wally’s plush-lined slot and had the time of his life with everything he wanted. Isn’t that life for you? Giles really would make some rich female a devoted, gay, companionable lap dog—he’d honestly try to make her happy. And there was Wally, in the very spot Giles wanted, making himself and his wife miserable because he couldn’t relax and take things as they were. He had to be punishing himself because he had got to think of himself as a failure, as not much of a man.”
Evie sighed. “Well, Wally needed somebody to talk to. So he talked. And he drank. And finally the liquor in him began seeing me as a woman.
“We went for a drive. And when he took me to the cottage, he just got out of the car and came on in. I figured it for a usual evening. He was well heeled and old enough to know what he wanted.”
“But it wasn’t a usual evening?”
“Nope,” Evie Grove said with her light laugh. “She fooled me.”
“Who did?”
“Laura Tulman, you dummy. I told Wally to mix us a drink while I got into something more comfortable. When I came back to the living area, he was gone. First and only time I ever had one of them take off from the cottage to go home.”
“Maybe his flesh was willing but his conscience wasn’t.”
She tipped her head to one side. “You wouldn’t think much of it one way or the other.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
She dropped the shoulder-strap handbag and sat on the day bed. “What’s to think about? The appetites of the body are real and normal.”
“Civilized, too,” I said, “if disciplined.”
With a gay toss of her hair, she burst into laughter. “A Puritan, no less.”
“No. You couldn’t understand what Wally Tulman did. I was explaining it for you.”
“Oh, who can explain a monstrous little snake who’d fear a woman and molest a child?”
“I don’t think he feared you. I think he had a lot more courage than even he thinks. The more I see of this thing, the more I think they’ve got the wrong man in Raiford. I’m the man who’d fear you, not Wally.”
“You?” she said, her eyes wide. She touched her lips with her tongue, a hint of pleasure in her face.
“Sure,” I said. “You got a chunk missing inside of you.”
“Have I? Really?”
“You’ve lost the line between right and wrong, Evie.”
“Dear, dear,” she said.
I shrugged. “It’s none of my business.”
“No, tell me. This I must hear. I didn’t know there were any men left around like you. The ones I meet are afraid of something or running from something or trying to prove something. You don’t need to prove anything and you wouldn’t run from a bulldozer if you got good and sore at it.”
“I’ve run from mere men,” I said. “Don’t kid yourself on that score. I’d run from some women just as quick, maybe a lot quicker.”
“Quit running from me, Ed.”
“Why?”
“Suddenly I like you. You’re different. I find you exciting.” She glanced around the room. She sniffed, crinkled her nose. “Faint sweat. Faint smell of old beer cans. Faint smell of an animal’s lair.”
“Yeah,” I said, “and the wary animal is wondering who pointed out the cave.”
“I’ve explained my motives, Ed.”
“You’ve given some excuses. Who are you really?” “Just a woman who was brought up in luxury. Then my father lost all his money. He and my mother died. I was left penniless. But not helpless. I like money, Ed. There’s a way of living that I like. Does that answer your question?”
“Who told you I was on this case?”
A slow smile came to her face. “So that’s what’s worrying you. Well, the answer is simple. Juan told me.”
“Who is Juan?”
“The bartender at the Yacht Club bar. He served you a beer and Milt Collins was there and he witnessed your runin with Milt.”
She stood up. I put my arm around her waist. Her flesh was firm and yielding. She had what it took to interest the millionaires. “Ed …”
“Shut up,” I said.
“Yes, Ed.”
CHAPTER
7
SHE KNEW how to kiss a man. She drew her face back, hit me lightly on the mouth with her lips again, and said, “Why didn’t I meet up with you a long time ago? Now how about a drink?” “All I got’s beer.” “Oh.”
“There’s a package store on the corner,” I said. “Fine. We’ll have a party.”
I went out of the building and bought a bottle of Scotch at the corner store.
As I came back, I spotted the man on the other side of the street. He was in shadows. You wouldn’t have seen him. I did. My habits are different.
I figured he might have a buddy on down the street or maybe on my side of the street, but I didn’t spot a second one.
Without breaking pace or letting him know I’d seen him, I turned into the house and moved up the stairs to the apartment.
When I went in, Evie Grove was lounging on the day bed. She’d combed out that honey mist of hair and put fresh lipstick on.
She’d got out ice and a bottle of ginger ale that had been kicking around in the refrigerator. “Scotch?” she said. “I’ll have mine on the rocks, Ed.” “Later.” “What?”
“The party’s postponed.”
She swung her feet to the floor and jerked herself upright.
“Before you blow your stack,” I said, “let me ask you if you were ever in jail?” “No.”
“It isn’t pleasant.”
“What’s jail got to do with us?”
“Maybe nothing. Maybe I’ve turned into a cautious old man. But if you want to save yourself—and me—some trouble, you’d better get out.” “Ed—”
“It isn’t a brush-off. You’ll leave with my regrets. That help?” “A little.”
“Just ease out the back way. Cross through the alley to the next street. Catch a cab. Go home.”
She took a moment to study my face. Then her smile flashed. “Good night, Ed.”
I took her arm and guided her to the door. I opened the door and steered her toward the back stairway. I watched her slick figure disappear into the gloom of the rear stairs. Then I closed the door, put the Scotch on a shelf in the kitchenette, opened a beer, turned off the light and sat down, to wait.
A considerable time passed. I’d about decided I was wrong. He could have been watching the house because of somebody else.
Then I heard the faint whisper of the floor in the hallway.
Looking at the spot in the darkness where the door was supposed to be, I gave a short, soft laugh. Like a laugh of pleasure. Like I was laughing with someone.
A couple hundred pounds of beef hit the door. The hinges held, but the latch didn’t.
I clicked on the light, leveled the .38 at him.
“You make one move,” I said, “and I’ll pin a brand new belly button on you.”
It was Garcia, a workhorse flatfoot. His swarthy face went as pale as possible, and his coal-black eyes jolted halfway out of their sockets. The leer on his face went plain sick.
He took his hand gingerly out of his coat pockets, leaving flashlight and gun in the pockets.
“You got a warrant?” I asked.
He stared.
I said, “I could shoot you with impunity, tearing in here like this.”
He shook his head. He didn’t believe I’d be drastic, but he wasn’t absolutely sure.
“Anybody can make a mistake, Ed,” he managed at last.
“Not like this,” I said. “Turn around.”
“Where we going?”
“To headquarters. That’s
where you intended me to go, isn’t it? The woman and me.”
He turned and we went out of the apartment. In the sultry darkness over the street, I said, “Where’s your car?”
“Right over there.”
“You’re the chauffeur,” I said. “After all, it’s only taxpayer’s money buying your time, the car, the gasoline, the organization.”
We walked across the street and got in the black police car.
“Ignore the two-way,” I said.
Garcia kept casting sidelong glances at me as we drove to the municipal building. By the time we parked the car, his mind was off me. He was sweating like a ward heeler losing an election. I knew he was thinking ahead—to his carpeting with Julian Patrick.
The desk sergeant got to his feet when Garcia and I walked in.
I told Garcia, “You’ve got as cute as you’re ever going to get with me. Don’t try it again.”
The desk sergeant was looking from one to the other of us.
“Tell Julian Patrick that Ed Rivers has brought Garcia in. Then place this man under arrest for trespassing, forcible entry and violation of privacy.”
“Now look, Ed—” Garcia said.
“Shut up.”
“Are you kidding?” the desk sergeant said. He was a young, strapping, sandy guy. Not on the force long enough to lose his sense of humor. He was having trouble keeping his smile under control.
“No,” I said, “I’m not kidding. I arrested this man under the powers granted to me by the State of Florida in issuance of a private detective’s license, and also under the powers granted by the Constitution of the United States, which authorizes a private citizen to make an arrest if present upon and during the commission of a crime. I’ll sign the complaint and appear as State’s witness.” “By God,” Garcia blustered. “Who the hell you think—”
“I told you to shut up. Now, Sergeant, you better get Patrick out here.”
“I can’t do that, Mr. Rivers.”
“Why not?”
“Lieutenant Patrick is attending a party at the home of the mayor.”
“Don’t explain the trouble to His Honor,” I said. “Or he might want to tag along and he’d just be in the way. Tell Patrick to think about his position in the city of Tampa. I’ll wait in his office and give him thirty minutes to get here.”
No matter what he was feeling inside, Patrick never changed on the outside. He was as cool as a knife blade, unhurried and calm when he walked into his office.
A tall, slender man, he moved with the grace of a dancer. His face was a little too narrow to be handsome, but a lot of women didn’t seem to mind. He had polished black hair and polished black eyes and a polished black mustache that went with the polish of his white and black evening clothes.
“Hello, Ed,” he said, going around behind his desk. He sat down and rocked back, showing no irritation, no worry, no apparent interest.
“Your man’s been locked up,” I said.
“He’ll be fined. Not because of you, Ed, but because he was incompetent.”
“That’s too bad. You knew Laura Tulman was going to hire a private eye. You knew the moment she hired me. Maybe you jumped the gun a little.”
“I don’t believe I understand that last remark, Ed.”
“Maybe it was Garcia who slugged me in the vestibule of my apartment building and followed it up with a phone call trying to scare me off.”
“Sorry,” he said. “You’re wrong on that.”
“Okay. But he’s been on my tail from just about that moment. Tonight he saw a known prostitute go to my apartment. He stationed himself outside. He saw me arrive. He saw that she apparently stayed. I guess he got a lot of big dreams about promotion—or maybe he phoned you and it was you who dreamed up the gimmick.”
“I don’t follow you, Ed.”
“The hell you don’t! If Garcia had found what he was so certain he would find in that apartment, he’d have hauled me and a naked chippy down here, slapped a morals charge against us, and handed you my license on a silver platter. You’d have put me out of business, all right, Julie, and out of the Tulman case for keeps.”
“You might have got your license back.”
“By being reasonable?”
Patrick shrugged.
I splayed my fingers on his desk and leaned toward him.
“That’s a dirty way of fighting, Julie.” I could feel myself losing my temper. Nobody ever lost his temper with Patrick and won.
“Are we fighting, Ed? I didn’t know we were fighting.”
I straightened and took a breath. “Okay, so I don’t let you sucker me into saying or doing something that still might land me upstairs in the cooler and put an arrest on my record.”
“You want an apology from Garcia?”
“I don’t give a damn about Garcia,” I said. “Kick him off the force and he’ll go back where he belongs, to peddling bolita or picking Spanish fly. It’d be good for the city to have him in a spot where he can do only minor damage.”
Patrick smiled. He had a way of smiling. It changed his whole face and personality. It lighted him up like the flow of light from gentle candles had suddenly surrounded him. It made him your friend.
“I don’t blame you for being sore, Ed. Maybe we can make it up to you.”
“You could, but you won’t.”
“How could I? Try me. I might surprise you.”
“What’s with this Tulman case, Julie?”
“Nothing.”
“See, I said—”
He held up his hand to stop me. “Take it easy, Ed. I’m telling you the truth. We had the guy dead to rights. He’s where he belongs.”
“But you don’t want me on the case.”
“No,” he said, “I don’t. But that doesn’t mean there’s the slightest doubt of Wallace Tulman’s guilt. It simply means that I know you for what you are. You’re bull-headed, and you’ll raise questions. As questions could be raised about any case. You’ll throw the whole mess into the papers, and we don’t want that. In any other case, it wouldn’t matter. But the nature of this case, and the people involved, are different. I’d take almost any measures to keep you from lighting a fire under this pot again, Ed.”
“Okay, Julie. I’m beginning to see the light. I’ve watched you for a long time. I’ve seen a once-nice guy become cynical. I’ve witnessed the decay spread out inside of you. You’re rising, Julie. You’re getting to be a big man. One by one you’re putting the politicians and rats in your back pocket.
“Ambition’s a sickness with you, Julie. You intend to be the master and dictator of this city, and the goal seems in reach now, doesn’t it? With old lady Wherry’s power, prestige and money behind you, you feel like you got it made. The way you handled the Tulman case made you that old gal’s fair-haired boy—and her shadow falls long over City Hall.
“But I’ll tell you something, Julie. I’m very sorry for you.”
I turned and walked out of the office. As I was closing the door, Julian Patrick said softly, “Ed …”
It was my last chance to turn back. I couldn’t, even if I had wanted to. I’d asked for no part in this thing; it had fallen on me like a ton of bricks in the dark vestibule of my apartment house.
I closed Patrick’s office door behind me.
I turned left and went to the press room. Two reporters were there, shooting the breeze and drinking coffee out of paper cartons.
I knew them both.
“Hello, boys,” I said. “I got a little item for you.”
CHAPTER
8
SITTING opposite me in a quiet restaurant, Laura Tulman was more than beautiful. Today she wore yellow and the color darkened her already black hair and eyes. It did things for the smooth tan of her face and the full deep redness of her lips. For my money, if you traced her line back, you’d find some of the best blood in southern Europe. Castile maybe.
She folded the newspaper, laid it down as if it was red hot, and smiled at me across h
er lunch coffee.
“Do you always go off with such a resounding explosion, Ed?”
I glanced at the paper. It was all there, front-page stuff with plenty of pictures dug up out of newspaper files.
I shrugged. “I didn’t do a thing, except tell the reporters I was on the case and answer their questions.”
“And such thorough questions. They got it all, from the assault on you at your apartment house to the effort by Lieutenant Patrick to discredit you and get you off the case. With the nature of the charge against Wally, it all adds up to a few questions and some very sensational stuff.”
“I guess it does. I hope I don’t meet the fate Julie Patrick must be wishing on me right now.”
“But he’s not a part of your purpose, and you always have a purpose, don’t you?”
“I try to.”
“The purpose is Giles Newell,” she said.
“You got brains as well as beauty.”
“The papers are calling him the vanishing witness. It doesn’t look good, from his point of view.”
“That’s too bad,” I said.
“It might frighten him.”
“I’m pretty sure it will.”
“He might run to a point beyond discovery.”
“Not if he’s as canny as he’s been pictured to me. When a building burns, all kind of creatures come scurrying out. Some that you didn’t even know were there. But we’re not going to wait for Giles to get a hotfoot. We’re going to keep looking. That’s why I asked you to lunch. You know him, his habits.”
“Not very well.”
“Better than I do. I want you to help.”
“All I can,” she said. She sat with her elbows on the table, her chin resting on her clasped hands. “Was she really beautiful, Ed?”
“Evie Grove?”
“Who else?”
“She sure as hell was.”
Her eyes deepened and changed expression. But I couldn’t read her.
Skip to dinner. The afternoon would have bored you stiff, unless you like legwork through snarling traffic and heat that clogged the throat and writhed in the guts.
Laura Tulman was game. She stuck with me. At dinner she still looked neat and reasonably fresh, though I knew she was dish-rag limp and her feet were pumping with a tortured life of their own.
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