by Ralph Dennis
We’d been on the narrow porch for a few minutes. I’d tried the bell. No answer. I gave up on that and began to bang the doorframe with the fat bottom of my fist.
“Hey. Hey, you.” It was a woman’s voice from the next door apartment.
“Yeah?”
“Randy’s not here.”
I stepped off the side of the porch and walked over to the woman’s apartment. I didn’t go up onto the porch. I stood on the walk and looked up at her. A hard, young face with frizzled red hair. It might have been a mod hairdo but I didn’t think so.
“Where is he?”
“He left town.”
“When?”
“Almost three weeks ago. His company transferred him to Denver.”
“What company?”
“Beneficial Mutual.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t thank me,” the girl said. “Anything to keep you from knocking the fucking building down.”
Her door closed with a squeak.
Two left on the list.
I’d made a good guess the night before. Winston is one of those short blocks off Argonne. A man with good wind could spit from one end to the other. I counted four houses and the rest were empty lots, some with “For Sale” signs out in the winter brush stubble.
No. 5 looked like a doll’s house for rich kids. Flat and only one floor. A screened-in porch off to the left. The main entrance to the right. The front lawn a mess. Like mine, the fall leaves hadn’t been raked away.
The Sunday paper on the steps. A rutted driveway, without a car in it, pushed up past the house. White paint was blistered and chipping on the front door. No answer after a few times. I rubbed the cold, sore knuckles and stepped off the cinderblock stoop. Hump led the way around the back. Watching our steps in the mud ruts.
It was a small backyard. A rusting barbecue grill was next to the back steps. A thin layer of ice was on the water in the grill, a red ice.
I stuffed my hands in my pockets and let Hump do the knocking this time. Another couple of minutes and there still wasn’t any sign of life in the house.
“Can you spring the lock, Hump?”
“Think so.”
I looked around. There was an empty lot off to the left and a wintered-in backyard on the right. No sign of anybody in the yard or watching from the windows. “Go ahead.”
Hump leaned his shoulder against the door. He gripped the knob. He bumped the door a couple of times with all his weight. I heard the lock fall apart on the other side of the door.
Waiting. No sound inside. He pushed the door in and it hit the remainder of the lock. It skidded across the floor. We were in the kitchen. No light burned there. Passing the stove, I looked down at the skillet. Five or six fish sticks, fried dark and hard, in a thick white grease. I tried the refrigerator. Five cans of Drewry’s beer. A part of a half gallon of milk, soured. Half a loaf of bread, some French’s mustard and a pack of pickle and olive loaf.
The living room was beyond. There was a battered green sofa and a coffee table and a dark blue carpet worn thin at the entrance to the kitchen and across the way at the front door.
The bedroom was off to the left. Past that a light burned in the bathroom. The bed had been slept in. I touched the sheets and found there was a gritty feel, like they hadn’t been changed for a couple of weeks. Hump passed me on the way into the bathroom. I went back to the wall next to the bedroom entrance and flipped on the lights. I crossed to the closet. Clothing still hung there. I squatted and looked in the bottom part of the closet. There it was. A clean spot surrounded by dust. A suitcase had been there. A large suitcase.
Hump came from the bathroom. He held out a tube of something. “That mushmouth sound the man has.”
“Yeah?”
“Orafix.”
“That’s thin,” I said. “You know how many people have dentures?”
“Add this.” From behind his back he held out a bottle of perfume.
I read the label. Straw Hat. “So what?”
He dropped the tube of denture adhesive on the bed and uncapped the perfume. I got a whiff of it. It was familiar but …
“Regina wears this.”
“So do a lot of other women in the world.” Orafix and Straw Hat. It wasn’t enough.
I left him in the bedroom and looked around in the living room. I found a few paperback novels, some back issues of Time and the first issue of a magazine called Gambler’s World. In the drawer under the coffee table I uncovered a handful of grass butts. Saved and not to be used until the supply ran out.
“Jim?”
I walked over and stood in the doorway.
“This Falco guy is a packrat. Can’t throw anything away.” He was digging around in the top drawer of the dresser.
“Like what?”
“Las Vegas memories.” He held up a handful of book matches. “The Sands, the Golden Nugget, places like that.” He held up a thin booklet in a plastic holder. “Savings book from a Vegas bank. Left ten dollars in it.”
“It’s not enough.” I edged in and started digging around in one end of the packed drawer. Letters, old check stubs, scraps of paper with names and phone numbers written on them, blurring and drying out, ready to vanish like they’d been written with magic ink. I found a brass hash pipe, the screen in the bowl hardly discolored.
“Try this,” Hump said.
It was a black and white polaroid picture. Turning brown now. A naked girl standing at a window. Her back is to the camera but her face is turned to the camera, as if she’d been called the split second before the picture was taken. The face is in three-quarters profile, a smiling sensual thrust above her shoulder. Below the arm, there because she had twisted her body slightly, is the outline of a tight small breast that would just fit into the palm of a hand.
“Regina?” Hump asked.
“Yes, that’s the bitch.”
The two strings are knotted. The hustler girl from Las Vegas and the question mark named James Falco.
“Run the tape for me.”
The Man scooted his chair around and punched the “Play” button.
“See how dependable I am? I said I’d call back and I did.”
“It wouldn’t hurt my feelings if you got lost,” The Man said.
“I plan to. As soon as I get my hands on the hundred thousand.”
“I’m not sure I can trust you,” The Man said. “I thought it was a one-time pay-off and here you are at the trough again.”
“That’s the way I am. Piggy, piggy.”
“You’ve got the copy of the ledger there?”
Crackling of paper. “Right in front of me.”
“Read me page 4 and page 31.”
A laugh, a wet sputter. “Now you’re getting cute.”
“If you’ve got it read it.”
“The fact that you ask interests me. I suppose there’s some good reason?”
“Suppose what you want to.”
“Page 4?” Mushmouth began to read the column of figures.
“Skip that,” I said.
The Man ran the tape forward and punched the “Play” button once more. Mushmouth was still reading figures. “This is almost the end of it,” The Man said.
“You said the call came right after we left last night?”
“I checked my watch.” The Man selected one of his special blend cigarettes from a box and lit it. “It was eight-fifteen.”
I circled the table and hit the “Stop” button. “We fingered Tony Mitchell without meaning to.”
Hump’s head jerked back. He’d had his head down, listening to the reading of hundreds and thousands. “You sure, Jim?”
“Somewhere on the other side of seventy percent,” I said. “Something happened to make Mushmouth or Falco or whoever think Mitchell had done a tricky to him. He got the idea that Mitchell might have a copy of the ledger. Friday night he has a question and answer session with Mitchell. Maybe Mitchell convinces him it’s not true, but Mushmouth breaks his
thumbs anyway. Why his thumbs? Probably because thumbs press copy machine buttons.”
The Man said, “I don’t see how we fingered Mitchell.”
“Sure you do. He calls you at eight-fifteen. But, the way I told you to, you’re playing it cozy. You ask him to read a couple of pages. You ask him to prove he’s got a copy.”
Hump nodded. “It starts him thinking and what he comes up with is Mitchell.”
“Maybe he doesn’t know what Mitchell’s done. He might even guess that Mitchell has called you himself and made a demand. What he does know is that Mitchell lied to him.”
“Bang,” Hump said.
“Actually,” I said, “it was two bangs.” I leaned over the tape recorder and hit the “Play” button.
Mushmouth said, “That match what you’ve got?”
“It matches.”
“You got the money?”
“I’ve got to bring it in from out of town. It ought to be here late Monday morning or early in the afternoon.”
“The same bagman. I want Hardman.”
“He’s got some doubts.”
“Screw his doubts.”
“Why does it have to be him? There ought to be ten other—”
“Because he’s fat and dumb and slow and he’s got a cute ass on him.” A laugh. “And he needs the money for his old age.”
“I’ll talk to him.”
“Do more than that. Convince him.”
“When and where?” The Man said.
“I’ll call you. Early Monday evening.”
“That’s it,” The Man said. I punched the “Stop” button.
“I need something else from Vegas. You pay off that security man out there yet?”
“He’s been paid.”
“Have him check out James Falco. Must have spent some time out there. Might have been a gambler. Might have been a house dealer.”
“I’ll call him right now.”
“I’ll need it as soon as you get it.”
“I’ll offer top dollar.”
One of The Man’s soldiers drifted in from the other room. He went to the refrigerator and took out a platter with about a pound of lox on it, a huge block of cream cheese and a bowl of kosher dills. From another shelf he lifted down a whole loaf of sour rye.
“Have a snack,” The Man said.
I shook my head. “No chitterlings?”
“Not where I live. Those things stink.”
That was true enough.
At my place Hump turned on the TV. The first game of the Sunday pro football doubleheader was almost over. I closed out the sound by shutting the bedroom door.
Art’s wife, Edna, answered the phone. “Jim, when are you coming by to see us?”
“Soon as I can.”
“You never have time for us.”
“I’ve been busy. Is Art up yet?”
“He’s in the shower.”
I said I’d call back.
“No, here he is. He fooled me.”
Art said, “Don’t you rest on Sunday like everybody else?”
“When I can. Look, Regina Clark bugged out on us.”
“Tell me about it.”
I did. At the end he said, “I meant to check out her story, where she was supposed to be the night Ronny was killed. I just never got to it.”
“I’ve got a new name for you. James Falco, 5 Winston Place. But don’t bother to look for him there. He’s gone too. I think Regina Clark got there before I did and warned him off.”
“What do you want out of me?”
“His record, if he’s got one. A photo.”
“It’s Sunday,” Art said, “and I’m doing your scut work again.”
“Or I’ve been doing yours.”
The second game was from the west coast, the 49-ers and the Lions. It was halftime when I heard the car out in the driveway. I went to the kitchen and got a Bud and handed it to Art as soon as he cleared the door. Art shucked his topcoat and sat down facing the TV.
“About time you got color,” he said.
“The next big score.”
“That Falco’s a strange one.”
“Found him, huh?”
“He’s a local boy. Raised here. Nothing on him but some juvenile and the court sealed that. The way I heard it it was small time breaking and entering at 16 and 17.”
It didn’t sound right. Extortion and murder were things you went to school to learn.
“So I went national and checked him out. Three arrests, one for pandering, one for armed robbery, one for dealing in funny money.”
“Can’t decide on a major?”
“One conviction. He did four on the armed robbery.”
“A photo?”
“One’s on the way. Got a bit of the skinny on him ahead of time.” He brought a pad out of his pocket. “He’s twenty-eight, six-one, about one-ninety. Dark hair. Girls like him and think he’s handsome. Word is he hustles them good when he’s short. No complaints from the women. Must give good value for money received.”
“What else?”
“A tattoo on his right bicep. ‘Born To Win’ on the background of a twenty dollar bill. A scar on his chin.” He put the pad away. “Word is the scar goes back to his pimping days. A girl went after him with a beer can opener. That was before pop tops.”
The scar reminded me of something. It was close and I almost had it before it floated away.
Art sipped the Bud. “You telling me everything, Jim?”
“Most of it.”
“What’s left out?”
“The part I didn’t tell you.”
“Smartass.” He claw-fingered at my shirt pocket and got one of my smokes. “If Ronny was flat, why would Falco and the girl go after him?”
“Maybe they didn’t know it.” I lit the smoke for him. “What the girl knew about Ronny went back to Vegas. She saw him as a high roller. Must have thought he had a stash.”
“And the Winters girl?” He blew smoke at me. “Where did she fit in?”
“I don’t know.”
“Tony Mitchell?”
“I think he was in it with them.”
“Why was he killed?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s all I get around here.”
“Except for free beer and free cigarettes.”
Art stood up. He tilted back his head and poured the rest of the beer down. He put on his topcoat.
“Don’t rush off. Stay for the second half.”
“I’ll come back when you’ve got color,” he said.
“You got color at home?”
“Me? With four kids to support?” He gave me a sour grunt and headed for the door.
Later in the evening, while Marcy and I were watching the Sunday Night Movie, a police cruiser dropped off a sealed envelope. It contained a full face and profile of James Falco.
One look at the photos and it made sense. The memory of the scar drifted by again and I grabbed at it. I knew where I’d seen him that one time before. It had been at the dance studio the afternoon we located Regina Clark. He’d been with her in the dance instruction room and they’d led me to believe that Falco was a student. Played a scene for me and foxed me good, those two.
All the ifs and therefores rattled around in my head.
If I’d thought to check the studio log, I’d have realized that Regina didn’t have an appointment for the time period we’d spent in the reception room. If I’d known that, I could have made my guess why Betty Winters had to be killed. Betty Winters knew who Falco was. If, during the time she spent with Hump, the Winters girl talked, we’d check Falco out and the whole mess might split open.
Therefore Regina had called Falco from Marcy’s apartment that night. Therefore Falco had probably gone to the Winters girl’s apartment and waited out in the hall until she opened the door. If you can do one killing you can do two. And three is as easy as two.
I got sick of the ifs and therefores and stuffed the photos back in the envelope. I went i
nto the kitchen and mixed myself a fistful of J&B.
CHAPTER NINE
Monday morning was sunny and cold.
Hump took one of the pictures of Regina Clark and the full face shot of Falco and spent the morning and the early afternoon flashing them around the downtown transient hotels. I did a trip back into the past. The days on the force I’d known some informers. Now I traced five of them. One was in the slam for beating his wife, another had died of an overdose six months ago and the other three acted like they didn’t know me now.
After lunch, I did a loop around the city, trying to touch as many of the perimeter motels as I could. It was nothing and double nothing. At four, I packed it in and drove home. I’d showered and changed clothes and cleaned and reloaded the .38 P.P. when Hump dropped by.
A shake of his head and I knew he’d drawn an egg too. Not that I’d expected much from it. It was time fill, a one in a thousand chance that we’d find a string. But it was harder sitting around and waiting for the dark. The dark had a lot of trouble in it. I couldn’t back out now but I had second thoughts and third thoughts about it. And my stomach felt like somebody’d been throwing their old lighted cigarette butts down my throat.
At five-thirty, it was time to leave for The Man’s apartment. I’d locked the front door and hit the top step on my way down when Art drove his unmarked car past my driveway and parked out on the street. While he got out and headed for the lawn, Hump gave me a questioning look.
“Meet you there,” I said.
I waited in the leaf clutter of the lawn, the wet rot that went back to the fall leaf drop. Art stopped a few feet from me and looked over his shoulder at Hump. Hump waved and Art waved back.
“Something going on?”
“The usual. We split the town down the middle. Falco and the girl have to be somewhere.”
“Why?”
“Huh?”
“Either you know something you haven’t told me or you’ve gone dummy on me. If I was Falco or the girl I’d be a thousand miles from here and still going.”
Hump backed down the drive. I watched him. I needed the time to think. What Art said was true enough. Without the hundred thousand to anchor them in town, they’d have been pushing west or toward Mexico. But I couldn’t tell Art about the hundred thousand so I’d have to run my mouth a bit and hope I found something to say sooner or later.
