MacBride went up to his office, flat-handed the door open and saw Pickney Sax sitting in the desk chair with one leg over a corner of the desk and the other over an arm of the chair. He was reading a detective story magazine.
“You read too, eh?” MacBride jibed.
Sax said, “Yeah. Want one?” and drew another out of one of his pockets, tossed it on the desk. “I always carry three or four around with me. When I get sick of reading ’em, I cut paper dolls.”
“From cutting throats to cutting paper dolls, huh?”
“Never cut a throat in my life. Sight of blood makes me whoops.”
He was the thinnest man MacBride had even seen. He looked as if he had been put together with laths and putty. His clothes cost plenty of money but didn’t prevent his looking like a scarecrow. He slouched and was careless of his linen and his hair was a mustard-colored thatch, his nose looked like a rudder put over to swing a boat hard to starboard. His voice was laconic and always sounded as if he had a cold.
“What got you up so early?” the skipper asked.
“I ain’t been to bed yet.”
“Want to see me?”
“Yeah.” Sax closed the magazine. “Yeah, I want to see you. Five of my boys were picked up last night by a gang of your stooges. And a gal I know. The boys would like to see a football game today and the gal would like to get her hair waved this morning.”
“That’s interesting.”
“Nuts, there’s nothing interesting about it I can see. What are you holding ’em for?”
“A fella was killed last night.”
“Sure a fella was killed last night. A fella from Boston. A little big fella. Tiny Torgensen. I did it. So what?”
“You worried?”
“Yah, sure I’m worried. Lookit me. Ha! Lookit me puss hang down to me toes with worry!” He stood up, gaunt, gangling, and said with ripping sarcasm, “You and your crummy ideas!”
MacBride sat down and said, “Beat it. They’ll get out at noon.”
Sax slammed his fist down on the desk and roared, “They’ll get out now! Now!”
MacBride stood up and kicked his chair back at the same time. His fist traveled two feet, crashed. Sax slammed to the floor. MacBride sat down again and said:
“Now beat it.”
Sax scrambled to his feet, fell on the desk and snarled, “Why the hell would I knock off Torgensen when any big shot you can name in this lousy burg could outbid me on Mularkey’s deal? What about Steamboat? Twenty minutes after Torgensen was killed last night I was walking past the Million House. I seen Steamboat in the doorway there tussling with a couple o’ Fitz’s boys. They took away his gun. I seen them take away his gun. Mularkey knows who knocked off Torgensen. So does Dolly Ireland.”
“Cut. Well, what about Dolly Ireland?”
Sax swaggered to the door, swaggered back again and cackled, “What about Dolly Ireland!” He leaned forward, propped a gaunt forefinger on the desk. “I know a guy, Skipper, I know a guy—a blind guy—only he ain’t blind. A moocher. He seen Dolly Ireland and Steamboat walk past Union Station fifteen minutes before Torgensen was killed. Figure it, figure it out. You’re smart. Figure it out. Sure! Steamboat loses a soft berth if Fitz bails out of the old game. Dolly Ireland’s crazy about Fitz but he’s going high hat with a swell dame. Figure it out, Skipper. I ain’t making no charges. I ain’t saying anything. I’m just telling you what I seen and what I heard!”
He snatched up his two detective story magazines and banged out.
The office became very silent and into the silence, after a minute, the skipper said, “H’m,” and reached for the phone. He called the Free Press office and asked for Kennedy. It was Kennedy’s day off.
The skipper took his hat and went downstairs to the garage. Gahagan put on his coat and started up the Buick.
“Kennedy’s place in Hallam Street,” MacBride said.
He sat in back, bounced slightly as Gahagan went over the rounded apron leading to the street.
Gahagan said, “It’s a fine day. It’s the kind of day I like. I like this here time of year. I like—”
“Shut up. I’m trying to think.”
“Take my wife, now—”
“You got her, you keep her. And shut up.”
Gahagan sighed, wagged his head and grooved the car through the bright, mellow morning. Hallam Street was in a quiet, unpretentious part of town, and the rooming-house where Kennedy lived was like many other rooming-houses in Hallam Street. The street had a washed look, like those Pennsylvania Dutch towns.
MacBride went in and rapped at Kennedy’s door. Entering the room, he saw Kennedy sitting on the bed in his pajamas, with an ice-bag on his head, and staring reflectively at a huge Saint Bernard dog.
MacBride said, “I never knew you owned a dog.”
“Neither did I,” Kennedy said.
“Where’d you get him?”
“I don’t know. I woke up and there he was.”
The dog looked gravely at MacBride.
“He’s big enough,” MacBride said.
“Every time he puts his paws on my chest he knocks me down. He’s knocked me down six times this morning. Well-meaning chap, though. I wish I knew how I came to possess him. It reminds me of the time I woke up one morning and found a donkey in my room. Animals must like me.”
“Well, when you get tight—”
“Kind of pet him, Steve, so I can get dressed.”
MacBride sat down and stroked the dog and Kennedy rose and began to fumble into his clothing.
“Know anything about Dolly Ireland, Kennedy?”
“Who? Dolly Ireland? Sure. I think she’s a dress model these days. Fitz used to run around a lot with her. You’d see them at all the places. They looked swell together. Dolly’s one of these girls—well, you know, she walks right up to you, sticks out her hand and says, ‘Hi, boy.’ I always thought she was pretty regular, though I saw her get mad once and crown a guy with a bottle.”
“Was Fitz and her, you know, ever that way?”
“You mean that way? Well, it’s hard to say. They were together a lot, but it always looked like a sister and brother act to me. I wish I knew how I got that dog.”
“Where does Dolly work?”
“Over on Central Avenue. Maffee’s.”
MacBride stood up and the dog reared and pushed him down onto the bed. The skipper grinned, cuffed the dog and said, “Some dog, Kennedy.”
“They carry brandy around in the Alps.”
CHAPTER VI
MacBride went to Maffee’s on Central Avenue and was told that Dolly Ireland had not come in. They gave him her address and he had Gahagan drive him to 598 Moor Street. It was a five-storied walk-up and he found Dolly Ireland’s name alongside a door on the third floor. When she opened the door he could smell coffee making.
“I’m MacBride from Headquarters,” he said.
“Yes?”
“Talk to you,” he said, inviting himself in with a gesture.
She was dressed in a white shirtwaist and a snug skirt of speckled gray flannel. Her yellow hair was long, it was pulled tight around the back of her neck and rolled in a bun on her left ear. Her face was a little bony, with wide, sensuous, attractive lips, and her eyes were very blue.
“Sure,” she said, motioning him in. “I’m just making breakfast.”
“Hate to interrupt,” he said, going in and sitting down when she nodded to an armchair.
A tea-wagon was set for one.
“Have some coffee?” she asked.
“Smells good. Yeah.”
She poured out two cups and nibbled on a piece of toast.
He said, “Murder’s pretty serious, ain’t it, Miss Ireland?”
“You ought to kn
ow, Captain; you handle enough of it.”
“Yeah. What were you doing down around Union Station last night, about eight, with Steamboat Hodge?”
She looked at him, gave a startled smile. “Boy, you get around, don’t you?”
“I hear things.”
“Well, there’s a dress shop in the station run by a friend of mine, Nora Burns, and I stopped by to tell her that Maffee had a few samples she ought to buy. I was on my way to the Million Club. When I left the station, it was by the north door, I ran into Steamboat. Steamboat always goes down to the station to buy his old home-town newspaper. He was born and brought up in Detroit, you know. Well, he was pretty drunk. I took him by the arm and walked him past the station. I remember he stopped to give a blind man a quarter and he said, ‘Buddy, it’s tough you’re blind, because you can’t see a looker here—a real gal—Miss Dolly Ireland.’ I shushed him and we walked on for about three blocks, but he said he had a date some place and I shoved him in a cab and then took one myself.”
MacBride looked into his coffee and said, “H’m.” Then he said, swirling the coffee around, “I got to ask personal questions sometimes. I got to ask you were you ever in love with Fitz?”
She smiled ruefully. “That is personal.”
“Yeah, I know.”
She sighed. “Fitz is one of those men—one of those grand men. But I don’t know, we just seemed to eat and drink and dance a bit and kid around. Being around Fitz was always comfortable.”
“That’s a part-way answer, ain’t it?”
She smiled ruefully again. “Yes, I guess it is. Fitz used to look at the moon with me a lot but I was never up there in the moon. It was just as well. We always had good times. He’s getting what he’s always wanted and I’m mighty glad.”
“You don’t look sore.”
“Why should I? I’m no sorehead. Why be sore when a grand guy like Fitz makes the grade?”
MacBride finished his cup of coffee. “Where’s Steamboat?”
“The last I saw of Steamboat was when I put him in that cab I told you about.” She suddenly looked at MacBride with very level eyes. “I saw Fitz late last night. He didn’t look good. What’s up?”
“I don’t know. There’s a chance Steamboat knocked off Tiny Torgensen.”
She put out a hand. “My God, don’t let Fitz know that! All Fitz has done for Steamboat, if he found out Steamboat killed Torgensen—”
“I know, I know,” MacBride muttered. “That’s why I’m trying to find Steamboat. I think Fitz suspects.”
Her face had gone white. “Poor Fitz! Poor Fitz!”
When MacBride walked out on the sidewalk Gahagan was beating himself on the chest with his fists and saying, “Ah, wotta day, wotta day! I feel like a million bucks. I could write a pome, I could. A pome I could write.”
MacBride, not paying any attention, stood for a minute nibbling his lip and staring narrow-eyed into space. Gahagan kept on pounding himself on the chest, and finally MacBride looked at him, made a sour face and said:
“What the hell are you doing?”
Gahagan threw up his arms, shrugged, and climbed disconsolately in behind the wheel.
At Headquarters Marcia Friel was waiting with her brother. Her face looked a little drawn. “Captain…” she said.
The skipper was rapt in thought and a kind of hard, bony dignity. He pulled himself out of it. “Yes, Miss Friel.”
Lewis Friel said, “It’s about Fitz.”
“I saw him this morning,” Marcia said. “I think he was out all night. He wouldn’t admit it, but I think he was. Can’t you do something? Can’t you go to him and talk to him? Can’t you advise him to sell his business to anyone who wants to buy it? I know it was admirable of him to want to sell only to Torgensen, but now that Torgensen’s dead, why, what does it matter? If he got out of the business now, it might help him a lot.”
Lewis Friel’s brows were knotted seriously. He said suddenly, “I’m afraid, even, that he might not sell at all now, and if he doesn’t, I’m out of luck. I’ve got this real-estate business all set up, I put a lot of money into it, and if Fitz backs out, I’m sunk.”
Marcia said, “Oh, forget about your business, Lewis. We’ve got to think about Fitz first. I don’t know…somehow”—she shuddered—“I’m afraid for him. That look in his eyes.”
MacBride muttered, “I’ll have another talk with him today.”
He went up to his office and spent an hour on routine matters. At noon he released everybody in the holdover. He tried to get hold of Mularkey and phoned three places but could not locate him. He phoned Steamboat’s place in Lyons Street and the man on duty there had nothing to report. At twelve-thirty Moriarity blew in and said:
“What’s wrong with Kennedy?”
“Well, what is?”
“It’s his day off and he won’t take a drink. He’s busier than a guy juggling eight balls. Running around town, turning down drinks.”
“Probably looking for Steamboat.”
“I asked him and he said no.”
“Well, that’s Kennedy for you. He gets tired of ideas quick. Soon as he gets me tied up in an idea, he drops it and goes looking for another one. I think he does it just to annoy me.”
At three o’clock Bettdecken phoned from the central-room desk and said, “I hear a guy’s been killed down in the Shane Hotel. I thought maybe you’d wanna know.”
CHAPTER VII
The Shane was a second-class hotel out on Wolff Avenue. It was pretty crowded. It was always pretty crowded, for it was hard by the wholesale houses. MacBride weaved through the people in the lobby and went up to the desk showing his badge.
“Where’s the trouble?” he asked the clerk.
“Ten-twelve.”
The skipper went up in a noisy, crowded elevator, got out at the tenth floor and went down a narrow corridor checking off door numbers. He opened 1012 and a cop turned and looked at him and then touched his cap indifferently.
It was a single room with a metal bed painted brown and with a grain, to look like wood. Two precinct detectives, Klein and Marsotto, were standing with their hands on their hips. A man from the coroner’s office was rolling down his sleeves. There were three uniformed cops besides the one standing at the door. The dead man lay on the floor with his head smashed.
MacBride said, “That’s Steamboat Hodge.”
Marsotto turned. “Yeah. That’s what I told Klein. He was registered as J. Martin, though.”
“He was hiding out,” MacBride said.
“That’s what I thought.”
“What time did it happen?”
“Well,” said Marsotto, “a guy in the room below heard a racket up here at a quarter to three. He phoned the desk and told ’em to send somebody up and quiet it, account of he had a headache. About five minutes later they sent a guy up and he found this. When he arrived, that chair was overturned, that bureau was knocked cockeyed, and there was blood in the bathroom where somebody’d washed.”
MacBride asked, “What was he hit with?”
Marsotto pointed. “That pinch bottle there. It was washed when the guy washed his hands and I’ll bet you don’t find any fingerprints on it.”
“Anything else I ought to know?”
“Well, the clerk said that at about half-past one this guy came down to the desk and asked for an envelope, a thick one, they were safe-keeping for him.” He pointed. “There’s the envelope but there ain’t nothing in it. Whatever was in it, it was snatched.”
“Anything else?”
“Yeah. One of the elevator lads said that about the time it happened he took on a guy here. The guy’s hat was dented in and he was drying his hands on his handkerchief. The guy was tall, with kind of long flat cheeks and sandy hair.” He glanced at MacBride. “It
sounds like Fitz Mularkey. We ain’t touched anything here, there might be prints. Rugge is on his way over here now.”
“Find a gun?”
“Yeah. Steamboat’s old double-action Colt with his initials carved in the bone handle. I’m holding that for Rugge too. It was halfway across the room from Steamboat, by the bureau. The way it looks, well, fingerprints have been rubbed from everything. You can tell on the bed there and on the basin in the bathroom and the mirror—all around here.”
MacBride was laconic: “Well, you don’t need me here. I’ll go over and see Fitz.”
He went downstairs and walked into the hotel bar and had a beer. He sipped thoughtfully of the beer, his face expressionless as a slab of wood. Usually he drank beer down with a couple of swallows. This time he took it like wine. He paid up and brooded his way through the lobby and out to the street where the Buick was parked. Gahagan was posing for a picture which a couple of young girls, obviously tourists, were taking.
“I wisht I had me medals along,” Gahagan was telling them.
“What medals?” MacBride asked.
Gahagan made a petulant face and shoved in behind the wheel. MacBride climbed in back. “Fitz’s place,” he said.
“The Million Club?”
“No. Where he lives. Wait. Go to the Million Club first.”
There was an early cocktail crowd at the Million Club when MacBride got there. He found Tom Carney in the bar and said:
“I hear a couple of your boys took a gun away from Steamboat last night.” He added, “Don’t try to think up any fast ones.”
Carney laughed shortly, a little puzzled. “Well, sure. Yeah. We took a gun away from him. He didn’t have it out. We just took it away from him and sent him on his way.”
“What’d you do with it?”
“Stuck it in the safe.”
“Get it.”
“Sure. Come along.”
They went into the office and MacBride stood dour-faced while Carney took a key and opened the wall safe. The gun was not there. Carney turned from the safe shaking his head in puzzlement.
MacBride growled. “Who else has a key to it?”
The Big Book of Reel Murders Page 207
