by Will Rayner
Agnes tapped on his door and opened it slightly. “I’m finished, T.J.,” she said. “The bookcase looks so nice! I’m sure Mr. Sam will like it.”
“Off you go, then, babe. I’ll lock up.” He listened for the sound of the latch closing on the outer door and then he lit an Old Gold and went to work. Using a pen with a broad nib and lots of ink, he printed a black-and-white version of ‘FLOOD’ on a blank envelope, along with simulated drips and the skull postmark. Next, he printed the message on a sheet of paper and drew a square around each letter. He knew Agnes would have to see his handiwork when she filed it, but at least there would be no hint of blood. Finally, he started writing his report on the incident for Agnes to type up.
When he finished, he pulled out is watch. Not yet seven o’clock. Depending on what train his father caught coming back from down south, he’d either drop into the office or go straight home. T.J. decided to wait a little while before calling Amy, his father’s housekeeper. Pop should see this threat right away, he realized. And the dicks handling the Baggett case over at Kearny Street. He started tidying up.
****
The hum of traffic on Bush Street had ebbed for the moment. The premises of Flood and Flood were quiet. T.J. heard the latch on the outer door turn. He reached into his bottom-right drawer for his Detective Special. Short, tapping steps crossed the hardwood floor. They paused, then changed direction. T.J. put the Detective Special away. It was pop. He opened his office door and saw the elder Flood inspecting the new bookcase.
Samuel Adams Flood turned toward his son. “It will do fine,” he said. “Where did you find it?”
“Agnes knew somebody in the building who was having sort of a clearing-out sale.”
“How much?”
“Five bucks. You’ll have to top up petty cash.”
“Receipt?” the elder Flood asked sharply.
“Filed away,” T.J. said. “Now, if you’d like to step into my parlor, I’ve got sumpin’ to show you. Our very own, real life death threat.”
He laid the garish envelope and its contents side by side on his desk. Sam Flood bent over to inspect them, his heels together and his hands clasped behind his back. “Nothing on the obverse side?” he asked.
“Nuttin’,” T.J. said.
“Did Agnes see this … communication?”
“Just the envelope. It was just lying there on her desk when we came back.”
Sam thought for a moment. “This … woman … was probably going to slip it under the door when she saw you and Agnes leave. Walked right into our office. You didn’t notice her in the corridor, of course. Perhaps we should give some thought to matters of our own security.”
“But we’re supposed to be the watchers, not the watchees,” T.J. said. “Watchees? Is there such a word?”
Sam ignored this diversion. “We’ll have to call the homicide department,” he said. “There’s a detective handling the Randolph Baggett threats. His name is … his name is … Towser. Detective Willard Towser. I have his number on my desk.”
T.J. followed Sam into his office and lit an Old Gold while connections were made with Kearny Street. Detective Towser was in the building and he had news for the Floods. Baggett had received a similar death threat this same day.
T.J. smoked and listened to his father’s end of the conversation: “It was placed on our secretary’s desk late this afternoon while we were absent … Of course we opened it … ‘He must die and so must you’ … Other way around?...we’ll be here.”
Sam Flood hung up. “Detective Towser is coming right over,” he said. “Mr. Baggett received his own threat today, except that the pronouns were reversed: ‘You must die and so must he.’”
“In an envelope?” T.J. asked. “That’s the first printed one, isn’t it? The rest have all been verbal – phone calls.”
“I believe you are correct. Now there’s some physical evidence, at least. The force might be able to do something with that.”
Detective Willard Towser was medium height and medium build. Narrow shoulders. He had a sour face and very large ears. I wonder if he has trouble in high winds, T.J. asked himself as he looked at Towser’s oversized appendages. The detective examined the exhibits, still laid out on T.J.’s desk. He used the letter opener to flip them over and back again.
“’Flood,’” he said. “The other envelope said ‘Die!’ You say the office was empty when this … ah … message arrived. Where was everybody?”
“I was on the train,” Sam said.
“And our secretary, Miss Wilkins, and I had stepped out on an errand,” T.J. said.
“An errand? Sure it was,” Towser smirked.
“Get your mind out of the gutter, buster,” T.J. snarled. “See that empty bookcase out there? Miss Wilkins and I had gone to pick it up.”
“You won’t get much cooperation from Kearny Street with that kind of attitude, Flood,” Towser rasped.
“The name is Mr. Flood, pal. Suppose I bounce you off that shiny Buick parked down there on Bush Street. What kinda attitude would that be?”
“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” Sam admonished. “Let us try to remain adults. You have this evidence, detective, and our report. It is surely a clear indication this disturbed woman is on the verge of committing a major crime. She has already tried once. You can be assured that Flood and Flood will assist you in any way we can, in your efforts to apprehend her.”
“Did you or Oakland manage to get any prints off the machete and the nurse’s cap?” T.J. asked.
“That is police business,” Towser said.
T.J. snorted derisively. “Then I guess your next order of police business is to toddle off back to headquarters with our little gift under your arm,” he said.
After Sam Flood had politely ushered Detective Towser on his way, he turned to his son with an air of mild exasperation. “Fingerprints will confirm that the person who attacked you and Mister Baggett is the same one who wrote that letter,” he said, “but I doubt they will help identify her. And if they did, the San Francisco Police Department is not likely to rush over and tell us. Not with your attitude. You must strive to be more diplomatic.”
“But some coppers are such twerps,” T.J. said. “Police business, my fanny.”
Flood senior knew he would probably never change Flood junior’s outlook on life. Growing up without a real mother and then losing his wife very early in their marriage had contributed to Thomas’s hard and cynical shell. One must keep trying, however. Abruptly, Sam took his Solomon Silverman fedora off the hat rack. “Let’s turn off the lights and lock up,” he said. “I’ve had a long day and I’m going home.”
“Not without me,” T.J. said. He went and got his Detective Special. “There’s a whacko skirt out there who mebbe can’t tell one Flood from another.”
“All the way up to Vallejo Street?” Sam protested. “I doubt anything will happen on the cable car.”
“Well, at least I’ll walk you to the turnaround on Powell Street.” There’s flatfoot business and there’s T.J. Flood business, he told himself.
Chapter 3
Lieutenant James T. Bracken and an old acquaintance from the Hall of Justice were eating pie and drinking coffee in a greasy spoon on upper Market, near Rose Street. The meeting was strictly hush-hush. Each had arrived on separate streetcars; there were no official cop cars parked outside to attract interest. Bracken was having cherry. He knew the fruit came out of a can, but it was still pretty good. Spend another nickel for a second slab? Bracken thought about it and decided it wouldn’t do his expanding waistline any good.
“Whaddya think of the Board of Commissioners hiring those out-of-town snoops to come in and toss the department?” his friend asked after the owner had refilled their cups.
Bracken took a careful sip of the hot brew. “Hadn’t thought much about it,” he answered. “The thing is, me lad, there isn’t that much opportunity for corruption in homicide. What’s the guilty party going to do, bribe me not to collar him? Put me
on the pad, pay me off each month while he piles up the bodies? Murderers don’t think like that.”
“Yeah, but homicide is just one department. You’re all part of one big whole back there on Kearny Street. You hear things, I hear things. The word I get is that these private eyes from LA might try to nail the Inspectors Bureau for not reporting what they know, or what they’ve heard. You’re homicide, your detail is part of the Bureau.”
“So?”
“So what I’m telling you, Jimbo, is to watch your back. Take those two vice dicks, Piszek and Wales. How many people knew they used blackmail to get their jobs and didn’t turn them in? That’s the kind of dereliction of duty that these snoopers wanna dig up.”
Bracken didn’t know about the blackmail, but he had suspected it. “Piszek and Wales?” he said. “I sent them up for that string of dastardly homicides a couple of years ago, indeed I did. They can’t bite me now. Look, Percy, the thing is, I know the force is in bad shape. You can’t miss it. Corruption, bribery, graft, extortion, coppers on the take – call it whatever you want, but Kearny Street needs cleaning up. I reckon, though, that those boyos from down south will run out of steam. It’s too big a job, of course it is.”
“Yeah, they don’t know the city all that well, to begin with. So I hear they might be looking for some extra help from one of the local gumshoe agencies.”
The tandem of Flood and Flood popped into Jimbo Bracken’s mind. That pair can’t walk past a rock without turning it over to see what was underneath, he thought. They’d be perfect. Especially T.J. Flood. His father, Samuel, pretty well sticks to the straight and narrow, but young Thomas, bless him, is more comfortable hanging out in the dark alleys and meaner precincts of our fair city. T.J. would know where to look for a crooked cop, and Sam would know what to do with him.
Jimbo Bracken slid out of the booth and clapped his old friend on the shoulder. “I’ll leave first,” he said, “of course I will. Give me about five minutes.” He was pretty sure Percy, who worked in the records branch and spent most of his time shuffling paper, was clean, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t some dick standing on the corner of Rose and Market checking out his friend’s movements. The thing is, they might be checking me out, too.
****
Samuel Flood and Solomon Silverman finished their lunch at the little establishment tucked into a cul-de-sac off O’Farrell Street. Silverman had discovered it a number years before – just around the corner from his shop on Powell Street – and it was now the regular rendezvous for their irregular luncheon dates. This meal, however, was a business lunch – even though neither man was overly familiar with the term. As the waiter cleared the dishes, Solly selected a cigar and Sam filled his pipe. They smoked in companionable silence for a few minutes before Sam got down to business.
“So, you wish to engage Flood and Flood to ascertain the whereabouts of your sister’s daughter, Miss Sharon Greenberg,” he said formally.
“Yes, I want you to find her and bring her home,” Silverman replied.
Sam took out his notebook and the silver-plated mechanical pencil which was a gift from his wife. “Our fee is $25 a day, plus expenses,” he said. “Normally, we would require a retainer, but because of the special circumstances of our relationship, I am willing to waive that requirement.” Silverman attempted to interject, but Sam held up his hand. “Solly, the point is to help an old friend find a missing niece, not enrich the agency’s bottom line. That is why we are making this verbal contract, with nothing written down … yet.”
“Samuel, I am a businessman even more than you,” Solomon said. “I have seen iron-clad contracts signed in triplicate mean nothing. A verbal agreement with a trusted friend and a handshake are even more binding to me.” He reached out his hand and Flood grasped it firmly. “As it is with me,” he said.
He opened his notebook. “A few preliminary details to start me off,” he continued. Sam wrote down the Greenbergs’ address on Clement Street, and Solly’s recollection that Sharon had a best friend named Bertha. “Esther will know about Bertha, I’m sure,” he said.
“Does Mrs. Greenberg know I’ll be calling on her?” Sam asked.
“Yes, I told her I would be asking you for assistance. You can go over there any time you want.”
“I’ll go right now, as soon as I pick up the Essex,” Sam said, putting his pencil and notebook away. “I think I’ll walk down to the garage. It’s not that far away.”
They split the tip – a nickel each – and parted on O’Farrell Street. “Solomon, everything is going to be okay” were Sam’s parting words to his old friend.
Driving west toward the Greenberg home, however, he realized that everything may very well not be okay. Sharon had been gone for four days now. The longer people are missing, he knew, the more likely they stay missing. Clement Street was a section of single-family homes. Sam noted that many appeared to be neglected, with the blank stare of their windows suggesting vacancy.
The Greenberg household, however, was well-kept. Esther Greenberg was a large-breasted woman, with wide, child-bearing hips. The classic Jewish momma, Sam thought, then castigated himself for falling prey to such a stereotyped conclusion. Although she must still be in her 40s, Mrs. Greenberg’s hair was already turning grey.
They sat in the parlor, on comfortable, chintz-covered furnishings. “My brother Solomon said you would be calling,” Esther said. “He said you are helping us find where Sharon is. I’ve already talked to the police about her, you know.”
“As well you should have, Mrs. Greenberg. But the police are very busy looking for a lot of missing persons, while I am concerned with only one – your daughter, Sharon.”
“Are you very expensive?”
“Don’t worry about the expense,” Sam said. “Solomon and I have taken care of that. The main thing is getting Sharon back home, safe and sound. So I want to ask you a few questions, if I may. Some of them are probably the same questions the police asked. I hope you don’t mind.”
Esther Greenberg shook her head. “I don’t mind. As long as it helps …” Her voice trailed off.
Briskly, Sam Flood continued questioning. “Sharon is 17?” he asked. And, at Esther’s nod of assent, added: “And she hasn’t been home for, what, four days now?”
“Four days this afternoon,” Esther answered.
“Now I have to ask you this, Mrs. Greenberg. Was Sharon happy at home? Did you perhaps have a big argument recently?”
“The police asked me the same question. Sharon is not a runaway, Mr. Flood. She had a stable family life. She misses her father, as I do, but we know he’ll be home soon. I have to admit, though, that she was restless – is restless. She wants so much to do good.”
“We all try to do good, Mrs. Greenberg.”
“But she really, really, really, really wants to do good,” Esther said. “And I think she feels guilty.”
‘Guilty? Why would she feel guilty?”
“Well, Mr. Greenberg has had a steady job on that big dam for quite some time now, so we really don’t have anywhere near the financial problems other families of our faith have. Or other faiths. Sharon … Sharon felt it wasn’t right that some people were hurting and some weren’t. She thought something should be done about that.”
Interesting, Sam thought. Perhaps Sharon’s sense of guilt led her to do good with the wrong person.
“When Sharon left home four days ago, do you know where she was going?”
“Oh yes. To Beth Sholom. She’s been helping out at the new synagogue, the one on 14th.”
“Helping in what way, exactly?”
“I’m not really sure. The congregation tries to help the more needy families of our flock and Sharon had something to do with that. You should talk to Miss Wise at the synagogue. Miss Rachel Wise.”
Sam wrote the name in his notebook, along with ‘14th Ave Syn’. “Did Sharon have a best friend, a close friend?”
“Well, Bertha Ginsdorf was her best friend, I guess. They
were always giggling together. Bertha works at the family bakery – Ginsdorf Kosher Bakery, at McAllister and Webster. You know, Mr. Flood, the police didn’t ask me any of these questions. The officer was very nice, but he didn’t stay long.”
“I’m sure he was quite busy, Mrs. Greenberg. But don’t you worry. I don’t have any other missing persons to find, except your daughter.” He added Bertha’s name to his notebook, along with the address. ‘Do you have a photograph of Sharon that I can borrow?”
“Oh, no. Her father doesn’t believe in cameras. He thinks they are too frivolous.”
No pictures, but a best friend’s address and another contact to check out. Progress of a sort is being made, Sam Flood told himself. Who should he approach first? The ideal procedure was to gain information from one source and have it corroborated by another. The problem here was to decide who would be the best sounding board for a young woman anxious to do the right thing – her best friend or her church. One always tells one’s innermost secrets to one’s best friend. That’s what best friends are for. On the other hand, one’s church was there to listen and to offer advice. Sam Flood couldn’t decide. The synagogue or the bakery? In the end, he let geography play a hand as he got behind the wheel of the Essex. Beth Sholom was closer and in the right direction.
Chapter 4
T.J. Flood came to a halt in front of Agnes Wilkins’s desk, clicking his heels together on the hardwood floor. “I’m off to lunch, Miss Wilkins,” he said, “and then I shall wander about for a while. If the big boss man calls, tell him I’m out dragging my coat-tails.”
“Coat-tails? I don’t understand.”
“Your Mister Sam will understand. Just tell him – dragging my coat-tails.”
“The salesman from Collier’s is bringing the books over at three o’clock. Will you be back by then?”
“I shall strive to be present at the appointed hour, babe.” T.J. clapped his fedora on his head with a flourish and left.
