by Michael Mayo
Spence drank and said, “Shit, shit, shit.”
The lights shone brightly around the house and the Pierce-Arrow was still parked by the front doors. I wondered how Flora and her buddies reacted to the beating Spats had laid on Titus. But there was no time for that after Spence and I got out of the car. Chink’s guys unloaded the trunk. Spence tapped on the driver’s window and said something to Oh Boy, who nodded and drove off toward the garage. As I went inside, I tried to decide between knucks and gun. Given the strange way Chink was acting, things were bound to go south. By the time I had the knucks on, it was too late to change.
Chink’s guys brought in the two large crates from the trunk. I followed them in and saw that Catherine Pennyweight and Flora had been tied to the two heavy high-backed chairs. Sammy Spatola and Cameron Rivers were standing behind them.
It looked like Spats had done a quick job on the older woman. Her arms and neck were tied to the chair. Spats had taken much more care with Flora. Ropes were tight around her legs, arms, and torso. Her blouse was unbuttoned, revealing a torn silk slip, and her skirt was pushed up around her thighs. Her hair was loose around her flushed face, and she’d obviously been crying. When she saw her husband, she screamed. “Walter! He attacked me!”
Spats was adjusting his fly as we came in. A dull-eyed smirk was smeared across his ugly face. Cameron Rivers grabbed a fistful of Flora’s hair, and pulled her head back. Her own face twisted into an ugly sneer and there was a smudge of white powder on her upper lip. The whole scene had a phony, staged feeling that didn’t make any sense unless it was meant to turn Spence into an uncontrollably angry husband. If that was the purpose, it didn’t work. He stayed calm.
Chink did not stay calm. I guess he was mad about the business at the airport because he spun around and tried to hit me. I blocked him with the cane, smacked his nose with my knucks, and he stumbled backward and fell when his heels caught at the thick edge of a rug. He was bleeding like hell, and yelled for Spats to shoot me. Spats shoved Cameron aside and pulled out his .45 and aimed it at me over Flora’s shoulder.
Cloninger huddled by a crate, leaving Spence on his own in the middle of the big room.
Flora screamed, “Walter!” He started toward her but stopped when Spats turned the pistol on him.
“Stop it,” Spence yelled. “Get away from her. This is crazy. What the hell’s going on? We made a deal. We’ve still got a deal if everybody will just simmer down.”
Mrs. Pennyweight croaked. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.” There was a red welt on the side of her head where Sammy Spats had pistol-whipped her. He backhanded her again with the barrel of the gun.
Spence tried to stay cool. “We’ve got five million dollars here, and you’ve left most of the stuff in the cars. What the fuck are you up to? If we can’t take it to Cloninger’s place, at least move it into the house.”
“No,” Chink said as he got to his feet. “First we get everybody here, where I can see ’em.” He was trying to sound smart and dangerous. “Where’s the kid?”
“Upstairs,” Catherine Pennyweight said, her voice just above a whisper.
“O’Naille, get him.”
One of the four drunken thugs stumbled up the stairs, and disappeared down the hall. We could hear doors banging open, and objects being thrown around. He came back to the second-floor balcony and said, “There’s nobody here.”
Chink headed up the stairs himself and said, “Look again.”
As the Mick turned around, I heard the flat crack of a pistol shot and he collapsed. His legs folded, and the back of his head bounced off the railing as he landed in a heap.
The three remaining thugs panicked and ran outside, with Spence right behind them. No matter what Spats had done to his wife, Spence wasn’t going to let anyone drive away with his goods. At the sound of the shot, Flora yelled again even louder and jerked against the ropes that held her. She kicked back hard enough that the tall chair hit Cameron Rivers in the face. Spatola tried to shove her away but he hit the chair and knocked it over on its side. Flora wailed. By then, I was moving too.
Caught halfway up the stairs, Chink froze. But I wasn’t worried about him. Spatola was the one with a gun in his hand, and right then his attention was divided between the bleeding Mick above him and the screaming woman on the floor.
I heard the big boom of Spence’s .45 outside, then his voice loud and angry, as Chink’s guys hightailed it to the woods.
I gimped to the far end of the hall and the servants’ stairs. The only place for me to get an angle on Spats was behind him on the second-floor balcony.
Right then, it didn’t really matter what Chink, Spats, and Cameron were up to. Maybe they’d planned to take their cut as agreed and then changed their minds and decided to hijack the whole package. But what was going on? Sammy said that there was only Mrs. Pennyweight and the kid. Maybe he didn’t know about the household staff. Maybe they were lying low, hiding in their rooms on the third floor, or in the garage with Dietz. If little Ethan was really gone, I had to assume that Connie Nix had figured a way to sneak him into the reading room.
But I couldn’t worry about that. First, I had to shoot Sammy Spats.
I was slow going up the stairs. I could have climbed to the third floor to see if Connie and the baby were there, but there was no time. On the second floor, the stairs opened at the far end of the hall, past the room I’d been using. The shot that had nailed Chink’s thug came from somewhere back here. I could smell the gun smoke. When I reached the other end of the hall, I could see the moaning Mick, alive but unmoving on the balcony.
And there were voices downstairs. Spence and Chink, I thought. Fine, let them hash it out while I look around. The doors to the bedrooms were all open. As I edged past Mrs. Pennyweight’s suite, I could see that her closets had been opened, clothes thrown on the floor, mattresses overturned. The crib that had held little Ethan stood empty by the fireplace, with no sign of Connie Nix or the boy.
So who shot Chink’s thug?
Maybe Connie had Ethan here and was trying to get him to the third floor when the guy showed up and she shot him. No, that was a pistol shot, not a rifle, but it might have come from Dietz’s little .22. Where was the groundskeeper? No sign of him up here, nor of anyone else. But what the hell, anybody who shot one of Chink’s guys was on my side.
I shed my overcoat, pulled out the Detective Special, and cocked it as quietly as I could. I kept my back against the wall as I moved forward to the end of the short hall and the balcony.
The voices grew louder, Spats saying, “Put it down or I’ll kill her, I swear I will.”
He sounded like he was right below me. To get a look at him, I’d have to make my way around the guy who’d been shot. I might be seen but I was counting on Spats having his back to me.
The next voice came from Cloninger: “I can promise you a threefold increase over the best that those ham-fisted ape chemists of yours can put together.”
Then Spence. “And don’t forget that as long as the merchandise is here, it’s safe. We’ve got the cops in our pocket.”
Chink said, “But as long as the stuff is here, it ain’t making any money. And that’s what I need.”
Well, hell, what to do? If Spats hadn’t moved since I last saw him, he’d be right behind Flora’s chair. Probably had his gun on her. I’d be shooting almost directly down, with a slight angle toward the woman tied to that chair. Where should I aim? Tom Mix would shoot the gun out of Sammy’s hand. But I wasn’t Tom Mix. So where should I aim? Right at the top of his head. Then he’s dead.
Could I still do this? I wasn’t on a dirt road in the sticks, with guys coming at me out of the night. Like hell I wasn’t. Nothing had really changed.
I leaned my stick against the wall and measured the distance across the balcony to the rail. I didn’t hurry and I didn’t hesitate. Two quick steps forward, half step to the left around the wounded Mick and the puddle of blood beneath him, one more short step, and I’d be at the railing.
One step, second step, then the side step, the short step, and I was against the railing. There they were. Chink sweating at the foot of the stairs, Cloninger close to him. Couldn’t see Cameron Rivers. Spence was standing behind the crates, his pistol lying on one of the boxes, exactly where he put it when Spats threatened to shoot his wife.
She was on the floor. The chair was still on its side, and the rope seemed tighter around her neck. Her face was bright pink, her hair a mess, the blouse pulled open. She’d twisted around and she saw me as I aimed at Spats. He was leaning over her and staring at her tits, with the .45 inches from her head. The angle was wrong. I’d be shooting right at Flora from where I was. Even if I got Spats dead center, the bullet might go through him and into her.
I had to get to the other side of the bleeding thug’s body.
I backed away from the balcony rail, making sure I kept my feet out of the blood, and got to the other side. The angle wasn’t perfect but was good enough. At least I had a clear shot at Spats’s right shoulder and head. The body was a better target, farther away from the terrified woman near his feet. I steadied myself against the railing, took a two-handed grip, and fired twice.
Maybe Sammy Spats heard me or maybe he jerked around when the first bullet hit. But he turned to look up, and the big .45 came around fast, and I felt the bullet crack through the air by my face. I fired again and so did Spats. He missed. I didn’t. But then, shooting first is a big advantage.
I slipped the warm pistol back into my coat pocket.
Chapter Twenty-Two
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 9, 1932
VALLEY GREEN, NEW JERSEY
As the sound of shots faded, Spence dashed across the room to his wife. He snapped open a pocket knife and cut the ropes that held her. She sobbed, and repeated, “It was horrible, horrible, horrible.”
Spence went at the ropes with a will. As soon as Flora was free, she flung her arms around his neck, and buried her face in his chest. I fetched my stick and went downstairs.
Spence had a crazed look in his eyes even as he tried to comfort his wife. “There, there,” he said as if he was talking to a child. “Everything’s going to be fine. We couldn’t tell you before, but now it’s all behind us. You’re going to be fine.”
I took the knife from him and freed Mrs. Pennyweight. The rope had left an ugly raw mark on her throat. Ever the lady, she said thanks, and carefully rearranged a silk scarf around her neck to cover it.
I heard a nasty bubbling sound behind me. It was Spats. Looked like the three shots had hit him on top of the shoulder, and in his chest. He lay on his back, eyes wide open, his breathing ragged, with a bloody froth on his mouth. He reached feebly with his left hand for the second .45 in the shoulder holster.
When Spence saw that he wasn’t dead yet, he pushed past me and yanked the pistol from its holster. He was angrier than I had ever seen him. The muzzle quivered as he pointed it at Spats. He would have finished the bastard right there but Flora’s sobs intensified.
Mrs. Pennyweight held her trembling daughter. “Not here, Walter. Not in front of her. She’s been through too much. This wasn’t . . .” She looked at me. “I didn’t know he would go that far.” I guess she’d been trying to teach her daughter some kind of lesson. Hell of a way to go about it.
Spence stuck the pistol into his belt and grabbed Spats by the collar. He dragged the rat bastard out to the driveway and emptied the .45 into his crotch. No need to splatter blood all over the wainscoting.
I turned to Chink, who dabbed at his nose with a pocket square. When Spence returned, he said, “Sorry, Spencer. Things got out of hand. Spats wasn’t supposed to do any of that shit with the ropes and the women. It’s just his way, you know. We was only trying to protect our investment. We had to be sure you wasn’t trying to fuck us over.”
So Chink figured that if he brought Spats and his four Irish thugs for the dirty work, Spence and Cloninger would be outnumbered and outgunned. Chink also had Flora’s chums on the inside. They told him that I was the only threat in the house, and gimpy Jimmy the Stick didn’t worry him much.
But now, even after Spats had attacked Flora, nothing had changed. Spence needed Chink to sell his stuff in the city.
And there were still a lot of loose ends.
I said I was going to get a brandy.
I rapped on the bookshelf and said, “It’s me. Don’t shoot,” before I released the catch and opened the door.
Connie Nix was sitting in the armchair with the rifle tucked under one arm and little Ethan bouncing on her left knee. She looked pretty pissed off. “Can I get out of here? We’ve been sitting in this chair for hours.”
“Yeah, it’s OK now, I think. What happened while I was gone?”
She explained that she first got worried when she was in the kitchen and heard the commotion upstairs. That was Titus blindsiding me, and then Spats laying into him. Mrs. Conway told her to pay no attention because they had work to do. Mrs. Pennyweight had ordered a tray of sandwiches and such for a light Sunday supper and Mr. Spencer’s return. She said there might be other guests.
Around seven, right after I left for the airfield, Mr. Mears took the cart upstairs. The old guy looked troubled when he returned and huddled with Mrs. Conway. They didn’t say anything to Connie but she could see that something bad was brewing.
Flora, Cameron Rivers, and Teddy Banks came back later. The kitchen staff heard more loud noises from upstairs. But Mrs. Conway claimed that Mrs. Pennyweight had said that none of them were to come up to the main floor unless they were called. No exceptions. Mrs. Conway announced she was going to bed. Mr. Mears agreed.
Connie was tempted to do the same until she heard more yells and stuff banging around upstairs. She ran up the servants’ stairs to the second floor and found Ethan in his crib, alone in Mrs. Pennyweight’s room. She knew they were in trouble, so she grabbed the boy and went back down the servants’ stairs.
When she got to the first floor, there were loud voices coming from the ballroom. She heard Mrs. Pennyweight telling Flora to do what the man said. She couldn’t tell what Flora was saying, but she sounded angry and then frightened. After Connie got Ethan into the reading room, she could make out more thumping noises and yelling right outside. That would have been Spats immobilizing Flora and Mrs. Pennyweight, probably with help from Cameron and Teddy.
After that, she waited, rifle close at hand, and didn’t really hear anything else until the shooting started.
We took the boy out into the library and I said, “You did all the right things. Whatever they’re paying you, it’s not enough.”
“Hah! I haven’t been paid in two months. Mrs. Pennyweight keeps saying that the ‘household funds have been frozen’ until the new oilfields are producing. And as soon as Mr. Spencer returned, I’d get a big bonus.”
She needed to know the truth. “That’s not quite right. Spence says he’s done some good business with the oil wells. But the real reason he flew down there was to pick up a load of heroin, cocaine, and morphine in Mexico. With Cloninger’s help, he’s gonna sell it. After that, sure, you and everyone will most likely be paid.”
Connie Nix was struck momentarily speechless. Finally, she said, “That’s crazy.”
I slid open the doors to the main room, and pointed to the wooden crates. Spence and Chink had pried one open, spilling out the excelsior they’d used for padding on the floor. Cloninger was examining a fist-sized cube of morphine, one of hundreds packed in neat little cardboard boxes inside the crates. They looked suspiciously like little Ethan’s imported food. Spence and Chink were talking in low, tight voices. Spence jabbed the smaller man in the chest, and Chink nodded in agreement with everything he said.
The scene reminded me of the first thing I saw when Oh Boy drove me to the house a week ago, with Spence, Cloninger, and Dietz huddled together in the driveway. Was it only a week? Seemed more like a year.
Connie Nix stared openmouthed at the stuff. The boy wriggled around, s
aw Spence, and waved his fat little arms as he yelled, “Dah!”
Spence glanced quickly at his son, smiled, then returned to Chink.
Mrs. Pennyweight untangled herself from Flora, still huddled in a chair. She walked over to the child. “Very good, Nix. Let’s get him back to my room. Ignore the bleeding man on the balcony.” They went upstairs.
Cameron Rivers and Teddy Banks were still unaccounted for, along with Titus. I found them gathered by the Electrola in the ballroom. Titus sat with his head in his hands, leaning over a wastebasket. His face had been cleaned up, but both his shirt and ears were still bloody. He bent over the wastebasket and dry-heaved. It sounded awful. Teddy held a cloth to his friend’s forehead and fretted. Cameron was back into the champagne. The three of them looked like hell.
“I don’t know what kind of deal you’ve got with Chink,” I said. “But if I was you, I’d scram out of here, PDQ.”
Cameron Rivers said, “Chink owes us money. We get a cut.”
Teddy didn’t care. He fretted, “Titus is hurt. He’s cold. We need to get him to a hospital.”
“Yeah, after we talk to—” Cameron stopped and stood up, suddenly terrified. “Flora, Flora, darling, it’s not what you think.”
“You were supposed to be my friend!”
Flora stood in the middle of the room, with one of Spats’s nickel-plated automatics in her hands. It was the one Spats had been using when he shot at me. That meant the hammer was cocked and there was a round in the chamber. All she had to do was pull the trigger. Flora stalked forward, still crying, her nose running, her voice ragged and hoarse.
I got out of the way.
“All that damned flattery and lies. ‘Flora, they all treat you so badly.’ ‘Your mother is using you.’ ‘Your husband doesn’t understand that a young woman has her needs.’ ‘If he really loved you, he’d stay.’ Lies, all lies. And you helped that monster. You helped him attack me.”
“No, Flora, darling, you don’t understand,” Cameron was talking fast, the words tumbling out over each other. “They made me do it, Teddy and Titus and that other man. They threatened me, they beat me, they swore that—”
