by Henry, Kane,
I took Alice Hilliad by the hand and led her to a mirror.
“That’s why,” I said and I pointed at the mirror.
There was hardly a bulge.
Higgins glanced at Gorin and nodded his head and looked wise. Gorin said, “I hate those things. Whatever it is, Mr. Chambers, please be careful.”
I said, “For a guy that practically ordered me shot up, you’re most solicitous, now that you think I’m working for you.”
I got out a stitched-wool felt hat with a wide brim and a narrow band and a feather and I went out.
I walked across to Curtis Wilde, Inc. I got rid of my gum.
I saw my friend Finnegan, bodyguard and bouncer de luxe with no bodies to guard and no one to bounce, and I inquired whether he could dig up Mr. Holstein for me.
“No good,” Finnegan said. “He fell on his face. Or something. He’s home. He had an accident.”
Which was all right by me.
I went up and saw Blair Curtis, smooth as talcum powder, happy to see me.
“How are you, Mr. Chambers?”
“Fine,” I said.
“Any closer to a solution?”
“Much closer.”
He looked surprised.
“Really?”
“I think so.”
“Can you tell me?”
“Not yet. But soon, I hope.”
I stuck my nose in on Edith Wilde.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“Where’d you learn that ‘hi’ stuff?” I asked.
“I’m strictly New York,” she said.
“For how long?”
“For the last twelve years.”
“And before that?”
“Rebel debbil.”
“No time for small talk. I’ve got to run. See you tonight?”
“Swell.”
At four thirty, I sat in my office and diddled with my hat and watched the clock on my desk and at ten minutes to five, Grant called.
I said, “Hello, Andy.”
Grant said, “I think you and I have some business, if that’s what you were leading up to when we talked last at the Nevada. You’re a pretty smart operator. Will you come and see me?”
“When?”
“Say at about five thirty, if you like.”
“I like. Very much.”
“See you then. Good-by.”
Hardly a bulge.
The first thing he said was, “Open your jacket,” and when I opened it, he said, “Take that pistol out, and use your fingertips. And put it here, on the desk.”
The girl at the switchboard was putting her hat on when I came and she had nodded when I had given her my name. “Yes, sir. He’s expecting you. Directly through the library.”
I hadn’t knocked. The door had swung closed behind me.
Now he sat behind his desk and gave orders.
I pinched Holly’s gun out of the holster and ladylike, with pinky extended, I put it on the desk.
“Sit down,” he said. “This chair, facing the desk.”
He motioned at it with the hand that held the nickel-plated outsize revolver. He sure had a big one, big-bellied, at least .50 caliber, and it looked like it belonged in a rodeo.
I said, “I’ll talk you out of that gun.”
His bulk filled out and spread over the chair behind the desk. His pale blond hair shone like a three-way torch on low. His black eyes squinted.
“Want to bet?” he asked.
“Ridiculous,” I said. It was something to say.
He pushed a key on the inter-office enunciator. “Everybody gone, Miss Fisher?”
“Yes, sir. Except Marie and myself. Just going.”
“You two run along then,” he said pleasantly. He snapped the key. He said, “Go on.”
“What?”
“Start talking me out of it.”
“May I smoke?”
He sat up straight. He rested his right arm on the desk. The muzzle of that stylish howitzer looked big enough to put your fist in.
He said, “I warn you, I’m nervous. Move slowly and we’ll get along, for a time. Put your cigarettes and your matches on your end of the desk. Then take one. Tricks — and you’re the late Mr. Chambers, which, at that, would be postponing the inevitable only infinitesimally.”
I moved slowly. I placed cigarettes and matches on the desk.
“Very good,” Grant said.
I lit one. Very slowly. “Consider, Andy,” I said, “that I might not be alone in my suspicions. It could be that you’ve been the subject of discussion. It could be people know I’m coming here. It could be I left a note, a letter, one of those ‘if I’m not back by eight o’clock’ things.”
“It could be,” he said, “but it isn’t.”
“Why, daddy?”
“Because, dear Peter Chambers, I know you. You are a professional, on the other side. The first move, always, is study your adversary. I know many more things about you than that you measure six feet two, that you have black wavy hair that’s cute when it falls over one eye and a little mustache that gives you a devil-may-care air and that you’re a bear with women. Much, much more. I’ve put time on it.”
I fixed my face to look interested. This bird with the large gun was having a fine time. I wasn’t.
He looked cheerful as a Christmas card. “You’re a self-centered, disdainful, egotistical dilettante. You work alone. You’re contemptuous of the police and you’re distrustful of the discretion of your associates. Sometimes you take your partner, Scoffol, into your confidence. Sometimes. You think he’s a stodgy, plodding, honest old-time cop. And he’s been out of town, anyway, and to telephone would be like sonny reporting to teacher, and you don’t go for that. And psychologically, it would be glory for you to preen before Scoffol, on his return, with another case you busted wide open, and with dispatch. You’ve probably checked on me, but, please note, I’ve checked on you too, and very thoroughly.”
I smoked. I felt like flicking at my mustache (that gives me a devil-may-care air) but I didn’t. I was beginning to wonder whether I was going to talk this guy out of it.
“Therefore,” Grant said, “you did no could-be’s. Not you. And if I’m wrong, it makes no difference. Could-be’s aren’t proof and proof is what it takes for conviction.”
I said, “All right. I play solo. So what?”
“So you and I both play solo. But there’s a difference. You play by rules. I don’t. You lose.”
I said, “Why the conversation?”
“We’re killing time. It amuses me. I like fencing with you. Still think you can talk me out of it?”
I said, “Fence this — where and how do you dump me? You can’t just do it and blow.”
“Don’t try to be cagey, Chambers, to draw me out. It isn’t necessary. Just ask me. I’m pleased to tell you anything you want to know. See if it will do you any good.”
I pulled back my lips and gave him a smile, a wise one. “You’re a cinch, chum, believe me. You’re supposed to blast with your fancy cannon, that’s all. But you want to fence. Fine. For me.”
“Brave words.”
“What have I got to lose?”
“We’ll have our chat first, if you will. You’ll like that. You’ll learn a good deal that I’m sure you want to know. Later, I’ll blast.”
I said, “A guy that talks as much as you in a spot like this, generally they don’t shoot.”
“Generally,” he said, and he wet his lips.
I lit a fresh cigarette. Slowly. The gun made a wide flat shadow, oblique on the desk.
“So,” I said, “when and how do you dump me? It’s dangerous.”
(He liked to talk. Which was good. Put that down as rule one. A guy with a heater that likes to talk, that guy can be taken. I had a feeling he was going to be bird’s-nest soup. I hoped.)
“Mostly, Chambers, this chat, as I said, is for killing time. You’re better company alive than dead, although this is the first time I think so. Als
o, there are a few items I’m curious about. But first, as to when and how: this is a small building and by nine o’clock the porters and cleaning people are gone. Then there is only one man, the night man. I telephone down and I send him on an errand. I’ve done it before. My car is parked around the corner. If the night man should lock the exit, I have a key. I take you to my car. I stuff you in and I return here. The night man comes back, I thank him and I go. Alone. I take you for a long quiet ride — oh, a long one — I drive almost all night. Then I deposit you. Maybe in a river, with proper equipment attached. Leave it to me. Neat?”
“Neat enough.”
He stuck a flat cigar in the corner of his mouth. He used his desk lighter, and he lit it. All with his left hand. His right hand wavered only slightly.
“And now,” he said, “you can tell me something. How did you know it was I?”
“Research, pal. Plus.”
“Plus what?”
“Plus I saw Rochelle Pratt Curtis murdered and I knew she had recognized the guy in the cab. Which meant, whoever he was, he was someone within her circle of acquaintances.”
Very intently he said, “But that’s a very wide range. That’s an impossible range.”
“I narrowed it down.”
“How?”
“I’ll tell you after you tell me.”
“Sure,” he said. “It makes no difference. Tell you what?”
“By the way, Andy. This occurs to me. How do you know that I haven’t another gun on me? You haven’t touched me. I might be trouble.”
“Not you,” he said. “You’re not melodramatic. Not you. All right, what were you interested in?”
I flicked ashes over the side of my chair. “In your organization. That is a lulu.”
“Thanks. That’s Andrew Grant.”
“I said organization.”
“I said Andrew Grant.”
He took the hand with the gun off the desk. He sat back in his chair. He motioned with his right hand. The gun waved a lot.
“Chambers, a long time ago I learned it was dog eat dog. A human life means nothing; your own life, conversely, means everything. We are taught differently. Comes a war — how quickly they attempt to reteach us. You have no personal grievance against the soldier of the enemy — but you kill him, unfeelingly. A human life, in the vast perspective, means nothing; but protect yourself. With yourself, there is no perspective.”
“Very lovely,” I said amiably. “So?”
“So there came an opportunity at one time to earn a great deal of money. The condition precedent was the demise of one individual. I had no personal grievance — but he became the enemy, and he died. My client believed, as do all my clients in that category, as you believe, that I am a link in a chain — the link between him, the client, and a well-organized, nefarious, lethal organization. I have earned the reputation, in exclusive circles; oh, well merited, of being the one to consult.”
“Preposterous,” I said. I swallowed accumulated spit in my mouth. I said, “That’s one racket that just can’t be worked solo.”
His cigar had died. He relit it. He was careless with the gun. I could have jumped him then. I didn’t.
He said, “I’m afraid you’re right again. I have needed assistants, at times. Rarely; I’m a trained lawyer and I know the meaning of evidence. I have used assistants, upon occasion, but each only once. Unfortunately, the dictates of my philosophy and my duty to myself prescribe that they must not ever be available to give evidence.”
I moved my mouth and showed my teeth and sort of reached for a grin. “No witnesses. I understand, perfectly. You were out on a job and Rochelle recognized you after Gorin was slugged and that was dangerous, which was her very hard luck. Feisal and Pineapple were witnesses to murder. So they too had to be disposed of.”
“Simple as that,” he said. He looked at his wrist watch. “And, now, please, how did you fit me in?”
“Murder on top of murder is good. But not perfect. Otherwise — what am I doing here now?”
In the dispassionate tone of a subway dime-changer, he said, very clearly: “Almost perfect, though, when properly performed, professionally. Omit the usual moron engaged in that work and omit motive — and you must have live witnesses. True; sometimes little deductions, bad breaks, that sort of thing, may lead one to suspect the culprit, but that is suspicion. When suspicion is sound and well based, it may lead to questioning, even arrest, it might terminate one’s usefulness in the field — but for a conviction, my irrepressible friend, proof is necessary. But I’m very curious. How did you manage it?”
“Blamey, Pineapple, cross-index file cards, cross-index in human minds, coincidence, a snapshot and a bathing beauty — and then you murdered Mike Maine.”
“That’s a riddle, not a reply.”
I said softly, “After I tell you, do we talk more?”
“Of course. I cannot imagine circumstances again wherein I may enjoy the luxury of loose talk and indulge the very natural desire to boast, to boot. I’ll gladly give you all the information you want, for the good it will do you. At most, it is for quick digestion …”
I reached for my pack of cigarettes. Slowly. I lit one from my butt and put the butt into the ash tray. I kept sitting on the edge of the chair. “Well, sir, I became interested in you from the personal angle. That’s Blamey. My interest quickened because somone talked to me about you, about Joe Pineapple, and about a guy called Little Squirt Cole.”
He sucked in his lower lip and he held it between his teeth. Nothing else.
“That someone,” I went on, “was Matty Pineapple, Joe’s brother. Then I checked on you downtown, just for fun, and cross-indexes and hunches set you up as a bad boy that had managed to stay clean, technically. I happened to be near when Rochelle Curtis was killed. That’s coincidence. I shot up the cab, which identified it quickly and coupled Feisal and Pineapple to the Rochelle thing — ”
“That was you too?” he interrupted.
“Yes. And I was retained on a matter that made all of that important. And a snapshot of a woman with an inordinately fine figure caught my attention and there you were, on that snapshot, with Rochelle Curtis. The range had narrowed, hadn’t it? I put Mike Maine on you. And then, Andy, you made the biggest mistake in your life. Now you’re going to have to do it to me too. Maybe.”
“Very noble. I’ll do it.”
“I’ll tell you something else. From my side of the fence. A professional killer who’s intelligent is a rarity; about the toughest proposition the coppers can grapple with. And a professional killer who is a loner, who sticks murder on murder for a purpose, who kills off his occasional necessary help, and who knows how to keep his mouth shut and his nose clean — that is a system. But you’ve been blabbing now, Andy, and that’s very wrong.”
“See if it will help,” he said.
“I can understand almost all of it. But I cannot understand why Mike Maine? You just lost your head.”
He said, “That was emotional. A crime of passion; that which a professional should never indulge in. My first crime of passion. Passionate hatred of you. You will be my second crime of passion, although you’ve mixed yourself into my affairs, so it will be business and pleasure. You tempted me with your Mike Maine. Blame yourself. And like it.”
I said nothing.
Neither of us said anything for a couple of minutes.
Then I said, “The play on Gorin was snatch. Which is out of your line. Why?”
Sharply he spat, “That’s enough of that.”
He was ripe for a jolt.
“Andy boy; Edward Holstein, formerly Grandma Ed Holly, retained you for a job on Wesley Gorin and Joe Pineapple, and the jobs were murder, not snatch.”
His eyes bulged like Esquire’s dandy little man. His teeth sawed into the unlit cigar and his jaw muscles lumped. And his hands trembled, with anger or surprise or excitement.
The time was right now.
I had reached for cigarettes and I had reached
for matches and I had reached putting them back into the ash tray and I had worked my way to the edge of the chair. I wasn’t sitting. I was squatting, crouching. I had figured the distance to the desk and I had figured the width of the desk and I knew I could make it. Now I let loose and went, clear over the desk. He pulled the thing and it made a big noise, but he was all upset. I heard the slug smack the wall, somewhere high. He didn’t pull it again. I had his right wrist in my left hand and my left knee was in his lap and we tussled and I reached over and got Holly’s gun off the desk and I smashed it against his head. Twice. He was quiet.
He lay face down half across the desk.
I shoved him back into his chair. I took his shining gun in my left hand and Holly’s in my right and I walked around the desk and moved my chair back several feet and sat down.
Two-gun Chambers.
After a while, he stirred and opened his eyes.
I said, “Hello, Andy boy.”
He looked at me with remote friendly eyes. Then he stiffened and his eyes came awake. He tilted his face sidewise like a pigeon cocking its head at a handful of corn. He leaned back in the chair and he touched his head. His hand came back with a spot of blood.
I said, “You’re one of those talking guys, you know.”
“For a professional killer,” I said, “you smell bad. And the chair you insisted upon for me was too close to the desk, or hadn’t you thought about that?”
He said nothing.
“All right, Andy, buck up just a little. I’m a talking guy myself. We’re not through chatting. Why snatch for Wesley?”
He said nothing.
“Look. Mike Maine was very dear to me. Just give me an excuse. I’m working on a case and I want information. Either we talk or I start putting little holes in you.”
Stiffly he said, “Because Holly put up twenty-five thousand for each of them, which is money. Something was cooking. I proposed to take Gorin in tow, and hold up Holly.”
“And Pineapple would be your assistant because for a snatch you need an assistant and in the end they’d both be taken care of and you’d earn your dough and everything would be jake.”
