I grunted, thinking they hadn’t proved very protective.
We pushed out into the undergrowth, circumnavigating bushes where we could and plowing through when no break was apparent. In about fifty yards we came to the highway.
Almost immediately we found what I had hoped for, tire marks on the clay shoulder. I squatted to examine them and Mouldy followed suit, screwing up his face in an unsuccessful attempt to look intelligent. The automobile had pulled its two right wheels completely off the road, leaving tracks in the shape of a fifteen-yard arc. A slight depression in the center of the arc, smooth and designless, told that the car had stopped, then spun its wheels in starting again. The tread marks were interesting. They consisted of little round dots made by the suction cups of skid-proof tires. I liked that. Such tires are rare, except on commercial vehicles.
Rising, I looked up and down the edge of the treed area in an attempt to detect evidence of anyone having forced through the underbrush. I not only found none, I couldn’t even relocate the spot we had broken through. I am not a woodsman.
We plowed back through the fifty yards of growth and found a sleepy Negro boy waiting for us in the parking area.
“Ize Romulus,” he announced. “Mr. Vance say you all want talk to me.”
I said: “Is Romulus your first or last name?”
He scratched his head and grinned a white, horse-sized grin. “Both, ah guess. Romulus all I got.”
“Where were you when Mr. Bagnell was shot, Romulus?”
“Right here somewhere, I expeck. Must have been right about here when Mr. Louie got it.”
“Seems you should have heard the shot, then. The bath window is only twenty yards from the lot.”
“Yes suh. But like I tole that other policeman, I could been up this end putting in a car. Lots of cars goin’ in and out last night. Maybe I hear it and think it’s a backfire, or maybe I racing some engine and just don’t hear it. Leastwise, I don’ recollect no sound might have been a shot.”
I asked: “Any more gates through this fence aside from the one in front, the one on the side and this one here?”
“No suh. Sure ain’t.”
“None in the part running from the front to the highway?”
“No suh. Jes pure fence.”
“Who has keys to the gates?”
“Jes me, suh. Not even Mr. Louie kept no extra keys. Ain’ no use anyone else having keys. No one goes back here ’cept me, cut grass now and then.”
“And the murderer,” I added.
He rubbed his knuckles over the clipped wool he used for hair. “Yes suh. Guess he come back here all right.”
“Was this gate locked?”
“Yes suh. I alius lock this here gate five o’clock when I come on.”
“Five? You mean it’s open before that?”
“Yes suh. No thin’ locked up till five. That’s when the bank truck come wif money for all them games Mr. Louie had. Daytimes I leave this here gate open for tradesmen deliver stuff to the kitchen. They unloads here, carts de stuff over that door there.” He pointed to the lone door at El Patio’s rear, directly opposite the gate.
“Is that locked at five too?” I asked.
“Yes suh. And barred from de inside.”
“Then whoever shot your boss must have come through those trees from the highway, because there isn’t anywhere else he could come from. He’d have to walk the whole length of the building’s rear, and then back again after the shooting. Your overheads throw at least some light back there. How come you didn’t see him?”
“Ah sure don’ know, suh. I jes plain didn’t hear nothin’ or see nothin’.”
We left him there on the lot, scuffing his feet against the gravel and staring after us yawningly.
CHAPTER FIVE
Blackmail Union
I FOUND FAUSTA ALONE behind the bar mixing herself a rum and coke. “Make mine rye and water,” I said. She deftly pulled a cork from a new bottle and measured out a portion by eye.
“Very professional,” I admired. “Got a, union card?”
“I only pretend like Joe, the bar keep. That’s probably too strong.”
“Better than too weak.” I sampled it and it almost curled my hair. When I recovered my breath, I asked: “Where’s Gloria?”
“Upstairs in Louie’s bed—she is taking nap.”
“How romantic. Who gets Bagnell’s dough, Fausta?”
“They not yet read the will.”
“I know. But you’re a smart little girl. Who gets the dough?”
She screwed up her nose at me. “You take me out tonight?”
I looked up at her, exasperated, then laughed. “Make it tomorrow, blackmailer. What’s the dope?”
“His sister get everything except $100,000 and El Patio. The race wires nobody get, because the syndicate lease to whoever they want now.”
I frowned over this. “That means Byron Wade steps in and ties up every bookshop in town, unless someone in Louie’s mob is smart enough to wear his pants.”
“No one smart enough. Greene the smartest of lot, and he a jolt.”
“You mean a jerk,” I said. “Who gets this place?”
“Me. And $100,000 for a bank.”
I whistled. “Nice business to inherit.” Then I thought of something. “How come he was so nice to you?”
I must have been scowling, because she laughed suddenly. “You jealous,” she accused.
“I am not. I’m just trying to solve a murder.” I tried to relax the wooden-ness of my face and added stiffly: “Your relations with Bagnell are your own business.”
A secret grin, as though at some remembered inner thought, hovered on her lips.
“All-right,” I snapped. “Why’d the old roué cut you in?”
“Four year ago, when I begin deal for Louie, he want very much make love to me.”
She stopped to sip her drink and her eyes danced at the increasing color I couldn’t keep out of my face.
“It’s this drink,” I growled. “You left out the water.”
She went on, her eyes still dancing. “I say no, and he give me many fine clothes and pretty jewels. I say thanks, but I still say no and he change his will like it is now and show it to me.”
“All this,” I broke in, “was while I was overseas crawling around in the mud!”
Her head went up high. “And what, Meester Moon, have you in the mud got to do with something?”
“You were engaged to me!”
“And who breaked it up?”
Our hands gripping the bar edge on either side, we glared at each other like angry kids. I recovered first and realized we were acting juvenile.
I forced a grin. “We both did. You moved out of my class, and I moved out of your way.”
“You never asked do I want you move.”
“Let’s not revive dead issues, Fausta. You were telling about the will.”
Her eyes stayed violent and she raised her glass to gulp her drink with an offended flourish. I continued to grin at her until her expression turned to a pout, then a penitent smile.
“O.K.,” she conceded. “We friends again. After Louie show me the will, I still say no and he say what do I want—to marry him? I say it is nothing I want from him but to deal his cards for my very good salary. He grumble a while and finally leave me alone, but I know he never change back the will.”
I got another unpleasant idea and blurted it out before I thought. “He wasn’t intending to change it soon, was he?”
“Not that I know.” Then the meaning of my question struck her. “What you mean, Manny?”
“Just what I asked.”
“You mean do I kill Louie?” Her eyes were still and disbelieving and her lips unnaturally straight.
I retreated fast. “Of course not, baby. I just asked a question.”
The hurt went out of her eyes at “baby”, a special word I hadn’t used since she stopped being my special girl, and some of the tautness left her face. “You looked so like a detect
ive, Manny. For a minute I feel strange to you. Why you call me ‘baby’?”
I said, “Pour in more water,” and pushed my half empty glass at her.
She held it under the faucet for a moment, then set it back on the bar.
“Why you call me baby?” she repeated.
I tasted my drink and said: “Much less poisonous. You know, Fausta, a hundred thousand is lots of dollars, but not much to back a place with this class clientele. A bad run the first night could wipe you out.”
She watched irritably while I poured down the rest of my drink. “You change the subject,” she accused.
I summoned up an insincere expression of innocence. “I mean it. A hundred thousand is no bank for this place.”
She shrugged resignedly. “I shall close the casino and make into it a cocktail lounge. Less money I make this way, but I sure of what I make. You like going in nightclub business, Manny?”
I grinned at her crookedly. “Thanks, Fausta, but I’m a lousy chef. Who was mad at Bagnell aside from Wade and his mob?”
“No one. Unless Amos Horne.”
“Got any ideas at all about this thing?”
“No.”
I straightened away from the bar. “Then I’ll see you around, Fausta.”
She scurried around the bar and caught my coat-tail. “Not so quick, my one. Tomorrow night you come what time?”
I snapped my fingers. “Oh yes. Tomorrow night. How about eleven?”
“Manny Moon!” She stamped both small feet like a child preparing for a tantrum. “I know your one hour dates! You get me eleven, take me home midnight. You come eight o’clock.”
“Nine,” I temporized.
Her eyes snapped. “O. K. But you one minute late, I cut out your heart.”
IT WAS 5:45 when a taxi let me out at 1418 Newberry. I rang the bell of apartment C, but nothing happened, so I pushed it again and kept my finger on it until I heard footsteps. The door abruptly jerked wide.
Although the man outweighed me, I had to look down to see his face. His head, like an upright pear, set the design for his body, which coned outward from narrow shoulders to thick hips and horseshoe legs. The last time I had seen a figure like his, it had been in a cage and I threw peanuts at it. He was in his undershirt and could have used on the top of his head some of the excess hair which matted his arms and shoulders. I guessed his age as forty-five.
“Amos Horne?” I asked.
“What you want?”
Putting one hand against his chest, I pushed him back into the room and kicked the door shut behind me.
“I’m Moon. Your wife sent me.”
His fists clenched, but he left them dangling at his sides. His eyes narrowed scornfully. “Where is the dumb tramp?”
I said: “Sit down and we’ll talk about things.”
“Lissen, you got a lousy nerve busting in here and telling me to sit down. If you got a message from my wife, spill it and scram.”
I said: “Sit down.”
His face reddened and he started to raise one fist. I didn’t move, and when his hand got shoulder high the fist unclenched, his expression turned uncertain and he used the hand to scratch the fuzz over his ear. He sat down.
“What you want?” he asked.
I unfolded onto a sofa next to his chair. “I’m a private investigator, and I want some answers. You don’t have to give any, but if you don’t, I’ll put a bug in the ear of Inspector Day at Homicide, and then you will have to give answers.”
“Homicide! I ain’t killed nobody.”
“Good. Then you won’t mind questions. Where were you last night?”
“Wait a minute. What’s this all about?”
“About a murder. Louis Bagnell was killed last night. Don’t you read papers?”
He looked startled, then a wary expression grew in his eyes. “I ain’t seen the papers. I work nights and haven’t been out all day. What’s Bagnell got to do with me?”
“Nothing. Except he was playing your wife and you threatened to kill them both.”
His mouth opened in what could have been honest amazement. “Did that fool wife of mine say that?”
“She did.”
“To the cops?”
“Not yet. But she probably will if they ask her.”
He let out a sigh of relief. “Look, Mister … What you say your name was?”
“Moon.”
“Moon,” he repeated with a thoughtful frown. Then half-recognition dawned in his eyes. “Yeah. I’ve heard of you. Look, Moon, my wife is a moron. I never said I’d kill nobody.”
“What did you say?”
“I don’t know. I was mad when I found out about her and Bagnell and just spouted off a lot of stuff. But I never said I’d kill nobody. It was something general, like you say when you’re mad. Like I’d beat both their brains in, or wring their necks or something. But, cripes, I didn’t mean I really would!”
I said: “Funny you use the term ‘wring their necks’. Did I tell you Bagnell was strangled?”
His jaw dropped. “I thought he was shot!”
“He was. Now tell me how you knew.”
His face changed from startlement to sullenness, then a begrudging grin spread across it. “Walked into that neat, didn’t I? It’s been on the radio all day. I figured I’d be smart and not know nothing. Guess I was too smart.”
“Let’s go back to my first question. Where were you last night?”
“I work from six-thirty to one-thirty in the morning.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“I was at work.”
“Where’s that?”
“I run a bingo game at Eighth and Market.”
“Got a telephone here?”
He looked surprised. “Yeah. In the hall.”
“What’s the number of your bingo hall?”
He pursed his lips and shook his head back and forth, “Sorry. It’s a private listing. We don’t give it out to everybody.”
“I can just as easily phone Homicide and have them check.”
I let him think it over for a minute. He said: “Fairmont 2103.”
I found the phone in the hall, dialed the number, and after a long time a male voice answered.
“Amos Horne there?” I asked.
“Naw. We ain’t open yet.”
“This is a friend of his. When’s the best time to catch him?”
“He gets here about six-thirty.”
“That’s too early. How late’s he stay?”
“Till closing. One-thirty.”
“He wasn’t there last night,” I objected. “I was in about eight.”
The voice on the other end grew impatient. “He went out for a while last night. He’ll be here tonight.”
I said, “Thanks,” and hung up.
When I returned to the living room, the begrudging grin was back on Horne’s face.
“All right,” he said. “I was gone from the hall from seven to nine. Does that prove I bumped Bagnell?”
“It might. What’s your story?”
“I was just riding around. Couldn’t keep my mind on business for thinking about Gloria, so I put one of the guys in charge and took a drive.”
“Where?”
“Just around.”
“For two whole hours?”
“Yeah.”
“Go near El Patio?”
His mouth quirked insolently. “Yeah. Drove out the highway right past it. Didn’t stop.”
“Stop here?”
His eyebrows were built straight across his forehead, undivided, like a hairy rope. Now one raised, forming a startling broken stair design.
“Why should I stop here?” he asked.
“To see if Gloria were home. Did you?”
“Suppose I did? So what?”
“So you did.” I rose. “Get your shirt on.”
He rose also. “Now wait a minute. You’re no cop. You got no right to arrest me.”
“Relax. I’m not arresting you
. Get your shirt on.”
He watched my face undecidedly, scratched his ear fuzz again, then went into the bedroom. In a few minutes he came out fully dressed.
“Now what?” he asked.
“Where do you keep your car?”
“Garage in back.”
“Let’s go.”
I followed him down some back stairs and across the rear yard to the alley. Lifting the center of three identical sliding doors, he exposed a 1938 Ford coach. Without stirring from the alley, I could see his tires were new synthetics and treaded with a V-thread.
“Got any other cars?” I asked.
He shook his head. “I ain’t a millionaire.”
“O. K. You can close it again.”
His left eyebrow made its queer twisting jump again. For a moment he looked at me curiously, then reached up, caught the door’s bottom edge and slammed it against the concrete floor.
“What was that for?” he asked.
“I just like to look at cars. It’s a fetish. What shall I tell your wife?”
“Tell the blamed fool to come home.”
“And get her ears knocked down?”
“Aw, I wouldn’t slam her.”
“I’ll tell her,” I said. “And I’ll see you around.”
I walked down the alley until it met a side street.
FROM a drugstore booth I phoned Warren Day at his home.
“Find out who the dame with the slave bracelet was?” I asked.
“No.” He sounded tired. “We had Mrs. Wade down to look at the girl’s body. She didn’t know her. She said her first husband had a cousin in Belleville, but couldn’t remember her first name and wasn’t even sure the last was O’Conner. We’re checking Belleville. Mrs. Wade said her first husband had no other relatives, far as she knows.”
“How about the other name on the bracelet?”
“Gerald Foster? Nothing yet. But the story’ll be in tomorrow’s papers. We’re hoping Gerald can read.”
I asked: “Any other progress?”
“Listen,” Day said, “I run Homicide, not the information bureau. Go out and dig up your own dope.”
His receiver slammed in my ear.
Early the following evening, just as I finished a painful second shave before my date with Fausta, the doorbell rang. It was Mrs. Wade, an unnecessarily hot fur collar haloing her cool face. Glancing beyond her, I saw she was alone and stepped aside for her to enter.
No Pockets in a Shroud Page 5
