Oh, it was great. Something was getting done that should have been done years ago. The heat was on and the fire was burning a lot of pants. The music I had on the radio was interrupted every five minutes now with special newscasts that said the people were getting control of the situation at last.
Of the people, for the people, by the people. We weren’t so soft after all. We got pushed too far once too often and the backs were up and teeth bared.
What were the Commies doing! They must be going around in circles. The thing that would have tipped the balance back to them again had been in their hands and they’d dropped it. Was the M.V.D. out taking care of those who had been negligent? Probably. Very probably. Pork-Pie Hat would have himself a field day. They were the only ones who knew where those documents weren’t. Our own government knew where they started to go and still thought they were in their hands. I was the only one who knew where they were.
Not five feet away. Safe as pie, I thought.
The phone rang and I picked it up. The operator said, “I have your party, sir.”
I said thanks, waited for the connection and heard Lee saying, “Hello, hello ...”
“Mike Hammer, Lee.”
“Yes, Mike, how are you?”
“Fine. I hear Washington is in an uproar.”
“Quite. You can’t imagine what it’s like. They tell me the hall is filled to the rafters already, waiting to hear the speeches. I’ve never seen so many reporters in my life.”
“Going to give ‘em hell tonight?”
“I’ll do my best. I have an important topic to discuss. Was there something special you wanted, Mike?”
“Yeah, sort of. I just wanted to tell you that I found it.”
“It?”
“What Oscar left behind. I found it.”
His voice held a bitter ring. “I knew it, I knew it! I knew he’d do something like that. Mike ... is it bad?”
“Oh no. In fact it’s pretty good. Yeah, pretty good.”
He paused, and when he spoke again he sounded tired. “Remember what I told you, Mike. It’s in your hands. Authenticate what you found, and if you believe that it would be better to publish the facts, then make them public.”
I laughed lightly. “Not this, Lee. It isn’t something you can print in a paper. It isn’t anything that you nor Pat nor I expected to find. It doesn’t tie you into a damn thing so you can blast ‘em tonight and make it good because what I have can push you right up there where you can do a good housecleaning job.”
The surprise and pleasure showed in his voice. “That is fine news, Mike. When can I see it?”
“When will you be back in New York?”
“Not before Monday night.”
“It’ll keep. I’ll see you then.”
I pushed the phone back across the desk and started working on the remainder of the sherry. I finished it in a half-hour and closed up the office. It was Saturday night and time to play. I had to wait until Velda came back before I made my decision. I ambled up Broadway and turned into a bar for a drink. The place was packed and noisy, except when the news bulletin came on. At seven o‘clock they turned on the TV and all heads angled to watch it. They were relaying in the pics of the dinner in Washington that was to be followed by the speeches. The screen was blurred, but the sound was loud and clear.
I had a good chance to watch Mr. and Mrs. Average People take in the political situation and I felt good all over again. It was no time to come up with the documents. Not yet. Let the fire stay on full for a while. Let it scorch and purify while it could.
The bartender filled my glass and I leaned forward on my elbows to hear Lee when he spoke.
He gave them a taste of hell. He used names and quotations and pointed to the big whiskers in the Kremlin as the brother of the devil. He threw the challenge in the faces of the people and they accepted it with cheers and applause that rocked the building.
I shouted the way I felt louder than anybody and had another drink.
At midnight I walked back to my car and drove home slowly, my mind miles away from my body. Twice I patted the .45 under my arm and out of force of habit I kept a constant check on the cars behind me.
I put the car in the garage, told the attendant to service it fully and went out the side door that led to the street. When I looked both ways and was satisfied that I wasn’t going to run into another ambush I stepped out to the sidewalk and walked to my building.
Before I went upstairs I checked the little panel of lights behind the desk in the lobby. It was a burglar alarm and one of the lights was connected to the windows and doors in my apartment. They were all blank so I took the stairs up and shoved the key in the lock.
For safety’s sake I went through the place and found it as empty as when I left it. Maybe Pork-Pie was afraid of a trap. Maybe he was waiting to get me on the street. He and the others had the best reason in the world to get me now. It wouldn’t be too long before they figured out where the documents went to, and that was the moment I was hoping for.
I wanted them, every one of the bastards. I wanted them all to myself so I could show the sons-of-bitches what happened when they tried to play rough with somebody who likes that game himself!
The late news broadcast was on and I listened for further developments. There weren’t any. I shoved the .45 under my pillow and rolled into the sack.
CHAPTER 10
I slept all day Sunday. At six-fifteen P.M. I got up to answer the persistent ringing of my doorbell and a Western Union messenger handed me a telegram. He got a buck for his persistence and I went into the living room where I opened it up.
The telegram was from Velda. It was very brief, saying the mission was accomplished and she was carrying the papers out on the first plane. I folded the yellow sheet and stuck it in the pocket of my coat that was draped on the back of the chair.
I had a combination meal, sent down for the papers and read them in bed. When I finished I slept again and didn’t wake up until twelve hours later. The rain was beating against the windows with a hundred tiny fingers and the street was drenched with an overflow too great to be carried off by the sewers at the end of the block.
For a few minutes I stood at the window and looked out into the murk of the morning, not aware of the people that scurried by on the sidewalks below, or of the cars whose tires made swishing sounds on the wet pavement. Across the street, the front of the building there wavered as the water ran down the glass, assuming the shape of a face molded by ghostly hands. The face had eyes like two berries on a bush and they turned their stare on me.
This is it, Judge, Here is your rain of purity. You’re a better forecaster than I thought. Now, of all times, it should rain. Cold, clear rain that was washing away the scum and the filth and pulling it into the sewer. It’s here and you’re waiting for me to step out into it and be washed away, aren’t you? I could play it safe and stay where I am, but you know I won’t. I’m me, Mike Hammer, and I’ll be true to form. I’ll go down with the rest of the scum.
Sure, Judge, I’ll die. I’ve been so close to death that this time the scythe can’t miss me. I’ve dodged too often, now I’ve lost the quick-step timing I had that made me duck in time. You noticed it and Pat noticed it ... I’ve changed, and now I notice it myself. I don’t care any more.
The hell of it is, Judge ... your question won’t get answered. You’ll never know why I was endowed with the ability to think and move fast enough to keep away from the man with the reaper. I kept breaking his hour-glass and dulling his blade and he couldn’t do a thing about it.
Your rain of purity has come, and out there in it is the grim specter who is determined that this time he will not miss. He’ll raise his vicious scythe and swing at me with all the fury of his madness and I’ll go down, but that one wild swing will take along a lot of others before it cuts me in half.
Sorry, Judge, so sorry you’ll never know the answer. I was curious myself. I wanted to know the answer too. It’s been puzzl
ing me a long, long time.
I showered and dressed, packing the automatic away in the oiled leather holster under my arm. When I finished I called long distance and was connected with the hospital. Again I was lucky and got the doctor while he was there. I told him my name and that was enough.
“Miss Brighton is out of danger,” he said. “For some reason she is under police guard.”
“Studious young men?”
“Yes.”
“How about her father?”
“He visits her daily. His own doctor is prescribing for her.”
“I see. My time is up, you know. You can talk if you like.”
“For some reason I prefer not to, Mr. Hammer. I still don’t understand, but I still believe that there is more to this than I can see. Miss Brighton asked me if you had called and I repeated our conversation. She has taken the same attitude of silence.”
“Thanks, doc. It’s going to be rough when it starts, but thanks. Tell Miss Brighton I was asking for her.”
“I will. Good day.”
I put the phone back and shrugged into my raincoat. Downstairs I got my car out of the garage and backed out into the rain. The windshield wipers were little demons working furiously, fighting to keep me from being purified. I drove downtown hoping to see Pat, but he had called in that his car was stuck somewhere along the highway and he might not make it in at all.
The morning went by without my noticing its passing. When my stomach tightened I went in and had lunch. I bought a paper and parked the car to read it through. The headlines hadn’t changed much. There were pages devoted to the new aspect of the cold war; pages given to the coming election, pages that told of the shake-up in Washington, and of the greater shake-up promised by the candidates running for election.
Lee had given ‘em hell, all right. The editorial quoted excerpts from his speech and carried a two-column cut of him shaking his fist at the jackals who were seeking the protection of the same government they had tried to tear down. There was another Communist demonstration, only this one was broken up by an outraged populace and ten of the Reds had landed in the hospital. The rest were sweeping out corridors in the city jail.
The rain let up, but it was only taking a breather before it came down even harder. I took advantage of the momentary lull to duck into a drugstore and put in a call to Lee’s office. His secretary told me that he wasn’t expected in until evening and I thanked her. I bought a fresh pack of Luckies and went back to the car and sat. I watched the rain and timed my thoughts to its intensity.
I took all the parts and let them drop, watching to see how they fit in place. They were all there now, every one. I could go out any time and show that picture around and anybody could tell that it was a big red flag with a star and a hammer and sickle. I could show it to them but I’d have to have the last piece of proof I needed and I’d have that when Velda got back. I went over it time after time until I was satisfied, then I reached for a butt.
There was only one left. I had just bought a pack and there was only one left. My watch was a round little face that laughed at me for thinking the afternoon away and I stared at it, amazed that the night had shifted in around the rain and I hadn’t noticed it. I got out and went back to the same drugstore and looked up the number of the terminal.
A sugar-coated voice said that all the planes were on schedule despite the rain and the last one from the Midwest had landed at two o‘clock. I smacked my hand against my head for letting time get away from me and called the office. Velda didn’t answer so I hung up. I was about to call her apartment when I remembered that she’d probably be plenty tired and curled up in the sack, but she said she’d leave anything she had in the lamp if I wasn’t in the office when she got in.
I started the car up and the wipers went back into action. The rain of purity was starting to give up and here I was still warm and dry. For how long?
The lights were on in the office and I practically ran in. I yelled, “Hey, Velda!” The smile I had ready died away because she wasn’t there. She had been there, though. I smelled the faintest trace of the perfume she used. I went right to the lamp and opened the little compartment. She had laid it right on top of the other stuff for me.
I pulled it out and spread it across my desk, feeling the grin come back slowly as I read the first few lines.
It was done. Finished. I had it all ready to wrap up nice and legal now. I could call Pat and the studious-looking boys with the F.B.I, badges and drop it in their laps. I could sit back in a ringside seat and watch the whole show and laugh at the judge because this time I was free and clear, with my hands clean of somebody’s blood. The story would come out and I’d be a hero. The next time I stepped into that court of law and faced the little judge his voice would be quiet and his words more carefully chosen because I was able to prove to the world that I wasn’t a bloodthirsty kill-happy bastard with a mind warped by a war of too many dawns and dusks laced by the crisscrossed patterns of bullets. I was a normal guy with normal instincts and maybe a temper that got a little out of hand at times, but was still under control when I wanted it that way.
Hell, Pat should be back now. I’ll let him get the credit for it. He won’t like it, but he’ll have to do it. I reached for the phone.
That’s when I saw the little white square of cardboard that had been sitting there in front of me all the time. I picked it up, scowling at the brief typewritten message. CALL LO 3-8099 AT EXACTLY NINE P.M. That was all. The other side was blank.
I didn’t get it. Velda was the only one to have been here and she would have left more of an explanation, at least. Besides, we had memo pads for stuff like this. I frowned again and threw it back on the desk. It was ten to eight now. Hell, I wasn’t going to wait another hour. I dialed the number and heard the phone ring a dozen times before I hung up.
A nasty taste was in my mouth. My shoulders kept hunching up under my coat as if I were cold. I went to the outer office to see if she had left a note in her desk typewriter and found nothing.
It wasn’t right. Not at a moment like this. Nothing else could come up now. Hell, I was on my way to being a hero. The door of the washroom was standing open a little and I went to close it. The light from the lamp on the wall darted in the crack and bounced back at me with bright sparkle. I shoved the door open and every muscle in my body pulled tight as a bowstring and my breath caught in my throat.
There beside the faucet was Velda’s ring ... the sapphire ring I had given her and her wrist watch!
Velda wasn’t here but her ring was and no girl is going to go off and forget her ring! No girl will wash her hands and not dry them, either ... But Velda apparently had, for there was no crumpled paper towel in the basket under the sink!
Somehow I staggered back to my chair and sat down, the awful realization of it hitting me hard. I buried my face in my hands and said, “Oh, God ... oh, God!” I knew what had happened now . . . they had her! They walked in on her and took her away.
I thought I was clever. I thought they’d try for me. But they were clever when the chips were down and now they had something they could trade. That’s what they’d say... trade. Ha, that was a laugh. They’d take the documents and when I asked them to give her back I’d get a belly full of slugs. Nice trade. A stupid ass like me ought to get shot anyway.
Goddamn ‘em anyway! Why couldn’t they act like men and fight with me! Why did they have to pick on women! The dirty yellow bastards were afraid to tangle with me so they decided to do it the easy way. They knew the score, they knew I’d have to play ball. They seemed to know a lot of things.
All right, you conniving little punks, I’ll play ball, but I’m going to make up a lot of rules you never heard of. You think I’m cornered and it’ll be a soft touch. Well, you won’t be playing with a guy who’s a hero. You’ll be up against a guy with a mind gone rotten and a lust for killing! That’s the way I was and that’s the way I like it!
I grabbed the phone and dialed Pat’s home
number. When I got him I said hello and didn’t give him a chance to interrupt me. “I need a favor as fast as you can do it, kid. Find out where the phone with the number Longacre 3-8099 is located and call me right back. Shake it because I need it right away.”
Pat let out a startled answer that I cut off by slamming the phone back. Five minutes later the phone rang and I picked it up.
“What goes on with you, Mike? That number is a pay station in the Times Square subway station.”
“Fine,” I answered, “that’s all I need to know. See you later.”
“Mike ... hey ...” I cut him off again and picked up my coat.
They thought they were smart but they forgot I had a fast brain and a lot of connections. Maybe they thought I wouldn’t take the chance.
I was downstairs and in the car like a shot. Going up Broadway I pulled out all the stops and forgot there was such a thing as a red light. When I turned off Broadway onto Times Square I saw a patrolman standing in front of the subway entrance idly swinging his stick in his hands.
Tonight was my night and I was going to play it all the way to the hilt. I yanked out the wallet I had taken from that overturned car the other night, plucked the F.B.I, card from the pocket and fitted it into mine. The cop was coming out into the rain to tell me I couldn’t park there when I stepped out and shoved the wallet under his nose.
I didn’t let him have more than a peek at it, but it was enough. I said, “Stay here and watch that car. I don’t want it gone when I come back.”
He drew himself all the way up with a look that only public servants old in the service can get and passed me a snappy salute. With the headlines blaring from all the papers he didn’t have to ask questions to know what was up. “I’ll take care of it,” he shot back.
The Mike Hammer Collection, Volume 2 Page 20
