The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps: The Best Crime Stories from the Pulps During Their Golden Age--The '20s, '30s & '40s

by Otto Penzler

  Mona Leeds said: “Come in.”

  He entered the small dressing-room. The torch singer was buffing her nails before the mirror.

  “I’m glad they let you go, Firpo.” The rich, husky voice sounded strained.

  He took a cigarette from a case on a table and sat down. “They had to. They didn’t have anything on me.”

  “You shouldn’t smoke cigarettes, Firpo. They’re not good for you.”

  He laughed.

  “I know,” she said rapidly. “You feel you don’t give a damn any more. I’d feel that way if something happened to Jugger but it’s wrong, Firpo. I don’t know how to tell you but—” She floundered for the right words. “You can’t know how sorry I am about the quarrel I had with Ruth last night. It was just a crazy fit of jealousy.”

  “Don’t let it worry you, Mona. You couldn’t help it and even Ruth wasn’t mad about it.”

  “Firpo, if only we could find out who did it.”

  “Don’t let that worry you either, Mona. What’d you tell the cops?”

  “Just what happened,” she replied. “I had that argument with Ruth and I never saw her again.”

  “That’s a lie,” said Firpo Cole deliberately. “I took Ruth home about one thirty. She probably went right out again and visited you. She didn’t bring her purse along and before she left you she probably said that she looked like the wrath of God and—”

  “Those were her exact words,” uttered Mona Leeds softly.

  He gave a wry grin. “Don’t be surprised. I know Ruth. Anyway, you loaned her your powder and lipstick and she came home. That couldn’t have been later than three in the morning. Somebody was either waiting for her at the apartment or followed her home and killed her. What I want to know is why you keep that visit to you a secret.”

  “You won’t like it, Firpo. That’s why I kept it to myself.”

  “I’m not a very sensitive plant. Go on.”

  “Well, she came to tell me she was sorry about our fight—and that she was a thief. She said she went back to the dance hall the night the old place burned down and found a piece of jewelry that Jugger had bought for me.”

  Firpo produced the brooch and showed it to the torch singer. “Is this what Ruth was talking about?”

  “Yes—but she was wearing it on her dress. How did you get it?”

  “That’s a trade secret. Go on.”

  “Ruth took it from Jugger’s desk,” continued the torch singer, “and she came over last night to give it to me. I wouldn’t take it.”

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “Because it wasn’t mine. Jugger might have bought it for me but he never mentioned it, so I told her to keep it—a sort of peace offering for that fight we had. I guess Jugger thinks it got lost in the fire.”

  Firpo Cole shook his head. “Jugger must have seen her wearing it.”

  “I guess so,” replied Mona Leeds. “That’s the way Jugger is. If he figured that she wanted it enough to steal it, he’d let her keep it.”

  “It’s worth four or five hundred bucks,

  Mona, so I doubt it. You know, the Easternstates Insurance thinks the fire wasn’t an accident.”

  The torch singer’s hand went to her mouth in a frightened gesture. “No. Jugger wouldn’t do a thing like that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “But it’s crazy, Firpo. He had a lot of money in his office—the receipts of a couple of days— that burned down, too.”

  “The insurance money more than made up for it. Besides, they’re not so sure the money was there in the first place. They only have Jugger’s and Tuttle’s word for it.”

  “But why should he take such a chance for a few dollars, Firpo? He’s doing fine the way he is.”

  “I don’t know but I’ll damned well find out.” He stood up. “You’re O.K., Mona. Don’t take it too hard if I find out that Jugger killed Ruth.”

  He left her staring after him with wide-eyed apprehension.

  IRPO COLE entered on the right wings of the band platform, found a meeting chair and sat down. From where he was, he could watch Jugger Callahan fronting the band. Jugger caught sight of Firpo, snapped his fingers to the boys and the music trailed off. He spoke into the mike.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, last night one of our beloved hostesses met a tragic end and out of respect to her I’d like everybody to keep thirty seconds of real silence.”

  He bowed his head and checked his wrist-watch. Throughout the semi-dark hall, couples waited with their arms twined around each other. Some girl in the back giggled and said: “No.”

  The thirty seconds were up. Jugger Calla-han’s toes beat a tattoo and he snapped his fingers. “All right, boys. A one-a, a two-a, a three-a, scratch!” The band began Potato Head Blues and the couples started to sway again like puppets whose wires had suddenly been jerked.

  Jugger walked over to Firpo. He patted his greased-back hair, obviously pleased that he had done the right thing by Ruth.

  “Firpo,” said the band leader, “we already got sixty-two bucks collected. How much can you chip in?”

  “For what?”

  “Ruth’s funeral, of course,” replied Jugger.

  “I’m not interested in Ruth’s funeral. There’s somebody else’s funeral I want to see about.”

  “Uh-huh. I get you, Firpo, but you ought to leave that to the cops. You probably never even met the guy who did it.”

  Firpo’s bloodshot eyes fixed themselves on the band leader’s face. “I won’t have far to go. That letter opener was stolen from here.”

  “Say, that’s right, isn’t it? Ephraim come to me around eleven thirty last night and asked me if I’d taken it so it must have been stolen earlier.”

  Firpo’s hands were in his pockets. There was something friendly and comforting about the feel of the automatic. He said: “We’ll talk about it later.”

  “Sure, Firpo,” said Jugger, not too heartily. “Sure.”

  The band leader returned to his post. The music ground on. Twenty sets, of three melodies each, every hour. Sixty dances in as many minutes with only an occasional break to give the customers a chance to buy more tickets.

  The Smiling Troubadours never stopped playing, though every once in a while a musician left the stand. And, as the hours wore on and they became more tired, the music became faster and more frenzied.

  Firpo stayed in his chair, watching the band leader. He didn’t intend letting Jugger out of his sight—not till he could trap him some way and prove to himself that here was the murderer of Ruth Bailey.

  Simms reached backstage in the course of his investigations. He seemed as much in a fog as ever. He asked Firpo whether Ruth had had any jewelry on her dress when he’d seen the body. Firpo couldn’t remember and the police dick left.

  The time went by and Firpo sat unmoving, watching Jugger Callahan with lackluster eyes. He tried to think of the murder of the only per-

  son he had ever cared for. What had Ruth said? That she was afraid? Of what?

  Suddenly, it hit Firpo Cole like a ton of dynamite. Where was the five hundred dollars that had found its way into Ruth Bailey’s purse and where was the envelope that read This better be enough?

  The police hadn’t said anything about the money or envelope so the murderer must have stolen both. There was no reason why the killer shouldn’t have taken the money but the envelope was a different matter. That typewritten sentence on it meant something to the murderer. Someone in the Tango Palace had probably thought that Ruth Bailey was blackmailing him. That very envelope had probably been written on one of the office typewriters.

  Firpo frowned and the swollen lips pursed in thought. His job was to find out who had typed that envelope.

  T two in the morning, the Smiling Troubadours gradually, almost reluctantly, stopped playing. There seemed to be a kind of weary excitement among them after the long grind. Customers filed out, spotlights went off and hostesses sat down to nurse their feet.

  Firpo Cole fell
into step beside Jugger Callahan as the band leader talked to friends, visited the washroom and finally went to his office. Jugger did not object. He imagined that Firpo felt lost—that he needed friendship. Firpo was like a dog that had lost its master and was trying to attach itself to someone else.

  After Jugger had finished checking the night’s receipts with the business manager, he turned to Firpo. “We’re having a tea party tonight. How about coming along? A couple of reefers might do you good.”

  Tea parties were a custom of long standing on every Saturday night at Jugger Callahan’s apartment. Any other time, Firpo Cole would have felt highly honored by the invitation, for these parties were attended only by the elite of the Tango Palace.

  “I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” said Firpo.

  Ephraim Tuttle locked up the books, said he’d see them later and went to pay off the girls. Firpo and the band leader left the dance hall. They walked down Main, then turned up Sixth.

  “Jugger,” asked Firpo Cole, “can you typewrite?”

  “One finger stuff. Why?”

  “It’s not important. Is there a file up in the office listing the girls’ addresses?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then anyone at the Tango could find out where Ruth lived.”

  “I guess so, Firpo, but—”

  “You could find out, too, couldn’t you?” cut in Firpo.

  “What the hell are you getting at?”

  “Forget it, Jugger.”

  The band leader started to say something but stayed his reply. They turned in to an all-night drugstore. Here, for a fiver, the clerk forgot the narcotic laws and gave Jugger a twelve-ounce bottle of cannabis indica. The band leader then bought a carton of cigarettes and some brown cigarette paper.

  They went outside and hailed a taxi.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  PAID IN FULL

  UGGER Callahan’s apartment was large and comfortable. Most of the boys from the band were already there. Mona Leeds and Evelyn Dorn, Ephraim Tuttle’s current doll, were making and serving sandwiches to the guests. Jugger lolled in an overstuffed chair and Firpo sat right beside him watching the preparations.

  Monkey Harris and a few of the other boys had sliced open the cigarettes from the carton and emptied the tobacco into a wide, shallow pan. Now they took the bottle of cannabis indica and poured the greenish-brown liquid into the pan. They allowed the tobacco to soak in the poisonous drug for several minutes, then put a match to it—which served both to burn up the excess alcohol and to dry the tobacco. This done, they began to wrap the residue in the brown cigarette paper. They worked diligently and the heap of these homemade marihuana cigarettes grew steadily.

  Jugger said to Firpo Cole: “These give a much better kick than the ready made kind.”

  “I never tried them,” replied Firpo. “When did you first start?” He wanted to hear Jugger talk—to wait for that mistake, that slip of the tongue which would point the finger of guilt at him.

  Jugger Callahan was in an expansive mood. He said: “Back in Chi, in the Capone days. A bunch of us muggle-hounds would get together and play hot music long before the word ‘swing’ was ever invented. Today the high school punks have taken over. They call themselves jitterbugs and if we send good we’re out of this world. They call the clarinet a licorice stick, a trombone a grunt iron, the bass fiddle a doghouse—and most of the time I don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.”

  “Yeah,” said Firpo. “Those sure were the good old days, all right, in Chi.”

  “The only thing that flowed freer than money,” continued the band leader reminis-cently, “was blood. We used to have classy apartments and buy a lot of jewelry for our women.”

  Firpo suddenly reached into his pocket and held the brooch out. “You mean like this thing you bought for Mona?”

  Jugger Callahan didn’t bite. “I bought that for Mona? What you getting at, Firpo?”

  “Haven’t you ever seen it before?” asked Firpo Cole.

  “No—yes, I think Ruth Bailey wore something like that.”

  Firpo frowned. Jugger was too old a hand to be caught that crudely. He said: “This is a star sapphire. It’s pretty valuable.”

  Evelyn Dorn was hovering over them with a sandwich tray. Her doe eyes bulged. “Geeze! A star sapphire.” She took it and examined it reverently. “That’s what I always wanted to get— a star sapphire.” She sighed. “But I guess I ain’t got what it takes. Nobody’s given me any—not even one yet.”

  “I’d still like to know what you were getting at, Firpo,” said the band leader.

  Firpo retrieved the brooch. “Let’s drop it.”

  Evelyn Dorn suddenly snapped her fingers. “Hell, Firpo, I forgot to tell you!”

  “What?”

  “That gangster—that Rocco Pace is on the warpath after you. You better watch out.”

  “What’s the matter now?” asked Jugger.

  “That’s all right,” said Firpo. “It’s nothing to worry about. I just stole Rocco’s gun.”

  Jugger Callahan looked at him queerly but made no comment. Evelyn Dorn wandered off. Firpo leaned back and closed his eyes. An idea was stirring within him.

  Turnip Billings, who played tenor horn, called out: “All finished, boys. Jugger Callahan and his Twelve Shtoonks will now get high.”

  He tossed a few reefers to Firpo Cole and Jugger Callahan.

  Jugger Callahan was a breather and it was not long before a quiet contentment seemed to come over him. After a while, he fixed glazed eyes on Firpo and said: “You’re not running after me because you like my mustache. You think I killed Ruth Bailey.”

  Firpo Cole, who was bluffing his smoke, nodded.

  “What’ll you do about it?”

  “When I make sure, I’ll kill you.” Firpo’s voice was dispassionate but as certain of itself as a pile driver.

  Jugger Callahan laughed. His good humor was not even ruffled. “You two-bit grifter, you talk big. How come you think I killed your Ruth Bailey?”

  “She was in love with you, Jugger—really in love—the way a bum like you couldn’t understand.”

  “I liked Ruth, but that’s all, Firpo. I never two-timed on Mona.”

  “I know,” replied Firpo. “I would of made you marry Ruth if you had.”

  The band leader laughed again. “Pickpocket to marriage broker. That’s good. But you haven’t told me how you think I come to kill Ruth.”

  They were talking in low tones. The others around them still laughed and shouted boisterously. The drug had not yet begun to take effect.

  Firpo said: “I figure it this way. You put a lot of insurance on the old Tango Palace and then faked a fire by soaking the drapes and everything else in oil and gasoline.”

  “You better keep those ideas to yourself,” said Jugger Callahan a little more seriously.

  “I don’t have to. An insurance dick thinks that. He found what used to be oil cans in the ruins. You also forgot that stone I showed you on your desk, because Ruth had to go back to the Palace that night and she saw it there. You must have been fixing for the fire about that time and you probably saw her take it.”

  “So now you’re calling Ruth Bailey a crook.”

  Firpo’s hands began to tremble and he waited a few moments before replying. “She took it because she knew you bought it for Mona and she was jealous. She started wearing it every day after that, Jugger, just to get Mona’s goat but you thought it was her way of saying that she knew you started that fire.”

  “Not so fast, Firpo. I lost over twelve hundred dollars in cold cash during the fire and you don’t think I’d be crazy enough to leave it up there if I burned the place down.”

  “I know that angle too, Jugger, but there’s no proof you left the dough to burn and that it isn’t in your pocket right now.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” the band leader uttered softly. “And what do you think I did after the fire?”

  “Ruth was wearing that thing and
you thought she was blackmailing you so you tried to buy her off. You slipped five hundred bucks into her purse with a note saying that it better be enough. But she kept wearing the brooch and you thought she wanted more sugar so you stole Tuttle’s letter opener, figuring that anyone at the Palace could be blamed. Then you killed her with it. It had a sharp point. It must have been easy.”

  “That’s a lot of shtush, Firpo, and you know it. You’re just excited about the killing. When you have a good night’s sleep you’ll decide you couldn’t prove a thing.”

  “That’s the only reason you’re still alive, Jugger.”

  Ephraim Tuttle had come in and walked over to them in time to hear the last sentence. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Firpo’s puking about some kind of star sapphire and that I killed Ruth Bailey,” responded Jugger.

  “Oh, he’s just weed-wacky,” pronounced the business manager. “I don’t know why the hell we let him louse up the place around here.” He walked away.

  HE doorbell to the apartment rang. Mona Leeds came in from the kitchen and said: “See who it is, Firpo.” He went through the vestibule. It was Rocco Pace standing at the door.

  “I thought I’d find you here,” said the racketeer.

  “Do you want to come in?” “That ain’t what I’m here for. I get a plenty good jag with dago-red.”

  “Then what did you want?” asked Firpo. “Why’d you hook my gat?” “I want to borrow it for a while, Rocco.” Rocco Pace gave a vague smile. “You liked that jane a lot, didn’t you, Firpo?” “Yes.”

  “I see. And you have to go gunning with my rod.”

  “I’ll give it back to you after, Rocco.” “Let’s have it now.” “I said I want to keep it for a while.” Rocco Pace’s voice was silken. “You know better than to give me any backtalk, Firpo. Let’s have it.”

  Firpo Cole hesitated a moment, then surrendered. “O.K.,” he said bleakly and handed the automatic to the racketeer.

  Rocco Pace whipped a polka-dotted handkerchief out of his breast pocket and carefully wiped the gun. Then he returned it to Firpo. “You ought to know better than to sport a rod with my prints on it.” He started off, then paused. “I don’t know if it’ll help you, Firpo, but one of the guys up at the Tango Palace has been plunging pretty heavily with a bookie I know. It’s practically bankrupted him. You can have it for what it’s worth.”