Come Die with Me
Page 16
I said, “None of you three told me you were related. Selina said she had no relatives worth mentioning and she also tried to steer me off investigating that last fracas in Santa Monica, when Larry Crewe got beat up. And she referred to you boys as ‘those gamblers’ as though she didn’t know who you were.”
Selina came over to sit near me on the davenport.
“I’m guessing, now,” I went on, “but maybe Giovanni’s hoodlums saw the Continental over at Malone’s cottage and after he was killed they came to see you boys, knowing you were there that night. You weren’t home, so they worked on Dave. Is that a good guess, Pete?”
“Dave wasn’t there,” he said. “Dave’s got nothing to do with this, absolutely nothing. Dave’s clean. He’s always been clean. He’s a good boy.”
“Is that why he went to Phoenix, because he couldn’t stand the sight of you any more?”
He glared at me. Selina murmured something.
I said, “Tip told Harry Adler about Selina. And maybe Selina told Tip about you boys?”
She shook her head. “He hinted that he was checking something like that, though, the day you found him here, Brock. He said there was a rumor I had some—racketeer brothers.”
“So,” I said, “Adler was another threat.” I looked at Pete. “How come he was at that cottage when you killed him?”
“I didn’t kill him,” he said hoarsely. “I swear to you I didn’t kill him. That was Giovanni’s, that one. It has to be. Those hoodlums of his … Hell, they were standing right over him when you caught them.”
The doorbell rang. Selina and Pete looked at me. I shrugged. Selina rose and went to the door.
Pete said, “How much?”
“What makes you think I can be bought, Pete?”
“All you guys can be bought. It’s what keeps you in business.”
Selina came back into the room. Dave Petroff was with her. Dave looked at his brother and said, “I got your note. I figured if you were driving Callahan around, it would be about time for him to get up here.”
“Sit down, Dave,” Selina said.
He sat in a chair near the doorway. Selina came over to sit near me again.
Her voice was soft. “You have to remember, Brock, that I was a little tramp, even at thirteen. So maybe Pete and Dave had reason to be ashamed of me. You can’t blame them, not completely.”
I looked at Pete. “When did you stop being ashamed of her?”
“In Italy,” he said, “and in Germany, I saw these young girls, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. All they were trying to do was survive, and all the fine young American soldiers, these noble bastards, were putting a price on that.”
“Not all of them,” I argued.
“Most of them in my outfit,” he said. “Guys I’d thought were really—you know—decent? I mean, not the slobs, but the real men, the guys who bathed once in a while. And I got to thinking that a woman really has only got that one weapon, hasn’t she? I mean, that’s one way she can always earn a buck to eat on.”
“And that took you back to Selina, in your mind?”
He nodded. “And then when Dave and I came out and she was doing so good, we figured the least we owed her was a chance to make it the class way. The slobs in this town are no better than soldiers.”
“Or any town,” I said.
For a moment nobody spoke and nobody looked at anyone else.
Once again Pete asked, “How much?”
“Pete,” I said, “if Jessup and Calavo saw your car over at the lake cottage, they’re going to take it to the police, eventually.”
“Never,” he said firmly. “They’d never take anything to the police.” He looked off into space. “All I wanted to do was reason with the little bastard and he went for that knife … Hell, I didn’t have any idea of killing him. And if those Giovanni hoods killed Adler, Malone can be written off to them, too. Maybe we can prove they killed Adler.”
Dave had been silent. Now he shook his head and said, “You couldn’t prove that, because they didn’t.”
We all stared at him. He sat quietly in his chair near the doorway looking back at us blandly.
Finally Pete said, “For Christ’s sake … Oh no, it couldn’t be! What did you mean, Dave?”
Dave said calmly, “He threatened to turn you in. He wanted to show me the tire marks in the back of the parking space there. He said he’d made molds of them. He said he knew about Selina and the guys we’d beat up.” Dave looked at the floor. “He said Selina had told Tip all about us and Tip had told him. I think he wanted money.”
Pete whispered hoarsely, “You think …? Dave, you’re talking foolish.” He turned to me. “Don’t listen to him, Brock. He’s—been out in the sun.”
Dave said calmly, “I’m sure he wanted money. Why else would he approach me? But the way he talked about Selina and … I took the .32 along, that one you took away from Johnny Hope.” He exhaled heavily. “And then I got out of town.”
Pete said, “Shut up. Shut up about guns and calibers. Callahan’s price is going up by the minute.”
“It just went out of reach,” I said. “All I can promise you is that Selina will be kept out of it. That deal I’ve already made with the law, and it won’t cost you a dime.”
“And the law hasn’t got a damned thing,” Pete said. “Not on me or on Dave, either. So all your big talk isn’t going to amount to a damn, Callahan.”
Dave said, “They can get me. I’ve still got the gun.”
Pete smiled. “Have you now? And wouldn’t this be a nice time to bring it out and show it to us? Point it at Callahan as you show it to us.”
Dave shook his head. “Pete, the first time you came here to see her, I told you it was wrong. She’s never been anything but trouble for us, never. When we were in the army and away from her and Ma, it was wonderful, wasn’t it? Just the two of us. And then, when we came out, you had to get mixed up with her trashy friends, her dirty troubles. And here we are, up to our necks again.”
“No,” Pete said. “Don’t go noble on us, Dave. Don’t do anything foolish. He hasn’t got a damned thing. Who’d believe a lousy private eye?”
Dave smiled. “The police. I came up the back road and I saw the Department car down there.” He looked at me. “They’ve had the house bugged all the time, haven’t they? They’ve been listening.”
“I guess so,” I said.
Pete stared at Selina.
“I had nothing to do with it,” she said quietly. “Believe me. I was gone for about two hours this afternoon. If they wired the house, it must have been then.”
Pete stood up. He looked at my crutch and said to Dave. “I’ll take the gun now.”
“I haven’t got it on me,” Dave said. “I don’t like guns.”
Pete looked at the crutch again and said, “And Callahan doesn’t usually carry one.” He started for the door.
Both Dave and Selina watched me, waited for me to make a move. My .38 was in the shoulder holster, but I didn’t reach for it. Officer Caroline would be waiting, right outside the front door.
I said, “I promised I’d keep Selina’s name out of it and I will.”
“I don’t give a hoot if you do or not,” Dave said. “Pete is the only relative I ever gave a damn about.”
In Trask’s office Pascal said, “The young one, Dave, he’s cooperative as hell. He even told us where to find the gun. What’s with him?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe jealousy? Pete was kind of his god and Selina was always an outsider. Then, when Pete began to take such an interest in his sister, after all those years, maybe Dave went over the edge. …”
I shrugged.
He said, “We’ve got that jacket of Pete’s from his closet, with the blood stains, but that never stands up except for clearing a man.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know. He’s being tough.”
Detective Caroline came in, smiling. “He’s starting to talk self-defense now.”
Pascal s
tared. “Who is? Dave.”
Caroline said, “Naw. The older one, Peter. We told him we had him cold with those fingerprints in the kitchen, the bloody prints, and he started screaming self-defense. …”
“There were no fingerprints,” Pascal said.
Caroline was still smiling. “We knew that, didn’t we, Sergeant? But Petroff didn’t, and that’s what counts. You’d better come and get this.” He went out.
Pascal stood up.
I said, “Hell, he practically admitted everything to me, and you guys had a tape on it, didn’t you?”
Pascal nodded. “But that’s not admissible evidence, buddy. We need the statement.” He turned toward the door. “Coming along?”
“No,” I said. “Who’s going to drive me home? I haven’t got my car here.”
“Miss Bonnet will take you home, natch,” Pascal said. “I phoned her half an hour ago. We can’t be hauling a big load like you around at the taxpayer’s expense.” He waved. “Thanks, Brock. And thanks again for that statement you gave the reporters.”
He went out and I got my crutch and limped along down the corridor to the front door. The night was getting cold and all my aches were aching.
I went out and stood on the sidewalk, looking up toward Wilshire, watching the steady flow of traffic going both ways up there. A car town, a traffic town, a murder, mug and money town. I was sick of it tonight.
And then Jan’s Chev turned off and came down Purdue Street, its lights picking me up where I stood there all alone. They weren’t all mugs. There were some good ones.
And there was always Jan. I waved and waited.
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copyright © 1959 by William Campbell Gault
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