Death of a Pusher

by Deming, Richard

  The lieutenant strode toward me, and I stepped out of the way to let him pass into the hall. Giving Carl Lincoln a curt nod, he crossed to open the door to 2-B. I followed him into the apartment, and Carl trailed after us.

  We entered a front room about eighteen feet long furnished with fairly new but cheap pieces. A lab man was dusting flat surfaces for fingerprints.

  Wynn paused to ask him, “Anything?”

  “Five sets, so far,” the technician said. “This is the last room.”

  Wynn continued on through a small dining room, where a uniformed cop stood doing nothing, and on into a kitchen. Carl and I followed.

  There were three people in the kitchen, but only two were standing up. Redheaded Hank Carter, Wynn’s partner, leaned his thin frame against the sink. Carter wore a perpetually sad expression, the probable result of working for years with Wynn. A plump, balding man whom I recognized as one of the medical examiners was just snapping his bag closed.

  The third occupant of the room lay on his back next to the stove. It didn’t surprise me that it was Benny Polacek, because I had expected it to be, but his condition discouraged me. He was going to be in no shape to carry out his assignment the next evening, because he was quite dead. He was in shirtsleeves, and the left side of his chest was clotted with blood from what appeared to be at least three bullet wounds. Someone had pushed up Benny’s sleeves to expose his bare arms nearly to the shoulders and had pulled his trousers down until they were bunched around his ankles.

  I gave Wynn an inquiring look, and he said, “We were looking for needle marks. There aren’t any.”

  The M.E. said, “I’d say time of death conforms to the time the shots were heard, Lieutenant. About ten P.M.”

  Wynn merely grunted.

  “I’ll send over a written report in the morning,” the M.E. said, and nodding to me and Carl, he picked up his bag and left. Wynn gazed moodily down at the body. Hank Carter regarded Carl and me without speaking. He was a good friend of both of us, but he seldom spoke when Wynn was around.

  I glanced about the room.

  There was no weapon in sight. From the position of the body and the fact that all wounds were on the left side, it seemed apparent that the man had been standing before the stove, half-facing the doorway, when he was shot from the direction of the doorway. An old-fashioned baked enamel coffeepot stood on one of the burners, and a shattered cup and saucer lay on the floor. I guessed that the dead man had been reaching for the pot to pour a cup of coffee when something caused him to turn part way around, just in time to be shot.

  Glancing at the table, I saw that another cup and saucer stood before the chair whose back was to the stove, suggesting that a guest had been present when the murder occurred. And—since it was likely the host would pour the guest’s coffee first—the other person must have been seated with his back to the door, for the empty cup still on the table must have been meant for the dead man.

  Lieutenant Wynn said, “Guy’s name was Benjamin Polacek. Know him?”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “He was a pusher.”

  “What we figured,” Wynn said. “That’s why you’re here. When we didn’t find any needle marks on him, we guessed he must be a pusher. Follow me.”

  He strode back out into the dining room, where the lounging patrolman straightened up hurriedly and tried to look as though he were doing something.

  He turned into a center hall off which there was a bathroom and a bedroom, and Carl and I followed him into the bedroom.

  Wynn opened the top drawer of a dresser and handed me a flat tin box.

  “We found this during a routine search of the place,” he said.

  The box contained nothing but a hypodermic syringe, a spoon, and a small alcohol lamp, the standard rig of horse riders. Then I noticed the residue of fine white powder which coated the bottom of the box.

  Wynn said, “Carter says that powder is heroin.”

  Getting a little on my finger, I touched it to my tongue. “Uh-huh. Cut with milk sugar. He must have had papers of the stuff measured out in single pops, and some spilled out. He would have gotten rid of his supply, of course.”

  The Homicide officer frowned. “Why do you say that?”

  “We nailed him for selling last week. He wouldn’t have risked more trouble by keeping a supply around.”

  Wynn’s frown deepened. “If he was arrested last week, what was he doing walking around? Out on bail?”

  “He made a deal with the D.A. This was Benny’s fourth fall, so he had a life penalty staring him in the face. It was all arranged for him to make a buy from the local wholesaler tomorrow night while we took moving pictures—but now that’s blown sky high.”

  “Who’s the wholesaler?” Wynn asked.

  “Councilman Goodman White.”

  Wynn stared at me as though I had suddenly grown a hole in my head. “You must be nuts, Sergeant.”

  I shrugged. “You can check with the D.A. if you don’t believe me.”

  After staring at me some more, the lieutenant decided to believe me. “Then Goodie White must be nuts. I never heard of him being tied to any racket, let alone naroctics.”

  “Neither did we,” Carl said. “But now it looks as though he’s violated both taboos in this town. Narcotics and murder.”

  The lieutenant and I both looked at him. I said, “You think Goodie pulled this kill to avoid being set up?”

  “Well, doesn’t it make sense?”

  “How would he know Benny was cooperating with us? Nobody but us, Herman Joyce, Captain Spangler, and the D.A. knew the guy had even been knocked over.”

  “Who’s Herman Joyce?” Wynn asked.

  “A rookie from Metro we used to play the part of a junkie,” I said. “He wouldn’t talk.”

  Wynn said thoughtfully, “Maybe Benny confided his troubles to a girl friend and she ran to White with the story. Or maybe there’s a leak in the D.A.’s office.”

  “There is a girl friend who knew he was picked up,” I said, suddenly remembering the honey blonde. “Her name’s April French, and she works in a chorus line somewhere.”

  “How’d she know about it?”

  “She came down to bail him out. But when she found out it was a narcotics rap, she gave him a disgusted look and walked out. Seems she didn’t know he was a pusher and she was through the minute she found out. She might have sounded off to some of her friends, and the story could have gotten back to Goodie via the grapevine.”

  “This Charlie guy knew Benny had been arrested, too,” Carl put in.

  “Charlie who?” the lieutenant asked.

  “We only know the first name,” I said. “Somebody was driving Benny the night we knocked him over, and the driver got away. When the French girl came to headquarters to bail Benny out, she mentioned that somebody named Charlie had phoned her about the arrest. That had to be the driver, because nobody else knew Benny was in jail.”

  Wynn said, “Where’s this French woman work?”

  I shrugged. “She didn’t say. Just said she danced in a chorus line.”

  “You mean you didn’t take down her address?” Wynn exploded.

  I could have explained that since the girl hadn’t been charged with anything, I had no right to ask her a lot of personal questions, and felt I had done pretty well to get as much from her as I had. But you don’t make excuses to Lieutenant Robert Wynn.

  I merely said, “No, sir, I didn’t.”

  CHAPTER 6

  After glowering at me for a time, the lieutenant said grudgingly, “We can probably locate her easily enough. April French isn’t a very common name.” Then his tone turned irritable. “If that damnfool young intern across the hall would let me talk to his sister, we might get a description of the killer.”

  “The sister saw him?” I asked.

  “According to her brother, she was over here for coffee when it happened. This is secondhand, because I haven’t seen the woman, but he claims she told him she was sitting with her back
to the kitchen door and Benny was just getting ready to pour her a cup of coffee when the killer fired from the doorway. He says she was too hysterical to get any more than that out of her, and he doesn’t know whether she recognized the killer, or even saw him. He gave her a sedative and put her to bed. Says she’s in shock and can’t be questioned until morning.”

  “Who is she?” I asked.

  “Her name’s Beverly Arden and her brother’s name is Norman Arden. He says she’s twenty-two and is a secretary at Whittiker Aluminum. Norman is just out of med school and is interning at City Hospital. But he’s still a licensed M.D., so I can’t force my way past him without getting up to my ears in grief.”

  Carl said, “Think he might be covering for her, Lieutenant? Maybe she knocked him off.”

  Wynn gave an impatient shrug. “Anything’s possible. Norman claims there was nothing between Benny and his sister. Says they just had a neighborly cup of coffee together now and then. Claims he dropped over occasionally, too, and Benny sometimes dropped in on them. But they were only casually friendly and didn’t move in the same social group.”

  “This Norman guy was in his own apartment when it happened?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Says he was in the shower when he heard the shots. He says that by the time he got dried off, dressed, and over here to investigate, the killer was long gone and Beverly was having the screaming meemies. He gave her some kind of shot to knock her out, put her to bed, and then called us.”

  Carl said, “If the killer came and went by the front entrance, maybe Graves can describe him, Matt.”

  Wynn asked, “Who’s Graves?”

  “A narcotics cop we had planted out front,” I said. “We’ve had Benny staked out ever since we released him.”

  “Well, get him in here,” the lieutenant snapped.

  Ordinarily I have Carl run little errands such as that, since I outrank him, but I can stand only so much of Robert Wynn before I need a breath of fresh air. Before Carl could move, I said, “Yes, sir,” and headed for the door.

  The door to Apartment 2-A was now closed, I noticed as I stepped into the hall.

  Outside the crowd had thinned somewhat, but a few curiosity seekers still stood on the sidewalk. Howard Graves wasn’t among them, but I spotted someone seated in a car across the street and guessed that it was he.

  Crossing the street, I peered into the car and saw that it was.

  “Hi, Matt,” he said. “The rumor’s circulating among the bystanders that somebody got shot. Was it our boy?”

  “Uh-huh. He’s colder than a carp. Has he been home all evening?”

  “No, he had dinner out. At an Automat over on Twenty-sixth. Then he had a couple of drinks in a tavern next to the Automat and came home. He walked in the front door about a quarter of ten.”

  “Hmm. He was shot only fifteen minutes later. Anybody follow him home?”

  “Just me. He didn’t even talk to anybody while he was out.”

  “You see anyone walk in or out of the building after he was in?”

  Graves didn’t say anything.

  “Well?” I asked.

  He said slowly, “You’re not going to like this, Matt.”

  “What?”

  “Well, Benny made a habit of staying home, once he got back from dinner. I’ve been covering him over a week, and never once has he gone out again once he was home. When I saw the light go on in his front room, I figured he was set for the night.”

  “For cripes sake!” I growled. “You picked tonight of all nights to goof off!”

  “How’d I know somebody was going to take a pot shot at him?” Graves said defensively. “I just walked around the corner to a little place where you can get coffee. I only figured to be gone a few minutes.”

  “How long were you gone?”

  “About a half-hour, I guess,” he said reluctantly. “I came hightailing back when I heard the sirens.”

  “This is great,” I said. “They want you inside to find out if you saw the killer arrive or leave. You know who’s in charge of this case?”

  “Who?”

  “Bob Wynn.”

  “Ouch,” Graves said. “He’ll have me busted down to a beat.”

  “I’ll try to cover for you, you damned fool,” I said. “Come on inside and keep your mouth shut.”

  Climbing out of the car, he followed me across the street and into the building. I walked down a hallway off the lobby to a door leading out back, Graves a step behind me. The door was unlocked, I was gratified to discover. Out back there was a concrete parking lot for the benefit of the tenants.

  “Did Benny park back here or in front?” I asked.

  “He keeps his car back here,” Graves said. “But tonight he used the front door. He walked to the Automat. It’s only a couple of blocks.”

  If I had been the killer, I would have parked my car in back and would have come in this way, I reflected. Probably Graves wouldn’t have seen anything even if he hadn’t deserted his post.

  We went back inside and upstairs to 2-B.

  “Wait here in the hall in case Wynn insists on seeing you,” I said. “We’ll hope he doesn’t.”

  Carl and Wynn were in the front room when I walked back into the apartment. Wynn frowned when he saw me alone.

  “Where’s the stakeout?” he asked.

  “Out in the hall. I thought the place was cluttered up enough by cops. He didn’t see anybody come in or out the front way, but there’s an unlocked back door leading to a parking lot.”

  “Nobody came in or out the front way all evening?” Wynn inquired.

  “Not since Benny Polacek got home. He had dinner at an Automat over on Twenty-sixth and didn’t get back until fifteen minutes before he was shot. Graves said he didn’t talk to anyone while he was out and nobody followed him home. The killer must have come and gone by the rear door. Want to talk to Graves?”

  If I hadn’t brought the stakeout inside with me, Wynn would have sent me back out for him. But since I offered to let him talk to the man, he wasn’t interested.

  “Not if he doesn’t have any more than that to say,” the lieutenant growled.

  Opening the door to the hall, I said, “I guess you can take off, Howie. Benny doesn’t need a tail any more.”

  “Thanks, Matt,” he said in a low voice, and hurried toward the stairs.

  Closing the door again, I said, “This leaves us out on a limb so far as Goodie White is concerned, Lieutenant. Of course if you manage to tag him for murder, the D.A. won’t quibble about a narcotics rap. You plan to pull him in for questioning?”

  Wynn frowned. “Not until I’ve had a chance to question Beverly Arden. He’ll keep until tomorrow.”

  I could understand his reluctance to move against a city councilman. In our case we had been prepared to move in on definite information and catch Goodman White redhanded with evidence he couldn’t refute. It was another matter to go after him on mere suspicion for an offense as serious as murder. In St. Cecilia a cop had better be right when he accused an influential politician of a crime.

  “You need us any more, sir?” I asked.

  Wynn contemplated for a moment, seemed to come to a decision and said, “Not right now, I guess. But since this thing involves both Homicide and Narcotics, I think we’d better have an interdivisional conference on it tomorrow. I’ll set it up through my chief and have him get in touch with Captain Spangler. Better phone in about one P.M. to learn the time and place of the conference.”

  “We aren’t due on duty until five P.M.,” I ventured.

  “Neither am I, Sergeant,” he snapped. “But a police officer is on call twenty-four hours a day. You phone your captain at one P.M. That’s an order.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said, heavily emphasizing the sir and throwing him an exaggeratedly formal salute.

  He reddened slightly, but he didn’t say anything. Aside from his tendency to be brass-happy, I didn’t have anything against Robert Wynn, but I could take only so much of his act
ing as though he were an army colonel and I was a buck private. And from previous experience he knew I was on the verge of telling him to go to hell.

  He would have broken any Homicide sergeant for some of the things I’ve said to him in the past, but because I wasn’t under his command, the worst he could do to me was complain about my discourtesy to his own immediate chief, who in turn could do nothing but relay the complaint to Captain Spangler, who almost certainly would take no action. By the rule book, sergeants are supposed to Sir lieutenants, but hardly anyone aside from Wynn took the rule seriously. Up to a point I was willing to take his nonsense just to avoid trouble, but I had reached the point and he knew it.

  He merely gave me a curt nod of dismissal.

  On the stairs we met a couple of morgue attendants bringing up one of the wicker baskets they use instead of stretchers for morgue cases.

  Outside, Carl said, “You were getting ready to pop off at Wynn again, weren’t you?”

  I looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Did it show?”

  “It always shows. What are you going to do if they ever transfer you to Homicide and you draw Wynn as a partner?”

  “Kill myself,” I said without hesitation.

  CHAPTER 7

  The next day, when I phoned Captain Spangler at one P.M., he said Carl and I could come in at three and that the conference would be in his office.

  “You can come in a couple of hours late some other time to make up for it,” he said in such a kindly voice that I immediately felt suspicious.

  It wasn’t normal for Spangler to offer time off which hadn’t been requested. For example, when we had checked in at one P.M. the day after bagging Benny Polacek, he hadn’t suggested that we could knock four hours off some later trick.

  I said, “You’ve got some nasty detail in store for us, haven’t you, Captain?”

  “Don’t be an idiot, Rudowski,” he said in a less kindly voice. “Just be here at three.”

  I phoned Carl at home to relay the instructions and tell him what the captain had said about letting us have the extra two hours off some other time. His reaction was the same as mine.