The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Original)

by Unknown

  “I’m sorry, Norma. I guess I should have come back here from Sorenson’s. But I thought I had a chance with Ambrose.”

  His voice got thready as memory recalled that moment when he felt the money leave his pocket.

  “I did have a chance,” he added sullenly. “Ambrose would’ve talked. That’s why the killer plugged him when he did. He would’ve spilled something and—”

  “It doesn’t matter, Flash,” Norma Patten said wearily. “Not now.” She tried to smile, failed and dropped her eyes to the folded hands in her lap.

  Judson rubbed his chin thoughtfully, pulling his lower jaw to one side. Haley bobbed his head and his eyes were gloating.

  “What time did Ambrose get it?” he asked.

  “About ten-thirty, I guess,” Casey said glumly.

  “And he took the ten grand, huh? Sure you didn’t misplace it?”

  Casey’s eyes smoldered deep and hot beneath narrowed brows, but he said nothing. Haley turned to the man on the chair.

  “Where were you at ten-thirty, Patten?”

  “I don’t remember exactly,” Patten said levelly.

  “There’s ways of makin’ guys like you remember,” Haley threatened.

  “And there’s ways of putting smart cops in their places.”

  “Say, listen, you—” Haley began angrily.

  “Pipe down!” Judson snapped. He glanced irritably at Haley and turned back to Patten. There was a worried look on his competent face and he seemed to be choosing his approach.

  Casey thought he understood this uncertainty. Patten carried a lot of weight; even here in the East. Sitting there in the chair, apparently unconcerned about his position, he was a slender, gray man with a hard, tight mouth above an angular jaw. His suit was gray, so were his eyes; gray and icy hard. His straight hair and clipped mustache were gray-black.

  To Casey it seemed that this man had something in common with his wife; they gave the impression that they got what they wanted out of life. And about Patten there was a quiet confidence, a surface covering for an inner hardness, and an air of one who was accustomed to success and could not be bluffed or pushed around.

  Then Casey remembered something else. The hand that had taken the ten thousand dollars—slender, long fingered with a gray sleeve. Suspicion darkened his eyes. Patten had that kind of a hand and sleeve and—so had Les Boyden. The long, supple fingers of a piano player. The color of his suit Casey could not remember.

  “Never mind this Ambrose thing now,” Judson said finally. “What I’m interested in is Sorenson. You’ve got no alibi, Patten. Or if you have, you won’t tell it. And that hand”—Judson reached down quickly and lifted Patten’s right hand. From where he stood Casey could see that the knuckles were skinned. Patten smiled and his brows climbed. “What about it?” he asked easily.

  “You knew about those pictures,” Judson said. “And you went down to Sorenson’s place to get them. You had a fight with him. Before you got through you plugged him.”

  “No!” Norma Patten cried. “He couldn’t have—he didn’t know where to go. I didn’t tell him and—”

  “He saw the pictures, didn’t he?” Judson cut in. “He gave you the ten thousand?”

  “Yes, but he couldn’t know—”

  “Why couldn’t he?” Judson picked one of the photographs from a table, held it up to the light, tossed it back with a shrug. “Sorenson had a small stamp that perforated his pictures. He probably made these some time ago, and stamped them for identification. There’s an S in each picture. If anybody was interested it wouldn’t be hard to find out who S is in the photo studio line.”

  Norma Patten’s eyes were wide and she gave her husband a quick enigmatic glance before she looked away.

  “You’ve got your wires crossed, Captain,” Patten said. “Mrs. Patten and myself both made mistakes on this thing. For obvious reasons I wanted those negatives and release.” He gave his wife a cold, hard stare and Casey, seeing it, wondered how much he meant by it. “And I gave her the money, foolishly, because I thought I could get to the contact man when he came back. What I should have done was have her tell this guy that he’d have to do business with me.”

  He gave Judson a direct look from under his brows. “I can assure you if I had known about the details I wouldn’t have bothered with the photographer; I’d have gone right to this Ambrose lad and—”

  “Maybe you did,” Haley cut in.

  Judson turned with a grunt of irritation. Haley shrugged and looked away. Patten continued evenly.

  “Her mistake was to call this photographer in.” He eyed Casey skeptically and sucked on his lips.

  “Because it was my fault in the first place,” Norma Patten said sharply, “and I thought maybe I could save you fifteen thousand.”

  “The point is,” Patten added, “that we’re out ten thousand—apparently—and haven’t anything to show for it.” He stood up, tall and straight and impressive in his unruffled manner. “Now if that fact, or anything else you have, leads you to believe that I killed Sorenson, or Ambrose for that matter, go ahead and arrest me. If not—”

  He shrugged, waited a moment, his manner indicating that he considered the interview at an end.

  “We’re not ready for an arrest—yet,” Judson said irritably. “But maybe we will be when we get through checking up on you.”

  “Any time you say, Captain. Just let me know and I’ll be glad to come down to Headquarters—with a lawyer.”

  VI

  n assignment that took Casey out of town to cover a kidnapping trial kept him busy most of the following day, and it was late afternoon before he returned to the city. A half hour later he trudged down the third-floor corridor at Police Headquarters to Logan’s office and went in without knocking.

  Logan was standing with his back to the door, staring out the lone window at the court below. He turned slowly, scowled, then returned to his window gazing without a word.

  Casey put down his camera and plate-case and dropped wearily into a straight-backed chair beside the desk. His mood was grouchy and irritable. The work of the day had yielded but one routine picture, and at no time had he been able to shake off the blanket of resentment that had wrapped around him since last night.

  His worry was no longer about Norma Patten or her husband, or who had killed Sorenson and Ambrose. Now that the matter was no secret it was, as far as he was concerned, a strictly police case—except for the ten thousand. That, no matter how he looked at it, seemed to be his fault, and he could not forget it.

  The story of the killings had been fairly well hushed up. No newspaperman but himself knew of Patten’s connection—or about the photographs. And since neither Sorenson nor Ambrose were of any great importance in the life of the city, the newspapers’ accounts were not unduly lengthy, and there was little more than a hint that there might be a connection between the two deaths.

  “Well, what the hell do you want?” Logan asked finally, coming over to the desk.

  “Nothing,” Casey said, “except the guy that lifted that ten grand from me.”

  “Then there really was a guy, huh?”

  Casey shoved out his legs and eyed Logan morosely. “What’re you sore at. I suppose when Norma Patten told me her story last night I shoulda grabbed a phone and let you in on it.”

  “You’d been better off.”

  “Damned if I wouldn’t,” Casey admitted disgustedly.

  “You oughta know better than to try this amateur detective stuff.”

  “Detective stuff, hell!” Casey growled. “I was just a contact man—and I got a hunch Ambrose would’ve got knocked off whether I’d stopped there or not.”

  “Yeah,” Logan said. “I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  He sat down opposite Casey, sighed and lit a cigarette, a tall, good-looking man with black eyes and black hair. His oxford gray suit was immaculate, his linen was fresh and his shoes were neatly polished. Competent, hard without making a fuss about it, he knew his job—and he k
new Casey.

  There was, between these two, a mutual respect and admiration founded upon experience and a long association; and for once their glum and somber moods seemed to synchronize. Presently Logan got comfortable in his chair and began to talk.

  “Why didn’t you tell us you went down to the Hut to see the Professor last night?”

  Casey looked up, momentarily startled.

  “I don’t know,” he said, and sounded as if he meant it. “I wasn’t sure where he fitted and—”

  “We aren’t sure now,” Logan muttered. “But someplace, son; someplace. We found he’d been at Sorenson’s studio earlier in the evening.”

  “And what’s he say?” Casey asked, interested now.

  Logan’s brows knotted at the bridge of his nose and he waved the cigarette in a gesture of resentment and defeat. “We don’t know. We can’t find him. All we know is that he was packing a gun last night—a waiter saw it when he sat down at the piano once. But he is in this someplace or he’d be around.”

  Casey told about his talk with Boyden the previous night, and then asked: “How does Patten stand?”

  “Number one,” Logan said. “We’ve got a lot of things on that baby.” He ground out his cigarette and sat up, eyes thoughtful. “We had him down here all morning. We’re pretty sure he was at Sorenson’s and we found a taxi-driver that took him to Ambrose’s office building somewhere around ten-thirty. The driver can’t be sure about the time.”

  “Pinch him?”

  “Not yet.” Logan spread his hands. “We’ve got to be careful. That guy is no lightweight. He knows a lot of right people around here, including the D.A. And the D.A. says watch him and see what happens.

  “We’ve got a hundred plain-clothesmen out snooping around checking up; and every man in the department is looking for Les Boyden. When we find him we might be ready to go to town. Somebody besides Sorenson and Ambrose is in on this job and—”

  “Figure it for me,” Casey said.

  Logan cocked a brow and his dark eyes were searching. “You haven’t got any ideas, have you?”

  “I don’t want any,” Casey said. “I’m just an amateur.”

  Logan grinned at the big photographer’s grumbling manner and went on with his story.

  “I figure it this way: Sorenson, Ambrose and the Professor cooked up this touch. The Professor got a dirty deal from Norma Patten. She used him as a stepping-stone, and she’s the sort of woman that would get what she wants. And if he got the chance my guess is the Professor would grab an angle to pay off.

  “He probably knew of those old modeling days, maybe about those same pictures. It was in the paper she was in town. So maybe he got in touch with Sorenson, or the other way around, and the two of them got Ambrose to make the touch.

  “And”—Logan’s voice got crisp and precise—“the only thing wrong with the picture was Sure-shot Patten. Nobody’d push that guy around much. I think he went gunning when he got the tip-off from the S-mark on those photographs.

  “He probably didn’t go to Sorenson’s to kill him, but things happen like that sometimes. And after he got Sorenson he had to see Ambrose. When he found you there—bingo. He didn’t know what Ambrose had to say and he was afraid to let him talk—to you.” Logan hesitated thoughtfully. “I don’t say that’s right, understand. But it could be.”

  “So now,” Casey said thoughtfully, “you’re wondering if Patten got to Boyden, or whether Boyden is hiding out.”

  “Something like that.”

  Casey stood up and retrieved his plate-case and camera. “Well,” he said, “I don’t want any part of it. I got banged around, lost ten grand and didn’t even get a picture out of it. All I want is to know where that dough is.”

  VII

  asey went back to the office to leave his camera and plate-case. He had dinner on his way home, arriving there about eight o’clock, and when he opened his apartment door he found Mary Nason, the singing girl he’d met at the Hut, sitting bolt upright in his wing chair, her hands gripping the arms.

  She rose quickly when he shut the door and met him in the center of the room, a small, white-faced girl with a tightness around her lips and alarm in the depths of her brown eyes.

  “Now what?” Casey said, and was rather gruff about it because he’d had enough trouble.

  “It’s Les. You’ve got to find him.”

  “Not me,” Casey said. He detoured around the girl, went into the adjoining bedroom and got his pipe.

  “But you’ve got to,” the girl said, following at his heels. “He’s in trouble and—”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because—well—he is.”

  “Then go to the cops. That’s their business.”

  He went back to the living-room and sat down. The girl dropped into the wing chair, fumbled with the handbag in her lap for a moment. When she spoke again her voice was low and pleading.

  “Please. You can help us.”

  “I gave him a chance last night,” Casey said bluntly. “He wouldn’t talk. You know what he was tryin’ to do, don’t you?” The girl shook her head, mute, and Casey told about Logan’s theory of the twenty-five-thousand-dollar blackmail effort.

  “I—I don’t believe it,” she gasped when he finished.

  “Then why is he in trouble?” Casey’s brows pulled down suspiciously. “You know where he is?” he added.

  “Yes.”

  “Then why don’t you go to him?”

  “I don’t know which apartment he’s in. And—I’m afraid. I thought you would help me—I thought you were a friend of his.” She leaned across the chair arm and went on hurriedly. “I don’t know why he’s gone. But it’s something wrong. I know.”

  “It’s a police job then,” Casey said. Ordinarily he would have been more receptive to this plea, but at the moment the remains of his grouch still festered and the girl had not yet penetrated his protective shell. “In fact,” he added, “I’ll call ’em right now and then you won’t need to worry any more.”

  He stepped to the telephone. Behind him as he lifted the receiver he heard the girl’s gasp; then her voice, thin and cold, saying:

  “Put that down or I’ll shoot!”

  Casey turned slowly, amazement in his eyes.

  Mary Nason stood rigidly in the center of the floor, her young face taut and her mouth tight. A little .25 automatic trembled in her hand.

  Casey frowned, made his voice casual. “Okey. If that’s the way it is.” He put down the telephone and came towards her slowly, the frown changing to a tolerant grin.

  “You can’t go to the police until I know why he has gone,” Mary Nason breathed.

  “Suit yourself,” Casey said. He stopped in front of her, glanced down at the gun. “Can’t you hold it steady?” he asked. And as her eyes dropped to watch her hand, he reached down quickly and twisted the automatic gently from her grasp.

  The change in the girl was startling. She looked up at him and a whiteness came around her quivering lips. Then she was trembling, as though long, racking shudders passed through her. The sight of this raw emotion, the realization that her motive was so important that, knowing nothing of the game, she had forced herself to pull a gun, cracked Casey’s callous crust.

  He was at once ashamed of himself; yet troubled now on her behalf. Because he knew now that he liked her, her simple genuineness, and he was afraid Les Boyden was involved more deeply than she dreamed. Drawing her back to the chair, he pushed her gently into it and said:

  “Tell me the rest of it.”

  She began to sob softly, and Casey let her alone until she had recovered some of her composure. When at last she looked up, she began to speak hurriedly.

  “Last night a man came to the Hut. I didn’t see him at first because he talked with Les out in the foyer. When I went to look for Les and didn’t see him, I went to the door. He was just getting into a taxi.”

  “Did you get a look at the man who was with him?” Casey asked her sharply.<
br />
  “Not a good look. I just saw his back. He was about as tall as Les and slender. It seemed funny, his going out like that, but I didn’t think he’d want me to run out on the street after him. I thought it might be business.”

  A dry sob interrupted her for a moment. “But he didn’t come back. He wasn’t at his rooms all night. And then I read about the Sorenson murder, and I’d heard Les say he was going to see Sorenson yesterday. So I didn’t dare go to the police until—”

  “How do you know where Les is?”

  “I recognized the taxi-driver. He gave me the address.” She gave a Randall Street number, adding: “And I thought you—”

  Casey said: “All right,” and stood up, pocketing the little automatic and remembering that Sorenson had been shot by just such a gun.

  “Promise you won’t tell the police,” Mary Nason begged.

  Casey shook his head. The thing was too mixed-up for him to try and figure out now, but if he could find Les Boyden it might be worth a look. It would be a sort of backhand favor for the girl maybe; and there was a chance of finding where that ten thousand dollars went. But he’d have to tip off Logan. He knew that, knew he was in no spot to handle a case like this alone.

  “I can’t promise that,” he said. “But I’ll look up this place, and then call up a personal friend of mine on the force. I’ll promise you this: I’ll get the best break I can for Les.”

  “All right,” Mary Nason said weakly.

  “If he’s in a jam he’s got to face it some time.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’d better run on home until—”

  “I’d rather stay here,” Mary Nason said. “Can I?”

  “Sure,” Casey said, making his voice confident. “And keep your chin up.”

  VIII

  he number Mary Nason had given Casey proved to be a three-story apartment house built in the shape of an inverted U with little patches of lawn crisscrossed by the walks that led to the three doors on each wing and the two doors at the end section.