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

by Unknown

  Canavan, still breathing a trifle unevenly, as though he might have run all the way from the Saints of Mercy Hospital, got out and went up the walk and punched the night bell. The door was opened by Big George Kolinski, no less.

  Canavan’s jaw dropped. “Well, for crying out loud, what are you doing here?”

  Big George’s fat face was wreathed in smiles. “Hel—lo, Lieutenant! I see we can always count on the police—eventually.”

  Canavan glared at him. “What do you mean by that crack?”

  Kolinski moved his well-tailored shoulders. “Mr. Weems reported the incident at least two hours ago. You boys are just beginning to take an interest.”

  “And what’s that to you?”

  Again that exasperating shrug. “Mr. Weems is one of our clients—the Morticians’ Protective Association, you know.”

  “Another of your rackets?”

  “A protective association,” Kolinski said. “Naturally when the police department didn’t function, Mr. Weems called us.” The big diamond on his hand twinkled as he laid a fat finger alongside his nose. “Not me directly, you understand. I am merely a director of the association. But when I heard about it—well, the case was so unusual that I went down to headquarters to see why a taxpayer like Mr. Weems wasn’t getting service. Lieutenant Kleinschmidt was just leaving, so I rode out with him.”

  Canavan almost choked. “It’s getting so you can’t even die without running into a racket. What do you do if the undertakers don’t pay up—yodel at the funerals?” He pushed past Kolinski as Lieutenant Roy Kleinschmidt came through a door at the end of the short hall.

  Kleinschmidt was big and blond and red-faced—a good cop, though without brilliance. He seemed relieved to see Canavan. “Look, Bill, this don’t hardly make sense—” He paused as another man came through the door. “Mr. Weems, this is my—now—partner, Lieutenant Canavan.”

  Weems was a smallish, twittery man with a perpetually quivering nose. He had a bandage wrapped around his head. His harried eyes went from Canavan to Big George Kolinski. “I’ve paid my dues. I don’t know why you should do this to me.”

  Kolinski’s tremendous bulk seemed to solidify. “Look, punk, I told you before that we didn’t do it. You think I’d be here if—”

  “Shut up!” Canavan said sharply. He looked at Kleinschmidt. “You tell it, Roy.”

  Kleinschmidt coughed apologetically. “Well, of course, like Big George, here, says—”

  “Never mind Kolinski!” Canavan yelled. “What happened? Was it—was it a guy named Edward Carroll?”

  Kleinschmidt blinked stupidly. “How did you know that? It wasn’t in the report.”

  Canavan could feel Kolinski’s eyes on him, alert, questioning. He suddenly became quite calm. “Skip that for now.” He looked at Egbert Weems. “Maybe you’d better tell me exactly what happened.”

  There really was not much to it. Weems was on duty, relieving his regular night man. A couple of guys had walked in and asked to see the body of Edward Carroll. Also his clothes and personal effects. Mr. Weems, becoming suspicious, had objected and been knocked on the head for his pains. Awakening some time later he had found his mortuary something of a mess, what with a couple of corpses dumped from their caskets and everything else topsy-turvy. He could find nothing missing, however, and it was probably this admission which accounted for the lack of hurry on the part of the police. His description of the two men was completely vague. It amounted to one tall man and one shorter man. Was there anything unusual about either? Not that Mr. Weems could remember. “I was naturally quite agitated,” he explained. He breathed noisily and bent a jaundiced eye on Big George Kolinski. “Pure vandalism!”

  Kolinski scowled. “Listen, punk, you try blaming this on the Association and you’re liable to really run into something.” He looked at Canavan. “You know who this guy Carroll is? He’s Ed Stengel!”

  Canavan took a deep breath. Stengel was, or had been, big-time. The police of half a dozen cities wanted him for twice as many very high-class jobs indeed. Kleinschmidt confirmed Kolinski’s identification. “That’s who, Bill.”

  “Let’s have a look at him,” Canavan said.

  They all went through the door at the end of the hall, into a room of smells and gleaming porcelain and a table that would have been suggestive even without the sheeted figure on it. A pair of bare feet, toes pointed ceilingward, protruded from beneath the sheet.

  r. Weems, with that curiously hallowed air peculiar to morticians, uncovered the face, and Canavan stared down at it, trying to find some resemblance to that other face of which he was so conscious, Miss Hope Carewe’s. This Stengel, alias Ed Carroll, had the same golden-brown hair and, in repose, the features had that same indefinable air of breeding. But there was a hardness, even in death, about the mouth and eyes. Of course, the man was older than the girl. Canavan placed him as around thirty-five.

  Kleinschmidt said suddenly: “There was a girl made the arrangements with Weems, here! Claimed she was this guy’s sister.” He looked at Canavan with swift suspicion. “That explains it, by golly. Her name was the same as the one you— Hey, so that’s how you knew who he was!” A slow, angry flush suffused his heavy face. “By God, Bill, you been holding out on me!”

  Big George Kolinski pounced. “What was her name again, Weemsie? Carewe?” He smacked his thick lips. “That the girl you rescued from Night Court, Canavan?”

  Canavan scowled. “What do you mean, I rescued her?”

  Kolinski chuckled nastily. “I was there, remember? I happened to see her leaving in your car. And now it turns out that she is the sister, or the moll, of a guy so hot he was burning up.” He rubbed his fat hands in pleasurable anticipation. “This is going to make swell reading in the papers, pal. Unless you can turn her up and offer a damned good reason for playing around with her.” He stabbed a finger at Weems. “Take a good look at this guy. Could he be one of the mugs who knocked you over?”

  Weems, startled, blinked his eyes at Canavan. “Well—”

  “Don’t say it!” Canavan yelled. “Don’t even think it!” He balled his fists. “Listen, you fat baboon, why the hell would I be chasing a corpse?”

  “Somebody is,” Kolinski said significantly. “Or something the corpse had.” He centered his attention on Roy Kleinschmidt. “Look at it this way, Lieutenant. Here we have a man who is notably big-time. Isn’t it conceivable that he might be holding something worth heavy sugar? Obviously the girl knew about it, or suspected. She was in a hell of a hurry to get the body away from the hospital.” He let his eyes slide up and down Canavan’s length. “Then we have a supposedly honest copper practically hijacking the gal out of court. Why do you suppose he would do that?”

  Kleinschmidt was still sore. “Where is the girl, Bill?”

  “I don’t know, I tell you! Why do you think I called in and had her description put on the air? Would I do that if I knew where she was?”

  “You might,” Kleinschmidt said. “You could have faked it to cover up her disappearance.” His fist slid unobtrusively toward the gun in his holster clip. “Maybe you even killed her, Bill.”

  Canavan couldn’t believe it at first. It was all too ridiculous. “You damned fool!” He sucked in his breath. “Listen, I happened to be passing through Night Court and I saw this gal. Obviously she didn’t belong there, so I checked with the clerk and found she was charged with beating an eight-buck dinner check. Sure, I squared it! Any guy with half an eye would have done the same thing.”

  “Why?” Kleinschmidt said. Kleinschmidt was not a romantic man. “Why would they, Bill?”

  Canavan resorted to heavy sarcasm. “Why, because I recognized her, of course. I knew she was Ed Stengel’s sister, and that he had a double fistful of diamonds, so I planned to make her tell me where he was. Only she knocked me out first and got away. Nuts!”

  “Maybe she didn’t knock you out, Bill. Maybe you just made it look like she had.” Kleinschmidt was definitely going for his gun n
ow. “I hate to do this, Bill, but—”

  Canavan hit him. He might not have done it if he’d stopped to think, but he was too mad to think. His fist connected with the Dutchman’s chin, and even as the big guy went down Canavan snatched out his own gun and waved it at Kolinski and the stupefied Mr. Weems.

  “Take it easy, you two lugs. And when Kleinschmidt wakes up tell him I said to use the few brains God gave him.” He backed to the door. “And you, Kolinski, you’d better watch your step. When I get through with this little job I’m going to make it my business to tear your Morticians’ Protective Association wide open.”

  He went out to his car. Neither Kolinski nor Mr. Weems made any attempt to stop him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE CORPSE IN THE FOLDING BED

  he address given on the hospital card turned out to be one of those mediocre bungalow-courts just off Hollywood Boulevard where anything can happen. Broken-down character actors choose these places for some reason, and extra girls and bartenders and car-hops. There were half a dozen parties going on in as many different units. A man like Ed Carroll, alias Ed Stengel, could have found no better place to remain incognito.

  Canavan went along the flagged walk till he came to 1217-A. There were no lights on inside, and he stood there in the shadows a moment, listening to the medley of sounds from adjacent units. Offhand, he couldn’t have told you just what he expected to find here. It was just that the girl was indubitably bound up with the affairs of one Ed Stengel, and Bill Canavan was intent on again meeting Miss Hope Carewe. This place, having been the temporary residence of Ed Carroll, might possibly offer a clue to the girl’s present whereabouts.

  He wondered if they really were brother and sister. The name Carroll lent a certain amount of credibility to this. The first syllable of both names was identical. Canavan frowned a little, remembering Big George Kolinski. Was Big George’s interest merely what he had stated? Or was the business of the Morticians’ Protective Association just a blind for a much deeper interest in Ed Carroll, alias Ed Stengel? Canavan was suddenly struck with Kolinski’s own words. Obviously someone was looking for something, and rather seriously too. The search had encompassed not only Hope Carewe’s hotel room, but also the corpse. Conceivably it would extend, or had already extended, to include this second-rate bungalow.

  Canavan went up the three shallow steps and tried the door. It opened under his hand, and he went in quietly, closing it behind him before he turned on the lights. It was even as he had expected. The place had been combed thoroughly, and certainly not too carefully. Evidences of hurry were scattered all about. Canavan decided there was not much use in his doing the job all over again. Whatever was being sought for had either been found or was never there at all.

  He went to the phone and called headquarters.

  “Hey,” the sergeant yelled, “we got a pickup order on you!”

  Canavan cursed Kleinschmidt. “That heel!” He took a deep breath. “Listen, Donny, what did the boys find out about that girl?”

  It appeared that the boys had found out nothing at all from the hotel room. There had been plenty of fingerprints, but none of these were on record at headquarters. “And anyway,” the sergeant said gloomily, “I don’t know where you got the idea she was hot. We checked with San Diego, where she registered from, and you know what?”

  Canavan admitted that he didn’t know what.

  “Why, she’s one of the Carewes. Her old man is worth around seventeen million bucks.”

  “The hell he is!”

  “Well, he is.” Lieutenant Canavan became suddenly conscious that the sergeant was prolonging the conversation unnecessarily. Obviously they were trying to locate Canavan by way of the phone he was using. He banged the receiver down and whirled as there was a creaking noise behind him. The folding-bed, apparently insecurely fastened, swung slowly down from its niche in the wall. Restraining springs allowed it to settle quite gently. There was a man on the bed. He was Luis Renaldo, who ran the Cathedral and to whom Canavan owed the sum of eight dollars. He was so dead that it hurt to look at him. Someone had cut his throat. The job had been done very thoroughly indeed and there was a lot of blood.

  Canavan just stood there for a moment, fascinated by the sight. Not that he was morbid, but this happened to be the first dead man he had ever found folded up in a disappearing bed. Also there was the fact that he was more than intimately acquainted with the corpse, that he had spoken with him but an hour or so ago.

  He wondered to whom he would now owe the eight dollars.

  It was some little time before he attempted to rationalize Renaldo’s being there at all, dead or otherwise. So far as Canavan knew, this latest dead man’s contact with Miss Hope Carewe had been slight. It was beginning to be quite apparent, however, that any contact at all was the same as taking cyanide.

  She was absolutely and positively poison.

  Look what just a speaking acquaintance had got a guy named William Canavan. He had been conked, and robbed, and was now even a fugitive from his fellow cops. Indeed he was accused of violating the sanctity of the Weems Mortuary and the person of yet another corpse, though at least it seemed agreed by all that Ed Stengel, or Ed Carroll, had not been murdered. He had just died. Of stomach ulcers.

  anavan, remembering suddenly that headquarters had probably traced his phone call, and that a prowl car was due any minute, had just decided that he had better get the hell out of there when the doorbell rang. It sounded loud enough to wake even Luis Renaldo. Canavan considered vanishing by the rear exit, but in case the bell-ringer was a cop he more than likely had his partner posted at the back door, and an attempted escape would make things look even worse than they were. Canavan compromised by folding Luis Renaldo and the bed back into the wall. He then opened the door. The caller was Terence O’Day, he of the horsily waggish face and caustic wit. He looked slightly drunk, but then he usually did. He did not seem surprised at finding Canavan here.

  “Hello, handsome,” he said.

  Canavan stared. “Well!”

  O’Day used his spread hand to push his disreputable hat farther back on his head. “Aren’t you going to invite me in? I’m the Press, you know. The good old Meteor.”

  Canavan breathed gustily. “How did you find out about this place?”

  O’Day grinned. “Everybody knows about this place, pal. Or almost everybody. And about you too,” he added cheerfully. “You’re getting quite famous, really you are, Bill, going around rescuing damsels in distress, and robbing corpses and one thing and another.”

  “I did not!” Canavan yelled.

  “Well,” O’Day said, “I’m only repeating what I heard. Kleinschmidt called in and my legman at headquarters passed the facts on to me. It was a simple matter to phone the hospital and get this address. Probably even Kleinschmidt has thought of it by this time.”

  Behind Canavan there was a tell-tale creaking. That damn bed was coming down again! Rather desperately he tried to close the door in O’Day’s face, but he wasn’t quick enough. O’Day put his foot against it. “Oh-oh, what have we here?”

  Reluctantly Canavan stood aside. “Now look, don’t go getting ideas. It wasn’t me that killed him.”

  “Certainly not,” O’Day said. He went over to the bed. “My, my, that prince of heels, Luis Renaldo!” He lifted a quizzical eyebrow at Canavan. “Didn’t you owe him eight bucks?”

  Canavan shook with impotent rage. “So you know that too!”

  “Of course,” O’Day said equably. His breath smelled of Sen-Sen. “When you escorted the little lady away from the bad, naughty jail I was just curious enough to find out how you did it.”

  “Someday,” Canavan snarled, “your curiosity is going to get you a swift sock in the nose!” He mopped sweat from his upper lip, though the night was not cold. “Look, Terry, be a good egg and forget you ever saw me, will you? And let’s get the hell out of here.”

  O’Day rocked back and forth on his heels. “Tell me about the lit
tle lady, pal. Is it true that she’s Stengel’s sister? Has her old man really got seventeen million dollars? Does she love you, or does she not?”

  Canavan lifted a threatening fist. “All right, heel, you’re asking for it!”

  Behind him a harsh voice said: “Hold it, Lieutenant!”

  Canavan whirled. There was a harness bull in the doorway, and the harness bull was holding his service gun as if he meant business. Out in back, someone was fumbling at the kitchen door. That indicated at least one other cop. The bull in the doorway caught sight of the corpse on the bed and he let out a yell and charged. Terence O’Day stuck out a foot and tripped him. Then, winking owlishly, he jerked a thumb at the open door. Canavan’s lips formed a soundless thanks. He ran out.

  From far down the street came the wail of a siren. That would probably be Kleinschmidt, and of all people Canavan did not want to meet the Dutchman. Especially with a murder victim at hand. He headed at top speed down the flagged walk, reached his car and had the righthand door open when two enormous shadows closed in on him. Something that certainly was not a frankfurter rammed him in the right kidney.

  “Be nice, copper.”

  Canavan was in no humor to be nice. With a sound like a maddened bull he pivoted and swung a devastating left at the nearest face. The face merely slid to one side and the momentum of the blow, missing, carried Canavan into a pair of outspread arms. “Sock him,” the owner of the arms said. The second guy socked. Canavan had already been knocked cold once tonight. This second attack was just too much. Blackness as absolute as the bottom of a coal mine engulfed him.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE LETTER

  e awoke with a sense of unreality, as does one who has been under an opiate for a long, long time. Blurred objects swam before his eyes, as though seen through layers and layers of gauze, or the opalescent depths of a gray-green sea. Once he had had a tooth extracted, a molar whose roots were wrapped around the jawbone, and the exodontist had given him several successive shots of novocaine. Canavan had passed out, awakening later with almost these same sensations. There was no pain, only the vague discomfort of incipient nausea. Voices were blurred too, and then the sharply insistent fumes of ammonia bit at his nostrils and the fog cleared away.