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

by Unknown

  In the back seat Spurck, with a black bag clutched between his fat knees, was nervously watching the passing traffic. Lennox stepped the car up to sixty and watched the back road in the rear-view mirror. At Rosecrans Avenue a Chevrolet coupé swung in behind them and followed them through Manhattan and Hermosa. Lennox slowed down to twenty and the coupé slowed down also. As they reached Redondo city limits, the Chevrolet speeded up and ran them to the curb. Two men were in the coupé, hats drawn low over their eyes. Lennox saw that the one beside the driver carried a riot gun across his knees.

  For a minute, the road was empty, no traffic coming either way. The man with the riot gun said: “Keep your hands on that wheel, mug.”

  Lennox obeyed, a thin smile twisting his lips for a moment. He knew that voice, knew it well. The man with the gun said to Spurck: “Toss the bag over, quick!”

  With trembling fingers, Spurck obeyed. The driver of the coupé opened the bag, inspected the contents. “If these are marked, guy, it’s curtains for you. Okey, Charley.”

  The man with the gun nodded. “Keep driving through Redondo and up through Palos Verdes till you come to where the road ends and another road goes off to the left and into Pedro. Drive out in the field at the end of the road. You’ll find your ham along the top of the cliff, tied up. We were set to push him over if you didn’t show up.” The coupé’s motor speeded up and they jerked away, swinging left at the next street.

  Spruck moaned: “Fifty thousand!” He sounded out of breath.

  Lennox put the Lincoln in gear. They went through Redondo, climbed the hill beyond and skirted the ocean until they came to the road’s end. Five minutes later, with the aid of a flashlight from the tool-box, Lennox found Wayborn. The actor was tied securely, lying flat on his back so close to the cliff’s edge that had he made any effort to free his bonds, he might have rolled off. Aside from chafed wrists and stiff ankles, he appeared none the worse for his experience, nor was he even thankful. “You might have gotten here sooner,” he told them, in a peevish voice. “I assure you that it was far from comfortable lying here, bound hand and foot.”

  Spurck exploded. For five minutes he called the actor everything that he could think of. Wayborn listened silently, then climbed into the car. Lennox grinned to himself as he turned the Lincoln towards town.

  5

  tan Braun, Spurck’s nephew, walked back and forth across his uncle’s office. He was slight, with black curly hair and long eyelashes. He looked like an actor and wasn’t. He was production manager for the studio.

  “It’s strange,” he said, “that Lennox advised you to pay that money. I wish that you’d have asked me about it.” He pouted as a small boy pouts when his feelings have been hurt.

  Spurck threw his hands wide. “Ask you? What good does asking you get me? Does it bring back Wayborn? Does it catch Price up with his schedule? It was you that wanted Wayborn—that ham. It was you that held up the schedule three days, changing the story. Maybe you would have got him back and saved us fifty thousand—you—”

  Braun said, harshly: “At least I’d have marked the money. You say Lennox wouldn’t let you do that?”

  Spurck’s face became crafty. “Which shows what you know. Me, I got a list of them bills from the bank. Every number. A copy I have made which Lennox takes. If we had marked the bills, they might have killed Wayborn when the picture is only half shot, to say nothing of retakes. Such ideas you’ve got.”

  Braun’s voice was stubborn. “You could have hired private detectives.”

  “A swell idea, when the barn door is closed and the horse is—”

  “Anyhow,” his nephew’s voice rasped, “I’ve hired some. They’re waiting outside now.”

  Abe Rollins and Dan Grogan came in. Grogan was big with a flat Irish face. Rollins was small, dark, with shifty eyes and too white teeth. He said: “Please tuh met yuh, Mr. Spurck. Braun’s been telling us about your trouble. Don’t worry, we’ll turn these mugs up.” He examined the two notes from the kidnapers. “I’d like to talk to Lennox,” he said. Spurck hesitated, then pressed one of the buttons at the side of his desk.

  Bill came through the door and nodded slightly to Braun. His blue eyes narrowed as they went over the two detectives; then he looked at Spurck. “What’s eating you now, Sol?”

  Spurck explained. As Lennox listened, his eyes got narrower. Then he looked at Rollins. “Okey. What do you want me to tell you?”

  The man cleared his throat with importance. “Did you recognize either of the men in the Chevy?”

  Lennox hesitated, then said: “No. Their faces were shadowed by their hats. I couldn’t have recognized my grandmother.”

  “Yet you told Mr. Spurck that you knew who had Wayborn?”

  Lennox said: “Yeah, I also told him that I’d try to get the fifty grand back, if he let me work it my way. I didn’t figure that he’d run in a couple of lame brains to mess things up.”

  Rollins’ face got red, Grogan shifted his feet. “Don’t be too smart, fella,” Rollins warned. “You’re not in the clear on this thing, not by a damn’ sight.”

  Lennox said: “Now isn’t that just too swell? You’ll be telling me next that I framed the whole play and got the fifty grand myself.”

  “That’s not such a bad idea,” Rollins snapped. “Maybe you did. As I remember it, you advised Mr. Spurck to pay the money.”

  “That’s right, Bill, you did.” Spurck sounded excited.

  Lennox looked at him. “So you got me tagged as a kidnaper, too. Okey, Sol, get your own fifty grand back. I’m quitting, washed up.” He swung towards the door. Rollins’ voice stopped him.

  “Not so fast, punk.” The detective’s hand was in his coat pocket, shoving the gun forward against the cloth.

  Lennox shrugged. “You seem to be running the set.” He turned back into the room.

  Spurck said: “Just a few questions, Bill. Don’t get sore.”

  Rollins said: “Isn’t it true that you are always broke?”

  “Ask Sol,” Lennox advised. “He’s my banker.”

  “And isn’t it true that you told Mr. Spurck that you knew who had Wayborn?”

  “What of it?”

  “You may be asked to explain that statement at the D.A. office.” Rollins’ voice was threatening.

  “Nerts!” Lennox found himself a cigarette and lit it.

  “And isn’t it also true that you offered to drive the car to Redondo? I should say that you insisted that you be allowed to drive; yet you made no effort to follow the kidnapers after the money had been passed?”

  Lennox shrugged. “Go right ahead, bright boy. Wrap me up in cellophane and deliver me at San Quentin; but while you’re talking, the mugs are spending Sol’s dough.” Spurck groaned, and Lennox laughed.

  6

  Nancy Hobbs said: “So you finally quit.” She said it in the tone of one who hears about a miracle and does not believe.

  Lennox nodded. “Can you feature that? After all I’ve put up with from that fat slob he accuses me of kidnaping. There’s one of his funny-looking dicks outside this joint now. I’m getting important.”

  She said: “Now’s your chance to get out of this town. No,” as he started to speak. “I know you’re broke, but I’ve still got a stake.”

  He was silent and she read refusal in his silence. “Too proud to borrow from a woman?” There was a jeer in her voice. “You’ve done worse.”

  He said: “It isn’t that, Nance. You’re a pal. I could borrow from you, but I can’t scram with this hanging over my head. I’ll get Sol’s fifty grand back; then I’ll take a powder; but I can’t go until I do. I said that I’d find that dough and I will.”

  “Don’t be a fool.” Her voice was hoarse. “These boys play rough. If they get the idea that you’re gumming their game, they’ll plant you in a ditch.”

  He looked at her with narrow eyes. “What boys, Nance? You seem to know a lot about this play.”

  “I know plenty about this town that I don’t p
rint in fan magazines,” she told him. “I get around.”

  “Words.” His voice was harsh. “Why not pass out some names.”

  She said: “Girkin. I gave you that once.”

  “Where’s he tie in? A cheap New York hood.”

  “He used to hang around the New York club where Elva Meyer undressed,” she said, softly. “That wasn’t her name then, but she’s the same girl that you promoted into lights.”

  “Is this straight?”

  “Did I ever give you a wrong steer, Bill?”

  Lennox was silent for a moment; then he shrugged. “That’s nothing to keep me awake nights. Girkin may be a big shot in New York, but he doesn’t rate out here.”

  “Doesn’t he? I saw him on the boulevard yesterday with French and they didn’t act like strangers.”

  Lennox swore softly. “French of the El Romano Club, huh? Nice people.”

  The girl smiled with her mouth, but her eyes were serious. “Friend of yours, isn’t he?”

  Lennox shrugged absently. “So long.” He rose. “I’ll be seeing you in New York.”

  She rose also. “You’re not losing me, Bill Lennox. I’m in this if you are.” She followed him into the street. He grasped her thin wrist in strong fingers.

  “Don’t play the sap, sweetheart. It would be just that much tougher, having you along.”

  A cab cruised by. He let go of her wrist and jumped to the running-board. The next moment he was inside. “Go ahead fast,” he told the startled driver. The cab lurched forward. Lennox peered through the back window. He saw Grogan cross the pavement and wave wildly to an approaching taxi. Lennox found a five in his pocket and passed it to the driver. “There’s a guy following us. Lose him.”

  The driver grinned and turned sharply into Vine, right on Sunset, left at Highland, crashing a signal. Finally, at the corner of Arlington and Pico, he pulled to the curb. “Where to?”

  Lennox said: “Take me to Melrose and Van Ness.” The driver shrugged and turned towards Western.

  Lennox got out at the corner and walked to the apartment house. He rang the bell of suite five, got no answer, tried nine and was answered by a buzz from the door. He jerked it open and started up the stairs. A woman’s voice called: “What is it, please?”

  Lennox said: “I pushed the wrong bell. Sorry.” Her door slammed, and he paused before number five. He knocked without response, then tried the knob. The door was unlocked. He opened it cautiously and stepped into the small hall. For a moment he stood listening. There was no sound in the apartment. He closed the door softly and went along the hall to the living-room door. There he stopped and said something under his breath. The door was partly open. Through the crack he saw the figure of a man sprawled in the middle of the rug. His quick eyes went about the room; then he pushed the door wide and crossed to the body. The face, twisted with fear and pain, was that of Charley, and he was very dead.

  7

  ill Lennox found nothing in the apartment that interested him. There were no papers in the desk, nothing, in fact, except a soiled deck of cards. He went into the bedroom and looked through the closets. Two suits hung there, flashy garments of extreme cut, nothing more. He walked back to the living-room and stopped just inside the door. There was a man looking at the body, a man with a gun in his hand, who said: “Now isn’t this swell?” The man was Grogan.

  Lennox didn’t say anything and the private dick laughed.

  “Imagine finding you here.” His voice held a note of gloating self-satisfaction. His gun came up so that it bore on the second button of Lennox’s vest. “Get the paws in the air, nice boy.”

  Lennox obeyed, and Grogan picked up the phone. “Gimme Hollywood station, and make it snappy.” His eyes never left Lennox’s face, the gun did not move. “That you, Bert? Grogan of Rollins and Grogan. Yeah, listen. Is Lew there? Swell. Let me talk to him, will yuh? Hello, Lew, Grogan. Listen. There’s a stiff in an apartment on Van Ness.” He gave the number. “It’s close to Melrose, apartment five. Yeah, I got the mug. He’s standing against the wall with his hands in the air. Make it snappy.” He hung up and grinned at Lennox. “Nice weather we’re having.”

  Lennox didn’t say anything. He stood there with his hands in the air. They stood there seven minutes, then a siren moaned below, heavy feet made noise on the stairs, and three men in plainclothes came in. The leader nodded to Grogan and looked at Lennox, then at the huddled body on the floor.

  He said: “What’s going on here? Who’s the stiff?”

  Grogan shrugged. “I don’t know who he is. I was trailing this bird. He came up here and I sneaked up after him. When I got here, he was searching the joint.”

  The city detective’s eyes went to Lennox. “Well, what’s the story?” His voice sounded bored, uninterested.

  Lennox shrugged. “When I got here, Charley was on the floor with a knife in his guts. That’s all I know.”

  Grogan pursed his lips and made a funny sound of disbelief. The homicide man said: “Charley who?”

  “Bartelli.”

  “Where’s he from?”

  “New York.”

  Two other men came through the apartment door. One said: “What’s going on here, Lew?”

  The other looked at Lennox and said: “Hello, Bill.” Lennox recognized Alder, of the Post.

  The city detective said: “So you know this guy?”

  Alder’s eyes widened. “Sure, everybody knows him. He’s Bill Lennox of General-Consolidated. What’s it all about, Lew?”

  The city man looked hard at Grogan. “Thought you said that you were trailing this dude?”

  Grogan shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I was, Sol Spurck’s orders.”

  Both reporters looked interested. Lennox snapped: “Be careful, you fool.”

  The city detective looked at him. “When I want to hear you talk, I’ll ask you. All right, Grogan. Go ahead with the story and don’t skip anything.”

  Grogan said: “Well, yuh see, it’s this way. Ralph Wayborn was snatched—”

  “Snatched?”

  “Yeah.” He went on and told the whole story. The reporters looked at each other. “So I was trailing Lennox to find where he had the dough planted, and I walked in on this.”

  The city detective said: “So we’ve got a kidnaping charge on you along with a murder rap.”

  Lennox said, in a tired voice: “That man’s been dead hours. If you birds would think before you open your mouths, you’d know that. Grogan here is my alibi. He can swear that I wasn’t in this place five minutes before he walked in.” Lennox smiled sweetly at the now silent private detective.

  8

  Nancy Hobbs said: “So you wouldn’t listen to me and you get yourself into a worse jam.” They were seated before the Hollywood Station in her car. “Will you go to New York now?”

  “Such ideas you have, Brat. I’m going to get that fifty grand.”

  “You’ll probably get a knife about where Charley got his.”

  “At least that would be a new experience. Who was it that said there is nothing new under the sun?”

  She swore whole-heartedly and stepped on the starter. “Where do we go from here?”

  “You don’t go anywhere,” he told her.

  “I suppose I’m to hang around, ready to bail you out?” Her voice was sarcastic.

  He grinned without mirth. “That’s a thought,” and unlatched the door at his side. “I’ll be seeing you.” He turned up the collar of his coat against the cold wind from the ocean and walked rapidly along. A block farther down he hailed a cab and climbed in.

  “Know where the El Romano Club is?” The man didn’t and Lennox gave him the address. Fog was beginning to roll in from the southwest. The street lamps looked fuzzy and the auto lamps glowed with funny rings. Lennox lit a cigarette, snuggled his chin deeper into his coat collar, and stared at nothing.

  The El Romano Club was located on the top of a storage building. The attendant looked at Lennox, nodded and motio
ned him to the elevator. They shot skyward, stepped out into a hallway with blank concrete walls. There were doors off this hall. Lennox knew that some of them opened into storage rooms. The door at the end seemed to open automatically as he stepped before it. He said: “Hello, chiseler,” to the man that stood aside for him to enter.

  The man grinned in what he thought was a pleasant manner. “Evening, Mr. Lennox. How are you?”

  Bill said: “Pretty lousy, Bert. Big crowd tonight?”

  The man shrugged expressive shoulders. “Fair. What can you expect with the studios on half-pay?”

  Lennox nodded and tossed his hat and coat to the hat-check girl, “ ’lo, gorgeous.”

  She gave him a dimpled smile. “Hello, Bill. You look like the devil.”

  “Sure, that’s because I’ve been working for him so long.”

  He went down the short, carpeted hall and into the main room. The room was large, high-ceilinged and comfortably filled. Three roulette wheels, set in line, occupied the center. In the far corner was a group of men and one woman about the crap table. Chuck-a-luck and the half-moon blackjack tables were ranged against the wall. Lennox crossed the room, conscious that people were turning to look at him. A blonde who a week ago would have rushed across the room to attract his attention presented a pair of too prominent shoulder blades for his inspection.

  Lennox’s lips thinned. “Just a friendly town,” he thought. “When the knife falls, everyone helps you down into the gutter.” He paused before the grilled window of the cashier’s cage and, picking up a pad of blank checks, filled one in for five hundred.

  The man behind the grille took it in his soft white fingers and pretended to study it. Lennox watched him with narrowed eyes. “Don’t you read English?”

  The cashier said: “You’re sure that this is good, Mr. Lennox?”

  Lennox said: “Hell, no; it isn’t good, and you know it, but you’ve cashed a hundred like it. I’ve never failed to pick them up, have I?”

  The man shrugged. “Sorry. My orders are not to cash any more checks.”