Fly Me to the Morgue

by Robert J. Randisi

  FORTY-EIGHT

  ‘All I know,’ Eric said, ‘is that my brother Philip didn’t want Chris to sell that horse.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Philip saw ways of making a lot of money with it.’

  ‘And Chris didn’t?’

  ‘Chris thought small,’ Eric said, ‘Philip thinks big.’

  ‘And how do you think, Eric?’ I asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do you think big or small?’

  Eric spread his arms.

  ‘Look where I am. What do you think?’

  ‘I think you’re a blackjack player who keeps himself close to the action.’

  ‘So I’m a gambler,’ Eric said. ‘Sue me.’

  I studied him for a few seconds, then asked, ‘Your brother Philip promised to cut you in, didn’t he?’

  ‘Cut me in on what?’

  ‘On whatever he was plannin’,’ I answered. ‘He wanted you to side with him against Chris and Adrienne.’

  He didn’t answer, but the look on his face said it all.

  ‘Did you know he was gonna have your brother Chris killed?’ Jerry asked.

  ‘Hey, hey,’ Eric said, waving his hands, ‘Phil wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ I said, ‘a brother wouldn’t kill a brother? Not over a lot of money?’

  ‘Philip has money,’ Eric said. ‘He wouldn’t need to kill Chris for more.’

  ‘Then maybe it was you,’ I said.

  ‘Me . . . what?’

  ‘Maybe it was you who killed your brother for money,’ I said. ‘I’ll bet you need it. I mean, after all –’ I spread my hands, ‘– look where you are.’

  ‘I never . . . I wouldn’t . . .’ He stopped short when Jerry put his big hand on his chest, pressed him back into the chair.

  ‘When Adrienne told you Jerry and I were goin’ out there, you called your brother Phil, right?’

  ‘R-right.’

  ‘And he sent someone out there to kill us, so we wouldn’t find out he killed Chris. Or had him killed.’

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘I don’t know . . . if he sent somebody to shoot at you, but . . . but I can’t believe he killed our brother. I won’t believe that of Phil.’

  ‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘Is he offering you that much money?’

  ‘I’m . . . I’m . . . I do need a lot of money,’ he said. ‘You’d find that out if you tried. I’m not denying that. And Philip is going to help me. B-but he didn’t kill Chris. He didn’t!’

  I reached out and touched Jerry’s tree trunk of an arm. He removed his hand from Eric’s chest.

  ‘I believe you.’

  He relaxed his shoulders a bit.

  ‘I believe that you don’t think Philip killed Chris,’ I said.

  ‘You . . . you think he did?’

  ‘I can’t think of anybody else with a motive,’ I said, ‘can you?’

  ‘Well . . .’

  ‘Come on, Eric,’ I said. ‘Don’t clam up now.’

  Jerry showed Eric Arnold his big hand, fingers splayed.

  ‘Yeah, all right,’ he said, quickly, ‘Philip is in business with . . . some people.’

  ‘Some people?’ I asked. ‘What people, Eric?’

  ‘Um, the mob,’ Eric said. ‘Phil’s in business with the mob.’

  I looked at Jerry.

  ‘Why doesn’t it surprise me that we’re gonna end up dealin’ with the mob?’

  FORTY-NINE

  ‘His name’s Vincent DeStefano,’ Eric said.

  ‘What does he do?’ I asked.

  ‘I-I don’t know.’

  ‘You do your brother’s books, right?’ I asked. ‘You must know something.’

  ‘Well, yeah, but—’

  ‘They’re phony books, right?’

  ‘R-right,’ he admitted, reluctantly. He looked pained, but somehow relieved at having said it.

  ‘So where are his real books?’

  ‘I-I don’t know.’

  ‘He doesn’t trust you, his own brother, with his real book?’ I asked.

  ‘N-No, it’s not that . . . exactly . . . it’s just that . . .’

  ‘Yeah, it is,’ Jerry said. He looked at me, but pointed at Eric. ‘This guy’s a boob, and his brother knows it.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I think you’re right.’

  ‘Hey . . .’ Eric said.

  ‘So where do we find Mr Vincent DeStefano, Eric?’ I asked.

  ‘I-I don’t know . . .’

  ‘You must have an address for him?’ I reasoned. ‘In your brother’s papers?’

  ‘Yeah, but the papers are phony.’

  ‘I’m bettin’ the numbers are phony, but the addresses are real.’

  He shrugged and said, ‘OK. I-I’ll get it.’

  He got up and went to a file cabinet, took peeks over his shoulder a few times to see if we were watching him. We were.

  ‘You come out of there with anything but paperwork and I’ll make you eat it,’ Jerry said, but with an easy-going smile on his face. Somehow, the smile made the threat even more menacing.

  ‘I don’t have anything . . .’

  ‘Just get the info,’ Jerry said.

  Eric finally fumbled a file out of the drawer and brought it back to where we were sitting.

  ‘Give that to me and something to write on,’ I told him.

  ‘And siddown,’ Jerry said.

  Eric sat, gave me the file and gave a pad and pen over to me. I found an address for DeStefano in Las Vegas. I also took down the phone number. I trusted myself more than him to write it down correctly.

  ‘Here,’ I said, and tossed the file back into Eric’s lap, along with the pad. ‘Now write down your brother’s address and phone number.’

  He hesitated.

  ‘Do it, asshole!’ Jerry snapped.

  Eric wrote quickly, gave me back the pad. I stood up, looked at Jerry.

  ‘He’s gonna call his brother the minute we leave,’ I said. ‘Or DeStefano.’

  Jerry looked at Eric.

  ‘You gonna do that, you little puke?’

  ‘N-no,’ Eric said, blinking rapidly. ‘I-I don’t even know Mr DeStefano.’

  Jerry felt he needed to reinforce the fear a little more so he produced his .45. Eric’s blinking increased.

  ‘If I hear you called your brother,’ Jerry said, pressing his gun to Eric’s forehead, ‘or DeStefano, I’ll come right back here and pull this trigger.’ He pressed the gun harder against Eric’s forehead. ‘You got that, Mr Accountant?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I got it,’ Eric said, ‘I got it.’

  ‘I’m serious, asshole,’ Jerry said. ‘I don’t care how scared you are of your big bad brother, or of Vincent DeStefano. I’ll come back here and blow your brains all over the wall.’

  Eric nodded jerkily.

  ‘Tell me you believe me!’

  ‘I believe you! I believe you!’

  ‘Good man.’

  Jerry removed his gun. The barrel left a round indentation on Eric’s forehead. I wondered how long it would last as a reminder? We went back out into the reception area. The cute little receptionist was still there. She looked Jerry up and down again. She apparently liked big men.

  ‘Here,’ she said, holding out a slip of paper to him.

  ‘What’s this?’ he asked.

  ‘My number,’ she said, ‘in case you wanna ask me any questions.’

  ‘Uh . . .’

  ‘He says thanks,’ I said, grabbing the slip.

  ‘I like a big man of few words,’ she said.

  Out in the hall I said, ‘Here ya go,’ and gave him the slip.

  ‘What am I supposed ta do with this, Mr G?’

  ‘Come on, Jerry,’ I said. ‘Don’t tell me a girl never gave you her number before.’

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘I don’t get that kinda thing. You and Danny maybe, but not me.’

  ‘Well . . . this is Vegas,’ I said. ‘Anything’s possible.’

  ‘So what do I do with it?’
/>
  ‘Put it in your pocket, just in case you end up with some free time.’

  ‘You know,’ he said, as we exited the building, ‘with real girls, not whores, ya gotta talk to ’em. I ain’t good at that.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I doubt that would be a problem with this girl.’

  FIFTY

  ‘Are we gonna go and see Philip now?’ Jerry asked.

  ‘Sure, why not?’ I asked. ‘There’s no point in waiting, is there? Especially since he still might call ahead.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Jerry said, ‘we should go and see DeStefano first?’

  ‘Do you recognize the name?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I think maybe we should find out just how connected DeStefano is before we go and see him,’ I suggested. ‘So let’s see big brother first.’

  He started the car and said, ‘I gotta warn ya, Mr G. I’m gonna wanna smash his face in as soon as he opens his mouth.’

  ‘I gotta warn you, Jerry,’ I said. ‘I’ll probably let you.’

  Philip Arnold had offices in a more businesslike section of town. His building was surrounded by other office buildings.

  On the lobby directory he was listed as Philip Arnold Consultants. Adrienne had said his business was investments.

  We waited for the elevator, stepped aside when it arrived to allow three men in suits to exit. They didn’t look like accountants or lawyers. I had a feeling that while the building might be in a better neighborhood than Eric Arnold’s was, the clientele was not much better. We got in and rode to the 3rd floor.

  ‘This is a good floor,’ Jerry said.

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘If I have to hang him from the window by the ankles it’s high enough to scare him, but low enough that he might survive if I accidentally drop him.’

  We found his door and entered. He had a reception area, but there was no receptionist. That was probably good, because if she had been there she might have been underneath the overturned desk.

  ‘I had a bad feelin’ when those guys left the elevator,’ Jerry said.

  I nodded. We approached the closed door of Arnold’s office, wondering if we were going to find another dead member of the family.

  As we entered, we saw that he wasn’t dead, but he was definitely the worse for wear.

  ‘Whatayou want?’ he demanded from behind his desk. He was holding a washcloth to his bruised and battered face.

  ‘I think we ran into your friends in the lobby,’ I said. ‘Three guys with bad-fitting suits?’

  He probed his mouth and said around his big hand, ‘I think they loosened some teeth.’

  ‘Why didn’t you show them your muscles?’ Jerry asked.

  ‘Or sic your muscle buddies on them?’

  ‘What the hell do you guys want?’ he demanded. He opened a drawer and took out a bottle of scotch and a glass.

  ‘No, thanks,’ I said.

  He ignored me, poured himself a drink, sipped it and then hissed as the liquor hit his sore lips and gums.

  ‘We just came from seeing Eric,’ I said.

  ‘Oh yeah? What’d that pussy tell you?’

  ‘He was very talkative,’ I said. ‘But I hope your friends didn’t get all that you have to give already. Jerry would be really upset if you had nothing left for us.’

  ‘Adrienne send you?’ he asked, giving Jerry a wary look.

  ‘We’re working on her behalf,’ I said.

  ‘You guys ain’t cops, and you ain’t private detectives. Whataya want?’

  ‘We’d like to know who killed your brother Chris,’ I said, ‘and who took some shots at us today out in Red Rock.’

  ‘Well, for the first question, I don’t know,’ he said, ‘and for the second, probably somebody who don’t like you.’

  ‘And that would be . . . you?’ I asked.

  Phil Arnold laughed, then hissed.

  ‘Don’t make me laugh,’ he said. ‘It hurts. You guys think I sent a shooter after you? I ain’t got that kind of juice.’

  ‘Balls,’ Jerry said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You ain’t got that kinda balls.’

  ‘So yeah,’ Arnold said, with a shrug, ‘maybe I ain’t.’ He poured himself some more scotch, sipped it carefully. His suit was disheveled, and there was blood on his white collar. ‘But I also wouldn’t have any reason to.’

  There were two overturned chairs on the floor. We righted them and sat down.

  ‘So who were the guys who roughed you up, Phil?’ I asked. ‘Collectin’ on a bad debt, or do they work for Vinnie DeStefano?’

  He was in the act of lifting the glass to his mouth, and stopped short to give me a sharp look.

  ‘Where’d you hear that name?’

  ‘We heard you’re in business with him,’ I said. ‘We also heard that your brother keeps your phony books. But you don’t trust him enough to let him keep the real ones.’

  ‘I don’t trust him to know enough to stay out of the rain. The fact that you bozos are here tells me I’m right. He can’t keep his damn mouth shut.’

  ‘Well, don’t blame him too much,’ I said. ‘It was kinda hard for him to keep quiet with Jerry standin’ on his chest.’

  ‘You wanna see?’ Jerry asked, with a smile.

  ‘Hey, fellas,’ he said, ‘I been worked over enough for one day, don’t you think?’

  ‘Not by me,’ Jerry said.

  ‘Look,’ he said, ‘why don’t we have a drink and talk about it, huh?’

  ‘Sure, Phil,’ I said, ‘let’s have a drink.’

  ‘I got some glasses in the john,’ he said. ‘And I need to wash my face.’ He pointed to the bathroom door.

  ‘Go ahead.’

  He got up, opened the door and went in. We heard the water turn on, and run . . . and run . . . and run . . .

  ‘Crap!’ I said, springing out of my chair.

  It was a bathroom, all right, with another door that led to a back hallway. I ran out, looked both ways, listened for his footsteps, but he was gone.

  FIFTY-ONE

  ‘I wonder why he didn’t do that with the other three?’ Jerry asked.

  ‘Maybe they were too smart to let him go to the john,’ I said, glumly.

  ‘Well,’ Jerry said, ‘we might as well go through this place.’

  ‘Yeah, why not?’

  As we tossed the place, not bothering to be neat because it was already in a shambles, Jerry said, ‘Look on the bright side, Mr G.’

  ‘Where’s that, Jerry?’

  ‘It’s pretty clear he ain’t got the balls to be behind his brother’s murder.’

  ‘That’s clear to you?’

  ‘Well, clear to me that he didn’t do it,’ he said. ‘And clear that he don’t have the juice to order it but sure didn’t do nothin’ to stop it, I bet.’

  I went through the file cabinet while Jerry went through the desk, but I stopped, frustrated.

  ‘I’ll bet all this stuff is fake, to match his fake books,’ I said.

  ‘So what do you wanna do?’

  I couldn’t believe I was saying it, and not Jerry.

  ‘I wanna get somethin’ to eat.’

  ‘No argument from me.’

  I gave Jerry directions to a nearby diner that always reminded me of the Greek diners of my youth in Brooklyn. I figured he’d like it. I ordered a pizza burger platter and he ordered meat loaf with lots of brown gravy on the meat and fries. ‘Wet fries’ we called them when I lived in Brooklyn.

  ‘Are we gonna go lookin’ for him again, Mr G?’ Jerry asked.

  ‘Nope,’ I said.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Seems to me he’s on the verge of becomin’ the next victim,’ I said.

  ‘Tell you the truth, Mr G., I don’t think that would break me up none.’

  ‘No, me neither, I guess.’

  He popped a handful of dripping wet fries into his mouth.

  ‘So DeStefano is our next move,’ I said. ‘We’ve got to find out wh
o he is, what he’s got to do with the Arnold family, or this horse.’

  ‘You want me to make some calls?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘and I’ll talk to Jack Entratter, see what he knows.’

  ‘Maybe you should ask his girl, too.’

  ‘Yeah, maybe I should.’

  ‘I wonder how the dick did today?’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Better than us, I hope.’

  ‘Aw, Mr G., we didn’t do so bad. We figured out these two brothers are limp dicks who couldn’t swat a fly. But maybe somebody they got involved with killed their brother.’

  I stared at him.

  ‘One of these days,’ I said, ‘you’re gonna let somebody see how smart you really are . . . I just hope it’s me.’

  He flashed a grin at me, brown gravy at the corners of it.

  FIFTY-TWO

  We went back to the Sands. Jerry went to his room to make some calls. I went to Jack Entratter’s office. He wasn’t there.

  ‘He’s on the casino floor,’ his girl said. ‘Somebody was cheating.’

  ‘Where?’ I hoped it wasn’t any of my tables. If I’d been in the pit I would have noticed it.

  ‘I’m not sure, Mr Gianelli.’

  I searched my memory. That was probably the only time she’d ever called me by name. It was progress. I didn’t want to push it.

  ‘OK, thanks.’

  I took the elevator back down, crossed the hotel lobby and entered the casino, looking for Jack.

  I found him, but not near the tables, where I thought I would.

  ‘Jack,’ I said, ‘what are you doin’?’

  ‘Hear that?’

  I listened. One of the slot machines was paying off, nickels pinging off the metal tray.

  ‘That’s the fifth jackpot today,’ he said. ‘Same machine. I’m tryin’ to figure out how she’s doin’ it.’

  The ‘she’ was a seventy-year-old, gray-haired grandmother who was happily scooping the nickels out of the tray and dumping them in her purse, which was almost as big as a suitcase.

  ‘Five jackpots?’ I asked.

  He nodded.

  ‘She’s gonna need help carrying them out.’

  ‘I’ll help her,’ he growled.

  ‘What are you gonna do, kneecap her?’

  He gave me a dirty look.

  ‘What are you doin’ here? Are you in trouble?’