Tricks

by Ed McBain

  Shoes:>

  6 frac12;>

  "Is this your husband's handwriting?" Brown asked.

  "Yes," Marie said. Same soft reverential voice.

  They led her inside.

  The morgue stank.

  She reeled back from the stench of human gasses and flesh.

  They walked her past a stainless-steel table upon which the charred remains of a burn-victim's body lay trapped in a pugilistic pose, as though still trying to fight off the flames that had consumed it.

  The four pieces of the dismembered corpse were on another stainless-steel table. They were casually assembled, not quite joining. Lying there on the table like an incomplete jigsaw puzzle.

  She looked down at the pieces.

  "There's no question they're the same body," Carl Blaney said.

  Lavender-eyed, white-smocked. Standing under the fluorescent lights, seeming neither to notice nor to be bothered by the intolerable stink in the place.

  "As for identification hellip;"

  He shrugged.

  "As you see, we don't have the hands or the head yet."

  He addressed this to the policemen in the room. Ignoring the woman for the time being. Afraid she might puke on his polished tile floor. Or in one of the stainless-steel basins containing internal organs. Three cops now. Hawes, Brown, and Genero. Two cases about to become one. Maybe.

  The lower half of the torso was naked now.

  She kept looking down at it.

  "Would you know his blood type?" Blaney asked.

  "Yes," Marie said. "B."

  "Well, that's what we've got here."

  Hawes knew about the appendectomy and meniscectomy scars because she'd mentioned them while describing her husband. He said nothing now. First rule of identification, you didn't prompt the witness. Let them come to it on their own. He waited.

  "Recognize anything?" Brown asked.

  She nodded.

  "What do you recognize, ma'am?"

  "The scars," she said.

  "Would you know what kind of scars those are?" Blaney asked.

  "The one on the belly is an appendectomy scar."

  Blaney nodded.

  "The one on the left knee is from when he had the cartilage removed."

  "That's what those scars are," Blaney said to the detectives.

  "Anything else, ma'am?" Brown asked.

  "His penis," she said.

  Neither Blaney nor any of the detectives blinked. This wasn't the Meese Commission standing around the pieces of a corpse, this was a group of professionals trying to make positive identification.

  "What about it?" Blaney asked.

  "There should be a small hellip; well, a beauty spot, I guess you'd call it," Marie said. "On the underside. On the foreskin."

  Blaney lifted the corpse's limp penis in one rubber-gloved hand. He turned it slightly.

  "This?" he asked, and indicated a birthmark the size of a pin-head on the foreskin, an inch or so below the glans.

  "Yes," Marie said softly.

  Blaney let the penis drop.

  The detectives were trying to figure out whether or not all of this added up to a positive ID. No face to look at. No hands to examine for fingerprints. Just the blood type, the scars on belly and leg, and the identifying birthmark mdash;what Marie had called a beauty spot mdash;on the penis.

  "I'll work up a dental chart sometime tomorrow," Blaney said.

  "Would you know who his dentist was?" Hawes asked Marie.

  "Dentist?" she said.

  "For comparison later," Hawes said. "When we get the chart."

  She looked at him blankly.

  "Comparison?" she said.

  "Our chart against the dentist's. If it's your husband, the charts'll match.'"

  "Oh," she said. "Oh. Well hellip; the last time he went to a dentist was in Florida. Miami Beach. He had this terrible toothache. He hasn't been to a dentist since we moved north."

  "When was that?" Brown asked.

  "Five years ago."

  "Then the most recent dental chart hellip;"

  "I don't even know if there is a chart," Marie said. "He just went to somebody the hotel recommended. We had a steady gig at the Regal Palms. I mean, we never had afamily dentist, if that's what you mean."

  "Yeah, well," Brown said.

  He was thinking Dead End on the teeth.

  He turned to Blaney.

  "So what do you think?" he said.

  "How tall was your husband?" Blaney asked Marie.

  "I've got all that here," Hawes said, and took out his notebook. He opened it to the page he'd written on earlier, and began reading aloud. "Five-eleven, one-seventy, hair black, eyes blue, appendectomy scar, meniscectomy scar."

  "If we put a head in place there," Blaney said, "we'd have a body some hundred and eighty centimeters long. That's just about five-eleven. And I'd estimate the weight, given the separate sections here, at about what you've got there, a hundred-seventy, a hundred-seventy-five, in there. The hair on the arms, chest, legs, and pubic area is black mdash;which doesn't necessarily mean thehead hair would match it exactly, but at least it rules out a blonde or a redhead, or anyone in the brown groupings. This hair is very definitelyblack. The eyes mdash;well, we haven't got a head, have we?"

  "So have we got a positive ID or what?" Brown asked.

  "I'd say we're looking at the remains of a healthy white male in his late twenties or early thirties," Blaney said. "How old was your husband, madam?"

  "Thirty-four," she said.

  "Yes," Blaney said, and nodded. "And, of course, identification of the birthmark on the penis would seem to me a conclusive factor."

  "Is this your husband, ma'am?" Brown asked.

  "That is my husband," Marie said, and turned her head into Hawes' shoulder and began weeping gently against his chest.

  The hotel was far from the precinct, downtown on a side street off Detavoner Avenue. He'd deliberately chosen a fleabag distant from the scene of the' crime.Scenes of the crime, to be more accurate. Five separate scenes if you counted the head and the hands. Five scenes in a little playlet entitled "The Magical and Somewhat Sudden Disappearance of Sebastian the Great."

  Good riddance, he thought.

  "Yes, sir?" the desk clerk said. "May I help you?"

  "I have a reservation," he said.

  "The name, please?"

  "Hardeen," he said. "Theo Hardeen."

  Wonderful magician, long dead. Houdini's brother. Appropriate name to be using. Hardeen had been famous for his escape from a galvanized iron can filled with water and secured by massive locks. Failure Means a Drowning Death! his posters had proclaimed. The risks of failure here were even greater.

  "How do you spell that, sir?" the clerk asked.

  "H-A-R-D-E-E-N."

  "Yes, sir, I have it right here," the clerk said, yanking a card. Hardeen, Theo. That's just for the one night, is that correct, Mr. Hardeen?"

  "Just the one night, yes."

  "How will you be paying, Mr. Hardeen?"

  "Cash," he said. "In advance."

  The clerk figured this was a shack-up. One-night stand, guy checking in alone, his bimbo mdash;or else a hooker from the Yellow Pages mdash;would be along later. Never explain, never complain, he thought. Thank you, Henry Ford. But charge him for a double.

  "That'll be eighty-five dollars, plus tax," he said, and watched as the wallet came out, and then a hundred-dollar bill, and the wallet disappeared again in a wink. Like he figured, a shack-up. Guy didn't want to show even a glimpse of his driver's license or credit cards, the Hardeen was undoubtedly a phony name. Theo Hardeen? The names some of them picked. Who cared? Take the money and run, he thought. Thank you, Woody Alien.

  He calculated the tax, made change for the C-note, and slid the money across the desk top. Wallet out again in a flash, money disappearing, wallet disappearing, too.

  "Did you have any luggage, sir?" he asked.

  "Just the one valise."

  "I'll have s
omeone show you to your room, sir," he said, and banged a bell on the desk. "Front!" he shouted. "Checkout time is twelve noon, sir. Have a nice night."

  "Thank you."

  A bellhop in a faded red uniform showed him to the third-floor room. Flicked on the lights in the bathroom. Taught him how to operate the window air-conditioning unit. Turned on the television set for him. Waited for the tip. Got his fifty cents, looked at it on the palm of his hand, shrugged, and left the room. What the hell had he expected for carrying that one bag? Rundown joint like this mdash;well, that's why he'd picked it. No questions asked. In, out, thank you very much.

  He looked at the television screen, and then at his watch.

  A quarter past nine.

  Forty-five minutes before the ten o'clock news came on.

  He wondered if they'd found the four pieces yet. Or either of the cars. He'd left the Citation in the parking lot of an A P four blocks north of the river, shortly after he'd deep-sixed the head and the hands.

  Something dumb was on television. Well,everything on television was dumb these days. He'd have to wait till ten o'clock to see what was happening, if anything.

  He took off his shoes, lay full length on the bed, his eyes closed, and relaxed for the first time today.

  By tomorrow night at this time, he'd be in San Francisco.

  CHAPTER 6

  Eileen came out of the ladies' room and walked toward the farthest end of the bar, where a television set was mounted on the wall. Quick heel-clicking hooker glide, lots of ass and ankle in it. She didn't even glance at Annie, sitting with her legs crossed at the cash-register end of the bar. Two or three men sitting at tables around the place turned to look at her. She gave them a quick once-over, no smile, no come-on, and took a stool next to a guy watching the television screen. She was still fuming. In the mirror behind the bar, she could still see the flaming imprint of his hand on her left cheek. The bartender ambled over.

  "Name it," he said.

  "Rum-Coke," she said. "Easy on the rum."

  "Comin'," he said, and reached for a bottle of cheap rum on the shelf behind him. He put ice in a glass, short-jiggered some rum over it, filled the glass with Coke from a hose. "Three bucks even," he said, "a bargain. You be runnin' a tab?"

  "I'll pay as I go," she said, and reached into her shoulder bag. The .44 was sitting under a silk scarf, butt up. She took out her wallet, paid for the drink. The bartender lingered.

  "I'm Larry," he said. "This's my place."

  Eileen nodded, and then took a sip of the drink.

  "You're new," Larry said.

  "So?" she said.

  "So I get a piece," he said.

  "You get shit," Eileen said.

  "I can't have hookers hangin' around in here 'cept I get a piece."

  "Talk to Torpedo," she said.

  "I don't know nobody named Torpedo."

  "You don't, huh? Well, ask around. I got a feeling you won't like talking to him."

  "Who's Torpedo? The black dude was slapping you around?"

  "Torpedo Holmes. Ask around. Meanwhile, fuck off."

  "You see the lady sittin' there at the end of the bar?" Larry said.

  Eileen looked over at Annie.

  "I see her."

  "She's new, too. We had a nice little talk minute she come in. I'm gettin' twenty percent of her action, just for lettin' her plant her ass on that stool."

  "She ain't got Torpedo," Eileen said. "You want to get off my fuckin' back, or you want me to make a phone call?"

  "Go make your phone call," Larry said.

  "Mister," Eileen said, "you're askin' for more shit than you're worth."

  She swung off the stool, long legs reaching for the floor, picked up her bag, shouldered it, and swiveled toward the phone booth. Watching her, Annie thought God, she's good.

  In the phone booth, Eileen dialed the hot-line number at the Seven-Two.

  Alvarez picked up.

  "Tell Robinson to get back here," she said. "The bartender's hassling me."

  "You got him," Alvarez said, and hung up.

  Detective/Second Grade Alvin Robinson worked out of the Seven-Three, near the park and the County Court House. The team at the Seven-Two was certain he wouldn't be made for a cop here in the Canal Zone, and were using him tonight only to establish Eileen's credentials as a bona fide hooker. He wouldn't be part of the backup team, though Eileen might have wished otherwise. She was still annoyed that he'd hit her that hard mdash;even though she knew he'd been going for realism mdash;but in the Caddy on the way over he'd sounded like a tough, dependable cop who knew his business.

  He walked into the bar not ten minutes after she placed her call. Eyes challenging, sweeping the room under the wide brim of his hat, everyone in the joint looking away. He did a cool pimp shuffle over to where Eileen was sitting, and put his hand on her shoulder.

  "That him?" he asked, and cocked his head to where Larry was filling a jar with tomato juice. Eileen merely nodded. "You," Robinson said, and pointed his finger. "Come here."

  Larry took his time ambling over.

  "You givin' my fox trouble?" Robinson said.

  "You got a phone in that pussy wagon of yours?" Larry said, toughing it out though he'd never seen a meaner-looking black man in his life. Everybody in the bar was looking at them now. The guys at the tables, the one who'd been watching television a minute earlier.

  "I ast you a question," Robinson said.

  "I read her the rules, pal," Larry said. "The same rules hellip;"

  "Don't palme , pal," Robinson said. "I ain't your fuckin' pal, and I don't live by no rules. If you never heard of Torpedo Holmes, then you got some quick learnin' to do. Nobody cuts my action, man. Nobody. Less he's lookin' for someother kinda cut I'd be mighty obliged to supply. You got that?"

  "I'm tellin' you hellip;"

  "No, you ain'ttellin' me nothin', mister. Youlist'nin' is what you doin'." He reached into his wallet, took a frayed piece of glossy paper from it, unfolded it, and smoothed it flat on the bar. "This's fromL.A. Magazine ," he said. "You recognize that picture there?"

  Larry looked down at a color photograph of a big black man wearing a red silk lounge robe and grinning cockily at the camera. The room in the background was opulent. The caption under the picture read: Thomas "Torpedo" Holmes at Home.

  >

  Robinson thought the resemblance was a good one. But even if it hadn't been, he firmly believed that most white men mdash;especially a redneck like this one mdash;thought all niggers looked alike. Thomas "Torpedo" Holmes was now doing ten years at Soledad. The article didn't mention the bust and conviction, because it had been written three years earlier, when Holmes was riding too high for his own good. You don't shit on cops in print, not even in L.A.