Deadly Weapon

by Wade Miller

  The matron took the girl’s hand. She stood up unsteadily. “I don’t want to be any trouble,” she said. “Maybe it would be better if I lie down a little. Will you come sit with me, Walter?”

  He patted her hand. “I’ll be there in a few minutes. Just take it easy for a while. I’ll be right in.”

  The two women went out, the matron quietly closing the door. Walter James and Clapp sat in the early morning stillness. Finally the big man stamped his feet and went to the small icebox. “Beer?” he asked.

  “For Christ sakes, no!” Walter James snapped.

  “I know it sounds pretty horrible,” Clapp sighed. He pulled out a can and plunged the opener into it. “But this has been the God damnedest day I’ve ever had! And I’ve had some pretty bad ones.” He took a long gulp. “I got to have something.”

  Walter James stared at the black and silver cigarette case. “She’ll never be able to forget that she gave me this the night her father got killed.”

  Clapp frowned at him through the match flame. “Why do you say ‘got killed’?”

  The match clicked in the bottom of the waste basket. “You know what you’re looking for, Clapp. Did you find it?”

  “No. Stein tells me the body was pretty well beat up. From the rocks probably. There’s nothing to show that Gilbert was pushed over the cliff. It wouldn’t take more than a gentle shove — I suppose it’s happened before.”

  “When did you find him?”

  “About ten o’clock. Some couple that went down to the bottom of the path to fool around thought they saw something and reported it.”

  “Nobody saw him fall then?”

  “Naturally not. Oh, Stein says there is one bruise across his throat that might have been caused before death. If somebody had hit him in the throat, he couldn’t have yelled on the way down.” He shrugged wearily. “Then again the noise of the ocean could cover up a scream. Or he may have jumped on purpose. It’s whatever you want to make it.” After another swallow of beer, he said, “What do you want to make it?”

  Walter James sucked on the cigarette. “Murder, I guess. I talked to Gilbert this morning — a little. He was despondent. But he was willing to talk the situation over with me as long as it wasn’t in his office. That was about eleven-thirty. I didn’t see him again.”

  “Where was he supposed to meet you?”

  “That’s the crazy part. Sunset House at three o’clock. I got there at three but he wasn’t around. I waited till four and went back to his house. He wasn’t there, so I took Kevin out to dinner. The Sunset House had looked like a nice place so I took her there. God, what a thing to do!”

  “That’s the way things happen, James,” Clapp said. “Coincidence in there screwing up the works. You take your girl out to dinner and a couple of hundred feet below her father’s washing around in the surf with a broken neck. But your story checks.”

  Walter James sat erect. “What do you mean — checks?”

  “Oh, don’t go off half-cocked at this time of morning. Maslar put a man on Gilbert today just to be on the safe side. Gilbert went out to the Sunset House at two o’clock. The tail lost him there and sat around waiting for him to show again. At three o’clock he saw you come in and start looking around for the old man. That’s all.”

  “That’s all? What was Gilbert doing at Sunset House an hour before he was supposed to meet me there?”

  Clapp spread his hands. “How in the hell am I to know? The man’s dead now.”

  “Sure,” said the slender detective bitterly. “He was pushed over the cliff between two and three o’clock. He was keeping an appointment with somebody besides me. You know the question.”

  “Who?”

  “Did Maslar’s bright boy see anybody out there who answered to Dr. Boone’s description?”

  “A big, healthy man?” asked Clapp sarcastically. “They were there in droves, including a state senator. That isn’t much to go on. I’m big and used to be healthy myself.”

  “It’s all we’ve got to go on,” snapped Walter James. “Unless you can make the Mexicans wring something more out of Luz. I suppose he got hauled in today? Or did Maslar’s men lose him, too?”

  “Calm down, son. Maslar’s doing a good job. The Mexicans and a couple of F.B.I. men surrounded the Devil’s Bar this afternoon and closed in like clockwork. But the human element kicked the whole thing in the seat of the pants. When Esteban Luz saw he was trapped, he blew his brains out. Nice neat suicide with witnesses.”

  The smaller man strode over to the window. “Damn!” he finally said.

  “Yeah,” agreed Clapp. “I’ve never seen a case before where so many leads end up with so many corpses. This case has a curse on it. Relax.”

  Walter James sat down on the window sill and laughed silently, helplessly. “And just think — Dr. Boone’s home getting a good night’s sleep. He hasn’t ended up as a corpse.”

  “Cheer up, James. Neither have we.”

  “It’s getting closer. Tomorrow you can check up on who left the light on in my apartment. And who started shooting from across the alley about seven o’clock when I was about to walk in.”

  Clapp slammed his hand flat on the desk blotter. “Not again!”

  Walter James gave him a sardonic grin. “From behind a fence in the used car lot in back of the Serra Apartments. The shot came through the rear window and was supposed to nail me when I opened my door and stood in the light. Luckily, I caught on. I never leave my lights burning.”

  Clapp said, “I’ll send Jim out first thing in the morning.”

  “Just don’t wake me up. The landlady’s pretty nosy. There’s an off chance she may have seen something. You can at least dig the slug out of the woodwork if your prowl men haven’t done it already. I’m ready to guarantee that it’s a .25 caliber from the other gun of the set I gave to Hal.”

  The big man pulled a report from his desk drawer and studied it. “James, maybe you shouldn’t have been in such a hurry to finish off John Darmer and young Esteban Luz.”

  Walter James’s face was impassive. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Clapp hunched his shoulders impatiently. “I’m not after you. You could probably prove self-defense, anyway. But you’re not fooling me any. The job had your name written all over it.”

  “Maybe.”

  “I wish you’d thought twice about it. They might have been able to tell us something.”

  “They might have been able.”

  “At least with Big Steve gone, we would have had something.”

  Walter James smiled. “I hate to get shot to little bits just so you’d have somebody to grill, Clapp.”

  Clapp replaced the paper and slammed the drawer. “It’s written off as an accident. Let’s hope nobody gets too nosy. It would have been easier on me if you had at least reported it.”

  “Maybe I didn’t feel like it.”

  “Hell,” said Clapp and stood up. “There’s a lot of things a guy doesn’t feel like doing. I didn’t feel like suspending Felix from the force this morning and getting together an indictment.”

  “Felix? What’s the story?”

  Walter James began to notice how tired the big man really was. The clear-cut planes of his face seemed blurred and his head sagged on his shoulders.

  “The usual one,” said Clapp slowly. “Good cop goes bad for a lousy fifty dollars a month extra. I put a check on the switchboard for all Tijuana calls and we caught Felix trying to tip off Luz about the raid.” Infuriated, he spat out, “He didn’t even have sense enough to use an outside phone!”

  Walter James hit Clapp’s arm gently with the back of his hand. “I’m sorry, Clapp. It’s nothing you could help.”

  “No,” the big man sighed. “I guess if there’s a twist in a man, it grows to the surface eventually. But it still never makes sense. Crime actually doesn’t pay — I mean, in dollars and cents. It’s low profit and high risk. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Walter James snapped
his fingers. “On this Gilbert killing, you might nose into Dr. Boniface’s movements this afternoon.”

  Clapp raised his heavy eyebrows. “Something stirring?”

  “I’m pretty sure he was hanging around Sunset House. And I’m not forgetting that he’s a big, healthy man, either.”

  Clapp made a note on his desk pad. “Okay.”

  Walter James roused himself. “I think I’ll see if Kevin’s in any shape to go home.”

  “James.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll do my darnedest to keep her father’s connection with this marijuana ring undercover. She doesn’t know anything obviously, and I can probably keep the investigation away from her. And definitely out of the papers.”

  “Thanks, Clapp.”

  The big man smiled and closed his eyes for a second. “Just take good care of the girl. I like her.”

  “I like Kevin, too. More than you would ever believe,” said Walter James soberly. As soon as this Dr. Boone thing is finished, I’m going to marry her and take her back to Atlanta. I promise I’ll take good care of her.”

  22. Thursday, September 28, 4:10 P.M.

  KEVIN FOUND the note late that afternoon.

  They had slept most of the day and had arisen about three o’clock. The girl wanted some fresh clothes, so Walter James drove her out to the empty house in East San Diego. There she hastily collected a few things and they hurried silently back to the Serra Apartments.

  Walter James keyed the door and swung it open for Kevin to enter. The note had been pushed under the door in their absence and was about a foot inside, touching the edge of the rug. She stepped on it before she noticed it and picked it up.

  The envelope was cheap and plain, the two dozen for ten cents variety. Across it was written “Walter James” in bright blue ink; the writing was neatly small, slightly backhanded.

  He ripped it open. Together, they were scanning the simple message when Clapp knocked lightly at the open door.

  “Hello, folks. Can I come in?”

  They jumped and Walter James said, “Come on in and sit down, Clapp.”

  The big man shut the door and took off his hat. “Didn’t mean to frighten you. Just thought I’d drop around and see how you were making out. Things are quiet downtown.”

  “We’re glad to see you,” Kevin said. “Please sit down.”

  Clapp lowered himself into the davenport. After Walter James was settled in the armchair, the girl coiled at his feet, resting one arm across his knees. He let the note lie loosely in his lap.

  “Not a bad place you found here,” said Clapp. “You were lucky.”

  “It’s nice enough,” Walter James admitted.

  The girl spoke suddenly, evenly. “Did you come to tell us you found my father had been murdered?”

  The men turned startled eyes upon her, then glanced at each other.

  “Don’t keep anything from me,” she pleaded. “I’m old enough. I can’t shock any more. You won’t hurt me by telling me anything.”

  Clapp began, “What makes you think — ”

  “It’s sort of obvious. You know this Shasta Lynn had some connection with the men you’re after. You know my father had some connection with Shasta Lynn. And right in the middle of your investigation, he dies. It’s a perfect circle — even I can see that.”

  “It isn’t a perfect circle,” murmured Walter James.

  “Maybe not. But something isn’t right somewhere. Dad was too cautious to ever fall off a cliff. And he would never have committed suicide.” She puzzled a moment. “He was sort of despondent these last couple of days, but I think that was because I was so obviously crazy about Walter. That’s the way fathers are, I guess. But he would never have committed suicide any more than he would’ve burnt up a thousand-dollar bill. Everything was an investment to him so he could take care of himself and me — he wouldn’t suddenly just throw everything away.”

  “Well,” said Clapp. He pushed the inside of his lip with his tongue. “I’m naturally a little suspicious of everything. But, honestly, Miss Gilbert, there isn’t anything off-color yet. It is an odd time for your father to die and we’ll investigate as a matter of course. As yet we don’t know anything at all.”

  Kevin gazed at him levelly.

  “If we happen to run onto anything, I won’t keep it from you. I promise you that much.”

  “Thank you,” she replied. “I’ll appreciate it.”

  “No,” said the big man, shifting around on the cushions, “what I really came to see you about was the attack last night.”

  “I’ve told you all we know,” said Walter James.

  “Oh, I know that,” smiled Clapp. “But amazingly enough, us cops managed to find out a little more. Jim talked to your landlady this morning.”

  “She’s a born source.”

  “That’s what Jim found out. There was somebody in this building yesterday afternoon who she’d never seen here before. Jim checked all the apartments and none of them had ever heard of — this person.”

  “Was it our big, healthy man?”

  “Not quite. It was a large old woman, white-haired and apparently in mourning. She wore a black satin dress way out of date like some old women do, and a small black veil over her face. Oh, yes, and she wore old-fashioned flat-heeled shoes and was sort of buxom.”

  Kevin said seriously, “Is it anyone you know, Walter?” and Clapp grinned.

  Walter James frowned, letting his mouth hang open as if he were about to say something.

  The big man went on. “The slug we dug out of your door was from a .25 just like you thought it’d be. Which ties in with the first attack last Saturday night. Also, it being a woman ties in with the face powder on the first gun. Now — who is this old babe? She doesn’t sound like a passion murderess.”

  “A woman,” Walter James muttered.

  “Jim checked pretty carefully. Your landlady has good eyes and she swears up and down it was a woman. Of course, this veil obscured her face, but she claims she was built like a woman.”

  “The flat shoes,” said Kevin. “Couldn’t it have been a man dressed up in woman’s clothes?”

  Clapp pushed his heavy lips together. “We only know what we’re told. Take it or leave it.”

  Walter James shook his head. “This old lady doesn’t quite fit my conception of Dr. Boone — except that they’re both apparently large people.” He lit two cigarettes and passed one down to Kevin. “But think of Shasta Lynn. She’s large. Her blonde hair could be fixed up to pass for white. Take a look at this.”

  He plucked the note from his lap and tossed it over to Clapp. The big man held it gingerly by the edges and read it.

  “Today’s date. ‘I would like to talk to you immediately after the last show tonight.’ Signed Shasta Lynn. Hey!”

  Walter James smiled. “That’s the way I feel. An opening maybe. Maybe we’ve got the thin edge of the wedge in at last.”

  “Yeah. This Lynn wench is the only off-balance woman in the picture so far — if, as Miss Gilbert says, this pistol-packing grandmother is a woman. Or unless your disappearing Ethel Lantz has gone berserk and come cross-country to put the finger on you. But this Shasta Lynn — ” He shook his head. “Something about her has never jibed and I’m not sure just what.”

  “We agree.”

  Kevin spoke up. “I wonder what she has to say?”

  Walter James squeezed her arm. “We’ll find out tonight. Want to meet us in front of the Grand Theater about nine or nine-thirty, Clapp?”

  “Pleasure. I love the theater.”

  Walter James laughed, exhilarated. “We can all go in together and see enough of the show so you’ll have some new material for your conferences. I’ll go back to Shasta’s dressing room and wait for her to come off after her number. If I need any official pressure, I’ll give you a call.”

  The big man grinned back. “Greissinger will throw a fit when he sees me walk in.”

  “My relatives would throw a fit,
too, if they saw me going to a show soon after Dad’s death,” Kevin said softly. “But I just have to — ”

  Walter James took the note and slapped it against Kevin’s arm. “Invitation to a dance! God, I hope it’s an opening at last!”

  “It’s something,” said Clapp. “Shasta Lynn can’t be Dr. Boone, but it’s something.”

  “I wonder who Dr. Boone is?” mused the girl.

  “A killer,” said Walter James.

  “And a weed runner,” added Clapp.

  “He seems almost superhuman,” Kevin confessed. “Do you think you’ll ever catch him?”

  “Miss Gilbert,” said Clapp soberly, “nobody can foresee everything — that’s why it’s so hard to commit a perfect crime. Just when you think you’ve taken care of everything, something or somebody pops up to block the deal.”

  “The unknown factor,” Walter James said softly.

  “Yeah, that’s it.”

  “Course, I don’t know anything about this,” said Kevin. “All I’ve done is read detective stories. But it seems to me you were very lucky to connect all these murders with each other. I mean — all these people died in so many different ways.”

  “The girl’s got a point,” said Clapp. “Run an itemized list. Hal Lantz was gunned out because he was getting too close to Dr. Boone. His wife went into hiding or was kidnapped — or worse — presumably because of the same reason. In Denver Melvin Emig was strangled and burned because he was part of Boone’s organization. Then we get to this town. The Filipino, Fernando Solez, is knifed for the same reason as Emig.” He hesitated. “Plus the possibility that Mr. Gilbert was pushed over a cliff for some reason we don’t see.”

  “Add three incidental deaths,” the slight man said quickly. “Esteban Luz was part of Dr. Boone’s outfit. When the police close in, he blows his brains out. Then there’s little Steve and Darmer — ”

  “Disposed of by you.” Clapp sighed. “That’s a lot of blood on somebody’s hands. I hope to God we’re not way off the track somehow.”

  Kevin chewed at her knuckle sadly. “I never realized before there were so many ways to die. So many ways to kill people. Why are there so many deadly weapons?”